The NPR: Nuclear Policy Change You Can Believe In

We are happy to serve you a daily summary of the day's top nuclear policy stories each morning, with excerpts from the stories in bullet form.

Stories we're following today:

Delayed U.S. Nuclear Review Likely to Call for Cuts - NPR [link]

• Each new administration goes through the Nuclear Posture Review, which is intended to determine what nuclear weapons are for, how many of them the U.S. should maintain, and a host of highly complex related issues.
• Some administration officials want a simple and straightforward answer: Nuclear weapons are solely for the purpose of deterring a nuclear attack against the U.S. and its allies.
• Jim Walsh of MIT says, "What you're going to see from this posture review is, there'll be change.  It's not going to be as much as some people wanted. It's going to be criticized by others as having gone too far.  But it definitely points the U.S. in a new direction, that is de-emphasizing nuclear weapons in a way that we haven't seen before."
• To listen to the entire segment, click below:

US Military Chief Eyes START Successor Soon - Reuters [link]

• The top U.S. military officer said on Wednesday he hoped for an agreement in "the next few weeks" on a nuclear arms reduction treaty with Russia.
• "I'm heavily involved right now ... in the negotiations for the follow-on START treaty," Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, told an audience at Kansas State University.
• A new pact could ease strained ties between Washington and Moscow and emphasize their commitment to nuclear disarmament at a time when major powers are pressing Iran and North Korea to renounce their nuclear ambitions.

How Important is Obama's Nuclear Posture Review? - Slate [link]

• This posture review will almost certainly not result in anything new, even if it alleges otherwise. Even if President Barack Obama does pursue some new nuclear policies, this document will have had little to do with it.
• The posture review would have one role to play in the politics of arms control. Documents of this sort tend to reflect a consensus. If it does call for deeper cuts, that would mean the Joint Chiefs of Staff had endorsed it—and, therefore, that they'd testify on the [START] treaty's behalf in Senate hearings.
• The true value of this Nuclear Posture Review depends, in part, on how President Obama views—and presents—its purpose.
• If he sees it as a way to build institutional support for drastic arms cuts, it could be very valuable indeed.  If he sees it as a first step toward his grander goal of wiping nuclear weapons off the face of the earth, he's going to be sorely disappointed.

NKorea Vows to Bolster Nuclear Deterrent - The Associated Press [link]

• North Korea vowed Tuesday to strengthen its nuclear deterrent and its means of delivery - an apparent reference to missiles - days after threatening rival South Korea and U.S. forces with attack if they conduct military exercises as planned next week.
• The North's official Korean Central News Agency said Tuesday there will be no progress in denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula unless the U.S. removes its nuclear threat against the North.
• The U.S. denies posing such a military threat to the North, although it retains about 28,500 troops in South Korea.

Eliminate NATO's Nuclear Relics - Daryl Kimball for the Arms Control Association [link]

• In the 21st century, battlefield nuclear bombs serve no meaningful military role for the defense of Europe or Russia.
• The United States and NATO should be prepared to negotiate away their relatively small number of obsolete tactical bombs in Europe to induce Russia to consolidate and reduce its larger tactical nuclear stockpile.
• NATO foreign ministers will meet in Estonia this April, just days ahead of the pivotal Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty Review Conference. They should seize the opportunity to reduce the salience of nuclear weapons by declaring that NATO nuclear sharing no longer is necessary for alliance defense.