WHITE HOUSE IS REVISING NUCLEAR STRIKE
PLAN TO INCLUDE PREEMPTIVE STRIKE
SEPT 11 2005
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
READ THE LATEST NEW
CONCERNING IRAN AND DICK CHENEY'S PLAN
TO ATTACK IRAN,
SOON AFTER A
TERRORIST ATTACK ON AMERICA , WITH
NUCLEAR WEAPONS .
GOD PUTS HOOKS IN THEIR
JAWS AND FORCERS THEM TO ATTACK FIRST AND IT'S ALL READY TO HAPPEN.
The draft document also envisions the use of atomic weapons for "attacks
on adversary installations including WMD, deep, hardened bunkers containing
chemical or biological weapons."
The Pentagon has drafted a revised doctrine for the use of nuclear weapons
that envisions commanders requesting presidential approval to use them to
preempt an attack by a nation or a terrorist group using weapons of mass
destruction. The draft also includes the option of using nuclear arms to
destroy known enemy stockpiles of nuclear, biological or chemical weapons.
The document, written by the Pentagon's Joint Chiefs staff but not yet
finally approved by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, would update rules
and procedures governing use of nuclear weapons to reflect a preemption
strategy first announced by the Bush White House in December 2002. The
strategy was outlined in more detail at the time in classified national
security directives.
At a White House briefing that year, a spokesman said the United States
would "respond with overwhelming force" to the use of weapons of mass
destruction against the United States, its forces or allies, and said "all
options" would be available to the president.
The draft, dated March 15, would provide authoritative guidance for
commanders to request presidential approval for using nuclear weapons, and
represents the Pentagon's first attempt to revise procedures to reflect the
Bush preemption doctrine. A previous version, completed in 1995 during the
Clinton administration, contains no mention of using nuclear weapons
preemptively or specifically against threats from weapons of mass destruction.
Titled "Doctrine for Joint Nuclear Operations" and written under the
direction of Air Force Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, the draft document is unclassified and available on a Pentagon Web
site. It is expected to be signed within a few weeks by Air Force Lt. Gen.
Norton A. Schwartz, director of the Joint Staff, according to Navy Cmdr. Dawn
Cutler, a public affairs officer in Myers's office. Meanwhile, the draft is
going through final coordination with the military services, the combatant
commanders, Pentagon legal authorities and Rumsfeld's office, Cutler said in a
written statement.
A "summary of changes" included in the draft identifies differences from
the 1995 doctrine, and says the new document "revises the discussion of
nuclear weapons use across the range of military operations."
The first example for potential nuclear weapon use listed in the draft
is against an enemy that is using "or intending to use WMD" against U.S. or
allied, multinational military forces or civilian populations.
Another scenario for a possible nuclear preemptive strike is in case of
an "imminent attack from adversary biological weapons that only effects from
nuclear weapons can safely destroy."
That and other provisions in the document appear to refer to nuclear
initiatives proposed by the administration that Congress has thus far declined
to fully support.
Last year, for example, Congress refused to fund research toward
development of nuclear weapons that could destroy biological or chemical
weapons materials without dispersing them into the atmosphere.
The draft document also envisions the use of atomic weapons for "attacks
on adversary installations including WMD, deep, hardened bunkers containing
chemical or biological weapons."
But Congress last year halted funding of a study to determine the
viability of the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator warhead (RNEP) commonly
called the bunker buster that the Pentagon has said is needed to attack
hardened, deeply buried weapons sites.
