The new Obama nuclear policy

The Obama nuclear policy has been criticized after President Obama conducted a Nuclear Posture Review and updated the nation's policy on nuclear weapons.

All round, the policy changes little, though the different parts of it have angered some of the more hawkish forms among Congressional Republicans. If the government were to put any fast cash into any more nuclear supplies, it would be for reactors, not for any more nukes.

Stark raving MAD

According to the article in TIME, the updated Obama nuclear weapons policy changes nothing regarding the default status between Russia and the U.S. Since the dawn of the Cold War, what kept a nuclear exchange from taking place between the two largest nuclear powers was something called “Mutually Assured Destruction,” wherein the nuclear deterrence held by either country would be deployed in the event of the other attacking with theirs.

This essentially means that neither side will benefit from a nuclear attack because both sides would be damages beyond the extent of recovery from pay day loans within the event a nuclear exchange happened

Non-hostility, with conditions

Part of the new policy for nuclear weapons is that President Obama pledged never to initiate a nuclear attack except against any state that won't participate in the Non-nuclear Proliferation Treaty. He also says that there will be no use of nuclear weapons against any states that aren't known to have nuclear weapons.

It is equally a carrot – for any states not to develop them – and a stick for – any states that can be considering it. It insinuates we might nuke rogue states that are developing nuclear weapons. More or less, with a broad room for exceptions, we won't be nuclear aggressors.

Nukes nixed new

Obama has also made it clear there shall be no new nuclear weapons built. Many of the hawkish Senate Republicans have balked at the idea, and our arsenal is aging in the nuclear area. We seem ok right now considering the weapons grade isotope of Plutonium, Pu-239 has a half life of 24,000 years (the amount of time an element will stay in its original form before decaying. Granted, Uranium 233 and Uranium 235 have half lives of 160,000 years and 703,800,000 years. However, just what constitutes “new” isn’t defined.

Terrorists are going to pay, and me bomb es su bomb

The Obama nuclear update on our policy also includes no change to existing doctrine that states harboring or enabling terrorists will not be spared the nuclear rod within the event of an attack. It also states that if an additional country presently holding any of these weapons really needs to use them (Belgium, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands) may only do so with our permission.

And Iran so far away

From an article from Reuters (See: reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6362IJ20100407), Iranian President Ahmadinejad is apparently none too pleased. He said that Obama is “inexperienced and an amateur politician.” He further added that “American politicians are like cowboys. Whenever they have legal shortcomings their hands go to their guns.” The revised Obama nuclear policy, in reality, changes little.