Arguing that it would promote nuclear proliferation and create an unstable global environment, local professors and students rejected the Pentagon’s proposal to allowpreemptive nuclear strikes against non-nuclear countries.
The proposed change in U.S. nuclear weapons policy has become a heated controversy between the Bush administration and physicists worldwide in the form of a petition, which claims that the Pentagon’s plan blurs “the sharp distinction that exists between nuclear and non-nuclear weapons and heightens the probability of future use of nuclear weapons by others.
“Anything that makes nuclear weapons easier rather than harder to use is a bad thing,” said Kenneth Lane, a professor of physics at Boston University. “They should be used only as a last resort — for national survival.”
More than 1,000 physicists have signed the petition, which encourages all physicists to take responsibility for the nuclear weapons that these scientists brought into existence more than 60 years ago.
Lane, who signed the petition, said that if nuclear weapons were used worldwide on a large scale, absolutely no one would survive.
“Nuclear weapons are not ordinary weapons, they are ultimate weapons,” Lane said. “The proposal is manifest nonsense. Why would we use nuclear weapons if we got into a scrap with some two-bit country? We’re not using nuclear weapons now.”
During the Cold War, Lane said, if the Soviets had moved west into Germany, the U.S. may have needed to use nuclear weapons to adequately defend itself. He addedtthat this new plan goes beyond those extreme situations and promotes the spread of nuclear weapons, both nationally and internationally.
“We don’t want to give potential war adversaries the notion that there is nothing we won’t do in order to prevail in a war,” he said.
Although he stood behind his decision to sign the petition, Lane said he is not sure if the petition will actually affect nuclear policy. He cited the failed opposition to missile defense as an example of academia’s influence on national procedure.
“The administration has been pushing to develop missile defense, and it has been shown by national scientific organizations that all of the schemes that they have for these missile defense systems cannot work,” he said. “They are so easy to defeat that they’re pointless. Still, the government’s missile defense program continues, with a site under construction in Alaska.”
Current nuclear weapon policy, the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, promotes non-proliferation, the end to the acquisition of nuclear weapons by additional nations, disarmament and the right to peacefully use nuclear technology.
The petition states “U.S. policy conveys a clear message to the 182 nations without nuclear weapons that the United States is moving strongly away from disarmament and is in fact prepared to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear adversaries.”
Jerome Friedman, a Nobel Laureate and a professor of physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said this could give non-nuclear weapon countries a reason to violate the NPT, increasing the amount of nuclear weapons and the probability of nuclear warfare.
“I believe very strongly in not causing instability in the world,” he said. “Nuclear weapons are a very destabilizing element in international relations, and they create a very dangerous global situation.”
Friedman said he signed the petition because he wanted his position to be considered, even though he was unsure of what impact the petition would have on the Pentagon’s actions.
“I think the nations with nuclear weapons need to be careful to not give countries reasons to get nuclear weapons,” Friedman said.
Boston University students from both sides of the fence agreed on the severity of nuclear weapons and thought they should only be used as a last resort during military conflict.
“The more the U.S. throws its muscle around, the less we’re going to get accomplished,” said College of Arts and Sciences junior Nicholas Duston. “Nuclear deterrence is a thing of the past.”
A Democrat and international relations major, Duston said he is against all nuclear attacks, especially against non-nuclear adversaries.
“I think it gives the Department of Defense more license to do things we never want to have happen,” he said. “It’s not like a fundamentalist is going to put down his dynamite if we threaten to nuke his country. The fact is, terrorists don’t really care.”
Duston said if this plan is implemented, he thinks it will further alienate both America’s allies and enemies.
“It’s going to further alienate people in countries who we’re threatening, because they’ll see it as further American bullying,” he said.
Brian Hoerner, a Republican and a CAS sophomore, said he thought using nuclear weapons as a threat was a legitimate tactical approach against non-nuclear countries but added that the weapons should only be deployed in extreme situations.
“Nuclear weapons should only be used as a last and final resort,” Hoerner said. “If you used nukes, you would kill a lot of innocent people.”
Hoerner said he is against the Pentagon’s plan because it would encourage global usage of nuclear weapons.
“It would be all right if the proposal was used to put pressure on other governments, but nuclear weapons aren’t as accurate as less lethal weapons when it comes to more strategic targets,” he said. “Using nuclear weapons would be an extreme military decision.”
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