"We cannot advocate for nuclear nonproliferation around the globe, while pursuing more usable nuclear weapons options here at home." - Rep. David L. Hobson, R-Ohio
As the United States urges other countries such as Iran and North Korea to stop their nuclear weapons programs, the U.S. Senate agreed last Friday to revive a nuclear bunker-buster study.
The Air Force-led study, officially called Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator, is designed to measure the feasibility of modifying an existing nuclear warhead to burrow underground before exploding. The program was stalled last year when the Congress declined to fund the study.
The Pentagon hopes that such weapons will improve U.S. capabilities to destroy hardened and deeply buried targets. President Bush supports the study.
The Senate voted 53-43 to include $4 million for the research. The U.S. House refused to provide the money last month, leaving a final decision to be worked between the two chambers.
"One of the most pressing threats posed by our potential adversaries in the international arena today is the proliferation of hard and deeply buried facilities," according to a 2002 written statement by John T. Byrd, director of Plans and Policy of the U.S. Strategic Command. "Our current arsenal, developed in the Cold War, was not designed to address this growing worldwide threat."
However, the Union of Concerned Scientists, a nonprofit environmental organization, argues that the current precision-guided conventional weapons are a more effective alternative to RNEP. Such weapons can be used to cut off a bunker's communications, power and air support.
The Union of Concerned Scientists further argues that a nuclear bunker buster would cause tremendous radioactive fallout because even the strongest casing will crush itself by the time it penetrates 10-to-30 feet into rock or concrete.
For comparison, even a one kiloton nuclear warhead, which is one-tenth as powerful as the Hiroshima bomb, must be buried at least 200-to-300 feet to contain radioactive fallout, its Web site said.
"A bunker buster cannot penetrate into the Earth deeply enough to avoid massive casualties and the spewing of millions of cubic feet of radioactive materials into the atmosphere," said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., a vocal opponent to the study.
The U.S. Congress assigned a panel of the National Academy of Sciences to report the feasibility of a nuclear bunker buster. It reached a similar conclusion last April that such a bomb would likely cause the same casualties as a surface burst if the weapons are of the same size, according to a recent article by The Associated Press.
Byrd argued in his statement that RNEP's purpose is to "tailor weapons to strenthen deterrence," which in turn makes them less likely to be used. While President Bush recognizes that Cold-War tactics like deterrence do not work against terrorists (this is where preemptive strike comes in), he pretends to be blinded to this.
"[RNEP] is not to develop. It's not to deploy. It's not to use. It's to study ... You make a study for a very simple reason: to learn whether you do believe that that is a need," said Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld during a press conference in May.
As a college student, I can grasp what he is saying.
I decided to major in government to learn whether I believe that there is a need. In the future, when I graduate with a government degree, I could say a new set of options opened up in front of me.
However, these options are out of reach unless I use my degree to achieve them.
Similarly, any benefit we can possibly see from the study will have to come from the fact that we proceed with using the weapons, whether for deterrence purposes or deploying it in battlefields.
Even if government officials are serious in claiming that this is only a study, the government is planning to spend millions of tax dollars and risk an international uproar to study something they have no intention of using.
That's like me saying, "I'll go to college for four years on borrowed money for the joy of learning."
"The message hasn't changed. We continue working with Great Britain, France and Germany to send a focused, concerted, unified message that says the development of a nuclear weapon is unacceptable," President Bush said recently.
We know that President Bush is not exactly a master of English language, but reviving a nuclear bunker buster study is not sending a "focused, concerted, unified message."
The United States is applying double standards and consequently sending wrong messages to other countries including some that are waiting to jump on any opportunity to have a nuclear weapon.
If we are not practicing what we are preaching, other nations will not heed what we say.
What will we say to North Korea and Iran when they claim to be conducting a "study" to see if they believe that there is a need for nuclear weapons?
Borrowing the words of Patrick Tyler, a New York Times journalist, after the invasion of Iraq in 2003, "there may still be two superpowers on the planet: the United States and world public opinion."
Son is a government senior.
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