Bush to Go Nuclear in Iraq?
Since the United States decimated Hiroshima and Nagasaki 50 years ago, the world has maintained a commitment to preventing the use of nuclear weapons. Now the Bush administration may weaken that commitment by considering the use of nuclear weapons in its illegal war against Iraq.
A January Los Angeles Times article indicated that the administration was actively considering the use of tactical nuclear weapons in Iraq. The article reported that military planners at the U.S. Strategic Command in Omaha, NE, and at the Pentagon, were creating lists of possible Iraqi nuclear targets. Pentagon planners were also reported to be considering options for using nuclear weapons, including the so-called "bunker-buster" nuclear weapon, which is designed to destroy deeply buried targets.
In March of 2002, the Bush administration launched a set of nuclear policies that lowers the threshold for using nuclear weapons. These policies, spelled out in the administration's Nuclear Posture Review, say that the US could use nuclear weapons against another country even if it does not use weapons of mass destruction against us, or has no nuclear weapons in the first place. The Posture Review specifically identifies Iraq, along with six other nations, as a target for a nuclear first strike. It also suggested that we might use nuclear weapons in a Middle East conflict or even "in the event of surprising military developments."
Representative Rush Holt (D-NJ) is currently gathering co-signers on a letter to the President expressing concern and opposition to any policy that lowers the threshold for the use of nuclear weapons. Representative Holt's letter points out that the threat of using nuclear weapons against Iraq "deepens the danger of nuclear proliferation by effectively telling non-nuclear states that nuclear weapons are necessary to deter a potential US attack."
The administration's aggressive nuclear policies increase the threat that nuclear weapons will be used -not only by the US, but by other countries as well -by signaling that nuclear weapons are now acceptable weapons of war. Rep. Holt asks, "Is this the lesson we want to send to North Korea, India, Pakistan or other nuclear powers?"
Take Action
Ask your Representative to co-sign Mr. Holt's letter urging the president not to lower the threshold on the use of nuclear weapons. Call your Congressperson at the Congressional switchboard at (800) 839-5276.Tell your member of Congress: Oppose the war on Iraq and demand that the president renounce the use of nuclear weapons in general, and specifically in the current conflict. The use of nuclear weapons would make this grave and terrible situation an utter disaster. Please sign on to Representative Holt's letter to the president.
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Read the text of Rep. Holt's letter
