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The Honorable George W. Bush Dear Mr. President: We are writing to convey our grave concern about public revelations that suggest your Administration considers nuclear weapons to be an extension of the continuum of conventional options open for possible use by the United States, and that your Administration may use nuclear weapons in the current military conflict in Iraq. We note with grave concern the Los Angeles Times report of Jan. 25 and 26 that your Administration is actively considering the use of U.S. nuclear weapons in the event that Iraq uses chemical or biological weapons, or to preemptively strike sites believed to store or manufacture chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons. Furthermore, according to a Jan. 31 Washington Times article, you have approved a national security directive that specifically allows for the use of nuclear weapons in response to biological or chemical attacks, changing a decades-old U.S. policy of deliberate ambiguity. According to the article, National Security Presidential Directive 17 states, "The United States will continue to make clear that it reserves the right to respond with overwhelming force-including potentially nuclear weapons -- to the use of [weapons of mass destruction] against the United States, our forces abroad, and friends and allies." Such language suggests that your Administration is prepared to use nuclear weapons first to respond to non-nuclear WMD threats, thereby increasing reliance on nuclear weapons. This shift in U.S. nuclear policy threatens the very foundation of nuclear arms control, as shaped by the 1970 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), which has served to slow nuclear proliferation for over 30 years. In the context of U.S. efforts to strengthen the NPT, President Carter issued a "negative security assurance" in 1978 (which was reiterated in 1995) to the effect that the United States would not use its nuclear force against countries without nuclear weapons unless the non-nuclear weapon state was allied with a nation possessing nuclear weapons. On February 22, 2002, the U.S. State Department spokesman, Richard Boucher, reaffirmed this policy: "The United States reaffirms that it will not use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear-weapon state parties to the Treaty of the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons, except in the case of an invasion or any other attack on the United States, its territories, its armed forces or other troops, its allies or on a state toward which it has a security commitment carried out, or sustained by such a non-nuclear-weapon state in association or alliance with a nuclear-weapon state." Although the Government of Iraq has sought in the past-and may continue to seek-nuclear weapons, that government is a state party to the NPT and is not believed to currently possess any nuclear weapons according to U.S. and IAEA estimates. Accordingly, abandoning the U.S. pledge under the NPT would be to turn our backs on all nuclear nonproliferation efforts, since the treaty serves as the hub for the entire nuclear arms control framework. In addition, such a shift in U.S. policy would deepen the danger of nuclear proliferation by effectively telling non-nuclear states that nuclear weapons are necessary to deter a potential U.S. attack. It further sends a green light to other nuclear states around the world that it is now somehow more permissible to use them. Is this the lesson we want to send to North Korea, India, Pakistan or other nuclear powers? Nuclear weapons, with their unique destructive power and their capacity to threaten the very survival of humanity, have been kept separate from other military options out of a profound international commitment to prevent their use. It makes no sense for the U.S. to break down the firewall that has existed for half a century between waging conventional warfare and the use of nuclear weapons. While we believe that the United States must reserve the right to use overwhelming conventional military force to deal with today's difficult security challenges, we cannot support a policy that explicitly contemplates the option of a nuclear response against a non-nuclear state, in direct contradiction of continued U.S. commitments under the negative security assurances. Lowering the threshold for the first-use of nuclear weapons reduces incentives for other nations to adhere to the international arms-control framework and thus increases the dangers of nuclear warfare. Even though the U.S. and other nations are now engaged in a war to topple the heinous regime of Saddam Hussein in Iraq, we urge you to also speak out and clarify for the American people and for the international community of nations that your Administration stands by long-standing negative security assurances and will not do anything to undermine U.S. commitments under the NPT. Republican and Democratic Presidents alike have upheld this policy since it was first announced in 1978. We are confident that their good judgment will stand the test of time, as we strive to meet the new and difficult security challenges confronting America in the wake of the September 11th terrorist attacks on our nation. Sincerely,
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