Nuclear weapons lose their relevancy
In their June 23 op-ed column “Obama is pursuing nuclear folly,� Eric Edelman and Robert Joseph accuse President Obama of a “quixotic quest� to eliminate the United States’ nuclear weapons and suggest that the Defense Department “cooked� a recent study to support Mr. Obama’s radical disarmament agenda. But the president’s nuclear policies are not radical or quixotic, nor is the study that inspired them.
The Defense Department found that nuclear weapons are less relevant to 21st-century national security needs. This should not be so surprising. In an age of unmanned drones and cyberwarfare, one hardly needs to cook the books to come to the conclusion that nuclear weapons are becoming less important.
It is easier to sling attacks than to consider actual strategic realities. But today, nuclear weapons absorb scarce defense dollars without providing much “defense� in return. Mr. Obama is right to refocus our resources on more useful defenses.
Ira Lechner, Washington
The writer is a chairman of Council for a Livable World.
To see the article on The Washington Post website, click here.