Presidential Candidates: Bernie Sanders

YES. This is common sense. But our current nuclear policy does not recognize this basic truth. The first step to making sure a war is never fought should be to declare that we will never start one. That is why I am a cosponsor of S.200, a bill that would prohibit the launching of a nuclear strike first absent a declaration of war by Congress and S. 272, a bill that would make it the official policy of the United States never to use a nuclear weapon first. As president I would pledge never to start a nuclear war and work to get the other nuclear-armed countries to make similar declarations. But that is just a first step. We need to bring the United States and the rest of the world together to do everything we can to rid this world of nuclear weapons.

YES. Absolutely. It is the last remaining legal restraint on US and Russian nuclear arms. It is the national security interest of the United States to have these restraints and to have the system of on-site verification that allow us to know in great detail what the Russians are doing with their long-range nuclear weapons. It is beyond foolish to allow this treaty to expire, but that is exactly what the Trump administration is doing. As president, I would extend this treaty and work on a new agreement to reduce dramatically US and Russian nuclear arsenals.

YES, and so do our closest allies. France, Germany and the United Kingdom urged Trump not to leave the JCPOA, and his decision to do so isolated the US. The JCPOA is one of the strongest non-proliferation agreements ever negotiated. It stopped a war with Iran; it blocked all of Iran’s paths to a nuclear bomb. As president, I would immediately rejoin this agreement, bring Iran back into compliance with the agreement and get to work on additional measures that can address our other issues with Iran and extend the limitations imposed by the agreement.

YES. Every step we take to reduce North Korea’s nuclear force, to open it up to inspections, to end the 70-year-old Korean War and to encourage peaceful relations between the Koreas and the United States increases the chances of complete denuclearization of the peninsula. Peace and nuclear disarmament must proceed in parallel, in close consultations with our South Korean ally. I will work to negotiate a step-by-step process to roll back North Korea’s nuclear program, build a new peace and security regime on the peninsula and work towards the eventual elimination of all North Korean nuclear weapons.

NO. These weapons should never be built.

YES. We can defend the United States and our allies for far less money. In fact, your estimate is too low. The actual estimated cost adjusted for inflation is $1.7 trillion and even that is an under estimate. Military weapon programs never come in on budget. The real bill is going to be more like $2 Trillion or $3 Trillion. We do not need and cannot afford to spend that much money on weapons designed to fight a 20th Century war when we have so many 21st Century challenges that require our immediate, concentrated attention and resources.

YES, as answered in the first question.

YES, as president I would bring the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty up for approval by the Senate as the earliest opportunity when I can be assured of its passing.

YES, any time you put up a defense, your opponent increases their offense to overcome it. Richard Nixon understood this. That is why he negotiated a treaty limiting ballistic missile defense as an integral part of his first treaty limiting US and Soviet long-range offensive weapons in 1972.

YES. It is foolish to spend billions of dollars — which is what we are doing right now and have been doing under both Republican and Democratic administrations — to build and deploy systems that have not been rigorously tested under realistic combat conditions. It gives us the illusion of security that could lead to very flawed and dangerous decisions.