According to one official, the Biden administration may try to use more nuclear weapons in light of China's and Russia's growing assertiveness.
In a period of great power competition, expanding the number of deployed nuclear missiles would go against decades of U.S. policy, but Pranay Vaddi, the senior arms control officer at the National Security Council, suggested it could be required.
“Absent a change in adversary arsenals, we may reach a point in the coming years where an increase from current deployed numbers is required,” Mr. Vaddi said during a June 7 meeting of the Arms Control Association.
“If that day comes, it will result in a determination that more nuclear weapons are required to deter our adversaries and protect the American people and our allies and partners.”
Mr. Vaddi’s remarks follow the publication of a report late last year by the Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States, which suggested that the United States expand and modernize its nuclear arsenal to deter increasing aggression by China and Russia.
“Given current threat trajectories, our nation will soon encounter a fundamentally different global setting than it has ever experienced: we will face a world where two nations possess nuclear arsenals on par with our own,” the report reads.
At the gathering on Friday, Madelyn Creedon, a member of the panel that wrote the report, also gave a speech.
She said that in order to upgrade their conventional and nuclear armies, China and Russia were "on a very aggressive path" and would probably need to be stopped.
“This is extraordinarily important because it’s clear that both Russia and China in the long term want to replace the U.S. as the leader in the rules-based international order,” Ms. Creedon said. “And their goal is to replace the U.S. and the West with something more conducive to their authoritarian regimes.”
In line with the 2010 New START pact with Russia, the United States now maintains a cap of 1,550 deployed strategic nuclear weapons. Last year, Moscow asserted that it had "suspended" its membership in the pact but continued to freely observe the boundaries, a move that Washington deemed to be "legally invalid."
The Pentagon anticipates that by 2030, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) will have more than 1,000 nuclear bombs in its arsenal due to its fast build-up. In light of this, the CCP now possesses more long-range missile launchers than the US.
As the world's three biggest nuclear countries compete with one another for influence on international affairs, Ms. Creedon hypothesized that, in the unlikely event of a global nuclear confrontation, it would probably start as a regional conflict that got out of hand.
It is by no means unanimous, though, that the US should expand its nuclear footprint.
Rep. John Garamendi (D-Calif.), who gave the keynote address during the morning session of the gathering, stated that the country should put more emphasis on "arms control and deescalation" because it already possessed "sufficient firepower to destroy any adversary."
“It’s well past time for voices of restraint and risk reduction to be heard in the nuclear arms debate,” Mr. Garamendi said.
“We as a whole society must decide what cost we should bear and what risks we must take. Our nuclear strategy must be balanced and rational, allowing for deterrence and defensive actions while encouraging collaboration toward a more peaceful future.”
