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Title
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Change and inertia in U.S. nuclear weapons policy after the Cold War : the case of the Obama administration
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Author
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Abstract
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| When the Cold War came to an end in 1991, there were expectations that the large nuclear weapons stockpiles and their associated policies would adjust to reflect new realities. Despite the decrease in the number of nuclear weapons since the end of the Cold War, U.S. nuclear weapons policy remained largely unchanged. When the Obama administration entered office, thousands of deployed weapons still remained on “hair trigger” alert, enough to destroy the world many times over. Unlike the previous post-Cold War administrations of George H. W. (GHW) Bush, Bill Clinton and George W. (GW) Bush, President Barack Obama had arguably dedicated significant personal attention into shifting U.S. nuclear weapons policy upon taking the oath of office, as notably highlighted through his first major foreign policy speech as president in Prague in 2009. It seemed as if President Obama was willing to adapt U.S. nuclear weapons policy to changed circumstances away from what can be described as a policy of maximum deterrence during the Cold War toward the direction of minimum deterrence. For the former, nuclear deterrence effects result from a secure and overwhelming retaliatory second strike capability. For the latter, the mere existence of nuclear weapons provides deterrence irrespective of force structure, declaratory and operational policy. President Obama’s nuclear vision early in his presidency leads to the following research question: Did the Cold War era nuclear weapons policy of the United States fundamentally shift from maximum deterrence toward minimum deterrence under the Obama administration? If so, how and why did it change? If there were no changes, resulting in inertia, what were the contributing factors? This study aims to answer these research questions by describing and explaining the change and inertia in the nuclear weapons policy of the United States during President Obama’s tenure in office between 2009 and 2017. This research project adopts a two-pronged approach in examining the change and inertia in U.S. nuclear weapons policy under the Obama administration. In Part I of this project, the concepts of minimum and maximum deterrence are introduced, reviewed and employed as a framework to a succession of post-Cold War U.S. administrations ranging from GHW Bush to Barack Obama to explain the “how?”; that is, how has U.S. nuclear weapons policy changed under the Obama administration, if at all? This is achieved through comparative analysis to highlight whether U.S. nuclear weapons policy shifted from maximum deterrence toward minimum deterrence under the Obama administration. This project reveals that through comparative analysis of the nuclear weapons policy of the GHW Bush, Clinton, GW Bush and Obama administrations, the latter maintained a predominantly maximum deterrent nuclear weapons policy, with exceptions. The Obama administrations left office in 2017 with a nuclear force structure, declaratory, operational, ballistic missile defence and counter-proliferation policies that were consistent with maximum deterrence. The administration’s nuclear testing and non-proliferation policies were consistent with minimum deterrence. The other half of the two-pronged approach employed in this project will be the focus of Part II, which aims to answer the “why”; that is, why was there change and inertia in U.S. nuclear weapons policy during the Obama presidency. In doing so, John Kingdon’s Multiple Streams Approach (MSA) to policy change is reviewed and employed. According to the MSA, agenda setting is the first stage in the policy process. Moving an idea higher up on that agenda involves three processes: problems, policies, and politics. Successful agenda setting requires that a coupling of the streams take place to open a “policy window” which enables policy change. Leadership is a key competency needed to align the streams. This approach is applied within the context of post-Cold War U.S. administrations and subsequently comparatively assessed to determine the reasons for change and inertia in U.S. nuclear weapons policy, particularly under the Obama administration. The MSA revealed that as a result of the coupling of the problem, policy and politics streams, and with sustained and persistent leadership demonstrated by President Obama, his administration was successful at opening policy windows of change consistent with minimum deterrence on arms control, nuclear security and non- proliferation. The Obama administration faced inertia in favour of maximum deterrence, however, when the MSA streams failed to couple during the 2010 Nuclear Posture Review process and the follow-on 2013 Nuclear Weapons Employment Policy. The Obama administration also failed to align the streams to seek ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. In conclusion, the final analysis explains the Obama administration’s inertia in changing the Cold War-era “business as usual” approach to nuclear weapons being due to a lack of presidential leadership in surmounting the following obstacles in the following order of obstructionist impact: 1) Parochial interests pursued by the Departments of Defense and Energy as well as relevant members of Cabinet and the National Security Council; 2) Domestic politics, including competing policy priorities and hyper political partisanship between the president’s Democratic Party and the Republican Party; and, 3) A changing geopolitical landscape which revived Cold War-like competition with Russia. |
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Language
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English
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Publication
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Antwerp
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University of Antwerp, Faculty of Social Sciences, Department of Political Science
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2019
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Volume/pages
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328 p.
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Note
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Sauer, Tom [Supervisor]
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Full text (publisher's version - intranet only)
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