Secret Plan Outlines the Unthinkable. America’s Post 9/11 Nuclear Doctrine

By William M Arkin and Prof Michel Chossudovsky

December 22, 2022

Los Angeles Times, March 10, 2002

This incisive article by William Arkin summarizes the key elements of America’s nuclear doctrine, formulated both before and in the immediate wake of September 11, 2001. […] The Bush administration, in a secret policy review completed early this year, has ordered the Pentagon to draft contingency plans for the use of nuclear weapons against at least seven countries, naming not only Russia and the “axis of evil”–Iraq, Iran, and North Korea–but also China, Libya and Syria. In addition, the U.S. Defense Department has been told to prepare for the possibility that nuclear weapons may be required in some future Arab-Israeli crisis. And, it is to develop plans for using nuclear weapons to retaliate against chemical or biological attacks, as well as “surprising military developments” of an unspecified nature.

[...]

Minimizing Collateral Damage while “Blowing up the Planet” 

Here are some of the highlights outlined in William Arkin’s article, most of which are being implemented: 

• “...the use of nuclear weapons against at least seven countries … naming not only Russia and the “axis of evil”–Iraq, Iran, and North Korea–but also China, Libya and Syria.”
• “nuclear weapons may be required in some future Arab-Israeli crisis.”
• “…using nuclear weapons to retaliate against chemical or biological attacks”
• “the NPR lists a military confrontation over the status of Taiwan as one of the scenarios that could lead Washington to use nuclear weapons.”
• “nuclear strategy …viewed through the prism of Sept. 11.  faith in old-fashioned deterrence is gone”
• “developing such things as nuclear bunker-busters and surgical “warheads that reduce collateral damage,”
•  “cyber-warfare and other nonnuclear military capabilities would be integrated into nuclear-strike forces”
• “the integration of “new nonnuclear strategic capabilities” into nuclear-war plans.
• “expand the breadth and flexibility of U.S. nuclear capabilities.
•  “what has evolved since last year’s [September 11, 2001] terror attacks is an integrated, significantly expanded planning doctrine for nuclear wars.”

read more:

https://www.globalresearch.ca/secret-plan-outlines-unthinkable/5792907