Easement in US nuclear weapons usage

[Nonkers]

Is it correct that the US has recently deregulated the rules by which nuclear weapons can be used in a theater?

What is the lowest rank that can authorise the use of a nuclear weapon? What is the largest kilotonnage he can use without getting permission from the US president or his underlings?

Under what circumstance can they be used eg if the US forces central base in Afghanistan was hit by a nerve agent WMD missile, killing hundreds, and the US commander knew its source in a Taliban mountain hideout, could he order an immediate Neutron Bomb attack without having to even contact his superiors in the USA?

[ToSeek]

Pentagon Revises Nuclear Strike Plan (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/10/AR2005091001053.html)

The Pentagon has drafted a revised doctrine for the use of nuclear weapons that envisions commanders requesting presidential approval to use them to preempt an attack by a nation or a terrorist group using weapons of mass destruction. The draft also includes the option of using nuclear arms to destroy known enemy stockpiles of nuclear, biological or chemical weapons.

Sounds as if presidential approval is still required, unless there's another update.

NOTE: Any discussion of the political implications of this is inappropriate to this forum and will be dealt with accordingly.

[Graybeard6]

First of all, note the source; the Washington Post. Second, note that it is a draft proposal.
"What is the lowest rank that can authorise the use of a nuclear weapon?" The President (or the PM, of the UK).
"What is the largest kilotonnage he can use without getting permission from the US president or his underlings?" Zero.
There is no such thing as a "Neutron Bomb"!

[BigDon]

Graybeard, are you saying there isn't an "enhanced radiation warhead" in our arsenal?

[Graybeard6]

Graybeard, are you saying there isn't an "enhanced radiation warhead" in our arsenal?
There may very well be; there was one once, but the delivery vehicle was killed.
The "neutron bomb" was a fiction; a weapon designed to "kill people without harming property".

[BigDon]

No, the neutron bomb was developed to stop massed Russian armor. Thats a completely different story.

It was the tabloids that gave it the "kill people without harming property" apelation. The Russians were more than happy to promote the supposedly "capitalistic" aspect of said story. They were designed to be low yield but effective. At yields above a certain kilo-tonnage the effect was lost due to increased blast and heat effect, ei a regular warhead would be just as effective. And these weapons were designed to be used on an ally's territory, (West Germany). A 15 kiloton neutron bomb is more effective over a wider area for killing tank crews than a "conventional" nuke of over 3 times the yield. The Russians really hated that we had an effective counter to their massed armor docturne.


If you are going to base your ideas on what is real by what the tabloids say and what is backed up by the (then) enemy, you're in trouble already. But I can see where you would disbelieve based on what you thought was true.

[BigDon]

Here, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neutron_bomb , for once Wiki got the right of it.

[Fortis]

No, the neutron bomb was developed to stop massed Russian armor. Thats a completely different story.

It was the tabloids that gave it the "kill people without harming property" apelation.
That one always bugs me as well. If you used it in an urban environment it would still leave an unpleasant mess, but then it was never intended to be used in a urban environment. At the time we were all worried about a massive Soviet tank assault across the plains of Germany.

One of the ironies of this story (if the open literature can be believed) is that (according to one article) tank armour had reached the point where to deliver a 'useful' lethal dose of radiation to a tank crew, the weapon would have had to have been so close that they would have been killed by the blast.

[Gillianren]

"Easement" is the wrong word for what we're discussing, I think. "Easement" is a property term. "Easing" is what we want, unless the US President's nuclear authority is slopping over onto his neighbor's property.

[Frog march]

well, according to that Wiki entry tritium(the element used in Neuton bombs) has a half life of 12.3 years, so any Neutron bombs left over from the cold war will be well out of date I would have thought.