Reply: Yes, entirely by chance. If you’re referring to the withdrawal from Araxos Air Base in Greece in 2001, the weapons were removed because Greece didn’t want to pay to equip its next generation aircraft with nuclear capability to carry them, although the official reason was poor overall security at the base. The withdrawal from the UK happened because the weapons were not needed on NATO’s northern flank and RAF Lakenheath had to focus on the conventional mission. HK

For Europeans, that cannot be a good result, as that means they will have to spend more on their security.

For one, I think it is time we removed the last of our troops there — given that the USSR is no more. I do not see Russia as a threat to the United States, unless we make her one. NATO policy made sense in that the USSR was a threat to the US. It was, however, primarily an ideological trheat, so it made sense to say to Europe we have so many troops here that if the Soviets attack, we are in it from the begining, I have trouble seeing that relevant today.

Then again, I am not in our foreign policy decision making group, so I guess my views are not really counted by anyone.

Reply: That is an argument NATO uses officially. But it is not a very good one. It might have been valid immediately after the massive pullout of nuclear weapons in 1992-1993. But today there’s no real doubt about the U.S. commitment that other forces/relations adequately convey. Rather than recycled arguments from the Cold War or early 1990s, I would be more impressed with justifications that relate to the security situation of today. HK

I agree that the Russian nuclear force does not reach the same level as the Soviet and that allows US / NATO to reduce its arsenal in Europe. But I also believe that the air defense systems have improved faster than the offensive systems, and specifically the strategic bombers are now useful only against countries with poor air defense. The bombers are white increasingly easy to detect and shoot down.

Reply: Actually, I’ll have to disagree with both of your points.

The missile defense system planned for Europe is, as far as I can gauge, not a “threat” to Russian security. With 10 interceptors it can (assuming it will work) at most complicate Russian ballistic missile strike planning in limited scenarios, but it’s certainly no “threat.” If one believes there is a threat from NATO against Russia, which I don’t (only counterproductive defense posturing), then nuclear weapons on offensive systems represent a far greater “threat.” In such a scenario, Russia’s defenses would be a challenge, although hardly insurmountable.

The suggestion that the US withdrew the weapons from the UK because they were a greater threat to Britain (and can’t penetrate Russian defenses) is, in my analysis, also not a correct reading of the situation. Rather, they were withdrawn because the Soviet threat they were deployed to counter had disappeared, because they compete with Air Force resources urgently needed for non-nuclear missions, and because the earlier force level in Europe was far in excess of what’s needed for the vague political mission they allegedly serve today. HK

Reply: The official justification is unknown, but one can speculate. First and foremost because the weapons in Europe are no longer tied primarily to what Russia does. The military mission evaporated in the early 1990s with the demise of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact, and the weapons have since been justified by a vague political role of signifying the continued US commitment to Europe. That role was needed after 1993 when thousands of tactical nuclear weapons were withdrawn, but is hardly credible today. The removal from Lakenheath and Ramstein means that NATO’s nuclear posture today is focused – to the extent there is a military focus – on the situation in the Middle East. The situation in Georgia and relations with Russia will probably not affect the nuclear posture in Europe directly, but they will likely make it harder to reduce or even eliminate the European deployment because some officials will argue that this is the wrong time to do things that could been seen as rewarding Russia. HK

Reply: First, how do you know?

Second, we in the public inevitably are late because these matters are so secret. Moreover, as late as in May 2006, F-15Es of the 48 FW at Lakenheath conducted a nuclear weapons drop exercise at Nellis AFB in Nevada. So the timeline might have been a little later, or the wing retained a nuclear mission even after the weapons were withdrawn. HK

Reply: Indeed it may take a long time; this morning the head of U.S. Strategic Command said that the United States needs to retain nuclear weapons “for at least the remainder of this century.” This statement – which extends the nuclear era further into the future than it has lasted so far – is at odds with Senator Obama’s nuclear policy proposal and the plan for elimination put forward by Kissinger, Nunn, Perry and Schultz. HK