The Evolution of the U.S. Nuclear War Plan:Continuity and Changes in the New Century

2013/09/09

abstract

On February 1, 2009, the U.S. Strategic Command revised the latest edition of OPLAN 0810-08, to a newly revised plan named OPLAN 8010-08 Change. This plan originates from the former Nuclear War Plan of the U.S. government targeted at the two socialist countries, the Soviet Union and China, which had the formal name of SIOP. As a secret of the highest level concerning U.S. national security, the Nuclear War Plan and its related policies have long been kept secret, making it nearly impossible to know the details. At the same time, the official declarations and statements of the U.S. on nuclear policy are tinted by many political and diplomatic elements, and so they can hardly reveal the truth about U.S. nuclear power and its policies on nuclear application. However, despite all the factors stated above, the decoded documents provided by the Information Security Law of the U.S. still provide us with clues on interpreting this high-level war plan. In January 2003, the Bush administration officially changed the plan’s name from SIOP to OPLAN.  Compared with SIOP, OPLAN made adjustments on the target, direction and means of striking, but essential information on nuclear intimidation and weapons of mass destruction has not been changed. OPLAN 8010-08 was formulated in the latter half of the Bush administration, and is theoretically a continuation of the nuclear strategy of the Bush administration. However, up to now, the Obama administration has not yet had any new operation plan at the strategic level, and OPLAN 8010-08 is still valid. In other words, once a war breaks out, especially a nuclear war, it is still the blueprint for operations. More importantly, through tracing the changes from SIOP to OPLAN, and the study on the newly released Nuclear Posture Review and Quadrennial Defense Review Report (QDR) of the Obama administration, we can sketch an outline of the direction taken by the nuclear application policies of the Obama administration,[1] and understand more clearly the essence and the real intentions behind the general nuclear strategy of the U.S.

I. SIOP and Its Changes in the Post-Cold War Period

The first SIOP of the U.S. was formulated during the latter half of the Eisenhower administration. Before that, all the U.S. services had their separate nuclear plans targeted at the Soviet Union and China. However, these plans were overlapping in their striking targets, which largely limited their performance and ability in future wars.[2] After several years of effort, the Joint Chiefs of Staff released SIOP-62 in 1961.[3] It put most of the U.S. nuclear power under the command of an integrated plan, and formulated detailed indexes of the striking targets of U.S. nuclear power, the list of strategic targets and the assurance criteria as well as the damage criteria of every Desired Ground Zero (DGZ)[4], and the number of warheads as well as the equivalences the U.S. military were expected to use. Taking damage criteria as an example, SIOP-62 stipulated that the chance of causing severe damage should reach 90%;[5] as for the delivery of N-bombs, it stipulated that for every 200 important DGZs, at least 97% should be reached.[6] According to some scholars, if SDP-62 had been put into application, total deaths within the Soviet Union and China would have reached 285 million.[7] The SIOP effectively integrated the nuclear power of the U.S. to create a strong intimidating power and practical ability, however its devastating power and inhumanity have caused heated discussion, and as a result there has been pressure to reform it since its inception.

As the U.S. first plan for a comprehensive nuclear war, the SIOP-62 exerted a huge influence on the formulation of the Nuclear War Plan. Since the Kennedy administration, a number of presidents and Secretaries of National Defense have expressed their shock on the striking indexes of the SIOP-62 and its expected harm.[8] However, the institutors of the SIOP-62 presented themselves as experts and used “top level national security” as a shield, thus effectively preventing fundamental adjustments to SIOP-62 by all future administrations. Because the institution of the nuclear war plans is largely dominated by professional military officials, it is difficult for presidents to advocate the overhaul of the whole plan when they are faced with words like "national threat", "potential crisis" and "nuclear devastation". As a result, although all the presidents of the U.S. from Kennedy to Reagan have made adjustments to the SIOP by adding options for nuclear strikes and increasing its feasibility, at the end of the Cold War the SIOP was still a terrifying "super killing" plan featuring rigid striking options, single striking directions and mass destruction.

After the Cold War, the SIOP became unable to adapt to the new international situation because of its limited targets and huge power for revenge. As a result, since 1991 the U.S. has reassessed the nuclear situation of the country in the post-Cold War period, and has released several influential reports. Concerning the adjustment of targets, the first problem was China. During the Reagan administration, because of the changes in international relations, China was temporarily removed from the SIOP, but shortly after the end of the Cold War, the U.S. military resumed its focus on China. In 1994, the U.S. Strategic Command submitted a secret report named Sun City Extended, whose decoded parts showed that China and the U.S. might face nuclear confrontation in regional conflicts, for instance concerning the North Korean issue, and in a direct Sino-U.S. conflict.[9] Apart from that, the U.S. and Russia have reached a series of agreements on reducing strategic nuclear weapons. In this context, as an important nuclear power, China's significance in the international nuclear field is sure to rise. In 1997 President Clinton signed the PPD-60, which required that “we should make plans for a more comprehensive target towards China”.[10] Soon after that, China was back in the SIOP-99 after 20 years from its removal.[11]

During the Clinton administration, the U.S. faced the challenges posed by the so-called “regional proliferators” who were alleged to have had WMDs. On the one hand, the continued influence of the “Cold War mentality” made the U.S. nuclear policy makers set their goal on Russia, which owned large amounts of nuclear weapons, but suffered from political instability. On the other hand, in the context of cutting down the number and scale of nuclear weapons, policy makers were afraid of inciting “regional proliferators” to take risks to enhance their power, and at the same time they were worried that their limited nuclear weapons were not enough to deal with all the other countries with WMDs apart from Russia. As a result, the U.S. had to weigh the threats posed by Russia, “China and ‘regional trouble makers’ to achieve the effect of "killing three birds with one stone". The Guide for U.S. nuclear war plan of 1996 indicated that Russia and China were still the main targets of a U.S. nuclear strike, and that "nuclear weapons might be used to prevent the use of WMDs and attacks aimed at the U.S. and its allies”.[12] Finally, countries like Iran and North Korea were not included in the list as targets of the SIOP, but in order to achieve an intimidating effect, the U.S. gave the mission of striking countries suspected of having weapons of mass destruction to the U.S. reserve forces.[13]

What deserves our attention is the close connection between the four elements of the American nuclear strategy. Looking at the influence of the policy on nuclear application and the policy on the control of nuclear power, it can be said that since the inception of the SIOP the former has in actuality determined the scale of American nuclear weapons and the base line of the negotiations on arms control.[14] The decision makers behind the American war planning know clearly that “the meaning of damage and assurance criteria is that it is related with nuclear power”.[15] For example, in order to realize the attacking aim, damage criteria and delivery ratio stipulated by the above-mentioned SIOP-62, the U.S. has to make use of the 3240 nuclear weapons in active service, which is also the base line of U.S. arms control negotiations.[16] The PDD of the Nixon administration pointed out more clearly that “the suggestions and standpoint of the U.S. within the SALT are closely related to its current weapon obtaining system and policies on the use of weapons”.[17] According to a research named “Phoenix” conducted by the USSAC, the standpoint of the U.S. in the START negotiations is always in line with the power stipulated by SIOP.[18] As a result, a large nuclear war plan is sure to become the greatest obstacle to nuclear arms control.

After the Cold War, the Clinton administration did make some adjustments to the U.S. nuclear war plan, but the core aim and main structure of the SIOP were not changed. From the modifications made, it is evident that the U.S. abandoned the outmoded idea of preparing for a protracted nuclear war. However, Russia and China were still the main targets of the nuclear war plan of the Clinton administration; as a result the problems of the shortage of nuclear weapons and of the ineffectiveness of nuclear disarmament have not been solved. More importantly, the new plan “failed to provide the president with sufficient options for retaliatory attacks”,[19] and as a result, it could not prevent the growing number of "new threats" to the national security of the U.S.


II. 9/11 and the Formulation of the “War Plan” Series

After the nuclear war plan of the Clinton administration was exposed to the public by the media and scholars, it aroused strong suspicion. In 2000, George W. Bush, who was running for the presidential election, accused the Clinton administration of “still being involved in the Cold War” in one of his speeches at the National News Club. Bush promised that, if elected as president, he would not use the nuclear war context as the basis (namely setting Russia and China as the target) to decide the scale of nuclear weaponry.[20] At that time, the U.S. government was facing great domestic and international pressure to cut down nuclear weapons, thus the aim of Bush's speech was largely to cater to the public. In fact, Bush's moves to “get rid of the Cold War mentality” in the US strategic war plan came into effect only shortly before the end of his tenure. However, it remains to be seen whether the 8010-08 war plan, which was finally named the Strategic Deterrence and Global Strike, will really abandon the mentality of the Cold War, and whether this will be beneficial for actually cutting down U.S. nuclear weapons.

What pushed the Bush administration to make adjustments to the rigid nuclear war plan of the U.S. was the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001, which caused the U.S. decision makers to become profoundly aware that “the non-state actors today could use relatively cheap and commercially available technologies to attack distant targets”[21]. Before 9/11, including during the Clinton administration, the U.S. was also faced with the threat of terrorism, but terrorism had never been an important factor endangering the U.S. national security. After 9/11, dealing with emergencies and accidental events has become the prime concern of U.S. national security. Because of this, flexibility was no longer enough for a U.S. nuclear war plan aimed at strategic deterrence, and adaptability, which aims to deter every emergency and accidental event, is the direction for future adjustment. In 2002, a Nuclear Posture Review disclosed by the media showed some of the features of the adjustment on nuclear employment policies undertaken by the Bush administration. They were “getting rid of the old large scale and comprehensive concept of SIOP and developing a plan with more flexibility and adaptability”,[22] which indicated that the U.S. was about to make major adjustments to the target countries of the strategic nuclear strike.

The essential and comprehensive adjustment of the Bush administration started from the change of the name of the SIOP. In January 2003, after repeated demands from the U.S. Strategic Command, SIOP was finally changed to OPLAN 8044. There are two main points of significance to the changing of the name. Firstly, it showed the lineage of the U.S. nuclear war plan, and at the same time, made it more understandable to the public. The reason why the U.S. Strategic Command had been asking for the SIOP to change its name since 1992 was to make it “no longer a single, large scale, comprehensive plan, but part of a plan that can deal with more complicated situations”.[23] Before that, apart from the SIOP, all the joint action plans by the Joint Chiefs of Staff were named OPLAN. So, after changing its name, the nuclear striking plan became part of the U.S. military action plan, and was given permission for regular use. In the post-cold war period, the U.S. nuclear striking plan has gone from a special plan to a common plan, and has become a means of dealing with non-nuclear threats, even regular threats. The second meaning of the name change was to advocate that it had great adaptability. Previously, the SIOP focused on deterring or defeating the threat of the Soviet Union (Russia) and China, but in OPLAN 8044, apart from all the main striking options of the SIOP, more options dealing with a larger range of enemies were also included. According to the U.S. Department of Defense, the U.S. will develop and employ nuclear power capable of defeating any potential enemies, regardless of whether they have nuclear weapons or not. The key of the new nuclear striking plan is “how we fight but not who we fight against”.[24] In other words, the SIOP would first find the target, and then formulate the striking plan accordingly, while OPLAN 8044 formulates the adaptive plans first, and waits for the target to appear. And in doing so, it realized the new striking strategy of the Bush administration: a strategy that is "based on capability" and not "on deterrence".

The Bush administration revised its strategic plan again.[25] The existing OPLAN 8044 has at least two editions, namely “the 2003 fiscal year edition” and “the 2005 fiscal year edition”. However, it is the OPLAN 8010-08 that made the final adaptations to the positioning targets, striking means and principles under the SDP. Evidence shows that the biggest change in OPLAN 8010-08 is that it combined strategic threats with a global strike. Strategic threatening is undoubtedly the continuation of the SDP task of the Cold War era. Hans M. Kristensen, a well-known scholar who has been following the U.S. nuclear war plan closely, assumed that the 8010-08 Strategic Plan was possibly the first non-SDP plan.[26] He also said that although some regular strike items are included, “the nuclear strike task is overwhelmingly important.” In the meantime, pre-emption or even nuclear strikes against nuclear-weapon-free countries are also included, officially becoming one of the two pillars of OPLAN 8010. In fact, as early as 2005, U.S. scholars revealed a “Joint Nuclear Operation Command”[27] which showed that OPLAN 8044 had already suggested pre-emptive actions against countries possessing WMDs and terrorist organizations.[28] Now OPLAN 8010 seems to have realized this shift and accomplished a global strike in a real sense. As a result, U.S. strategic plans target not only the nuclear powers like Russia or China and nuclear-free countries like Iran and the DPRK, but also other non-national entities and terrorist organizations.[29]

III. Predicting the Trends of the U.S.’ Strategic War Plan from the Obama Administration’s Nuclear Policy

The “8010-08” War Plan remains currently in effect, which is not abnormal. Viewed historically from the perspective of the United States’ overall nuclear strategy, adjustments to the nuclear employment policy remain the most difficult, consuming much time with little progress. There are two reasons behind this: firstly, a strategic strike plan is the most important to a nation’s security, therefore policymakers would certainly encounter formidable obstructions if they intended to make major adjustments; secondly, the American president and defense secretary have certain limited terms, while the tenures of the joint chiefs of staff responsible for such war plans outlining (as well as the strategic command in charge of making specific war plans) are relatively stable. Except in cases like the 9/11 attacks, motivations for adjusting war plans on the military side are far from adequate. The most obvious example is that after the Cold War, the U.S. government promised many times a complete change in its nuclear employment policy, and the then-presidents Clinton and George W. Bush also made a number of statements of policy dismissing the “Cold-War mentality”, but at the end of 2001 a highly secret report to the congress, submitted by the Bush administration, revealed that the situation of U.S.’ nuclear employment hadn’t changed much: “the U.S.’ nuclear policy remained the same as that of the previous years, even the same as that of previous decades”.[30]

After Obama took office, and especially after the debut of the Nuclear Posture Review Report 2010, major adjustments to the U.S.’ nuclear employment policy were predicted again. The Nuclear Posture Review Report is an outline in which the administrative department reports on the U.S.’ nuclear strategies and policies to the U.S. Congress, so it can be classified as a nuclear statement policy. Divergences exist as to the relationship between nuclear statement policies and nuclear employment policies.[31] Undoubtedly, nuclear statement policies can reveal the general trends in the U.S.’ nuclear forces distribution, but, due to political or diplomatic exigencies, they might also in some way (intentionally) conceal the true purposes of the U.S.’ nuclear strategies. Except for the “Guidelines of Nuclear War Plans”, the Nuclear Posture Reviews of successive governments used to be the closest to the core idea of the nuclear war plans. They include the National Security Presidential Directive Files, the Force Employment Guide of the Department of Defense, and the Joint Strategic Capabilities Design of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. But the Obama administration changed the top-secret nature of its Nuclear Posture Review Report and published the whole report as soon as it was finished, indicating that the report has evolved from an internal guiding document to a statement of the U.S. nuclear policies, thus reducing its credibility in terms of reflecting the U.S.’ strategic war plans.[32] Nevertheless, we are still able to predict the general trends of the Obama administration’s building strategic war plans by drawing on the historical evolution of the U.S.’ strategic war plans, relative nuclear statement policies and nuclear arms control policies promulgated or implemented after Obama came to power.

3.1 China and Russia remain major targets of a nuclear strike; A nuclear-free world is still far away.

The academic community agreed that the nuclear policy that would be followed by Obama during his tenure was announced for the first time in the speech he delivered in Prague on April 5th, 2009. In referring to nuclear disarmament (and similar to his U.S. president predecessors), Obama first criticized the Cold-War mentality of the previous administration and promised that the U.S. nuclear strategy in the new era would seek a more peaceful and secure world without nuclear weapons.[33]

In fact, Obama was not the first U.S. president (and will likely not be the last) who has made such a promise. On many an occasion, George W. Bush also emphasized the need to dismiss the Cold-War mentality, stressing that the U.S. and Russia were not enemies any longer, and therefore the U.S. would not use its nuclear force to deter the Russian threat. Nevertheless, all versions of the Bush administration’s strategic war plans still listed Russia as the top-priority target for a strike, and most targets for strike on the Russian territory were still included among the SIOP items. Targeting China is a matter upon which the U.S. government is reticent. In June 1998, the heads of the Chinese and American governments jointly announced they were not targeting strategic nuclear weapons at each other. In the same year, the Chinese target was relisted in the SIOP. In the 21st century, the U.S. military holds its military conflicts with China in the future to be major threats to U.S. security. Therefore, the Bush administration’s strategic war plans clearly identify three types of emergencies, among which potential emergencies refer to possible threats to the U.S. from rival peers.[34] China is considered not only as likely to have conflicts with the U.S. in the future concerning the Korean Peninsula and the Taiwan region, but also to become the U.S.’ near-peer in the future. Therefore, it is hard to remove the Chinese target from the U.S. strategic strike targets.

The history of the previous strategic war plans reveals that only with an equivalent nuclear disarmament between the U.S. and Russia in real terms, and with a consideration of the weight of medium nuclear powers, will the U.S. remove China and Russia from its strategic strike plans, thus helping to achieve a nuclear-free world. Concerning the issue of China and Russia, the U.S. emphasizes capabilities rather than intentions, something which has actually been proved by the Nuclear-Posture Review Report promulgated by the Obama administration. In the report published in April 2010, the then Defense Secretary Gates pointed out that as long as nuclear weapons exist, the U.S. must keep a secure, guaranteed and effective nuclear arsenal.[35] Meanwhile, President Obama on the one hand stresses building a nuclear-free world, while on the other hand he expresses an effort to promote the U.S.’ security interests in the broader sense.[36] It’s impossible to remove Russia from future strategic war plans, but China is more likely to become a key target of the Obama administration’s strategic war plans. Although the U.S. government acknowledges that China’s nuclear arsenal is much smaller than that of the U.S, it’s still skeptical toward China’s strategic intentions in the future because of the lack of transparency in the progress and the scope of the country’s nuclear projects and strategies as well principles.[37]

All in all, no matter how present the slogan of a nuclear-free world is in the U.S.’ nuclear statement policy, the U.S. will in practice neither conduct unilateral disarmament nor weaken its emphasis on the Chinese and Russian targets. Therefore, some scholars suggest that it would be better for the U.S. to restore the Single Integrated Operational Plan of the Cold War era, so that its nuclear war plans would only be targeted at potential rival nuclear powers, and adjust its war plans according to expectations of nuclear threats.[38]

3.2 The influence of nuclear weapons is weakening, but uncertainty in the application of nuclear weapons still exists.

Whether in Obama’s Prague speech or in the Nuclear Posture Review Report, the U.S. government acknowledges a fundamental fact, which is that the dangers of full-scale nuclear wars among leading powers have reduced, but the risks of nuclear proliferation and nuclear terrorist attacks suffered by the U.S. have increased, signaling that the U.S. is planning to weaken the influence of nuclear weapons. Another evidence of this is that the U.S. was active in negotiating with Russia the follow-up treaty to the START. As is mentioned above, the U.S.’ nuclear employment policy and nuclear arms control policy closely relate to and restrict each other. Therefore, we can predict that the influence of nuclear weapons is weakening in the new strategic war plan from the trends of U.S. nuclear arms control policy. In July 2009, Obama and the then Russian president Dmitry Medvedev agreed on a Joint Understanding for the START Follow-on Treaty in Moscow: the U.S. and Russia each reduced the number of nuclear warheads to 1500-1675, and strategic delivery weapons to 500-1100.[39] On April 8, 2010, the U.S. and Russia signed a treaty in Prague, reaffirming the Obama administration’s policy of nuclear arms reduction within defined limits.

Nevertheless, when it comes to the Obama administration’s employment of nuclear weapons, uncertainty and ambiguity still exist. Although Obama repeatedly expressed the need to amend the U.S. nuclear strategy so as to compress the potential risk of employing nuclear weapons, he clearly made exceptions for cases like Iran and North Korea. More importantly, in an open policy statement,[40] the Obama administration reiterated the U.S.’ negative security assurance on three conditions: firstly, they must be states with no nuclear weapon; secondly, they must have signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty; thirdly, they must fulfill the obligations of nuclear non-proliferation: the right to interpret these three conditions is reserved to the U.S.[41] From the historical development of the U.S. strategic war plans, it would seem that the ambiguity of the nuclear statement policy will only encourage policymakers and executors of nuclear employment policies to make choices that are focused solely on US security. Currently no signs indicate that the Obama administration would separate its strategic deterrence from the global strike mission, and the new strategic war plans will continue following the Bush administration’s principle of employing a series of gradually updating items in order to increase flexibility.[42] Therefore, it is still a question as to whether future strategic war plans will fulfill Obama’s negative security assurance and whether the U.S. nuclear forces will not be aimed at other nations or organizations than China, Russia, North Korea and Iran.

3.3 The targets for strike in the strategic war plans will be more extensive.

While the influence of nuclear weapons is weakening, the strike targets of the U.S. strategic war plans are probably going to increase. The developing trends from SIOP to OPLAN reveal that targets for the U.S. strategic strike tend to become more extensive irrespective of which political party the president belongs to and irrespective of what the president promises to do before elected.

Firstly, after the Cold War, the U.S. military strongly advocated enlarging its strategic strike targets to all forms of terrorism, but the Clinton administration clearly stated that nuclear deterrence could only be applied to state-sponsored terrorism, and that non-state actions would be free from nuclear deterrence.[43] After the 9/11 attacks, the U.S.’ alertness to the so-called terrorist extremist organizations increased. Obama even considers nuclear terrorism to be the most pressing and dangerous issue of the present day.[44] OPLAN 8010 has already enlisted non-state actors and terrorists as targets for potential strikes. Statements by Obama (like the one mentioned above) will only enhance the U.S. military’s strategic strike on this target rather than weaken it.

Secondly, out of concern for political alliances and national prestige, the U.S. government has always been expanding the coverage area of its nuclear umbrella. In the Cold-War era, the U.S. only provided nuclear umbrella for its allies; in the George W. Bush era, the U.S. stated it would implement a retaliatory strike against those who used weapons of mass destruction on the U.S., the American people, the American armed forces, and the friends and allies of America;[45] while several speeches delivered by President Obama and Defense Secretary Gates clearly put all the allies and other security partners of the U.S. under the protection of the nuclear umbrella.[46] Obviously, partnership is a broader concept than alliance.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the strategic war plans of the Obama administration are still under planning. Both internal and external elements that cause policy adjustments might emerge. However, the objective fact that many other countries in the world possess nuclear weapons, and the existence of terrorism fundamentally limit the direction of new policy adjustments. In predicting the U.S.’ future strategic war plans, attention must be paid to differences between the U.S. nuclear statement policy and nuclear application policy. The Nuclear Posture Review Report and the Quadrennial Defense Review Report or the policy statements of the U.S. president do not represent an effective regulation of the U.S. strategic war plans, leaving much room for compromise. Secondly, the opinions of the military side must be taken into account. Because U.S. presidents are unable to guarantee that the worst-case scenarios and hypothesis presented to them by the military officials will never come to pass, it is (and will continue for the foreseeable future) therefore, an a great challenge to overhaul the military’s designs on the use of excessive force for defense purposes. The planners’ traditional modes of thinking, as well as their responsibilities toward the military, oblige them to be ready to expect worst-case threats as well as to pursue the widest possible security. In fact, multiple contradictions have already emerged when the Obama administration sketches its U.S. nuclear strategies. Speaking on the topic of amending the U.S. nuclear strategy, Obama has to, on the one hand, emphasize the employment of conventional weapons, while, on the other hand, to promise to guarantee the safety of the American people by employing all possible means.[47] Although the two ideas evidence a type of contradiction, from the recent history of America’s nuclear war-planning, it is almost certain that the secret plans as they now exist continue (and will continue) to be an excessive force, increasing targeting zone plan for nuclear weapons. [1] According to the documents of the US government, the overall nuclear strategy of the US is composed of nuclear declaration, nuclear weapon employment policy (nuclear striking policy), nuclear weapon obtaining policy and nuclear control policy. These aspects are all inter-related, and together compose the US nuclear strategy. Referring to Doc. CH00260, NSSM 169, March 5, 1973, Digital National Security Archive (hereinafter cited as DNSA), ProQuest Information and Learning Company.
[2] Referring to decoded documents on US nuclear war plan released by National Security Archive of George Washington University of the US: J.C.S. 2056/131, Notes by the Secretaries to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, August 20, 1959, enclosing memorandum from JCS Chairman Nathan Twining to Secretary of Defense, “Target Coordination and Associated Problems,” August 17, 1959, Top Secret, Source: National Archives, Record Group 218, Records of the Joint Chief of Staff, Decimal Files 1959, 3205 (17 Aug 59). From William Burr ed., The Creation of SIOP-62: More Evidence on the Origins of Overkill, National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book, No.130, 2004, http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB130/index.htm.
[3] So named because it came into effect in fiscal year 1962.
[4] Desired Ground Zero (DGZ): The point on the surface of the earth at, or vertically below or above, the center of a planned nuclear detonation. Additionally, in military parlance, if several single targets are located within a certain radius, that group of targets could be grouped into a single target, becoming a desired ground zero.
[5] Doc. NH00244, Target Coordination and Associated Problems, August 16, 1960, DNSA.
[6] Doc. NH00269, Army Participation in the NSTL/SIOP, Memorandum, November 1, 1960, DNSA.
[7] David A. Rosenberg, “Nuclear War Planning”, in Michael Howard ed., The Laws of War: Constraints on Warfare in the Western World, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994, p. 169.
[8] Cable from Vice Admiral Parker, Naval Reserve Training Command, Offutt Air Force Base, to CNO, February 6, 1961, Source: U.S. Navy Operational Archives, Arleigh Burke Papers. NSTL/SIOP Messages, Exclusives & Personals, cited in William Burr ed., The Creation of SIOP-62.
[9] STRATCOM, Sun City Extended, February 1, 1994, p. 39, http://oldsite.nautilus.org/archives/ nukestrat/USA/Force/SunCityEx.html.
[10] Doc. PR01816, Targeting Policy, PDD-60 Related, March 17, 1998, DNSA.
[11] Bruce Blair, Background Paper on the Strategic War Plan and START Reductions, Center for Defense Information, http://www.cdi.org/issues/proliferation/blairbckReduc.html.
[12] Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Instruction, CJCSI 3110.04, February 12, 1996, The Nuclear Information Project, p.C-1, http://www.nukestrat.com/foiaindex.htm.
[13] Bruce Blair, Background Paper on the Strategic War Plan and START Reductions.
[14] The nuclear employment and nuclear arms control policy are effected and constrained by technological development.
[15] Cable from Vice Admiral Parker, Naval Reserve Training Command, Offutt Air Force Base, to CNO, February 6, 1961, Source: U.S. Navy Operational Archives, Arleigh Burke Papers. NSTL/SIOP Messages, Exclusives & Personals, Cited in William Burr ed., The Creation of SIOP-62: More Evidence on the Origins of Overkill.
[16]. JCLSG, Offutt AFB cable 292318Z to JCS, April 28, 1961, Source: U.S. Navy Operational Archives, Arleigh Burke Papers. Messages, file # 2, NSTL/SIOP Messages Other Than Exclusives & Personals, Period January1, 1961. Cited in William Burr ed., The Creation of SIOP-62: More Evidence on the Origins of Overkill.
[17] Doc. CH00260, NSSM 169, Report, March 5, 1973, DNSA.
[18] Hans Kristensen, The Matrix of Deterrence: U.S. Strategic Command Force Structure Studies, May 2001, http://oldsite.nautilus.org/archives/nukestrat/matrix.html.
[19] “U.S. Conventional Forces and Nuclear Deterrence: A China Case Study,” CRS Report for Congress, RL33607, Aug 11, 2006, p. 7.
[20] “U.S. Nuclear Weapons: Changes in Policy and Force Structure,” CRS Report for Congress, RL31623, January 27, 2006, pp. 1-2.
[21] “U.S. Conventional Forces and Nuclear Deterrence,” p. 3.
[22] Nuclear Posture Review [Excerpts], January 8, 2002, http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/ library/policy/dod/npr.htm.
[23] George L. Butler, CINCSTRAT, Memorandum for the Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff, “Renaming the Single Integrated Operational Plan (SIOP),” September 2, 1992, the Nuclear Information Project, http://www.nukestrat.com/foiaindex.htm.
[24] “U.S. Conventional Forces and Nuclear Deterrence,” p. 9.
[25] Since OPLAN8044, the U.S. Strategic Action Plan was indeed added into more and more options on using regular weapons against countries with no nuclear power. As a result, in the preceding paragraphs, according to different circumstances, Strategic Action Plan and Nuclear War Plan would be used.
[26] Hans M. Kristensen, “Obama and the Nuclear War Plan,”, p. 5.
[27] The Joint Nuclear Action Order is the order of action to the commands of different regions according to nuclear employment policies and nuclear war plan, which could partly reveal the content of the nuclear war plan.
[28] “Pentagon Revises Nuclear Strike Plan,” The Washington Post, September 11, 2005, p. A01.
[29] “U.S. Conventional Forces and Nuclear Deterrence,” pp.8-9.
[30] “U.S. Nuclear Weapons,” pp. 1-2.
[31] Nuclear statement policies make statements concerning the U.S.’ overall nuclear strategy on two levels, open or secret, according to its different objects (such as the U.S. Congress, alliances and potential rival countries).
[32] Li Deshun, “An Analysis on the Obama Administration’s Nuclear Posture Review Report,” Foreign Affairs Review, No. 3, 2010, pp. 31-39.
[33] “Remarks by President Barack Obama,” Office of the Press Secretary, The White House, April 5, 2009, http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-barack-obama-prague-delive red.
[34] “U.S. Nuclear Weapons,” p. 16.
[35] Nuclear Posture Review Report, April 2010, preface by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, p. i.
[36] Ibid., “Executive Summary,” p. iii.
[37] Ibid., p. v.
[38] Hans M. Kristensen, “Obama and the Nuclear War Plan,” pp. 10-11.
[39] Kingston Reif and Chad O’Carroll, “Fact Sheet: 2010 Nuclear Posture Review,” Arms Control Center, http://armscontrolcenter.org/policy/nuclearweapons/articles/fact_sheet_2010_nuclear_ post ure_review/.
[40] In the cold war era, in order to build a system of nuclear non-proliferation, the U.S. issued a negative security assurance, promising not to launch nuclear strikes on non-nuclear states.
[41] Nuclear Posture Review Report, p. ix.
[42] David E. Sanger and Peter Baker, “Obama Limits When U.S. Would Use Nuclear Arms,” The New York Times, April 5, 2010, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/06/world/06arms.html.
[43] Colonel Rhoades, STRATCOM, Meeting of Working Group 5, on NPR Report, Feb 23, 1994, the Nuclear Information Project, http://www.nukestrat.com/foiaindex.htm.
[44] Nuclear Posture Review Report, p.iv.
[45] Hans M. Kristensen, “Obama and the Nuclear War Plan,” pp. 6-7.
[46] Nuclear Posture Review Report, p.iii; “Remarks by President Barack Obama”.
[47] David E. Sanger and Peter Baker, “Obama Limits When U.S. Would Use Nuclear Arms”.

author： LIU Yue