Allies fear Biden will adopt ‘no first use’ nuclear policy

With the US expected to release its latest Nuclear Posture Review by the end of the year, countries including the UK, France, Germany and Australia are reportedly lobbying President Joe Biden not to abandon the policy of strategic ambiguity on the use of nuclear weapons, the Financial Times reports.

While allies do not believe the review will include a “no first use” declaration, they fear he is considering a policy known as “sole purpose”.

The policy, which Mr Biden campaigned on in 2020, would dictate that the sole purpose of the country’s use of nuclear arsenal “should be to deter — and, if necessary, retaliate against – a nuclear attack”.

“‘Sole purpose’ is another name for a ‘no first use’ policy and must be rejected,” Republican Senator Jim Risch, ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, wrote in Defense News.

“As much as the world dislikes nuclear weapons, they are an important tool that helps maintain stability around the world. Declaring that the United States will never be the first to use a nuclear weapon represents the worst in potential policy. It scares our friends, encourages our adversaries and damages the very non-proliferation goals it claims to advance.”

According to the Financial Times, the US sent a questionnaire to allies earlier this year and received an overwhelmingly negative response to any changes in nuclear policy – but some are reportedly concerned that US officials have not appropriately conveyed the extent of their opposition to Mr Biden.

“Allies are essentially, in unison, collectively panicking,” a congressional source told the newspaper.

“They don’t believe their numerous and repeated overtures are being reported up to Biden administration principals, and to the President himself. Adopting a ‘sole purpose’ nuclear declaratory policy would be soul crushing to US allies and partners. It would gut our credibility. After Afghanistan and [the Russia-Germany gas pipeline] Nord Stream 2, there is a genuine concern as to how much more they can take.”

The issue was highlighted as Mr Biden met with world leaders at the G20 summit in Rome over the weekend.

In a joint statement after Mr Biden’s meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron, the pair said that the “fundamental purpose of NATO’s nuclear capability is to preserve peace, prevent coercion, and deter aggression”.

“Given the deteriorating security environment in Europe, we reaffirm that a credible and united nuclear Alliance is essential,” the statement said. “In light of this security environment, allies should continue close consultations on nuclear and arms control matters, particularly within NATO.”

Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s office has been contacted for comment.

On Sunday, China’s state-run Global Times outlet encouraged the US to announce a “no first use” nuclear weapons policy “with no strings attached”, saying the move would be “widely welcomed across the globe”.

“US allies such as Japan and Australia are falling into the trap of their own petty calculations, but they will not feel more secure if the US does not try to make the commitment of restricting the use of nuclear weapons,” the outlet said.

“China is the only nuclear power that has declared it will not use nuclear weapons first. China’s morality in its nuclear policy has always been adequate.”

Former President Barack Obama considered adopting a so-called “no first use” policy, but ultimately decided against the move after pushback from allies including Japan.

As Mr Obama’s Vice President, Mr Biden supported a no-first-use posture.

“Given our non-nuclear capacities and the nature of today’s threats, it’s hard to envision a plausible scenario in which the first use of nuclear weapons by the United States would be necessary or would make sense,” he said in 2017.

Malcolm Davis, a senior analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, argued prior to the US election last year that a no-first-use posture under a Biden administration would be bad for Australia and the region.

“Now is not the time for well-intentioned efforts towards denuclearisation or adoption of a no-first-use posture,” Mr Davis wrote.

“Any decision by Biden to embrace a ‘sole purpose’ declaration would end US strategic ambiguity. With the military balance much less skewed in the US’ favour, China and Russia could use conventional military force to impose their will, without having to worry about a nuclear riposte from the US, so long as they themselves remained below the nuclear threshold.”

Mr Davis said China and Russia now had much greater ability to inflict heavy losses on US forces.

“If they sink an aircraft carrier or two or use overwhelming force against US allies, for example, what would a Biden administration committed to a no-first-use policy do?” he wrote.

“Such a state of affairs would not engender confidence in US extended nuclear deterrence among America’s allies. For Tokyo, Seoul and Canberra, or Warsaw for that matter, knowing that the US would no longer deter major conventional attacks by maintaining the possibility of a nuclear response would increase the prospects of military coercion or threats from China and Russia.”

Alan Dupont, nonresident fellow at the Lowy Institute and international security expert at the University of NSW, raised similar concerns earlier this year.

“Almost without exception, US allies fear that any lessening of Washington’s commitment to the longstanding doctrine of extended nuclear deterrence would leave them vulnerable to attack by non-nuclear means,” he wrote in The Australian.

“It would certainly constrain Australia from supporting Taiwan in a conflict with China. Without a strong and credible US nuclear deterrent, we would be vulnerable to nuclear and conventional military coercion by China.”

It comes amid growing concern about Beijing’s rapid advancements in military technology, particularly hypersonic, nuclear-capable missiles.

General Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, last week described reported tests by China earlier this year of an orbital hypersonic missile system as close to a “Sputnik moment”.

“What we saw was a very significant event of a test of a hypersonic weapons system, and it is very concerning,” Mr Milley told Bloomberg TV.

“I think I saw in some of the newspapers, they used the term ‘Sputnik moment’. I don’t know if it’s quite a Sputnik moment, but I think it’s very close to that. So it’s a very significant technological event that occurred, or test that occurred, by the Chinese, and it has all of our attention.”

Earlier this month, the US State Department disclosed the total number of nuclear weapons in the US stockpile, reversing a Trump administration policy to keep those numbers secret.

The number of US nuclear weapons, including those in active service and in long-term storage, stood at 3750 as of September 2020, down from 3805 a year earlier, the State Department said.

Russia is estimated to have around 4500. The US and Russia together possess the vast majority of the world’s nuclear weapons.

China is thought to have around 350 warheads, and has been building hundreds of intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) silos in remote northwest areas near the Mongolian border.

Only nine countries possess nuclear weapons – the US, Russia, China, France, the UK, Pakistan, Israel, India and North Korea.

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