What Happened to US “Global Zero” Nuclear Disarmament

Nuclear Modernization, The Global Disarmament Racket and America’s Security

By Peter Huessy

A History Introduction: Arms Control & Disarmament

A push in 2007 from the “Four Horsemen”–former Senator Sam Nunn, former Secretaries of State George Schultz and Henry Kissinger, and former  Secretary of Defense William Perry— to  set a goal of zero nuclear weapons galvanized the disarmament community to seek the abolition of nuclear forces. Although by their own admission they had no idea how disarmament could be accomplished. 

At the time American strategic nuclear forces under START I (1991) and the Moscow treaty (2002) had been reduced by nearly ninety percent. On the other hand, while Russia agreed to both treaties, its strategic nuclear forces probably while significantly reduced remained somewhere around 2500-3000, with the ability to grow significantly. 

Disarmament advocates assumed US and Russian nuclear forces would continue to reduce. Once New START was ratified in 2010, US strategic nuclear forces would continue their descent to an official 1550 warheads. In the Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) of the time, it was widely predicted that further START type arms agreements would be on the horizon, lowering US nuclear forces toward worldwide nuclear disarmament, joined by a reformed or reset Russia, and move all in due course to what has become known as “Global Zero.” 

Progress in reducing nuclear warheads was impressive. Since the height of the Cold War, for example, there has been roughly a 90% reduction in the deployed US strategic nuclear forces, with the reductions occurring primarily from 1986-2024. And in 1991, under what was known as the PNI or Presidential nuclear initiative the President unilaterally eliminated most of the US force of theater or regional nuclear weapons, leaving a few hundred gravity bombs in Europe as a backup to NATO’s deterrent capability. Unfortunately, Russia didn’t follow suit and now has at least 1900 such weapons and probably at least 4000 under realistic assumptions. 

But what is little understood is that the reductions were not easily accomplished. The Soviets had repeatedly rejected American proposals to reduce nuclear weapons.