Obama Budget Contradicts Pledge To Reduce Nuclear Weapons

Posted by | February 2, 2010 10:53 | Filed under: Top Stories


Although preaching non-proliferation, the new budget put out by the White House asks for billions of dollars for new nuclear weapons facilities, with plans for $625 million more than last year.

The Alliance for Nuclear Accountability (ANA) said that the Obama budget includes large increases for a new plutonium production facility in Los Alamos, New Mexico (pictured) and for a new highly enriched uranium production facility near Oak Ridge, Tennessee, each estimated to cost about $3 billion. The budget also fails to list a new privately financed $700 million plant, which will produce nonnuclear components for nuclear weapons in Kansas City, Missouri.

“The Administration has argued that the massive increases in nuclear weapons proposed in this budget are necessary to maintain a robust nuclear deterrent,” said Jay Coghlan, Director of Nuclear Watch New Mexico, an ANA member group. “This is simply not true. The United States currently has a stockpile of 10,000 warheads that are certified as reliable. The new production facilities proposed in this budget will allow the Department of Energy to introduce untested nuclear weapons designs into the previously reliable nuclear stockpile.”

“The plan described in this budget is not about maintaining a reliable nuclear stockpile. It is a multi-billion dollar ‘radioactive pork’ construction plan that will reconstitute the nation’s ability to produce new nuclear warheads,” said Ralph Hutchison, Coordinator of the Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance. “Building new nuclear weapons production facilities makes no sense as the U.S. prepares to participate in this spring’s nuclear nonproliferations Treaty Review Conference, where it will try to persuade other nations to reduce arsenal sizes.”

There is additional funding to secure nuclear materials, which is a good thing, but the overall impact of the request appears to contradict the stated goal of nuclear non-proliferation.

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Copyright 2010 Liberaland
By: Alan

Alan Colmes is the publisher of Liberaland.

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