Rethinking Nuclear Weapons

Ethical Questions

1) HYPOTHETICAL SCENARIO: You are a Ph.D. physicist. You have been approached by Los Alamos National Laboratory, a prominent Department of Energy research facility whose primary mission is nuclear weapons research, development, and maintenance. With strong support from Congressional backers, the laboratories have expanded their counterproliferation programs. One such effort is an attempt to develop a new, low-yield, earth-penetrating nuclear warhead capable of destroying shielded underground facilities such as a bunker where known terrorists are hiding.

Past nuclear tests suggest that even under ideal circumstances and very low yield, use of the envisioned weapon could kill tens to hundreds of thousands with blast and intense radioactive fallout.
You would not have access to complete details of your assignment until accepting the job and passing a security clearance.

Would you consider accepting such a position? Would your opinion differ if creating the proposed one such nuclear weapon would require resumption of underground nuclear tests? Would the nuclear weapons use policy of the sitting president affect your decision? If so, how?

2) Throughout the world, an estimated 33,000 nuclear weapons are currently deployed. If smaller nations believe that only 200-280 weapons will guarantee their security, while the United States needs more than 9,000 —how many nuclear weapons are required to act as an active deterrent?

3) To what extent can nuclear weapons substitute for conventional military forces? Are these two forms interchangeable, or does the nuclear deterrence system exist more or less independently of the conventional system?