Basically known confirmed direct suggestions for nuclear weapon use in conflicts past WW2 (not MAD related) that are either suggestions by high ranking military or were considered directly by the American President (or whoever was the top leader in their respective countries)
On the American side the use of nuclear weapons on China by MacArthur during the Korean War and the studies into tactical nuclear weapon use by the Pentagon during the Vietnam War are both well known, but what are other conflicts or potential skirmishes (that in theory wouldn’t have lead to a nuclear exchange) were there?
According to Foreign Affairs (and other sources) during the Persian Gulf War the George H.W. Bush administration issued a formal warning to Saddam Hussein that strongly implied any use of chemical or biological weapons against Coalition troops would be met by nuclear retaliation, in part because Coalition forces were extremely afraid Saddam might use them as they were his only real way of inflicting significant casualties on the invading forces.
I can’t remember my book source, but I also remember reading something a while back about how Bill Clinton mused about using a tactical nuclear warhead during his 1998 cruise missile strikes in Afghanistan since Bin Laden’s group was very heavily dug in but very quickly decided not to when he saw all his other options.
Your questions are a bit difficult to understand. Every nation that has a nuclear arsenal has detailed war plans on using them. Nuclear weapons have assigned uses during war time like any other.
And militaries plan for multiple contingencies, and the use of nuclear weapons is one of them.
As for threat. The US has a nuclear arsenal which is designed and deployed to turn the Russian Federation, China and other countries in a car park. The reverse is also true… Thats as open and clear a “suggestion” or threat as any.
If I’m reading the OP right as “what notable or concrete proposals/plans have been made in the past for employing nuclear weapons against a non-nuclear armed adversary?”
Some (notably Moshe Dayan) in the Israeli cabinet suggested using nuclear weapons on the second day of the 1973 Yom Kippur war. The suggestion was discussed, but obviously never implemented.
Wouldn’t it be easier to name a conflict that someone, somewhere in the government or military didn’t suggest the possibility of using nuclear weapons? I’m thinking the invasion of Granada. Beyond that I got nothing.
On 9 December 1950, MacArthur requested field commander’s discretion to employ nuclear weapons; he testified that such an employment would only be used to prevent an ultimate fallback, not to recover the situation in Korea.[92] On 24 December 1950, MacArthur submitted a list of “retardation targets” in Korea, Manchuria and other parts of China, for which 34 atomic bombs would be required.[92][93][94][95] According to Major General Courtney Whitney, MacArthur considered a proposal by Louis Johnson to use radioactive wastes to seal off North Korea, but never submitted this to the Joint Chiefs.[96] In January 1951, he refused to entertain proposals for the forward deployment of nuclear weapons.[97]
A mushroom cloud rise over the desert, watched by seven men in uniforms.
Military personnel observe Operation Buster-Jangle in November 1951.
In early April 1951, the Joint Chiefs became alarmed by the build up of Soviet forces in the Far East, particularly bombers and submarines.[98] On 5 April 1951, they drafted orders for MacArthur authorizing attacks on Manchuria and the Shantung Peninsula if the Chinese launched airstrikes against his forces originating from there.[99] The next day Truman met with the chairman of the United States Atomic Energy Commission, Gordon Dean,[91] and arranged for the transfer of nine Mark 4 nuclear bombs to military control.[100] Dean was apprehensive about delegating the decision on how they should be used to MacArthur, who lacked expert technical knowledge of the weapons and their effects.[101] The Joint Chiefs were not entirely comfortable about giving them to MacArthur either, for fear that he might prematurely carry out his orders.[99] Instead, they decided that the nuclear strike force would report to the Strategic Air Command (SAC).[102] This time the bombers deployed with the fissile cores.[103] SAC did not intend to attack air bases and depots; the bombers would target industrial cities in North Korea and China.[104] Deployments of SAC bombers to Guam continued until the end of the war.[103]
There has been debate whether MacArthur’s advocated the employment of nuclear weapons, including over whether his submission to the Joint Chiefs of Staff was tantamount to a recommendation.[105][106] In his testimony before the Senate Inquiry, he stated that he had not recommended their use.[107] In 1960, MacArthur challenged a statement by Truman that he had wanted to use nuclear weapons, saying that “atomic bombing in the Korean War was never discussed either by my headquarters or in any communication to or from Washington”; Truman, admitting that he did not have documentation of any such claim, said that he was merely providing his personal opinion.[108][109] **In interview with Jim G. Lucas and Bob Considine on 25 January 1954, posthumously published in 1964, MacArthur said,
“Of all the campaigns of my life, 20 major ones to be exact, [Korea was] the one I felt most sure of was the one I was deprived of waging. I could have won the war in Korea in a maximum of 10 days… I would have dropped between 30 and 50 atomic bombs on his air bases and other depots strung across the neck of Manchuria… It was my plan as our amphibious forces moved south to spread behind us—from the Sea of Japan to the Yellow Sea—a belt of radioactive cobalt. It could have been spread from wagons, carts, trucks and planes… For at least 60 years there could have been no land invasion of Korea from the north. The enemy could not have marched across that radiated belt.”**[110]
You’re not going to see a lot of governments openly discussing plans for doing this because its legality is questionable.
The text of the Non-Proliferation Treaty doesn’t explicitly using nuclear weapons against non-nuclear powers. But there as an agreement at the time (1968) that the nuclear powers would independently make a public policy of not using nuclear weapons against a non-nuclear power. This was the supposed carrot to encourage countries to sign the treaty; if you agreed to not develop nuclear weapons and remain a non-nuclear power, the nuclear powers would agree not to use their nuclear weapons against you.
Dan Carlin said on Hardcore History that Truman threatened the Russians with nukes if they didn’t get their troops out of Iran. I don’t remember what his source was on that.
I think it’s a fair guess that the idea of using nukes in Afghanistan in 2001, Iraq in 2003, Libya in 2011 or Syria in 2013-present was never seriously considered or advocated by anyone in the government.
Same for the Falklands War in 1982, Kosovo in 1999, etc.
During the Desert Shield phase, one congressman in a Larry King show proposed the use of low-yield nuclear weapons against republican guard positions. This was meant to quickly neutralize the guards, and avoid a deadly contact with allied forces. People tended to be overly respectful of the RG and their supposed capabilities.
Not sure but I read somewhere that one Iowa battleship that was stationed in the gulf during Desert Storm had nuclear-tipped Tomahawks in its stores.
Good point. But there are also over twenty years between '45 and '68, Plus, as Shinna notes, some outliers, and less-than-open (at least at the time) discussions.
The official statement concerning, e.g., the Falklands War is that the ships certainly carried nuclear weapons but it was “inconceivable” to actually use them:
Then there was the dumbass in the 1980’s who suggested a single nuclear weapon hitting Moscow would end all the cold war bullshit and punish the Russians for their adventures, but I can’t find it.
The use of nuclear ground penetrating “bunker busters” was discussed by the Bush (43) Administration in both the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan (in particular, striking the complex of underground shelters and caves at Tora Bora) and the 2003 invasion of Iraq, to strike at underground command bunkers and hypothetical WMD storage sites that never transpired. These weren’t offhand comments, either; while the bombs were never constructed, the Department of Energy was given a half billion dollar budget to develop the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator, and subscale tests of the device and delivery system were performed. Some have speculated that the program continued under black funding after cancellation but I suspect the technical problems and fallout from using such a device (both political and radioactive) made it obviously unpalatable.
As long as these devices exist there is always the option for use, and someone ready to propose it. That we have nclear weapons on standby, ready to be launched with a few minutes notice increases the potential for accidental, inadvertant, or ill-considered use. This possibility increases when the person with plenary authority over their deployment knows essentially nothing about our “nuclear triad” or strategic deterrence.
This.
I would add the Panama invasion to this short list, but perhaps even that qualified for a nuke suggestion.
It seems to me that it is SOP for the military to formally recommend the use of nuclear weapons at the start of any US war and the the President to formally turn them down. Almost like everyone was trying to justify the existence of the weapons in the first place…
I’ve read quite a bit about the 1982 Falklands War recently. The use of nuclear weapons against Argentine targets was very briefly considered by Thatcher and her War Cabinet, but immediately ruled out as disproportionate to the situation and guaranteed to make the UK a pariah state.