In an underground bunker at an air base in western Germany are more than one US nuclear bomb…thin, pointed and more than a foot wide. Experts estimate that there are about 100 of these bombs stored among five NATO countries, ready to be loaded onto planes. One bomb is the size of 11 Hiroshima bombs.
As part of NATO’s reassurance, these bombs known as the B61 were sent to Europe in the last half century, to deter Russia, and they remained there for these reasons. A month ago, scenarios for the use of these deadly weapons were unimaginable and the possibility of a nuclear conflict was unimaginable one day, and due to current events, the world became concerned about the outbreak of a third world war, which may overlook the The universe at the beginning of the twenty-first century. Or inhabit the terrible god of war and subject all to the voice of reason.
The B61 aircraft, as reported by the Washington Post. It is the only US nuclear weapons system in Europe. They appear to be from the Cold War era, but the political value of these weapons is enormous, says Franklin C. Miller, President George W. Bush’s senior director for defense policy and arms control, noting that B61s. . NATO governments consider it a major political commitment.
Andy Weber, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Nuclear, Chemical, and Biological Defense Programs under President Barack Obama, also supports this view by saying that the value of our nuclear weapons is in Europe. zero. It’s there for purely political reasons.”
“It provides the alliance with a nuclear response and that is its military value,” says retired General Philip Breedlove, NATO supreme commander from 2013-2016 and head of the Frontier Europe Initiative for the Middle East Institute.
The question that arises here is what is the use of this deadly weapon? And the scenario for the use of the B61 during a hypothetical escalating conflict between NATO and Russia, a single nuclear warning shot from Russia to Poland could trigger a nuclear response from the Allies, shooting down a B61 on a military site in Kaliningrad, for example.
That, in turn, could prompt a Russian escalation, and then — if things continue along this path — we could reach an all-out nuclear war with the United States, resulting in at least 91.5 million casualties worldwide, according to a simulation of the Princeton University Science Program. and global security 2019.
Here, we can encounter levels of horror that have been confined to theory and fiction for 77 years or pursued by some in cinematic checkers. For example, if an 800-kiloton ICBM exploded over the White House, half a million people could be killed, and people could suffer third-degree burns from Silver Spring, Maryland, to Alexandria, Virginia, accordingly. To Nukemap, a simulation website created by nuclear weapons historian Alex Wellerstein.
National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan noted Tuesday during a White House briefing that it was Putin who “raised the specter of the potential use of nuclear weapons” early on.
“It’s something we have to worry about,” Sullivan said. “Based on our current analysis, we have not changed our nuclear posture yet. But we are constantly monitoring this potential possibility.”
What could raise B61s from their slumber underground? The classic scenario, Miller says, involves NATO’s inability to stop the Russian invasion using its non-nuclear defenses. But the United States has a variety of other, smarter options than the B61 in its nuclear and non-nuclear arsenals. Even in an escalation scenario, the 50-year-old deterrent that we keep in the ground might still be there.
The B61 was born in the years following the Cuban Missile Crisis because the Air Force was concerned with the possibility of dropping nuclear weapons from low-flying aircraft at high speeds. The B61 could be used as a “tactical” or “non-strategic” nuclear bomb on the battlefield, against a forward military target, As opposed to a “strategic” knockout, behind enemy lines, on the seat of government or a city.
In the late summer of 1969, scientists and military leaders gathered in Los Alamos, New Mexico, the birthplace of the atomic bomb, for a three-day symposium on tactical nuclear weapons. Burchenal, then deputy head of US European Command, in his remarks that Europe’s tactical nuclear program “remains the single most unifying component of NATO.” He said: “We must launch a resolute program in developing weapons and improving weapons to meet our current and future requirements.” “We cannot rest on the laurels of 20 years of relative calm at NATO in Europe.”
At that time the new B61 family was welcome, but not enough. By 1975 the United States had 6,951 tactical nuclear warheads and 145 nuclear storage sites in Europe, according to a declassified memo sent to Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. The idea was deterrence: any Soviet incursion into Europe would risk a limited nuclear strike, which could escalate into an all-out strategic war that would outweigh any benefits of the incursion, according to James M. Acton, the nuclear agency’s co-director. Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
The NATO leadership has committed itself to remaining in the nuclear alliance as long as nuclear weapons exist. Jessica Cox, NATO Director of Nuclear Policy 2020 writes. Nuclear-armed states like Russia and China are once again investing heavily to create more sophisticated and diversified nuclear arsenals, North Korea continues its nuclear expansion, and Iran is once again seeking headlines for its nuclear developments.”
So the B61 still exists, albeit a small part of Russia’s larger tactical nuclear force, which is undergoing modernization and has significant advantages over the arsenals of the United States and its allies, according to the Trump administration’s 2018 Nuclear Posture Review.
An estimated 100 US bombs within the European region are not waiting to be detonated as much as they are waiting for renewal. In May, the US is set to begin large-scale production of a modernized version of the B61 that will have an adjustable yield – meaning the military can increase or decrease the detonation force of each bomb.
The upgrade, which began more than a decade ago, is expected to cost between $9.1 billion and $10.1 billion — making it probably the most expensive nuclear bomb program in US history, according to Hans Christensen, director of the Federation’s Nuclear Information Project. . of American scholars.
“Since the end of the Cold War, there have been fewer and fewer” US nuclear weapons in Europe, and many US officials “say we don’t need these things there anymore,” Christensen says. But for some, he says, the invasion of Ukraine “reaffirms the need for these weapons in Europe,” and modernizing the B61 “commits to the next era of nuclear proliferation.
On March 14, Germany announced that it would replace its aging bombers with US F-35s that can also carry B61s, signaling a recommitment to the Allied nuclear sharing agreement.
Critics of the updated B61 consider it not a Cold War relic or a sign of NATO unity, but essentially a new and destabilizing type, with its “yield demand” and increased accuracy likely to lower the threshold for use in a conflict, Hall says.
Jill Hrubi, director of the US National Nuclear Security Administration, said in a statement released in December that refurbishing the B61 “improves accuracy and reduces yield without changing military characteristics, while improving safety, security, and reliability.”
But it’s the combat capability that gives the bomb its deterrent value, according to experts, and an updated B61—with higher accuracy combined with lower yield—may be a more conceivable option in a military conflict.
As Jim Mattis told the House Armed Services Committee in 2018 when he was Secretary of Defense, “I don’t think there is such a thing as a ‘tactical nuclear weapon.’ Any nuclear weapon being used at any time is a strategic game-changer.”
Perhaps as soon as next year, in a world reshaped by this Russian invasion, the soil of NATO will be replanted with modern nuclear bombs from the United States. They will stay underground and out of sight – but they will never be far from the surface.