It's Crazy the President Can Launch Nukes on His Own

[Johnboy60]

The saber rattling currently taking place between the White House and North Korea makes clear that it's time for Congress to close a dangerous loophole, write two op-ed writers in the New York Times. They think it's outrageous that one person—the president—has the authority to launch a nuclear strike and set off a potentially catastrophic war.

We need to curb president's power to launch nuclear war: opinion

 

[Episaw]

The saber rattling currently taking place between the White House and North Korea makes clear that it's time for Congress to close a dangerous loophole, write two op-ed writers in the New York Times. They think it's outrageous that one person—the president—has the authority to launch a nuclear strike and set off a potentially catastrophic war.

We need to curb president's power to launch nuclear war: opinion

That is not entirely true. Every president has a national security team to advise him and no President would press the button until he had brought them together for a discussion about the appropriate action.

if a President did press the button, he would do so after getting the apporval of his national security advisors.

 

[Goonie]

That is not entirely true. Every president has a national security team to advise him and no President would press the button until he had brought them together for a discussion about the appropriate action.

if a President did press the button, he would do so after getting the apporval of his national security advisors.

Has someone told Trump this? Your forgetting Trumps complete ignorance of presidential norms.

 

[Desk trauma]

That is not entirely true. Every president has a national security team to advise him and no President would press the button until he had brought them together for a discussion about the appropriate action.

if a President did press the button, he would do so after getting the apporval of his national security advisors.

There is no requirement that they do so nor mechanism to stop them other than mutiny.

 

[Episaw]

Has someone told Trump this? Your forgetting Trumps complete ignorance of presidential norms.

Trump does not have the key in his desk. It has to be given to him and the cupboard has to be unlocked by two people.

 

[Episaw]

There is no requirement that they do so nor mechanism to stop them other than mutiny.

I don't mind if you show ignorance of your knowledge of White House procedures.

 

[Desk trauma]

I don't mind if you show ignorance of your knowledge of White House procedures.

Please cite the legal requirement that the president convene and listen to the national security council in order to use nuclear weapons.

 

[Desk trauma]

One of the few positives of this administration is that the power of the executive may be reigned in. Maybe...

 

[Episaw]

Please cite the legal requirement that the president convene and listen to the national security council in order to use nuclear weapons.

Nuclear biscuits and footballs: How the president launches an atomic bomb
By Dugald McConnell and Brian Todd

• 
  Breaking Cover."

There is a black book listing a menu of strike options; a list of secure bunkers where the president can be sheltered; instructions for using the Emergency Broadcast System; and a 3-by-5-inch card with authentication codes for the president to confirm his identity.
"It contains the equipment and the decision-making papers that the president would need to make a very quick decision" and to relay instructions to the National Military Command Center to launch a strike, according to Metzger.
Before being chosen as a military aide, Metzger said he underwent extensive vetting by the Defense Department, the Secret Service and the FBI, including psychiatric and psychological evaluations and "a very, very extensive background check."
The president, on the other hand, undergoes no such vetting, critics point out. And while the military officers who would carry out a nuclear launch are required to work in pairs, where both must concur before they can execute a nuclear launch, there is no such check on the president's actions.
"The president has supreme authority to decide whether to use America's nuclear weapons. Period. Full stop," said the Arms Control Association's Kingston Reif. A president could only be stopped by mutiny, he said, and more than one person would have to disobey the president's orders.
And as Reif points out, the stakes couldn't be higher: The size of America's nuclear arsenal gives the president "immense, unprecedented power. The US right now deploys approximately 900 nuclear warheads that are on the order of 10 to 20 times more powerful than the weapons that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And those 900 warheads are available for use at virtually a moment's notice."
But Metzger said that, in his experience at least, the president takes the responsibility very seriously, as do the five military aides.
"The result of a decision the president would make is so grotesquely horrible -- it would change the face of the earth, it would change humanity, it would change mankind," he said. "I guess when you're on duty, you try not to think of the import of that. But you are fully prepared to do so if you have to."

 

[Desk trauma]

"The president has supreme authority to decide whether to use America's nuclear weapons. Period. Full stop," said the Arms Control Association's Kingston Reif. A president could only be stopped by mutiny, he said, and more than one person would have to disobey the president's orders.

That runs a bit contrary to your assertion.

 

[chevyontheriver]

The saber rattling currently taking place between the White House and North Korea makes clear that it's time for Congress to close a dangerous loophole, write two op-ed writers in the New York Times. They think it's outrageous that one person—the president—has the authority to launch a nuclear strike and set off a potentially catastrophic war.

We need to curb president's power to launch nuclear war: opinion

That's why we elect a fit and stable and virtuous person to be president. Oh, wait ....

 

[Goonie]

Nuclear biscuits and footballs: How the president launches an atomic bomb
By Dugald McConnell and Brian Todd

• 
  Breaking Cover."

There is a black book listing a menu of strike options; a list of secure bunkers where the president can be sheltered; instructions for using the Emergency Broadcast System; and a 3-by-5-inch card with authentication codes for the president to confirm his identity.
"It contains the equipment and the decision-making papers that the president would need to make a very quick decision" and to relay instructions to the National Military Command Center to launch a strike, according to Metzger.
Before being chosen as a military aide, Metzger said he underwent extensive vetting by the Defense Department, the Secret Service and the FBI, including psychiatric and psychological evaluations and "a very, very extensive background check."
The president, on the other hand, undergoes no such vetting, critics point out. And while the military officers who would carry out a nuclear launch are required to work in pairs, where both must concur before they can execute a nuclear launch, there is no such check on the president's actions.
"The president has supreme authority to decide whether to use America's nuclear weapons. Period. Full stop," said the Arms Control Association's Kingston Reif. A president could only be stopped by mutiny, he said, and more than one person would have to disobey the president's orders.
And as Reif points out, the stakes couldn't be higher: The size of America's nuclear arsenal gives the president "immense, unprecedented power. The US right now deploys approximately 900 nuclear warheads that are on the order of 10 to 20 times more powerful than the weapons that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And those 900 warheads are available for use at virtually a moment's notice."
But Metzger said that, in his experience at least, the president takes the responsibility very seriously, as do the five military aides.
"The result of a decision the president would make is so grotesquely horrible -- it would change the face of the earth, it would change humanity, it would change mankind," he said. "I guess when you're on duty, you try not to think of the import of that. But you are fully prepared to do so if you have to."

"The president has supreme authority to decide whether to use America's nuclear weapons. Period. Full stop,"

You might want to reread your own link.

 

[DogmaHunter]

That is not entirely true. Every president has a national security team to advise him and no President would press the button until he had brought them together for a discussion about the appropriate action.

if a President did press the button, he would do so after getting the apporval of his national security advisors.

I think the point is that there are no laws for such safety checks.
Trump has the power to press whatever button he pleases without taking any advice whatsoever.

And you know he's impulsive enough to actually do it too.

 

[Episaw]

I think the point is that there are no laws for such safety checks.
Trump has the power to press whatever button he pleases without taking any advice whatsoever.

And you know he's impulsive enough to actually do it too.

Do I?

 

[Radagast]

I think the point is that there are no laws for such safety checks.

Actually, any nuclear launch must be endorsed by the Secretary of Defense.

 

[Desk trauma]

Actually, any nuclear launch must be endorsed by the Secretary of Defense.

Authentication, not endorsement. They have no say in the decision, all they do is confirm the order, unless they choose mutiny.

 

[Radagast]

Authentication, not endorsement. They have no say in the decision, all they do is confirm the order, unless they choose mutiny.

The Secretary of Defense does not have to confirm the order. Tom Clancy's novel The Sum of All Fears gives a description of what that would look like in practice.

 

[Desk trauma]

The Secretary of Defense does not have to confirm the order. Tom Clancy's novel The Sum of All Fears gives a description of what that would look like in practice.

Now there is a reliable source.

 

[Ana the Ist]

That runs a bit contrary to your assertion.

Lol I kept reading that thinking "what am I missing here?"

It completely contradicts his statement.

 

[Episaw]

Now there is a reliable source.

That is what I was thinking.