The White House’s plans to slash the size of the US nuclear arsenal are reportedly facing resistance from officials in the Pentagon and other US agencies out of concern that they may be too ambitious. The Los Angeles Times reported Monday that the internal debate centers around the outcomes of the nuclear posture review, the top-secret blueprint on future US nuclear policy. According to the newspaper, the Administration is pressing the case for reducing the role of nuclear weapons and their numbers, including a new arms deal with Russia, to strengthen international nonproliferation regimes. Accordingly, some of the changes it is considering are raising alarm bells, such as potentially altering the current nuclear triad and changing US declaratory policy on the use of nuclear weapons from purposeful ambiguity to something else. (For more, read Tuesday’s Wall Street Journal op-ed piece (may require free registration).)
A provision in the fiscal 2025 defense policy bill will require the Defense Department to include the military occupational specialty of service members who die by suicide in its annual report on suicide deaths, though it remains to be seen how much data the department will actually disclose.