Barack Obama Commits US To No Nuclear Weapons Use Iran Exception

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Obama, Medvedev To Sign New Arms Pact

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President Obma: Health Care Speech, George Mason University

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In a week when the US President will meet with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Thursday to sign a new arms pact Barack Obama will today commit the US to not using nuclear weapons, even for self-defence, against non-nuclear states even if they mount an attack on the US using chemical or biological weapons of mass destruction.

Exceptions to this rule would be states that although not formally declared a nuclear power are though on balance to have or be building towards nuclear capability such as Iran and North Korea. This opens up the possibility of nuclear attacks on both of these countries should the US deem them needed.

Obama did not go the whole way to a hoped for by some, blanket ban on the US being the first to use nuclear weapons - the so called no first use  pledge. President Obama said: “We are going to want to make sure that we can continue to move towards less emphasis on nuclear weapons, to make sure that our conventional weapons capability is an effective deterrent in all but the most extreme circumstances.”

Obama did make striking new pledges announcing that the new US nuclear strategy would renounce the development of new nuclear weapons. He said that the US approach would be a big step towards making nuclear weapons obsolete.

Obama says that he sees the US as working in tandem with Russia in making the world safe from nuclear harm.