A Pentagon document laying out the US doctrine on nuclear operations was accidentally posted online and was publicly available for about a week, Israel Hayom has learned.
Dated June 11, the document, which has since been removed, noted that Pentagon believes using nuclear weapons could "create conditions for decisive results and the restoration of strategic stability."
According to The Guardian, the simply titled "Nuclear Operations" document was the first such doctrine paper in 14 years. It reveals that Washington essentially sees nuclear war as "winnable.
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The report quotes arms control experts as saying the doctrine marks "a shift in US military thinking towards the idea of fighting and winning a nuclear war – which they believe is a highly dangerous mindset."
"Using nuclear weapons could create conditions for decisive results and the restoration of strategic stability," the joint chiefs' document says. "Specifically, the use of a nuclear weapon will fundamentally change the scope of a battle and create conditions that affect how commanders will prevail in conflict."
According to The Guardian, the document quotes Cold War theorist Herman Kahn as saying: "My guess is that nuclear weapons will be used sometime in the next hundred years, but that their use is much more likely to be small and limited than widespread and unconstrained."
A spokesperson for the Joint Chiefs of Staff said the document was removed "because it was determined that this publication, as is with other joint staff publications, should be for official use only".
The spokesperson did not say why the document was made public in the first place.
Before it was taken down, the Nuclear Operations document was downloaded by Steven Aftergood, who directs the project on government secrecy for the Federation of American Scientists.
Aftergood told the British daily that the doctrine "is very much conceived as a war-fighting doctrine – not simply a deterrence doctrine, and that's unsettling."
He pointed out that as a Pentagon document – rather than a policy paper – the doctrine sets out to plan for worst-case scenarios.
"That kind of thinking itself can be hazardous. It can make that sort of eventuality more likely instead of deterring it," he said.
