[politics] Jesus. H. Christ. On a crutch.

So, we've finally gone and done it: we've officially embraced a first-strike nuclear policy:

The Pentagon has drafted a revised doctrine for the use of nuclear weapons that envisions commanders requesting presidential approval to use them to preempt an attack by a nation or a terrorist group using weapons of mass destruction. The draft also includes the option of using nuclear arms to destroy known enemy stockpiles of nuclear, biological or chemical weapons.

I guess calling it 'preemptive' doesn't scare as many people as calling it 'first-strike'. This takes 50 years of nuclear policy and turns it upside down - it removes nuclear weapons from the category of 'last resort' and potentially makes them the most immediately available tool in the tool chest. Folks, the likelihood of seeing US nuclear weapons being used on a target in the next 10 years just approached 100%. There's more on this depressing decision here; GlobalSecurity.org has a copy of the actual document here, but I personally haven't had the heart to go and read it.