Its sponsorshipThe fact that this conference is being sponsored by the Danish Parliament's Foreign Policy Committee demonstrates the seriousness with which this issue is being considered in Denmark, and this gives the United States an additional and important opportunity to present its views in a public and multinational forum.
Nuclear deterrence remains the paramount objective of U.S. national security strategy.
Ensuring security has always relied on a mix of complementary elements. That mix has always, for example, included diplomacy and political alliances and, further, national defense efforts and military alliances to bind these efforts together. With the advent of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction, the consequences of war grew even more terrible, and the use of nuclear deterrence to prevent war became a necessary further element in both national and alliance efforts to achieve security. Now, we stand ten years after the Cold War's end, and we face clear evidence that the proliferation, and indigenous development, of weapons of mass destruction and their means of delivery pose the growing prospect of the threat of their use not only on a regional but on a global basis. It is therefore more than time to review our policy and reassess the range of threats to national and Alliance security and consider the right balance of tools to protect it.our deterrence strategy has rested on assuring the certainty of a devastating retaliation with offensive nuclear forces.