Yesterday, U.S. president Barack Obama sat down for an interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos following his controversial no nukes decision. Basically, Obama is keeping his promise not to develop any more nuclear weapons even though our enemies will continue full steam ahead with their nuclear weapons programs.
In response to Obama’s decision, former Republican VP candidate Sarah Palin said Obama was like a child in a playground who says ‘punch me in the face, I’m not going to retaliate.’
“I really have no response to that. The last I checked, Sarah Palin is not much of an expert on nuclear issues,” Obama told Stephanopoulos.
But does someone need to be an expert on nuclear issues to know that you don’t leave your country wide open to attack?
“What I would say to [Republican critics] is, is that if the secretary of defense and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff are comfortable with it, I’m probably going to take my advice from them and not from Sarah Palin,” Obama said defensively.
But as Hot Air points out, his own defense secretary may not be comfortable with his decision. Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates (the one that Obama said he would listen to over Palin) has already stated publicly that the U.S. would be crazy not to have nuclear weapons as a deterrent to other countries that are a threat to us.
In a speech given on October 28, 2008, Gates said:
“we must have a deterrent capacity that makes it clear that challenging the United States in the nuclear arena – or with other weapons of mass destruction – could result in an overwhelming, catastrophic response.”
