U.S. Nuclear Weapons Policy: Considering
“No First Use”
Updated March 29, 2022
The Biden Administration’s Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) reviewed U.S. nuclear declaratory policy—
the statements the United States makes about when, how, and why it might use nuclear weapons to deter
adversaries and reassure U.S. allies of its commitment to their defense. But, according to an
Administration fact sheet, the NPR will not alter this policy to include a “no first use” pledge stating that
the United States will never use nuclear weapons first in a conflict or a “sole purpose” policy stating that
the sole purpose of nuclear weapons is to deter nuclear use. Instead, the NPR will state that “the
fundamental role of U.S. nuclear weapons is to deter nuclear attack on the United States, our allies, and
partners.” It will also indicate that “the United States would only consider the use of nuclear weapons in
extreme circumstances to defend the vital interests of the United States or its allies and partners.”
The United States has long pledged to refrain from using nuclear weapons against most non-nuclear
weapon states, but has neither ruled out their first use in all cases nor specified the circumstances under
which it would use them. This policy of “calculated ambiguity” addressed U.S. concerns during the Cold
War, when the United States and NATO faced numerically superior Soviet and Warsaw Pact conventional
forces in Europe. At the time, the United States not only developed plans to use nuclear weapons on the
battlefield to disrupt or defeat attacking tanks and troops, but it also hoped that the risk of a nuclear
response would deter the Soviet Union from initiating a conventional attack. This is not because the
United States believed it could defeat the Soviet Union in a nuclear war, but because it hoped the Soviet
Union would know that the use of these weapons would likely escalate to all-out nuclear war, with both
sides suffering massive destruction.
Since the end of the Cold War, the United States has modified its declaratory policy to reduce the apparent
role of nuclear weapons in U.S. national security, but has not declared that it would not use them first. In
the 2010 Nuclear Posture Review Report, the Obama Administration stated that the United States “would
only consider the use of nuclear weapons in extreme circumstances” and would not threaten or use
nuclear weapons, under any circumstances, “against non-nuclear weapons states that are party to the
Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and in compliance with their nuclear non-proliferation obligations.” But
the Administration was not prepared to state that the “sole purpose” of U.S. nuclear weapons was to deter
nuclear attack because it could envision “a narrow range of contingencies” where nuclear weapons might
play a role in deterring conventional, chemical, or biological attacks.
The Trump Administration, in the 2018 Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) Report, also rejected the idea that
the sole purpose of nuclear weapons is to deter nuclear attack, and, therefore, did not adopt a “no first
use” policy. It noted that “the United States would only consider the employment of nuclear weapons in
extreme circumstances to defend the vital interests of the United States, its allies, and partners” but stated
that nuclear weapons contribute to “deterrence of nuclear and non-nuclear attack; assurance of allies and