The Obama administration states in its just released defense guidance paper that perhaps America’s nuclear “deterrence goals can be achieved with a smaller nuclear force.”

What appears to be a public musing is, in fact, already becoming a diplomatic reality. The administration didn’t wait long after securing Senate ratification of the New START agreement, which limits the U.S. force to 1,550 operational warheads, to renew its push toward its cherished goal of zero nuclear weapons. In late December, “strategic stability talks,” regarding tactical nuclear weapons but widely believed to aim toward even deeper reductions in U.S. strategic forces, began with Russian deputy foreign minister Sergey Ryabkov in Washington, D.C.