Flat Out Lying

"I made it very clear to the Congress that the use of federal money, taxpayers' money to promote science which destroys life in order to save life is - I'm against that. And therefore, if the bill does that, I will veto it.''

Unless those lives happen to be collateral damage of liberation or the research happens be for national security.

Here's my favorite: the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator (RNEP), something the Navy is quite skeptical about.

Questionable Utility

Given the proposed mission of using earth penetrating nuclear weapons (EPNW) to destroy hardened, deeply buried targets (HDBTs) at depths of 300 meters or greater in rock while largely containing the blast and fallout, RNEP does not represent a practical addition to our nuclear stockpile for the following reasons:

1. To be effective against HDBTs, RNEP must achieve penetration in excess of current capability. Tripling the penetration depth of a 1 kt to 10 kt EPNW to 10 meters in dry hard rock (the probable physical limit), only increases the depth of the damage zone by about 15 meters.
2. Because of the threat to civilian populations posed by the radioactive fallout of a shallow nuclear blast, the tactical flexibility and moral acceptability of RNEP as an instrument of preemptive warfare are limited.

These conclusions are not lost on the international community. The Russian Federation and the Chinese government are both capable of making an accurate technical assessment and are unlikely to consider RNEP to represent a meaningful change in the status of U.S. threat. However, as a symbol of the United States's recently declared preemptive doctrine, RNEP is eliciting a vociferous negative response. The Russians and the Chinese both feel threatened by the Bush administration's aggressive nuclear policies and evidence suggests that they are responding by investing resources to expand their nuclear deterrent capabilities.

It'll certainly make quite an impression. That is, it'll certainly make a big hole. But national security?

It'll improve national security about like extending our War on Terra into Iraq did.