From Time: It is Europe’s dirty secret that the list of nuclear-capable countries extends beyond those — Britain and France — who have built their own weapons. Nuclear bombs are stored on air-force bases in Italy, Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands — and planes from each of those countries are capable of delivering them. The Federation of American Scientists believes that there are some 200 B61 thermonuclear gravity bombs scattered across these four countries. Under a NATO agreement struck during the Cold War, the bombs, which are technically owned by the U.S., can be transferred to the control of a host nation’s air force in times of conflict. Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Dutch, Belgian, Italian and German pilots remain ready to engage in nuclear war…

The issue re-entered the public discourse in Europe last year, when a U.S. Air Force report found that the European air-force bases storing the weapons were failing to meet basic security requirements to safeguard the weapons. These revelations cemented the unpopularity of the agreement. Belgium’s Parliament had already unanimously requested that NATO withdraw the weapons, while a 2006 poll found that almost 70% of people in the four countries want the U.S. nukes withdrawn. In October, German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle declared that “Germany has to set a good example when it comes to disarmament by getting the atomic weapons stationed in this country removed.” Westerwelle added that President Barack Obama’s speech in Prague in April, in which the President called for countries to renew the vision of a world free of nuclear weapons, had “opened the door” to a nuclear-weapons-free Europe…

Obama’s ongoing “nuclear posture review” and NATO’s review of its strategic concept may call for an end to the burden-sharing arrangement. But if Obama fails to address the issue — and if NATO doesn’t come to an agreement — countries may choose to take their own steps to get rid of the weapons. In 2001, when the Greek air force ordered a new fighter jet, it chose a model that could not carry the B61, forcing the U.S. to withdraw its weapons there. Germany may soon retire its own Tornado fighter jet, opting instead for the Eurofighter, which can’t carry B61s. “NATO countries are currently answering the question backward. We are allowing aircraft selection to determine our posture,” says Heather Conley, director of the Europe program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Given that Europe’s nuclear arsenal is so unpopular, potentially unsafe and a hindrance to global nonproliferation efforts, it’s time for it to go. (photo: USAF)