I sincerely believe, if it were purely a DoD matter, nuclear first-strike weapons would be right there on the table.
My reasoning is basically what I imagine theirs to be:
If we used nuclear weapons, any idea of a surgical strike becomes a moot point. The strategy at that point becomes to demonstrate the incredible lethality and willingness of the US to simply kill and destroy anyone who would consider a nuclear threat an option. Basically, it'd be the real version of shock and awe: shockwaves and awe-****, what's going on in the world.
And it is also my genuine belief that we've got both nuclear first-strike plans for Iran at least partially drawn up and have had them for at least a decade. If there is one thing the DoD does (or at least did in previous decades) it was plan for nuclear attack situations. I'd also imagine we've got them for every country that has nuclear weapons, from the UK, to China, to Israel. Although I'd also be the first to admit that our plans for a strike on European countries are for the most part hardly kept in a super-secret serious box. In fact, I'd imagine they are joked about over coffee between MI6 guys and central intel folks. Nevertheless they're real. In fact, I thought I recalled something like Battle Plan Red or something that was just this, an absurd yet entirely real gaming for a theoretical attack on Britain, but frankly I'm too lazy to research it. Maybe I'm crazy. The Israeli ones most likely 'do not exist'
the main reason being that the IDF finds such things rather less amusing than other US allies. Not to mention that, if it did, it'd have probably been well in the hands of (if not partially drawn up by) friendly folks at Mossad by now.
I recall a funny exchange from "the constant gardener":
(to a UK foreign intel service station chief in Africa) "What's the matter, I thought you spies were supposed to know everything that's going on in your neck of the woods?"
(UK spy's response) "Only God knows everything - and he works for Mossad."
Hehe.
But in all seriousness, things are hardly run by the DoD nuclear handbook somewhere in the basement of the Pentagon. If they were, fellows over at Foggy Bottom would most likely simultaneously implode and explode in a rare chemical reaction caused by a fusion of supercharged incredulity with incalculable ire.
Then you've got the problem of a radioactive world fourth largest oil exporter. It wouldn't be a huge direct problem for the US, except that our main suppliers like Venezuela, Bolivia, Russia, etc would probably never speak to us again. Not to mention India, Pakistan and China who would most likely consider this an act of war. And our friends in Iraq and Saudi Arabia would most likely be more than a little hesitant to truck through a radioactive strait of hormuz to sell the perpetrators oil.
All that said, despite our incredulity at the notion, Space Command, NORAD, NATO tactical nuclear deployments in Europe and a fleet of nuclear powered submarines themselves capable of a several overkill capacity don't exist because we thought it'd be a funny joke. They're a m.a.d-borne reality and function as a "deterrent", sure, but then again, what good's a deterrent if it's incapable of being used. Firing nuclear missiles is more than anything else at the heart of the US military preeminence strategy, even if we'd never conceivably use them. Yikes.
But again, my vote on the question is a resounding no - until we do.
PS -My read is that Ramsey Clark is probably considered the biggest joke by every succesive Attorney General since. I'd imagine his military opinions are taken about as seriously at the DoD as Howard Dean's notebook on strategies and tactics in 21st century land-warfare.
