Publishing Institution: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center / Publication Year: within 10 Years

1. Net-Zero and Nonproliferation: Assessing Nuclear Power and Its Alternatives

Author:: Henry D. Sokolski
Publication Date:: 01-2024
Content Type:: Book
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Six years ago, NPEC ran a mock execution of a law Congress passed in 1978 but that the Executive refused to implement —Title V of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Act of 1978. Title V called on the State and Energy Departments to conduct country-specific analyses of how developing states might best meet their energy needs without nuclear power. It also called for the creation of an energy Peace Corps and an assessment of what our government was spending on energy development aid-related projects. When NPEC started its efforts, the staff on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee asked to see what NPEC produced to use it to pressure the Executive finally to implement the law. NPEC commissioned a number of studies on how Iran, Saudi Arabia, China, and Taiwan might best meet their energy requirements without nuclear power. The center also contracted studies on the history and intent of Title V and on what government programs were already in play that aligned with Title V‘s stated objectives. As soon as NPEC’s project was completed, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee staff prepared a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asking the Secretary finally to implement Title V and file the reports required by law. Then, something unexpected occurred. The committee’s legal counsel discovered that the Secretary was under no obligation to comply: Congress had eliminated Title V’s reporting requirements along with several hundred other Congressionally mandated reports back in 1995. Flummoxed, I quietly set the book manuscript aside. Why, then, release it today? Because it is again timely. In October, the Biden Administration announced it is still considering extending civilian nuclear cooperation with Riyadh that would allow the Kingdom to enrich uranium — a process that can bring states within weeks of acquiring the bomb. Administration officials no longer question if Saudi Arabia really needs nuclear energy to meet its energy requirements. Shouldn’t they? Meanwhile, Taiwan’s presidential election this coming Saturday will, among other things, decide if Taiwan will build more nuclear reactors or not. Again, is new nuclear Taiwan’s best energy bet? As for China, the Pentagon has become increasingly concerned that the two “peaceful” fast breeder reactors and plutonium reprocessing plants Beijing is building will be used to make hundreds of bombs worth of weapons plutonium. One of the two fast breeder reactors is already operating. The question these dangerous nuclear activities raise is just how necessary they are to meet China’s energy requirements. Then, there’s Iran, which is intent on building reactors of Iranian design. It plans on expanding its nuclear power program from roughly one gigawatt electrical capacity to 11. Given Iran’s renewables potential and oil and gas reserves, how much sense does this make? Finally, in its efforts to achieve net zero, the Biden Administration has joined 20 other nations in pledging to triple global nuclear generation by 2050. Again, how practical is this? This volume’s aim is to help provide answers. Of course, in light of how long our government has ignored Title V, demanding it be implemented now would be odd. Creating a clean energy Peace Corps, comparing the costs of different types of energy, and trying to determine what investments would reduce emissions quickest and cheapest, however, all should be discussed. It’s my hope that the release of Net-Zero and Nonproliferation: Assessing Nuclear Power and Its Alternatives today might prompt such discussion.
Topic:: International Cooperation, Nuclear Power, Nonproliferation, Legislation, Energy, and Net Zero
Political Geography:: China, Iran, Middle East, Taiwan, Asia, Saudi Arabia, North America, and United States of America

2. Nuclear Danger and the NPT

Author:: Henry Sokolski
Publication Date:: 06-2024
Content Type:: Book
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Next month, the second Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) preparatory review conference will meet in Geneva. In anticipation of this international conference, NPEC is releasing Nuclear Danger and the NPT, an edited volume of research on what nuclear dangers await and how proper enforcement of the NPT can help. The hope is that the volume’s analysis will prompt constructive debate. It certainly is needed. Within ten years, there is a distinct possibility South Korea, Japan, the UAE, Egypt, Turkey, and Iran may decide to acquire nuclear weapons. After that, Algeria, Finland, Sweden, Ukraine, and Australia may be sorely tempted to do the same. More could follow. What is fueling these grim prospects? Several things: Growing Russian, Chinese, and North Korean nuclear capabilities and threats; Russian forward basing of nuclear weapons in Belarus; waning allied confidence in U.S. nuclear security guarantees; and an increasing acceptance of dangerous civilian nuclear activities that bring states to the brink of bomb-making. Legally, the NPT is supposed to prevent these troubles. The question is will it? Much depends on what major nuclear powers choose to do regarding their NPT commitments and how smaller, nonnuclear nations view the treaty. Nuclear Danger and the NPT is designed to help clarify what that requires. Earlier this year, NPEC released an occasional paper on the challenges of creating a nuclear weapons-free zone in the Middle East. Such challenges will surely be considered at the upcoming NPT review conference, but there will be more issues up for discussion. Attendees will likely debate the future of U.S. and Russian nuclear sharing arrangements, as well as the limits of what should be considered “peaceful” under the NPT. Iran’s threatened withdrawal from the treaty will also be a concern, as will China’s worries over the potential for Washington to redeploy nuclear weapons to South Korea or for Seoul to acquire its own nuclear weapons. The U.S. delegation is likely to raise complaints about China’s nuclear weapons build up and Beijing’s unwillingness to enter into good faith negotiations on effective nuclear controls. Finally, Russia’s assaults on Ukraine’s civilian nuclear systems and the legitimacy of such assaults are likely to be discussed. Nuclear Danger and the NPT covers all of these topics in depth. For hawks and doves, Washington insiders, and simply concerned citizens, it’s worth reading.
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons, Nonproliferation, Nuclear Energy, and Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT)
Political Geography:: Russia, China, Iran, South Korea, Global Focus, and United States of America

3. China, Russia, and the Coming Cool War

Author:: Henry Sokolski
Publication Date:: 11-2024
Content Type:: Book
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: As the dust settles on the election, one thing is certain: there is going to be increased interest in expanding America’s nuclear arsenal. Whatever the merits of what that move might be, it’s hardly a complete strategy to cope with a long term strategic contest, Russia, China, and their proxies. That will require far more than any adjustment of our nuclear arsenal. What’s required? At the request of several national security officials and outside experts, NPEC is sharing its answer with today’s release of China, Russia, and the Coming Cool War available as an Amazon book. It consists of four chapters. The first sketches out what a long-term contest with China, Russia, and its proxies will demand. Although building up military might and using threats of massive destruction against our enemies were critical to winning the Cold War, in the coming cool contest, they will no longer serve as our top ace in the hole. Instead, the key levers will be keeping our key military, political, and commercial functions immune to attacks and communicating, protecting, sharing, and analyzing essential information on an unprecedented scale. Wars may be waged against nations but the aim increasingly will be to disable them without physically obliterating them. What, though, should we do about the growing nuclear threat? That’s the focus of the book’s next chapter, “Xi and Putin Are Building More Nukes: How to Compete.” It, in turn, is followed by “What Missile-driven Competition with China Will Look Like,” which was first released three years ago. The Pentagon recently confirmed this chapter’s predictions about China’s development of intercontinental conventional missiles by 2030. The chapter’s other forecasts and military and diplomatic proposals are still timely. This brings us to the book’s last chapter, “Can Self-Government Survive the Next Convulsion?” It examines the domestic political, economic, and social implications of pursuing this volume’s recommendations. What’s needed most is a geographic distribution of America’s critical military and financial infrastructure and demographic capital. Fortunately, this has already begun, driven by the COVID-19 pandemic, and aligns with America’s bent to spread and increase political power and wealth domestically. The book’s final section is an appendix consisting of an introduction Thomas Cochran and I co-authored for “China’s Civil Nuclear Sector: Plowshares to Swords?” — a three-year NPEC study of China’s nuclear weapons production potential. The Pentagon has cited this research in each of its annual Chinese military power assessments for the last three years running. The Pentagon has used the study to help explain why China is likely to acquire as many nuclear weapons in a decade as the United States currently has deployed. It was this projection, perhaps more than any other, that caused national security analysts to focus on what is likely to be a long-term strategic contest with China and its new ally, Russia. Paul Bracken, author of The Second Nuclear Age, reviewed the book: “China and Russia’s military buildups have far-reaching political and strategic consequences. Yet the US is not remotely prepared to cope either intellectually or with appropriate hardware. Henry Sokolski takes a major step forward here by analyzing these challenges and what we need to do about them.”
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons, Nonproliferation, Strategic Competition, and AUKUS
Political Geography:: Russia, China, and United States of America

4. Lessons from China: How Soon Could Iran Get the Bomb? (Occasional Paper 2404)

Author:: Hui Zhang
Publication Date:: 12-2024
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: It’s unclear when Iran might get the bomb. In July, Secretary of State Blinken revealed that Iran was only one to two weeks away from producing enough weapons grade uranium for several bombs. The New York Times quoted experts who estimated it would take Iran up to another year to make a missile-deliverable weapon. A conservative estimate would be no more than five months but could be much less. In the attached historical analysis of China’s nuclear weapons program, Hui Zhang pegs the number at three to five weeks, and possibly less. It makes for interesting reading, not only on what China was able to accomplish so quickly sixty years ago, but on what Iran may do.
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons, Weapons, and Nonproliferation
Political Geography:: China and Iran

5. War Game Reveals Chinese Attacks on Communications Could Paralyze Taiwan’s Efforts to Resist

Author:: Henry Sokolski
Publication Date:: 09-2024
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Top security analysts have long noted that if China disables Taiwan’s underseas cable and disrupts its microwave, cell and space-based communications systems, Beijing could secure a smokeless victory over the island. Over the last five to 10 years, however, private commercial space-based communications and internet services have grown dramatically in importance. The critical role of Starlink in supporting Ukrainian military operations amply demonstrates this point. This prompts several policy questions: What national security roles should governments require commercial space service providers to play during a security crisis or war? Should governments set minimum standards for cyber and physical hardening for commercial satcom providers to meet in order to be eligible to compete for government contracts? What is the proper response to repeated “accidental” or deniable assaults on commercial and military space systems? To find out, the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center conducted a space war game that focused on a near-term Taiwan-China scenario. It utilized the talents of current and retired officials, congressional staff, and outside experts to play the game. In the game, China cut communications cables, disrupted microwave and cellular services, attacked Taiwan’s electrical supply system locally and jammed its satellite communications. The United States and its space-faring allies acted slowly. Private space service providers were no quicker. Finally, the President of the United States authorized covert cyberattacks against China’s Beidou satellite ground stations. China responded by launching similar cyberattacks on U.S. GPS systems and the U.S., redoubling its attacks against the Beidou system. With U.S. naval forces closing in to disrupt a Chinese naval quarantine of Taiwan, Beijing called for a mutual ceasefire in exchange for bilateral talks to lock Taiwan’s future as a province of China. The U.S., allies and Taiwan rejected this offer, opening the door for further military escalation. In the hot wash, the players discussed three key findings: Washington, its space-faring allies and industry players must clarify how they might backfill Taiwanese communication systems well before China might try to disable them. The US and its allies must address Taiwan’s lack of legal recognition, which leaves it uniquely vulnerable to offensive Chinese space and terrestrial military actions against Taiwan’s communications systems. Washington and its space-faring allies must develop additional military space options with plausible deniability to deter and counter similar Chinese capabilities. The recommendations paired with each of these findings. Taiwan needs to be more vocal about its communications systems’ vulnerabilities and consider developing mechanisms to disable China’s satellites temporarily, in a deniable manner. The United States should lower the classifications associated with its non-kinetic anti-satellite systems and create an operational working group on space security that includes Taiwan.
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons, Communications, Nonproliferation, and War Games
Political Geography:: China and Taiwan

6. Gaming Israeli Nuclear Use: Pandora Unleashed

Author:: Henry Sokolski
Publication Date:: 02-2024
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: With the continued fighting in Gaza, a nuclear rubicon of sorts has been crossed: Elected Israeli officials — a deputy minister and a ruling party member of Parliament—not only have publicly referenced Israel’s possession of nuclear weapons, but suggested how such weapons might be used to target Gaza. This is unprecedented. More recently, Iran directly attacked an Israeli-manned intelligence outpost in Iraq and publicized a staged missile strike against a mock Israeli air base. Iran also has inched within weeks of making several nuclear weapons and made its military ever more immune to first strikes against its key missile and nuclear facilities. Iran and its proxies also now have long-range, high-precision missiles that can easily reach key Israeli targets. None of these developments is positive. For decades, most security analysts assumed Israel’s undeclared nuclear weapons were only deployed to deter attacks and that Iran would not dare to attack Israel directly. The attached war game report, “Gaming Israeli Nuclear Use: Pandora Unleashed,” directly challenges these assumptions. The game starts in 2027 with Israeli intelligence reporting that Iran is mating nuclear warheads to its long-range missiles. This prompts Israel to ask Washington to collaborate in a conventional military strike against key Iranian nuclear facilities and missile bases. Not wanting to be drawn into a major war with Iran, the United States, however, demurs and instead offers Israel U.S. standoff hypersonic missiles. Several moves later, Israel, isolated and desperate, launches two nuclear strikes against Iran to which Iran replies with a nuclear strike of its own. The game raised several basic questions. Would Israel or Iran conduct further military nuclear operations? Might Israel target Tehran with nuclear weapons? Might Iran target Tel Aviv with nuclear arms? Would Russia or the United States be drawn into the war? These and other unknowns informed the game’s key findings. These included: 1. The strategic uncertainties generated after an Israeli-Iranian nuclear exchange are likely to be at least as fraught as any that might arise before such a clash. 2. Although Israel and Iran might initially avoid the nuclear targeting of innocents, such self-restraint is tenuous. 3. Multilateral support for Israeli security may be essential to deter Israeli nuclear use but will likely hinge on Israeli willingness to discuss regional denuclearization. 4. Little progress is likely in reducing Middle Eastern nuclear threats if the United States continues its public policy of denying knowledge of Israeli nuclear weapons.
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons, Weapons, Nonproliferation, and War Games
Political Geography:: Iran, Middle East, Israel, Palestine, and Gaza

7. Nuclear Verification’s Holy Grail: Verifying Nuclear Warheads — a new approach

Author:: Miles Pomper, William Moon, Marshall Brown, Ferenc Dalnkoki-Veress, Dan Zhukov, Dick Gullickson, and Yanliang Pan
Publication Date:: 12-2024
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: This study is the culmination of four years of work to think through what would be required to track and monitor nuclear warheads in a verification process. It first began in 2021, shortly after President Joe Biden of the United States and President Vladimir Putin of Russia extended the New START Treaty until February 2026; the two presidents also announced the launch of bilateral strategic stability talks. This positive moment in the U.S.-Russian relationship, which became almost unimaginable after the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, was the original impetus for the project. It also launched in the aftermath of the U.S. withdrawal from the Treaty Between the United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics on the Elimination of Their Intermediate-Range and Shorter-Range Missiles, commonly known as the INF Treaty. The Russians had been violating the Treaty with the production and deployment of the 9M729 missile, also known in NATO parlance as the SSC-8. All NATO allies concurred with the withdrawal, which the United States completed in August 2019. The effort began with two strands of activity. The study team knew that when the United States and Russia decided to return to the negotiating table, the United States would place a high priority on seeking direct limits on warheads. Prior treaties had focused on controlling and eliminating missiles but had not focused directly on the warheads that armed them. It had long been a goal of the United States to seek direct limits on warheads, in order to more accurately constrain a Russian preponderance in warheads designated for theaterand shorter-range systems.1 However, if such an agreement were negotiated, the European allies would be ill-equipped to participate. On-site inspections under the INF Treaty had ended on May 31, 2001, so it had been twenty years since the allies had had to participate in verification activities. Most had lost expertise and institutional memory; some had never participated at all. “Raising the IQ” of the NATO allies about participating in arms control implementation was thus the first strand of activity. The second strand grew up around a conviction in the study team that the well-practiced verification techniques that had been exercised in INF and strategic arms control treaties since the 1980s could be augmented with new technology and innovative techniques. Thus emerged the emphasis on using cryptography to underpin a unique warhead tracking system. This work took advantage of some of the finest experts in the field of cryptography at Stanford University, and also the extensive experience gained during the Defense Threat Reduction Agency’s many years of work to strengthen warhead protection, control and accounting in Russian Ministry of Defense nuclear warhead storage facilities. This work, which spanned a period of over fifteen years from 1995- 2013, provided the study team with a great depth of knowledge about the normal operating procedures in Russian military warhead facilities. This deep knowledge was vital to developing a concept for the tracking system, providing it with a realism and accuracy that otherwise would not have been possible. These two strands of work culminated in 2022 in a significant study, “Everything Counts: Building a Control Regime for Non-Strategic Nuclear Warheads in Europe.”2 However, the team realized that only one element of warhead verification had been touched—the broad outlines of a system for maintaining and exchanging information over the life of an agreement. Other verification elements such as on-site inspections and particular verification technologies had not been considered. They therefore resolved to expand the scope of work to imagine an entire closed system for nuclear warhead verification. With the cryptographic element as its foundation, the team reviewed the extensive experience of treaties, agreements and other activities such as exhibitions and joint experiments that had been built up over the many years of U.S.-Soviet and Russian cooperation on nuclear weapons control. From this, they created a comprehensive menu of measures that could be considered for a future warhead control regime, calibrating the measures according to the level of their intrusiveness.
Topic:: Arms Control and Proliferation, Nuclear Weapons, and Nonproliferation
Political Geography:: Russia and United States of America

8. The Future of NATO’s Nuclear Posture and Arms Control in Today’s More Dangerous World

Author:: Miles Pomper, David Santoro, and Nikolai Sokov
Publication Date:: 09-2024
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Since the late 1960s, NATO has sought to balance two objectives—maintaining a strong nuclear deterrent while supporting efforts to buttress strategic stability through arms control and advance nonproliferation and disarmament through the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty process. The success of this strategy was most evident in the dual-track strategy of deployments and negotiations that led to the signing and implementation of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty in 1987. The end of the Cold War also led to substantial cuts in U.S. and Russian strategic systems. Since then, NATO Allies have regularly voiced their support for continuing to pursue these two objectives, including supporting the goal enunciated by U.S. President Barack Obama in 2009 “to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.”1 In the last decade, however, Russia’s malign behavior has undermined NATO arms control efforts to the point that it appears traditional arms control will be effectively dead when the New START agreement—already suspended by Russia—expires in 2026. Russian’s invasion of Ukraine, its repeated nuclear saber-rattling in that conflict, and the deployment of non-strategic nuclear weapons to Belarus has also forced the alliance to look to ways to enhance its deterrence, including its nuclear deterrence. Meanwhile, the massive increase in China’s nuclear arsenal and its growing partnership with Russia, is generating additional pressure to increase U.S. nuclear forces as well as questions about the ability of the U.S. to provide extended deterrence simultaneously to Allies in Europe and Asia. Those doubts have been reinforced by political developments in the United States—and in the war in Ukraine—that have raised anxieties about a decoupling of European and U.S. deterrence and defense and led to fresh discussion of a potential “Eurodeterrent.” Meanwhile, developments in North Korea and Iran—and their increasingly close ties with Moscow—further threaten the viability of the already shaky nuclear and missile nonproliferation regimes and have eroded longstanding cooperation between Washington and Moscow to manage nuclear nonproliferation risks in third countries. In response to these developments, Allies and experts, such as the Congressional Strategic Posture Commission, have proposed various adaptations to the alliance’s nuclear posture, including to its nuclear sharing arrangements. This report examines these deterrence proposals, particularly considering how they support the alliance’s other longstanding objectives of arms control, disarmament, and nonproliferation. The paper begins with some background on US/NATO nuclear policy from the end of the Cold War to the further invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. It then delves into changes in Russian nuclear doctrine, Moscow’s nuclear behavior during the Ukraine War, and the Kremlin’s views on future arms control. The report next discusses China’s nuclear modernization and views on arms control and the reaction among NATO and Asian Allies and the international community to these changes. It then discusses potential future U.S. and NATO posture options, including those already being undertaken by NATO or proposed by the US. Congressional Strategic Posture Commission and the State Department’s International Security Advisory Board. It concludes with an analysis of the potential impact of various options on arms control, disarmament, and nonproliferation and offers some policy recommendations.
Topic:: NATO, Arms Control and Proliferation, and Nonproliferation
Political Geography:: Russia, China, Europe, and United States of America

9. Russia, The Global South and Multilateral Nuclear Diplomacy after the Invasion of Ukraine

Author:: Hanna Notte
Publication Date:: 05-2024
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 had a detrimental impact on multilateral nuclear diplomacy. The war caused an earthquake in procedure, paralyzing processes at the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations First Committee, and meetings dealing with the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. This was the case even as Russia’s nuclear saber-rattling and occupation of Ukrainian nuclear power plants, and Europe’s recommitment to nuclear weapons, demonstrated the ongoing need for nuclear dialogue. States from the Global South tended to navigate cautiously vis-à-vis Russia across the multilateral nuclear negotiating forums. Amid greater difficulties in forging common positions on nuclear issues related to the Ukraine war, these states were also frustrated with what they perceived as a deprioritization of their interests in multilateral nuclear diplomacy. Western states, especially during the first year of the war, were seen as exercising unwelcome pressure on the Global South to take sides against Russia. Russia, meanwhile, pursued a dual strategy, undermining nonproliferation efforts and chipping away at trust in legacy institutions, while also leveraging these forums in pursuit of greater alignment with states in the Global South. The implications of these different dynamics for the health of the nuclear order may take some time to fully play out, but will likely be profound.
Topic:: Diplomacy, Nuclear Weapons, Nonproliferation, Multilateralism, and Russia-Ukraine War
Political Geography:: Russia, Global Focus, and Global South

10. Prescription for Military Paralysis: Wartime Reactor Meltdowns (Occasional Paper 2305)

Author:: Henry Sokolski
Publication Date:: 06-2023
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: More than 15 months into the war, Russian attacks against Ukraine’s nuclear plants have yet to release any radiation. As the likelihood of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant reopening quickly declines and Putin’s desire to distract the world from his declining political and military standing increases, some experts fear he may want to induce a radiological release from the plant. In any case, Putin’s military assaults against the Zaporizhzhia plant have already set a worrying precedent. Last December, NPEC held a wargame, the results of which The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists just published, to examine what might happen in a future Russian invasion of Ukraine. In this reinvasion in 2037, Russia targets power reactors in Ukraine, Poland, and Romania. The United States plans to build scores of new reactors in these countries. What if Russian missiles targeted them in a future war? NPEC tapped the expertise of Ukrainians, Romanians, NATO officials, Poles, US security experts, and Hill staff to find out. It hosted five sessions over two weeks and ran a three-move wargame. The game’s play revealed how the uncertainties and dangers of military attacks against nuclear power plants can paralyze decision-making and fundamentally alter the course of wars. The military disruptions these uncertainties introduce may far outstrip the safety issues any reactor radiological release might otherwise present. The game’s play revealed three reasons why.
Topic:: Security, NATO, Military Affairs, Nonproliferation, War Games, Nuclear Energy, and Russia-Ukraine War
Political Geography:: Russia, Europe, and Ukraine

11. Commercial Satellite Use Catalyzes Nuclear-Armed States to Combat: A Wargame After-Action Report (Occasional Paper 2306)

Author:: Henry Sokolski
Publication Date:: 10-2023
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Recent reports of Elon Musk’s refusal to allow Ukraine to use his satellites to help it mount strikes against Russian military targets in Crimea pose a basic question: Just how sustainable might military use of commercial satellites be? So far, the United States and other spacefaring nations have deferred or taken a hands-off approach to dealing with this issue. When it comes to space, states are roughly where they were with sea power in the 1600s and air power before World War I: dramatic acts of air war and naval piracy were about to ensue, but instituting national or international regulation hardly seemed urgent… until they were. How prepared are we to deal with such a transition in space? Can we keep non-state and state actors from using space to intensify the pace of military air and ground operations? Or are space Lusitanias, in which the world’s major powers get dragged into wars, more likely? To find out, the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center (NPEC) designed and conducted a wargame this summer tailored to this purpose. SpaceNews published the game’s results (see below). The game’s play begins in 2027 with a Pakistani terrorist group’s hijacking of “commercial” Chinese satellite services to mount an attack against an Indian nuclear base. The terrorists’ aim is to drag Pakistan into a war with India to help decide the status of Kashmir. Through a number of twists and turns, the game ends with intensified ground operations between Pakistan and India and China and the United States engaging in space combat against a set of each others’ commercial space satellites. Are we ready for this future? The short answer is no. The long answer can be teased from the game’s report and its key takeaways below.
Topic:: Defense Policy, Nuclear Weapons, Weapons, Space, War Games, Satellite, and Russia-Ukraine War
Political Geography:: South Asia and Asia

12. Space: America's New Strategic Front Line

Author:: Henry D. Sokolski
Publication Date:: 10-2023
Content Type:: Book
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Last week, the Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States released its final report. Although Congress tasked it to assess the role of space systems in America’s strategic posture, the commission dedicated less than a half-page of its 160-page review to this matter. Of its 20 pages of specific recommendations, the commission made none on space. This seems odd. As China and Russia build up their nuclear arsenals well beyond what America has deployed, the cost and impracticality of quantitatively countering these threats only grows. The commission report rightly recommends the United States make its strategic nuclear forces less vulnerable to a potential first strike. But what of the argument that to do this America and its allies must be able to stun or disable its adversaries’ military eyes, ears, voices, and nervous systems both on Earth and in space? Those who argue this maintain that if America commands space, it can be assured of victory in war and, better yet, be able to deter conflicts. Does it follow that if America and its allies lose assured command of space, acquiring more and better nuclear weapons may be for naught? What does securing command of space demand? What would it enable our military to do? What space capabilities are our key space adversary — China — and our key Asian allies—Japan and South Korea — planning to employ? What will implementing America’s current space strategy entail and cost? What might alternatives to this strategy entail? Which, if any, space capacities and military actions does the Outer Space Treaty (to which Russia, China, the United States, and most states in Asia and Europe are parties) allow or prohibit? Can these limits be enforced? What can space war simulations do to help get the answers? NPEC commissioned some of the nation’s top military and legal space experts to examine these issues. It then held a series of space simulations to test their answers out. The result, which my staff and I are releasing today, is a 354-page volume, Space: America’s New Strategic Front Line (introduction below). It features insights from space policy experts and practitioners and more than suggests that strategic deterrence will depend on securing space superiority.
Topic:: Security, Defense Policy, Nuclear Weapons, Nonproliferation, and Space
Political Geography:: Russia, Japan, China, South Korea, North America, and United States of America

13. A Middle East Free of Weapons of Mass Destruction: A Utopia?

Author:: Pierre Goldschmidt
Publication Date:: 11-2023
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Earlier this summer, well before Hamas launched its raids against Israel, Pierre Goldschmidt, the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA’s) former Deputy Director for Safeguards, sent me an analysis of how to approach creating a nuclear weapons free zone in the Middle East. I agreed to publish it along with a commentary by Ariel Levite, the former Deputy Director of Israel’s Atomic Energy Commission. The result is the attached occasional paper, “A Middle East Free of Weapons of Mass Destruction: A Utopia?” The greater Middle East is at a critical juncture. Either the number of states in the region having nuclear weapons or nuclear weapons options will grow or the number will be frozen and decline. Saudi Arabia, Iran, the UAE, Turkey, Egypt, and Algeria will either become Israel’s nuclear equal (or come within weeks of doing so) or they will forgo the option. In any case, creating a nuclear weapons free zone in the region has been promoted for nearly a half-century and is sure to be an issue in the upcoming Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty Review Conference and Preparatory Committee meetings scheduled through 2026. Yet, many analysts have dismissed going to zero nuclear weapons in the region as being unrealistic. Certainly, with Israel so embattled, any movement toward creating a zone now will take even longer. On the other hand, current developments suggest time may not be on our side. Less than a month after Hamas’ first incursions, not one, but two elected Israeli parliamentarians, including a junior member of Israel’s cabinet, publicly recommended Israel use its nuclear weapons against Hamas in Gaza. Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince has fielded growing concerns that Iran might quickly get nuclear weapons by repeating his earlier public threat to acquire nuclear weapons if Tehran does. In an effort to deflect this threat and to “stabilize” the region, the Biden Administration wants the Saudis to join the Abraham Accords. As a part of any such deal, the Crown Prince, though, has demanded that the United States green-light Saudi efforts to pursue a “peaceful” uranium enrichment program. This would effectively give the Kingdom a nuclear weapons option and would catalyze nuclear hedging throughout the greater Middle East. It’s unclear if such racing can be curbed. Pierre Goldschmidt lays out an alternative incremental approach toward creating a weapons free zone in the region. Ariel Levite clarifies many of the serious reservations about proceeding now that most Israelis would likely have. Each makes points worth our attention. The hurdles are real but so are the risks of not trying to surmount them.
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons, Weapons of Mass Destruction, and Nonproliferation
Political Geography:: Iran, Middle East, Israel, Palestine, and United States of America

14. Dangerous Decline: Russia’s Military and Security Influence in the Global South and the Implications for the United States

Author:: Hanna Notte
Publication Date:: 11-2023
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: This study argues that Russia seeks to boost its military and security influence in the Global South in light of what it considers a protracted, systemic confrontation with Western states. Russia’s capacity to accrue such influence will vary considerably by domain and country. The war against Ukraine and its effects on Russia’s economy, technology base, and reputation are shaping demand and supply side factors—what states in the Global South want from Russia, and what Russia can offer. Though Russian power projection in the Global South will be limited, the impact of Moscow’s actions on U.S. strategic interests will not be trivial.
Topic:: Security, Foreign Policy, Nonproliferation, and Russia-Ukraine War
Political Geography:: Russia, United States of America, and Global South

15. Radiological Security in Contested Territories

Author:: Margarita Kalinina-Pohl, Artem Lazarev, Miles Pomper, George Moore, and Edward Kendall
Publication Date:: 02-2023
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Radioactive materials, such as cesium-137 and cobalt-60, are located in more than 100 countries and in every region of the world. They are used widely for medical, scientific, and industrial purposes—but can also be used maliciously as key ingredients in radiological dispersal devices (RDDs), the most notorious type of which is known as a “dirty bomb” which disperses radiological material using explosives. Though responsibility for the development and enforcement of regulations pertaining to the safety, security, and full cycle management of radioactive sources rests with state authorities, thousands of radioactive sources today exist in areas without the clear presence of a state. Such areas are often characterized by conflict and rampant criminal activity as a result of weak or nonexistent governance. Radioactive material located in these contested or poorly governed territories poses a serious risk for regional and global security, as they could be trafficked illegally and used in an RDD or for other malicious purposes anywhere in the world. International and regional organizations face a range of political and legal challenges in helping secure radioactive materials in contested territories since the sources in question are often found beyond the de facto or de jure control of UN-recognized states. Addressing the safety and security of these materials requires stakeholders to navigate uncharted legal issues and play creative roles to secure or transport these materials into safer areas. This report covers one of the few success stories involving the removal or elimination of dangerous radioactive sources from a contested territory. It describes and assesses the lessons learned from the Republic of Moldova’s removal of approximately 2,700 disused radioactive sources and materials from the breakaway region of Transdniestria. Though these materials were located in a territory that is not de facto governed by an International Atomic Energy Agency member state, creative diplomacy by the Republic of Moldova, the Pridnestrovian Moldovan Republic (the unrecognized authorities in Transdniestria), the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), and other key stakeholders contributed to the success of this removal operation. The report describes these diplomatic efforts and analyzes the significant political, legal, and technical factors that contributed to the success of this multiyear mission. While recognizing that each country and conflict is unique, we hope that this case study can serve as a successful model of cooperation and confidence building for reducing radiological risks in contested territories around the world.
Topic:: Arms Control and Proliferation, Nuclear Weapons, Nonproliferation, and Radiological Weapons
Political Geography:: Global Focus

16. Present Danger: Nuclear Power Plants in War

Author:: Henry Sokolski
Publication Date:: 10-2022
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: After Russia’s unprecedented seizure of Ukraine’s nuclear plant at Zaporizhzhya, the United States needs to adjust its military planning and policies to cope with hostile military forces’ targeting, seizure, and garrisoning of armed forces at large operating nuclear plants and clarify its policies regarding possible US targeting of such plants. This article is the first to analyze these concerns. It compares Russia’s assaults with previous strikes against research reactors and nonoperating nuclear plants in the Middle East and clarifies what new military measures and policies will be needed to cope with military operations against large, operating nuclear plants. US Army and Pentagon officials, as well as military and civilian staff, will discover ways to mitigate and reduce future military harm to civilians in war zones and understand the operational implications of military assaults on and seizures of civilian nuclear facilities.
Topic:: Energy Policy, Military Strategy, Nuclear Power, and Russia-Ukraine War
Political Geography:: Russia, Europe, and Ukraine

17. Blocking the Gateways to Nuclear Disorder in the Middle East

Author:: John Spacapan
Publication Date:: 09-2022
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: This study will explain how the United States and like-minded states can still stop, or at least significantly slow down, the bomb’s spread in the Middle East. The historical record as well as the current intentions of potential proliferators in the region suggests this is possible, but Washington will need to start planning now. The three case countries of this monograph – Iran, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia – are all taking aggressive steps toward nuclearization.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Defense Policy, Arms Control and Proliferation, Nuclear Weapons, and Military Strategy
Political Geography:: Middle East

18. Arresting Nuclear Adventurism: China, Article VI, and the NPT

Author:: Henry Sokolski and Andrea Beck
Publication Date:: 06-2022
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Given the current crisis in Ukraine, it’s tempting to consider focusing on Chinese compliance with the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) to be an academic indulgence. Giving into this inclination, however, would be a mistake. As dangerous as Russia currently is, China will be more threatening in the long run. As we are learning with Russia’s violation of the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, enforcing binding understandings is critical lest violators run roughshod over law and good order. This is true with Russia’s behavior in Ukraine. It is no less so with China’s nuclear weapons buildup and its repeated refusal to join in good faith negotiations to limit its nuclear weapons activities, which is required by Article VI of the NPT. This buildup and refusal clearly flies in the face of China’s legal NPT obligations. The question is what might bring Beijing back into compliance. To get the answers, NPEC held a battery of workshops last fall, followed by a week-long diplomatic simulation. The game participants included U.S., Japanese, and Australian former and current officials and staff as well as outside experts. The group concluded that Beijing is unlikely to comply willingly with the NPT anytime soon, but that U.S. and international security would still be best served by spotlighting Beijing’s nuclear adventurism and suggesting diplomatic off-ramps to arrest its nuclear buildup.
Topic:: Arms Control and Proliferation, Diplomacy, Military Strategy, Peace, and Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT)
Political Geography:: Russia, China, Europe, Ukraine, and Asia

19. Keeping Secrets

Author:: Henry Sokolski
Publication Date:: 05-2022
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: With Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, Americans have had a ringside seat at one of the most unusual of presidential shows: President Joe Biden publicly divulging some of our nation’s most protected, secret insights on what Vladimir Putin and his military might be planning. Some have criticized this; most think it has prevented Putin from controlling the war’s narrative. If we are lucky, it could be part of a more important movement toward liberalizing the use and sharing of intelligence. America and its allies could finally be progressing from a vision of war first theorized a hundred years ago. That violent and indiscriminate vision was fully realized with the city-busting aerial attacks of World War II. Ever since, we have believed that being able to decimate a nation’s military, industrial, and demographic capital promises deterrence in peace and quick victories in war. Today, this vision is being slowly supplanted with weaponry and tactics that can target terror precisely, in order to disable nations without decimating them.
Topic:: Defense Policy, Military Strategy, Classification, and Secrecy
Political Geography:: North America and United States of America

20. An Oral History of the Arms Control and Regional Security (ACRS) Working Group

Author:: Hanna Notte and Chen Kane
Publication Date:: 01-2022
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: The full research report on the Oral History of the Arms Control and Regional Security (ACRS) Working Group is now available to read and download. The report, authored by Dr. Hanna Notte and Dr. Chen Kane, draws on archival documents and interviews with working group participants to piece together a comprehensive account of the series of ACRS multilateral and bilateral meetings which took place in the early 1990s between states and entities in the Middle East. Dr. Notte and Dr. Kane conducted and compiled dozens of oral history interviews with diplomats and officials who participated in the ACRS multilateral meetings in the early 1990s, following on the heels of the Madrid Conference of 1991. Transcripts of these oral history interviews, the transcript of a critical oral history roundtable on ACRS (convened in November 2021), and previously-unpublished documents on ACRS from US Presidential archives and private collections of American diplomats, are all freely available in a new digital archive, ACRS Oral History Project, hosted on the Wilson Center’s website.
Topic:: Arms Control and Proliferation, Nonproliferation, Oral History, and Regional Security
Political Geography:: North America and United States of America

21. Grim Prospect: Low-Yield Nuclear Weapons in the Middle East

Author:: Eva M. Lisowski
Publication Date:: 05-2021
Content Type:: Research Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was formed in 1957 to promote the peaceful use of nuclear energy and to inspect civilian nuclear materials and activities to deter military diversions. To decide the frequency of inspections and inspection criteria, the IAEA set its safeguard standards with the objective of assuring “timely detection of diversion of significant quantities of nuclear material from peaceful nuclear activities to the manufacture of nuclear weapons.” The two nuclear weapon designs developed and detonated during World War II were the “gun-type” and “implosion” designs. Because implosion device technology requires much less fissile material than guntype technology, the IAEA significant quantity6 (SQ) values were determined based on the fissile material requirements of nuclear implosion devices like the plutonium-based “Fat Man” detonated over Nagasaki in 1945. Utilizing implosion designs perfected in the late 1940s, however, the explosive yields achieved in 1945 can be produced with much less fissile material. Table 1 lists the fissile material requirements of contemporary nuclear weapon technology. “Low Technical Capability” in Table 1 refers to the Mark III implosion device set off at Nagasaki. “Medium Technical Capability” refers to implosion designs perfected in the late 1940s and “High Technical Capability” in Table 1 refers to the implosion technologies the United States perfected in the 1950s.
Topic:: Arms Control and Proliferation, Nuclear Weapons, Science and Technology, Nonproliferation, Nuclear Energy, and International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
Political Geography:: Middle East

22. Space and Missile Wars: What Awaits

Author:: Henry D. Sokolski
Publication Date:: 04-2021
Content Type:: Book
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Sometimes, slow, steady changes produce revolutionary results. A case in point is missile and space technologies, which Space and Missile Wars: What Awaits will examine. Long-range missiles, satellites, and space launch vehicles used to be high technology exclusive to the superpowers. Now, scores of states have both. As for ballistic missiles and drones, even non-state actors have them, and these systems are far more accurate than anything the superpowers had even at the height of the Cold War. Then, long-range missiles could only be certain of destroying their targets if they were nuclear-armed and wiped out areas as large as cities. Now, drones are so accurate they can pinpoint and kill single individuals. As for space satellite launchers, they originally were derived from nuclear delivery missiles. None were privately owned. Similarly, almost all space satellites were government property and, until 1965, the owners were only American and Soviet. Now, the French, Chinese, Japanese, British, Indians, Israelis, Ukrainians, Iranians, and North Koreans have all launched satellites of their own. In addition, more than 60 nations own and operate their own satellites and increasingly, satellites are launched, owned, and operated entirely by private entities. These developments are nontrivial. They will define the military competitions with China, Russia, and other hostile states for the next two to three decades. Will the spread of accurate missiles embolden weak actors – small states and terrorist organizations – to threaten stronger states with missile attacks against key civilian targets (dams, reactors, petrochemical plants)? Will weak actors be tempted to use accurate drones to assassinate their adversaries’ key leaders? Will such attacks catalyze war, producing modern Sarajevos that draw in nuclear-armed states (e.g. Israel, Pakistan, India, North Korea, or the superpowers)? With so many new space actors, will anyone be able to attribute hostile actions in space? Will states attack satellites mostly in low Earth orbit or geosynchronous orbit? Will the most important attacks come from antisatellite systems based on Earth, in low Earth orbit, or on or near the moon? This volume is designed to answer these questions.
Topic:: Arms Control and Proliferation, Nuclear Weapons, Science and Technology, Non State Actors, Military Affairs, Drones, Nonproliferation, Space, Missile Defense, Satellite, and Nuclear Energy
Political Geography:: Global Focus

23. China's Civil Nuclear Sector: Plowshares to Swords?

Author:: Henry D. Sokolski
Publication Date:: 03-2021
Content Type:: Research Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Although much has been said about the fusion of China’s civilian and military sectors, no detailed, unclassified analysis has been done of how Beijing’s “peaceful” nuclear efforts might be exploited to make more nuclear warheads. Even the U.S. Department of Energy’s own explanations of the export restrictions it imposed on “advanced” nuclear exports to China failed to discuss this. This volume is dedicated to clarifying just what the connection could be. Much of it focuses on China’s advanced fast breeder reactor program and its related plutonium recycling efforts. As explained in this volume’s first chapter, “How Many Nuclear Warheads China Might Acquire by 2030,” the least burdensome way for China to achieve nuclear weapons parity with the United States is simply to use the weaponsgrade plutonium that its planned “peaceful” fast breeder reactor and reprocessing programs will produce to make primaries for the two-stage thermonuclear weapons designs they already have perfected. By exploiting this weapons plutonium and the highly enriched uranium and tritium that China can easily access or make, Beijing by 2030 could conservatively assemble an arsenal of 1,270 warheads (nearly as many as the US currently has deployed on its intercontinental missiles).
Topic:: Arms Control and Proliferation, Nuclear Weapons, Science and Technology, Military Affairs, Nonproliferation, Missile Defense, Denuclearization, and Nuclear Energy
Political Geography:: United States and China

24. New Frontiers for Security Cooperation with Seoul and Tokyo

Author:: Henry D. Sokolski
Publication Date:: 02-2021
Content Type:: Research Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: With a new Democratic administration, Washington is almost certain to moderate its demands that Japan and South Korea pay more for American forces on their soil. This should ease tensions with Seoul to Tokyo. To strengthen security relations with Japan and South Korea, though, more will be required. Rather than simply increase their conventional military deployments, Washington, Seoul, and Tokyo will need to collaborate in new ways to enhance allied security. This will entail working more closely on new military frontiers, such as enhancing allied command of outer and cyber space as well as in underwater warfare. Washington, Seoul, and Tokyo will also want to carve out new functional areas of cooperation to make existing energy sources more secure, communications more reliable, data sharing easier and safer, and allied economic assistance to developing nations in strategic zones more effective. Enhanced collaboration in each of these areas has begun but is not yet locked in or fully institutionalized. It should be. Washington, Seoul, and Tokyo need one another to deal with China and North Korea. Yet, how each currently strategically views Beijing and Pyongyang differs. Nor is America’s preferred military approach to deterring Chinese and North Korean adventurism — by preventing Beijing and Pyongyang from projecting military strikes against their neighbors — all that easy to achieve. Adding new, more tractable items to America’s Asian security alliance agenda won’t immediately eliminate these misalignments. But it will strengthen the security ties they have as liberal democracies — bonds Beijing and Pyongyang are straining to fray.
Topic:: International Cooperation, Nuclear Weapons, Science and Technology, International Security, Military Affairs, Cyberspace, and Nuclear Energy
Political Geography:: United States, Japan, China, and South Korea

25. Dealing Preventively with NPT Withdrawal

Author:: Pierre Goldschmidt
Publication Date:: 01-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Since it came into force in 1970, the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) has worked remarkably well to prevent the horizontal proliferation of nuclear weapons. The one major exception is North Korea, which withdrew from the NPT in 2003. Despite this track record of success, the stability of the current non-proliferation regime could be significantly undermined by further withdrawals by countries such as Iran. The right of states to withdraw from the NPT is clearly stated in the Treaty. Article X.1 provides that: “Each Party shall in exercising its national sovereignty have the right to withdraw from the Treaty if it decides that extraordinary events, related to the subject matter of this Treaty, have jeopardized the supreme interests of its country. It shall give notice of such withdrawal to all other parties to the Treaty and to the United Nations Security Council three months in advance. Such notice shall include a statement of the extraordinary events it regards as having jeopardized its supreme interests.” Since it is impossible to deny the right of states parties to withdraw from the NPT, it is all the more important to put in place appropriate preventive measures to dissuade withdrawal from the Treaty. The urgency of dealing preventively with NPT withdrawal increases as more nonnuclear-weapon states are poised to become “nuclear threshold states.”1 As the IAEA reported in 2008: “Much of the sensitive information coming from the [Abdul Qadeer Khan] network existed in electronic form, enabling easier use and dissemination. This includes information that relates to uranium centrifuge enrichment and, more disturbing, information that relates to nuclear weapon design.”2 and: “a substantial amount of sensitive information related to the fabrication of a nuclear weapon was available to members of the network."3 The widespread dissemination of this type of scientific and technical information raises the prospect that more states will acquire the capability to manufacture nuclear weapons and their means of delivery, thus increasing the
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons, Treaties and Agreements, Disarmament, and Nonproliferation
Political Geography:: Iran, Middle East, North America, and United States of America

26. North Korea’s Nuclear Program: The Early Days, 1984–2002

Author:: Torrey Froscher
Publication Date:: 02-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: The North Korean nuclear program has been a major intelligence and policy challenge for more than 30 years. Former Secretary of Defense Bill Perry described the problem as “perhaps the most unsuccessful exercise of diplomacy in our country’s history.”1 Donald Gregg, who was CIA station chief in Seoul as well as US ambassador to South Korea, called North Korea the “longest running intelligence failure in the history of American espionage.”2 To be fair, Gregg was referring specifically to a lack of success in recruiting human sources—not necessarily errors in specific or overall assessments. Nonetheless, his comment underscores the difficulty of figuring out what North Korea is up to. In 2005, the Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD), which was convened to investigate the failed 2002 national intelligence estimate on Iraqi WMD capabilities, indicated that we know “disturbingly little about the weapons programs and even less about the intentions of many of our most dangerous adversaries,”3 presumably including North Korea. Today we know a lot more about North Korea’s nuclear program— but mostly it is what they want us to know. Pyongyang has conducted six nuclear tests. We know that North Korea has nuclear weapons, a significant fissile material production capacity, and an ambitious nuclear and missile development effort. These programs are completely unconstrained. The United States has tried many approaches to deal with the problem over the years, and intelligence has played a key role in support. Are there lessons to be learned from this experience? Obviously, it’s a very big question and I will sketch out just a few thoughts, mostly from an intelligence perspective: What we knew and when and how we thought about the problem. North Korea was one of many issues I worked on as an analyst and manager in CIA until my retirement in 2006. The views that follow are my own, of course, and the specific information is drawn from the extensive public literature on the issue, as well as declassified intelligence documents.
Topic:: Diplomacy, Intelligence, Nuclear Weapons, and History
Political Geography:: Asia, North Korea, and United States of America

27. The NPT turns 50: Will it get to 60?

Author:: Henry Sokolski
Publication Date:: 02-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: In the next decade, it is all too likely that the past success of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in preventing the further spread of nuclear weapons among the world’s nations will be reversed. Three trends make more proliferation likely. First is the decay of nuclear taboos. Second, and arguably worse, is renewed vertical proliferation—the increase in size and sophistication of nuclear arsenals by states that already have them. Third, the technical information to fuel nuclear breakouts and ramp-ups is more available now than in the past. These trends toward increased proliferation are not yet facts. The author describes three steps the international community could take to save the NPT: making further withdrawals from the NPT unattractive; clamping down on the uneconomical stockpiling and civilian use of nuclear weapons materials (plutonium and highly enriched uranium); and giving real meaning to efforts to limit the threats that existing nuclear weapons pose.
Topic:: Arms Control and Proliferation, Nuclear Weapons, Treaties and Agreements, Nuclear Power, Disarmament, and Nonproliferation
Political Geography:: Russia, North Korea, Global Focus, and United States of America

28. Understanding and Reducing Military Vulnerabilities of Civilian Nuclear Plants: The Case for the Northeast Asia

Author:: Jungmin Kang
Publication Date:: 05-2020
Content Type:: Case Study
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: A Fukushima-like nuclear accident does not have to be caused by nature. Similar results could be wrought by military attack that disabled its safety systems, including cooling and power systems of nuclear power plants (NPPs). This study shows hypothetical releases from a core meltdown or spent fuel pool fire of NPPs occurred by military attack such as missile attacks in some of Northeast Asia countries, with atmospheric dispersion and deposition calculations using the HYSPLIT code with historical meteorological data for the region.
Topic:: Energy Policy, Science and Technology, Nuclear Power, and Crisis Management
Political Geography:: Japan, Asia, and Korea

29. Improving the Role of Intelligence in Counterproliferation Policymaking: Report of the "Speaking Truth to Nonproliferation Project," 2018

Author:: Henry Sokolski
Publication Date:: 03-2019
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: This report is the culmination of a two-year project sponsored by the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center, which engaged more than 50 senior, retired and serving policymakers, intelligence officers, and top academic national security analysts. Its findings are based on hours of group discussions and private conversations that helped develop new primary histories of eight nuclear proliferation cases: India, Pakistan, Israel, Taiwan, South Korea, Libya, and an Argentine and a separate South African nuclear rocket case. Each history was prepared by an academic historian and was based on open sources. Former officials who had direct roles in these cases then critiqued these accounts. Additional private interviews were conducted with participants to fill in historical gaps. The purpose of the case studies was to identify when and how intelligence shaped or prompted nonproliferation policy actions and, if it did not, why. This set of historical conclusions prompted a more general discussion of how policy and intelligence officials might improve their collaboration to prevent and curb further nuclear proliferation and how academics might contribute by enhancing their treatment of such issues. The project addressed three broad, related questions: How can the role of intelligencein the making of nonproliferation policy be improved? How can the nonproliferation agenda get the priority it deserves? How can the nonproliferation community be sustained and strengthened?
Topic:: Arms Control and Proliferation, Intelligence, Nuclear Weapons, History, Nuclear Power, and Nonproliferation
Political Geography:: Pakistan, Africa, South Asia, Middle East, India, Israel, Taiwan, Asia, South Korea, Libya, South Africa, Argentina, South America, and North Africa

30. Commerical Space: Space Controls and the Invisible Hand

Author:: Brian G. Chow
Publication Date:: 06-2019
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: This article reviewed three major projections of the global space industry by Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and Bank of America Merrill Lynch and extracted the trands that would significantly impact the design of both the domestic and international space traffic management (STM) schemes. If found that, in the next two decades, the United States will have the largest market share in practically every space industrial sector. It suggests how the United States, as well as the West, can use its market power to incentivize Russia and Chinna to fall in line with a STM that provides peace and prosperity to all. It also proposed five measures as building blocks for developing standards, practices, regulations and laws for such STM.
Topic:: Science and Technology, Space, Public Sector, and Private Sector
Political Geography:: Russia, China, Eurasia, Asia, North America, and United States of America

31. Future Space Controls and the Invisible Hand

Author:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center and American Bar Association Standing Committee on Law and National Security
Publication Date:: 09-2019
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: The Nonproliferation Policy Education Center (NPEC) and the American Bar Association Standing Committee on Law and National Security (SCOLNS) held a law and policy workshop on Thursday, June 20, 2019. The workshop was the second collaboration between NPEC and SCOLNS, and it concerned the legal and policy issues that are emergin as space becomes increasingly commercialized and accesible. As the emerging space domain presents new challenges and opportunities, it is the hope of SCOLNS and NPEC that this report will guide future legal and policy decisions. The workshop sought to address a series of questions regarding national security challenges in space: Commercial Space: What will be profitable and when? Future Undesirable Space Conjunctions: Who is and should be liable? Insuring Against Unwanted Space Conjunctions: What new norms, regulations, laws, and understanding might be desirable? The workshop was comprised of experts from NPEC, SCOLNS, the U.S. Air Force, the Defense Intelligence Agency, the Department of Commece, the Department of States, nonprofits, think tanks, academia, and private companies and individuals. The discussion was governed under Chatham House rules, and therefore ideas and group affiliations from the workshop were not attributed to specific individuals.
Topic:: Science and Technology, Law, Space, Public Sector, Norms, and Private Sector
Political Geography:: Global Focus

32. Intelligence and Policy Community Cooperation in the Libya WMD Disarmament Case

Author:: William H. Tobey
Publication Date:: 10-2018
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: As the Trump Administration prepares to negotiate with North Korea, a question has arisen as to what model Washington should follow. National Security Advisor John Bolton has suggested that the Libyan nuclear case represents the best example to emulate. Given the violence Libya suffered after it disarmed, this recommendation provoked criticism, not only from the North Korean government, but a number of American analysts. Anticipating the importance of this case, NPEC commissioned William Tobey, former Deputy Administrator for Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation at the National Nuclear Security Administration, to write a primary history. Mr. Tobey served on the National Security Council in the Bush (43) Administration when the Libyan nuclear case was being worked.
Topic:: Intelligence, International Affairs, and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: Libya

33. Avoiding a Nuclear Wild, Wild West in the Middle East

Author:: Henry Sokolski (ed)
Publication Date:: 05-2018
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: With the Trump Administration’s announcement last fall that it intended to negotiate a civil nuclear cooperative agreement with Saudi Arabia, a debate has ensued over how restrictive any such agreement should be over the enrichment of uranium and the reprocessing of plutonium. These nuclear activities can bring a country within weeks of making its first batch of bombs. This announcement immediately raised the question, how much economic sense it made for Saudi Arabia to invest in nuclear power. It also raised a number of security questions. Should the United States allow Riyadh to reprocess and enrich even though these activities could bring Saudi Arabia within weeks of acquiring nuclear weapons? If Washington acceded to this demand by Riyadh, what would be the implications for the terms of nuclear cooperation with the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Jordan, Turkey, and Morocco? How would such an agreement impact efforts to tighten the terms of our nuclear understanding with Iran? Would such a permissive deal with Riyadh make it more difficult to say no to Seoul’s demand that we allow them to enrich uranium? All of these questions and more are discussed in this volume’s four sections
Topic:: International Affairs and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: Middle East

34. Alternative East Asian Nuclear Futures, Volume I: Military Scenarios

Author:: Henry D. Sokolski
Publication Date:: 06-2018
Content Type:: Book
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: The 13 chapters contained in this book’s two volumes were prompt-ed by a single inquiry in 2012 from the MacArthur Foundation. Was there any way, I was asked, to further clarify the economic and nonproliferation downsides if further production of civilian pluto-nium proceeded in East Asia? My initial reply was no. So much already had been done.But the more I thought about it, two things that had yet to be at-tempted emerged. The first was any serious analysis of just how bad things could get militarily if Japan and South Korea acquired nuclear weapons and North Korea and Mainland China ramped up their own production of such arms. Such nuclear proliferation had long been assumed to be undesirable but nobody had specified how such proliferation might play out militarily. Second, no serious consideration had yet been given to how East Asia might be able to prosper economically without a massive buildup of civilian nucle-ar power. Since each of the key nations in East Asia—China, the Koreas, and Japan—all would likely exploit their civilian nuclear energy infrastructure to acquire their first bombs or to make more, such inattention seemed odd.
Topic:: Arms Control and Proliferation, Nuclear Weapons, Science and Technology, Military Affairs, Nuclear Power, and Nonproliferation
Political Geography:: United States, Japan, China, North Korea, and Global Focus

35. Alternative East Asian Nuclear Futures, Volume II: Energy Scenarios

Author:: Henry D. Sokolski
Publication Date:: 06-2018
Content Type:: Book
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: The 13 chapters contained in this book’s two volumes were prompt- ed by a single inquiry in 2012 from the MacArthur Foundation. Was there any way, I was asked, to further clarify the economic and nonproliferation downsides if further production of civilian pluto- nium proceeded in East Asia? My initial reply was no. So much already had been done.But the more I thought about it, two things that had yet to be at- tempted emerged. The first was any serious analysis of just how bad things could get militarily if Japan and South Korea acquired nuclear weapons and North Korea and Mainland China ramped up their own production of such arms. Such nuclear proliferation had long been assumed to be undesirable but nobody had specified how such proliferation might play out militarily. Second, no serious consideration had yet been given to how East Asia might be able to prosper economically without a massive buildup of civilian nucle- ar power. Since each of the key nations in East Asia—China, the Koreas, and Japan—all would likely exploit their civilian nuclear energy infrastructure to acquire their first bombs or to make more, such inattention seemed odd.
Topic:: Arms Control and Proliferation, Nuclear Weapons, Science and Technology, Military Affairs, Nuclear Power, and Nonproliferation
Political Geography:: United States, Japan, China, North Korea, and Global Focus

36. A Fresh Examination of the Proliferation Dangers of Light Water Reactors

Author:: Victor Gilinsky
Publication Date:: 10-2017
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Even before the ink was dry on the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) in l968, officials in the U.S. State Policy Planning staff had privately warned their superiors that non-weapons member states to the treaty could come within weeks of acquiring a nuclear arsenal by amassing nuclear weapons useable fuels claiming that these were intended for peaceful purposes. The advice was quietly filed away. Six years later, with India’s “peaceful” nuclear explosion, the warning seemed more salient. Still, even after a series of studies pointing out the military risks associated with proliferating civilian nuclear technology, most policy makers believed that the danger was speculative and still, at worst, many years away.
Topic:: Arms Control and Proliferation and International Affairs
Political Geography:: Global Focus

37. Nuclear Rules, Not Just Rights: The NPT Reexamined

Author:: Henry D. Sokolski
Publication Date:: 03-2017
Content Type:: Book
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: With 190 state members, the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) is almost universal. However, it has fallen on hard times. North Korea violated it and withdrew in 2002. Israel, Pakistan, India, and North Korea—the nuclear-armed states most likely to use them—refuse to sign. Others—e.g., Syria, South Korea, and Egypt—have violated its safeguards and yet suffered no serious consequences. Also, with the Iran deal, enriching uranium or re- processing spent reactor fuel, which can bring states to the very brink of bomb making, is now less taboo. Finally, with President Trump’s suggestion that South Korea’s and Japan’s acquisition of nuclear weapons is inevitable, the prospect of the treaty lasting in perpetuity is easily open to question.1
Topic:: International Organization and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: Global Focus

38. Should We Let The Bomb Spread

Author:: Henry Sokolski (ed)
Publication Date:: 01-2016
Content Type:: Book
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: In 1966, Leonard Beaton, a journalist and strategic scholar, published a short book that asked must the bomb spread.1 Mr. Beaton’s query reflected the profound alarm with which proliferation was viewed shortly after the Cuban Missile Crisis. Today that alarm is all but absent: Now, not only is proliferation increasingly viewed as a given (more of a fact than a problem), but some security experts actually see advantages in nuclear weapons spreading or, at least, little harm. Cultivation of this latter view took time—nearly a half century— and considerable scholarship. In 1981, Kenneth Waltz popularized French and American finite deterrence thinking of the late 1950s by asking whether or not nuclear weapons in more hands might be better. His answer was yes. As nuclear weapons spread, he argued, adversaries would view war as being self-defeating and peace would become more certain.
Topic:: International Affairs and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: Global Focus

39. The Nuclear Terrorism Threat: How Real Is It?

Author:: Michael Brian Jenkins and John Lauder
Publication Date:: 08-2016
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: NPEC Working Paper 1602, “The Nuclear Terrorism Threat: How Real Is It?” presents two opposed views on the threat of nuclear terrorism. Brian M. Jenkins, a Rand analyst and a leading expert on nuclear terrorism, argues that the threat is overblown. John Lauder, former director of the Central Intelligence Agency’s Nonproliferation Center, argues the opposing case that the threat is growing and we need to be hedging against it now.
Topic:: Terrorism, International Affairs, and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: Global Focus

40. How Dark Might East Asia’s Nuclear Future Be?

Author:: Henry D. Sokolski
Publication Date:: 08-2016
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: NPEC Working Paper 1601, “How Dark Might East Asia’s Nuclear Future Be?” contains detailed projections of what the future holds for a more nuclear-armed China, Japan, North Korea and South Korea. None are predictions. The volume’s purpose is to encourage deeper debate about the security implications of nuclear proliferation in East Asia.
Topic:: International Affairs and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: Global Focus

41. Alternative North Korean Nuclear Futures

Author:: Shane Smith
Publication Date:: 01-2016
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: On February 12, 2013, North Korea’s state media announced that it had conducted a third nuclear test “of a smaller and light A-bomb unlike the previous ones, yet with great explosive power…demonstrating the good performance of the DPRK's nuclear deterrence that has become diversified.”[1] Since then, there has been renewed debate and speculation over the nature and direction of North Korea’s nuclear program. Can it develop weapons using both plutonium and uranium? How far away is it from having a deliverable warhead and how capable are its delivery systems? How many and what kind of weapons is it looking to build? These are not easy questions to answer. North Korea remains one of the most notoriously secret nations, and details about its nuclear program are undoubtedly some of its most valued secrets. Yet, the answers to these questions have far reaching implications for U.S. and regional security.
Topic:: International Affairs and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: Global Focus

42. Nuclear Energy Basics, Part 2: Reactors and Nuclear Fuel Making

Author:: Henry D. Sokolski
Publication Date:: 09-2016
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Many of the materials, facilities, and technologies used to produce nuclear energy can be used to create nuclear weapons material. In nearly all stages in the production of peaceful nuclear energy, it is difficult to differentiate between peaceful activities and those useful to produce explosive materials for nuclear weap- ons. The purpose of this primer is to inform the reader about the basic steps of the nuclear fuel cycle and nuclear energy production, and to draw attention to those aspects of the fuel cycle that present the greatest nuclear weapons proliferation risks.
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: Global Focus

43. Nuclear Energy Basics, Part 1: Fission, Fusion, and the Bomb

Author:: Henry D. Sokolski
Publication Date:: 09-2016
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: The Nonproliferation Policy Education Center (NPEC), a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization, is a nonpartisan, educational organization founded in 1994 to promote a better understanding of strategic weapons proliferation issues. NPEC educates policymakers, journalists, and university professors about proliferation threats and possible new policies and measures to meet them.
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: Global Focus

44. The Nuclear Terrorism Threat: How Real Is It?

Author:: Michael Brian Jenkins and John Lauder
Publication Date:: 09-2016
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: After the Cold War and nearly 70 years of waging war against communism, the United States and its key allies have adopted the war against terror as their new organizing principal. The king of terrorist threats, however, is nuclear terrorism. As Vice President Dick Cheney once argued, “if there is a one percent chance” of a terrorist developing a nuclear weapon, “we have to treat it as a certainty in terms of our response.”1
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons, Terrorism, and International Security
Political Geography:: Global Focus

45. How Dark Might East Asia’s Nuclear Future Be?

Author:: Henry D. Sokolski
Publication Date:: 09-2016
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Long considered unlikely, the prospect of South Korea and Japan getting nuclear weapons and China and North Korea significantly ramping up their arsenals has become the next big worry. This June, CIA Director John Brennan testified that nuclear proliferation was “a blinking red light” and spotlighted North Korea’s nuclear misbehavior as a key concern.1 His testimony came only weeks after a The New York Times interview of Donald Trump in which the Republican presidential hopeful emphasized the inevitabil- ity and possible benefits of Japan and South Korea going nuclear.2 Since then, the question of whether or not it is in Washington’s interest to push nonproliferation in East Asia has been a hot topic in and outside the Beltway.
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: East Asia

46. SERIOUS RULES FOR NUCLEAR POWER WITHOUT PROLIFERATION*

Author:: Henry D. Sokolski and Victor Gilinsky
Publication Date:: 09-2016
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: In this chapter, we try to step back from the day-to- day struggles in Washington, DC, over nuclear non- proliferation policy to ask what measures we would need to have in place to be reasonably confident that expanding nuclear power globally will not increase the number of nuclear weapons-armed states. We recognize that, since the start of the Atoms for Peace Program in the mid-1950s, the United States has sup- ported worldwide use of nuclear power. It also has op- posed the spread of nuclear weapons and supported measures to control the nuclear weapons proliferation risks inherent in spreading nuclear technology for civilian purposes. The principal administrative ele- ments of this nonproliferation effort are the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) and the associated in- spection activities of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), as well as various national and inter- national export controls.
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: Global Focus

47. Alternative North Korean Nuclear Futures

Author:: Shane Smith
Publication Date:: 01-2016
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: On February 12, 2013, North Korea’s state media announced that it had conducted a third nuclear test “of a smaller and light A-bomb unlike the previous ones, yet with great explosive power…demonstrating the good performance of the DPRK's nuclear deterrence that has become diversified.”[1] Since then, there has been renewed debate and speculation over the nature and direction of North Korea’s nuclear program. Can it develop weapons using both plutonium and uranium? How far away is it from having a deliverable warhead and how capable are its delivery systems? How many and what kind of weapons is it looking to build? These are not easy questions to answer. North Korea remains one of the most notoriously secret nations, and details about its nuclear program are undoubtedly some of its most valued secrets. Yet, the answers to these questions have far reaching implications for U.S. and regional security.
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: North Korea

48. "Japanese Strategic Weapons Programs and Strategies: Future Scenarios and Alternative Approaches

Author:: Ian Easton
Publication Date:: 11-2015
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: The balance of power in Northeast Asia is shifting in ways that are dangerous to the security of Japan. That is certainly how the picture has appeared to the eyes of many observers in recent years.The reasons are many, and they are compelling. First, China’s emergence as a regional military power has taken place in a far more disruptive fashion than was expected. Attempts to shape China into a “responsible stakeholder” have failed. Beijing now threatens Tokyo with a growing number of coercive air and maritime operations around the Japanadministered Senkaku (Diaoyu) Islands. Chinese fighters, bombers, ships, and submarines have greatly expanded the scope of their training operations. They now frequently pass through Japan’s Ryukyu Island Chain on their way out into the Philippine Sea where they conduct exercises that undermine confidence in the ability of the U.S. Navy to intervene in a regional conflict.
Topic:: International Affairs and Military Strategy
Political Geography:: Japan

49. How South Korea Could Acquire and Deploy Nuclear Weapons

Author:: James Fergusson
Publication Date:: 11-2015
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: Political leaders and defense planners in the Republic of Korea (ROK), or South Korea, are cognizant that worsening security in Northeast Asia could lead to additional states, including the ROK, to consider and even develop nuclear weapons. In particular, Korean President Park Geun-hye warned in May 2014 that another nuclear bomb test by North Korea (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea or DPRK) would be “crossing a Rubicon” and would make it “difficult for us to prevent a nuclear domino from occurring in this area
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons, International Security, and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: South Korea

50. If Japan and South Korea Go Nuclear: Two Military-Technical Scenarios

Author:: Ian Easton and Charles Ferguson
Publication Date:: 05-2015
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
Abstract:: America's security alliances with Japan and South Korea made headlines last month. In addition to Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's address to a joint session of Congress, Secretary of Defense Ash Carter visited both Japan and South Korea. Their main focus was on how to fortify Seoul's and Tokyo's security alliance ties with the US against possible Chinese and North Korean military threats.
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: Global Focus

Search

Search Constraints

Search Results

Refine your search

Topic

Political Geography

Content Type

Publishing Institution

Author

Publication Year

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS