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Siegfried S. Hecker

Siegfried S. Hecker is a professor of practice at the Monterey Institute of International Studies at Monterey and at the Department of Nuclear Engineering, Texas A&M University. Hecker is also professor emeritus (research) in the Department of Management Science and Engineering, senior fellow (emeritus) and affiliated faculty member at the Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC) and the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, and director emeritus of the Los Alamos National Laboratory, where he served as director from 1986 to 1997 and as senior fellow until July 2005. He is the editor of Doomed to Cooperate: How American and Russian Scientists Joined Forces to Avert Some of the Greatest Post-Cold War Nuclear Dangers (Los Alamos Historical Society, 2016). Hecker is chair of the Bulletin‘s Board of Sponsors.


Articles by Siegfried S. Hecker

Question for the candidates: Has Russia’s war in Ukraine changed your view of the role of nuclear weapons?

By Siegfried S. Hecker | Nuclear Weapons
Siegfried Hecker, a Senior Fellow at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, testifies before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee 21 January, 2004 on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. Hecker, who was a member of an unofficial US delegation that visited the controversial Yongbyon research complex this month, told lawmakers that North Korea can accumulate six Kilograms (13.2 pounds) a year of plutonium that could be used to make a nuclear weapon. "The five megawatt reactor has been re-started, it appears to be operating smoothly, providing heat and electricity, also accumulating approximately six kilograms (13.2 pounds) of plutonium per year in its spent fuel rods." Photo credit: Stephen Jaffe/AFP via Getty Images

An excerpt from “Hinge Points: An Inside Look at North Korea’s Nuclear Program”

By Siegfried S. Hecker, Elliot Serbin | Nuclear Energy, Nuclear Weapons
Young professionals on a night out in Red Square (left to right): Elliot Serbin, Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), Stanford University; Maxime Polleri, CISAC, Stanford, Elizaveta Likhacheva, Moscow Engineering Physics Institute (MEPhI); William Heerdt, Monterey Institute for International Studies; Anna Kudriavtseva, MEPhI; Daine Danielson, University of Chicago; James McKeon, Nuclear Threat Initiative; Ksenia Pirnavskaya, MEPhI; Gabriela Levikow, CISAC, Stanford; and Katie McKinney, CISAC, Stanford.

Three major nuclear accidents, as seen by young American and Russian professionals

By Siegfried S. Hecker, Alla A. Kassianova | Nuclear Energy, Nuclear Risk
Siegfried Hecker chats with some of the participants in the US-Russia Young Professionals Nuclear Forum

The future of global nuclear power through the eyes of young Russian and American professionals

By Siegfried S. Hecker, Alla A. Kassianova | Analysis, Nuclear Energy, Voices of Tomorrow
George H.W. Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev sign the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) in 1991.

George H.W. Bush worked toward a soft nuclear landing for the dissolving Soviet Union

By Siegfried S. Hecker | Nuclear Risk, Nuclear Weapons

Time to insert the control rods on North Korea

By Siegfried S. Hecker | Columnists, Nuclear Weapons

The US-Russian teamwork that kept nuclear weapons safe

By Siegfried S. Hecker, Paul C. White | Columnists, Nuclear Energy, Nuclear Weapons

When science brought Americans and Russians together

By Siegfried S. Hecker | Columnists, Fusion Energy, Nuclear Energy, Nuclear Weapons

A visit to Russia’s secret nuclear labs

By Siegfried S. Hecker | Columnists, Nuclear Weapons

US-Russia rift threatens science ties that keep us safe

By Siegfried S. Hecker | Columnists, Nuclear Weapons

Questions for the presidential candidates on nuclear terrorism, proliferation, weapons policy, and energy

By Siegfried S. Hecker | Nuclear Energy, Nuclear Weapons

For Iran, a nuclear option more trouble than it was worth

By Siegfried S. Hecker | Columnists, Nuclear Energy, Nuclear Weapons