As it pursues an agreement on Iran’s nuclear program, the international community needs to pay attention to Saudi concerns—and the possibility that Riyadh may pursue the Bomb.
SCIENCE, SECURITY EXPERTS: HILL DEAL DOES NOT END NEED FOR WORK ON HOST OF TECHNICAL ISSUES IN IRANIAN FRAMEWORK AGREEMENT Former UN Ambassador, Princeton’s Frank Von Hippel Among Those Applauding Framework, While Highlighting the “Devils in the Details” to be Resolved. WASHINGTON, D.C. – April 16, 2015 — While agreeing that the framework agreement imposing … Continued
The United States currently faces one of its greatest and most misunderstood threats: climate change. And as changing climate patterns affect the water supplies critical to human life and agriculture, as sea levels rise and threaten coastal communities, and as changes in the environment increasingly weaken marginal states, the implications for U.S. defense will only grow.
The only visible achievement of the talks between the major powers and Iran in Istanbul in mid-April -- 15 months after the previous round had been pronounced a failure -- was agreement to meet again in Baghdad.
This month Turkey and Japan agreed to begin exclusive negotiations on constructing four nuclear power reactors at Sinop on the Black Sea. The deal marks the start of Turkey's second nuclear power project, after it reached a similar deal three years ago with a Russian consortium to construct four reactors at Akkuyu near the Mediterranean.
The rising demand for energy, especially in Asia, has made it all but inevitable that a surge in the construction of new nuclear reactors will occur over the next 20 years. That will pose issues regarding the building of new uranium enrichment and reprocessing facilities or the expansion of existing facilities.1
The US remains the single most powerful country and will remain so for some time. Russia is roughly equal only in respect to its nuclear arsenal. China will soon become the world leader in terms of total economic output—but its per capita income level will not soon approximate Western developed countries. So, where do India and Pakistan fit in?
The next president will have to deal with many pressing questions, but few are as consequential as this one: Do we want to live in a world in which the number of nuclear weapons is going up or going down? The American public should be aware of the candidates’ various nuclear weapons plans before they vote.
Congress is once again working overtime to complete the federal budget. National security is at the forefront of the debate, as Congress has finally passed (and the president has signed) its $459.3 billion defense appropriations bill for fiscal year 2008. (The bill also contains another $11.6 billion in emergency spending for the new mine-resistant, ambush-protected armored personnel carrier intended for the army and marines in Iraq.)
Russia's Ministry of Defense held an unprecedented international conference in Moscow last week to explain "how NATO missile defense facilities … may affect Russia's forces of nuclear deterrence." Senior Russian military officials used the meeting, which included 200 participants from 50 countries, to publicly back President Vladimir Putin's decision to skip the NATO summit in Chicago later this mon