War in Ukraine has delivered a sequence of messages from Russia’s leadership — threats to use nuclear weapons, tactical and strategic, and announcements that next generation ICBM ‘Sarmat’ missiles are being deployed. What Hans Kristensen points out here is a proliferation and escalatory reliance on nukes
Category: Proliferation
Quotes: Rattling & Ratcheting Nukes
A moment last fall in the Moscow press talked of turning the U.S. into a ash wasteland, the result of Russian nuclear weapons. This carryover from the first Cold War (call it 1.0) has bestowed another level of Mutually Assured Destruction to today’s new Nuclear MAD, a Cold War 2.0 getting hotter day by day…
Eyes On the Global Security Threat
This is no time for equivocation. The ‘West v East’ war (not “special operation” as Russia calls their invasion of Ukraine) is a tragedy. The Putin decision to invade Ukraine is disastrous — humanly, strategically, morally, politically — and for year to come will be seen for what it is — a preventable disaster
No First Use
Remember the storm that rose with the ‘Peril’ revelation of General Milley’s call to China? Do not forget how ex-president Trump’s state of mind was in question as he refused to acknowledge defeat and exit the White House. The ex-president has yet to acknowledge his election defeat nearly a year later. The former Commander-in-Chief, who […]
U.S. President and a ‘secret’ nuclear weapons system
“I have built a nuclear — a weapons system that nobody’s ever had in this country before. We have stuff that you haven’t even seen or heard about… what we have is incredible”
U.S. China ‘Spats’ Rattle the World
(Associated Press – July 28, 2020) — Antagonisms between the United States and China are rattling governments around the world, prompting a German official to warn of “Cold War 2.0”
The End or: How I Worried & Learned to Not Love the Bomb
The house on Sunset Boulevard was inconspicuous. Set back from the street, it could barely be seen but the house was a deep lot, with tennis court in the back where Lloyd Shearer, editor of Parade Magazine in its heyday would regularly interview a Who’s Who of celebrities. Sagan brought a story with him…
Physics of Proliferation
How can Washington and Moscow stop nuclear escalation? Nuclear experts, east and west, are scrambling to obey orders from the top. While academics debate whether there is a ‘new nuclear arms race’ underway (there is), the new nuclear Cold War, nuclear version 2.0, is growing hotter every day
Eurasian Thoughts and China-EU Summit
China expansion, U.S. containment… Continuing the Strategic Demands’ Eurasia series, a few crucial ‘Great Game’ thoughts with Pepe Escobar via Asia Times. Moving pieces on an extremely complex – and dangerous – geopolitical chessboard
Back to the Brink, Nuclear Catastrophe
As nuclear treaty after nuclear treaty bites the dust, today, February 1st, 2019, the U.S. announces its intent to withdraw from the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty. Nuclear arms control is immeasurably damaged. A new nuclear arms race is heralded, a global breakout characterized by many as “insanity”.
Dems Re-Intro Bill to Prevent Nuclear First Use
Another legislative attempt to bring sanity into nuclear weapons policy. Being ‘on the brink’ of disaster is not rational policy. A new nuclear arms race is accelerating. Threats and chaos dominate U.S. foreign policy. Risks are multiplying and strategic opportunities lost in clicks of daily crisis. It is time to change course …
Two Minutes to Midnight
Via the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
Green Politics / Nuclear Weapons
At the front lines of the Cold War, a green political movement was launched in Europe. Today, green parties exist in over 1/2 the countries of the world — as nuclear nonproliferation education continues at the front of a green agenda
US President Threatens at the UN
In what is arguably one of the more threatening addresses since the creation of the United Nations, the US president lays out his vision of nations, “sovereignty”, and what he sees as “America First” within the international community. He goes on, lecturing, warning, threatening the use of US force
Long-game Diplomacy — or War
As the US president ramps up his rhetoric in Europe, pointing at enemies ranging from a “fake news” press to North Korea, from “urban carnage” to Iran, from Democrats and those who question his “modern day presidential” tweeting to whatever and whomever he chooses to target in the daily news cycle, a clock ticks
Nuclear #HairTrigger, Nuclear First Use
The “button” can morph into a perverse temptation for an unstable leader. In 1974, during his impeachment proceedings, President Richard M. Nixon said to reporters: “I can go into my office and pick up the telephone, and in 25 minutes, 70 million people will be dead.”
Moyers: Sleepwalking Into a Nuclear Arms Race with Russia
“Sleepwalking Into a Nuclear Arms Race with Russia” Chuck Spinney and Pierre Sprey write for Moyers’ online (and Spinney’s Blaster blog) with a warning about a new nuclear arms race, one where ‘the nuclear issue boils down to a question of understanding how America’s spending decisions and actions impact patriotic Russians’