Jon Kyl has become the second ranking Republican Senator by dint of hard work, perseverance, and attention to detail – all admirable traits. He has never voted for an arms control treaty transmitted to the Senate by a Democratic President.…
This post is geared to the silent majority of ACW readers who refrain from commenting on what they read on this site. So let’s try something new: The first annual ACW Best Quips about the Bomb Contest. (Unless this experiment…
It’s never a good sign when the United States votes in lonely isolation at the United Nations. This can only mean one of three things: that the rest of the world is spineless, or that the White House is obtuse…
Two questions were paramount after the destructive power of atomic weapons was revealed. Some, depending on temperament and instinct, asked whether the capability to make such weapons might possibly be placed under international control. Others, assuming failure in this pursuit,…
The era of modern cruise missiles began when the Nixon administration was looking for leverage in arms control negotiations with the Kremlin. Nixon and Kissinger did not fare well in the SALT talks, in part because the Soviet Union was…
Money is the mother’s milk of politics; motivation is the mother’s milk of the politics of treaty ratification. Arms control battles in the United States tend to be uneven fights — and not just because skeptics need only 34 votes…
Several chroniclers of The Bomb have concluded that the term “nuclear strategy” is an oxymoron. The dilemmas of crafting a nuclear strategy and planning to execute are best dealt with on paper. But even on paper, dilemmas are hard to…
Not all, Cold War secrets have been revealed. The time has come at last to reveal one more. During a particularly nasty chapter of the Cold War in the 1980s, an amazing couple from New Hampshire, Jim and Carol O’Rourke,…
Those who still seek an ambitious military space diplomacy initiative during the Obama administration would do well to dwell on New START. President Obama, already tackling half a dozen outrageously hard problems, has to work overtime to convince two-thirds of…
Charles Krauthammer is a rapier-witted columnist who reminds me of Joseph Alsop, who skewered liberals, détentists, and anti-Vietnam War activists in Washington Post op-eds during the Cold War. Alsop used his Georgetown salon to extend his influence; Krauthammer’s salon is…
