164 posts
From Tomnod’s website: Examples of possible military buildings, crowds, landmarks and military vehicles in Damascus detected by Tomnod’s CrowdRank and derived from volunteer imagery insight. * * * DigitalGlobe announced today that it is acquiring Tomnod, a five-guy operation known…
Greetings from the old #nukefest2013. For my regular column at Foreign Policy last week, I pondered the meaning of Kim Jong Un’s Map of Death. In that post, I made some simple estimates of the four targets: If one has…
There’s a Mad Man Theory of Deterrence. Does it apply to arms control, too? Here’s the keeper Mad Man quote, found in Richard M. Nixon’s The Real War (1980): International relations are a lot like poker – stud poker with…
In a few weeks, South Korea’s newly-elected President, Park Geun-hye, will arrive in the United States on her first state visit. Between now and then, Washington and Seoul will be working on a diplomatic response to accompany their resolve not to…
In January I discussed the prospects for including a serious nuclear cooperation component in a future comprehensive deal to resolve the Iran crisis, permitting Russia to provide Iran with PWR fuel-fabrication infrastructure to complete the front end of its civil…
The FY 2013 Intelligence Authorization Act repeals the requirement for “721 Reports” — officially known as the biannual Unclassified Report to Congress on the Acquisition of Technology Relating to Weapons of Mass Destruction and Advanced Conventional Munitions. This is a terrible decision.…
The thirtieth anniversary of President Ronald Reagan’s surprise roll-out of the Strategic Defense Initiative has been duly noted within narrow circles. The section of my shoe box files devoted to SDI is thick and inviting. The 4 X 6 card…
You know who tries to deter cyber-attacks with nuclear weapons? North Korea, that’s who. North Korea released a statement that Kim Jong Il had “ratified the plan of the Strategic Rocket Force for firepower strike” against “the U.S. mainland, their…
About a year ago, I wrote about the case of Pierre Noir, the first IAEA inspector to die on the job. Noir died of a heart attack while inspecting a nuclear reactor in Taiwan on January 30, 1978. I am…
The most rewarding aspect of the Monterey Institute is the students. Okay, it’s the weather. But the students are a close second. We have, for instance, an embarrassment of Chinese-speaking graduate students. One of our best, Jonathan Ray, has been…
