Years

2017

144 posts

Article

The Long Demise of the German H-List

At a meeting in Berlin today I was privy to an update, from someone who really knows this stuff, on the European Union’s efforts to amend its dual-use export control regime. The key document is called Regulation 428/2009 and the…

Article

Responding to the INF Treaty Violation

Quote of the Week: “I don’t think even the surreptitious and very disagreeable deployment of a hundred SS-20s would have a very significant military effect. I think the SS-20s, in my judgment, in fact, is not a terribly useful military…

Episode58 min

The INF, NATO, and the MSC

Jeffrey just returned from the Munich Security Conference. On his way back, he passed through DC where he sat down with Aaron and Scott to discuss NATO, extended deterrence, intermediate-range nuclear forces like the RS-26 and the SSC-8, and what…

Article

Reasons for the Great Unraveling of the Arms Control Enterprise

New Feature: Quote of the week “The demagogue, though he professes (and fails) to readjust matters in the interests of the majority of the electors, yet stereotypes mediocrity, organizes intolerance, disparages exhibitions of uncommon qualities, and glorifies conspicuous exhibitions of…

Article

A World Preparing for Wars

William Bullitt accompanied President Woodrow Wilson and Colonel Edward House to Paris to negotiate an ambitious peace treaty after the carnage of World War I. Reflecting on the handiwork of vengeful allies in the Versailles Treaty, Bullitt prophetically declared, “This…

Article

Rethinking China’s Fast Reactor

At the beginning of 2017 a little more information percolated to the outside world concerning the hazy official particulars of China’s aspirations to “close the nuclear fuel cycle” by deploying fast breeder reactors and reprocessing plants. What’s coming across adds…

Episode58 min

KN-11 Ashore

North Korea tested the Pukguksong-2, a medium-range solid-fueled ballistic missile. Jeffrey says “I told you so,” Scott wonks out about the missile’s canister and Aaron brings along his toddler to warn us of the dangers of an EMP attack. By…

Episode49 min

NEW START UP

Donald Trump ordered up a new Nuclear Posture Review and reportedly told Vladimir Putin that the New START arms control treaty was a bad deal — after first asking his advisers what it was. We don’t know whether Trump really…

Article

Tear-Down Mode

Republican insurgents in the Congress are now in full tear-down mode, aiming their wrecking balls at what’s left of seven decades of bipartisan achievement to reduce nuclear dangers and nuclear arsenals. The disruptors are now ascendant in Washington, with the…

Episode42 min

The Khorramshahr: BM-25 Musudan in Iran

Iran’s Khorramshahr missile may be the BM-25 variant of North Korea’s Hwasong-10, which the US calls the Musudan, which is based on the Soviet R-27 Zyb, which the US called the SS-N-6 Serb. Simple, right? Don’t worry! Jeffrey and Scott…