Pierre Noir, Again
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…
Arms Control Wonk
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Show and TEL
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…
WMD-Day + 10
President James K. Polk’s war of choice against Mexico from 1846-48 resulted in the acquisition of what became the states of California, Utah and Nevada, as well as parts of New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, and Wyoming. Mexico received $15 million…
Chinese Chashma Poker Chip?
It’s late Saturday afternoon here in Ipanema, 28 degrees C and fair, and my options are to go back to the beach or blog this. So if I get a little speculative as the paragraphs wear on, just chalk it…
Ring Magnets
Last month, David Albright published screen shots of a solicitation by an Iranian company for ring magnets that may suitable for centrifuge bearings – a crucial component of Iran’s centrifuges. The question is whether the magnets, which fall below the…
Shoot-Look-Shoot
I have a column up at Foreign Policy (“Billion Dollar Baby”) on the announcement by newly installed SECDEF Chuck Hagel that 14 additional ground-based interceptors ought to do it with regard to North Korea. I noted in the piece that…
Emerging Powers and Nuclear Politics
Megan Garcia has penned a great little essay on “emerging powers” in nuclear politics in general, and Brazil in particular. Let me also plug her monograph, Global Swing States and the Non-Proliferation Order. The subject is super important — one of the big…
The Dunn Theorem
Lew Dunn, the Bronx’s gift to the Nonproliferation Treaty, has a theory about NPT Review Conferences. The Dunn Theorem is that back-to-back successes are a rarity; more likely, every other RevCon is a flop. If Lew is right, the next…
Crazy Korea Story
Several of my colleagues have been scratching their heads over a bizarre story that appeared in the Joongang Ilbo (“U.S. nukes to remain in South, To deter a North attack, weapons to stay after joint drills, possibly on sub”) that attributed…
Company for Public Transit
Over the course of a year, you enter e-book territory when you write, on average, 800 words a week for ACW. This site’s capabilities for retrieving material by subject matter are still a work in progress. For this flimsy reason,…
