A few months ago, I blogged about Operation Groundhog — an effort to secure nuclear material left by the Soviet Union at the former Semipalatinsk Nuclear Test Site. Efforts in Kazakhstan, like the sealing of 178 nuclear test tunnels, were initially public. (The tunnel sealing was said to be complete in 2000.) I noticed that …
“New” Radiation Symbol
by | 2011-05-20 | 19 Comments
Somehow, I missed that a couple of years ago the IAEA and the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) released a new symbol for ionizing radiation. For a field that spends an inordinate amount of time trying to place the real risks from radiation in some sort of perspective, I am not sure this sends precisely …
An Abundance of Shoulds
by | 2011-05-19 | 8 Comments
Two of the best surveys of steps required to eliminate nuclear weapons were honchoed by the Carnegie Endowment (Universal Compliance, 2007) and the Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission chaired by Hans Blix (Weapons of Terror, 2006). Both compendiums use the words “should,” “need,” and “must” over 400 times. It is undeniably true that hundreds of …
The Hunt for Small Potatoes
by | 2011-05-18 | 20 Comments
In April 2009, Bob Gates openly mused about eliminating the Triad. I was a little surprised, to say the least. Now, he’s gone and done it again.
