I realize that I haven’t mentioned the sordid story how the US came to not have a policy on Iran. I mean that literally—no policy. None, zero, zip. Steven Aftergood at the Federation of American Sceintists has compiled a list…
Fred Kaplan in Slate has the best obituary yet for Paul Nitze.
Readers may have noticed references over the past few days to a long-running dispute between the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and Brazil over access to a Brazilian facility to enrich uranium, INB Resende. The dispute centers over whether the…
“If Hitler invaded hell I would make at least a favorable reference to the devil in the House of Commons.”—Winston Churchill He had a point. Keep it in mind and bear with me for a moment. I’ve recently noted that…
A couple of weeks after I mentioned a study by Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA)—a joint program of the Center on Policy Attitudes (COPA) and my employer the Center for International and Security Studies at Maryland (CISSM), School of…
Apparently we do have an Iran policy: be very, very vague. Check out these headlines: U.S. Signals Opposition to Light-Water Reactor Offer to Iran; Tehran Expected to Offer Deal to Europeans (Global Security Newswire, October 21, 2004) US presses Iran…
My talk at the UN went well today. I heard a couple of especially blunt comments by officials from national delegations to the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva. Among the things I heard: The Conference remains at an “impasse” created…
The New York Times and Washington Post have excellent obituaries that capture Nitze’s good and bad qualities. Decorum inhibits candor, however. Nitze’s role in slandering Paul Warnke, during Warnke’s confirmation hearing for Director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency…
While I was in Nanjing, Space News confirmed (“U.S. Declates Satellite Jammer Ready” October 11, 2004, p.1) that the Air Force canceled the Counter Surveillance Reconnaissance System (CSRS or “scissors) and has delivered the first Counter Communications System (now called…
I had an interesting conversation with Steve Weisman at the New York Times regarding his story on the “new” intelligence estimate that concludes “it is no longer clear that Cuba has an active, offensive bio-weapons program.” We still disagree about…
