Iran’s enrichment effort continues to move forward as their scientists and technicians continue their relentless pursuit of ever higher enrichment levels, and ever more effective centrifuges. At least that’s the official story, eagerly broadcast by Iranian officials. Few have probably missed the 23 June claim by Mr. Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of the Atomic …
Echoes of a Treaty Ratification Past
by | 2010-06-23 | 6 Comments
The 1987 INF Treaty broke the back of the nuclear arms race, completely changed the tenor of U.S. – Soviet relations, and ushered in previously inconceivable intrusive inspections. Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev accomplished these results by rejecting nuclear orthodoxy. The New Start Treaty builds on these breakthroughs, but it doesn’t come close to abolishing …
Weekly Public Service Announcement
by | 2010-06-22 | No Comments
In the second of the public service announcements, I’d like to share one event today in DC for the fellow wonks. The book event is at CATO today at noon entitled Exporting the Bomb: Technology Transfer and the Spread of Nuclear Weapons. The author of the book is Matthew Kroenig, and other speakers are Charles …
North Korea’s Nuclear Test That Wasn’t
by | 2010-06-21 | 13 Comments
Monday, the wonk world was briefly aflutter with the news reported by the Chosun Ilbo: a radionuclide detection station in South Korea had caught a strong whiff of xenon, whose radioactive isotopes are the products of nuclear fission. The Chosun’s correspondent even suggested that the xenon spike, which took place in mid-May, might have something …
