Nuclear Issues

Nearly nine months into the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden, Washington’s relationship with Beijing has sunk to a historic low. After a high-level diplomatic meeting in March that devolved into an ugly exchange of insults, fruitless visits to China by U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman and Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry, and virtual climate talks that failed to produce clear deliverables, the world’s two great powers have reached a dangerous impasse. 

...If the Biden administration hopes to manage the competition and prevent it from turning into catastrophe, it must take urgent action to establish and maintain open channels of communication between the Pentagon and China’s armed forces.

Stephen Walt asks whether the United States is a good model for other liberal states and whether its policy judgments are ones that others should trust and follow, especially with respect to foreign policy.  He argues that—on balance—the answer to both questions is "no."

Commercial bidding and purchase documents and other accounts suggest China is likely to start construction of a second spent fuel reprocessing plant of the same capacity and at the same site as its first such plant, the CNNC Gansu Nuclear Technology Industrial Park in Jinta, Gansu province.

Since 2010, China has significantly expanded its indigenous enrichment capacity to meet the expected rapid increase of enrichment requirements. Meanwhile, China has expanded its plutonium reprocessing and recycling capabilities for “saving uranium.” The purpose of this report is to provide a better understanding of the development of China’s uranium enrichment and plutonium recycling programs.

Every president serving in the last two decades has said that nuclear terrorism is a significant national security threat. Analysis of this threat has been, for good reason, mostly focused on foreign extremist groups, but recent events raise questions of whether there should be greater focus in the United States on far-right, domestic extremist threats. These extremists represent a unique danger because of their prevalence in federal institutions such as the military and the potential that they might infiltrate nuclear facilities, where they could access sensitive information and nuclear materials.

The historian Fredrik Logevall has written a grand fresh take on the life of John F. Kennedy, as if to reignite an old flame. He's given us a chance to remember politics as the sport of great minds and hearts, high language, serious stuff.

Stephan Walt writes that Trump's foreign-policy instincts might be more sound—but he has forfeited the chance to lead.

A comparative analysis of the United States’ and the Soviet Union’s previously underexplored radiological weapons programs identifies the drivers behind their rise and demise. The findings of this analysis illuminate the factors likely to affect the pursuit of radiological weapons by other states in the future.

Scott Sagan and Benjamin Valentino, and Charli Carpenter and Alexander Montgomery continue the debate on the power of noncombatant immunity norms, discuss how scholars should approach the study of these norms, and emphasize their shared objective to determine how security norms can be bolstered rather than undermined.

Stephen M. Walt advises presidential candidate Joe Biden to embrace nationalism while reaffirming liberal values: They are an election-winning combination.