Nuclear Issues

7 Items

President Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping at the G20 Summit in Bali

Alex Brandon | AP

Analysis & Opinions - The Washington Post

Despite Rumors of War, the U.S. and China Can Manage Their Relationship

| June 14, 2023

As the Biden administration and Congress struggle to get their heads around the challenge posed by China today, they should reflect on lessons learned in America’s success in winning the Cold War with the Soviet Union. Just because fundamental and irresolvable differences in values and interests compel the United States and China to be formidable rivals does not mean a hot war is a viable option.

People inspect the wreckage of buildings that were damaged by Saudi-led coalition airstrikes, in Sanaa, Yemen, Tuesday, Jan. 18, 2022.

AP Photo/Hani Mohammed

Analysis & Opinions - Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School

Significance of the Iran-Saudi Arabia Agreement Brokered by China

Belfer Center experts on the U.S.-China relationship and Middle East issues shared thoughts on the significance of the unexpected Iran-Saudi Arabia agreement brokered by China. 

The USS Vesole, foreground, a radar picket ship, steams alongside the Soviet freighter Polzunov, outbound from Cuba, for an inspection of her cargo in the Atlantic Ocean, Nov. 11, 1962

AP Photo/Pool

Analysis & Opinions - Arms Control Today

The Cuban Missile Crisis at 60: Six Timeless Lessons for Arms Control

| October 2022

As the best documented major crisis in history, in substantial part because Kennedy secretly taped the deliberations in which he and his closest advisers were weighing choices they knew could lead to a catastrophic war, the Cuban missile crisis has become the canonical case study in nuclear statecraft. Over the decades since, key lessons from the crisis have been adapted and applied by the successors of Kennedy and Khrushchev to inform fateful choices.

The Chinese flag displayed at the Russian booth of import fair.

(AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)

Analysis & Opinions - The National Interest

China and Russia: A Strategic Alliance in the Making

| Dec. 14, 2018

THE YEAR before he died in 2017, one of America’s leading twentieth-century strategic thinkers, Zbigniew Brzezinski, sounded an alarm. In analyzing threats to American security, “the most dangerous scenario,” he warned, would be “a grand coalition of China and Russia…united not by ideology but by complementary grievances.” This coalition “would be reminiscent in scale and scope of the challenge once posed by the Sino-Soviet bloc, though this time China would likely be the leader and Russia the follower.”

President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping walk together at Mar-a-Lago on April 7, 2017. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

AP Photo/Alex Brandon

Analysis & Opinions - The Atlantic

Can North Korea Drag the U.S. and China Into War?

| Sep. 11, 2017

Amid the exchange of threats between North Korea and the United States, ongoing North Korean nuclear and missile tests, and U.S. talk of “all options,” there is growing concern about the real possibility of war with North Korea. What many have not yet reckoned with is an even darker specter. Could events now cascading on the Korean Peninsula drag the U.S. and China into a great-power war?

South Korean soldiers look at a map illustrating about the Korean War at the Korea War Memorial Museum in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, July 7, 2017. South Korea's new liberal President Moon Jae-in reiterated he's willing to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong Un even as he condemned the North's first intercontinental ballistic missile test-launch this week as a "reckless" move that incurred punishment by the international community. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)

AP Photo/Lee Jin-man

Analysis & Opinions - The Sunday Times

Donald Trump must threaten Kim Jong-un and pray he blinks

| July 09, 2017

"Since the election of Donald Trump as US president, the probability of a Sino-American conflict has soared. Last year Trump ran an aggressively anti-Chinese election campaign, repeatedly threatening to impose tariffs on Chinese imports. Trade is only one of several bones of contention. America remains committed to freedom of navigation in the South China Sea. China’s island-building programme is designed to make that sea Chinese in fact as well as in name. Trump is less committed than any US president since Richard Nixon to the 'One China' policy, which pretends that Taiwan is not an independent state."