Nuclear Issues

130 Items

A Life In The American Century Author: Joseph S. Nye Jr.

AUTHOR PHOTOGRAPH © MARTHA STEWART

Magazine Article - Newsweek

Don't 'Jeopardize Free Speech That Is Fundamental' to Harvard, Says Prof

    Author:
  • Meredith Wolf Schizer
| Jan. 24, 2024

In this Q&A, Joseph S. Nye talks about his advice for the interim and future president of Harvard in the wake of Claudine Gay's resignation, which countries should be highest on our radar to prevent the threat of nuclear war, what role the U.S. should play in the Russia-Ukraine war, the significance of U.S. alliances in the Middle East, and more.

an alert from the Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency

AP/Jon Elswick

Journal Article - Foreign Affairs

The End of Cyber-Anarchy?

| January/February 2022

Joseph Nye argues that prudence results from the fear of creating unintended consequences in unpredictable systems and can develop into a norm of nonuse or limited use of certain weapons or a norm of limiting targets. Something like this happened with nuclear weapons when the superpowers came close to the brink of nuclear war in 1962, during the Cuban missile crisis. The Limited Test Ban Treaty followed a year later.

Journal Article - Quarterly Journal: International Security

Correspondence: Are Belligerent Reprisals against Civilians Legal?

    Authors:
  • Christopher A. Ford
  • John R. Harvey
  • Franklin C. Miller
  • Dr. Keith B. Payne
  • Bradley H. Roberts
  • Allen S. Weiner
| Fall 2021

Christopher Ford, John Harvey, Franklin Miller, Keith Payne, and Bradley Roberts respond to Scott Sagan and Allen Weiner’s spring 2021 article, “The Rule of Law and the Role of Strategy in U.S. Nuclear Doctrine.

President Joe Biden speaks during an event Monday, March 8, 2021, in the East Room of the White House in Washington

AP Photo/Patrick Semansky

Analysis & Opinions - Just Security

The Illegality of Targeting Civilians by Way of Belligerent Reprisal: Implications for U.S. Nuclear Doctrine

| May 10, 2021

To date, the U.S. government has not declared that it no longer reserves a purported right to target civilians by way of reprisal, in response to an unlawful attack against U.S. or allied civilians. As we have argued elsewhere, and as Adil Haque recently called on the Biden administration to do, it is time for the United States to acknowledge that customary international law today prohibits targeting civilians in reprisal for an adversary’s violations of the law of war.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Mark Esper holds a Q&A session during a visit to the U.S. Strategic Command at Offutt AFB, Neb., Thursday, Feb. 20, 2020.

AP Photo/Nati Harnik

Journal Article - Quarterly Journal: International Security

The Rule of Law and the Role of Strategy in U.S. Nuclear Doctrine

| Spring 2021

When properly applied, the key principles of the law of armed conflict have a profound impact on U.S. nuclear doctrine. Specifically, it would be unlawful for the United States to intentionally target civilians, even in reprisal for a strike against U.S. or allied civilians.

An unarmed Minuteman 3 ICBM launches from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California on Wednesday, August 2, 2107. (Senior Airman Ian Dudley/Vandenberg Air Force Base via AP)

Senior Airman Ian Dudley/Vandenberg Air Force Base via AP

Analysis & Opinions - The New York Times

Pentagon Suggests Countering Devastating Cyberattacks With Nuclear Arms

| Jan. 16, 2018

A newly drafted United States nuclear strategy that has been sent to President Trump for approval would permit the use of nuclear weapons to respond to a wide range of devastating but non-nuclear attacks on American infrastructure, including what current and former government officials described as the most crippling kind of cyberattacks.

Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall

U.S. Department of Energy

Announcement - Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School

Former Deputy Secretary of Energy Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall Named Senior Fellow With Harvard's Belfer Center

| July 12, 2017

Former Deputy Secretary of Energy Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall is joining Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs as a Senior Fellow, the Center announced today. Sherwood-Randall, who has served in the White House and Departments of Energy and Defense, is returning to the Center where she worked in the 1990s to help establish two pioneering projects – the Strengthening Democratic Institutions Project with Graham Allison, who this month stepped down as the Center’s director, and the Preventive Defense Project with Ash Carter, the former Secretary of Defense who is the new Belfer Center director.