Articles

The risks of nuclear escalation are greater than ever given the possibility of misinterpreted cyber espionage and military strikes against early warning systems. 

Christopher Clary and Gaurav Kampani respond to Jaganath Sankaran's winter 2015/16 article, "Pakistan's Battlefield Nuclear Policy: A Risky Solution to an Exaggerated Threat."

Pakistan has developed tactical nuclear weapons to deter India from executing its Cold Start war doctrine. India, however, has disavowed that doctrine. Further, the use of such weapons against Indian troops inside Pakistan would kill and injure countless civilians, while risking massive nuclear retaliation by India. In this International Security article, Jaganath Sankaran argues Pakistan should reconsider the role of tactical nuclear weapons in its military strategy.

Through structured interviews and a literature review, we assess which approaches to protection against insider thefts in the casino and pharmaceutical industries could be usefully applied to strengthen protections against insider theft in the nuclear industry, where insider thefts could have very high consequences.

China currently has far fewer nuclear weapons than the U.S., possibly the fewest of the five original nuclear weapons states. But if China feels threatened by the deployment of U.S. missile defenses, that could well change.

Although Japanese politicians have expressed interest in the bomb in the past, the country’s veto players make acquisition unlikely. Early research viewed proliferation exclusively as a response to security needs.  Since the 1980s, most models have included domestic factors, but they have focused exclusively on a single actor whose influence can be negated if veto power is widely enough dispersed. Thus, despite Japan’s intimidating plutonium supply, and its persistence in building a complete fuel cycle, the country’s large and growing number of veto players suggests the continuation of a rigid nuclear weapons policy. As this analysis indicates, historical institutional analysis is crucial to understanding a state’s propensity for proliferation and should be considered alongside other contributing factors.

India’s inability to coerce Pakistan into halting its support for insurgents in Kashmir, as well as its experience in past conflicts with Pakistan, led it to develop Cold Start—a new offensive military doctrine that will allow it to mobilize quickly and retaliate in a limited manner. Although India is far from realizing its goal, this break from a traditional defensive strategy deserves scrutiny. A history of misperception and mistrust between India and Pakistan, poor intelligence, and domestic insecurity suggests that limited war could quickly escalate to the nuclear threshold, posing a serious risk to the stability of the subcontinent and the rest of the world.

Hui Zhang re-examines the North Korean explosion on October 9, 2006. His research suggests that the test was likely not a failure if Pyongyang had planned for a yield of 4 kt, as it told Beijing prior to the event.