News & Announcements

Following the news that the Trump administration plans to abandon the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, signed in 1987 by Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev, ten Belfer Center nuclear and U.S.-Russia relations experts offered their thoughts on the significance and consequences of this action.
 

Senior Fellow Will Tobey speaks with WBEZ 91.5 Chicago about the Obama administration's nuclear security accomplishments ahead of President Obama's fourth and final nuclear security summit.

What can the United States do to thwart the nuclear ambitions of its allies? Dr. Kogan analyzes past cases where the United States was able to leverage its alliance commitments to stop friendly states from going nuclear. He then asks what lessons these past nuclear negotiations hold for today.  In the coming decade, key U.S. allies in the Middle East (Saudi Arabia) and East Asia (South Korea, Japan) may consider reducing their reliance on U.S. security guarantees by acquiring independent nuclear deterrents.  In conversation with Project Director Kevin Ryan, Dr. Kogan discusses Washington's options in confronting these contemporary allies with nascent nuclear appetites.

Nuclear terrorism remains a real and urgent threat. Despite an array of mechanisms established to combat this threat, several serious problems persist, requiring relentless attention and actions by the United States, Russia and other responsible nations. These problems include continuing nuclear security vulnerabilities in a number of countries and the continued incidents of illicit trafficking in nuclear materials, radioactive sources and the various components.

This new report, “Steps to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism: Recommendations Based on the U.S.-Russia Joint Threat Assessment,” was produced jointly by researchers at Harvard’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs and the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute for U.S. and Canadian Studies (ISKRAN). The study outlines concrete steps for the United States and Russia to take in leading international efforts to combat the threat of nuclear terrorism.

Researchers from the United States and Russia today issued a joint assessment of the global threat of nuclear terrorism, warning of a persistent danger that terrorists could obtain or make a nuclear device and use it with catastrophic consequences. The first joint threat assessment by experts from the world’s two major nuclear powers concludes: “If current approaches toward eliminating the threat are not replaced with a sense of urgency and resolve, the question will become not if but when, and on what scale, the first act of nuclear terrorism occurs.”

An update from U.S.-Russia Initiative to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism for the week of  April 22-29, 2011.

An update from U.S.-Russia Initiative to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism for the week of February 18-25, 2011.

An update from U.S.-Russia Initiative to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism for the week of January 7-14, 2011.

An update from U.S.-Russia Initiative to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism for December 24-January 7, 2011.

An update from U.S.-Russia Initiative to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism for December 17-23, 2010.