Apr 26, 2020

The secretary of state is preparing an argument that the U.S. remains a participant in the Obama-era nuclear deal, with the goal of extending an arms embargo or destroying the accord.

Apr 27, 2020

The authors conducted a study which highlights how the U.S. public as a whole and various demographic groups view President Donald Trump's positions on nuclear weapons.

Apr 28, 2020

 Gen. Mark. A. Milley’s job is to provide sound military advice to the president. But at a deeper level, his responsibility is to safeguard the independence and integrity of the armed forces. The last thing the country needs is a military leadership that’s trying to curry favor with any commander in chief, particularly one who’s hungry for affirmation.

Apr 28, 2020

Stephen Walt writes that even though Bernie Sanders is out of the presidential race, the time has come for many of the policies that he promoted: Universal Healthcare; Democratic Socialism; Income Redistribution; and Foreign Policy.

Apr 29, 2020

The world is on the cusp of a geopolitical reset. The global pandemic could well undermine international institutions, reinforce nationalism and spur de-globalization. But far-sighted leadership could also rekindle cooperation, glimmers of which appeared in the G-20’s offer of debt relief for some of the world’s poorest countries, a joint plea from more than 200 former national leaders for a more coordinated pandemic response and an unprecedented multinational pact to arrest the crash in oil markets.  

May 3, 2020

Rachel Esplin Odell argues for a wiser and more conservative strategy that resists the temptation to exaggerate the challenge posed by China.

May 5, 2020

Stephen Walt writes that arguments against U.S. offshore balancing misunderstand history. The strategy that worked against the Soviet Union can work against China.

May 6, 2020

Nathaniel Moir reviews Maxwell Taylor's Cold War: From Berlin to Vietnam by Ingo Trauschweizer.

May 7, 2020

History is replete with irony, but rarely more poignantly than in the summer of 2016 when, on 23 June, the UK voted to leave the European Union and the next day, 24 June, the EU published its Global Strategy document asserting its ambition of “strategic autonomy.” Whither Franco-British defense cooperation in such chaotic circumstances? This paper attempts to provide the outline of an answer to that question.

Apr 21, 2020

Stephen Walt argues that as democracies falter, it's worth considering whether the United States made the right call in attempting to create a liberal world order.

Apr 22, 2020

In October 2019, the Belfer Center's Arctic Initiative and the Wilson Center's Polar Institute co-hosted a workshop on Policy and Action on Plastic in the Arctic Ocean with the Icelandic Chairmanship of the Arctic Council. The Arctic Council asked Magnús Jóhannesson, the Council's designated Special Coordinator on Plastics Pollution and Marine Litter, and Gunn-Britt Retter, Head of Arctic and Environmental Unit at the Saami Council — who both participated in the workshop — to comment on some of the points that the report raises.

Apr 24, 2020

In his new book, Do Morals Matter? Presidents and Foreign Policy from FDR to Trump, Joseph S. Nye developed a scorecard to determine how U.S. presidents since 1945 factored questions of ethics and morality into their foreign policy. In an interview, Henry Farrell asked him a few questions to get to the heart of his findings.

Apr 24, 2020

Nathaniel L. Moir recounts the events of 1968: The war in Vietnam and extensive civil unrest in the United States — and yet another big problem that made life harder. In 1968, the H3N2 pandemic killed more individuals in the United States than the combined total number of American fatalities during both the Vietnam and Korean Wars.

Apr 24, 2020

When Russian intelligence officers plotted their campaign to destabilize American politics in 2016, they had nearly a century of experience in covert manipulation to draw upon. The Internet had given the Russians new tools for this mischief. But their secret weapon was us — an open, divided, angry America.

Apr 26, 2020

Joseph Nye suggests that a new U.S. administration might take a leaf from the success of the post-1945 American presidents that are described in Do Morals Matter? Presidents and Foreign Policy from FDR to Trump. The United States could launch a massive COVID-19 aid program like the Marshall Plan.

Apr 27, 2020

The authors conducted a study which highlights how the U.S. public as a whole and various demographic groups view President Donald Trump's positions on nuclear weapons.

Apr 28, 2020

Stephen Walt writes that even though Bernie Sanders is out of the presidential race, the time has come for many of the policies that he promoted: Universal Healthcare; Democratic Socialism; Income Redistribution; and Foreign Policy.

Apr 29, 2020

The world is on the cusp of a geopolitical reset. The global pandemic could well undermine international institutions, reinforce nationalism and spur de-globalization. But far-sighted leadership could also rekindle cooperation, glimmers of which appeared in the G-20’s offer of debt relief for some of the world’s poorest countries, a joint plea from more than 200 former national leaders for a more coordinated pandemic response and an unprecedented multinational pact to arrest the crash in oil markets.  

Apr 29, 2020

Joel Clement appeared on CNN's Erin Burnett OutFront on April 23, 2020.  In this blog post for the Union of Concerned Scientists, he elaborates on what he wishes he had said during that interview.

Apr 29, 2020

Americans are not going to wait for sufficient testing. So what happens then? Juliette Kayyem describes "opening up" as a high-stakes version of a coloring book. States can use more and more crayons, but the goal is to avoid going over the edges.

Apr 30, 2020

As the divergent experiences of the US and South Korea show, testing can be the difference between disease containment and catastrophe. Rather than relying on national governments to ensure the rapid development, production, and deployment of diagnostics during outbreaks, the world needs a global coordinating platform.

May 1, 2020

Joel Clement describes how the Arctic is transforming into a warmer, wetter, and less predictable climate state, what the consequences are for the Arctic's indigenous inhabitants, and what measures can be taken to build resilience.

May 3, 2020

Rachel Esplin Odell argues for a wiser and more conservative strategy that resists the temptation to exaggerate the challenge posed by China.

May 3, 2020

“Those who do not study history are condemned to repeat it.”  And the rest of us are condemned to repeat George Santayana.

Will the Coronavirus Recession of 2020 be V-shaped?  Or U-shaped?  If we fail to heed the lessons of history it is likely to be W-shaped, with incipient recovery followed by successive relapses into sickness and recession.

As has been widely noted, we would have been better prepared to cope with the Covid-19 pandemic in the first place if everyone had paid more attention to the past history of epidemics. Be that as it may, the world is now deep into the pandemic and its economic consequences, the most severe such events since the interwar period, 1918-1939.  As decision-makers in every country contemplate their next steps, they would do well to ponder the precedents of that interwar period.

May 5, 2020

Stephen Walt writes that arguments against U.S. offshore balancing misunderstand history. The strategy that worked against the Soviet Union can work against China.

May 6, 2020

Nathaniel Moir reviews Maxwell Taylor's Cold War: From Berlin to Vietnam by Ingo Trauschweizer.

May 7, 2020

During times of crisis, the most effective leaders are those who can build solidarity by educating the public about its own interests. Sadly, in the case of COVID-19, the leaders of the world's two largest economies have gone in the opposite direction, all but ensuring that the crisis will deepen.

May 7, 2020

Official figures exclude thousands who have died during the pandemic. To draw the right lessons, the United States needs an accurate tally of the victims.

May 8, 2020

Sue Biniaz, former lead climate negotiator for the United States, shared her thoughts on the postponement of COP-26, and on the possible re-engagement of the U.S. in the international effort to address climate change in the newest episode of “Environmental Insights: Discussions on Policy and Practice from the Harvard Environmental Economics Program,” a podcast produced by the Harvard Environmental Economics Program.

Jan 8, 2020

Neither the United States nor Iran wants to go to war. That’s the good news. The bad news is that in the fog of crisis — similar in many ways to the fog of war — the danger of inadvertently stumbling into war is dangerously high.

Jan 13, 2020

The arguments in favor of the United States' declaring that the only purpose of its nuclear weapons is to deter others who possess them from using theirs — in other words, that in no circumstances will this country use nuclear weapons first — are far stronger than the arguments against this stance. It must be hoped that the next US administration will take this no-first-use step promptly.

Jan 13, 2020

Stephen Walt writes that the United States' unusual historical experience, geographic isolation, large domestic market, and general ignorance have weakened its ability to make viable foreign-policy strategies.

Jan 15, 2020

Joseph Nye writes that some decoupling of interdependence is likely, particularly in areas related to technology that directly affect national security. But will Washington and Beijing go too far?

Jan 21, 2020

Joseph Nye's new book rates the efforts of presidents from FDR to Trump.

Jan 28, 2020

In the unintuitive world of nuclear weapons strategy, it’s often difficult to identify which decisions can serve to decrease the risk of a devastating nuclear conflict and which might instead increase it. Such complexity stems from the very foundation of the field: Nuclear weapons are widely seen as bombs built never to be used. Historically, granular—even seemingly mundane—decisions about force structure, research efforts, or communicated strategy have confounded planners, sometimes causing the opposite of the intended effect.

Feb 3, 2020

The study of existential risk — the risk of human extinction or the collapse of human civilization — has only recently emerged as an integrated field of research, and yet an overwhelming volume of relevant research has already been published. To provide an evidence base for policy and risk analysis, this research should be systematically reviewed. In a systematic review, one of many time-consuming tasks is to read the titles and abstracts of research publications, to see if they meet the inclusion criteria. The authors show how this task can be shared between multiple people (using crowdsourcing) and partially automated (using machine learning), as methods of handling an overwhelming volume of research.

Feb 10, 2020

Realistic, creative vulnerability assessment and testing are critical to finding and fixing nuclear security weaknesses and avoiding over-confidence. Both vulnerability assessment and realistic testing are needed to ensure that nuclear security systems are providing the level of protection required. Systems must be challenged by experts thinking like adversaries, trying to find ways to overcome them. Effective vulnerability assessment and realistic testing are more difficult in the case of insider threats, and special attention is needed. Organizations need to find ways to give people the mission and the incentives to find nuclear security weaknesses and suggest ways they might be fixed. With the right approaches and incentives in place, effective vulnerability assessment and testing can be a key part of achieving and sustaining high levels of nuclear security.

Feb 10, 2020

Nuclear security is never finished. Nuclear security measures for protecting all nuclear weapons, weapons-usable nuclear materials, and facilities whose sabotage could cause disastrous consequences should protect against the full range of plausible threats. It is an ongoing endeavor that requires constant assessment of physical protection operations and reevaluation of potential threats. One of the most challenging areas of nuclear security is how to account for the impact–positive and negative—of non-nuclear emerging technologies. The amended Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material (amended CPPNM) states it should be reviewed in light of the prevailing situation, and a key part of the prevailing situation is technological evolution. Therefore, the upcoming review conference in 2021, as well as any future review conferences, should examine the security threats and benefits posed by emerging technologies.

Feb 10, 2020

Civil society has played a very important role in nuclear security over the years, and its role could be strengthened in the future. Some nuclear organizations react against the very idea of civil society involvement, thinking of only one societal role—protesting. In fact, however, civil society has played quite a number of critical roles in nuclear security over the years, including highlighting the dangers of nuclear terrorism; providing research and ideas; nudging governments to act; tracking progress and holding governments and operators accountable; educating the public and other stakeholders; promoting dialogue and partnerships; helping with nuclear security implementation; funding initial steps; and more. Funding organizations (both government and non-government) should consider ways to support civil society work and expertise focused on nuclear security in additional countries. Rather than simply protesting and opposing, civil society organizations can help build more effective nuclear security practices around the world.

Feb 10, 2020

Participants at the final Nuclear Security Summit in 2016 agreed on “action plans” for initiatives they would support by five international organizations and groups—the International Atomic Energy Agency, the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism, INTERPOL, the United Nations, and the Global Partnership Against the Spread of Weapons and Materials of Destruction. These institutions were supposed to play key roles in bolstering ongoing nuclear security cooperation after the summit process ended. The action plans were modest documents, largely endorsing activities already underway, and there have been mixed results in implementing them. To date, these organizations have not filled any substantial part of the role once played by the nuclear security summits.

Feb 23, 2020

With the Russia investigation and impeachment behind him, President Trump finally may feel empowered to engage with Russian President Vladimir Putin and pursue an arms control deal.  

Mar 2, 2020

How do presidents incorporate morality into decisions involving the national interest? Moral considerations explain why Truman, who authorized the use of nuclear weapons in Japan during World War II, later refused General MacArthur's request to use them in China during the Korean War. What is contextual intelligence, and how does it explain why Bush 41 is ranked first in foreign policy, but Bush 43 is found wanting? Is it possible for a president to lie in the service of the public interest? In this episode, Professor Joseph S. Nye considers these questions as he explores the role of morality in presidential decision-making from FDR to Trump.

Mar 5, 2020

The opening of the British archives has seen historians uncover the secrets of the UK's nuclear weapons programme since the 1990s. While a growing number have sought to expose these former secrets, there has been less effort to consider government secrecy itself. What was kept a secret, when and why? And how and why, notably from the 1980s, did the British government decide to officially disclose greater information about the British nuclear weapons programme to Members of Parliament, journalists, defence academics and the tax-paying general public. 

Mar 17, 2020

On December 5, 1994, leaders of the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Russian Federation met in Budapest, Hungary, to pledge security assurances to Ukraine in connection with its accession to the Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) as a non-nuclear-weapons state. The signature of the so-called Budapest Memorandum concluded arduous negotiations that resulted in Ukraine’s agreement to relinquish the world’s third-largest nuclear arsenal, which the country inherited from the collapsed Soviet Union, and transfer all nuclear warheads to Russia for dismantlement. The signatories of the memorandum pledged to respect Ukraine’s territorial integrity and inviolability of its borders, and to refrain from the use or threat of military force. Russia breached these commitments with its annexation of Crimea in 2014 and aggression in eastern Ukraine, bringing the meaning and value of security assurance pledged in the Memorandum under renewed scrutiny.

On the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the memorandum’s signature, the Project on Managing the Atom at the Belfer Center for Science & International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School, with the support of the Center for U.S.-Ukrainian Relations and the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute, hosted a conference to revisit the history of the Budapest Memorandum, consider the repercussions of its violation for international security and the broader nonproliferation regime, and draw lessons for the future. The conference brought together academics, practitioners, and experts who have contributed to developing U.S. policy toward post-Soviet nuclear disarmament, participated in the negotiations of the Budapest Memorandum, and dealt with the repercussions of its breach in 2014. The conference highlighted five key lessons learned from the experience of Ukraine’s disarmament, highlighted at the conference.

Mar 31, 2020

A nuclear explosion detonated anywhere by a terrorist group would be a global humanitarian, economic, and political catastrophe. The current COVID-19 pandemic reminds us not to ignore prevention of and preparation for low-probability, high-consequence disasters. For nuclear terrorism, while preparation is important, prevention must be the top priority. The most effective strategy for keeping nuclear weapons out of the hands of terrorists is to ensure that nuclear materials and facilities around the world have strong and sustainable security. Every president for more than two decades has made strengthening nuclear security around the globe a priority. This includes the Trump administration, whose 2018 Nuclear Posture Review states: “[n]uclear terrorism remains among the most significant threats to the security of the United States, allies, and partners.”

Apr 11, 2020

A simplified nuclear exchange model demonstrates that China’s ability to launch a successful nuclear retaliatory strike in response to an adversary’s nuclear first strike has been and remains far from assured. This study suggests that China’s criterion for effective nuclear deterrence is very low.

Apr 24, 2020

In his new book, Do Morals Matter? Presidents and Foreign Policy from FDR to Trump, Joseph S. Nye developed a scorecard to determine how U.S. presidents since 1945 factored questions of ethics and morality into their foreign policy. In an interview, Henry Farrell asked him a few questions to get to the heart of his findings.

Apr 27, 2020

The authors conducted a study which highlights how the U.S. public as a whole and various demographic groups view President Donald Trump's positions on nuclear weapons.

May 6, 2020

Nathaniel Moir reviews Maxwell Taylor's Cold War: From Berlin to Vietnam by Ingo Trauschweizer.

Mar 24, 2020

The coronavirus pandemic has slowed the economy, but it hasn’t put dozens of other major global issues on pause. From a rapidly changing Middle East and Brexit to great power rivalry and 2020 election security, Belfer Center scholars have been active in the classroom and out in the field sharing impactful research. This issue of our newsletter, produced before COVID-19 became a full-fledged pandemic, shares highlights from this work.