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Begin New Search Topic Nuclear Power Political Geography Global Focus Content Type Special Report

1. The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Strategic Stability and Nuclear Risk, Volume III, South Asian Perspectives

Author:
Peter Topychkanov, Sanatan Kulshrestha, Yanitra Kumaraguru, Malinda Meegoda, Kritika Roy, Saima Aman Sial, Dmitry Stefanovich, and Maaike Verbruggen
Publication Date:
04-2020
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Stockholm International Peace Research Institute
Abstract:
This edited volume is the third in a series of three. The series forms part of a SIPRI project that explores regional perspectives and trends related to the impact that recent advances in artificial intelligence could have on nuclear weapons and doctrines, as well as on strategic stability and nuclear risk. This volume assembles the perspectives of eight experts on South Asia on why and how machine learning and autonomy may become the focus of an arms race among nuclear-armed states. It further explores how the adoption of these technologies may have an impact on their calculation of strategic stability and nuclear risk at the regional and transregional levels.
Topic:
Arms Control and Proliferation, Nuclear Power, Cybersecurity, Political stability, Disarmament, and Artificial Intelligence
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Russia, South Asia, India, East Asia, and Global Focus

2. Non-proliferation challenges facing the Trump administration

Author:
Robert Einhorn
Publication Date:
03-2017
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
The Brookings Institution
Abstract:
The global nuclear non-proliferation regime, as it has evolved since the entry into force of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in 1970, has been remarkably resilient. Despite predictions of a “cascade of proliferation,” there are currently only nine states with nuclear weapons, and that number has remained the same for the past 25 years.[1] The NPT is nearly universal, with 190 parties and only five non-parties (India, Israel, North Korea, Pakistan, South Sudan). Several countries voluntarily abandoned nuclear weapons development programs (Argentina, Brazil, Egypt); several others were forced diplomatically or militarily to give up the quest (Iraq, Libya, South Korea, Syria); three former Soviet republics inherited nuclear weapons but gave them up (Belarus, Kazakhstan, Ukraine); and one country built a small arsenal before unilaterally eliminating it (South Africa). With Iran’s path to nuclear weapons blocked by the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) for at least 10 to 15 years, there are no non-nuclear weapon states currently believed to be pursuing nuclear weapons, according to U.S. government sources. And despite cases of nuclear smuggling and continuing interest of terrorist groups in acquiring nuclear weapons, no thefts of enough fissile material to build a bomb are believed to have taken place.
Topic:
International Relations, International Security, and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:
Global Focus

3. The Deterrence and Assurance Conversation

Author:
Rebecca K.C. Hersman
Publication Date:
01-2017
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
As we survey the world today, we find the nuclear landscape to be more uncertain and precarious than it has been at any time since the end of the Cold War. In recent years, Russia has taken to routinely rattling its nuclear saber—publicly embracing the value and utility of nuclear weapons while rejecting further nuclear arms control efforts—in an effort to intimidate its smaller neighbors and to test European unity along the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) periphery. North Korea’s expansion and diversification of its nuclear arsenal and associated delivery platforms, combined with Kim Jong-un’s penchant for provocation, has raised the risk of nuclear coercion and undermined confidence in current deterrence approaches. Meanwhile, nuclear competition between Pakistan and India continues to grow, spurred on by Pakistan’s now-open acknowledgment of a range of “tactical” nuclear weapons as part of their “full spectrum deterrence.” And China, unabashed in its desire to assert greater regional dominance, is modernizing, diversifying, and hardening its nuclear forces while simultaneously enhancing complementary capabilities in space, cyber, and advanced missile systems. Over a quarter century past the fall of the Berlin Wall, nuclear dangers appear to be growing rather than receding, contributing to an increasingly complex security environment
Topic:
International Security, Self Determination, and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:
Global Focus

4. Evaluating Project Aim 2020: Preparing to Transform the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission

Author:
Robert Shea
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
The National Academy of Public Administration
Abstract:
The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has experienced significant changes over the last five years. NRC developed Project Aim 2020 (Project Aim) to improve the agency’s planning and operational functions. Project Aim set out to identify key strategies and recommendations to transform the agency during the next five years to enhance the NRC’s ability to plan and execute its mission in a more effective, efficient, and agile manner. The NRC requested the National Academy of Public Administration (the Academy) to conduct an independent assessment of Project Aim. The Academy’s review of Project Aim consisted of two reports: an evaluation of Project Aim processes; and an assessment of the Project Aim final report. The Academy reports were prepared by a professional Study Team, in consultation with an experienced Focus Group of five Academy Fellows and one non-Fellow. The Study Team and Focus Group utilized their knowledge of strategic planning and organizational change management in their evaluation of the NRC’s efforts, providing the NRC with several pragmatic recommendations as the agency pursues an important organizational transformation.
Topic:
Diplomacy, Nuclear Weapons, United Nations, Military Strategy, Nuclear Power, and Denuclearization
Political Geography:
Global Focus

5. Civil HEU Watch Tracking: Inventories of Civil Highly Enriched Uranium: National and Global Stocks, as of End 2014

Author:
David Albright and Serena Kelleher-Vergantini
Publication Date:
10-2015
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Institute for Science and International Security
Abstract:
Highly enriched uranium (HEU) is a key ingredient in nuclear weapons, making it one of the most dangerous materials in existence. As a result, governments take extraordinary measures to secure HEU against theft or diversion and to reduce the inventories of HEU in the world. To that end, it is important to track how much civil HEU exists and where it is. However, national civil HEU stocks are difficult to estimate, with transparency policies varying by country and few countries providing official declarations of their stocks. As a result, this report contains the few official civil HEU declarations and estimates civil HEU stocks in countries that do not provide public declarations. This study relies on open source information to derive these estimates. It is an update of a report published in 2005.
Topic:
Nuclear Weapons, Nuclear Power, and Uranium
Political Geography:
Global Focus