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Begin New Search Topic Nuclear Weapons Political Geography Russia

191. Weapons of Mass Destruction in India and Pakistan

Author:
Anthony H. Cordesman
Publication Date:
01-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)
Abstract:
India continues its nuclear weapons development program, for which its underground nuclear tests in May 1998 were a significant milestone. The acquisition of foreign equipment will benefit New Delhi in its efforts to develop and produce more sophisticated nuclear weapons. During this reporting period, India continued to obtain foreign assistance for its civilian nuclear power program, primarily from Russia.
Topic:
Security, Nuclear Weapons, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Russia, South Asia, India, and Asia

192. Annual Report to Congress on the Safety and Security of Russian Nuclear Facilities and Military Forces

Publication Date:
09-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Abstract:
Moscow will continue to devote scarce resources to maintaining its nuclear forces. Nevertheless, the aging of Russia's strategic systems and Putin's military reform plan to shift resources to the general purpose forces probably will result in Russia having fewer than 2,000 strategic warheads by 2015. Even with ongoing reductions, Moscow probably will retain several thousand nonstrategic nuclear warheads in its inventory because of concerns over its deteriorating conventional capabilities.
Topic:
Security, Government, and Nuclear Weapons
Political Geography:
Russia

193. Renovating U.S. Strategic Arms Control Policy

Author:
Richard D. Sokolsky
Publication Date:
02-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
There has been a tectonic shift in the strategic landscape since the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) negotiations concluded in the early 1990s. The Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact are defunct. America and Russia are no longer enemies and the nuclear arms race between the two countries is, for all intents and purposes, over. The threat of a surprise nuclear attack has all but vanished along with any plausible scenario between the two countries that could escalate to a nuclear war. The strategic warning time for reconstitution of a credible conventional military threat to Europe can now be measured in years. The likelihood that Russia could marshal the economic resources for clandestine production of new nuclear weapon systems on a militarily significant scale is extremely remote. The most serious security threats emanating from Russia today—poorly safeguarded nuclear warheads and materials and the potential proliferation of such material and expertise to states of concern—reflect profound weakness. Simply put, the proliferation risks attendant to a Russia in the throes of a long-term structural crisis are a far more serious security threat than SS–18 heavy missiles destroying U.S. intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) in a preemptive first strike.
Topic:
Defense Policy and Nuclear Weapons
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, and Europe

194. The Next Wave: Urgently Needed New Steps to Control Warheads and Fissile Material

Author:
Matthew Bunn
Publication Date:
03-2000
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
Nothing could be more central to U.S. and world security than ensuring that nuclear warheads and their essential ingredients—plutonium and highly enriched uranium (HEU)—do not fall into the hands of terrorists or proliferating states. If plutonium and HEU become regularly available on a nuclear black market, nothing else we do to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons will succeed. Similarly, unless stockpiles of nuclear warheads and fissile materials can be secured, monitored, and verifiably reduced, it will be impossible to achieve deep, transparent, and irreversible reductions in nuclear arms. Measures to control warheads and fissile materials, therefore, are central to the entire global effort to reduce nuclear arms and stem their spread. The tens of thousands of nuclear weapons and hundreds of tons of plutonium and HEU that remain in the U.S. and Russian nuclear stockpiles represent a deadly legacy of the Cold War, and managing them securely must be a top U.S. security policy priority.
Topic:
Security, Arms Control and Proliferation, Nuclear Weapons, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, Europe, and Asia

195. Arms Control and Missile Defense: Not Mutually Exclusive

Author:
Charles V. Peña
Publication Date:
07-2000
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
Traditionally, strategic offensive arms control and ballistic missile defense have been viewed as mutually exclusive. During the Cold War, the general belief was that anti–ballistic missile (ABM) systems would call into question the ability of the superpowers to successfully survive a first nuclear strike and inflict sufficient damage with a second strike. That is, missile defense could allow one superpower to launch a first strike and then use its defenses to intercept a second strike with the other superpower's surviving warheads—thereby undermining deterrence and stability. Furthermore, the thinking was that this situation would result in a dangerous offensive arms race as each side sought to counter the effects of the other's defenses.
Topic:
Defense Policy, Arms Control and Proliferation, and Nuclear Weapons
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, Europe, and Asia

196. A Verification Regime for Warhead Control

Author:
Liu Suping
Publication Date:
01-2000
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), Stanford University
Abstract:
After a brief period of progress, the U.S.-Russian nuclear reduction process has reached a stalemate. This situation causes us to rethink the following issues: What is the motivation for the two nuclear superpowers to conduct nuclear reductions? How can the focus of the nuclear arms reduction process be changed from verification of reduction of delivery vehicles to verification of reduction of warheads and nuclear materials? What is the objective for future nuclear reductions? What kind of verification regime will be required for future nuclear reductions?
Topic:
Arms Control and Proliferation and Nuclear Weapons
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, Europe, and Asia

197. China, Nuclear Weapons, and Arms Control: A Preliminary Assessment

Author:
Robert A. Manning, Ronald Montaperto, and Brad Roberts
Publication Date:
04-2000
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
Historically, U.S. nuclear strategists and arms control experts have paid little attention to the People's Republic of China (PRC). China has not been a major factor in the U.S. nuclear calculus, which has remained centered on U.S.-Russian nuclear arsenals as the principal framework for arms control and arms reductions. Yet today China is the only one of the five de jure nuclear weapons states qualitatively and quantitatively expanding its nuclear arsenal.
Topic:
Security, Foreign Policy, Defense Policy, Arms Control and Proliferation, and Nuclear Weapons
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, China, Europe, and Asia

198. START II Nears Ratification, Implementation Still at Risk

Author:
Jon Wolfsthal and Joseph Cirincione
Publication Date:
04-2000
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
Seven years after President's George Bush and Boris Yelstin signed it, the Russian Duma is on the verge of ratifying the START II arms reduction treaty. The agreement, ratified by the United States Senate on January 26, 1996, would cut the number of U.S. and Russian deployed strategic nuclear weapons to 3,000-3,500.
Topic:
Arms Control and Proliferation and Nuclear Weapons
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, Europe, and Asia

199. Making the Grade 2000: Second Annual Review of Fissile Material Control Efforts

Author:
Kevin O'Neill
Publication Date:
04-2000
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Institute for Science and International Security
Abstract:
A little over a year ago, ISIS initiated an annual review of fissile material controls covering a broad spectrum of initiatives. To do so, 19 separate initiatives were identified and assessed. Based on this assessment, grades were awarded on a scale of A, B, C, D, and F, where an “A” is excellent and an “F” is failing. Numerically, an “A” corresponds to a numerical grade of four, and an “F” to zero. The results of the first review were disappointing. Only 12 of the 19 initiatives received a passing grade of “C” or higher. The average grade of the initiatives was a “C”-showing an unfortunate level of mediocrity across the fissile material control agenda. In ISIS’s 2000 review, we found that the outlook is worse today than it was a year ago. Rather than make progress during the past 12 months, the overall fissile material control agenda fared poorly. The average grade of the identified initiatives fell from a “C” to a “C-minus.” This overall finding is borne out if one looks at the individual grades assigned to each of the 19 identified initiatives. ISIS judged that five initiatives remained essentially static, nine received lower grades, and five initiatives received higher grades.
Topic:
Arms Control and Proliferation, Nuclear Weapons, Weapons, and Fissile Material
Political Geography:
Russia and United States of America

200. Defense Monitor: The Impact Of National Missile Defense On Russia and Nuclear Security

Publication Date:
08-2000
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Center for Defense Information
Abstract:
Russia s nuclear arsenal is broke and broken. Moscow s overall economic decline has taken a large toll on Russian security during the past decade. Its military cannot adequately perform traditional, essential security missions — airspace surveillance and defense, territorial defense against invasion, border control, and maintenance of internal cohesion. The sole exception to this dismal state of military affairs is nuclear deterrence, and even this mission is becoming burdensome.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, Nuclear Weapons, and Politics
Political Geography:
Russia and Moscow