Pavel Podvig | Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

What to do about tactical nuclear weapons

Pavel Podvig — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 13:32:08 -0800

Since the United States and Russia might soon sign a new treaty that limits their strategic nuclear weapons, it's natural to wonder about Washington and Moscow's tactical nuclear weapons, which the treaty won't cover. The hope is that the momentum for a nuclear-weapon-free world, the renewed U.S.-Russian negotiations, and the ongoing review of the U.S. nuclear posture and NATO strategic concept will help make progress on reducing nonstrategic nuclear arsenals--an issue that has been largely neglected for more than a decade.

The false promise of missile defense

Pavel Podvig — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 13:03:59 -0700

Of the many security quagmires confronting President Barack Obama, perhaps the most challenging is how he navigates the Bush administration's decision to place missile defense installations in Eastern Europe. As a candidate, Obama didn't rule out keeping the Bush plan to put a missile defense radar in the Czech Republic and interceptors in Poland, but he did place the onus on the technology--i.e., it had to be viable. True to his campaign promise, upon taking office, he ordered a review of the program, which is about to be completed.

The Moscow summit: A positive first step

Pavel Podvig — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 07:56:52 -0700

The U.S.-Russian summit held earlier this month in Moscow marked a good beginning for the relationship between the Obama and Medvedev administrations. While the two presidents made promising progress on the most urgent issue on the table--replacing START--it wasn't the only important agreement they made.

What if North Korea were the only nuclear weapon state?

Pavel Podvig — Wed, 27 May 2009 09:47:07 -0700

North Korea's nuclear test will almost certainly fuel skepticism about the nuclear disarmament agenda. If no country has nuclear weapons, skeptics will ask, then how can “nuclear renegades” such as North Korea be deterred or dissuaded from getting a nuclear weapon and how can they be disarmed if they get one? For most opponents of nuclear abolition this argument ends the debate.

Reaction to the Obama-Medvedev joint statement on arms control

Pavel Podvig — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 08:33:26 -0700

For Russia, dialogue with the United States has always been as much about style as substance. So it isn't surprising that the change of tone brought by the Obama administration has produced encouraging results for nuclear arms control. The joint statement by U.S. President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev is hardly groundbreaking, but it does contain a few remarkable points.

Broadening the disarmament agenda through START

Pavel Podvig — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 08:19:35 -0800

On the subject of nuclear disarmament, one point is rarely disputed: the United States and Russia should lead the way, and other nuclear weapon states should join the process when U.S. and Russian arsenals are roughly comparable to their own. Given that these two countries have the largest nuclear arsenals, with more than 95 percent of all nuclear warheads, it is reasonable to expect them to start eliminating their weapons first.

Russia's new arms development

Pavel Podvig — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 14:24:06 -0800

We don't know at this point what the next U.S.-Russian arms control agreement will look like, but everyone in the international community expects it to be a step toward significantly reducing the world's two largest nuclear arsenals. The levels set in the Moscow Treaty, which Washington and Moscow signed in May 2002, commit them to reducing the number of operationally deployed nuclear warheads on each side to no more than 1,700-2,200 warheads by 2012. One would expect that a post-Moscow Treaty agreement will bring much lower numbers.

Formulating the next U.S.-Russian arms control agreement

Pavel Podvig — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 07:56:25 -0800

As the United States waits for a new administration to take office in January, expectations are high that arms control talks with Russia will be revitalized shortly thereafter. Parties in both countries--no matter political persuasion--think Washington and Moscow should move quickly to devise a new disarmament agreement that would replace the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), which expires in December 2009.

Barack Obama's missile defense challenge

Pavel Podvig — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 14:04:12 -0800

What a difference eight years makes. Following the 2000 U.S. presidential election, Russian President Vladimir Putin offered a new disarmament initiative that called for reducing U.S. and Russian strategic nuclear arsenals to 1,500 warheads apiece. Although that statement was basically ignored--at the time, Washington was embroiled in the recount saga--Putin's proposal remained the official Russian position on disarmament in subsequent years.

A silver lining to the U.S.-India nuclear deal

Pavel Podvig — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 14:31:15 -0700

The civilian nuclear cooperation deal between the United States and India, which President George W. Bush signed into law last week, has been controversial from the moment it was first outlined in New Delhi about three years ago. It would allow Washington to trade nuclear technology with New Delhi despite the fact that India is a de facto nuclear weapons state outside of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

U.S.-Russian relations after the conflict in Georgia

Pavel Podvig — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 14:30:51 -0700

If there's a consensus about the confrontation between Russia and Georgia, it's that the conflict has seriously strained the relationship between Moscow and its Western counterparts--namely, the United States and NATO. Now that the worst of the conflict seems over, it appears that the harshest measures suggested in the first days of the conflict, i.e., expelling Russia from the G-8, won't materialize. Despite all of the disagreements and mistrust, each party seems to understand that severing ties between Russia and the West isn't realistic.

The fallacy of the Megatons to Megawatts program

Pavel Podvig — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 08:14:07 -0700

Few U.S.-Russian cooperation efforts are more popular and less controversial than the "Megatons to Megawatts" program, also known as the HEU-LEU deal, which converts Russia's highly enriched uranium (HEU) from nuclear weapons into low-enriched uranium (LEU) for U.S. nuclear power reactors. Under the agreement that the countries signed in 1993, Moscow made a commitment to eliminate 500 metric tons of HEU--probably more than one-third of the total HEU stock that the Soviet Union produced during the Cold War.

The push for a new arms control agreement with Russia is ill-conceived

Pavel Podvig — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 11:42:00 -0700

Skepticism about arms control agreements has been a prominent Bush administration position. As such, its arms control achievements are few and far between. But in its waning days, the administration has finally agreed with the long-standing Russian position that any new arms control agreement should be "legally binding." John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, also recently announced in a major speech on nuclear issues that he would seek a new arms control agreement with Russia.

Don't block U.S.-Russian nuclear cooperation

Pavel Podvig — Thu, 22 May 2008 09:34:00 -0700

Two weeks ago, the United States and Russia signed an agreement on civilian nuclear cooperation, commonly known as a "123 agreement." It was immediately attacked from all sides. Some members of Congress urged the Bush administration not to submit the document to Congress and threatened to block it once they did. Meanwhile, nuclear skeptics in Russia raised concerns that the agreement could revitalize the idea of importing foreign spent nuclear fuel into Russia or strengthen the U.S.-led Global Nuclear Energy Partnership. For their part, U.S.

The realities of nuclear fuel supply guarantees

Pavel Podvig — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 11:17:00 -0700

Virtually any discussion regarding the security implications of the spread of nuclear power involves the need to build a mechanism that would ensure a guaranteed, uninterrupted supply of nuclear fuel for new nuclear power plants.

The U.S. satellite shootdown: An unnecessary action

Pavel Podvig — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 22:00:00 -0800

The intercept of the disabled USA-193 spy satellite the United States conducted on February 20 set a new benchmark for military exercises that have no benefits, but come at a tremendous political cost. The intercept topped even the U.S. decision to deploy missile defense installations in Poland and the Czech Republic as an ill-advised maneuver that could only bring scores of suspicion and mistrust--exactly what the deployments inspired in Russia, where missile defense now poisons virtually every other issue in U.S.-Russian relations.

The truth about Russia's military "resurgence"

Pavel Podvig — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 22:00:00 -0800

Prideful talk of new missiles, submarines, and bombers actually reveals weak Russian leadership and a stubborn military-industrial complex that's preparing to fight yesterday's wars.

How Russia's nuclear fuel delivery to Iran benefits nonproliferation

Pavel Podvig — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 22:00:00 -0800

By supplying Iran with nuclear reactor fuel, Moscow might have taken an important step in preventing countries interested in nuclear power from enriching uranium indigenously.

U.S. nuclear weapons security--a "silly" notion

Pavel Podvig — Sun, 11 Nov 2007 22:00:00 -0800

At first glance, the U.S. military's response to the incident at Minot Air Base involving the transportation of six nuclear warheads across the United States was reasonably thorough and harsh--three colonel-rank commanders were relieved of their positions, the bomber wing at Minot was decertified from its wartime missions, and a number of air force personnel lost their certifications. More action will probably come in the next few months.

Russia and nuclear disarmament

Pavel Podvig — Tue, 16 Oct 2007 22:00:00 -0700

U.S. political leaders such as Barack Obama might be willing to discuss making a nuclear-weapon-free world a reality, but in Moscow, the tone is decidedly different.