It would be a gross mistake to consider the changes to the nuclear doctrine as a response to the Ukraine crisis alone
During a meeting of the Russian Security Council standing conference on nuclear deterrence on September 25, it was announced that changes would be made to the document titled “Basic Principles of State Policy of the Russian Federation on Nuclear Deterrence.” At the time of writing, the revised version of the document ...
... possible use of nuclear weapons by non-nuclear forces. This trend is particularly evident in the interaction between Washington and Seoul, which established the Nuclear Consultative Group and approved (on the margins of the NATO summit) the Guidelines for Nuclear Deterrence and Nuclear Operations on the Korean Peninsula.
New coalition and alliance constructs resembling NATO are taking shape: AUKUS, new formats in Northeast Asia between the United States, South Korea, and Japan emphasizing space infrastructure....
... on fixed land-based, sea-based, and mobile land-based components. Back in 2012, a number of U.S. policymakers mentioned the Pentagon’s desire to create a broad regional missile defense infrastructure in Asia Pacific to meet the country’s unique nuclear deterrence needs [
5
]. Notably, no country of East Asia, in whole or in part, has ever expressed its intentions to unprovokedly attack American bases, much less the territory of the United States. Pyongyang’s
statements
about “striking a ...
... action as escalatory.
In the
Kinzhal
case, Russia attempted escalation control through deliberate allusion to the nuclear option, despite
statements of its leadership
against nuclear use in Ukraine. While there remains a conceptual difference between nuclear deterrence and nuclear use, this may still contribute to a conflation of conventional and nuclear stakes in the conflict, increasing the risks of the signals being misunderstood in the U.S. Further, it is likely to further complicate Russia’s ...
... states, [
2
] not to mention the libraries of scientific and political literature on the subject.
Nevertheless, these mottoes are by no means as unambiguous as they seem. On the contrary, they are literally woven of contradictions, while the notion of nuclear deterrence—depending on its interpretation by politicians, military, and civilian experts, not to mention the media—undergoes transformations that would have driven crazy the great Publius Ovid, an ancient Roman poet with his immortal
Metamorphoses
...
Policy Brief #44 / 2022
Policy Brief #44 / 2022
In October 2022, Joseph Biden’s administration published the new U.S. Nuclear Posture Review (NPR-2022) as part of a single National Defense Strategy (NDS-2022) package along with the Missile Defense Review (MDR-2022). The previous Nuclear Posture Review appeared in February 2018 during Donald Trump’s presidency.
One of the key functions of any publicly available strategic document is to deliver information to other states – both friendly and hostile...
June 2020 will go down in the history of Russia’s approaches to nuclear deterrence and nuclear weapons in general
June 2020 will go down in the history of Russia’s approaches to nuclear deterrence and nuclear weapons in general. This is largely connected with the unprecedented release of the document
Basic Principles ...
... Europe to improve. His ambition for the EU is to develop an international arms control agenda in view of the potential return of military and nuclear competition by 2021 as the future of a New START Treaty also remains unclear. Obviously, France’s nuclear deterrence – especially after Brexit was concluded in January 2020 – adds to its gravitas at the EU level. Macron’s phrase that ‘the vital interests of France now have a European dimension’ opens the door.
Interesting as they are, the ...
Of all the “official” nuclear powers, the UK arguably displays the most peculiar approach to nuclear deterrence
Of all the “official” nuclear powers (Russia, the US, France, the UK, China), the UK arguably displays the most peculiar approach to nuclear deterrence. Here, we will outline the most salient details, assess the prospects, and ...
... between 5 and 7 kt.
According to official explanations, up to and including those contained in the new nuclear doctrine [
1
], the United States intends to use the weapon to give additional stability and flexibility to its regional (not strategic!) nuclear deterrence. The idea is that the number of such missiles will be limited, because they are intended for fairly specific purposes.
The U.S. military had long sought permission for low-yield nuclear weapons from the White House,
arguing
that the ...
