Nuclear Weapons

Photo: U.S. President Joe Biden’s fiscal 2022 budget request asks for $753 billion in national security funding, an increase of 1.6 percent that includes $715 billion for the Defense Department. Source: Defense News.

President Biden’s First Nuclear Arms Budget Is Disappointing

By Kingston Reif and Shannon Bugos*

WASHINGTON, DC (IDN) — As the Biden administration prepares to initiate a review of U.S. nuclear weapons policy, its first budget request proposes to continue every part of the unnecessary and unsustainable nuclear weapons spending plans it inherited from the Trump administration. This includes the controversial additions made by President Trump to the Obama-era program, such as additional, more usable lower-yield nuclear capabilities.

Photo: For a half century, the French nuclear bomb tests and their consequences have cast a shadow over Tahiti. Image: Bruno Barrilo/Heinui Le Caill

France Denies Covering-Up Deadly Nuclear Tests in French Polynesia

By Asia Pacific Report newsdesk

SUVA (IDN) — The French government has denied any cover-up over radiation levels in the Pacific following its nuclear testing in the region, as state-backed discussions took place in Paris about the legacy of the explosions, reports France 24.

A two-day meeting called by French President Emmanuel Macron was held following fresh allegations that the testing from 1966 to 1996 caused hidden atmospheric and ground radiation.

Photo: Robert Floyd, who heads Australia's safeguards and nonproliferation office, will succeed Lassina Zerbo, a geophysicist originally from Burkino Faso, as CTBTO Executive Secretary. Credit: Government of Australia.

Protracted Talks Lead States to Settle on Next CTBTO Leader

By Daryl G. Kimball*

The writer is the Executive Director of the Arms Control Association.

WASHINGTON, DC (IDN) — After an unusually contentious process that lasted for months, representatives from the member states of the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) finally agreed to appoint Robert Floyd of Australia to serve as its executive secretary.

Image: A Trident II missile fires its first stage after an underwater launch from a Royal Navy Vanguard-class ballistic missile submarine. Source: Wikimedia Commons.

US Should Commit to A No-First-Use Nuclear Policy

Viewpoint by Van Jackson*

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (IDN) — It was one of the most potent lessons of the Cold War—nukes are good for deterring others from using nukes, but not much else. Weapons capable only of spasmodic mass violence are too crude as a credible tool of coercion in most circumstances.

If the United States seeks only deterrence, but not political advantage from nuclear weapons, then adopting a no first use nuclear policy is not just low-risk—it’s necessary.

Image Source: Geneva Centre for Secuirty Policy

Sixteen States Urge the Nuclear-Weapon States to Take Decisive Steps Towards Disarmament

By Aar Jay Persius

BERLIN (IDN) — "A nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought." On June 16, at their meeting in Geneva, US President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin re-affirmed this fundamental truth, famously coined by their predecessors, Reagan and Gorbachev, at the last peak of the cold war, write the Foreign Affairs Ministers of Germany (Heiko Maas), Spain (Arancha González Laya) and Sweden (Ann Linde) in an article published in the German newspaper Rheinische Post on July 5.

Photo: The aftermath of a nuclear test carried out in Licorne in French Polynesia in 1971. Credit: The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO).

Nuclear Weapons Have Always Been Illegal; It’s Long Past Time to Abolish Them

“History is written by the victors. Thus, the heinous massacre that was Hiroshima has been handed down to us as a perfectly justified act of war.... It is clear that the use of nuclear weapons, which cause indiscriminate mass murder that leaves survivors to suffer for decades, is a violation of international law.”– Hiroshima Mayor Takashi Hiraoka before the International Court of Justice, Nov. 7, 1995

Viewpoint by Jacqueline Cabasso*

OAKLAND, California, USA (IDN) — July 8, 2021, marks the 25th anniversary of the International Court of Justice’s (ICJ’s) Advisory Opinion on the legal status of nuclear weapons.

Photo: US President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin shake hands at the Villa la Grange on June 16 in Geneva, Switzerland. Credit: Visual China Group (VCG)

Miles to Go Before the World Moves Further from the Brink of Nuclear Catastrophe

By Aar Jay Persius

BERLIN (IDN) — U.S. President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin reaffirmed at their June 16 summit in Geneva the principle agreed on by President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in 1985, that “a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought”. They also decided to engage in a robust “strategic stability” dialogue to “lay the groundwork for future arms control and risk reduction measures”.

Photo: Deputy Secretary of State Antony "Tony" Blinken meets with Chinese Executive Vice Foreign Minister Zhang Yesui at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Beijing, China, on February 11, 2015. [State Department photo/ Public Domain]

The US Builds A 'Systemic' Pact to Counter China's Growing Influence

By J Nastranis

NEW YORK (IDN) — Nearly five months after the termination of Donald Trump's erratic presidency, US President Joe Biden has triggered a sort of 'systemic' pact against China—with partners in the Group of Seven (G-7), the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), and the European Union (EU) at the June 11-15 summits.

Thirty NATO allies agreed that “[we] will engage China with a view to defending the security interests of the Alliance. … China’s stated ambitions and assertive behaviour present systemic challenges to the rules-based international order and to areas relevant to Alliance security.”

Image: A time exposure of seven MIRVs from Peacekeeper missile passing through clouds while approaching an open-ocean impact zone during a flight test. (U.S. Air Force photo)

Nuclear Risks: Reduction or Elimination?

Viewpoint by Sergio Duarte

Ambassador, former UN High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, President of Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs.

NEW YORK (IDN) — “We escaped the Cold War without a nuclear holocaust by some combination of skill, luck and divine intervention—probably the latter in greatest proportion.”[1]

— Gen. Lee Butler, former commander of U.S. nuclear forces.

Photo: US President Joe Biden with Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin. Credit: David Lienemann | Official White House.

A Seismic Event in US-Russia Relations

Viewpoint by Somar Wijayadasa*

NEW YORK (IDN) — The President of the United States Joseph Biden and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin met on June 16 in Geneva at a time when the two countries are engrossed in an antagonistic confrontation over many issues—historically, the worst ever relations between the two countries.