Nuclear Countries

Many historians argue that the bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki were a turning point in mankind's history, events that marked the beginning of humanity's ability to instantly self-annihilate.

In its inability to signal a true commitment to nuclear disarmament, virtual deterrence is hardly ideal. But it sounds like a step in the right direction, right? Wrong.

In a cruel joke at a time of supposed disarmament, the CMRR promises to be the most expensive construction project in the history of Los Alamos.

The light shining on the safety of nuclear energy as a result of the Japanese nuclear crisis has been of such powerful wattage that it's even flushing safety issues with nuclear weapons labs and manufacturing facilities out of hiding.

We're under the gun: we need to make use of the nuclear taboo as a springboard to disarmament before its expiration date. But there exists another nuclear taboo against discussing the destruction caused by nuclear weapons.

No matter the short term benefits to security, when the West severs the ties that bind disarmament to nonproliferation, it further undermines the trust of the developing world and long-term prospects for international security.

With hawks always willing to poke a stick into the hive of U.S.-Russia relations, it's folly to think that just because the Cold War ended that we've been inoculated against nuclear war with Russia.

The incarnation of "sexy," that is, that cropped up a few years ago: exciting or trendy in a general, not erotic, way. That settled, let's move on to ...

When the subject of torture in the abstract is broached, the conversation tends to wend its way toward the terrorist and the ticking time-bomb scenari...

Perhaps bewitched by Tea Party-style incoherence, Republicans guided by Jon Kyl have placed themselves in the unlikely position of bucking the national defense establishment, to which traditionally they've been joined at the hip.

Odds are, with the Cold War consigned to history, you couldn't have imagined that a nuclear weapons facility of such immensity was still on the table.

In their rush to make President Obama look weak, Senate Republicans may, many believe, be weakening national defense.

Remember: how ever pro-nuclear those opposed to New START may appear to be, they're voting against a measure that Secretary Gates and the Pentagon support.

With the end of the Cold War, nuclear terrorism has displaced an attack by the Soviet Union as the prime nuclear fear. And that's not only reviving the specter of a traditional nuclear attack, but combining it with contemporary fears.

As with almost all mainstream opinion pieces about U.S.-Iran relations, there's no mention of the United States pursuing a policy of nuclear reciprocity -- that is, disarmament.

With its insinuation that they're less invested in the peace process than the United States and Israel, U.S. ambassador to the IAEA Glyn Davies's gloating is an insult to the Arab states.

If threatened with nuclear attack, should a state, especially one that characterizes itself as founded on a respect for human rights, threaten to retaliate, thus ensuring massive loss of life on its own as well as the aggressor's side?

"Nuclear deterrent" is what the good guys retain for emergencies; "nuclear weapons" are what the bad guys wield -- or seek to. Thus 'nonproliferation' has come to invoke nothing but a double standard.

Russians can't help but be offended by constant references in the U.S. press and in national security circles to the danger of loose nukes winding up in the hands of terrorists.

In July 1945 answers to a multiple-choice questionnaire were solicited from 250 scientists at the Chicago Metallurgical Laboratory division of the Manhattan Project. The question and choices follow.

The acclaimed new film Countdown to Zero may serve the purpose of alerting neophytes to the full extent of the danger of nuclear weapons. But for others, it's best viewed while wearing a hazmat suit.

Conventional thinking holds that nuclear weapons are cheaper than non-nuclear weapons. In other words, they ostensibly represent a means for a state with limited conventional forces to level the playing field.