nuclear weapons Archives - Foreign Policy In Focus

NATO Goes Anti-Nuclear?

by Alice Slater | Mar 9, 2010

President Obama’s call for a nuclear-weapons-free world in Prague last April unleashed a great outpouring of support from international allies and grassroots activists demanding a process to actually eliminate nuclear weapons. One recent and unexpected initiative has come from America’s NATO allies. Belgium, Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and Norway have called on NATO to review its nuclear policy and remove all U.S. nuclear weapons currently on European soil under NATO’s “nuclear sharing” policy. Despite U.S. insistence on strict adherence to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which prohibits the transfer of nuclear weapons to non-nuclear weapons states, several hundred U.S. nuclear bombs are housed in Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, and Turkey.

The Other Nuclear Survivors

by Gwyn Kirk | Mar 2, 2010

The 56th anniversary of the first U.S. hydrogen bomb test was on March 1. Code-named Bravo, the test took place at Bikini Atoll, a ring of tiny coral islands in the central Pacific.

Pushing South Asia Toward the Brink

by John Feffer, Zia Mian | Jul 27, 2009

The contradictions and confusions in U.S. policy in South Asia were on full display during Secretary of State Hilary Clinton’s recent visit to India. U.S. support for India, which centers on making money, selling weapons, and turning a blind eye to the country’s nuclear weapons, is fatally at odds with U.S. policy and concerns about Pakistan.

A More Expensive Bill for North Korea

by Brent (Won-Ki) Choi, Jennifer Doak, Joowoon Jung | May 22, 2009

This essay is part of a strategic dialogue on North Korea that includes this article by John Feffer. The authors respond to each other here.

The News on Nukes

by Frida Berrigan, John Feffer | May 8, 2009

It’s not on the front pages of what is left of U.S. newspapers. The headlines are dominated by violence in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Iraq, by Miss America’s semi-nude photo scandal, and by the Chrysler fiasco. But just about everyone who is anyone is talking about nuclear weapons this week.

Anti-nuclear Nuclearism

by Darwin BondGraham, Will Parrish, Miriam Pemberton | Jan 12, 2009

(Editor’s Note: This is part of a strategic dialogue on U.S. nuclear policy. Please also see Russ Wellen’s Abdicating U.S. Nonproliferation Leadership and his response to this piece.)

The Goldilocks Apocalypse

by John Feffer | Aug 20, 2008

Being a futurologist means never having to say you’re sorry. Our predictions always come true eventually — or, if they don’t, well, how quickly people forget. Look at Newsweek’s George Will. He predicted that the Berlin Wall would endure, and in an article published on the very day in 1989 that the Germans were tearing it down. That should have been enough to revoke his futurology license and demote him to sports writing. But no, almost three decades later he’s still peering into his crystal ball.

An Uncomfortable Conversation about Nukes

by John Feffer, Conn Hallinan | Jul 17, 2008

Why are Henry Kissinger, George Shultz, William Perry, and Sam Nunn writing opinion pieces in the Wall Street Journal calling for the abolition of nuclear weapons? Keep in mind, these four people are not just major defense hawks. People like Kissinger helped push through the single most dangerous and destabilizing innovation in nuclear weaponry, the arming of missiles with multiple warheads. All four have supported every conflict the United States has engaged in since World War II, all have enthusiastically supported nuclear weapons, and none has suddenly gone kumbaya on us.

What Lee Can Learn From Bush?

by John Feffer | Apr 15, 2008

On the occasion of their first summit, George W. Bush should have a private, one-on-one, conservative-to-conservative chat with Lee Myung-bak. In this chat, the U.S. President should tell the cautionary tale of how his administration did everything it could to repudiate the North Korea policy of its predecessor ― only to end up in the very same position.

NATO at a Crossroads

by Ian Davis, Miriam Pemberton | Mar 19, 2008