The Defense Science Board concludes in a new report that the United States has lost its “national consensus” on what the nation’s nuclear deterrent should look like and…
Read moreAfter having spent the last several years sending diplomats to Teheran to try to persuade Iran not to develop nuclear weapons, the British government announced Monday that it…
Read moreA key uncertainty affecting our confidence in the long-term reliability of nuclear weapons is the stability of the plutonium in the core, or “pit.” The pit is a sphere or shell of plutonium that is compressed by conventional explosives to create the supercritical mass required to sustain a nuclear chain reaction. In hydrogen bombs, this first part is called the primary. The energy of the primary is used to compress the fusion part of a hydrogen bomb or secondary. For large bombs, the great majority of the energy comes from the secondary, but if the primary produces too little energy, the secondary will fail completely.
Read moreAn incipient nuclear arms race is emerging between China and the United States, according to a new report published today by the Federation of American Scientists and the…
Read moreThe annual report published Monday by the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission is different – kind of toned-down – compared with the report published in 2005. The…
Read moreThe latest report from the UN group that monitors the arms embargo on Somalia has caused quite a stir, generating extensive news coverage and eliciting vehement denials from governments accused of violating the embargo. But, as underscored by declassified US intelligence documents from the 1990s, such disregard for the embargo is nothing new. The documents, which were obtained by the FAS under the Freedom of Information Act, reveal a disheartening similarity between sanctions-busting in the mid-1990’s and sanctions-busting now. From the countries involved to the weapons shipped, little appears to have changed over the last decade.
Read moreThere have been several recent reports of the acquisition and (attempted) use of shoulder-fired missiles by terrorists and insurgents. Below is a quick summary of these reports: El Salvador: Foiled Assassination Attempt The most dramatic of these reports is that of a foiled assassination attempt against Salvadoran President Tony Saca. During a 6 October interview with the Salvadoran daily El Diario de Hoy, Saca revealed details of the alleged plot, which involved two SA-7 surface-to-air missiles and a Cuban national with alleged ties to the now defunct Medellin drug cartel in Colombia. The suspect, George Nayes, was arrested on September 13th and was subsequently extradited to the United States, where he has reportedly been charged with “drug trafficking and terrorism.”
Read moreB83 thermonuclear bombs at Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana. Image © Paul Shambroom Ever wondered where all those nukes are stored? A new review published…
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