U.S. military commanders “are responsible for the maintenance of the health of their commands to ensure mission accomplishment in the event of CBRN [chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear] attacks,” a new Army Field Manual advises, while noting that “medical planners can expect, as a minimum, 10 to 20 percent casualties within a division-sized force that has experienced a nuclear strike.” See “Multiservice Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures for Health Service Support in a Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear Environment” (pdf), U.S. Army Field Manual 4-02.7, July 2009.
Among those countries that are “known to possess” nuclear weapons, the new Field Manual lists Israel (at page I-4), although neither Israel nor the United States formally acknowledge such possession. This is the second time in ten months that a Pentagon publication has cited Israel as a nuclear weapons state, observed Amir Oren in Haaretz on September 13. A similar reference appeared in the 2008 Joint Operational Environment study. (“Israel as a Nuclear Power,” Secrecy News, March 17, 2009).
Iranian scientists have published a prodigious amount of research in nuclear science and technology in the open literature. A bibliography of such publications is available in a newly updated 195-page compilation (pdf) prepared by Mark Gorwitz.
The Congressional Research Service has prepared an updated summary report on “U.S. Arms Sales to Pakistan,” with background on recent weapons transactions and their rationale.
tudents in the 21st century need strong critical thinking skills like reasoning, questioning, and problem-solving, before they can meaningfully engage with more advanced domains like digital, data, or AI literacy.
When the U.S. government funds the establishment of a platform for testing hundreds of behavioral interventions on a large diverse population, we will start to better understand the interventions that will have an efficient and lasting impact on health behavior.
The grant comes from the Carnegie Corporation of New York (CCNY) to investigate, alongside The British American Security Information Council (BASIC), the associated impact on nuclear stability.
We need to overhaul the standardized testing and score reporting system to be more accessible to all of the end users of standardized tests: educators, students, and their families.