The Commission published its final report on 1 July 2014. The report was also accompanied by a series of background briefings that were released on the same day.
Content Type
Evidence submitted by UNA-UK
The United Nations Association of the UK has submitted evidence to the BASIC Trident Commission, seeking to address two of the Commission's main questions that it is investigating.
Iran sanctions bill
The U.S. Congress is poised to consider an Iran sanctions bill this week that may shut down any transactions with the Iranian oil industry and tighten financial loopholes as part of tough international moves aimed at pressuring Tehran to curb its nuclear program.
Obama and Romney on U.S. Foreign Policy
Today, Barack Obama will speak about foreign policy at the Veterans of Foreign Wars national convention, followed by Mitt Romney who will speak at the same convention tomorrow. Romney, who has been criticized in the press for his lack of foreign policy and national security experience, is then scheduled to travel abroad, in an attempt to strengthen his reputation on foreign issues. He will go to London to speak at the start of the Olympics—an opportunity to build on the transatlantic relationship—and then to Israel and Palestine to speak with representatives of both nations.
Trinity nuclear test anniversary – U.S. first to test, but will it be the last to fully support a ban?
Today is the 67th anniversary of the world’s first nuclear explosion test, known as “Trinity”, which used a plutonium core. It was unnecessary for the first use of a nuclear warhead, on Hiroshima three weeks later, as designers were so confident about that form of HEU ‘gun-type’ warhead.
Will the NWS fail to support the NWFZ…again?
Foreign Ministers from the five recognized nuclear weapons states (NWS) meet on Thursday with members of the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF). There had been an expectation that the NWS would at last endorse the Southeast Asian Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone (NWFZ) by signing up to its Protocol, but they are still expressing reservations over the scope of the Treaty and its restriction on the passage of NWS vessels through the surrounding seas. China also has particular concerns that the Treaty treads on its territorial sovereignty – it is already in dispute with ASEAN members over the South China Seas.
Dissecting the DDPR
NATO’s Chicago Summit in May provided the Alliance with its second opportunity in two years to re-think the presence of U.S. theatre nuclear weapons in Europe, but for the second consecutive time, NATO failed. In this report, BASIC policy consultant, Ted Seay, examines key decisions made (and not made) in Chicago, in relation to the future of NATO's nuclear sharing arrangements and the Alliance as a whole.
Anglo-American (In)Dependence
Americans celebrate their Independence Day on Wednesday. It has been 236 years since they broke away from Great Britain, but the pair remain two of the closest allies in the world. But just how special is the so-called ‘special relationship’, and how much does this depend upon the cooperation between their nuclear weapons communities?