Executive Director of BASIC, Paul Ingram was recently quoted in New Scientist magazine in an article exploring whether risks of a nuclear arms race would be heightened under Trump.
‘Every US president has constant access to a nuclear launch device only he can activate. Born in the Cold War, it is designed for when Russian nuclear missiles are detected making their 30-minute flight to the US, allowing 10-15 minutes to decide to order a counter-strike which would not be countermanded. But it could be used in other scenarios. “There is nothing to prevent a launch for very little reason,” says Paul Ingram of the Brirish American Security Information Council, an arms control think-tank in London.’ (Debora MacKenzie, 2016).
Read the full article here.