This report summarizes the key issues and highlights around a visit by high level British Parliamentarians to Washington, DC. They met with Senators and senior Administration officials to discuss the prospects for nuclear disarmament and stronger non-proliferation. A brief summary and full report (PDF) are available below.
2009
Stay focused for START follow-on
Keith Payne, a member of the US Strategic Posture Review Commission, has decried as folly the ongoing Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) follow-on negotiations between the United States and Russia.
Getting to Zero Update
In this issue: BASIC and Getting to Zero ; Commitments to disarmament and arms control ; Country reports ; Missile defense
The Shadow NATO Summit: Options for NATO – pressing the reset button on the strategic concept
NATO officials, civil society and policy experts gathered to examine the organization’s future and explore how civil society groups and parliamentarians could advance NATO-related policies and actions.
This event was organized by NATO Watch, BASIC, Bertelsmann-Stiftung, and ISIS-Europe, with support from the Marmot Charitable Trust.
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START follow-on negotiations: Russians focus on delivery vehicles
An announcement on the US/Russian negotiations is expected at July's summit between Obama and Medvedev.
Political developments around nuclear weapons and the “butterfly effect”
During the past month or two, getting to zero has seemed to resemble the early phase of the butterfly effect of Chaos Theory. The thinking goes as follows: the movement of air caused by a butterfly flapping his wings could contribute to the formation of a hurricane, or other major weather event. Without that one extra factor of the flapping of the butterfly's wings, the event may not have occurred. Of course, the flapping of a butterfly's wings alone cannot cause a weather event.
NATO nuclear burden sharing and NPT obligations
NATO's major review of its Strategic Concept will cover all aspects of its strategic policy, including its nuclear posture, including the issue of US warheads in European non-nuclear states, which threatens the cohesion of the NPT.
Obama’s nuclear diplomacy
Barack Obama has called for a world free of nuclear weapons and has committed to reducing their number and salience during his administration. His continuing engagement with allies and Russia on nuclear arms control, and the results of posture reviews back home, could result in significant progress.