In The Iranian Nuclear Crisis: A Memoir, Seyed Hossein Mousavian gives us a rich history of Iran’s nuclear programme and describes his own attempts to achieve a “grand bargain” with the West. He offers a combination of text book and personal accounts but, more importantly, a political analysis of the behavior of all actors involved both past and present.
Arms control
Iran Update: Number 161
- Nations cling to talks
- Additional sanctions bear down on Iran
- Military tensions intensify
- U.S. leaders pay multiple visits to Israel to offer reassurance
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.
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.
Country Report: Pakistan
Pakistan's first nuclear weapon detonation took place in May 1998, just a few weeks after neighboring country India's first nuclear tests. Pakistan's nuclear weapons are seen as some of the world's most insecure, due to the instability in the region, the threat of terrorism, and the history of clandestine nuclear networks. For years, top Pakistani nuclear scientist A.Q.
Iran Update: Number 160
- Moscow talks leave both parties frustrated
- Latest IAEA-Iran talks end without making progress; Iran produces fuel plates for reactor
- Putin proposes Iranian involvement in Syria crisis
- Iran announces development of nuclear-powered submarine
- Iranian and British representatives hold difficult bi-lateral meeting
Iran Nuclear Talks Extended as Region’s Unrest Clogs Discussions
BASIC's executive director, Paul Ingram, was featured in an article on NorthJersey.com by Henry Meyer, Ilya Arkhipov, and Jonathan Tirone. The article covers the E3+3 (P5+1) discussions with Iran in Moscow, which ended on June 19th without any breakthroughs. Ingram was quoted as saying, “The nuclear crisis will only be resolved when Iran's role within the region is fully addressed…a conversation about Syria and Bahrain is part of that.”
Read the full article on NorthJersey.com:
Evidence Submitted by Ward Wilson
JUNE 2012
Ward Wilson uses historical accounts to present the argument that nuclear deterrence does not work. In fact, Wilson argues that it has failed a number of times, and some of those failures have come close to war. Wilson writes, “Nuclear weapons are niether as capable of influencing military conflicts nor as effective at political persuasion as was once though. Nuclear deterrence appears to be seriously flawed: it is far more prone to failure than proponents of nuclear weapons would have us believe.”
Click the link below to read the full document.