Where Are We Going with Nuclear Weapons
Abstract: Whatever “nuclear order” existed through the 20th century has now come nearly undone. Arms control treaties have been abandoned; an unprecedented three-way U.S.-Russia-China competition is underway; North Korea’s arsenal grows; the U.S. has changed the nonproliferation rules for some of its friends, which now makes others (Saudi Arabia, South Korea) want similar breaks, alarming many others; no nuclear antagonists engage each other in sustained high-level dialogue to stabilize their relations; the Ukraine War exacerbates fear of something similar over Taiwan, with nuclear dimensions. What are the implications of unrestrained nuclear competition, and what is a desirable and feasible alternative? George Perkovich will present his draft answers to these questions and welcome a robust discussion of these issues.
George Perkovich is the Japan chair for a world without nuclear weapons and vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, overseeing the Technology and International Affairs Program and Nuclear Policy Program. He works primarily on nuclear strategy and nonproliferation issues; cyberconflict; and new approaches to international public-private management of strategic technologies.
He is the author of the prize-winning book, India’s Nuclear Bomb (University of California Press, 1999), and co-author of, Not War, Not Peace? Motivating Pakistan to Prevent Cross-Border Terrorism (Oxford University Press, 2016).
