Nuclear Weapons

Bottom Line: Even the use of a "small" tactical nuclear weapon would mean crossing the nuclear threshold. Why wouldn't you assume that the other side would respond in kind?A RAND wargame several years ago on a potential Russian offensive into the Baltics brought talk of a “new Cold War” into sharp focus. The game made clear…

Key point: The military and intelligence communities in the late 1960s hoped the D-21 would help the United States to spy on strategic targets more reliably than a satellite could do at that time, and without risking a human pilot.Between 1969 and 1971, the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office deployed super-fast spy…

MANILA/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte on Tuesday announced the termination of a two-decade-old Visiting Forces Agreement with the United States (VFA), delivering on threats to downgrade an alliance important to U.S. interests. U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper called the decision “unfortunate” and said it would be a move…

Key point: At 52 years and going strong, the B61 series of bombs are likely the oldest serving nuclear weapons in the U.S. arsenal. One of the longest-serving nuclear weapons in Americas arsenal is the B61 nuclear free-fall bomb. The B61 bomb was first intro…

A bad day — "Like many scientific projects, Failure happened." Eric Berger - Feb 10, 2020 2:02 pm UTC Enlarge / Replica Iranian missiles are shown alongside the Simorgh rocket, left, on display at the Holy/Sacred Defense Museum, a vast complex that commemorates the 1980s Iran-Iraq War, in Tehran, Iran,…

An unarmed Minuteman III ICBM launches during a developmental test from Vandenberg Air Base in California on Wednesday, February 5, 2020Photo: DVIDS/U.S. Air ForceThe U.S. tested a nuclear-capable missile overnight, launching an unarmed Minuteman III from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, according to the 30th Space Wing, which is…

Iran’s Bushehr nuclear power plant has been in operation for almost ten years.Credit: Majid Asgaripour/AP/Shutterstock Iran has accumulated 1,200 kilograms of enriched uranium — more than doubling the stockpile it had just three months ago, according to a statement from a senior official at the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran…

“The blessing of military weapons is not reflected in the tradition of the Orthodox Church and does not correspond to the content of the Rite,” reads a new document on the website of the Moscow patriarchate of the the Russian Orthodox Church. Russian priests should stop blessing nuclear weapons and…

Washington (CNN)The US military deployed a new submarine-launched low-yield nuclear weapon, something the Pentagon sees as critical to countering the threat posed by Russia's arsenal of smaller tactical nukes. Several former high-ranking administration offic…

Key point: Israel wants to be sure it is never able to be threatened or defeated. That is why it maintains a secret nuclear weapons program.The Iranian nuclear nonproliferation agreement has been the top foreign policy issue throughout Washington for the past two months.  Approving or disapproving the deal was the…