Confronting the Threat of Nuclear Winter

View the paper “Confronting the Threat of Nuclear Winter”

Nuclear weapons explosions send large quantities of smoke high into the atmosphere. The smoke blocks incoming sunlight and destroys ozone, causing major environmental harms worldwide, including cold temperatures, reduced precipitation, and increased ultraviolet radiation. In technical terms, nuclear winter refers to cooling such that winter-like temperatures occur during summer, as caused by nuclear war. This paper uses the term nuclear winter more generally to refer to the full set of global environmental harms from nuclear war. The …

Read More »

Winter-Safe Deterrence as a Practical Contribution to Reducing Nuclear Winter Risk: A Reply

View the paper “Winter-Safe Deterrence as a Practical Contribution to Reducing Nuclear Winter Risk: A Reply”

In a recent issue of this journal, I published an article proposing the concept of winter-safe deterrence. The article defined winter-safe deterrence as “military force capable of meeting the deterrence goals of today’s nuclear weapon states without risking catastrophic nuclear winter”. The article and a summary version published in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists have since stimulated extensive discussion in social media, the Bulletin, and now a symposium in this journal. The discussion has been productive for refining certain …

Read More »

Winter-Safe Deterrence: The Risk of Nuclear Winter and Its Challenge to Deterrence

View the paper “Winter-Safe Deterrence: The Risk of Nuclear Winter and Its Challenge to Deterrence”

Eight countries have large nuclear arsenals: China, France, India, Israel, Pakistan, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States. North Korea might have a small nuclear arsenal. These countries have nuclear weapons for several reasons. Perhaps the biggest reason is deterrence. Nuclear deterrence means threatening other countries with nuclear weapons in order to persuade them not to attack. When nuclear deterrence works, it can help avoid nuclear war. However, nuclear deterrence …

Read More »