The quest to regulate nuclear weapons gives us one possible answer to the question of why there has not been a third world war.
While modernizing the US nuclear arsenal is a necessity, adding more nuclear weapons to the US stockpile is a costly and unnecessary endeavour.
If stagnation in inter-Korean cooperation is to be bypassed, there needs to be a new approach that goes beyond leveraging economic support for denuclearisation.
In the context of the war in Ukraine, the world may be entering a more dangerous phase where the use of nuclear weapons, however localised and limited, emerges as an option.
It is high time that states took stock of the emerging threats and the unaddressed gaps that run the risk of further weakening the nuclear non-proliferation regime.
It may seem strange but, despite their offensive power, nuclear weapons are primarily held as defensive tools – unlikely to be ever used. This is due to a concept central to IR known as ‘deterrence’.
Both neorealism and the selectorate theory show that North Korea’s demand for nuclear weapons strongly correlates with a large US military presence in East Asia.
Liber and Press present a strong case for a more cautious approach to continued nuclear deterrence, but seem to overlook the potential for catastophe.
Frank Sauer discusses the Iran Nuclear Deal, the ‘nuclear taboo’ and deterrence, nuclear sharing, and several treaties on nuclear weapons, including the New START, NPT, and TPNW.
A fourth Trump-Kim Summit meeting ahead of the US elections appears unlikely, as does progress towards reaching a balanced agreement.
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