IRAN -- NUCLEAR PROGRAM
October 22, 2012
Winners of Cuban Missile Crisis Lessons Contest Announced
Press Release
The Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs and Foreign Policy Magazine have announced the winners and runners-up of the “Lessons of the Cuban Missile Crisis Contest,” held to mark the 50th anniversary of the crisis that narrowly averted nuclear war in October 1962.
October 19, 2012
Winners Announced for Cuban Missile Crisis Lessons Contest
News
On the 50th anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis, Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center and Foreign Policy Magazine invited policymakers, scholars, students, and members of the public to propose 300-word lessons for today’s leaders from the 13 days in 1962 when the world stood on the brink of nuclear war. Today, the Belfer Center and Foreign Policy are pleased to announce the winners of the Cuban Missile Crisis lessons contest.
October 11, 2012
"The Toughest Sanctions"
Op-Ed, Boston Globe
By Juliette Kayyem, Lecturer in Public Policy
"Companies that manage the transport of all these resources can have tremendous impact on any nation's survival, making the movement of goods across the seas an unrecognized animating force in foreign affairs. The sanctions and the resulting economic crisis made the route through the Strait of Hormuz unsustainable for this major shipping line."
October 11, 2012
"Red Lines in the Sand"
Op-Ed, Foreign Policy
By Graham Allison, Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government, Harvard Kennedy School
In a new Foreign Policy op-ed, Graham Allison, director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, writes that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been campaigning so virulently for President Obama to draw stricter red lines regarding Iran’s nuclear program because of “his knowledge that Israel and the United States have been complicit in a process of drawing red lines they say Iran will never be allowed to cross, watching Iran cross those lines, and then retreating to declare the next obstacle on the path to a bomb to be the real red line.”
October 10, 2012
"WMD Free Zone in Mideast: An Opportunity for Detente with Iran"
Op-Ed, Power & Policy Blog
By Tytti Erästö, Stanton Nuclear Security Postdoctoral Fellow, International Security Program/Project on Managing the Atom
"The P5+1 and Iran should take note of the fact that there is a new window opening, and try to make most of it. The new opportunity comes in the form of a historic conference for the establishment of a weapons of mass destruction free zone (WMDFZ) in the Middle East—a conference which will be held in Finland in the coming December. What is special about this opportunity is that it allows Iran and the P5+1 to step outside of the negative dynamics created by their previous interactions, and to approach the nuclear issue from a different perspective."
AP Photo
October 4, 2012
"Inside Bibi's Bunker"
Op-Ed, Foreign Policy
By Chuck Freilich, Senior Fellow, International Security Program
"How these debates will be resolved depends on Israel's unique policymaking process. The question of whether to strike Iran is not just up to Netanyahu: In Israel, like other parliamentary democracies, the premier is merely "first among equals" — not the chief executive or commander in chief, as in the United States. With the exception of very limited circumstances, such as responding to imminent attacks, the Israeli prime minister requires cabinet approval for all national security decisions."
October 3, 2012
"'Never Again!'"
Op-Ed, The Jerusalem Post
By Chuck Freilich, Senior Fellow, International Security Program
"Then, as now, fanatical leaders called for Jewish extermination, while an irresolute, self-preoccupied West, failed to take effective action. The USA, however, is a very different country from what it was in 1938, and while one can legitimately believe that Obama should take even firmer action, he has done more than any other Western leader."
AP Photo
September 28, 2012
"American President: Out on a Limb"
Op-Ed, The Huffington Post
By Charles G. Cogan, Associate, International Security Program
"So assuming that negotiations over the Iranian nuclear program will resume after the American presidential elections, as most observers think they will, we will have to see if the policy of stiffing the Iranians — who abhor foreign pressure, in view of their both glorious and inglorious past — will continue not to work; or whether U.S. concessions, which have not been forthcoming so far, will dent the ideological obduracy of the Iranian position."
September 2012
Containing Iran: Strategies for Addressing the Iranian Nuclear Challenge
Book
By Robert Reardon, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Project on Managing the Atom/International Security Program
This study assesses current U.S. policy options on the Iranian nuclear question. It suggests that U.S. goals can be met through patient and forward-looking policymaking. Specifically, the United States can begin to lay the groundwork for an effective containment policy while continuing efforts to forestall Iranian weaponization. A successful containment policy will promote long-term positive political change in Iran while avoiding counterproductive provocation.
AP Photo
April 2012
"Safe, Secure and Effective Nuclear Operations in the Nuclear Zero Era"
Paper
By Ronald G. Allen, Jr., Former Research Fellow, International Security Program/Project on Managing the Atom, 2011–2012
Without significant change in the geopolitical landscape, nuclear weapons will remain a relevant portion of America's long-term national security strategy. Therefore, the burdens and responsibilities of maintaining an effective nuclear deterrent force are paramount to ensure credibility for America and her allies. Bottom line: nuclear weapons and nuclear deterrence are still relevant today and for the foreseeable future. Therefore, to maintian international strategic stability we must embrace the necessity of nuclear deterrence, develop strategic policy that supports deterrence as an essential element and adequately resource the enterprise.
