Recent Publications

There is very little government regulation over private sector activities that might generate enhanced potential pandemic pathogens – germs that might not only trigger a pandemic, but that have been engineered to make them more virulent or more transmissible. Current oversight of these activities applies only to government-funded work. With the growth of the bioeconomy and increasing amounts of privately funded life science research, this forms an ever-growing gap. This article discusses mechanisms, both legally binding and voluntary, that can broaden the reach of these oversight policies to cover all relevant work, not just the government-funded part of it.

Recent disputes with other members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), engagement with Russia, and domestic democratic-backsliding call into question the value Turkey brings to the NATO alliance. In this article, Mr. Paul J. David-Justus examines the history of Turkey’s membership in NATO, the challenges Turkish domestic and foreign policy pose to the alliance’s objectives, and the advantages and liabilities it brings to the alliance. Further, it identifies options regarding the future of Turkey’s role in NATO.

North Korea’s new nuclear policy law points to the dilemma Kim Jong Un faces as he tries to reconcile competing strategic objectives: maximizing the deterrence value and operational utility of his growing nuclear capability while preserving his absolute political authority. This article discusses North Korea’s approach to nuclear command and control in the context of its unique governing system and political culture.

This study examines alternative approaches North Korea could take for command and control of its nuclear forces (NC2) as it makes critical choices on the type of nuclear strategy and posture it wishes to adopt. The report helps fill an important analytical gap in current assessments of North Korea, and also examines implications of North Korea’s choices for U.S. and South Korean deterrence strategies and defense planning. This work can help shed light on the most recent announcements made by North Korea concerning its nuclear forces.

Mr. John Caves, CSWMD Distinguished Fellow, and Dr. Seth Carus, NDU Emeritus Distinguished Professor of National Security Policy examine the breakdown in consensus decision-making at the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) and place this development in the context of Russia, China, and Iran’s larger challenge to a rules-based international order. The article further considers how this dynamic may play out in the OPCW in the coming years and discusses how the United States can continue to use the Chemical Weapons Convention and OPCW to defend the international norm against chemical weapons while better protecting itself and its allies and partners from a greater chemical weapons threat.