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Jamie Kwong is a fellow in the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Her research focuses on nonproliferation issues, the Korean Peninsula, and multilateral regimes, including the P5 Process and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. She has also conducted novel research on the climate change-nuclear weapons nexus and authored the Carnegie paper, How Climate Change Challenges the U.S. Nuclear Deterrent.
Previously, Kwong was a research assistant at the Centre for Science and Security Studies, working on projects related to the P5 Process, the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, and transatlantic deterrence. She also worked in the Nuclear Policy Programme at the Royal United Services Institute on projects related to strategic stability, disarmament verification, and the UK Project on Nuclear Issues. Before completing her studies, she interned with the U.S. State Department’s International Security and Nonproliferation Bureau and the Central Intelligence Agency. Her analysis has been published in outlets including Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, and The Nonproliferation Review, among others.
Kwong holds a PhD in War Studies from King’s College London, where she studied as a Marshall Scholar. Her dissertation examined U.S. public opinion of North Korea’s nuclear weapons program and was awarded the King’s College London Doctoral Studies Outstanding Thesis Prize. She holds an MA in Public Diplomacy and BA in International Relations from the University of Southern California, where she served as a Korean Studies Institute Fellow.
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education
PhD, War Studies, King’s College London , MA, Public Diplomacy, University of Southern California, BA, International Relations, University of Southern Californialanguages
EnglishAll work from Jamie Kwong
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This paper presents findings from an original survey of US public attitudes toward nuclear proliferation issues to determine what types of elite messaging, if any, impact those attitudes.
Climate change is scary enough on its own. But what about the effect of climate change on our nuclear weapons?
In Nevada, I saw the scars of the U.S. nuclear testing program. They reinforced my belief that Washington must lead the way on a new no-first-test agreement.
NATO bases with nuclear-capable aircraft need to adapt to challenges posed by wildfires, flash flooding, extreme heat, and other climate-related disasters.
North Korea’s exploitation of growing rifts between Russia and the West, paired with its ambitions for advanced nuclear capabilities, should prompt a substantial reevaluation in Washington of the problems posed by North Korea’s nuclear arsenal and how the United States approaches the Korean Peninsula.
As these challenges risk detrimental impacts to the “backbone of America’s national security,” the military will have to prepare its critical—and limited—nuclear weapons facilities to weather more than just hurricanes.
The United States has invested heavily in its nuclear arsenal to address a changing geostrategic environment.
In a new paper, Carnegie Nuclear Policy Program Fellow Jamie Kwong argues that climate change now poses a significant threat to the U.S. nuclear deterrent.
Climate change is very unlikely to undermine the complex web of facilities, bases, and operations involved in nuclear programs and their deterrence missions. But even small incidents and accidents are potentially devastating.
Most nuclear states are undertaking modernization campaigns to ensure their nuclear weapons are viable for decades to come. While aimed to address a changing geostrategic environment, do these plans account for a changing geophysical environment? Are nuclear weapons vulnerable to climate change?
- Tom Ellison,
- Jamie Kwong,
- George Perkovich
Climate change stands to impact each leg of the U.S. nuclear triad in different and increasingly serious ways. Given the high-stakes nature of the nuclear enterprise, the Department of Defense and other key stakeholders must better prepare for, mitigate, and adapt to these climate challenges.