Isaac Chotiner | The New Yorker
On Monday night, forty-eight hours after President Donald Trump ordered a series of strikes on Iranian nuclear sites, he announced a ceasefire between Israel and Iran… Nicole Grajewski is a fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s Nuclear Policy Program, and the author of the book “Russia and Iran.” … Grajewski and I spoke just prior to the ceasefire announcement, and followed up after Trump’s declaration… We discuss why a ceasefire may be difficult to sustain, what Russia’s relationships with both Iran and Israel may portend for the region, and why a war meant to end Iran’s nuclear program may instead have delivered prolonged uncertainty.
Ankit Panda | The Caravan
When considering nuclear risks, commentators often invoke “the brink.” The notion evokes a sense of peril… However, the proverbial nuclear brink is not a well-defined point beyond which lies ruin… For the protagonists of a nuclear crisis who might see utility in exploring this terrain, the only way to learn the true steepness of the slope is to tread forwards, one step at a time, knowing full well that the next step could lead to a loss of footing and, eventually, towards the abyss. Leaving this terrain uncharted is what nuclear-armed states normally do, even as deep political grievances might fester. Not in South Asia, however.
Julian E. Barnes, Helene Cooper, Eric Schmitt, Ronen Bergman, Maggie Haberman, and Jonathan Swan | The New York Times
A preliminary classified U.S. report says the American bombing of three nuclear sites in Iran set back the country’s nuclear program by only a few months, according to officials familiar with the findings. The strikes sealed off the entrances to two of the facilities but did not collapse their underground buildings, the officials said the early findings concluded… The report also said that much of Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium was moved before the strikes, which destroyed little of the nuclear material.
Mark Goodman and Mark Fitzpatrick | Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
As the Iranian nuclear program saga plays out, one diplomatic action has been widely expected: Iran may declare its withdrawal from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Such a withdrawal would eliminate the legal prohibition on Iran’s acquisition of nuclear weapons and the requirement that Iran accept international safeguards monitoring. Over the past decade, Iran has threatened many times to play this card in retaliation for far less serious assaults.
Steven Erlanger and Stephen Castle | The New York Times
Britain said it would buy 12 F-35A stealth fighter-bombers, enabling the country’s military to once again have the capacity to deliver nuclear weapons from the air, in an announcement timed to this week’s NATO summit in The Hague. The new planes, once delivered, can carry both conventional and nuclear bombs… Downing Street called it “the biggest strengthening of the U.K.’s nuclear posture in a generation.”
National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine
War is devastating to society; nuclear war even more so. Since the beginning of civilization, humankind has been at war with itself, but no weapon has ever come close to the formidable power of a nuclear weapon. A nuclear war would not only brutally take human lives and leave everlasting wounds on society, but also cause significant and sometimes irreversible damage to the environment… This study represents the latest knowledge the scientific community has amassed and current assessment based on published literature for the likely environmental impacts of wartime nuclear detonation.
Ashley J. Tellis | Foreign Affairs
Since the turn of the century, the United States has sought to help India rise as a great power… But India and the United States are not aligned on all issues. New Delhi does not want a world in which Washington is perpetually the sole superpower. Instead, it seeks a multipolar international system, in which India would rank as a genuine great power. It aims to restrain not just China—the near-term challenge—but also any country that would aspire to singular, hegemonic dominance, including the United States.