WMD Insights

The Comparative Strategic Cultures Curriculum project is an ASCO effort that explored approaches for leveraging strategic culture analyses to understanding WMD behavior. This new report includes a collection of commissioned essays and case studies that examine the field of strategic culture and assess its applicability as a methodological approach to understanding decisions to acquire, proliferate, or use WMD, or abide by or violate international norms regarding WMD. More information about this project, and the essays and case studies, can be found at http://www.dtra.mil/
ASCO/comparative
strategic
cultures.cfm

This monthly publication seeks to provide timely and noteworthy unclassified information on international attitudes towards weapons of mass destruction and efforts to curb their proliferation. Our goal is to assist our readers in planning for today’s issues and those that may be just over the horizon. Your opinions about this product are important to us. Please click Feedback to take a short electronic survey. Thank you

Jonathan Fox
DTRA Program Manager

Michael Moodie
Editor-in-Chief

Jennifer Borchard Managing Editor

Brenda McVeigh
Layout and Design

Timothy Long
Web Developer

The WMD Insights project is sponsored by the Advanced Systems and Concepts Office (ASCO) at the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA). ASCO identifies, encourages, and executes high-impact projects to promote new thinking, address technology gaps and improve the operational capabilities of DTRA, DOD and other government agencies in response to weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and related threats. A variety of ASCO studies, conference reports, and papers can be found at http://www.dtra.mil/
ASCO/publications.cfm

August 2008 Issue . . .

The West is currently engaged with Iran in a diplomatic process that has only one recognizable role: waiting until the US Presidential elections in November . . . view article

Six-Party Talks Move Towards North Korea’s Denuclearization
	On June 27, 2008, the North Korean government ostentatiously blew up the cooling tower at its Yongbyon nuclear facility before the world’s media. . . . view article

Downing of Georgian Drone over Breakaway Region Highlights Potential Proliferation Challenges
	On Sunday, April 20, 2008, an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) belonging to the Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) was shot down while performing a reconnaissance mission over Georgia’s breakaway region of Abkhazia . . . view article

Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism: Steady, but Slow Progress
	In early July, the Group of Eight (G-8) leading industrial states reaffirmed their high-level support for the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism (GICNT) at their summit in Japan . . . view article

PSI Celebrates Fifth Anniversary with Mixed Record
	On May 28-29, representatives from over 80 countries attended a conference in Washington to mark the fifth anniversary of the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI), launched by President George W. Bush in a May 31, 2003 speech in Krakow, Poland . . . view article

UN Security Council Resolution 1540 PART I: Resolution 1810: Progress since 1540
	On April 25, 2008, the United Nations Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 1810, reaffirming its commitment to Resolution 1540 . . . view article

UN Security Council Resolution 1540 PART II: The Caribbean States: A Case Study
	In February 2008, a one-day workshop on the implementation of UN Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1540 was convened in Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic to address development priorities in the Caribbean as they pertain to key governance issues related to the resolution’s implementation. . . . view article

Canada’s Nuclear Paradox: CANDU Exports and Nonproliferation
	Canada’s involvement in the Manhattan Project in the 1940s and its subsequent renunciation of the bomb foreshadowed early on that Canada’s nuclear identity would include inconsistencies . . . view article

The views expressed on this website are those of the authors only and do not represent the official policy or position of the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.