"United States-South African Nuclear Relations During the Cold War and Beyond"

NPIHP Experts Leopoldo Nuti and Vladislav Zubok are featured in a new documentary on the US Jupiter missiles stationed in Italy

The role that nuclear weapons play in international politics and security is evolving. For wealthy, militarily powerful countries, nuclear weapons are playing a diminishing role in security planning. Conversely, some countries that lack advanced military capabilities may be coming to see nuclear weapons as increasingly important for their security. The differences between these two groups are reinforced by the fact that, over the past decade, two dictators who ended their nuclear programs have lost their regimes and their lives. As a result, authoritarian leaders may now have an increasingly personal interest in holding on to their nuclear ambitions. U.S. interests can be advanced by minimizing the association that has developed over the past decade between ending nuclear weapons programs, ending regimes, and ending authoritarian leaders’ lives.

Sergey Radchenko writes in Foreign Policy on Mao and Stalin’s first awkward meeting and what it tells us about Xi Jinping’s confident trip this week to see Vladimir Putin.