Numerology in the Second Nuclear Age
The nuclear numbers game has changed. During the Cold War, deterrence strategists claimed that the nuclear balance mattered, even at extraordinarily high numbers. By this musty logic, the United States now has more deterrence leverage against Russia than at any time since the Soviet nuclear build-up in the 1960s. This paper contends that nuclear "numerology", centered around "prompt hard-target kill" capabilities and nuclear exchange ratios, provides extremely modest political leverage. The “delicate balance of terror” that Western deterrence strategists worried about so obsessively during the Cold War now sounds like the laments of an ancient, interred religion. New nuclear dangers are now reducible by cooperative threat reduction initiatives rather than by increasing warheads, yields, and throw-weights.
Available in:
Regions and themes
ISBN / ISSN
Share
Download the full analysis
This page contains only a summary of our work. If you would like to have access to all the information from our research on the subject, you can download the full version in PDF format.
Numerology in the Second Nuclear Age
Author(s)
Related centers and programs
Discover our other research centers and programs
Security Studies Center
Heir to a tradition dating back to the founding of Ifri, the Security Studies Center provides public and private decision-makers as well as the general public with the keys to understanding power relations and contemporary modes of conflict as well as those to come. Through its positioning at the juncture of politics and operations, the credibility of its civil-military team and the wide distribution of its publications in French and English, the Center for Security Studies constitutes in the French landscape of think tanks a unique center of research and influence on the national and international defense debate.
Find out more
Discover all our analyses
The Hunt for Economic Security: The Role of Navies in Deterring Threats to the Maritime Economy
The maritime domain is currently faced with a wide variety of threats, such as climate change, economic warfare, shadow fleet operations, protection of critical infrastructures, and illicit activities ranging from illegal fishing to piracy. Navies suffer from inherent limitations when deterring threats to the global maritime economy: their global presence and permanence limits their credibility in terms of deterrence, their focus usually set on immediate deterrence, implementing deterrence by punishment in and from the naval domain is difficult and costly.
A Fragile Consensus? The Pressure on the Norm Against Nuclear Testing
Apart from North Korea, no state has conducted explosive nuclear tests in the 21st century, reflecting the emergence of a strong international norm against such testing.
The Franco-German Brigade and the Revival of European Defense
One thing has been clear since Donald Trump's return to the White House: the very existence of the European unification project is threatened. Unless it develops a sovereign defense policy to counter the war in Ukraine and the weakening of American security guarantees, the European Union will continue to see its internal cohesion and external attractiveness wane.
Taking the Pulse: Can Europeans Build Their Independent Extended Nuclear Deterrent?
Confronted with a U.S. disengagement and the Russian threat, Europeans are reconsidering their stance on nuclear deterrence. Given the capabilities of the French and British arsenals, can Europe develop an independent nuclear deterrent?