Nuclear Weapons

The Wisdom of Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative

Ronald Reagan expanded upon the doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction to strengthen American nuclear deterrence

The Power of Truth Telling in the Evil Empire Speech

40 years ago today in 1983, Ronald Reagan delivered his famous “Evil Empire” speech.

Herbert Butterfield’s Antinuclear Christian Realism

Herbert Butterfield, despite having been one of the world’s foremost Christian Realists, was deeply conflicted on nuclear arms.

The Man Who Tore Down the Wall

Gorbachev was different from all his predecessors. He knew how cruel the Soviet system was.

Russia’s Long History of Obstructing Iranian Progress toward Freedom - Iran Russia
Russia’s Long History of Obstructing Iranian Progress toward Freedom

A look at the history of Iran-Russia relations demonstrates the same pattern of Russian regimes exploiting Iranian resources. Most evidently, tsarist Russia obstructed the Iranian Constitutional Revolution of 1906–07, and the Soviet Union attempted to create a satellite state in the Azerbaijan province of Iran.

The West Should Remember Cold War-Just War Lessons of Nuclear Deterrence
The West Should Remember Cold War-Just War Lessons of Nuclear Deterrence

In our day it is difficult for some, perhaps many, to recall that the West’s Cold War policy of nuclear deterrence—anchored in traditional just war moral principles of just cause, right intention, proportionality, and discrimination—helped avert war rather than increase the prospects of nuclear conflagration.

Presidential Playbook for a Dangerous Phase of Putin’s War - Biden
Presidential Playbook for a Dangerous Phase of Putin’s War

With Vladimir Putin’s planned two-day war to topple Ukraine’s democratically elected government now in its third month and Russian casualties piling into the tens of thousands, concerns abound that Putin might take increasingly drastic steps to alter the disastrous situation he faces on the battlefield. To prevent those grim prospects—or at least contain their effects—President Joe Biden should turn to the playbook his predecessors drafted.

A Cuban Missile Crisis Lesson for the Russia-Ukraine War

John F. Kennedy never flinched, but he showed his mettle during the Cuban Missile Crisis. It was his finest hour. Will this one be ours?

A Cold War–Just War Response to Nuclear Threats
A Cold War–Just War Response to Nuclear Threats

Vladimir Putin’s recent announcement to place his nation’s nuclear deterrent forces on a state of heightened alert invites those of us in the free world—and surely the United States—to revisit the just war assumptions that served as a deterrence during the Cold War.