One of the serious risks associated with the strategic nuclear arsenals of Russia and the United States is that an accidental launch might result from a false alarm or from misinterpreting information provided by an early-warning system. This risk will not be reduced by bringing down the number of strategic missiles on high alert to the level of about 500 warheads on each side because this measure will not significantly affect first-strike vulnerability of the Russian strategic forces. Other measures that have been suggested so far, namely an upgrade of the Russian early-warning system, establishing additional channels of real-time exchange of early-warning data, or transparent and verifiable de-alerting of strategic forces, are more likely to increase the probability of an accident than to reduce it. To address the problem of an accidental launch in the short term, the United States and Russia, while continuing to work toward deep reductions of their strategic nuclear forces, should develop and implement measures that would keep their entire forces at low levels of readiness without revealing their actual alert status.

The debate over how to deal with Iran's nuclear program is clouded by historical amnesia. Nuclear proliferation has been stopped before, and it can and should be stopped in this case as well. Unfortunately, with Tehran -- as with some of its predecessors -- the price for Washington will be relinquishing the threat of regime change by force.

Authors should always be so fortunate as to have such thoughtful and stimulating readings of one's work. What follows: Eden turns some comments by Renee Anspach, Hugh Gusterson, and Thomas Hughes into invitations to do further research. She then discusses organizational frames in the context of other conceptions of frames. Last, she tackles the difficult issue of taking a stand on the science in Whole World on Fire(Eden, 2004) while claiming to be a thoroughgoing social constructivist.

Lynn Eden received the 2005 Robert K. Merton Professional Award from the Science, Knowledge & Technology Section of the American Sociological Association (ASA), for her book Whole World on Fire: Organizations, Knowledge, & Nuclear Weapons Devastation (Cornell University Press, 2004). The book was featured in an Author Meets Critics session at the 2005 ASA meetings in Philadelphia, with Renee Anspach, Hugh

Gusterson, and Thomas P. Hughes as the critics. The journal invited the participants to submit their comments for a review symposium published in Social Studies of Science, and was delighted to receive the review essays from Professors Anspach, Gusterson, and Hughes, and the reply from Professor Eden.

Nuclear terrorism is the common enemy of all mankind, and its danger is a reality. In the face of the emergence of global, non-state terrorism, China must be prepared to confront a new kind of enemy -- the nuclear terrorist. There are several potential forms of nuclear terrorism. A terrorist attack using a functional nuclear device would be devastating. A "dirty bomb" is another form, although much less deadly and far easier to build than a crude nuclear device. China believes that to combat nuclear terrorism, the most important thing is to enhance nuclear materials control and their security. China has taken substantial measures to further strengthen its control over nuclear materials as well as to protect its nuclear facilities. In the face of this new challenge of combating nuclear terrorism, there is still much work for China to do, including improving management and control of radioactive sources and clarifying the design basis threat. In all, every nation must not only perform its due obligations to prevent nuclear terrorism, but also participate actively in building international nonproliferation and nuclear security regimes. All countries should take unanimous action, And China will continue to contribute to this end.

This article is based on a paper the author researched and wrote as a 2004-2005 visiting scholar with the Project on Peace and Cooperation in the Asia-Pacific Region at CISAC.

A net assessment of the benefits/losses of arms control treaties in terms of military significance was required in response to the START Resolution of Ratification. The response by the Executive Branch belabored smaller issues, avoided accomplishments and didn't carry out the net assessment.

The nuclear nonproliferation regime has come under attack from proliferation determinists, who argue that resolute proliferants connected by decentralized networks can be stopped only through the use of aggressive export controls or regime change. Proliferation pragmatists counter that nuclear aspirants are neither as resolved nor as advanced as determinists claim. A technical review of recent proliferators' progress reveals that Iran, North Korea, and Libya (before it renounced its nuclear program) have been unable to significantly cut development times; the evidence that these regimes are dead set on proliferating and cannot be persuaded to give up their nuclear programs is not compelling. Because these states lack tacit knowledge, the most effective way to dissolve the hub-and-spoke or star-shaped structures of their nuclear and ballistic missile networks is to target the hubs--that is, second-tier proliferators such as Pakistan that have assisted these states with their nuclear and missile programs. Past strategies aimed at dissuading proliferants have been most successful when they combine diplomatic, social, and economic benefits with credible threats and clear red lines. The United States should therefore use these strategies instead of regime change to target current and potential hub states to halt further proliferation.

This report proposes a set of initiatives aimed at stopping the spread of nuclear weapons to more countries and to non-state terrorist and criminal organizations. The most effective way to do this is to strictly limit access to the key nuclear-explosive materials required to make nuclear weapons: high-enriched uranium (HEU) and plutonium. These materials must be secured and, where possible, eliminated; and the number of locations where they can be found or produced drastically reduced.

We propose measures to strengthen international security standards on the storage and transport of fissile materials; stop the spread of facilities capable of producing fissile materials (reprocessing and enrichment plants); end verifiably the production of fissile material for weapons; dispose of excess weapons and civilian fissile materials; and phase out the use of HEU as a reactor fuel.

Although the measures called for have been on the international agenda for decades, most are barely moving forward, if not completely stalled. These measures urgently need high-level attention.

Specifically, we call for the following initiatives:

• A finding by the U.N. Security Council that a country that withdraws from the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and seeks to use for weapons purposes materials and technology acquired while it was a member constitutes a threat to international security and that such country will be subject to a clearly articulated escalating set of sanctions imposed by the international community. Exporters and importers should negotiate bilateral safeguards as a backup to international safeguards to assure that, in addition to a country's obligations under the NPT, they have a bilateral agreement that any nuclear facilities, equipment, or material that is exported will not be converted to weapons use. Such backup safeguards are already mandated in some agreements for nuclear cooperation between supplier and receiver countries;
• The establishment of internationally verified minimum standards for the physical protection of fissile materials;
• An international agreement that countries will build new uranium enrichment plants only if they have been first reviewed and approved under agreed criteria by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) or a special committee under the U.N. Security Council and are subject to an additional level of multinational oversight;
• A moratorium on building new spent-fuel reprocessing plants until the existing plutonium stocks, including excess military stocks, are disposed of, and phase-out of plutonium separation at existing reprocessing plants if there is no compelling economic rationale to continue;
• A Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty (FMCT) to end further production of fissile materials for weapons or outside international safeguards;
• Actions by the United States and Russia to dispose of fissile materials recovered from excess weapons;
• A phaseout of the use of HEU in reactor fuel and critical assemblies.