Arms Control Wonk

Jeffrey and Aaron walk through a piece of foundational field canon, The Wizards of Armageddon by Fred Kaplan, discussing its coverage of institutional and personal decisionmaking, picking apart the concepts of deterrence and compellence, and...

After a brief hiatus due to Jeffrey's house catching on a lil' bit of fire, the Arms Control Wonk team is back to take a look at North Korea's triple missile launch and looming possible nuclear test.  Jeffrey and Aaron discuss the North Korean...

The U.S. has unilaterally committed to not conducting destructive anti-satellite missile tests! Jeffrey and Aaron walk through what the U.S. has actually normatively committed to, what this means for potential future attempts at arms control in space,...

and join Jeffrey to talk about their new book: The group sits down to talk through China's DF-21D and DF-26 missiles. Do they work? What do they do? What can they actually accomplish? How do navies adapt to the new threat environment?  The...

...get a pod.  North Korea has conducted three (and, as I'm typing this, apparently four), ICBM (or ICBM element) tests, with two labelled as "satellite" system tests.  Jeffrey and Scott talk through an OSINT Oreo: Good OSINT to...

Should we be worried that Russia may intentionally use nuclear weapons in Ukraine?  Jeffrey and Aaron discuss the role nuclear weapons, conspiracy theories, and misinformation play within conventional wars and escalation dynamics.  Aaron...

Russia has invaded Ukraine, and some folks are arguing that Ukraine could've deterred Russia "if it had never given up nuclear weapons." But they never "had" nuclear weapons. Jeffrey and Aaron talk through the control of nuclear weapons in Ukraine...

Jasmine Owens, Lead Organizer and Policy Coordinator at the Physicians for Social Responsibility, joins Jeffrey to discuss social justice and nuclear weapons. Jasmine and Jeffrey attack the tough issues facing culture within the nuclear security...

Dr. Michal Onderco, Associate Professor of International Relations in the Department of Public Administration and Sociology at Erasmus University Rotterdam, joins Jeffrey to talk about his new book, Dr. Onderco and Jeffrey talk about the history of...

After North Korea tested its new MaRV twice, a bunch of weird news stories suddenly started breaking about U.S. responses. Flights were grounded in parts of the West Coast, there was a shelter in place order up at the missile defense site in Alaska,...