Restoring Strategic Stability in an Era of Great Power Tension

 The United States has entered a new era of high tension and military competition with major powers China and Russia that has some of the most threatening elements of the Cold War, including an incipient nuclear arms race. The peril of this period of high tension is exacerbated by the near collapse of arms control agreements and verification regimes that kept Cold War dangers in check, and the emergence of new and destabilizing technologies such as offensive cyber capabilities, hypersonic missiles and anti-satellite weaponry. Domestically this moment arrives at a time when the Cold War consensus on national security issues has all but disappeared in the face of political polarization in Washington, D.C. Little wonder that the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists has reset their Doomsday Clock to just 100 seconds to midnight, the closest we have been to Armageddon since they first started the clock back in 1947.

With its mandate to foster dialogue and act as a bridge between the Executive and Legislative Branches, and to bring the lessons of history to bear on current challenges, the Center for the Study of the Presidency & Congress (CSPC) has launched a project on nuclear nonproliferation and strategic stability to try and revive a spirit of bipartisan cooperation on these critical national security issues. Along with our partners at the Nuclear Threat Initiative, co-chairs Senator Sam Nunn (ret.) and former Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, CSPC will convene Congressional leaders and former national security and military officials in private discussions, and also foster a dialogue with current security experts and Russia and China hands to explore new ideas for navigating this dangerous period.

Subjects that we will explore in these discussions will include past successful arms control agreements and the mechanisms used to successfully foster bipartisan cooperation on national security issues; potential policies to enhance strategic stability with Russia and China, and reverse current dangerous trends in major power relations; and an examination of the dwindling expertise on strategic issues in Congress, and how to improve “nuclear literacy” in the legislative branch.