Minimum deterrence and missile defenses: what's new,what's true,what's arguable

Minimum deterrence is a compromise, or halfway house, between nuclear abolition or nearly zero and assured destruction, the dominant paradigm for strategic nuclear arms control during and after the cold war. Minimum deterrence as applied to the current relationship between the United States and Russia would require downsizing the numbers of operationally deployed long-range nuclear weapons to 1000, or fewer, on each side. More drastic bilateral Russian–American reductions would require the cooperation of other nuclear weapons states in making proportional reductions in their own arsenals. In addition, US plans for European-based and global missile defenses cause considerable angst in Russia and threaten to derail the Obama “reset” in Russian–American relations, despite the uncertainties about current and plausible future performances of missile defense technologies.     

Iran's nuclear programme: civil and/or military goals?

The ultimate goal of Iran's nuclear programme remains uncertain. While the nuclear reactor of Bushehr has finally been connected to the power grid, the nuclear fuel enrichment activities and their location cause concern to the international community. Thirty years of nuclear investments demonstrate a negative cost–benefit analysis: technical constraints and economic and infrastructural requirements constitute a burden on the implementation of a nuclear programme. This article analyses the economic, legal, technical and political aspects of the Iranian programme in order to uncover its civil and/or military finality.     

网络化无人水下航行器CAN总线调度方法

传感器时间驱动,控制器和执行器均为事件驱动的网络控制系统节点驱动方式,已在众多的网络控制系统研究中被采用。在此种节点驱动方式下,依据各控制回路传感信息的不同时间性质将网络化无人水下航行器各控制回路划分为周期性控制回路和随机性控制回路来进行处理。采用时分复用原理对系统总线传输时间进行划分,通过递归遍历寻优方法对系统周期性控制回路信息传输需求进行优化调度;基本周期最小时间余量最大的寻优指标确保了总线负载均衡和随机性控制回路信息传输需求得到及时满足,这样有效地减少了低优先级控制回路(节点)信息传输的延迟等待时间。利用M ATLAB/T uretim e工具进行仿真试验,仿真结果说明了调度方法的有效性。     

Combating nuclear smuggling? Exploring drivers and challenges to detecting nuclear and radiological materials at maritime facilities

International concern over nuclear terrorism has grown during the past few decades. This has driven a broad spectrum of efforts to strengthen nuclear security globally, including the widespread adoption of radiation-detection technology for border monitoring. Detection systems are now deployed at strategic locations for the purported purpose of detecting and deterring the smuggling of nuclear and radioactive materials. However, despite considerable investment in this area, few studies have examined how these programs are implemented or the operational challenges they face on a day-to-day basis. This article seeks to address this with a focus on radiation-detection efforts at maritime facilities. Utilizing practitioner interviews and a survey, this article identifies the factors that influence the planning and use of these systems in this fast-moving environment. The results clearly demonstrate that the implementation of these systems varies significantly across different national and organizational contexts, resulting in a fragmented global nuclear-detection architecture, which arguably undermines efforts to detect trafficked nuclear-threat materials. Greater consideration should therefore be given to developing international standards and guidance, designing and adopting tools to support key parts of the alarm assessment process, and broader sharing of good practice.     

The stability of the nuclear nonproliferation norm: a critique of norm-contestation theory

This article argues that the nuclear nonproliferation norm (NNPN) is a social fact with a relatively independent life of its own and that it has a powerful impact on the behavior of both nuclear-weapon states (NWS) and non-nuclear-weapon states (NNWS). It challenges the application of critical constructivist research on norms to the NNPN and the idea that its legitimacy and structural power depend on contestation “all the way down.” State and non-state actors play an important role in explaining the dynamics of the NNPN, but agential constructivism runs the danger of “throwing the baby out with the bath water,” neglecting the structural impact of the NNPN on state behavior. The article examines the limitations of norm-contestation theory, arguing that some norms are more resistant to contestation than others. The NNPN is more difficult to contest than new norms (such as the Responsibility to Protect) because it is rooted in fifty years of nonproliferation nuclear diplomacy. The US-India nuclear deal is not a case of “norm change” but a violation of the NNPN. The “core” of the NNPN has not changed since the US-India nuclear deal. The conflict confronting NWS and NNWS is about the implementation of “type 2” norms (organizing principles) and “type 3” norms (standardized procedures), and not about the “hard core” of the NNPN.     

Avoiding self-inflicted wounds to the credibility of the US nuclear deterrent

Nuclear deterrence requires not only the reliability of a state’s strategic weapons and the willingness of its leaders to employ them but also an adversary’s appreciation of these conditions. Weapons perceived as failing to hold their targets at risk may lack deterrent value, just as retaliatory threats that are not believable may fail to deter, even if a state’s operational capabilities are robust. Both the technical and political credibility of the US nuclear deterrent may have suffered self-inflicted harm since the end of the Cold War, often as casualties of intemperate policy debates. In particular, doubts have been sowed about the reliability of aging US warheads under a science-based stockpile-stewardship regime meant to substitute for nuclear-explosive testing. Likewise, the credibility of US deterrent threats may have waned as American leaders have spoken ever more stridently about the horrors of nuclear war and nuclear terrorism, underscoring their extreme aversion to the risk of nuclear attack. Diminished credibility in both spheres threatens to compromise US national-security objectives ranging from nuclear nonproliferation to the outcomes of nuclear crises.     

How long until midnight? Intelligence-policy relations and the United States response to the Israeli nuclear program, 1959–1985

Why did the United States fail to stop Israeli acquisition of nuclear weapons? Existing research argues that patrons such as the U.S. should have an easy time halting proliferation by militarily and economically vulnerable clients. Nevertheless, Israel acquired nuclear weapons with relatively little American opposition. Utilizing extensive primary source research, we argue that problematic intelligence-policy relations hindered U.S. efforts to arrest Israeli proliferation as (1) policymakers often gave mixed guidance to the intelligence community, resulting in (2) limited information on Israeli efforts that reinforced policy ambiguity. The results carry implications for understanding the dynamics of nuclear proliferation and intelligence-policy relations.     

船用反应堆堆芯物理计算软件包的研制

基于船用反应堆结构特点与运行方式 ,通过对核电站大型机版堆芯物理计算软件的移植与修改 ,研制了微机版船用反应堆堆芯物理计算软件包 .可用于船用反应堆燃料组件参数及堆芯三维细网临界与燃耗的计算研究     

基于资源平衡的分布式星群网络连接接入策略

针对现有卫星网络接入策略未能充分考虑卫星资源以及合理确定卫星资源权重问题,提出了一种基于资源平衡的星群网络连接接入策略。该策略充分考虑卫星的多种资源建立卫星资源评价模型,利用移动代理技术,采用层次分析法和熵值法计算各卫星资源的主观和客观权重,并通过Kullback散度权重优化方法对主客观权重进行平衡处理,判决过程兼顾了卫星的综合性能水平和用户偏好,提高了接入的准确性和合理性。仿真结果表明,采用该接入策略,有效改善了新呼叫阻塞率和强制中断率。     

微陀螺仪检测平衡回路建立与验证

基于梳齿电容微结构,分析了电压驱动梳齿电容振动产生静电力的工作原理;针对微陀螺仪开环直接检测的不足,采用静电力平衡哥氏力的方法构建平衡回路,抑制哥氏振动。提取了微陀螺仪哥氏输出信号振动幅值;以哥氏振动幅值为控制量,设计了微陀螺仪检测平衡回路。仿真和实验表明构建的检测平衡回路能够有效地平衡哥氏力,抑制哥氏振动,使质量块回到平衡位置,微陀螺仪标度因数线性度和对称性有显著提高,测量范围、阈值和分辨率等性能均有不同程度改善。