Second-strike Capability Research Articles

Dracarys: Unleashing the Lessons of Nuclear Conflict from House of the Dragon

Given increasing nuclear-related dangers in the real world, which pose an existential threat to humanity, teaching nuclear theory to students is critically important. I argue that the hit TV show House of the Dragon can be utilized to educate students on the nuances of nuclear theory in a fun and engaging—but also surprisingly rigorous—way. In particular, the fire-breathing weapons of mass destruction in the Game of Thrones prequel show illustrate five key lessons about nuclear conflict dynamics. First, nuclear war is incredibly destructive and causes significant psychological trauma to survivors of nuclear attacks. Second, nuclear weapons can induce caution in leaders and deter major war. Third, while a powerful force, nuclear deterrence can fail due to irrational leaders, principle-agent problems, and accidents. Fourth, nuclear compellence is harder than nuclear deterrence and can backfire. Fifth, nuclear superiority beyond a secure second-strike capability provides little strategic benefit. In sum, House of the Dragon offers a more modern option than classics like Dr. Strangelove to teach about nuclear theory.

Nuclearization of Indian Ocean Region Implications for Strategic Stability in South Asia

This research focuses on nuclearization of the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) by India and its impact on strategic stability between India and Pakistan. The research question addressed in this paper is how nuclearization of IOR by India can have negative implications for South Asian strategic stability? With the help of major powers through Military Logistic Support Agreements and by being a member of alliances like Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, India will have access to more sophisticated technologies in the IOR. This Indian naval nuclear and military exceptionalism will assist India to use coercive strategies and nuclear blackmail vis-à-vis Pakistan. This will negatively impact strategic stability between India and Pakistan. Pakistan will have to consequently acquire assured second-strike capability as well as, invest in antisubmarine warfare capabilities including swarms of unmanned underwater vehicles controlled by artificial intelligence. The findings indicate that as India will not revise its naval nuclear ambitions, Pakistan must work for a progressing economic outlook so that it can opt for assured second strike capability in the future. The research methodology utilized in this article is qualitative. Both primary and secondary sources of data were employed in this research. Interviews were conducted for the collection of primary data.

The Dynamics of an Entangled Security Dilemma: China's Changing Nuclear Posture

Abstract Amid an intensifying rivalry with the United States, China is modernizing and significantly expanding its nuclear forces. These developments fuel concerns that China's traditional nuclear strategy premised on a limited nuclear arsenal for assured retaliation and a no-first-use policy is undergoing a major shift. Using Chinese-language materials, an examination of Chinese debates about China's security environment and the future direction of its nuclear strategy finds that a nuclear-conventional entangled security dilemma is emerging between the United States and China. The shift in the conventional balance of force in the region and the U.S. development of lower-yield nuclear weapons has led to greater fears in China of U.S. limited nuclear use in a conflict. Chinese strategists increasingly believe that U.S. nonnuclear strategic capabilities threaten China's nuclear forces. Although there is limited evidence of a shift in its nuclear strategy, China is changing its strategic posture to ensure its second-strike capability, including by relying on advanced conventional weapons (e.g., counterspace capabilities, cyber weapons, and electronic warfare) that can target U.S. missile defense. The dynamics of an entangled security dilemma may weaken arms race stability, and they underscore why it will be challenging for the United States to engage China in nuclear arms control.

The Nuclear Balance Is What States Make of It

Abstract Does nuclear superiority offer states political or military benefits? And do those benefits accrue beyond acquiring a secure second-strike capability? International relations theory has long held that nuclear superiority does not confer significant advantages, a conclusion supported by much of the qualitative literature on bargaining and crisis interactions between nuclear-armed states. New work by scholars using statistical methods to analyze data on nuclear crises, interstate disputes, and compellent threats has sought to answer these questions, producing conflicting results. Despite the contributions of these recent works, this line of research has assumed that warhead counts are an appropriate measure of nuclear capabilities and that states possess accurate information about the material balance. Instead, states use multiple quantitative and qualitative characteristics to evaluate the nuclear balance, and they often have inaccurate or incomplete information about the size, composition, and configuration of other states' nuclear forces. Using new data, replications of two prominent recent works show that results are sensitive to how the nuclear balance is operationalized. Drawing on archival and interview data from the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War, findings show how states and leaders often understand and respond to the nuclear balance in inconsistent, asymmetric, and subjective ways.

China’s 2021 orbital-weapon tests

In mid-2021, China launched two unprecedented test weapons that travelled long distances in low-Earth orbit before releasing hypersonic gliders into the atmosphere, which hit targets on Chinese territory. Much is unknown about these tests, but this ‘orbital glider-release system’ is a new technology that could substantially increase China’s nuclear second-strike capabilities against the United States and serve as a hedge against the deployment by the US of new missile-defence systems.

Challenges in Nuclear Posture and Deterrence from Pakistan’s Perspective

India and Pakistan are engaged in a nuclear arms competition with new technologies and systems that have a direct bearing on their respective doctrines and nuclear postures. The statements by senior Indian leadership over the past few years throw into question the viability of India’s no-first-use posture and have placed further stress on the deterrence relationship between these two regional adversaries. India’s efforts to explore space for a limited war in a nuclearised environment have encouraged Pakistan to introduce remedial measures in the form of short-range ballistic missiles. These are part of its full spectrum deterrence, which aims to deter an entire spectrum of conventional and nuclear threats. India’s work to operationalise its second-strike capability, acquisition of ballistic missile defences and development of hypersonic weapons could undermine regional strategic stability. These efforts require countermeasures on the part of Pakistan to ensure deterrence stability between the two nuclear armed neighbours.

India’s sea-based nuclear forces and strategic stability in South Asia

ABSTRACT Nuclear ballistic missile submarines (SSBNs) are traditionally believed to provide assured second-strike capability and stabilize deterrence. This paper contests this classical assumption in South Asia’s context and argues that SSBN capability to become secure and credible deterrent depends upon doctrinal issues, command and communication systems, and operational readiness of SSBN force. In a dyad, if both countries have invulnerable second strike capability, there is less incentive to strike first. Whereas invulnerability of one country incentivizes first strike. In South Asian strategic situation, an assured sea-based second-strike capability may contribute to India’s aggressive nuclear posture. This paper evaluates New Delhi’s induction of SSBNs in light of its stated notion of minimalism, as declared in its nuclear doctrine, and discusses in the context of traditional stability theory associated with the development of SSBN force. This paper primarily considers deterrence stability and crisis stability as two dependent variables to study how India’s sea-based nuclear capability affects strategic stability in South Asia.

At the Brink of Nuclear War: Feasibility of Retaliation and the U.S. Policy Decisions During the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis

Recent studies in nuclear deterrence show that nuclear punishment is infeasible in most cases due to the opponent’s second-strike capability, tactical redundancy, and the logic of self-deterrence. However, if the challenge against nuclear deterrence is expected to go unpunished, the deterrent policy is not credible and will likely fail. Can the defender violently punish the challenger possessing nuclear weapons? If it can, under what conditions? Thanks to President Kennedy’s tape recordings, the Cuban Missile Crisis provides researchers an exceptional laboratory for testing various theories on the defender’s policy choices after deterrence failure. This article derives a research hypothesis and its competing counterpart and examines their respective explanatory power via a process-tracing analysis of key members within the Executive Committee during the crisis. The study finds that the challenger’s feasibility of retaliating with atomic weapons is a crucial predictor for the defender’s policy choices.

Book Review of "Underestimated: Our Not So Peaceful Nuclear Future" by Henry D. Sokolski

Underestimated: Our Not So Peaceful Nuclear Future by Henry D. Sokolski is a compact book of just three chapters and running 135 pages, but it is likely to unnerve any reader who knows about the growing stockpiles of separated plutonium and stockpiles of highly-enriched uranium. Discussions revolve around the need for a well-protected second-strike capability, the call for a new generation of nuclear weapons that would be easier to use, and the growing interest in the early use of tactical nuclear weapons to quickly de-escalate a conflict. The book commences with the current popular views on nuclear proliferation and proceeds to analyze the consequences of the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Three currently-held views – arms control, hawkish, and academic neorealist – are analyzed in-depth. The first of these schools – arms control – postulates that nuclear weapons are ineffective at deterring aggression, their use is extremely remote, and proliferation is of no vital consequence. To buttress this argument, they cite examples of the Arab-Israeli War of 1973, the Korean and Vietnam wars, and the terror attacks of 9/11 in 2001 and Mumbai in 2008. Hence, John Mueller concluded that “nuclear weapons do a poor job of deterring small or major wars” (9). The Obama administration went on to make reducing nuclear arms a prerequisite for preventing their future spread (6). However, hawkish supporters of nuclear weapons hold the view that reducing American and Russian nuclear arms has a negligible impact on the nuclear ambitions of other countries; North Korea and Iran are cited as apposite examples. Therefore, they believe that nuclear weapons in the U.S. and allied hands help maintain peace.

North Korea, missile defense, and U.S.-China security dilemma

This article examines the relationship between US missile defense and the US-China security dilemma dynamics by developing the concept of diffuse signaling involving the Korean peninsula. We argue that the US’ efforts to bolster deterrence against North Korea’s growing threats through missile defense have resulted in China’s countermeasures of enhancing survivability and penetrability of its second-strike capability, leading to downward spirals of tensions between Beijing and Washington. We explain how three structural factors – geography, the US alliance system, and nuclear asymmetry – have made diffuse signaling salient, thus making it very challenging for the United States to reassure China even when its actions targeted North Korea. The article empirically shows the action-reaction process through which China and the US have come to experience the aggravation of the security dilemma over the Korean peninsula.

A New Cold War? Causes and Future of the Emerging US-China Rivalry

The Trump Administration declared China a strategic competitor and a revisionist power. It escalated a trade war to a fullfrontal clash with China. Some experts qualified it as a new Cold War between the US and China. Both countries are undergoing dramatic transformation. Their destinations will determine the course and outcome of the emerging US-China rivalry. This article argues that while engagement is now defined by competitive interests, the profound interdependence continues underpinning the bilateral relationship. Although there is no precedent to guide economic and geostrategic competition between the two largest and deeply intertwined economies and heavily militarized superpowers, the US and China must find some balance of interests with each other and avoid violent confrontation that serves neither’s interest. This level of engagement requires vision and flexibility. With strong economic interdependence, the existence of an international institutional order, limited ideological confrontation, and nuclear second-strike capability, leaders of two countries have no choice but find ways to manage their competition and continue futher engagement with each other. Authors conclude that the stronger China grows, the harder it gets for Washington to force it back down. Driving PRC into a corner is the way to make China even tougher. So it could cause more severe consequences for both countries.

India’s Agni Missile Systems: Strengthening India’s Nuclear Deterrence

Over the years, India has been able to acquire a credible minimum nuclear deterrence. In this, the Agni missile system is integral to India‟s counter second-strike capability especially against China. The Agni category missiles are solid propelled ballistic missiles, ranging from short range missiles to intermediate range missiles (700-5000kms) with road and rail mobility providing greater chances of survivability during an enemy attack. This strengthens its scope of launching a counter/second strike. This makes India one of the few countries in the world with the ability to potentially decapitate its enemy by preserving its arsenal in the first attack from the enemy. This article provides a deep analysis of India‟s Agni missile systems.

‘Dog-beating stick’: General Zhang Aiping’s contribution to the modernisation of China’s nuclear force and strategy since 1977

Since the Reform and Opening-up in the late 1970s, the second generation of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leadership, led by Deng Xiaoping, worked towards a breakthrough in the development of strategic nuclear weapons and employment policy. By the middle 1980s, the Chinese military had successfully developed China’s first generation of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM), submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBM), and communication satellites, which provided China with an elementary and limited second-strike capability. These technological advances were complemented by advances in Chinese nuclear strategy as well. Despite retaining the basic principle of no-first-use of nuclear weapons, the Chinese military leaders, such as Deng and General Zhang Aiping, gradually accepted the concept of nuclear deterrence. Meanwhile, they put forward China’s own concepts, including ‘da gou gun’ (‘dog-beating stick’), ‘huan shou zhi li’ (‘the power to strike back’), ‘xia hu ren’ (‘bluff’), and ‘di you wo you, di yong wo yong’ (‘we have whatever the enemy has; we use whatever the enemy uses’). All of these new strategic weapons and concepts, which came from the 1980s, have been playing a key role in ensuring that China enjoyed limited nuclear deterrent since the late 1980s. Zhang devoted most of his attention to these achievements.

India’s Development of Sea-based Nuclear Capabilities: Implications for Pakistan

India is rapidly building up its navy in order to develop blue-water capabilities and increase its prowess in the Indian Ocean and beyond, which is integral to India’s grand strategy to attain a regional and global power status. This poses a threat to the regional states. It, especially, heightens Pakistan’s threat perception, whose main security threat comes from India. Of all the gravest concerns for Pakistan is India’s development of nuclear triad, which is mainly comprised of its nuclear powered submarine fleet, armed with a range of nuclear-tipped missiles, which gives it a second-strike capability. The paper looks at how India’s development of sea-based nuclear capability would affect nuclear deterrence stability in South Asia. The paper assesses the Indian naval nuclear development and also whether a second strike capability can potentially stabilises deterrence in South Asia. It finds that the development of a nuclear triad, in general, and second strike capability, in particular, would not stabilise deterrence or bring strategic stability to South Asia. In fact, it would increase arms race tendencies. It would eventually brings instability and further uncertainty to the region with complex command and control issues involved, and the risk of accidental or unauthorised launch.

Strategic imperatives, status aspirations, or domestic interests? Explaining Russia’s nuclear weapons policy

What are the causes of Russia’s increasingly assertive nuclear weapons policy? This article offers a synthetic explanation combining strategic imperatives, status aspirations, and domestic political factors. In brief, it is argued that strategic imperatives go a long way toward explaining Russia’s nuclear force modernization. Russia seeks to upgrade its aging nuclear arsenal to maintain an assured second-strike capability. Status aspirations, in turn, can account for many nuclear exercises and maneuvers conducted by Russia. The aim is to promote Russia’s image as a great power in world politics. Finally, regime security considerations are the primary driver of Moscow’s abrasive nuclear rhetoric, which often caters to a domestic audience. The article unpacks these arguments, demonstrates their explanatory purchase, and discusses policy implications.

Indo-Russian Strategic Partnership and Indian Military's Cold Start Doctrine

The South Asian strategic stability is at risk because of the Indian military's doctrinal shift, massive military modernization and operationalization of the Cold Start Doctrine-(CSD) against a nuclear weapon state, Pakistan. This study is divided in two parts. The first part would emphasize on the strategic stability of South Asia and the Indian military's efforts to execute Cold Start Doctrine against Pakistan. Second part would highlight the Indo-Russian defense collaboration and its likely impact on regional security. The Russian T-90 MBTs, SU-30 MKI Air aircraft along with S-400 Air defense system, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities would be the backbone of any aggressive action against Pakistan. In addition, the Russian assistance in the nuclear submarines would provide India with assured second-strike capability and confidence to go for any misadventure against Pakistan under CSD. The Russian weapon and equipment would revamp the Indian military's overall warfighting capabilities, fill the operational gaps and enable India to operationalize the CSD against Pakistan. Limited war envisaged by the Indian military may not remain limited for Pakistan. Pakistan's quid pro quo response may push India to escalate the conflict which may endanger the deterrence stability in south Asia. Therefore, the Indian CSD is a threat to the regional peace and stability. India needs to consider shunning such types of strategies and resort to peaceful negotiations with Pakistan to resolve all outstanding issues for long term peace and stability in south Asia.

Conclusion

Conclusion

Strategic stability in the twenty-first century: The challenge of the second nuclear age and the logic of stability interdependence

ABSTRACTStrategic stability has been a core pillar of nuclear-armed states since the Cold War. Despite remaining an explicit policy preference, challenges posed by the second nuclear age make it increasingly difficult for states to establish and maintain strategic stability. These challenges are based on the growing number of nuclear-armed actors and these states' different motivations and capabilities. Additionally, new conventional weapons systems have added a new layer of complexity. The diversification of ballistic missile roles into the realm of conventional strike platforms coupled with the development of ballistic missile defense, challenges two core components of strategic stability: second-strike capability and mutual vulnerability.This article addresses these challenges and contends that strategic stability cannot be established through traditional bilateral mechanisms. It argues that states are more strategically interdependent in the second nuclear age. Therefore, they must recognize that developing and deploying these new platforms inevitably affects the nuclear and conventional deterrent capabilities of another state, undermining strategic stability.

China’s Development of a More Secure Nuclear Second-Strike Capability: Implications for Chinese Behavior and U.S. Extended Deterrence

China’s Development of a More Secure Nuclear Second-Strike Capability:Implications for Chinese Behavior and U.S. Extended Deterrence Benjamin Schreer (bio) The People’s Republic of China (PRC) is in the midst of improving its nuclear arsenal, both quantitatively and qualitatively. Since the details of this nuclear modernization process remain clouded in secrecy, estimates of the numbers of China’s nuclear warheads vary significantly. Pessimists believe that Beijing could possess well over 1,000 warheads, most of which are assumed to be hidden in a complex system of underground tunnels.1 In contrast, this essay agrees with conservative assessments that the total size of China’s nuclear arsenal is approximately 250 warheads, delivered by land-based ballistic missiles, aircraft, and an emerging ballistic submarine fleet. The U.S. intelligence community expects that the number of these nuclear warheads capable of threatening the U.S. homeland will more than double to over 100 by the mid-2020s.2 China is on a long-term path of replacing its old liquid-fuel, moveable DF-3A intermediate-range ballistic missiles (IRBM) with solid-fuel, road-mobile DF-21 medium-range ballistic missiles (MRBM). The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Navy’s Jin-class nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine (SSBN) was also expected to conduct its first patrol by the end of 2014 while armed with the JL-2 submarine-launched ballistic missile. The PLA Navy is estimated to have three Jin-class boats, which could increase to four to five SSBNs by 2020. China is also reportedly developing a next-generation SSBN, called the Type 096. It is therefore gradually making progress toward a credible sea-based nuclear deterrent.3 [End Page 14] Therefore, as one scholar wrote in the pages of this journal, “after decades of reliance on a small and potentially strategic deterrent, China is finally achieving the ‘lean and effective’ nuclear force” that its leaders believe to be essential to protect the nation’s security interests.4 The PRC’s incremental development of this more secure second-strike nuclear capability began more than two decades ago. The rapid advances in U.S. conventional precision-strike capabilities observed in military operations during the 1990s and the first decade of the 2000s was a key driver behind those efforts. However, while Beijing’s reasons for wanting to enhance mutual nuclear vulnerability with the United States are clear, the implications for China’s strategic behavior, U.S.-Sino crisis stability, and Asian security in general are less certain. Optimists argue that China’s development of a more secure second-strike capability that enhances mutual vulnerability will strengthen U.S.-Sino crisis stability. One proponent of this view is Robert Ross, who argues that such a capability would minimize the risk of the United States launching a disarming first strike, while leaving intact Washington’s ability to respond with its dominant conventional forces to any attempt by Beijing to alter the regional status quo.5 Yet given the changing strategic context underlying the U.S.-Sino relationship, there are reasons to caution against such a positive reading. The Changing Strategic Context and U.S.-China Strategic Stability China’s nuclear modernization occurs in the midst of Asia-Pacific power shifts. Beijing is increasingly willing to contest U.S. leadership in the region, which has long been based on the United States’ unrivaled military power. To do so, China is not only modernizing its nuclear forces but also significantly upgrading its conventional capabilities. By investing in anti-access/area-denial capabilities, China is raising the costs for a third-party intervention (for example, by the United States) in a dispute in its “near seas”—that is, the Yellow Sea, the Philippine Sea, and the South China Sea. The goal of this strategy seems to be to displace the United States as the dominant power in the western Pacific.6 [End Page 15] In this context, the assumption that the United States’ conventional superiority will guarantee U.S.-Sino strategic stability in contemporary Asia could be problematic. To be sure, in absolute terms U.S. conventional forces will still outweigh China’s by a wide margin for years to come. However, as China is...

China's Nuclear Forces and Their Significance to India

The Indian nuclear program is a response to a perceived politico-strategic threat from China as opposed to a military-operational one that New Delhi began after perceiving an “ultimatum” from China in 1965. Consequently, India is in the process of acquiring an assured second-strike capability vis-à-vis China to meet the requirements of general deterrence. While India has always been concerned about the Sino-Pakistani nuclear/missile nexus, China has become wary of the growing military ties between the United States and India in recent years, especially because of the military implications of the US-India civil nuclear deal. Given the growing conventional military gap between the two states, India is not lowering its nuclear threshold to meet the Chinese conventional challenge. Instead, India is upgrading its conventional military strategy from dissuasion to deterrence against China. While the overall Sino-Indian nuclear relationship is stable, it will be challenged as China acquires advanced conventional weapons that blur the distinction between conventional and nuclear conflict.