There’s a line in Taoist philosophy that says, ‘The Tao that can be spoken is not the eternal Tao.’ It’s a cautionary principle that should underpin one’s reading of the final joint declaration from the …
Articles by: "Rod Lyon"
The issue of how Australia should position itself between the current primary power in the Asia–Pacific (the US) and the rising contender (China) has returned suddenly and forcefully to Australian policy debates. If anything, the …
Despite evidence of belated second thoughts by the principal players (see here and here), a summit meeting between President Donald Trump and Kim Jong‑un is still likely to occur in Singapore on 12 June. In a …
With the location and date of the forthcoming summit between President Donald Trump and Kim Jong‑un now fixed, speculation has turned to what sort of agreement might be achievable. US National Security Advisor John Bolton recently …
The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) has been diligently promoting the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons—usually just called the nuclear ban treaty—since it was opened for signature on 20 September 2017. ICAN’s …
The current tensions between Washington and Pyongyang aren’t just about history. Nor are they simply the result of personal frictions between Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un. At their core, they reflect the difficulties that typically …
As international concern mounts about North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs, recent events suggest a Pyongyang strongly interested in a new round of talks—or at least in talks with South Korea and the US, if …
Some years ago, Christine Leah and I published an article that explored Australian thinking about nuclear weapons and strategy. We argued that for more than six decades Australians had essentially espoused ‘three visions of the …
The Trump administration’s Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) has received mixed reviews. Some see it as a dramatic move away from a long-term US policy of reducing the size and salience of its nuclear arsenal, and …
Suddenly and unexpectedly, a small but intense debate has ignited in Australia over an unlikely topic—the wisdom of acquiring an indigenous nuclear weapons arsenal. (Some of the contributions to that debate can be found here, …
Late last week, a ‘pre-decisional’ draft of the Trump administration’s forthcoming Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) was leaked to the Huffington Post. While it would be wrong to treat that draft as the final text—after all, …
Originally published 5 August 2017. As some readers will probably recognise, the title of this post is a phrase drawn from Herman Kahn’s On thermonuclear war, one of the more depressing texts of the 20th …