Nuclear Non-Proliferation

Joseph Cirincione
Senior Associate and Director for Non-Proliferation
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Mon, Feb 7, 2005

The world is at a nuclear tipping point. America now faces some of the most serious nuclear proliferation crises in its history. One of the few issues John Kerry and George Bush agreed on in the 2004 presidential debates was that nuclear proliferation is by far the greatest threat facing the United States today. The president must deal with the triple threat of nuclear terrorism, the emergence of new nuclear-weapon states, and the deterioration of the existing nonproliferation regime. Joseph Cirincione will assess the dangers and discuss the current administration policies, the obstacles they must overcome and the traps they need to avoid.

Recently ranked among the 100 people whose ideas will shape the debates over the "ten most important issues of the day," (The National Journal, May 2004), Cirincione is an expert in non-proliferation, national security, U.S. foreign policy, and Iraq (WMD). He is the author of Deadly Arsenals: Tracking Weapons of Mass Destruction (Carnegie Endowment, 2002). In addition to his position as a Senior Associate at the Carnegie Endowment, he teaches at the Georgetown University Graduate School of Foreign Service and is a frequent media commentator on proliferation and security issues. In 2004, the World Affairs Councils of America named him one of the 500 people whose views have the most influence in shaping American foreign policy. Cirincione worked for nine years in the U.S. House of Representatives and served as staff director of the Military Reform Caucus under Congressmen Tom Ridge and Charles Bennett. He is the author of numerous articles on proliferation and nuclear weapons issues, the editor of Repairing the Regime (Routledge, 2000), the producer of the DVD The Proliferation Threat, and the publisher and editor of the Internet site ProliferationNews.org. He has held positions at the Henry L. Stimson Center, the U.S. Information Agency, and the Center for Strategic and International Studies. He is member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the International Institute for Strategic Studies. Other Cirincione publications include WMD in Iraq: Evidence and Implications (Carnegie Endowment Report, January 2004) and North Korea and Iran: Test Cases for an Improved Nonproliferation Regime? (Arms Control Today, December 2003).