Invited Perspective: Anticipating the Effects of Emerging Technologies on Nuclear Deterrence

Author: Melanie Sisson (Brookings Institution)

This publication was released as part of the SMA project “Risk of Strategic Deterrence Failure.” For more information regarding this project, please click here.

Invited Perspective Preview

The effectiveness of nuclear deterrence depends upon mutual confidence in second-strike capabilities – for nuclear deterrence to work, nuclear-armed competitors must all believe that each can absorb a first strike and still return a nuclear response. Emerging technologies being pursued by US competitors that enhance their ability to locate, track, and target nuclear assets, and those that can be used to compromise or to damage components of nuclear communication, command, and control (NC3) erode second-strike and put at risk the future deterrent effectiveness of US strategic forces. The United States can guard against this outcome by modernizing its air- and sea-based nuclear assets, developing resilient and redundant cyber defenses, and actively pursuing international agreements that limit the deleterious effects of ISR and that prohibit kinetic or cyber attacks on terrestrial and satellite-based components of NC3.

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