Members of the ELN Network respond to ELN Director Sir Adam Thomson’s recent commentary, reflecting on what choices countries can make that will affect what a 21st-century-style cold war will be like.
If there is one parallel between the Cuban Missile Crisis and the war in Ukraine, Marion Messmer writes, it’s that decision-making is influenced by myths, enemy images, and beliefs. The fog of war makes miscommunication, misperception, and miscalculation that much more likely, in turn increasing the risk that further escalation might take place. Whether the war in Ukraine will be able to provide a similar motivation for arms control efforts as the Cuban Missile Crisis did will depend on how exactly it will end.
Thanks to the INF Treaty, Russian forces attacking Ukraine have not been able to use ground-to-ground ballistic and cruise missiles of ranges from 500-5,500 km, which could have devastated centres in Western Ukraine. Dan Plesch writes that the process that produced the INF Treaty provides important guidance for a renaissance in disarmament in the present century and calls on civil society to seek a global zero on missiles.
At a time when war rages at NATO’s doorstep, and collective defence coupled with rising defence spending is at the centre of everyone’s attention, ELN Policy Fellow Katarina Kertysova writes that managing to get 30 capitals to agree to an ambitious programme on climate security deserves applause.
Gender mainstreaming is already driving innovation in arms control and disarmament. Here’s how countries with feminist foreign policies can build on these efforts and take this agenda forward, writes Renata Dalaqua.
Although it may now be hard to escape a cold war, especially between Russia and the West, countries can still make real choices that affect the course of the confrontation, writes ELN Director Sir Adam Thomson. Here he suggests four axes along which all states involved should be considering their positioning as they pursue their clashing desired outcomes.
We should not underestimate the possibility of turning Johnson’s ‘Global Britain’ into ‘Regional Britain’, given the economic challenges that Prime Minister Truss has to contend with, writes Nikita Gryazin.
Five members of the ELN’s Network reflect on the election of a new Italian government
The significance of NATO’s June Summit is in the adoption of a tougher and more robust approach to security through a renewed emphasis on defence, deterrence and, whenever necessary, confrontation, write ELN Senior Associate Fellows Nicholas Williams and Simon Lunn.