Nautilus Peace and Security Weekly – 25 October 2012

Recommended Citation

Nikhil Desai – Energy Security Contributor Some thought the moment to save the earth had passed in Copenhagen nearly three years ago. Phew!! What a relief!!!…, "Nautilus Peace and Security Weekly – 25 October 2012", NAPSNet Weekly Report, October 25, 2012, https://nautilus.org/napsnet/napsnet-weekly/nautilus-peace-and-security-weekly-25-october-2012/

CONTENTS

See this week’s blog: Bridges to nowhere – promises, promises, from our Energy Secruity contributor, Nikhil Desai.


DETERRENCE: Assessing the undersea balance between the U.S. and China, Owen Cote, MIT Security Studies Program Working Paper (February 2011) [PDF, 240KB]

China plans to use diesel submarines for coastal defense, offensive mine warfare, and intelligence; and maybe nuclear submarines (SSNs) in the Philippine Sea.  Its limited anti-submarine capacities focus on coastal defense and on the diesel submarine threat of regional adversaries rather than American SSNs.


DPRK: S. Korea, U.S. set for defense ministerial talks, Lee Chi-dong, Yonhap News Agency (22 October 2012)

North Korea is on the agenda for the highest level defense talks between the US and Korea, the Security Consultative Meeting.  North Korea displays mixed economic reform signals: simultaneously claiming to be open for business while shuttering Chinese businesses. There will be a positive environmental impact from closing pollution-intensive industries. North Korea threatened to repay propaganda leaflets with artillery.


ENERGY SECURITY: China nuclear report acknowledges safety concerns, Brian Spegele and Wayne Ma, The Wall Street Journal [16 October 2012]

India cannot bring itself to an honest assessment of nuclear safety, economics, finance or emergency preparedness. US claims of safety – if not the economics – rely on not just blind trust in experts but on a history of institutional framework of checks and balances, credible fear of civil penalties and criminal proceedings, healthy debate and whistle-blower protection. All Indian establishment can do is issue promises and float new fantasies.


Blog: Bridges to nowhere – promises, promises

by Nikhil Desai – Energy Security Contributor Some thought the moment to save the earth had passed in Copenhagen nearly three years ago. Phew!! What a relief!!!…


GOVERNANCE AND CIVIL SOCIETY: Doubts cast over Japan nuclear phase-out, Jonathan Soble, Financial Times (23 October 2012)

The Noda administration’s decision to phase out nuclear power has been called “insincere politics”. Some criticize that nuclear power enabled the government to laud cleaner emissions without actually developing its renewable energy sector. Korea may be taking over the climate change reins from Japan and was selected to host the UN Green Climate Fund in Songdo City, which has set voluntary emissions targets and seeks to be a “green” model city.


CLIMATE CHANGE ADAPTATION: Informing climate adaptation: a review of the economic costs of natural disasters, their determinants, and risk reduction options, Carolyn Kousky, Resources for the Future (July 2012)

Estimating the full range of economic costs from natural disasters is difficult, both conceptually and practically. Complete and systematic data on disaster impacts are lacking, and most data sets are underestimates of all losses. The data suggest negative consequences of disasters, although communities tend to have a lot of resilience, recovering in the short- to medium-term from all but the most devastating events.


CLIMATE CHANGE AND SECURITY: Integrating tipping points into climate impact assessments, Timothy M. Lenton and Juan-Carlos Ciscar, Climatic Change (29 August 2012)

There is currently a huge gulf between natural scientists’ understanding of climate tipping points and economists’ representations of climate catastrophes in models. In particular, there are multiple potential tipping points and they are not all low probability events. For nine different tipping events, the range of expected physical climate impacts is summarised and suggestions are made for how they may translate into socio-economic impacts.


The Nautilus Peace and Security Weekly Report presents articles and full length reports each week in six categories: Austral security, nuclear deterrence, energy security, climate change and security, the DPRK, climate change adaptation and governance and civil society. Our team of contributors carefully select items that highlight the links between these themes and the three regions in which our offices are found—North America, Northeast Asia, and the Austral-Asia region. Each week, one of our authors also provides a short blog that explores these inter-relationships.

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