Abstract: China's three human spaceflights (2003, 2005, and 2008) and 2007 anti-satellite test have put the world on notice that a new geography is emerging in 21st Century space competition, which also includes several other leading Asian countries: India, Japan, and South Korea. North Korea is also desperately trying to enter the club of space-faring nations.  Why are Asian states today so interested in space?  What are their evolving capabilities, in both the civilian and military sectors? And how are these countries' activities likely to affect the interests of the United States?  This presentation will cover each of these issues, as well as emerging Obama administration space policies, particularly in regard to China.  (Dr. Moltz recently returned from research trips to South Korea and Japan, where he conducted extensive interviews with space officials and analysts. His talk is based on a book manuscript he is currently writing.)

James Clay Moltz holds a joint appointment as an associate professor in the Department of National Security Affairs and in the Space Systems Academic Group at the Naval Postgraduate School.  >From 1993 to 2007, he worked at the Monterey Institute of International Studies' Center for Nonproliferation Studies, where he served as deputy director from 2003-07.  Dr. Moltz is the author (most recently) of The Politics of Space Security: Strategic Restraint and the Pursuit of National Interests (Stanford University Press, 2008).  He received his Ph.D. and M.A. in Political Science from the University of California at Berkeley and holds an M.A. in Russian and East European Studies and a B.A. in International Relations (with Distinction) from Stanford University. Dr. Moltz serves as a consultant to the NASA Ames Research Center, where he chairs the Space Futures Analysis Group.

If you would like to be added to the email announcement list, please visit https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/stsseminar 

In 2008, the iconic doomsday clock of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists was set at five minutes to midnight-two minutes closer to Armageddon than in 1962, when John F. Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev went eyeball to eyeball over missiles in Cuba! We still live in an echo chamber of fear, after eight years in which the Bush administration and its harshest critics reinforced each other's worst fears about the Bomb. And yet, there have been no mushroom clouds or acts of nuclear terrorism since the Soviet Union dissolved, let alone since 9/11.

Our worst fears still could be realized at any time, but Michael Krepon argues that the United States has never possessed more tools and capacity to reduce nuclear dangers than it does today - from containment and deterrence to diplomacy, military strength, and arms control. The bloated nuclear arsenals of the Cold War years have been greatly reduced, nuclear weapon testing has almost ended, and all but eight countries have pledged not to acquire the Bomb. Major powers have less use for the Bomb than at any time in the past. Thus, despite wars, crises, and Murphy's Law, the dark shadows cast by nuclear weapons can continue to recede.

Krepon believes that positive trends can continue, even in the face of the twin threats of nuclear terrorism and proliferation that have been exacerbated by the Bush administration's pursuit of a war of choice in Iraq based on false assumptions. Krepon advocates a "back to basics" approach to reducing nuclear dangers, reversing the Bush administration's denigration of diplomacy, deterrence, containment, and arms control. As he sees it, "The United States has stumbled before, but America has also made it through hard times and rebounded. With wisdom, persistence, and luck, another dark passage can be successfully navigated."

Michael Krepon is Co-founder of the Henry L. Stimson Center and the author or editor of thirteen books and over 350 articles. Prior to co-founding the Stimson Center, Krepon worked at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the US Arms Control and Disarmament Agency during the Carter administration, and in the US House of Representatives, assisting Congressman Norm Dicks. He received an MA from the School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University and a BA from Franklin & Marshall College. He also studied Arabic at the American University in Cairo, Egypt.

Krepon divides his time between Stimson's South Asia and Space Security projects. The South Asia project concentrates on escalation control, nuclear risk reduction, confidence building, and peace making between India and Pakistan. This project entails field work, publications, and Washington-based programming, including a visiting fellowship program. The Space Security project seeks to promote a Code of Conduct for responsible space-faring nations and works toward stronger international norms for the peaceful uses of outer space.

Krepon also teaches in the Politics Department at the University of Virginia.

Abstract: For the last five years CISAC affiliate David Montague has been studying the viability and implications of sustainable energy options. He first presented his work in an initial paper entitled "Sustainable Energy Independence - A National and International Security Imperative" at CISAC in 2006. It proposed an holistic approach to energy independence on a time table much shorter than the Bush administration's halfhearted approach. This seminar presents his most recent work that "peels the onion" several layers deeper from a national security perspective and quantitatively examines pro and con arguments raised about the various advocated concepts.

Dave Montague an independent consultant and CISAC affiliate, retired as President of the Missile Systems Division at Lockheed Martin Missiles and Space in 1996. A member of the National Academy of Engineering, Mr. Montague has 50 years of background in design, development and management of strategic and tactical military systems, In addition to his development expertise in both tactical and strategic strike, surveillance, and defensive systems, his experience includes the requirements, development, and national security policy issues of strategic forces and research into strategic energy issues and the viability of electric vehicles.

An Engineering graduate of Cornell University Dave is a fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Until recently he served on the National Research Council's Naval Studies Board. Consulting for Los Alamos and Livermore National Labs and NASA, for three years he was a member of the Los Alamos National Lab Director's Senior Advisory Group. He previously served on numerous other government advisory groups and studies, including eight years on the Navy Strategic Systems Steering Task Group, various Naval Studies Board committees, and task forces for both the U.S. Army and the Defense Science Board.

Dave has written and been a major contributor to numerous reports including the recent National Academies Report on Conventional Prompt Global Strike. He was a major contributor to the American Physical Society Report on the Science and Technology of Boost Phase Defense in Review of Modern Physics  July 2004,  and is the Author of "Restoring Trust", copyright 2001, a book on Organizational and Project Management currently available on the Web.

If you would like to be added to the email announcement list, please visit https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/stsseminar

Abstract: This talk discusses the evolution of nuclear deterrence in the post-Cold War and Post-911 environment.  An examination of the historic role of deterrence and past trends in stockpile composition are discussed, and the concept of a capability-based deterrent and the implications for stockpile size, the nuclear weapons complex, and science are examined.  The role of both complex- and stockpile-transformation in enabling a capability-based deterrent is evaluated

Dr. Martz has been with Los Alamos National Laboratory for 25 years.  He is an authority on plutonium chemistry and metallurgy, and has lead various elements of the nuclear weapons program at Los Alamos including the group responsible for pit activities, the program examining materials aging in the stockpile, leadership of the weapon design division, and most recently, was head of the New Mexico team in the recent Reliable Replacement Warhead Design study.

If you would like to be added to the email announcement list, please visit https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/stsseminar 

North Korea’s nuclear weapon test in October 2006 and the subsequent “debate” in Japan about whether or not to ponder its own nuclear future brought renewed attention to the subject of Japan and nuclear weapons.  Pundits and policy makers in both the United States and Japan contemplated the implications of Pyongyang’s nuclear breakout, and many wondered if this marked the beginning of fundamental change in Japanese thinking on these issues.  Just as North Korea’s long-range missile test over Japanese airspace in 1998 was a major catalyst leading to Japan’s full-fledged embrace of America’s missile defense (MD) development program a few years later, might the 2006 nuclear test eventually prove to be a similar watershed moment in Japanese defense policy?  Would there be a rising tide of Japanese sentiment in favor of reexamining the three non-nuclear principles of non-possession, non-manufacture, and non-introduction? 

In pursuit of answers to these questions, the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis (IFPA) conducted an extended research effort over the past two years to examine not only Japan’s propensity and capacity to “go nuclear,” but also to explore the overarching issue of how deterrence is functioning and changing in the context of the U.S.-Japan alliance.  It is these latter questions in particular regarding deterrence and extended deterrence that proved most interesting and, we think, particularly important to U.S. policy makers, given the dramatic changes underway in the regional security environment in East Asia and relevant proposals in the areas of non-proliferation and arms control.  Mr. Schoff's presentation will describe the results of IFPA's study and offer steps that the allies can take to reshape extended deterrence for the twenty-first century in ways that strengthen and diversify the bilateral relationship, and ultimately contribute to regional stability and prosperity.

About the Speaker:

James L. Schoff is the Associate Director of Asia-Pacific Studies at the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis (IFPA) in Cambridge, MA, where he specializes in East Asian security issues, U.S. alliance relations, international crisis management cooperation, and regional efforts to stem WMD proliferation. He also contributes to IFPA’s U.S. government and military contract work relating to East Asia. Some of his recent publications include Realigning Priorities: The U.S.-Japan Alliance and the Future of Extended Deterrence (IFPA 2009); Nuclear Matters in North Korea: Building a Multilateral Response for Future Stability in Northeast Asia (Potomac Books 2008) (co-author); In Times of Crisis: Global and Local Civil-Military Disaster Relief Coordination in the United States and Japan (IFPA, 2007); “Transformation of the U.S.-Japan Alliance,” in The Fletcher Forum of World Affairs (Winter 2007); Political Fences and Bad Neighbors: North Korea Policy Making in Japan and Implications for the United States (IFPA, 2006); and Tools for Trilateralism: Improving U.S.-Japan-Korea Cooperation to Manage Complex Contingencies (Potomac Books, 2005).

Mr. Schoff joined IFPA in 2003, after serving as the program officer in charge of policy studies at the United States-Japan Foundation. Prior to that he was the business manager for Bovis Japan and Bovis Asia Pacific, and international construction and project management firm. Mr. Schoff graduated from Duke University and earned an M.A. in International Relations from The Johns Hopkins University School for Advanced International Studies (SAIS). He also studied for one year at International Christian University (ICU) in Tokyo, Japan, and he lectured at Boston University in 2007.

Japan has been hit unexpectedly hard by the global economic  recession.  Although Japanese financial institutions were not  seriously damaged by the initial financial crisis in the United  States, the economy has been staggered by an unprecedented drop in  exports.  With the economy likely to shrink by five to six percent  in 2009, Japan faces the worst economic downturn in over a half  century.  Policy responses to this situation have been complicated  by the uncertain political situation, with an unpopular prime  minister and a looming election for the lower house of the national  Diet.

What does all this mean for relations with the United States?   There are several important developments.  First, one impact of the  crisis is a shrinkage of Japan's current-account surplus, implying  that (at least in 2009) Japan will be a much smaller net supplier  of capital to the United States and the rest of the world.  Second,  the government appears to be willing to respond to the crisis with  strong fiscal stimulus, which should please the Obama  administration.  Third, even with stimulus in Japan, economic  recovery will lag behind that of the United States because real  recovery will depend on an upturn in exports.  Fourth, it is China,  not Japan, that will be the key among Asian countries.  China will  continue to grow, and is also applying fiscal stimulus, so it will  likely play a significant global role in enabling an end to the  recession.
All of these factors will play into bilateral relations,  complicated by the political uncertainty in Japan.  Bilateral  relations are close, and will remain so in the Obama  administration.  But the administration is likely to view Japan as  playing only a limited role in the global effort to cope with the  consequences of the financial and economic crisis.

About the Speaker:

Edward J. Lincoln joined NYU in 2006 to be director of the Center for Japan-U.S. Business and Economic Studies and clinical professor of Economics at the Stern School of Business. Professor Lincoln teaches courses on the global economy.

Professor Lincoln’s research interests include contemporary structure and change in the Japanese economy, East Asian economic integration, and U.S. economic policy toward Japan and East Asia. His latest book, on the underappreciated importance of economic issues in international relations and American foreign policy, is Winners Without Losers: Why Americans Should Care More About Global Economic Policy, published in 2007. He is the author of eight other books and monographs, including East Asian Economic Regionalism (The Council on Foreign Relations and the Brookings Institution, 2004), Arthritic Japan: The Slow Pace of Economic Reform (Brookings, 2001), and Troubled Times: U.S.-Japan Economic Relations in the 1990s (Brookings, 1998). An earlier book, Japan Facing Economic Maturity (Brookings, 1988) received the Masayoshi Ohira Award for outstanding books on the Asia-Pacific region.

Before joining NYU, Professor Lincoln was a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, and earlier a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. In the mid-1990s, he served as Special Economic Advisor to Ambassador Walter Mondale at the American Embassy in Tokyo. He has also been a professorial lecturer at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.

Professor Lincoln received his Bachelor’s degree from Amherst College, his M.A. in both economics and East Asian Studies at Yale University, and his Ph.D. in economics also at Yale University.

Is Japan Adrift?

The political drift in Japanese politics and the meteoric rise of China have led many analysts to begin discounting Japan as a major player in the international system. However, beneath the frustration caused by Prime Minister Taro Aso's abysmal poll ratings and opposition leader Ichiro Ozawa's campaign finance scandal, Japan continues moving steadily forwrd in pursuit of a more active national security strategy. While Japanese poliics are in structural paralysis, Japanese political thought is not. Indeed, a consensus is apparent in a series of unofficial strategic documents issued by scholars and politicians this last year. Meanwhile, the Japan Self Defense Forces have recently stood up their first fully independent and joint operational commands to deal with the North Korean missile launch and Somali pirates.

Japan has always been a conservative society, slow to change well established institutions and patterns of behavior in the face of new strategic circumstances. But Japan has also historically been finely attuned to three strategic coordinates:the power of the world's leading hegemon, the power of China, and the threat from the Korean peninsula. All three are in flux, and so too is Japan's future strategic trajectory

About the Speaker

Michael Green is a senior adviser and holds the Japan Chair at CSIS, as well as being an associate professor of international relations at Georgetown University. He served as special assistant to the president for national security affairs and senior director for Asian affairs at the National Security Council (NSC) from January 2004 to December 2005. He joined the NSC in April 2001 as director of Asian affairs with responsibility for Japan, Korea, and Australia/New Zealand. From 1997 to 2000, he was senior fellow for Asian security at the Council on Foreign Relations, where he directed the Independent Task Force on Korea and study groups on Japan and security policy in Asia. He served as senior adviser in the Office of Asian and Pacific Affairs at the Department of Defense in 1997 and as consultant to the same office until 2000. From 1995 to 1997, he was a research staff member at the Institute for Defense Analyses, and from 1994 to 1995, he was an assistant professor of Asian studies at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), where he remained a professorial lecturer until 2001.

Green speaks fluent Japanese and spent over five years in Japan working as a staff member of the National Diet, as a journalist for Japanese and American newspapers, and as a consultant for U.S. business. He graduated from Kenyon College with highest honors in history in 1983 and received his M.A. from Johns Hopkins SAIS in 1987 and his Ph.D. in 1994. He also did graduate work at Tokyo University as a Fulbright fellow and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as a research associate of the MIT-Japan Program. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, The International Institute for Strategic Studies, and the Aspen Strategy Group and is vice chair of the congressionally mandated Japan-U.S. Friendship Commission. He serves on the advisory boards of the Center for a New American Security and Australian American Leadership Dialogue.

On the eve of President Obama's reported first meeting with President Lee Myung-bak, the "New Beginnings" policy study group will release its recommendations to the Obama administration for strengthening U.S.-South Korean relations, and a panel of New Beginnings members will discuss the report. 

The Korea Society and Stanford University's Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center established the New Beginnings project last year to support an updating and expansion of the alliance based on the election of new leaderships in both countries.

Panelists include former Under Secretary of State Michael H. Armacost, former Ambassador to Korea Thomas Hubbard, Korea Society President Evans J. R. Revere, Shorenstein APARC Director Gi-Wook Shin, Korea Economic Institute President Charles "Jack" L. Pritchard, and US-Korea Institute at SAIS Chairman Don Oberdorfer.