1AC---Nukes

1AC---Nukes
 1AC---Plan
The United States federal government should substantially increase its water
protection in relevant areas of nuclear power in the United States.
 1AC---Nuclear Power
The advantage is Nuclear Power:
Water mismanagement causes reactor closures and decreases power generation but
incorporating integrated resource planning into water management forces the
industry to adapt to the impacts of climate change.
Alan Cooke et al. 21, 30 years of experience in utility resource analysis and planning at PNNL; Juliet
Homer, team lead of the Energy Policy Analytics Team at PNNL; Jen Lessick, Renewable Energy
Researcher at PNNL; Dhruv Bhatnagar, Energy Systems Research Engineer at PNNL; and Kamila
Kazimierczuk, Wind Energy Engineering Analyst at PNNL; October 2021, “A Review of Water and Climate
Change Analysis in Electric Utility Integrated Resource Planning,”
https://epe.pnnl.gov/pdfs/Water_in_IRP_whitepaper_PNNL-30910.pdf

Integrated resource planning ( IRP ) is the process by which a utility projects future customer needs and
identifies the resource mix that is most likely to meet those needs while balancing cost and risk . Utilities
generally perform IRPs every 2 to 3 years, and the analyses extend 10 to 20 years into the future. IRP brings

together the consideration of customer demand for utility services, the supply and demand resources by which the demand

can be met, and the environmental , legal , financial , and regulatory considerations that guide or constrain
how the utility operates. It is a process for identifying risks and opportunities and for charting a course that takes into
account the aforementioned considerations while addressing risks and taking advantage of opportunities.1 As such, IRP is a key forward-looking process for
addressing the environmental considerations that are the subject of this white paper.

One limitation of using IRPs for this review is the fact that IRPs are more common in vertically integrated states – those where a utility provides generation,
transmission, and distribution services. In states that participate in regional markets operated by a Regional Transmission Operator (RTO) or Independent System
Operator (ISO), on the other hand, transmission is performed by the market operator and distribution is performed by the utility, while responsibility for generation
varies by region. Some states within regional markets have IRP requirement, such as California, Michigan, and Indiana. Other states, such as the states in New
England, do not. However, while some gaps exist in coverage, IRPs offer a uniquely comprehensive, single window into utility planning so this review focuses

on treatment of water resources and climate change in IRPs.

The environmental consideration that could become a constraint on future IRPs is the impact of climate change on surface
and groundwater within the area in which the utility’s generating resources are located, including both thermal resources and
hydropower resources. Availability of water can impact the ability to cool thermal resources and
generate power through hydroelectric generation. Insufficient incoming water can prevent thermal plants
from being operated at full capacity, and if the situation becomes severe enough, it could prevent plants from
operating at all . Likewise, changes to water availability, both timing of flows and quantity of water can impact
hydro power generation . In thermal electric plants, if incoming water is too warm it can lead to additional costs to
add additional cooling capacity , lead to a reduction in the net plant generating capability , and/or make it
harder for plants to meet permit requirements related to water temperatures after cooling water is
returned to the source of the water or otherwise discharged. Concurrently, the conditions leading to input water shortages or water temperature increases—
conditions like higher average temperatures or prolonged drought— would likely lead to changes in consumer electric demand.

With hydroelectric generation, changes to water availability , both timing of flows and quantity of water can impact the total annual
energy generation as well as when the energy is available which, in combination with potential load changes, poses challenges for utilities with
significant hydroelectric resources. Highlighting these potential challenges is a significant non-IRP set of studies performed in accordance with Section 9505 of The
SECURE Water Act of 2009 (U.S. Congress 2009) and referred to as “9505 assessments.” The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) working with the Oak Ridge National
Laboratory, the U.S. Corps of Engineers, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, the International boundary Water Commission and the federal Power Marketing
Administrations (PMAs) has performed two 9505 assessments of the potential future climate impacts on the federal hydropower resources, the output of which is
marketed by the PMAs. (DOE is currently working to deliver the third assessment.) In a 2017 Report to Congress summarizing the second 9505 assessment, DOE
stated “(t)he most important climate change effects impacting future hydropower generation are likely to be earlier snowmelt, change of runoff seasonality, and
increasing frequency of extreme high- and low-runoff events.” (U.S. DOE 2017)

The dependence on cooling water is changing, as discussed in sections 2.0 and 7.0, as utilities retire thermal generation and
rely more heavily on non-carbon dioxide emitting resources. However, dependence on water will remain an important factor for
hydroelectric generation, and for cooling nuclear plants , some large gas plants and any modern and efficient coal plants retained by utilities as they
progress to lower-carbon dioxide emitting generating portfolios. This dependence is being increasingly complicated by the impacts of global climate change. As
utilities experience and learn more about the potential impacts of climate change on the hydrological cycle and on customer loads, analyzing
the
impacts of water risks and climate change becomes increasingly important . The purpose of this white paper is to report
on an investigation of the extent to which utility IRPs across the United States are addressing the impact of water availability, water temperature, and climate
change impacts on the consideration and selection of resource portfolios.

The AFF solves:

1. Innovation.
Risk-informed policy for water protection is necessary for market predictability,
operation assurance, and tech advancement.
John Tappert 20, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Director of Rulemaking, Environmental, and
Financial Support, 10/29/2020, “Risk-Informed, Technology-Inclusive Regulatory Framework for
Advanced Reactors,” https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2020/11/06/2020-24387/risk-
informed-technology-inclusive-regulatory-framework-for-advanced-reactors

On January 14, 2019, the President signed the Nuclear Energy Innovation and Modernization Act ( NEIMA ) into law (Pub. L. 115
439). NEIMA directs the NRC to develop the regulatory infrastructure to support the development and
commercialization of advanced nuclear reactors . The current application and licensing requirements ,
developed for large light-water and non-power reactors as outlined in part 50 of title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations (10 CFR),
“Domestic Licensing of Production and Utilization Facilities,” and 10 CFR part 52, “Licenses, Certifications and Approvals for Nuclear Power Plants,” do not
fully consider the variety of designs for advanced nuclear reactors and may require extensive use of
the exemption process for regulations that include prescriptive requirements specific to light-water
reactors. Through this rulemaking, the NRC is proposing to amend the regulations by creating an
alternative regulatory framework for licensing advanced nuclear reactors.
III. Discussion

The NRC is developing preliminary proposed rule language for the purpose of adding a new, alternative part to its regulations
that will set out a risk-informed, technology-inclusive framework for the licensing and regulation of
advanced nuclear reactors. This new approach would: (1) Continue to provide reasonable assurance of adequate
protection of public health and safety and the common defense and security, (2) promote regulatory stability ,
predictability , and clarity , (3) reduce requests for exemptions from the current requirements in 10 CFR parts 50 and
52, (4) establish
new requirements to address non-light-water reactor technologies , (5) recognize
technological advancements in reactor design , and (6) credit the response of advanced nuclear reactors to postulated accidents, including
slower transient response times and relatively small and slow release of fission products. The proposed rule would add 10 CFR part 53, “Licensing and Regulation of
Advanced Nuclear Reactors.”

The NRC will periodically make available portions of preliminary proposed rule language on the federal rulemaking website at http://www.regulations.gov under
Docket ID NRC-2019-0062. This preliminary proposed rule language is draft and may be incomplete in one or more respects; however, the NRC welcomes diverse
stakeholder feedback to inform the proposed rulemaking activity.
Various sections of the 10 CFR part 53 preliminary proposed rule language will be released to stakeholders during the development of the proposed rule. The public
will be provided with opportunities to comment on the preliminary proposed rule language before or during public meetings and on a rolling basis throughout the
12-month public comment period. The NRC plans to hold public meetings every 4 to 6 weeks over the next 12 months. The meetings will be noticed in the NRC's
Public Meeting Notice System at least 10 days in advance of the scheduled meeting. Preliminary proposed rule language is being provided to increase transparency
and to facilitate discussions with stakeholders on the licensing process for advanced nuclear reactors. The NRC will post new and revised updates to the preliminary

proposed rule language periodically on the Federal rulemaking website at www.regulations.gov that may be of interest to stakeholders. The NRC will not
issue a Federal Register notice each time preliminary proposed rule language is added to the docket.
Please monitor the docket on www.regulations.gov and use the following information to sign up for docket alerts.

Adopting uniform cooling water standards is essential to industry-led deployment of

closed-cycle systems that reduce water consumption and are a net decrease to costs.
Steve Fleischli 11, Senior Director of Water Initiatives at the NRDC, 5/5/2011, “Power Plant Cooling
Water and Clean Water Act Section 316(b),” https://www.nrdc.org/resources/power-plant-cooling-
water-and-clean-water-act-section-316b, RMax
Power Plants Are Among the Nation’s Largest Water Users

In 2005, cooling water withdrawals accounted for nearly 41 percent of all freshwater withdrawals and 49 percent
of all water withdraws (fresh and saline) in the United States.1

With approximately 500 U.S. power plants still relying on the most antiquated and destructive type of cooling system
known as once-through cooling, power plants are the largest water users in the country. Each of these
plants can withdraw at least 50 million (and often more than a billion) gallons of cooling water per day using once-
through cooling, but better options exist.
Understanding Various Types of Cooling Systems

Power plants now can use one of three basic types of cooling systems:

In a once-through cooling system, water is withdrawn directly from a body of water, diverted through a condenser where it absorbs heat from the boiler steam, and
then discharged back into the water at higher temperatures. Because once-through cooling systems do not recycle the cooling water, this leads to incredibly high
water withdrawal per day.

In a closed-cycle recirculating cooling system, the cooling water goes from the condenser to cooling towers, where the heat from the boiler steam dissipates
through evaporation and convection. The cooling water is then recirculated through the condensers. Hundreds of U.S. power plants use closed-cycle cooling. This
generally reduces water usage by about 95 percent when compared with once-through cooling.

Dry cooling systems run the boiler steam through radiator-like coils, where heat is transferred directly to the air by convection. Power plants equipped with dry
cooling use virtually no water and therefore virtually eliminate fish kills.

Once-through cooling systems affect the full spectrum of organisms in the aquatic ecosystem at all life stages from tiny
photosynthetic organisms to fish, shrimp, crabs, birds, and marine mammals, including threatened and endangered species.2 They kill billions of fish
and destabilizes aquatic populations .3
Water Facts

Intake structures kill aquatic organisms by “entraining” them through plants’ heat exchangers where they
succumb to physical, thermal and toxic stresses and “impinging” them on intake screens (i.e., trapping them against the screens by the pressure of the intake flow),

and the discharge of heated water from cooling systems may also harm wildlife.

Throughout the country, the toll on fisheries by power plants rivals—or even exceeds—that of the fishing industry.
 According to Delaware Riverkeeper, the Salem Nuclear Plant—the nation’s largest user of cooling water—withdraws more than 3 billion gallons of
water per day from Delaware Bay, and kills an estimated 3 billion fish per year;
 The Brayton Point power plant has been associated with an 87 percent reduction in finfish abundance in Mt. Hope Bay, Rhode Island;4
 Combined, the 19 California plants using once-through cooling technology suck in more than 15 billion gallons of sea water every day and kill an
estimated 2.7 million fish and 19.4 billion larvae and other marine life—including two dozen sea lions and a dozen seals—annually.5,6,7 For the 12
 power plants in the Southern California Bight, impingement of recreational fish species is between 8 to 30 percent of the number of fish caught in the
Bight.8
 The Bay Shore coal power plant in Ohio kills 46 million Lake Erie fish and sucks in another 2 billion larvae per year.9

The Clean Water Act and Cooling Water

Section 316(b) of the Clean

Water Act requires all power plants—new and old—to install the “best technology available”
( BTA ) for minimizing the adverse environmental impacts of cooling water intake structures. Congress included section
316(b) in the 1972 federal Clean Water Act, yet implementation of section 316(b) has been stalled for decades .
 In 1977, the EPA’s first attempt at section 316(b) regulations was remanded by the Fourth Circuit due to procedural defects.10 For more than 15 years,
the EPA failed to propose any new cooling water intake regulations.
 In 1993, frustrated with the EPA’s inaction and the resulting regulatory vacuum, numerous environmental groups sued the EPA in federal district court
to compel issuance of the regulations required by section 316(b).11
 In 1995, environmental groups won a consent decree ordering the EPA to take final action with respect to section 316(b) regulations.12 n In December
2001, the EPA issued regulations for cooling water use at new facilities, identifying closed-cycle cooling as the “Best Technology Available.”
 In July 2004, the EPA issued final regulations applying to existing power plants . Riverkeeper, NRDC and others sued
over these rules for not complying with the protective mandates of 316(b). Environmental groups prevailed, and, as a result of that litigation, the EPA
now is required to re-issue rules to require BTA for existing power plants.13

Power Plant Cooling Water and Clean Water Act Section 316(b): The Need to Modernize U.S. Power Plants and Protect our Water Resources
Better Technologies and Solutions Already Exist

Closed-cycle systems “ reduce the amount of cooling water needed and in turn … directly reduce the number
of aquatic organisms entrained in the cooling water intake structure” as well as impingement and other stresses on the
ecosystem.14 Virtually all of the gas-fired power plants and the majority of coal-fired plants built in the last 30 years have closed-cycle cooling.15

Recycling cooling water could lead to a 98 percent reduction in environmental damage caused by intake
structures. Reducing entrainment and impingement does not just help save the lives of fish and other species now ,
but their survival can have an exponential benefit in restoring robust populations that may be currently in decline or on their less than acceptable population levels.

Costs of Improving Systems are Minimal and Benefits are Numerous

Industry can reasonably incur costs associated with improving their systems. Even where costs are passed on to consumers, those
costs may be only a few cents or a few dollars per month.

In Massachusetts, the Brayton Point power plant, which provides approximately 6 percent of New England’s electricity and fought improvements for
years, is now upgrading its plant at the modest long-term expense to ratepayers—less than the price of the postage

stamp on a monthly electric bill.16

In Ohio, experts say using closed-cycle cooling at the Bay Shore power plant is the only cost-effective method to
comply with sections 316(a) and (b).17 Experts also conclude that the per year economic damage from fish
mortality at that facility alone equals $29.7 million per year, with a net present value of a 20-year stream of these losses
equal to $315.0 million, or $22.1 million more than the cost of the cooling towers.18

New York’s power industry “could easily bear the additional cost of closed cycle cooling. In addition, a requirement
for closed cycle cooling would cost power customers very little , would have no adverse impacts on reliability ,
and would improve air quality.”19

Many energy companies reap enormous profits from their activities, and any upgrade costs should be viewed in comparison to net revenue.20 Any potential
impact to energy supply reliability can be accommodated by timing upgrades through a phased approach ,
instead of requiring compliance all at once across the industry.21 The choice of whether to retrofit, repower or retire a unit (and let it be
replaced by newer generation) is up to each operator. Yet cooling water decisions will not cause any significant adverse
repercussions on the energy grid or economy .
Absence of National Standards Creates Uncertainty and Delays Protection of Waterbodies

In the absence of national regulations , cooling water standards have been relegated to ad hoc
determination by individual permit writers, typically state agencies, exercising “best professional judgment.” These site-specific
proceedings, which typically involve a complex assessment of the local marine ecosystem and fishery population dynamics to determine technology
requirements, impose a significant burden on local permitting agencies .

Permit proceedings typically extend over many years—in some cases, more than a decade— despite the CWA’s
requirements that certain permits have a five-year limit and that BTA regulations be reviewed and, if appropriate, revised every five years.
Industry, which has a critical strategic advantage in these complex proceedings because of its superior resources, has taken advantage of

biological complexity and used delay tactics to avoid technology upgrades .

This case-by-case approach is guaranteed to mire the CWA permitting process in an endless cycle of
paperwork and litigation that will leave waterbodies across the country unprotected. There are ways to structure a categorical
rule to avoid unacceptable consequences , if any, of a “one-size-fits-all” rule without resorting to the unworkable extreme of a
case-by-case regime.

The EPA Must Act to Protect our Rivers, Lakes, and Oceans

The EPA must adopt stringent regulations that require the equivalent of the protection achieved by closed
cycle cooling or better.

Many older
plants have been retrofitted and the more innovative plants have stopped relying on natural
waterbodies altogether, using the effluent from wastewater treatment plants to eliminate the fish kills or
dependence on drinking water supplies.22 New plants can be designed to draw no water at all from rivers, lakes, or oceans.

The plan causes retrofits and new tech deployment.

Glen Andersen et al. 19, Energy Program Director at NCSL; Megan Cleveland, Energy Policy Specialist
at NCSL; and Daniel Shea, Energy Policy Specialist at NCSL; April 2019, “Water for Energy: Addressing the
Nexus between Electricity Generation and Water Resources,” National Conference of State Legislatures,
https://www.ncsl.org/Portals/1/Documents/energy/Energy_Water_Nexus_v04_33640.pdf

Retrofitting a once-through to a closed-loop plant can reduce its water withdrawals by 98 percent ,
greatly decreasing the water required for a plant to operate, even if water consumption increases .
However, these retrofits can be very costly , and are often pursued in order to meet regulatory
requirements . The Oyster Creek nuclear plant in New Jersey decided to shut down early, in part due to the higher operating costs that it would have
experienced had it complied with requirements to convert its once-through system to a closed-loop system. The economics become even more difficult when
retrofitting from a once-through system to a dry cooling system because, depending on the location, it often cannot satisfy cost-benefit analyses. For this reason,

full conversion to dry cooling is rarely done, and hybrid wet-dry systems are more commonly considered.
A study that focused on coal- and natural gas-fired power plants in Texas found that conversions of coal plants with once-through systems to closed-loop systems
resulted in the best savings—reducing water withdrawal by 98 percent while costing around 0.12 cents for every gallon of water not withdrawn. This is due, in part,
to the fact that natural gas-fired plants are already more water-efficient than coal plants. To eliminate 100 percent of cooling withdrawals with a dry cooling system
for those same coal plants, it would cost around 0.67 cents per gallon on average—five times more than it cost to eliminate 98 percent of the withdrawals.88

While it may not be technically feasible for some plants to convert to dry cooling , water scarcity can
be a significant selling point . The developer of the Ivanpah concentrating solar power (CSP) facility in California’s Mojave Desert has eliminated 90
percent of the water consumption of the typical CSP facility using dry cooling, while two developers of small modular nuclear reactors
(SMRs) have proposed systems that can use dry cooling tech nologies.89

2. Investment.
The plan’s standard gives businesses the confidence to invest. They want to invest
now, but won’t without a clear, stable industry standard.
Matthew Bandyk 20, reporting for Utility Dive, 9/10/2020, “For nuclear plants operating on thin
margins, growing climate risks prompt tough choices,” https://www.utilitydive.com/news/for-nuclear-
plants-operating-on-thin-margins-growing-climate-risks-prompt/584883/

An Aug. 18 report from Moody's Investors service found that credit risks for nuclear plant operators will grow
over the next two decades due to climate hazards . That timeline is too long for climate change to be financially material for nuclear
plant owners today, Glenrock Associates equity analyst Paul Patterson said. "I don't think it's at the front burner of people's minds," he said.

At the same time, some nuclear plants are operating on thin margins , so a single catastrophic disruption can
lead to early retirement . "If it comes to the point where they will have to make substantial capital investments ...
maybe it is the straw that breaks the camel's back ," Patterson said.
For example, in 2018, Exelon closed the Oyster Creek nuclear plant in New Jersey, one of the longest-running plants in the U.S., rather than spend $800 million
developing a new water cooling system in order to reduce the amount of heated water the plant discharged into the local bay, which environmental groups argued
was harming the aquatic ecosystem.

That plant's cooling issue cannot be linked specifically to climate change, but scientists expect that over time rising water
temperatures will degrade the efficiency of thermal power plants' water cooling systems. As a result, those plants
may need to draw greater and greater volumes of water in order to make up for the efficiency losses , or consider
switching to more expensive air cooling systems.

Other potential effects of climate change on nuclear plants include higher flood levels that surpass what plants were originally designed to
handle. These and other impacts will require nuclear regulators and plant operators around the world to cooperate to
properly assess risk and determine solutions , according to an article in the journal Global Environmental Politics, "The Climate Vulnerabilities
of Global Nuclear Power," published last year.

"We have no standard by which these risks are being mitigated across the world," said Sarah Jordaan, assistant professor at the
Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and a co-author of the article.

These are long-term problems, with the most serious impacts not projected to occur until the second half of the century. But the
decisions about
which nuclear reactors will be around if those impacts come to pass are being made right now . The N uclear R egulatory
C ommission has already approved license extensions for two plants that will allow them to operate for a total life
of 80 years, and other
plants are seeking or are expected to seek similar extensions. Those licenses will not
expire until into the 2050s.
The Natural Resources Defense Council has filed a legal challenge against the NRC for its decision to extend the license at Florida Power & Light's Turkey Point plant.

There is currently no regulatory standard for reviewing how a nuclear plant like Turkey Point can withstand
climate change impacts as it approaches 80 years of operation, according to Caroline Reiser, Nuclear Energy Legal Fellow in NRDC's Climate and Clean
Energy Program.
Perception of unmanaged water stress shuts down nuclear viability and freezes
investment.
Esther Whieldon 20, Senior Writer at S&P Global Sustainable, 10/21/2020, “Climate change poses big
water risks for nuclear, fossil-fueled plants,” https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/news-
insights/latest-news-headlines/climate-change-poses-big-water-risks-for-nuclear-fossil-fueled-plants-
60669992

As global warming climbs and humanity's water consumption increases , nuclear and fossil-fueled power plants
that rely on fresh water for cooling may not be able to perform at their peak capacity or could be forced to shut down
temporarily even as demand for their supplies for indoor cooling and other uses increase , according to researchers
and industry experts.

Climate change-exacerbated water shortage issues pose a near-term and longer-term performance
risk to power plants, such as hydropower and nuclear , around the world. And in the Lower 48, more than half of the
fossil-fueled and nuclear fleet is located in areas forecast to face climate-related water stress by the end of
this decade under a business-as-usual scenario, according to an analysis by S&P Global Market Intelligence.
But electric utilities' overall exposure to power plant water stress risks could diminish as they pursue decarbonization strategies and replace water-dependent plants
with wind and solar generation that require little to no water. Some companies are also implementing water management and related investment strategies to
reduce their exposure.

Water issues have become more and more important to utilities over time, said Alex Bond, Edison Electric Institute's associate general
counsel for energy and the environment. EEI is an association of U.S. investor-owned utilities .

Bond said water stress is one component of resilience that utilities currently monitor and analyze . "Our
companies take electric sector resiliency very seriously ," he said.

According to projections from the World Resources Institute's Aqueduct Water Risk Atlas, water stress — when humanity’s competition for water exceeds
the rate at which nature can replenish its stocks — could grow materially by 2030 in the drought-prone Western U.S., as well as the
upper Midwest and portions of the Northeast and Florida, due to climate change .
About 61.8% of existing fossil-fueled and nuclear power plants in the Lower 48, or a combined 535 GW of operating capacity, is in areas that could face medium-
high to extremely high water stress in 2030, based on an analysis of Market Intelligence’s power plant data paired with the Aqueduct water stress projections.

Moreover, 68.6% of the Lower 48's natural gas-fired fleet, 73.3% of its oil-fueled fleet, 61.0% of its nuclear fleet, and 44.6% of its coal-fired fleet are
in areas expected to face medium-high to extremely-high water stress that year.
"As we're seeing snowpack decline — a natural mountainous reservoir of water — and as we're getting lower amounts of total precipitation and available water in
the U.S. West, this is going to be a really serious issue for the power sector," said Betsy Otto, director of the Global Water Program at the World Resource Institute,

or WRI. Moreover, scientists have said the West is entering a megadrought that could last more than 20 years .

Scenario one is ENERGY.

Reducing nuclear output shocks the electricity market.
Dr. Peter B. Lyons et al. 16, former Department of Energy (DOE) Assistant Secretary; Donald R.
Hoffman, President and CEO of Excel Services Corporation; and a team of ANS members; “The U.S.
without Nuclear Energy: A Report on the Public Impact of Plant Closures,” American Nuclear Society,
http://cdn.ans.org/pi/publicpolicy/docs/the-us-without-nuclear-energy-report.pdf
Section 2: The Economic Impact of Losing Nuclear Power U.S. nuclear power plants operate at an overall fleet average
capacity factor above 90%. Coal and natural gas can also attain high capacity factors, but have negative environmental impacts. Renewables have
minimal emissions but they only generate electricity when the sun shines and the wind blows and are thus unable to respond to short term peak electric system
requirements. In
electricity markets, renewable mandates and federal and state tax subsidies sometimes
result in negative price bidding where power producers pay customers to take their generated electricity, distort ing
market prices . In traditional utility states, “must take” provisions, in which any electricity generated must be bought, apply to qualifying renewables
facilities. This disrupts an electric company’s economic operation of its portfolio of generation resources. The result in both regulated and

deregulated electricity markets is lower efficiency and higher emissions due to the other forms of
generation. Customers need electricity when they need it: to run hospitals, factories, the internet, their homes, and to light their stores and offices. To
meet mandated emissions reductions goals and maintain reliability without nuclear, the U.S. will have to
rely heavily on natural gas , despite its carbon emissions. Renewable energy sources cannot replace nuclear on
their own. A report by the Brattle Group detailed the nuclear industry’s contribution to the U.S. economy and found that system reliability
in some regions would be particularly vulnerable to the loss of nuclear capacity . In particular, in the VACAR, PJM, Central, New

York, and Desert Southwest regions, nuclear provides 24% or more of regional electricity generation.15 According to the Brattle Group, “ without nuclear

plants, the economy would rely more heavily on existing and new natural gas-fired generating plants ,
and to a lesser extent, more generation from existing coal-fired plants.”16 Note that because of their high capacity factor, nuclear plants are only 9% of U.S.
generation capacity, but supply 19% of U.S. electricity. Displacing
nuclear electricity with greater use of fossil generation
would mean higher electricity prices – wholesale prices would be 10% higher on average ; retail prices
would rise about 6% .17 The cost of building new generation, transmission, and storage facilities to
replace existing nuclear facilities would also contribute to electricity price increases , especially in regions
like New York (15%), New England (24%), and the Northwest (34%) as calculated by the Brattle Group .18
Customers would also be more exposed to natural gas price volatility , which nuclear generation
currently helps mitigate with its consistent operational costs . This price hedging effect that nuclear plants
provide accounts for the majority of nuclear’s overall economic impact . James Hansen, a leading figure in the climate
change movement has written: “We need affordable, abundant clean energy, but there is no particular reason why we should favour renewable energy over other
forms of abundant energy. …The climate system cares about greenhouse gas emissions – not about whether energy comes from renewable power or abundant
nuclear power...The future of our planet and our descendants depends on basing decisions on facts, and letting go of long-held biases when it comes to nuclear
power.” 19 7 The U.S. without Nuclear Energy Third Way wrote: “…it is important to be clear-minded about what renewables can deliver as part of an affordable,
reliable, and low-emissions electricity system. Despite tremendous technological advances in renewable generation, storage, and transmission, there are still
serious challenges. A large-scale penetration of renewables into the power grid would
require: 1. Significant overbuilding of generation to meet demand;
2. Costly grid upgrades and storage expansion; 3. Storage that might not be available in time; and 4. A huge build-out of transmission

infrastructure .” 20 Both Hansen and Third Way highlight the practical constraints to pinning clean energy hopes entirely on renewables. Transitioning to a
zero-emissions energy infrastructure without nuclear would involve a 50% greater capital investment , to the tune of $73.7 trillion dollars
globally.21 In short, it is becoming increasingly clear that a realistic pathway to emissions reductions within the coming decades must include
nuclear , and that every nuclear plant shutdown makes achieving those objectives significantly more
difficult, if not impossible .

Those spikes will decimate growth and create conditions for prolonged downturns.
Mark Febrizio 15, a policy analyst at the George Washington University Regulatory Studies Center;
8/20/2015, "Lesson For EPA: Higher Energy Prices Harm People,"
https://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/the-grid/lesson-for-epa-higher-energy-prices-harm-people/
Access to affordable, reliable electricity is crucial to modern life. Electricity prices are a big deal for American families and
businesses because higher energy prices can lead to severely negative economic consequences . A recent

study commissioned by the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA) assesses the impact
of higher electricity rates on economic growth and employment by simulating a 10 percent and 25
percent increase in electricity prices.
The economic forecasting and analysis firm Regional Economic Models, Inc. (REMI) produced the study, which incorporates a two-region REMI-PI+ computerized
model to evaluate the rise in prices. The study illustrates the resulting impact on gross domestic product (GDP), jobs, and disposable personal income. In order to
emphasize the impact that price increases have on rural America, the study compares the results for areas served by not-for–profit rural electric cooperatives (and
their vicinity) alongside the results for the rest of the U.S.

The study reveals that higher

electricity prices have a negative impact on jobs and economic growth: from 2020
to 2040, cumulative job losses in the U.S. range from 18.5 million to 31.3 million and national GDP
cumulatively declines by $2.8 trillion to $5.4 trillion.
Overall, the regions hit the hardest by high electricity prices are areas served by rural electric cooperatives, which prominently feature crucial industries like
agriculture and manufacturing. Ensuring that American families and businesses have affordable and plentiful electricity is an essential priority of energy policy.
Unfortunately, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) policies, especially the so-called “Clean Power Plan” or carbon rule, will make it harder for Americans to
access affordable energy. EPA’s recently finalized mandate to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants will increase electricity prices for
Americans and have no tangible impact on climate change. According to one estimate of the proposed rule, residents of 43 states could see double-digit percentage
increases in their electricity bills under EPA’s rule. Now that the regulation is finalized, states are faced with a choice: submit plans to EPA or reject the rule.

Given the huge costs and minimal benefits, states should reject EPA’s pleas for state implementation plans and wait until the rule’s legal issues are resolved in the
courts.

Higher Energy Prices Hit Poor, Rural America Hardest

Electricity is an ubiquitous part of modern life. Higher electricity prices not only require families to dedicate more resources to electric bills, but also harm
employment and inhibit growth.[1] Based on NRECA’s results, these negative effects would be primarily concentrated in areas that are served by rural electric co-
ops and their surrounding vicinity.

Regions served by rural co-ops are especially sensitive to energy price hikes because they tend to
feature more energy-intensive businesses and have more households that spend a larger proportion of
their income on energy. Critical industries like manufacturing (32 percent of the industry’s
employment) and agriculture (64 percent) are disproportionately located in areas served by rural co-
ops.[2]
Residential households in this area also spend more on electricity as a percentage of their total expenditures, devoting 1.72 percent of consumer spending on
electricity compared to 1.45 percent of spending from the rest of Americans.[3] Since
families living in regions supplied by co-ops
have, on average, a lower real income per capita than those living in the remainder of the U.S. ($39,000 per
year to $48,000 per year, respectively),[4] they have less income in the first place to devote to electricity, making the

impact of rising prices more significant.

In its study, NRECA estimated the effects of a 10 percent and 25 percent increase in electricity prices over the 2016–2040 period, applied linearly.[5] The results
were measured against the baseline, which was a business-as-usual forecast where prices do not change.[6] The study quantifies these results in the context of
employment, GDP, and real disposable personal income (RDPI).

Economic Impacts Intensify as Prices Increase

The study examines the impact of a 10 percent and 25 percent increase in electricity prices and shows
how accelerating the rise in electricity prices has additional economic impacts .
Under the 10 percent scenario:

- Rural co-op areas would experience average annual job loss of 360,000 from 2020 to 2040.
- The rest of the U.S. would see an average annual job loss of 522,000.
- Rural co-op areas would see annual GDP reductions averaging $48 billion; cumulative GDP losses would reach $1 trillion from 2020–2040.
- The rest of U.S. would see annual GDP reductions averaging $86 billion; cumulative GDP losses would reach $1.8 trillion from 2020–2040.
 - In rural co-op areas, the average decline in per capita RDPI would be $479 over the 2020–2040 timeframe.
- In the rest of the U.S., the average decline in per capita RDPI would be $323.

Under the 25 percent scenario:

- Rural co-op areas would experience average annual job loss of 614,000 from 2020 to 2040.
- The rest of the U.S. would see an average annual job loss of 875,000.
- Rural co-op areas would see annual GDP reductions averaging $92 billion; cumulative GDP losses would reach $1.9 trillion from 2020–2040.
- The rest of the U.S. would see annual GDP reductions averaging $165 billion; cumulative GDP losses would reach $3.5 trillion from 2020–2040.
- In rural co-op areas, the average decline in per capita RDPI would be $1028 over the 2020–2040 timeframe.
- In the rest of the U.S., the average decline in per capita RDPI would be $681.[7]

Discussion: Study’s Impacts Comport with Reality

NRECA’s results make intuitive and economic sense. When businesses pay more for their inputs, they
have less capital to devote to paying and retaining employees. For energy prices, this is compounded by
the fact that some companies purchase inputs from other businesses also affected by price increases. In
rural areas, the “relatively small populations and electricity-intensive industry mixture” cause a greater proportional loss of jobs compared to the rest of the
country.[8]

Due to the electricity-intensive industry mixture in rural America, higher electricity prices have a greater relative impact on GDP in rural areas compared to the rest

of the U.S.[9] The

national impact would also be severe . Overall, the U.S would experience either a $2.8
trillion or $5.4 trillion cumulative loss in GDP from 2020–2040 , depending on the scenario. This decline in GDP
would permanently harm national economic output .[10] The end result would be a less competitive
economy and a population more sensitive to economic recessions .
While measurements of employment and GDP losses show the macroeconomic effects of higher electricity prices, they don’t speak specifically to the impact on
households and families. To address this, the study evaluates the consequences for real disposable personal income
( RDPI ), which “is the net of labor and capital income, minus taxes, and adjusted for a price index (including housing prices and electricity prices) to make real
income.”[11] Essentially, RDPI
provides a good indication of the overall state of the economy and future
prospects for growth as well as a measure of the prosperity of households. In particular, a higher price
index and higher production costs for businesses correspondingly increase prices for consumers and
decrease RDPI.[12] When electricity prices increase, Americans must pay more to meet their electricity
needs, leaving households with fewer resources to devote to other areas and priorities. Since average incomes
are lower in rural areas than in other parts of the U.S., the impact on rural America would be substantial.

Slow growth causes great power war.

Dr. Hal Brands 21, history PhD from Yale, Kissinger Distinguished Professor of Global Affairs at the
Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies; and Dr. Michael Beckley, political
science PhD from Columbia, associate professor of political science at Tufts University; 9/24/2021,
“China Is a Declining Power—and That’s the Problem,” https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/09/24/china-
great-power-united-states/, pacc <3 Stras

Slowing growth makes it harder for leaders to keep the public happy . Economic underperformance
weakens the country against its rivals. Fearing upheaval, leaders crack down on dissent. They maneuver
desperately to keep geopolitical enemies at bay. Expansion seems like a solution —a way of grabbing economic
resources and markets , making nationalism a crutch for a wounded regime , and beating back foreign
threats.

Many countries have followed this path. When the United States’ long post-Civil War economic surge ended,
Washington violently suppressed strikes and unrest at home, built a powerful blue-water Navy, and engaged in a fit of belligerence and
imperial expansion during the 1890s. After a fast-rising imperial Russia fell into a deep slump at the turn of the 20th century,
the tsarist government cracked down hard while also enlarging its military, seeking colonial gains in East Asia and sending around 170,000 soldiers to occupy

Manchuria. These moves backfired spectacularly: They antagonized Japan, which beat Russia in the first great-power war of the 20th century.

A century later, Russia became aggressive under similar circumstances. Facing a severe, post- 2008 economic slowdown , Russian President
Vladimir Putin invaded two neighboring countries , sought to create a new Eurasian economic bloc, staked
Moscow’s claim to a resource-rich Arctic, and steered Russia deeper into dictatorship. Even democratic France engaged in anxious aggrandizement

after the end of its postwar economic expansion in the 1970s. It tried to rebuild its old sphere of influence in Africa, deploying
14,000 troops to its former colonies and undertaking a dozen military interventions over the next two decades.

All of these cases were complicated, yet the pattern is clear . If a rapid rise gives countries the means to act boldly, the fear of decline serves
up a powerful motive for rasher, more urgent expansion. The same thing often happens when fast-rising powers cause their own
containment by a hostile coalition. In fact, some of history’s
most gruesome wars have come when revisionist powers
concluded their path to glory was about to be blocked .

America lashes out. Cross out defense that doesn’t assume polarization.
Matthew Baum 19, Marvin Kalb Professor of Global Communications at Harvard University, and Philip
Potter, Associate Professor of Politics at the University of Virginia, April 2019, “Media, Public Opinion,
and Foreign Policy in the Age of Social Media,” The Journal of Politics, 82(2),
https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/702233, Stras
An erosion of the public’s capacity to impose democratic constraint has a similar impact on the audience cost arguments and, more broadly, on
our understandings of democratic credibility and conflict reciprocation. International relations scholars generally agree that leaders usually feel
some pressure to actually carry out the threats and promises that they make in the international system. This might be because they care about
their reputation with other leaders, but the usual argument is that democracies are more likely than autocracies to follow through on threats
because they have domestic audiences who will hold them to account if they fail to do so (Fearon 1994; Schultz 2001). Polarization undermines
that linkage, thereby potentially undermining the democratic advantage in foreign crisis negotiations and, ultimately, making war more likely.
The tribal element of polarized politics means that followers are unlikely to hold their leader to
account. Opposition, in turn, is unlikely to give the president any credit regardless of the policy . Thus, while
traditional versions of audience cost theory assumed that in democracies domestic audiences would judge a vacillating leader harshly, such
accountability is less likely to emerge in a polarized environment .3 In this respect, polarization thus causes
democratic leaders to more closely resemble their autocratic counterparts .
As we have noted, even in the information environment that preceded cable, satellite, and the Internet, the public had a low baseline of
attentiveness. But voters were able to use heuristics to help them determine both when to engage with foreign policy issues and what to think
about them when they did (Popkin 1991; Sniderman et al. 1991). This was accomplished primarily through reliance on partisan elites (Iyengar
and Kinder 1987; Krosnick and Kinder 1990). However, opposition and disaffected copartisans have no meaningful
access to the public in a polarized and fragmented media ecosystem . Elite whistle-blowing will only
inhibit leaders when there is a credible threat that the public will hear the whistle being blown , but the audience cost
mechanism relies on precisely this hand-tying process. If it breaks down there is no reason for democratically elected leaders to fear
punishment for backing down on their threats and commitments and therefore no boost to their credibility when they make commitments.

The polarized and fragmental information environment also has corrosive effects on the rally-round-
the-flag phenomenon , at least with regard to how it has been widely understood to date. Since approval rallies for presidents
following uses of force abroad were traditionally located primarily among opposition partisans, partisan tribalism seems likely to result in
smaller and less frequent rallies. For instance, when President Obama drew a “red line” with Syria over President Assad’s use of chemical
weapons against civilians, he faced widespread criticism from Republicans in Congress and low marks from the public over his handling of the
crisis. At the same time, public support for intervening in Syria remained low, arguably complicating Obama’s efforts to credibly communicate
America’s resolve to Assad.
That said, while we may observe smaller and less frequent spikes in presidential approval ratings as a consequence of heightened polarization,
a different sort of rally effect may become more common . That is, the intensity of support for and
opposition to the president might spike among his supporters or opponents in the immediate aftermath of a
crisis event . A case in point is President Trump’s recent sounding of the alarm over a Central American migrant caravan during the run-up
to the 2018 midterm election. Notwithstanding the assertions of many pundits, there is little evidence that President Trump succeeded in
increasing overall support for Republicans by characterizing the migrant caravan as an invasion. Trump first tweeted about the caravan on
October 18, 2018. According to data on fivethirtyeight.com, Democrats led Republicans by 8.4 percentage points in the generic ballot during
October 1–18. The Democratic lead from October 19 through election day was 8.3 points, or basically unchanged. Indeed, one postelection
analysis (Winston Group 2018) concluded that late-deciding voters broke toward the Democrats by 12 points and cited the emphasis on the
migrant caravan, which crowded out good news on the economy, as a key causal factor. However, among Republicans, concern over illegal
immigration measurably increased with Trump’s caravan-related tweets. It is entirely possible, albeit uncertain, that Republican turnout in
some states consequently rose, thereby improving the performance of Republican candidates in close elections, such as the Senate race in
Florida and the gubernatorial race in Georgia. Since Democrats were already at historic levels of intensity leading up to the election, such a
spike could have produced a net benefit for Republican candidates. The implication is that prior concerns about “diversionary”
conflict were overblown because the types of conflicts that a leader might initiate for such a purpose were precisely those
most likely to collapse the elasticity of reality ( mak ing the risk greater than the potential reward ). However, in a highly
polarized environment where the electoral battle is more about mobilizing supporters than convincing the undecided there may
be much more incentive for leaders to engage in this potentially destructive behavior .

Downturns ensure global leadership turnover.

Dr. Markus Brückner 19, Economics PhD and Professor at Australian National University, External
Consultant to IMF and World Bank; and Dr. Hans Grüner, Economics PhD and Professor at the University
of Mannheim, External Consultant to European Central Bank; 10/31/2019, “Economic growth and
political extremism,” Public Choice, Issue 185/1-2. pp 131-159, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11127-019-
00745-w, pacc
Abstract

We argue that the growth rate, but not the level of aggregate income, affects the support for extreme political parties. In our model, extreme parties offer short-run
benefits to part of the population at the expense of a minority. Growth effects on the support for such parties arise when uncertainty exists over whether the same

subset of individuals will receive the same benefits in the future. More people are willing to take political risks if economic growth
is slow. Based on a panel of 16 European countries, our empirical analysis shows that slower growth rates are associated with a
significant increase in right-wing extremism . We find no significant effect of economic growth on the support for extreme left-wing parties.
1 Introduction

Distributional consequences are associated with political extremism, both in the short run and in the long run. Extreme political parties often propose to redistribute
resources away from specific subgroups of society, such as the rich, ethnic minorities, or citizens living in specific regions. This paper analyzes the impact of
economic growth on the support for extreme political parties in western democracies. We argue that the growth rate, but not the level of aggregate income, affects
the support for extremism.

In the first part of our paper, we discuss three alternative explanations for why an increase in the economic growth rate reduces the support for extreme political
parties. Two well-known explanations are related to retrospective voting and behavioral effects, the latter meaning that voters may react more strongly to changes
in than to levels of economic well-being. The third, novel explanation is that parties with extreme political platforms are perceived to create considerable
uncertainty about the future distribution of income.

We develop a simple game-theoretic model that analyzes that uncertainty effect. In our model, extreme political
parties offer short-run gains from redistribution to a group of individuals. However, the same individuals also
face long-run losses owing to the higher income risk that is associated with an extreme regime.1 The model permits a
comparative static analysis with respect to several key variables of interest. The growth rate is associated with larger future income
risk . Such risk reduces the number of voters favoring extreme parties . The level of aggregate income has no effect on the
support for extremism. Income inequality raises support for redistribution and affects the impact that a change in the growth rate has on the support for extremism.
An important feature of our model is that the effect of economic growth on the support for extremism depends on uncertainty of future income redistribution. If
redistributive policies are perceived as predictable—in the sense that the same group will have income taken away from it in the future—then the political support
for an extremist party is unaffected by growth.

In the empirical part of our paper, we estimate the relationship between economic growth and the support for extreme political parties using a panel data set
comprising 16 European countries . Our dependent variable is a survey-based measure, compiled by Euro-barometer, of respondents' support for
extreme right-wing parties and extreme left-wing parties. We use that data, which spans more than three decades and contains entries on a
semi-annual frequency , to estimate the effects of economic growth on the support for extremism. Our empirical analysis shows a significant
negative effect of real per capita GDP growth on the support for extreme right-wing parties: controlling for country and time fixed effects, a one percent age
point decline in real per capita GDP growth increases the vote share of extreme right-wing parties by up to one
percent age point. We document that the negative effect of economic growth on the support for right-wing extremism is robust across
estimation techniques and model specifications . We do not find a systematic effect of growth on the support for left-wing extremism.
A possible explanation for the differential effects between left-wing and right-wing extremism that relates closely to our theoretical model is that right-wing
extremism might be associated with more uncertainty over what groups will be subject to income expropriation in the future. Left-wing extremism is associated
with income redistribution, but little uncertainty exists over its target. Communist doctrine (see, for example, the Communist Manifesto by Marx and Engels 1848),
envisions a classless society; i.e., a society wherein incomes are distributed equally. Over the past century, extreme left-wing parties have followed closely that
doctrine by proposing to redistribute incomes from rich to poor; as opposition parties they have voted against laissez faire policies and, when in power, they have
implemented programs that reduced the wealth and income prospects of the rich (see, e.g., Brown 2010).

Right-wing extremism, in contrast to left-wing extremism, does not advocate a classless society. Instead, it often is associated with discrimination against specific
groups of society for racial, religios, political or other reasons.2 An extreme case of a murderous and discriminatory regime was the German fascist rule during the
first half of the 20th century. One can see it as a direct consequence of the Nazi party's "Fuhrerprinzip"—"the principle of unconditional authority of the leader"
(Bernholz 2017, p.9)—which created considerable uncertainty over who might be stigmatized, imprisoned or killed in the future.3 Indeed, from the Nazi period we
know that various groups were stigmatized for different reasons4 and that stigmatization also was particularly erratic.5,6

The empirical analysis of our paper is related to Stevenson (2001), who examines the determinants of aggregate policy preferences in a panel of 14 European
countries. One of Stevenson's main findings is that declines in economic growth cause policy preferences to shift to the right, while increases in economic growth
cause policy preferences to shift to the left.7 Our paper differs from Stevenson in at least three important aspects. First, in contrast to Stevenson, we show that our

empirical results are robust to controlling for country fixed effects , meaning that our results also hold at the
within-country level , and not just in cross-section . Relatedly, Acemoglu et al. (2008, 2009) showed that the cross-country relation
between income and democracy turns insignificant when country fixed effects are entered into the econometric model. Second, we provide evidence that our

empirical findings reflect a causal effect of economic growth on political extremism . We show that our main
findings are robust to estimating dynamic models that enable to test for Granger causality; and we also show that the main findings hold with an

instrumental variables approach. Third, we distinguish in our empirical analysis between extreme right-wing and extreme left-wing parties. That
distinction matters: a robust negative effect of economic growth is found on the support for extreme right-wing parties, whereas no systematic effect exists for the
support of extreme left-wing parties. Our finding of a significant negative effect of economic growth on the support for right-wing extremism is in line with the

finding of Bromhead et al. (2012), who show that the vote

share of right-wing extremists during the Great Depression was
significantly larger in those countries that experienced a more severe economic crisis . Using subnational data for
218 European regions during 1990-2016, Rao et al. (2018) find a significant negative effect of regional output on
the vote share of extreme right-wing parties , but no signicant effect on extreme left-wing parties.

Leadership turnover causes nuclear war.

Dr. Andrew Bertoli 18, PhD and International Relations Professor at IE University, Spain; Dr. Allan
Dafoe, PhD and International Relations Professor at UCLA; and Robert Trager, Political Science Professor
at UCLA; 5/9/2018, “Is There a War Party? Party Change, the Left–Right Divide, and International
Conflict,” Journal of Conflict Resolution, 63(4), https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0022002718772352, pacc
Is the likelihood that a democracy will take military action against other countries largely influenced by which party controls the presidency? Many believe so
(Palmer, London, and Regan 2004; Arena and Palmer 2009; Clare 2010). In modern American politics, one party is consistently identified as more hawkish than the
other. Surveys have revealed that Republican voters consistently prefer more aggressive policies (Eundak 2006; Trager and
Vavreck 2011; Gries 2014). Moreover, many believe that Al Gore, had he been elected, would not have invaded Iraq like President George W. Bush did (Jervis 2003;
Lieberfeld 2005), and that the foreign policies of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump would be similarly opposed (Paletta 2016).
Nevertheless, it is very difficult to determine whether the party in control of the presidency really has an important impact on foreign policy due to the selection of
parties into particular domestic and international contexts. Put simply, which party controls the presidency is not random. For example, the victory of George W.
Bush in 2004 can be attributed to a number of domestic and international factors at the time, including the American public's heightened concerns over national
security following September 11. Similarly, Barack Obama's success in 2008 was influenced by problems at home and a decrease in public willingness to engage in

military adventurism. Therefore, an observational analysis would likely be biased by such selection processes . Thus, even
if countries behave differently when certain parties control the presidency, it would be very difficult to
know if that difference is explained by the parties or by the environments into which the parties are selected.

In principle, we could overcome this problem by running an experiment in which we randomly assigned countries to
be ruled by leaders from different parties . Such an ideal research design would avoid the confounding problem,
making it possible to test whether countries tend to be more or less aggressive when certain parties control the
presidency. Experiments are unmatched in their ability to identify causal effects, so this type of study could greatly improve our understanding of how electing
candidates from different parties influences foreign policy.

We approximate this ideal experiment by using a regression discontinuity (RD) design. Specifically, we look at close presidential
elections where a candidate from one party barely defeated a candidate from a different party. Such a design works if it is close
to random which party won in these cases, a premise which is plausible given the inherent randomness in large national elections. Thus, we use close elections to
get data that are similar to what would result from a real experiment. Such natural experimental designs are extremely rare in the study of war and thus warrant
attention in the exceptional instances when they do occur.

We run two main analyses. First, we look at whether countries tend to be more (or less) aggressive when presidential candidates from right-wing parties barely
defeat candidates from left-wing parties. This quasi-experimental comparison involves a small sample size (n = 29), but we still find noteworthy evidence that
electing right-wing candidates increases the likelihood that countries will initiate high-level military disputes against other states. Second, to increase our statistical
power, we examine cases where candidates from incumbent parties barely won or barely lost to candidates from challenger parties (n = 36). Specifically, we test
whether countries experienced a larger change in their propensity to engage in military disputes when the candidate from the challenger party barely won. Thus,

our key outcome of interest here is how much countries deviated from their prior levels of dispute involvement. We find statistically significant
evidence that electing candidates from challenger parties causes countries to experience a larger change in their propensity to engage in military conflict
with other states.

Upon further examination of the data, we find that the results from our second test are largely explained by a tendency for candidates from challenger parties to

initiate military disputes in their first year in office. Thus, these findings support the theory that major leadership transitions tend to increase the
chances of state aggression, either because new leaders lack the experience to manage international crises
effectively or because they need to prove their resolve by acting tough .
This article makes several important contributions to the study of international relations. First, there is a long-standing debate in political science over whether
leaders have an important independent impact on interstate conflict or whether their influence is largely constrained by strategic realities (Byman and Pollack 2001;
Mearsheimer and Walt 2003; Jones and Olken 2009; Chiozza and Goemans 2011; Saunders 2011; Horowitz, Stam, and Ellis 2015; Croco 2015). This study provides
quasi-experimental evidence that leaders do have a meaningful impact on foreign policy. Second, the results presented here suggest that domestic political ideology
can spill over into the international realm. One of the main explanations for the democratic peace is that democracies act in accordance with their domestic norms
when it comes to foreign policy (Morgan and Campbell 1991). The findings presented here support that hypothesis by showing that left-wing leaders do tend to

behave more dovishly in international affairs. Third, these results suggest that we should be alert to the potential for interstate conflict when
right-wing leaders are in office, as well as after elections where party control of the presidency changes hands.

This study is also notable because it is one of the first in the international relations literature to use a preanalysis plan . Prior to
looking at any of the results, we pre-registered the main tests that we planned to conduct in this article. Our motivation here was to
tie our hands , so that there could be no question of sifting through the data to find the statistical tests that produced
the most interesting or significant results. The temptation for scholars to run many tests and then report the ones that are most "interesting" can lead to
misleading findings. This danger has attracted a great deal of attention across scientific fields over the last decade, and it is seen by many as a major problem for
quantitative research (Nosek et al. 2015). The purpose of preanalysis plans is to help ensure that research remains credible.

The article proceeds as follows. We first discuss the theoretical bases for the claim that party control of the presidency influences conflict decisions and review the
existing empirical work on this subject. We then outline the research design in more detail. Next, we conduct design checks to verify that the research design is
appropriate. We then present the results for party ideology. After that, we test whether party turnover leads to changes in the likelihood of state aggression. We
then discuss the findings and conclude.

Leaders, Parties, and International Conflict

In recent years, much debate has arisen over whether leaders influence the chances of interstate conflict, and if so, how. A major question in this research program
is whether leaders from certain parties are more likely to behave aggressively in foreign affairs or whether the ideology of the leader is largely unrelated to state
behavior.

The theory that party control of the presidency influences the chances of interstate conflict can be derived from three premises. The first is that
conservatives and liberals hold different views about the legitimacy or efficacy of military force. This
assumption is backed by cross-national survey data showing that liberals tend to be more concerned with fairness, duties of care, and
preventing harm, while conservatives tend to favor the preservation of social orders, the purity of sanctified objects, and loyalty to in-groups (Graham, Haidt, and

Nosek 2009; Boer and Fischer 2013). Several studies have also found that these differences in moral foundations influence foreign policy attitudes
(Schwartz 1992; Kertzer et al. 2014; Kertzer and Rathbun 2015). In particular, liberals are more "prosocial" and seek compromise internationally, in
contrast to conservatives, who are more "proself” and therefore bargain more aggressively (Schwartz, Caprara, and Vecchione
2010).

The second assumption is that general differences in party attitudes appear at the elite level. There are two ways that these differences could affect the behavior of
political elites. First, the political leaders could sincerely hold beliefs and preferences similar to those of their constituents, leading them to have different foreign
policy strategies and goals. Alternatively, the leaders could have different beliefs and attitudes than their constituents, but nonetheless recognize that they must
carry out their supporters' agenda if they hope to stay in office.

Although it is difficult to know the extent to which leaders true foreign policy preferences reflect those of their constituents, several observational studies show that
changes in a leader's base correlate with changes in their approach to international affairs. First, Mattes, Leeds, and Carroll (2015) find that changes in the
supporting coalitions of leaders predict foreign policy change, measured by the policy positions taken by nations in the United Nations General Assembly. Rathbun
(2004) and Haas (2005) come to a similar conclusion looking at support for peace-enforcement missions, and Solingen (2009) finds that economic interests

and the ideologies of partisan coalitions influence nuclear weapons policy. Therefore, even when a leader
has different foreign policy beliefs and goals than the rest of the party, there may still be pressure to toe the party line .
The third assumption is that leaders from different parties can act on their divergent preferences. This means that international and domestic constraints on leaders
cannot be so powerful that they largely limit leaders to a single course of action. For example, some realists argue that there is little room for leaders to have an
independent impact on foreign policy because they all need to defend and advance the national interest (Mearsheimer 2001; Mearsheimer and Walt 2003).
Regarding domestic constraints, Trager and Vavreck (2011) find that right-wing and left-wing leaders can have incentives to hide their "types." Liberal leaders may
be forced to adopt more hawkish foreign policies because they fear that their moderation will sometimes be interpreted as weakness (Schultz 2005), whereas
conservative leaders may have incentives to adopt more moderate policies because the public would likely judge them unduly aggressive if they acted hawkishly.
Thus, leader preferences and political incentives could actually push in opposite directions.

Several previous studies have examined whether right-wing leaders tend to behave more aggressively in foreign policy than left-wing leaders. Using
logistic regression on panel data covering eighteen parliamentary democracies from 1949 to 1992, Palmer, London and Regan (2004) find that right-wing
governments are more likely to be involved in military disputes, while left-wing governments are more likely to see the disputes in which they are involved in
escalate. Their explanation is that right-wing parties favor using force more often, so their leaders will engage in military conflict more often. However, when left-
wing leaders engage in conflict, they will need to emerge victorious to justify their involvement, so they will be more likely to bargain tough and escalate if
necessary. These researchers find that a shift from left to right government increases the chances of dispute initiation by about 50 percent and that left-wing
governments are about twice as likely to escalate conditional on being in a dispute. Second, Arena and Palmer (2009) apply a probit model to panel data covering
twenty stable democracies from 1960 to 1996 and find that right-wing governments are more likely to initiate disputes. Their theory is based on the finding that
right-wing leaders are less likely to be removed from office for using force unwisely than left-wing leaders. This makes right-wing leaders more likely to start
international conflicts in the hopes of increasing their domestic support. Third, Clare (2010) applies logistic regression to twenty parliamentary democracies from
1950 to 1998 and finds that parliamentary democracies are about twice as likely to initiate disputes when they are controlled by right-wing parties.

The central limitation of these studies is that their conclusions rest on the results of regression analysis on cross-national panel
data. Such an approach is not guaranteed to eliminate bias from omitted variables. In fact, the results from this type of analysis can be badly
biased , even when researchers control for a wide range of important covariates (Clarke 2005). In some cases, controlling for
potential con-founders can even amplify bias (Pearl 2013). Thus, the results from these past studies should be interpreted as
a tentative first cut at answering this question rather than the final word on the subject.

The design-based approach that we employ in this article gets around the omitted variable bias problem because the
as-if random assignment of leaders to office should create balance across observable and unobservable
pretreatment characteristics. In many other scientific fields, the results of conventional observational analyses
have been overturned by design-based studies. For example, the validity of hormone replacement therapy and a variety of theories in
development economics, psychology, and elsewhere have been overturned when experimental and quasi-experimental approaches were brought to bear
(Women's Health Initiative 2002; Freedman 2009; Dunning 2012). Therefore, the tests that we present in this article provide an important step forward in our
understanding of the empirical relationship between party control of the presidency and interstate conflict.
Before moving on to our research design, though, we should first lay out the hypotheses that we want to test. As we detail in our preanalysis plan, we started this project with the belief that leaders do matter and that electing leaders from different parties does affect the likelihood of state aggression. Given this prior, we formulated two main hypotheses. The first is the party ideology hypothesis, which predicts that electing leaders from right-wing parties will increase the likelihood of state aggression. The second hypothesis is highly general and speaks directly to the
question of whether leaders matter in international relations. It posits that electing a leader from the incumbent party will lead to less change in international dispute behavior than electing a leader from a challenger party. We refer to this as the incumbent/challenger hypothesis.

Party Ideology Hypothesis: Electing presidential candidates from right-wing parties will make countries more aggressive than electing candidates from left-wing parties.

Incumbent/Challenger Hypothesis: Electing candidates from challenger parties will lead to a greater change in state aggression than electing candidates from incumbent parties (the absolute difference in aggression between presidential terms will be greater when there is party turnover).

One issue that is related to the incumbent/challenger hypothesis is that new leaders may be particularly likely to act aggressively early in their terms. There are several reasons why this might be the case. First, new leaders may lack the experience to manage international crises effectively, making it more likely that disagreements with other states will turn into military conflicts (Potter 2007). Second, new leaders may be more likely to want to show the international community that they are willing to use force abroad, which could strengthen their bargaining leverage in
future international negotiations (Wolford 2007; Dafoe 2012). Third, new leaders may want to send a signal to their domestic audiences that they are tough when it comes to foreign affairs, which could increase their popularity at home. This idea that leaders are more likely to get involved in military disputes when they first arrive in office has received support from cross-national logistic regression analysis on panel data (Gelpi and Grieco 2001) and a mixed-methods analysis that looks at American presidents (Potter 2007).

While most of the existing theory and research on leadership transitions has focused on cases where new leaders come to office, a similar logic might be applied to party control of the presidency, particularly when it comes to the reputational mechanisms. New leaders who are from the same party as the old one should be able to associate themselves with the previous leader's reputation, giving them less of a need to signal their resolve. On the other hand, when leaders from challenger parties come to power, there should be less certainty that the new leader will have an
approach to foreign policy that is similar to the old one's. In short, when party control of the presidency changes hands, it marks a more significant leadership transition (Mattes, Leeds, and Matsumura 2016). Thus, even if parties tend to behave pretty similarly across ideologies, we might still find that leaders from challenger parties might be much more aggressive early in their tenures.

Challenger Aggression Hypothesis: Electing candidates from challenger parties will lead to an increase in state aggression when the new leader takes office.

We did not preregister the challenger aggression hypothesis prior to looking at the results, but this was the only hypothesis we tested outside of those we preregis-tered. Thus, the findings do not reflect data mining. Nevertheless, some readers may wish to interpret the test of this particular hypothesis as exploratory.

Research Design

There are several different design-based approaches that could be used to investigate how leaders affect state behavior. One would be to look at all cases of leadership turnover and compare how countries behaved before and after the leadership change. This research design rests on the idea that countries are comparable before and after leadership transitions. This assumption may be plausible in some cases, but in others, it is clearly invalid. For example, the periods before and after normal electoral leader transitions are usually not comparable. Many countries elect
the leader and members of the legislature at the same time, making it difficult to determine the effect of leadership change by itself. Similarly, looking at cases when leaders were forcibly removed from office also has its limitations, since leaders are usually removed at times of extreme political tension. Likewise, leadership changes that are caused by assassinations are not likely to provide valid comparisons. The new leader will probably have to deal with a more complicated political situation in the aftermath of the assassination, making the beginning of their term much
different from the end of the previous leader's term.

Another potentially promising approach would be to focus on changes in leadership that resulted from the natural deaths of leaders. The timing of natural leader deaths should be fairly unrelated to the domestic and international environments. Moreover, the legislature will typically not change following the natural death of a leader, making it much easier to isolate the independent effect of leaders on foreign policy. However, the natural death approach is not well-suited for this particular study. The reason is that the new leader almost always comes from the same party
as the old leader. Thus, this exogenous change in leadership does not provide much leverage in determining how party control of the presidency affects interstate conflict. This research design could be useful in looking at other types of variation in leaders, such as age, military experience, and occupational background. However, it is not a promising design for this study.

The approach that we take instead is to use an RD design. RD involves comparing units that barely surpassed and barely fell short of an important cut point that influenced treatment assignment. For example, if there was a test where everyone who scored a fifty or higher got a scholarship, researchers could assess the effects of getting the scholarship by comparing the students who scored fifty and fifty-one to the students who scored forty-eight and forty-nine. So long as there is no sorting at the cut point, as could happen if the graders had opportunity and motive to
nudge some test takers above the cut point, it should be close to random which of these students won the scholarship, since they were all on the verge of getting it (Lee 2008).

Close elections provide an excellent opportunity to use RD analysis. Given the inherent randomness in the electoral process, whether candidates barely win or barely lose in close elections is plausibly as-if random (Eggers et al. 2015).1 Political scientists have used RD to study questions like how winning an election influences a party's likelihood of winning the next election (Lee 2008) and how winning an election affects a candidate's wealth later in life (Eggers and Hainmueller 2009). Scholars have also used RD to test how economic and political outcomes differ when
Republican candidates for mayor barely defeat or barely lose to Democratic candidates (Pettersson-Lidbom 2008; Gerber and Hopkins 2011; Beland 2015; de Benedictis-Kessner and Warshaw 2016).

In this article, we look at close presidential elections. To our knowledge, this study is the first to apply RD specifically to presidential elections. For our analysis, we followed the procedures that were outlined in our preanalysis plan (which is available at the end of the Online Appendix). We will briefly summarize these procedures in the remainder of this section.

Our Statistical Approach

There are two general ways to analyze an RD. The first, known as the continuity approach, involves plotting two smoothing functions on either side of the cut point and estimating the difference at the cut point (Voeten 2014). This method should be used when the score, or "forcing variable," is continuous. The second method is the local-randomization approach, appropriate when the forcing variable is discrete (Lee and Card 2008; Cattaneo, Frandsen, and Titiunik 2015; Bertoli 2017). It involves drawing a window around the cut point and treating the units within that
window like they were in a randomized experiment.

Since the forcing variable in this study is vote share in a presidential election, which is essentially continuous, we would normally use the continuity approach. However, we discovered in our preanalysis plan that the continuity approach had a type 1 error rate (false-positive rate) of 12 percent for this study, which we believe is due to our small sample size. Since the type 1 error rate should be 5 percent by design, we chose not to use this method, since it was overly likely to give us significant results. Instead, we used the local-randomization approach, which we found had a
type 1 error rate of about 4 percent.

Defining Close Elections

We considered elections to be close if the top two candidates were within 2 percent of the cut point (48 percent to 52 percent range). Data on close races were available in the data set constructed by Bertoli, Dafoe, and Trager (2018). This data set includes every democratic election between 1815 and 2010, where democracies are defined as countries with Polity IV Institutionalized Democracy scores above five. The data set provides information on the top two candidates including their names, parties, and vote shares in the election. If there were more than two
candidates running in an election, we focused only on the votes for the top two candidates, rescaling their vote shares accordingly. In cases where there were runoffs, we used their vote shares from the runoff rather than the initial election. We also excluded close elections in nondemocracies because we were concerned about fraud in these cases. Given the possibility of fraud, we did not feel confident in assuming that the outcomes of these elections were as-if random.

One complication that arose is that the United States elects presidents through the electoral college. This system makes it possible for candidates to lose the popular vote but still win the election if they defeat their rival in the electoral college. To deal with this issue, we counted the electoral college vote rather than the popular vote when looking at the United States. This decision is consistent with other similar studies (Bertoli, Dafoe, and Trager 2018). For every other country, we used the popular vote.

Measuring Party Ideology

To identify parties as left or right-wing, we evaluated the parties against each other according to their positions at the time of the election on social questions associated with liberalism and conservatism. Parties were judged further to the right when they expressed support for "traditional values," national, religious, racial, or ethnic in-groups, or the benefits of authority and traditional sources of authority such as a monarchy. Parties were judged further to the left when they expressed inclusive sentiments, a duty of care for vulnerable groups, and support for democratic
principles. Secondarily, we evaluated parties as left or right on economic policy preferences. Advocacy for wealthier interests placed a candidate further to the right, and advocacy for the less well-off is associated with the left. These two social and economic dimensions are highly correlated, with the principal exceptions coming from communist and postcommunist countries. In these cases, the primary social dimension determined the left-right coding. When parties could not be easily classified as left or right according to these metrics, we excluded the election from the
ideology test.

Main Analyses

We looked at two different types of close elections. The first were close elections between right-wing and left-wing parties, where it was essentially random whether the presidency was controlled by a leader with a right-wing or left-wing ideology. In total, we have twenty-nine close elections between right-wing and left-wing parties. The second set of close elections that we analyzed was narrow races between an incumbent and challenger party. In these cases, it was as-if random whether the country experienced party continuity or change in the executive branch. We
have thirty-six of these close elections in our data set. For this group of cases, we were particularly interested in testing whether a change in party control of the presidency increased the likelihood of a change in state aggression.

Although our sample sizes are not large, the power tests that we ran at the beginning of this project indicated that we had a good chance of picking up a medium-sized or large effect. For the test of left- versus right-wing parties, we determined we would correctly detect (at a = .05) a medium-sized effect (0.5 standard deviation [SD]) 30 percent of the time, a large effect (0.8 SD) 54 percent of the time, and a very large effect (1.2 SD) 82 percent of the time. In the incumbency power analysis, we found that we would detect a medium-sized effect 55 percent of the time, a
large effect 93 percent of the time, and a very large effect over 99 percent of the time. Also, if the effects were small or nonexistent, the power tests indicated that we would be able to establish confidence intervals that were precise enough to rule out very large (+1.2 SD) positive and negative effects.2

Moreover, although the results turn out to be significant at conventional levels, we encourage readers to avoid interpreting p values as either significant (p < .05) or not while reading this article and to bear the bias-variance trade-off in research design in mind. Almost all quantitative research in international relations lacks any claim to strong causal identification, being based on observational data and linear adjustment of largely ad hoc covariate sets. By contrast, the design presented here has a strong claim to causal identification and unbiasedness, providing a crucial
complement to the vast majority of the literature which does not. Thus, since p values provide a continuous measure of how inconsistent the evidence is with the null hypothesis, a higher p value in an unbiased design may actually reflect more evidence against the null than a lower p value in a biased one. Small p values (e.g., p < .2), even if not significant at conventional standards, also provide important evidence in these contexts.

In addition to our two main tests, we examined whether candidates from challenger parties are more likely to initiate military disputes at the beginning of their terms than candidates from incumbent parties, which would be consistent with the theory that major leadership transitions make state aggression more likely. Our motivation for running this test came from reading Wolford (2007), Dafoe (2012), and Wu and Wolford (2016). These articles advance a compelling theory and intriguing empirical evidence that new leaders have reputational incentives to act tough
when they first come to office. We find strong evidence consistent with this hypothesis.

Outcomes

We measured aggression using the number of militarized interstate disputes (MIDs) that a country initiates. These disputes are cases where countries explicitly threatened, displayed, or used force against other states (Ghosn, Palmer, and Bremer 2004). Specifically, we look at the number of these disputes that a state initiated starting from when the leader took office and ending at the date that the winner of the next election was scheduled to start. In cases where leaders were replaced part of the way through their term, we used the day that they left office instead. Since
the length of time that candidates held office varied, we divided the total number of disputes by the duration of the time period. Thus, the unit of measurement is military disputes initiated per year in office.

We use slightly different versions of the outcome variables for our different tests. For the ideology test, we use military disputes initiated per year, as described in the previous paragraph. For the main incumbency test, we use the absolute change in military disputes initiated per year from the previous term. We use this variable because we are interested in evaluating whether there was a larger absolute change in military aggression when the challenger party barely won. Thus, the measure is:

Absolute change in military aggression =|MIDs/year during winner's term

—MIDs/year during previous term|

In other words, we are testing whether challenger parties gaining control of the presidency makes countries with high levels of prior aggression more likely to experience a decrease in dispute initiation and countries with low levels of prior aggression more likely to experience an increase in dispute initiation. We conduct a one-sided test for this analysis, since we expect that the absolute change will be larger for countries where the challenger party barely wins. Lastly, for the exploratory test about whether challenger candidates tend to be more aggressive when they first
take office, we look at the number of disputes that each country initiated in the first year of the new presidential term.

Across these tests, our main outcomes are (1) military disputes initiated and (2) high-level military disputes initiated. High-level disputes are cases where countries used force against other states or entered into international wars.3 Following the preanalysis plan, we examine high-level disputes, which constitute actual uses of force, separately because the factors that drive posturing may be different from those that drive actual violence. As secondary outcomes, we look at (3) all disputes that countries engaged in and (4) all high-level disputes that countries engaged in.
These cases include disputes that countries did not start but participated in nonetheless.

Estimation

We employ two estimation strategies. Our primary statistical analysis involves t tests. This is a simple approach, recommended for its parsimony and robustness, which is appropriate given the assumption that close elections were as-if random (Dunning 2012). As a secondary test, we plot the outcome as a function of the electoral result and estimate how the expected value of the outcome changes at the cut point using local linear regression, as is often done for RD designs. An advantage with using this approach is that it makes it possible to visualize how outcomes change
at the cut point.

Design Checks

Our research design rests on one main assumption, necessary for internally valid estimates: the outcomes of the close elections considered in this study are as-if random. For example, the design would be invalid if any candidates could precisely manipulate their vote shares around the cut point, such as by counting the votes and adding just enough to win. This assumption should be valid for democracies provided that elections are fair (Eggers et al. 2015).

A second "representativeness" assumption facilitates generalizing from our results, and this is that the democracy years experiencing close elections are not dissimilar to democracy years in which elections are not close. If this assumption is reasonable, then we can generalize from our results to all democracy years. However, if the countries that had close elections are not representative of other democracies, then the causal estimates that we find may not reflect broader patterns in international relations.

We can test the as-if randomness assumption in two ways. First, we can check that the samples are balanced on important pretreatment characteristics. Figure 1 plots the balance using two-sided t tests. The graph on the left shows that countries where right-wing parties barely won were very similar to countries where left-wing parties barely won, and the graph on the right shows that countries where incumbent parties barely won were similar to countries where challenger parties barely won. In Figure 1, we look at twenty-four covariates, and not a single one is
significantly imbalanced. Thus, the data are consistent with the assumption that who won these close elections was as-if random.

[Figure One Omitted]

[Figure Two Omitted]

Second, we can test whether there is balance in the number of cases on either side of the cut point. Figure 2 shows how close right-wing and incumbent parties were to winning the presidency. For the twenty-nine close elections between right-wing and left-wing parties, there were sixteen cases where the right-wing party won and thirteen cases where the left-wing party won (p = .71). Similarly, for the thirty-six close elections between incumbent and challenger parties, there were seventeen cases where the incumbent party won and nineteen cases where the challenger
party won (p = .87). Thus, there is no evidence of sorting in either sample.

[Figure Three Omitted]

We can also evaluate the external validity assumption by comparing the two samples to the broader population of all democracies since 1815. Figure 3 uses box-plots to compare our samples to the broader population with respect to covariates related to military power. The comparisons show that our samples are very similar to the broader population of democracies from 1815 to 2010. Thus, at least with respect to these covariates, there is little reason to believe that either of our samples consist of an idiosyncratic group of countries that would behave differently than
most other democracies. Rather, the representativeness of our samples indicates that our results should be indicative of broader trends in international relations.

In sum, the outcomes of the close elections appear to be random, and the countries where the close elections happened are fairly representative of all other democracies. Therefore, the design appears to have worked very well. In the next two sections, we will look at how electing presidential candidates from different parties affects state aggression using this new empirical approach.

Results for Party Ideology

Our results indicate that right-wing parties tend to be more aggressive than left-wing parties. Table 1 shows the aggression
levels of the countries that had close elections between right-wing and left-wing candidates. On average, the countries where right-wing parties barely won
started .06 more disputes per year than countries where left-wing parties barely won. Similarly, they engaged in .10 more high-level disputes per year than
countries where left-wing parties barely won. Given that the average duration of a presidential term for these countries is 4 years and 169 days, this adds up to .32
more disputes initiated and .43 more high-level disputes initiated over an average presidential term.
 confidence intervals are based
Figure 4 plots the estimates for the two main outcome variables along with the two other indicators of aggression. The

on two-tailed t tests. They suggest that electing right-wing parties does increase state aggression , particularly when it comes to
high-level disputes. Of course, all of these confidence intervals cover zero, so we cannot rule out zero effect with 95 percent confidence based on this analysis alone.
The estimate most different from zero is of high-level disputes initiated (p = .25). For disputes initiated, the results appear to be more consistent with no effect (p
= .64), as do the results for the supplemental tests of all disputes and all high-level disputes.

[Table One Omitted]

[Figure Four Omitted]

However, if we look at the specific disputes in more detail, the evidence that electing right-wing leaders increases state aggression
grows stronger. While all the high-level disputes that the right-wing leaders engaged in involved unequivocal
uses of force , the only high-level dispute that any of the left-wing leaders initiated is questionable and should probably be excluded. This dispute was
between Costa Rica and Nicaragua in 1995, and it did not involve any military action by either country. Costa Rican police crossed the Nicaraguan border in pursuit
of suspects and were arrested. Two days later, the Costa Rican police force retaliated by arresting two Nicaraguan police officers who had crossed the border "to get
a drink of water." The two sides made a prisoner swap on the following day. If this case is dropped, then electing right-wing parties appears to lead countries to
initiate . 12 more high-level disputes per year (p = .162).4

Moreover, the only reason that these results are not significant is because the United States (2001) is an outlier, which inflates the standard errors. We can address

this issue by modifying the outcome to a simple indicator variable for whether countries initiated any high-level disputes (no = 0,
yes = 1), which makes our test insensitive to outliers . The estimates then suggest that electing right-wing parties increases the chances that
countries will initiate high-level military disputes by 25 percent (p = .041). Therefore, even though the initial tests were not statistically significant, they become
more conclusive after we address some minor issues with the data.

Given the number of democracies in the world today, there may be enough close elections to get much more precise estimates a decade or two from now or maybe
even after the next expansion of the MID data set. This design is definitely worth returning to in the near future. However, for the present, we will turn to a second
test in the next section on more data that yields increased statistical power. This test provides further evidence that which party controls the presidency does affect
the likelihood of state aggression.

Results for Incumbent versus Challenger Parties

The second test that we run compares cases where challenger parties barely defeated incumbent parties to cases where they barely lost to incumbent parties. In
these cases, it was as-if random whether the incumbent or challenger party won. Thus, we can test how much military aggression changes when the party that
controls the executive branch changes. The outcomes that we use for this test are the absolute changes in the military indicators between the term when the
incumbent or challenger party barely won and the previous term. For this analysis, we use one-sided tests that assume that there will tend to be a larger change in
military aggression when the challenger party barely wins.

Table 2 shows the absolute change in aggression levels for the countries that had close elections between candidates from incumbent and challenger parties.
When the candidates from challenger parties barely won, the absolute change in disputes initiated per year was .031 greater than when candidates
from incumbent parties barely won (p = .30; 26 percent increase from baseline). For high-level disputes, the difference is even more notable. The absolute change in

high-level disputes initiated per year was .074 greater than when candidates from incumbent parties barely won (p = .046, 133
percent increase from baseline). The average length of the presidential terms for these data was 4.42 years, so this adds up to a difference
of .33 high-level disputes initiated per presidential term. Figure 5 plots the confidence intervals for the aggression indicators.

This estimated effect is substantively large relative to other determinants of conflict that international relations scholars
have analyzed. For example, past studies have found that revolutions increase the likelihood that countries will initiate military disputes by about 74 percent (Colgan
2010), arms transfers by about 60 percent (Krause 2004), and neutrality pacts with potential conflict joiners by about 57 percent (Leeds 2003). The effect of
challenger parties winning appears to be in the ballpark of these estimates, although it is hard to nail down this effect very precisely because of the relatively small
sample size.

Figure 6 illustrates the effect for high-level disputes across a greater range of margins of victory. As countries move from incumbent party victories (the points on
the left) to challenger party victories (the points on the right), there is a large shift in the absolute change in high-level disputes initiated. Countries where the
challenger party barely won experienced a much larger change than countries where the incumbent party barely won. Although this method of estimating the

treatment effect was not the primary method that we discussed in our preanalysis plan, the results for this approach are fairly conclusive .
Scenario two is EXPORTS.
Russia and China weaponize dual-use nuclear exports to erode non-proliferation
efforts. Reinvigorating domestic output reinvigorates U.S. partnerships.
Dr. David Gattie 20, associate professor of engineering at the University of Georgia, PhD from UGA; and
Dr. Joshua Massey, director of the Master of International Policy program at the University of Georgia,
Public and International Affairs PhD from UGA, retired lieutenant colonel in the Marines; Fall 2020,
“Twenty-First-Century US Nuclear Power: A National Security Imperative,” Strategic Studies Quarterly,
14(3), https://www.jstor.org/stable/26937414, pacc
America's twentieth-century policy on the peaceful uses of nuclear power was original US strategic thinking. It was a policy founded on a rules-based liberal
international order shaped by personal experiences and aligned with comprehensive, long-term national security objectives. However, in the twenty-first century,
the US is embroiled in a national discussion as to whether it should advance its civilian nuclear power enterprise or abandon it altogether. This
disposition conflicts with America's original nuclear power policy and does not align with twenty-first-century realities. Nuclear power generation is

not merely a domestic energy issue subject to popular opinion or the volatility of energy markets. Competing powers are leveraging civilian
nuclear collaborations to meet strategic geopolitical objectives. If America retreats from the civilian nuclear field , revisionist
powers will become the global leaders in nuclear science , nuclear engineering , and nuclear technology
in the twenty-first-century with adverse implications for US national security . Thus, the civilian nuclear power enterprise should be
included as a strategic sector within the US national security industrial base and deliberated as a foreign policy issue within a global alliance.

In a globalized, interdependent world, energy is among a country's most important natural resources. Abundant supplies of marketable energy such as coal, oil, and
natural gas afford resource-rich countries with geopolitical opportunities and advantages that resource-poor countries lack. The historical trend in energy has been
toward resources of greater energy density coupled with the development of technologies to harness and channel energy into the human endeavor. Energy
animates a country's economy and underpins the technological capacity to protect itself and defend its interests. It has a value proposition beyond that of a market
commodity as it defines and shapes geopolitical relationships and international stature.

Nuclear energy is arguably the most complex energy resource because of its dual utility for civilian power and
military weaponry , both of which have distinct strategic roles. Because of this dual utility, it should not be reduced to a mere domestic energy policy
issue. Nuclear power is of such strategic importance that it must be viewed as an instrument of US national security and foreign policy. This article first reviews the
original principles of US nuclear power policy and evaluates the disposition of twenty-first-century US nuclear power policy. Next, it identifies domestic and
international issues that are challenging the US nuclear enterprise. Finally, the article recommends two core actions for aligning twenty-first-century US nuclear
power policy with national security and foreign policy.

The twentieth century and the bipolar Cold War that threatened it have given way to a globalized, multipolar twenty-first century with nations turning to nuclear
power to meet economic development needs.1 At the same time, the twenty-first century faces the specter of climate change—a global issue that is complicating
US energy discussions. When international control of nuclear energy, competition for global nuclear technology leadership, and climate change are combined, these
challenges of twenty-first-century US nuclear power policy appear more complex than those of the twentieth century.2 It might, then, be considered hubris for the
US to conclude it can sustain its global leadership role in nuclear science and technology, uphold its commitment to international control of nuclear energy,
maintain a reliable electric grid, and meet the additional challenge of climate change while unilaterally disengaging from civilian nuclear power. In all, America is
facing a perfect storm of twenty-first-century domestic and international challenges to its nuclear power enterprise. We contend that the legacy principles of US
nuclear power policy established in the twentieth century remain sound and valid and that actions are required to operationalize those principles to meet this
century's national security challenges.

US Nuclear Power Policy: First Principles

With the discovery of the neutron in 1932 and fission in 1938, enough was understood about the energy available in the nucleus of a uranium atom that scientists
and engineers were understandably concerned that this energy could be channeled into the construction of an explosive. In 1944, and with the atomic bomb close
to reality, some scientists and engineers working on the Manhattan Project, along with key officials from the State and War Departments, were already thinking of
postwar US nuclear policy and the impact atomic energy would have on a yet-to-be-constructed world order.3 Knowing that scientific discovery could not be
monopolized long term and that technological advantages are similarly temporary, the US convened numerous proceedings from 1945 to 1953 focused on
America's nuclear power policy. Among these was the Acheson-Lilienthal Committee and its board of consultants, which concluded, among other key points, that
the US was "not dealing simply with a military or scientific problem but with a problem in statecraft and the ways of the human spirit."4 The committee realized that
America's nuclear power policy and its engagement in a global effort to control atomic energy would require a brand of statecraft aligned with twentieth-century
international arrangements that were unfolding and unpredictable. What became evident was that nuclear power had become a political issue "in the context of
the great contest between Western freedom and Soviet totalitarianism" and would require candor, trust, and confidence with the American public and with US
allies in an emerging world order.5

Subsequently, in December of 1953, President Eisenhower delivered his "Atoms for Peace" speech to the United Nations. He proposed that atomic energy "be
allocated to serve the peaceful pursuits of mankind"— particularly to "provide abundant electrical energy in the power-starved areas of the world"—thus dedicating
strength to "serve the needs rather than the fears of mankind." President Eisenhower essentially framed the first US nuclear power policy.6 Consequently, the

Atomic Energy Act of 1954 liberalized the US nuclear enterprise by allowing private companies to develop and construct nuclear
reactors domestically under the regulatory authority of the federal government and to engage internationally in the sharing of
nuclear science and technology for peaceful civilian uses . Pursuant to President Eisenhower's policy declaration, in 1955 the
National Security Council (NSC) produced a Statement of Policy on Peaceful Uses of Atomic Energy. It specified that in the interests of national security, US programs
for development of the peaceful uses of atomic energy should be directed toward the following:

• "Maintaining U.S. leadership in the field, particularly in the development and application of atomic power.

• Using such U.S. leadership to promote cohesion within the free world and to forestall successful Soviet exploitation of the peaceful uses of atomic energy to
attract the allegiance of the uncommitted peoples of the world.

• Increasing progress in developing and applying the peaceful uses of atomic energy in free nations abroad.

• Assuring continued U.S. access to foreign uranium and thorium supplies.

• Preventing the diversion to non-peaceful uses of any fissionable materials provided to other countries."7The foundational NSC discussions of
America's nuclear power policy were carried out at the dawn of a new liberal international order but in the shadow of a rising Communist power. Communist
intentions, which were at that time unknown, had to be anticipated and incorporated into America's foreign policy calculus to ensure US national security and global
stability in Europe and Asia. The life experiences of the individuals involved were as central to their deliberations of the postwar world as was the science behind
nuclear fission. It was the undercurrent of these experiences that motivated the NSC to establish an international system to safeguard the US and the world

from future great power conflicts by controlling atomic energy in all its various pathways that could offer peaceful applications and
prevent military extensions.

The potential implications of atomic energy came into focus as the key discussants realized they were not dealing with just another domestic energy issue or simply
a science and technology issue. Rather, they were ushering in a new era of energy statecraft that would require a level of technological capacity within the US
industrial complex and the US diplomatic corps fundamentally different from that associated with traditional energy commodities such as oil and natural gas. They
recognized the importance of US technological primacy in the nuclear space, underpinned by a vigorous nuclear research and development enterprise. Primacy
would sustain America's early technological lead and its credibility as a nation of experts capable of engaging authoritatively, competently, and competitively in a
global network of ever-evolving developments in the nuclear field.8 Moreover, they perceived the strategic imperative of crafting US nuclear power policy as an
extension of US foreign and security policy.9

From these proceedings emerged the most robust civilian nuclear power program in the world today—one that includes 95 US reactors and 25 Section 123
agreements with other nations.10 The US monopoly on nuclear science and engineering was short-lived as Russia, the UK, France, and China developed nuclear
weapons by 1964. They were followed by India, Pakistan, and North Korea with declared nuclear weapons and Israel with undeclared nuclear capabilities.11 As for
civilian applications, since 1954, 38 countries have engaged in the construction
and operation of nuclear reactors, much of which has
been through international partnerships to ensure international control, safety, and security within the global nuclear
materials cycle.12 However, while in the twentieth century the US was the global leader and international authority for the development and deployment of civilian
nuclear science, engineering, and technology, the twenty-first century is unfolding differently—domestically and internationally—and with many challenges.

Twenty-First-Century Nuclear Power Challenges and Implications

According to Ambassador Thomas Graham Jr., a former senior US diplomat, and Adm Richard W. Mies, retired, "The recent struggles of the U.S. nuclear energy industry may appear to be no more than the usual economic disruption caused by competition among technologies. But from
our experience in diplomacy and the armed forces, we understand that a declining domestic civil nuclear industry has other ramifications. Critical U.S. national security interests are at risk."13

The first principles of US nuclear power policy clearly convey the national security imperatives of nuclear energy and technology. However, most of the original principles are not being fulfilled. Policy makers today must understand the challenges confronting America's civilian nuclear
power sector and the national security implications of a declining US nuclear enterprise—both domestic and international in nature. Despite the ever-expanding field of international players, the national security implications of US nuclear power policy are rarely included in America's
domestic energy debate.

Domestic Challenges and Implications

The domestic debate on US nuclear power policy is fragmented into several issues that precipitate the decline of the US civilian nuclear enterprise, three of which are briefly discussed here.14 First, atomic energy has long been controversial within the public domain due in part to
concerns about reactor safety and the security of nuclear materials and technologies that could be misused for nuclear weaponry.15 To this end, it is not uncommon for the civilian use of nuclear power to be conflated with military applications.16 The Acheson-Lilienthal Committee noted
that "one of the most serious dangers to the promotion of effective international action is . . . that our natural preoccupation with the destructive aspects of atomic energy may blind us to its useful aspects."17 Today, that conflation continues with calls for the US to opt out of the nuclear
industry altogether based in part on waste and proliferation concerns.18

Second, within America's overall energy policy debate there is a call to move the US away from all traditional fuels—meaning fossil fuels and nuclear resources—and transition the country to 100 percent renewable energy, in part to address the impacts of global climate change.19 This is
an ongoing issue with considerable political overtones, not only in the US but globally as well.20 The underlying theory is that the US and the world can meet all energy needs with renewable energy alone, with no need for fossil fuels or nuclear power.21 The rationale is that renewable
energy will improve energy security by displacing imported energy with a domestic resource that poses near-zero risk, whereas fossil fuels and nuclear energy have import/export dependencies, emissions issues, waste, and proliferation risks. The push for 100 percent renewable energy in
the US is likely to remain part of the national energy policy debate well into the future as global climate change concerns are elevated in the national energy conversation and renewable energy is promoted as the lowest-risk pathway to address those climate concerns.22 It is important to
note that global climate change has been identified as a national security issue by the US Department of Defense and the US Office of the Director of National Intelligence. Since US climate policy influences US energy policy, US climate policy will influence the trajectory of US energy
technology—including nuclear power. Consequently, US energy and climate policy are entangled with US nuclear power policy and national security.23

Third, the free market historically has been a dominant driver of the US energy portfolio, and some contend that market forces alone should determine the fate of America's nuclear industry.24 Currently, those market forces are moving the US electric power sector toward natural gas
because it is abundant and inexpensive and because large nuclear construction projects, by comparison, are more capital intensive and require a long-term investment perspective. Consequently, about 20 percent of US civilian nuclear power reactors are under threat of premature
closure.25 Moreover, domestic nuclear construction waned toward the end of the twentieth century. New construction has been largely dormant in the twenty-first century with only two reactors under construction at Plant Vogtle in Georgia—the first new US nuclear construction
project in over 30 years.26 Further complicating America's nuclear power policy debate is that, in spite of the twenty-first-century emergence of China and Russia and bipartisan agreement in Washington of this emergence, recent polling indicates that great power competition is not a top
priority with the American public.27 By extension, the national security implications of US civilian nuclear power policy within the context of the strategic geopolitical objectives of these two revisionist powers are even less likely to be a priority. The US debate over the fate of its nuclear
enterprise has been generally reduced to that of a domestic energy policy issue within the overall debate of global climate change—a debate that includes considering whether the US should retain its nuclear enterprise or abandon it altogether. This disconnect between nuclear power as
a national security issue, as understood by policy makers post-World War II, and nuclear power as only a commodity in the energy market may reflect what Hal Brands and Charles Edel characterize as contemporary amnesia with the United States "losing the tragic sensibility that impelled
it to do great things."28

The debates over waste and proliferation concerns, renewable energy, and the role of markets are creating strong domestic headwinds for the future of US nuclear power and have the potential to bring the civilian US nuclear industry to a close. Moreover, the domestic challenges to
America's nuclear enterprise raise an even more pointed question: Does the US see any value in retaining its twentieth-century nuclear leadership into the twenty-first century? At the same time, international forces are presenting additional challenges to America's nuclear enterprise and
global leadership in nuclear power—challenges that are more strategic and have broader implications for US national security.

International Challenges and Implications

The greatest national security challenge to the original principles seems to emanate from international actors, particularly through geopolitical exploitation. The

decline in US domestic nuclear construction over the past 30-plus years—relative to the growth of nuclear power
development in other regions of the world—has created opportunities for revisionist powers China and
Russia to aggressively engage in expanding nuclear power collaborations . Since 2000, 96 nuclear reactors have been connected to
the grid in 13 countries. Of these, 45 were constructed in China and 12 in Russia. An additional four Chinese-designed reactors and seven Russian-designed reactors
were deployed in five other countries, meaning 71 percent of reactor deployment is associated with China or Russia either by domestic location or by reactor
design. Currently, 54 reactors are under construction in 20 countries. Of these, 13 are Chinese designed (11 in China, 2 outside of China), and 16 are Russian
designed (4 in Russia, 12 outside of Russia). Thus, 54 percent of reactors under construction are associated with China or Russia.

In all, since 2000, 150 nuclear reactors have been connected to the grid or are under construction in 22 countries. Of these, 97 are associated with China or Russia in
11 of those countries. Thus, for the past 20 years, China and Russia are associated with 65 percent of reactor construction in half of the countries where nuclear
power has been or is being deployed.29 Much of the new reactor construction can be attributed to the practical need for electricity in developing economies in
Eurasia and the Asia-Pacific region.

China and Russia are deftly leveraging their nuclear expertise for strategic geopolitical gain and are on
track to displace America as the reliable global partner in nuclear technology and international nuclear
collaborations .30 From planning to construction, operation, and decommissioning, nuclear collaborations span decades, affording China and
Russia the ability to project their respective geopolitical influence in countries that will be dependent on
them for nuclear technology and services . Both nations are positioned to assume global leadership in
civilian nuclear technology and services and are outcompeting other states on the global stage to the extent that "the nuclear industry in a few
decades is likely to be decidedly non-Western."31 China is a particularly adept competitor as it is taking an "integrated approach to innovation" as well as a "whole-
of-nation implementation of military-civil fusion" to "leverage synergies between defense and commercial developments" including global nuclear commerce, which
is embedded within its Belt and Road Initiative.32 This status isn't a reflection of superiority in nuclear expertise or capabilities so much as how each country views
nuclear power—as an energy technology subject to popular opinion and political leanings or as a geopolitical tool subject to the will of the state. It also indicates

that China and Russia are exploiting nuclear energy to attract allegiance .
China has developed a three-phase strategy to transition from its current light-water-reactor technology to nuclear fusion.33 It has also structured a deal to establish a nuclear industry university for advanced study.34 Lin Boqiang, director of the China Center for Energy Economics
Research at Xiamen University, emphasizes that "China is the fastest-expanding nuclear power generator in the world . . . at a time when traditional giants like the US are retreating." He characterizes China's state-owned nuclear sector as an "incomparable advantage" of the Chinese
system as it offers "long-term stability and rich financing sources to support research and development."35 This advantage is unique compared with the US capitalist-based nuclear sector. China is leveraging that advantage, having identified advanced nuclear technologies in its Thirteenth
Five-Year Plan as a strategic industry for development.36 With its state-owned nuclear enterprise, Russia has its own strategic build-own-operate plan for international nuclear agreements, has deployed its BN-800 fast breeder reactor, and is working on closing its fuel cycle.37

The nuclear power enterprises of China and Russia are state-owned enterprises (SOE) and are being leveraged as extensions of the state to meet strategic foreign policy and geopolitical objectives. This structure stands in contrast to the privatized US civilian nuclear power industry that,
while regulated by a centralized federal authority, is driven by competition and is not supported by national financing to achieve foreign policy or geopolitical objectives. This is not a military competition—rather it is a strategic competition wherein China and Russia are deploying civilian
nuclear technologies and services with high geopolitical stakes.

While unilateral efforts by China and Russia are concerning enough, those concerns are heightened given that "the two countries have significantly expanded their cooperation, especially in the energy, military, and technology spheres, since 2014 . . . as the overall US lead in science and
technology shrinks."38 The geopolitical synergism of Chinese and Russian nuclear enterprises raises questions as to whether the US is positioned to maintain its nuclear leadership role and warrants attention to issues contributing to the US decline relative to the rest of the world.39

Aligning US Nuclear Power with National Security Objectives

Henry DeWolf Smyth, a US physicist who played a key role in the early development of atomic energy and US nuclear policy, posed a question in 1956 that still reverberates today: "Are the aims of our foreign policy consistent with the aims of our domestic policy as far as nuclear power is
concerned?"40 Global leadership in the twenty-first-century landscape of civilian nuclear power will belong to the country that not only sustains its existing nuclear plants, an issue the US is dealing with currently, but also has a long-term vision for growth and expansion of its nuclear
enterprise. Further, it must have a strategy to operationalize that vision—a vision and strategy the US currently is not projecting. Such a strategy will require research and development programs for advanced reactors, advanced and alternative nuclear fuels, spent fuel management, and
technologies for closing the nuclear fuel cycle.41 The strategy must also show evidence of a long-term commitment to nuclear power technologies and peripheral services that attract developing economies looking to establish long-term cooperative nuclear power relationships—as was
the custom in the early years of nuclear power programs.

Currently, the US is facing two national-level issues affecting the fate of the US civilian nuclear power enterprise. Those two issues are global climate change and the reemergence of long-term, strategic competition by revisionist powers.42 It is imperative to ensure that any policies
engendered by these issues align US nuclear power policy with the objectives of US foreign policy and national security. To that end, we propose two core actions—one domestic and one international. First, expand the scope of nuclear science, engineering, and technology within the
national security industrial base to include US civilian nuclear power as a strategic sector, and conduct a whole-of-government industrial base review of the US civilian nuclear enterprise. Second, marshal US allies having core nuclear expertise and capabilities into a twenty-first-century
coalition capable of doing collectively what each nation is not doing individually—outcom-pete illiberal, authoritarian powers in global nuclear partnerships.43

Civilian Nuclear Power as Part of the National Security Industrial Base

US and allied nations generally approach nuclear power from an economic feasibility basis, be that in domestic projects or bilateral cooperation. China and Russia, on the other hand, approach it with a strong emphasis on geopolitical gains and not economic feasibility alone. As long as it
does not include the national security value of nuclear power, economic feasibility of itself will not compete with the geopolitics of a state. Given that the twentieth-century liberal international order was constructed with America's nuclear power policy aligned with national security
objectives, this potential shift in civilian nuclear primacy from democratic to authoritarian nations raises a broader question as to the geopolitical arrangements of the twenty-first century. Specifically, can the US, without world-class civilian nuclear power expertise in its industrial base,
sustain in a more geopolitically complex twenty-first century what it established in the twentieth century with the world's premier civilian nuclear power expertise? This question demands a response as a decline in the US civilian nuclear industry translates to a decline in US nuclear
expertise, which is acutely problematic if that decline is countered by an increase in nuclear expertise in competing great powers.

While the overarching role of nuclear capabilities in US foreign policy unquestionably will be to maintain America's military superiority, the full scope of twenty-first-century great power competition will not be restricted to military means. Twenty-first-century great power competition is a
strategic competition where "technological advances and an economic rebalancing" are leveraged as "low-cost and relatively low-risk opportunities to weaken the United States and the Western alliance."44 Given that authoritarian powers are leveraging civilian nuclear technology as
extensions of the state in this contest for technological superiority, concerns regarding America's national security industrial base should extend to the US civilian nuclear power industry.

We propose expanding the scope of nuclear science, engineering, and technology within the US national security industrial base to include US civilian nuclear power as a strategic sector. This will shift US civilian nuclear power from an issue debated predominantly as a domestic energy
and climate policy issue to a core foreign policy issue deliberated within the national security space. Doing so will serve to ameliorate much of the political volatility associated with populist energy policies as well as some of the inherent fluctuations in domestic energy markets. It will also
provide grounds for conducting a whole-of-government nuclear industrial base review—led by the Department of Defense and the intelligence community—to evaluate risks, identify impacts, and make recommendations for strengthening, reorganizing, and reconstituting the US nuclear
sector's domestic and global manufacturing and supply chain. The US nuclear sector is currently working from a twentieth-c entury model wherein the US had substantial momentum from its post-World War II monopoly and its great power competition in the nuclear space was military
competition with the USSR. The twenty-first century is far different, and the US must evaluate how its nuclear enterprise should be structured and organized to efficiently and effectively compete on a global scale with Chinese and Russian SOEs and how to out-innovate state-backed R&D
programs in advanced nuclear technologies.

The domestic challenges previously noted are fundamentally misaligned with the foundational principles of US nuclear power policy that considered nuclear power strategy to be first and foremost a foreign policy and national security issue—not merely a domestic energy policy issue.
Moreover, relegating the future of US nuclear power to markets alone, particularly a global market without fair market signals, is a gamble that will not pay dividends on the national security value of nuclear power. Smyth emphasized that "decisions about the peacetime development of
nuclear energy have not, cannot and probably should not be made on the basis of strict economic realism."45 Smyth's opinion was echoed by Thomas E. Murray, Jr., businessman and commissioner of the Atomic Energy Commission, who considered attaining economical nuclear power to
be as vital to national security as US preeminence in nuclear weapons.46 Affordability matters, of course, and the competition inherent in free market capitalism is critical to innovation in next-generation nuclear reactors. However, national security is not an emergent property of
capitalism and free markets because the national security benefits of nuclear power are non-monetized benefits. As the US has witnessed, if left to markets alone, America's nuclear power policy and its nuclear legacy would be overly influenced by near-term profits and marginal costs of
energy. Therefore, the free market's invisible hand should be allowed limited pull on the levers of foreign policy and national security or on any market approach that marginalizes or precludes nuclear science, engineering, and technology from the US industrial base.

The robustness of the US industrial base and supply chain in a highly interdependent globalized economy recently triggered concerns pertaining to America's industrial capacity to respond to contemporary threats. This was evidenced by President Trump's issuance of Executive Order
13806 directing "the Secretary of Defense to conduct a whole-of-government effort to assess risk, identify impacts and propose recommendations in support of a healthy manufacturing and defense industrial base—a critical aspect of economic and national security."47 This order can
serve as the model for a similar industrial base review of America's civilian nuclear enterprise to evaluate how the US should "transform, organize, sustain, and leverage [its] national security technology and innovation community to prevail in a long-term competition against an
authoritarian regime that has centralized, long-range national plans to dominate the critical dual-use technologies central to future economic and military competitiveness."48 This inherently will include an evaluation of the various sectors of the US nuclear enterprise, including plant
operation, fuel services, safety, security, and project management, to name a few, as well as a reevaluation of the US public-private nuclear partnership that prevailed throughout the twentieth century. Moreover, since this evaluation is oriented toward restructuring the US nuclear sector
for twenty-first-century international arrangements, consideration should be given to engaging allied nations in a broader contingent, which prompts the second proposed core action.
A US-Led Global Alliance

While the US deliberates the fate of its nuclear industry, Japan, South Korea, France, and the UK—all US allies—are having domestic issues over the future of their respective nuclear power enterprises. Following the Fukushima incident and the shutting down of its nuclear reactors, Japan
has announced plans to construct 22 new coal-fired power plants.49 South Korea has proposed a nuclear phase-out policy that is creating domestic concerns of an exodus of nuclear expertise from the ROK and a collapse within its nuclear supply chain.50 France will soon face the
uncertainty of whether nuclear power is considered clean enough to meet the green energy objectives of a post-Brexit European Union and has embarked on a path of reducing its dependency on nuclear power.51 Meanwhile, the UK has faced numerous challenges in the construction of
new nuclear capacity at Hinkley Point C. Exacerbating these challenges is UK collaboration with China as an investment partner in the project, triggering security concerns among UK policy makers questioning the decision to engage China in its civilian nuclear industry.52

International control of atomic energy in the twentieth century was accomplished by a US-led coalition of
nations to prevent proliferation of nuclear weapons , which will remain the paramount objective for all activities related to nuclear
power. However, additional proliferation concerns have emerged in the twenty-first century—the propagation of ideologies from
authoritarian powers leveraging technologies such as nuclear power to project soft power and advance their
respective geopolitical interests . Since bilateral nuclear cooperation translates to decades-long relationships, a US response must be geopolitically
strategic with long-term objectives, not merely transactional as if nuclear power is only an energy commodity. We propose that it is incumbent upon
the US as chief signatory of the twentieth-century liberal international order to reassert its leadership and
unite its allies into a twenty-first-century coalition of civilian nuclear power partners . This coalition must be
capable of competing with China and Russia in the deployment of nuclear technology , fuel, and services in
emerging economies where energy demand is increasing rapidly and countries are seeking partnerships.

The National Technology and Industrial Base (NTIB) focuses on defense applications. Its creation stems from the priority of "retaining access to global technology and industrial capabilities" and the need for industrial cooperation between the US and other nations—particularly Canada,
the UK, and Australia.53 The NTIB could be paralleled with a Civilian Nuclear Technology and Industrial Base (CNTIB) to facilitate US nuclear power cooperation with Canada, the UK, Australia, France, South Korea, and Japan—each having nuclear expertise or resources critical to the global
nuclear ecosystem (fig. 1). The CNTIB would be fundamentally informed by the afore-proposed nuclear industrial base review and then used as the framework for organizing a US-led coalition of allied nuclear collaborators (fig. 2). Each country could contribute unique, specialized services
in a best-of-practice arrangement capable of doing collectively what isn't being done individually—respond strategically to China's and Russia's efforts to be the trusted, reliable partner in nuclear power.

[Figures Omitted]

As nuclear construction is capital intensive and presents financial and investment challenges on the domestic front, this allied arrangement provides a shared risk environment for new nuclear projects as well as for research and development into advanced nuclear science, engineering,
and technology. As such, it will position the US and allied partners with the organizational capacity to compete with Chinese and Russian SOEs to be the preferred nuclear power partner for meeting global energy demands under low-carbon constraints of global climate change. It also will
shift the purview of nuclear power from one that is predominantly focused on nuclear energy as a transactional commodity issue at the domestic level to one of a strategic geopolitical issue at the international level. This trans-actional to geostrategic shift, in keeping with the shift
proposed in the first core action, will project an allied show of force that democratic nations are willing and capable of responding to the challenge of twenty-first-century great power competition for superiority and dominance in nuclear technology and services.

A US-led international arrangement will facilitate a transition of the US civilian nuclear enterprise from a model aligned with twentieth-century foreign policy and national security challenges to one that aligns with foreign policy and national security objectives of the twenty-first century.
It will refurbish America's nuclear brand while adhering to the original principles of US nuclear power policy. Such a move will foster "maintaining U.S. leadership . . . [,] using such U.S. leadership to promote cohesion within the free world . . . [,] increasing progress in developing and
applying peaceful uses of atomic energy . . . [,] assuring continued U.S. access to foreign . . . supplies[, and] preventing the diversion to non-peaceful uses."54

Conclusion

America's twentieth-century nuclear legacy was established through strategic public-private research and development collaborations. This basis gave the privatized US nuclear industry the momentum to engage the world in civilian nuclear power partnerships as the US nuclear brand
was accepted as the technology, safety, and security standard to which other nations ascribed—a nuclear brand that can be characterized as mutualistic and nonpredatory. America's initial advantage of having a monopoly on nuclear science, engineering, and technology was not
exploited to subject defeated nations to US rule. Instead, the US leveraged its initial advantage in a strategic global effort to establish nonproliferation-focused international control over atomic energy, to share the science and technology for peaceful purposes, and to project security
guarantees for allies against the inevitable development of atomic weaponry by illiberal, authoritarian nations. In essence, the US established international protocol to safeguard the world from the very science it had discovered and the technology it had developed. To that end, America's
nuclear policy has been mutualistic, not predatory, providing benefits to both the US and Section 123 partners. However, abandoning or severely reducing peaceful applications of nuclear energy will tarnish this brand and shift the culture of US nuclear applications to predominantly
military. Such a reframing does not reflect the first principles of nuclear power policy articulated in the National Security Council's 1955 Statement of Policy on Peaceful Uses of Atomic Energy and the dual-use applications of atomic energy.55

The twentieth-century liberal international order was arranged under US leadership , with US nuclear power
policy aligned with US foreign policy and national security objectives to sustain and extend the benefits of that
liberal order throughout the world . This framework was accomplished during a time when great power competition was largely a bipolar
struggle for military superiority, when global climate change had not been elevated as a national and international security concern, and when the US was the
dominant, most reliable partner for global civilian nuclear technology and services. The twentieth century gave way to a much different, more complex, and more

globally interconnected twenty-first century with great powers seeking to, at a minimum, erode US influence globally and
regionally and using technology as one of the eroding forces. This includes civilian nuclear technology . However, as the US
is engaged in a national debate over the fate of its nuclear power enterprise, authoritarian powers China and Russia are having no such debate. Rather, they are
embedding nuclear power partnerships into their respective geopolitical strategies—including designs for dominating the global market in civilian nuclear
technology and services—thereby occupying in the twenty-first century the nuclear technology space occupied by America in the twentieth century.

Given America's legacy of commitment to global leadership in nuclear science, the conversation is not aligned with twenty-first-century challenges—thus the need
for sober discussion within America's security and foreign policy community. America's nuclear power enterprise is at a strategic crossroads for decision-making that
original policy makers likely would have never imagined—one that could set the US on a trajectory toward unilateral disengagement from civilian nuclear power. If
the US disengages from civilian nuclear power , whether by the hidden hand of economics, fear of waste, proliferation, misplaced
confidence in the potential of renewable energy, or a lack of political resolve, it will signal America's abandonment of its
foundational principles of nuclear power.

Ceding control over exports disintegrates non-proliferation.

Dr. Matt Bowen 20, Research Scholar at the Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University,
physics PhD from the University of Washington, Seattle, 9/29/2020, “Why the United States Should
Remain Engaged on Nuclear Power: Geopolitical and National Security Considerations,” Center on
Global Energy Policy at Columbia University,
https://www.energypolicy.columbia.edu/research/commentary/why-united-states-should-remain-
engaged-nuclear-power-geopolitical-and-national-security, pacc
Rising Competition from China and Russia

As mentioned, the US domestic nuclear energy industry is facing substantial challenges in the US electricity sector. US reactor vendors are also
having difficulty competing with other supplier nations to be the vendor of choice for nuclear programs
around the world. A 2010 Government Accountability Office report found that the US share of exports of nuclear reactors , major
components and equipment, and minor reactor parts fell 36 percent between 1994 and 2008—from an 11 percent share to 7 percent—and the US share of
nuclear fuel exports fell from 29 percent to 10 percent in the same period.[23]

As Figure 1 shows, Russia is the leading supplier of nuclear reactors to other countries, and China , with the biggest domestic
build in the world, is positioned to play a large role in the future.
Figure 1: Number of nuclear plants under construction and constructed by key countries since 1997

Given that the Westinghouse AP1000 reactor builds in Georgia and South Carolina have gone very badly,[24] if
no US advanced reactor efforts
succeed, the United States could be left without a reactor option to offer other countries under its nuclear
cooperation agreements . This can only decrease the leverage the United States has to negotiate
nonproliferation commitments with other countries in future cooperation agreements. This is especially true today as countries interested in
nuclear power do not need to sign agreements with the United States in order to access viable supply chains for reactor programs. It is hard to see why
countries would allow America to set conditions on their civil nuclear energy programs—let alone higher ones
than NSG standards dictate or that other supplier countries ask for—as part of US 123 agreements if the United States is not able to offer

nations anything of value in return.

Under a hypothetical future where US nuclear energy capabilities diminish further, countries that make the sovereign decision to pursue civil nuclear energy

programs will still have reactor supplier options—they will just not be US ones. The nonproliferation commitments negotiated by the
Chinese and Russians in their supply agreements with recipient states are likely to be weaker than what the United
States would have otherwise negotiated as an active participant in the international nuclear energy
marketplace. As a recent US National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) report noted, the conditions of supply in US nuclear cooperation agreements
only apply if US designs are chosen by other countries.[25] In particular, NNSA observed, “Over time, if foreign-designed reactors are

consistently chosen over US designs , this would decrease the ability of the U nited States to influence global
supplier norms .”

Reestablishing leadership prevents Russia and China from negotiating contracts with
weak non-proliferation safeguards.
DOE 20, U.S. Department of Energy, 4/23/2020, “Restoring America’s Competitive Nuclear Energy
Advantage: A Strategy to Assure U.S. National Security,”
https://www.energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2020/04/f74/Restoring%20America%27s%20Competitive
%20Nuclear%20Advantage-Blue%20version%5B1%5D.pdf, pacc

Reestablishing technology leadership is paramount for the long-term export position of the nation, which is vital to
supporting domestic nuclear capabilities. At times, however, even when U.S. technology can competitively vie for market

share, other nations are able to pull together technology, services, financing, training, and used-fuel takeback to create more
attractive bid packages . To counter this whole-of government approach from our competitors, the Working Group supports the rapid adoption of
policies that increase the short-term competitiveness of nuclear exports.

The competitiveness of the U.S. nuclear industry in the global market is critical for more than the health of the industry and
the economic opportunities it presents. It also underpins U.S. non-proliferation goals and the national security. In non-
proliferation endeavors, U.S. credibility underpins negotiations. When another nation desires access to
U.S. technology , strong non-proliferation standards and regulatory rigor can be ensured. Credibility, however, is
linked to the quality of the technology available and the preponderance of alternative technology in the global export market. Unfortunately, some foreign

exporting nations, like Russia and China, do not hold their trading partners to the same high standards and may
even use lower standards as a selling point . The dominant market position of Russian and , in the future,
Chinese state-owned enterprises is enabling foreign countries to import nuclear technologies without the same
non-proliferation safeguards required by the United States and its allies, further disadvantaging U.S. civil nuclear exports, as well as
reducing global efforts for a robust international nuclear safeguard s and security regime.

Solves nuke terror.

Daniel Poneman 16, former Deputy Secretary of the Department of Energy, 3/30/2016, “Two Reasons
to Restore American Nuclear Leadership,” https://www.belfercenter.org/publication/two-reasons-
restore-american-nuclear-leadership, pacc

If the United States resumed a more robust role in the expansion of nuclear power — whether through current generation technology,
small modular reactors, or both — it could remain at the cutting edge of global efforts both to fulfill post-Fukushima

standards for nuclear safety and to require the most stringent controls against the threat of the diversion of
nuclear talent , technology , or materials to terrorists or hostile nations .
To be sure, for the United States to rejoin the ranks of dynamic leaders in nuclear energy will require determined effort to address a number of perennial
challenges: economics, safety, security, and radioactive waste. The economics of nuclear power would benefit from the imposition of a price on carbon, regulatory
reform, or compensating reactors for their unique ability to supply reliable base-load power even when Mother Nature knocks fossil or renewable plants off the
grid.

The other key issues — safety, security, and waste — will yield to best practices that by now are quite familiar, but where American participation can and should
reinforce international efforts to grapple with the same challenges.

Restoring America’s commitment to world leadership in nuclear technology would also make us safer in other ways. Compared to the gradual harm inflicted by

climate change, the consequences of nuclear terrorism would be immediate. If violent jihadists of ISIS or another terrorist group build or otherwise
acquire a nuclear weapon , who doubts that they would gladly use it to slaughter innocent civilians? A single
nuclear warhead detonated in a major city would wreak devastation that could dwarf all terror attacks in
the history of the world combined.

Our ability to detect and prevent nuc lear terror ism depends on our technological leadership  — leadership
that has steadily eroded in recent decades as the United States stopped building new reactors , shut down reactors and fuel cycle
facilities, and
reduced its investment in the next generation of scientists and engineers who will develop advanced nuclear
technologies to meet these challenges.

Moreover, every time the United States exports nuclear fuel or nuclear reactors , we export the strong
nonproliferation standards that have resulted from decades of bipartisan Presidential and Congressional commitments to minimize the risk
of the spread of nuclear weapons .
We need to reverse that slide. Since the dawn of the nuclear age, U.S. advice, technology and skills have contributed to peaceful nuclear energy programs the world

over. That leadership — which now stands at risk — has

been a cornerstone of America’s non-proliferation efforts since
President Eisenhower. Now it is more important than ever before .

Nuclear terror is likely.

Matthew Bunn 21, James R. Schlesinger Professor, Practice of Energy, National Security, & Foreign
Policy, Harvard Kennedy School, Co-Principal Investigator, Project on Managing the Atom, Belfer Center,
9/16/2021, “Twenty Years After 9/11, Terrorists Could Still Go Nuclear,”
https://thebulletin.org/2021/09/twenty-years-after-9-11-terrorists-could-still-go-nuclear

Unfortunately, that possibility was all too real . Investigations after the attacks uncovered focused al Qaeda efforts to get
nuclear , biological, and chemical weapons . The nuclear program reported directly to Ayman al-Zawahiri, now the leader of the group, and got as far as
carrying out crude but sensible conventional explosive tests for the bomb program in the Afghan desert. Weeks before 9/11, Osama bin Laden and Zawahiri met
with two senior Pakistani nuclear scientists and discussed how al Qaeda could get nuclear weapons.

But that was then. Today, both al Qaeda and another major jihadist terror group, the Islamic State, have suffered tremendous blows, with their charismatic leaders
dead and many others killed or captured. A US-led counterterrorism coalition destroyed the Islamic State’s geographic caliphate in Iraq and Syria. In recent years,
many terrorist attacks have not been much more sophisticated than driving a van into a crowd. Al Qaeda has not managed to carry out a single successful attack in
the United States since 9/11. Is a terrorist nuclear attack still something to worry about?

The short answer, unfortunately, is “yes.” The probability of terrorists getting and using a nuclear bomb appears to be low—but the consequences if they

did would be so devastating that it is worth beefing up efforts to make sure terrorists never get their hands on a
nuclear bomb’s essential ingredients . To see the possibilities, we need to look at motive , capability , and opportunity .

Motive. Violent Islamic extremists desperately want to strike back at the “ crusader forces ” who have inflicted such
punishing blows on their organizations . And both the I slamic S tate and al Qaeda would like a spectacular action
to put them firmly back at the forefront of the violent Islamic extremist movement. Years ago, al Qaeda spokesman Sulaiman Abu Ghaith argued that because
Western actions had killed so many Muslims, al Qaeda had “the right to kill four million Americans, one million of them children.” That kind of hatred still festers.
(Abu Ghaith is serving a life sentence in a US prison.)

Nuclear explosives are only one of the paths to mass slaughter that terrorists have pursued. Nuclear efforts must compete for terrorists’ attention with tried-and-
true conventional weapons, biological weapons—whose dangers the pandemic has highlighted—chemical weapons, and more. Many of these other types of

weapons would be easier for terrorists to acquire, and so their use may be more likely. But the history-changing power of a mushroom
cloud rising over a major city has proved attractive to terrorists in the past and may again.

Capability. Government studies make clear that if a sophisticated, well-funded terrorist group got hold of the needed
plutonium or highly enriched uranium ( HEU ), they might well be able to put together a crude nuclear bomb.
Unfortunately, it does not take a Manhattan Project to build a bomb, when you have weapons-usable fissile material. Indeed, the
group needed to make a crude bomb might not have a footprint much bigger than the 9/11 attackers had. Despite the enormous destruction that has been rained
on al Qaeda and the Islamic State over the last 20 years, a cell of terrorists could be working on a nuclear project even now, somewhere far from US attention and
drone strikes.

The intense counterterrorism campaigns of the last two decades have surely reduced terrorists’ ability to plan and carry out such a complex effort. But we simply

do not know what capability might remain. The Taliban’s rapid return to power in Afghanistan could add to that
capability, making that country a terrorist haven again—but there are many other largely ungoverned or terrorist-controlled places where
such a project could be undertaken.

And the capability side of the equation can change at remarkable speed . In January 2014, the US intelligence community did not
mention the Islamic State in its annual assessment of threats to US security. By summer, the group had seized much of Iraq and Syria and declared a global
caliphate.

Opportunity. Fortunately, around the world, security for plutonium and HEU is far better than it once was, making it far harder for terrorists to get their hands on
the needed ingredients for a bomb. More than half of all the countries that once had such material on their soil have gotten rid of it. While stolen HEU or plutonium
was once showing up in parked cars and airplane luggage racks in Europe, there hasn’t been a major seizure of potential nuclear bomb material for a decade now.
Nevertheless, with the Obama-era nuclear security summits now far in the rearview mirror, the momentum of nuclear security
improvement has slowed. There is still a need to ensure that nuclear weapons , materials , and facilities are
protected against the full range of plausible threats—especially from insiders , who appear to pose the biggest nuclear security
problem. The rise of domestic violent extremists in the United States and other advanced democracies makes the insider threat
even more challenging . There is still a need for realistic tests and assessments of nuclear security systems’ real capabilities against intelligent adversaries
looking for ways to beat them. And there’s still a need to strengthen nuclear security culture—to make sure the staff and guards at nuclear facilities are giving
security the priority it needs, day-in and day-out.

Entombs the planet.

Dr. Louis Beres 19, Associate Professor of Political Science at Purdue University, 7/9/2019, “Terrorism
and Global Security: The Nuclear Threat,” Routledge

Nuc lear terror ism could even spark full-scale nuclear war between states . Such war could involve the entire spectrum of nuclear
conflict possibilities, ranging from a. nuclear attack upon a nonnuclear state to systemwide nuclear war. How might such far-reaching consequences of nuclear
terrorism come about? Perhaps the most likely way would involve a terrorist nuclear assault against a state by terrorists "hosted" in another state. For example,
consider the following scenario:

Early in the 1980s, Israel and her Arab state neighbors finally stand ready to conclude a comprehensive, multilateral peace settlement. With a bilateral
treaty between Israel and Egypt already several years old, only the interests of the Palestinians—as defined by the PLO— seem to have been left out.
On the eve of the proposed signing of the peace agreement, half a dozen crude nuclear explosives in the one kiloton range detonate in as many Israeli

cities. Public grief in Israel over the many thousand dead and maimed is matched only by the outcry for revenge. In response to the public
mood , the government of Israel initiates selected strikes against terrorist strongholds in Lebanon, whereupon
the Lebanese government and its allies retaliate against Israel. Before long, the entire region is ablaze , conflict has
escalate d to nuclear forms, and all countries in the area have suffered unprecedented destruction.

Of course, such a scenario is fraught with the makings of even wider destruction. Howwould the United States react to the situation in the Middle
East? What would be the Soviet response ? It is certainly conceivable that a chain reaction of interstate nuclear conflict could

ensue, one that would ultimately involve the superpowers or even every nuclear weapon state on the planet.
What, exactly, would this mean? Whether the terms of assessment be statistical or human, the consequences of nuclear war require an entirely new paradigm of
death. Only such a paradigm would allow us a proper framework for absorbing the vision of near-total obliteration and the outer limits of human destructiveness.

Any nuclear war would have effectively permanent and irreversible consequences . Whatever the actual extent of injuries
and fatalities, it would entomb the spirit of the entire species in a planetary casket strewn with shorn bodies and imbecile
imaginations.

This would be as true for a "limited" nuclear war as for an "unlimited" one. Contrary to continuing Pentagon commitments to the idea of selected "counterforce"
strikes that would reduce the chances for escalation and produce fewer civilian casualties, the strategy of limited nuclear war is inherently unreasonable. There is, in
fact, no clear picture of what states might hope to gain from counterforce attacks. This understanding is reflected by Soviet military strategy, which is founded on
the idea that any nuclear conflict would necessarily be unlimited.

Nuclear War Between the Superpowers

The consequences of a strategic exchange between the United States and the Soviet Union have been the object of widespread attention. One account of these
consequences is offered by Andrei D. Sakharov, the brilliant physicist who played a leading role in the development of Russia's thermonuclear capacity:

A complete destruction of cities, industry, transport, and systems of education, a poisoning of fields, water, and air by radioactivity, a physical
destruction of the larger part of mankind, poverty, barbarism, a return to savagery, and a genetic degeneracy of the survivors under the impact of
radiation, a destruction of the material and information basis of civilization—this is a measure of the peril that threatens the world as a result of the
estrangement of the world's two superpowers. 13

Presently, U.S. strategic arsenals contain approximately 9,000 strategic weapons and 4,000 megaton equivalents. Soviet strategic forces number approximately
3,000 weapons and about 5,000 megaton equivalents.14 An exchange involving any substantial fraction of these forces could promptly destroy more than half of
the urban populations in both countries. The subsequent fallout could be expected to kill upwards of 50 percent of the surviving rural inhabitants as well as create
worldwide contamination of the atmosphere.15

To better understand the effects of fallout, it is useful to recognize that radiation effects have three basic forms: (1) radiation directly from the explosion; (2)
immediate radioactive fallout (first twenty-four hours); and (3) long-term fallout (months and years). In areas where radioactive fallout is of particularly high
intensity, individuals will be exposed to high doses of radiation regardless of shelter protection. Those who do not become prompt or short-term fatalities and have
suffered radiation exposures above 100 REMs will undergo hemo tological (blood system) alterations that diminish immunological capabilities. The resultant
vulnerability to infection will seriously impair prospects for long-term recovery.

The effects of a nuclear war between the superpowers, however, cannot be understood solely in terms of projected casualties. Rather, these effects must also
include quantitative effects (i.e., availability of productive capacity, fuel, labor, food, and other resources); qualitative effects (i.e., political, social, and psychological
damage); and interactive effects (i.e., the impact on the relationships between the social and economic factors of production).17 When these corollary effects are
taken into account, it is easy to see that policy makers and public alike have typically understated the aggregate impact of nuclear war.

This point is supported by a 1975 study of the National Research Council, National Academy of Sciences, entitled Long- Term Worldwide Effects of Multiple Nuclear
Weapons Detonations. Going beyond the usual litany of crude physical measures of destruction (e.g., number of human fatalities, number of cities destroyed), the
report portrays the long-term, worldwide effects following a hypothetical exchange of 10,000 megatons of explosive power in the northern hemisphere. These
effects are cast in terms of atmosphere and climate, natural terrestrial ecosystems, agriculture and animal husbandry, the aquatic environment, and both somatic
and genetic changes in human populations.

While the report recognizes that the biosphere and the species Homo sapiens would survive the hypothesized nuclear war, it recognizes that the very idea of
survival in such a context is problematic. Building upon this recognition, a more recent study prepared for the Joint Committee on Defense Production of the
Congress—Economic and Social Consequences of Nuclear Attacks on the United States—identifies four discrete levels of postattack survival. This new taxonomy
permits a more subtle look at the interactive effects of nuclear war and allows more precise judgments about the acceptability or unacceptability of nuclear attack
damage. According to the study, there are four levels of survival, in decreasing order of damage.

1. Biological Survival of Individuals. Individuals or groups of individuals survive but not necessarily within the organized political, social, and economic structure of a
modern society.

2. Regional Survival of Political Structures. Some subnational political units survive as viable entities, but without a functioning central government.

3. Survival of a Central Government. Some form of viable, central control over all preattack national territory survives, but the effectiveness of this control may vary
over an extremely wide range, depending on the specific nature and pattern of the attack(s).

4. Survival Intact of Basic Societal Structure. Damage to the nation is characterized as relatively limited socially, politically and economically; nevertheless, the attack
is militarily destructive. This is the concept of survival envisioned in the notion of limited or controlled nuclear war. However, it should be noted that the idea that
effective strategic military attacks can be benign in their impacts on society is in dispute. It is used here as a criterion without any implicit acceptance that it can be
achieved. 19

There are, however, levels of strategic exchange at which even the first listed category of survival might not be relevant. At such levels, the species itself—let alone
organized political, social, and economic structures—would disappear. The plausibility of such levels is underscored by the fact that the magnitude of exchange
postulated in the NAS report is really quite low. Were the superpowers to exchange between 50,000 and 100,000 megatons of nuclear explosives, rather than the
10,000 megatons assumed by the report, worldwide climatological changes would imperil the physical existence of Homo sapiens.

Worldwide Nuclear War

Ifnuc lear terror ism should lead to worldwide nuclear war, the results would represent humankind's last and most complete calamity ,
defying not only our imaginations of disaster, but our customary measurements as well. As the culmination of what Camus once described as "years of

absolutely insane history," worldwide nuclear war would represent the final eradication of the very boundaries of annihilation .

In technical terms, the consequences of systemwide nuclear war would include atmospheric effects ; effects on natural
terrestrial ecosystems ; effects on managed terrestrial ecosystems; and effects on the aquatic environment .

Atmospheric effects would be highlighted by greatly reduced ozone concentrations producing increased u ltra v iolet
radiation and a drop in average temperature . Even the possibility of irreversible climatic shifts cannot be ruled out.
Natural Terrestrial Ecosystems would be affected by systemwide nuclear war through three principal stress factors: ionizing radiation; uv-B radiation; and climatic

change. The cumulative effect of these three factors would render the entire planet a "hot spot" where even vast forests
would show physiological and genetic damage.21

Proliferation causes nuclear war.

Dr. Andrew Futter 21, International Politics Professor and Director of Research at the University of
Leicester, “Nuclear Proliferation and Nuclear Ages,” Chapter 4 of The Politics of Nuclear Weapons

In the Second Nuclear Age, the greatest risk no longer appears

to be from a large-scale confict between major powers (although this possibility always
remains) but instead from regional instability in the Mid dle East , South or Northeast Asia , or even a n on- s tate a ctor
armed with a nuclear weapon (see Chap. 9).18 This threat has been exacerbated by the spread of W eapons of M ass
D estruction technology , and particularly the combination of nuclear and ballistic missile capabilities to new
actors across the globe. Ultimately, the central theme of the Second Nuclear Age is that the spread of the bomb, along with the
means to build and deliver nuclear weapons, to new actors has changed the central dynamics of the
global nuclear order, and consequently we may no longer be able to rely on the nuclear thinking and toolkit that helped us to survive the First Nuclear
Age. In the words of Fred Ikle, writing in 1996:

Half a century after it began, the nuclear

drama has reached the conclusion of its frst act—a rather happy ending in spite of the
gloomy prospects for civilization that darkened the stage at the outset. This respite, though, is not a lasting
redemption from the dangers of nuclear warfare .19
The Nuclear Proliferation Debate: Optimists and Pessimists

The thinking that led to a conceptualisation of nuclear history into two distinct nuclear ages is also reflective of the broader debate about the role of nuclear
weapons in international politics. In essence, the relative stability, or at least the lack of major interstate war, of the First Nuclear Age gave rise to the notion that
nuclear weapons had helped to “keep the peace” during the Cold War, and that horizontal nuclear proliferation might therefore be stabilizing. This is based on the
theory of the nuclear revolution (discussed in the next chapter) and specifically the notion that the advent of nuclear weapons fundamentally changed warfare,
because no rational actor would want to risk attacking an adversary if they could retaliate with nuclear weapons. Tus, a certain level of stability might be achieved
between nuclear-armed states that might not otherwise exist. However, this view of nuclear history, and of the stabilizing potential of nuclear weapons, is
challenged by those who believe that vertical nuclear proliferation and a reliance on rationality and luck are not a good basis for international politics and security.
They also question the post-hoc view that nuclear weapons were the main reason that the Cold War didn’t turn hot and warn against using this potentially flawed
analogy today.

The concern that nuclear weapons will spread to new actors that characterize the Second Nuclear Age has provided the backdrop for the nuclear proliferation
debate. The question at the heart of this debate is whether nuclear proliferation to new actors will stabilize or destabilize international politics and whether nuclear
proliferation makes inter-state, and possibly nuclear, war more or less likely. This subject is at the center of a discussion between two political scientists, Kenneth
Waltz and Scott Sagan. The debate can be succinctly explained as follows:

Kenneth Waltz argues that fear of the spread of nuclear weapons is exaggerated: “More may be better” since new nuclear states will use their weapons
to deter others from attacking them. Scott Sagan argues that the spread of nuclear weapons will make the world less stable: “more will be worse” since
some new nuclear states will engage in preventive wars, fail to build survivable forces, or have serious nuclear weapons accidents.20

We can think of this debate as being split between proliferation optimists and proliferation pessimists and centring on the wisdom and reliability of Mutual Assured
Destruction as a mechanism for stability and security (see Chap. 5). Kenneth Waltz is seen as the champion of the nuclear proliferation optimists, and Scott Sagan
for the pessimists. Te central tenets of these two positions are explained below:

The proliferation optimists hold that horizontal nuclear proliferation should not necessarily be viewed as automatically destabilizing. As Kenneth Waltz explained in
1981:

Those who dread a world with more nuclear states do little more than assert that more is worse and claim without substantiation that new nuclear
states will be less responsible and less capable of self-control than the old ones have been. … Such fears have proved unfounded as nuclear weapons
have slowly spread. I have found many reasons for believing that with more nuclear states the world will have a promising future.21

This is partly because:

New nuclear states will confront the possibilities and feel the constraints that present nuclear states have experienced. New nuclear states will be more
concerned for their safety and more mindful of dangers than some of the old ones have been.22

Ultimately, this viewpoint believes that “Nuclear weapons reasonably used make wars hard to start.”23 As such, the spread of nuclear weapons—in certain
circumstances—should actually be welcomed, and retaliatory nuclear deterrence and MAD does and should remain the bedrock of global nuclear relations.

The proliferation pessimists contend that horizontal nuclear proliferation can only ever lead to an increase in nuclear dangers
and the possibility of nuclear use . Pessimists point to a number of factors that make horizontal proliferation potentially dangerous: the
growth of the threat posed by nuclear terrorism and illicit nuclear networks (see Chap. 8); the possibility of
nuclear accidents ; the difficulties of ensuring civilian control and safe and secure c ommand a n d c ontrol of nuclear weapons
(see Chap. 5); the specter of preventive war against aspirant nuclear states (see Chap. 8); the problem of building
survivable second strike forces; and the fact that stability through proliferation rests on actors always
behaving rationally at all times.24
Foremost amongst these however is a critique of the misplaced belief that nuclear weapons helped keep the peace during the First Nuclear Age. In the words of
Sagan, writing in 2006:

Deterrence optimism is based on mistaken nostalgia and a faulty analogy . Although deterrence did work with the
[United States and] the Soviet Union and China, there were many close calls; maintaining nuclear peace during the
Cold War was far more difficult and uncertain than US ofcials and the American public seem to remember
today.25

Proliferation pessimists focus on the problems of organisational culture and the fact that new nuclear actors are perhaps
more likely to experience nuclear accidents . As Scott Sagan explains, “professional military organisations— because of common biases,
infexible routines, and parochial interests—display organisational behaviors that are likely to lead to deterrence failures and deliberate or accidental nuclear

war”.26 Newly armed nuclear states might also be less likely to be able to prevent unauthorized use because
they lack the positive mechanisms of strong civilian control.27 Consequently, pessimists argue that retaliatory nuclear deterrence
(and MAD ) may not represent the panacea that it is held to be by proliferation optimists. We can compare and contrast
these views in Table 4.5 below:

Nuclear Latency and Virtual Nuclear Arsenals

While only a small number of states have taken the decision to build nuclear weapons, (and the vast majority have decided not to) the peculiarities of nuclear

technology means that there exist a number of states theoretically capable of building nuclear weapons at short notice
should they chose to, but which are not currently considered to be nuclear armed states. These states possess their own civilian nuclear
programmes , often including the ability to produce h ighly e nriched u ranium or plutonium 239 and have a relatively
advanced military infrastructure that could be used to develop a nuclear weapon (for more on this see Chap. 11). While these states may not be
able to build a working bomb overnight (or in total secrecy), they could probably do so in a relatively short space of time should they choose to—although estimates
of this vary from case to case and amongst experts. These states are known as virtual nuclear weapons states or threshold nuclear weapons states because they
adopt a position referred to as nuclear latency. As Anver Cohen and Joseph Pilat explain:

Virtual weapons are indeed a reality of physics and cannot be ignored, because knowledge , experience , materials and other
requirements to make nuclear weapons are widespread . A continuum of virtual capabilities exists, ranging from
general technology difusion and the existence of nuclear energy programmes to conscious decisions to develop or maintain militarily signifcant
nuclearweapons capabilities.28

[Table omitted]

Nuclear latency remains one of the biggest proliferation challenges facing the international community today

The complication with nuclear latency stems from the fact that the technology needed for a civilian nuclear power programme is very similar to that needed to
produce fissile material for a bomb, and because some military hardware designed for non-nuclear weapons systems can be modified to deliver nuclear weapons
(aircraft or missiles for example). Te problem is compounded by the central bargain of the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty whereby all states that have signed
the Treaty as Non-Nuclear Weapons States have a right to produce their own civilian nuclear energy (for more on the NPT see Chap. 8). As a result, states can move
fairly close to acquiring a nuclear “breakout” capability without actually undermining the NPT or breaking international law (this is at the heart of the current
controversy over Iran’s civilian nuclear programme and whether or not that is being used as a cover to develop nuclear weapons). With hundreds of civilian nuclear
facilities and powerplants operating in dozens of countries worldwide,29 the challenge of nuclear latency is ever present. According to the then Director of the
Atomic Energy Agency, Mohammed ElBaradei in 2010:

Some estimates indicate that 40 countries or more now have the know-how to produce nuclear weapons, which means that if they have the required
fssile material—high enriched uranium or plutonium—we are relying primarily on the continued good intentions of these countries.30

While ElBaradei’s statement should not necessarily be interpreted as meaning that all of these states will or could easily build nuclear weapons, it does underline
the importance of this challenge. Indeed, and despite the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan and the decision taken by Germany in 2011 to phase out civilian
nuclear power,31 the global trend could be toward more rather than less nuclear power generation in the future (for the implications of this see Chap. 11).

In theory, any country with an active civilian nuclear industry and a modern weapons programme could build a nuclear bomb, although this would not be a
straightforward task for any nation that decided to do so. The best-placed states to do this have full control of the nuclear fuel cycle, i.e. they can enrich the fuel for
(uranium) and/or separate the by-products of nuclear fssion (plutonium). States that operate a civilian nuclear power capability but have to buy nuclear fuel from
abroad are far less of a proliferation risk, although because plutonium is a by-product of uranium fssion (see Chap. 2) these civilian power plants must be closely
monitored by the relevant international authorities, such as the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). However, technological capabilities are only one
dynamic of proliferation and must of course be matched with the political will required to build a bomb. Developing a nuclear warhead small enough to be placed
on a missile and that can survive the pressures of fight and possibly atmospheric re-entry for example is a very difcult task, although by no means insurmountable
for a modern state. In general, a nation wishing to move from latency to full nuclear weapons capability would meet signifcant challenges, not least keeping the
programme secret from the international community and the International Atomic Energy Agency (the world’s nuclear watchdog).
Below are a number of examples of states that we might consider as having various degrees of nuclear latency:

1. Japan . Japan is usually held up as the model of a latent nuclear weapons state because it has an advanced civilian nuclear industry, the ability to
produce highly enriched uranium or plutonium (in addition to the large stockpiles it already has) and a modern military. Given the geopolitical tensions

in Northeast Asia, the threat that Japan may decide to “ go nuclear ” is ever-present , although most observers
suggest that there is little enthusiasm for such a move, and Japan remains a key member of the Non-Proliferation Treaty. However, Japan could
probably build a deliverable nuclear weapon if it chose to within a relatively short space of time (maybe less than a year).32 As Mark Fitzpatrick noted
in 2019, “Te biggest obstacles to a Japanese nuclear weapons program aren’t technical or logistic; they are political, legal, and cultural.”33

2. So uth Ko rea. South Korea operates a number of civilian nuclear power plants and has expressed an interest in
acquiring the technology necessary to control the nuclear fuel cycle (it can’t currently enrich uranium or
reprocess plutonium).34 It also theoretically has the infrastructure and manufacturing base to support a nuclear weapons programme.35 Like Japan

and Taiwan, South Korea sits in a potentially volatile region and future changes could drive the case for a bomb. South
Korea also previously hosted US tactical nuclear weapons on its territory during the Cold War (until 1991) and is believed to have entertained the idea
of a home-grown nuclear weapons efort in the past.36 Te likelihood of a future nuclear-disarmed North Korea and the credibility of the US-extended
guarantee are probably the key variables in any future move toward acquiring the bomb.37

3. Taiwan . Taiwan is not a member of the N on- P roliferation T reaty given its unique status in international society and has previously
had an indigenous nuclear weapons programme in the 1970s. While it is not currently believed to have enrichment or reprocessing capabilities, Taiwan

does have specific regional concerns that could lead to arguments for a nuclear weapons
capability, but the costs of doing so are possibly too high for the time being (US opposition, international condemnation, or even a Chinese pre-
emptive strike). Taiwan would probably also need to build a suitable missile and warhead.38 As Arthur Ding suggested in 2012, “Despite the logic that
strategic logic might dictate the acquisition of a modest nuclear arsenal. Taiwan is unlikely to develop nuclear weapons.”39 But this could of
course change in the future.

4. Brazil . Brazil possesses all the major elements needed to produce fissile material for a bomb (from an
indigenous supply of uranium ore to enrichment and the ability to fabricate nuclear fuel) but currently lacks the means to deliver nuclear weapons

should it choose to build them, although it has previously had a nuclear bomb programme (see Chap. 10). Brazil is also an
active member of the Non-Proliferation Treaty and is seen as an unlikely future nuclear weapons state at the time of writing.40

5. Iran . Iran is a member of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, but it has long been suspected that its nuclear programme could be designed for military
purposes. Iran appears to be seeking to achieve full control of the nuclear fuel cycle, which would mean
an ability to produce h ighly e nriched u ranium and plutonium, and has a large military, including a relatively
advanced ballistic missile programme. Iran is perhaps the biggest concern for future proliferation due to its current geopolitical
situation,41 and especially after the US withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action in 2018 (for more on Iran and the Iran Nuclear Deal see
Chap. 7).

6. Saudi Arabia . Sitting at the heart of a region with ever-changing security requirements—not
least the possibility of a nuclear-armed Iran on its doorstep , coupled with a perceived decline in US
influence, and with an advanced infrastructure and burgeoning economy, Saudi Arabia represents a serious nuclear
proliferation concern.42 Saudi Arabia has only a rudimentary civilian nuclear infrastructure, but it is rumoured to have close
nuclear ties with Pakistan and other Gulf Emirates states that do.43 It also has the resources to
support a nuclear weapons programme.