Growing Stability Challenges to the Nuclear Weapons Domain

For sixty years, a level of stability has prevailed in the nuclear weapons domain, as the strategic technology environment has been characterized by mostly evolutionary change. The bedrock of this stability has been the confidence among nuclear powers that each could absorb a major first strike and yet still deliver a devastating retaliation. This confidence has sprung from the ability of most nuclear weapons to maintain location uncertainty and reliable connections with command authorities. However, the pace of recent developments is such that emerging technologies could disrupt this stable environment by reducing both location uncertainty and command connectivity, suggesting the prospect of increasing nuclear instability. Relevant emerging technologies include artificial intelligence coupled with big data analytics (AI/BDA), low-cost overhead persistent surveillance, advanced cyber capabilities, and quantum sensors. Additionally, combining several of these and other technologies has the potential to pose even greater challenges to strategic stability by rendering retaliatory forces more vulnerable to attack. Even if these challenges do not come to pass, this prospect, and the high stakes involved, could lead countries to take measures guarding against worst-case scenarios, further aggravating nuclear instability. This paper examines possible new technological measures and their countermeasures, as well as their implications for nuclear domain strategic stability and the larger nuclear, cyber, and space environment. Policy, diplomatic, and technical next steps to strengthen nuclear stability and reduce nuclear proliferation incentives are also identified.