Boiling Point: Preparing for the new nuclear age

Abstract

Since the dawn of the nuclear age, Australians have looked nervously North. During the Cold War, it was the Soviet Union that cast the longest shadow. Our alliance with the United States and the presence of joint intelligence facilities on Australian soil made US a potential target in any superpower conflict. In the decades that followed, our anxieties shifted to rogue states such as North Korea and Iran, to nuclear terror- ism and, most recently, to China's rapidly growing arsenal. The logic has always been simple: nuclear weapons were dangerous because they were in the hands of those who might one day use them against US. That logic has shaped Australian strategy for generations. But what if it no longer holds? What if the next countries to acquire the world's most destructive weapons aren't our enemies but our friends?