Former Secretary of State George P. Shultz, former Secretary of Defense William J. Perry, former Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger and former Senator Sam Nunn have joined together to form the Nuclear Security Project—an effort to galvanize global action to reduce urgent nuclear dangers and build support for reducing reliance on nuclear weapons, ultimately ending them as a threat to the world.

 

Building on ideas set forward in two Wall Street Journal op-eds in January 2007 and January 2008, by Shultz, Perry, Kissinger and Nunn, the Project links the vision of a world free of nuclear weapons with urgent steps that can be taken immediately to reduce nuclear dangers.

 

The Project developed in response to deep concern about the dramatic change in global threats, and a belief that there is a unique opportunity — and a short window of time — for coordinated actions to pull back from a nuclear precipice.

 

The Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) serves as the Secretariat for the Project, in cooperation with the Hoover Institution.

 

Building momentum and encouraging debate

The interest, momentum and growing political space that has been created to address these issues since the January 2007 article was published has been extraordinary, with strong positive responses from people all over the world.

 

In addition, there have been indications of general support for this project from 17 of 24 former U.S. officials with extensive experience as secretaries of state and defense and national security advisors. These include: Madeleine Albright, Richard V. Allen, James A. Baker III, Samuel R. Berger, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Frank Carlucci, Warren Christopher, William Cohen, Lawrence Eagleburger, Melvin Laird, Anthony Lake, Robert McFarlane, Robert McNamara and Colin Powell.

 

The Project is designed to motivate governments to rethink their policies, change direction and act on the steps that will reduce the risk of a nuclear weapon being used by increasing understanding, awareness, support and action by policymakers, policy experts and the public around the world for purposefully and significantly changing direction and reducing these nuclear dangers.

 

PROJECT OBJECTIVES

 

The overall objectives of the Nuclear Security Project are to:

 

Advance the substantive agenda and help close analytic gaps;

 

Expand and internationalize support and action toward the vision and steps.

 

PROJECT ACTIVITIES

 

Activities include:

 

	Expanding support for the vision and steps through international and domestic activities and events;
	Building understanding about how to advance the steps toward a world free of nuclear weapons through consultations with a network of international project partners;
	Producing a documentary film to deepen awareness of growing nuclear dangers and build support for the project goals;
	Supporting analytic studies focused on the steps needed to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons.

 

Sign up to receive periodic email updates about Nuclear Security Project activities here.

 

For more information call 202-296-4810 or email nuclearsecurityproject@nti.org