Nuclear Networks and Proliferation

Michael Kraig, senior fellow at the Stanley Foundation states that the future threats of Nuclear terrorism would not come from countries, but from vast networks of operatives with only tenuous links to states who would steal or obtain nuclear material from the growing global black market and this necessitated an overhaul of the existing counterproliferation mindset, currently almost exclusively focused on rogue states to one which focused on law-enforcement to check illicit activities. In a Foreign Policy commentary, "Nuclear Network Theory", he calls for a global buildup in law-enforcement capabilities to detect human networks involved in both conventional and unconventional terrorist acts including real-time data sharing on extremist groups, developing more advanced legal capabilities to identifying phony or "front" businesses used by illicit transnational actors and claims that success in nonproliferation would require the creation of a cadre of national and transnational civil servants trained to crack down on black market trade.