Andrea Stricker

Thirty years ago, in 1988, the United States secretly moved to end once and for all Taiwan's nuclear weapons program, just as it was nearing the point of being able to rapidly break out to build nuclear weapons. Because intense secrecy has followed Taiwan's nuclear weapons program and its demise, this book is the first account of that program's history and dismantlement. Taiwan's nuclear weapons program made more progress and was working on much more sophisticated nuclear weapons than publicly recognized. It came dangerously close to fruition. Taipei excelled at the misuse of civilian nuclear programs to seek nuclear weapons and implemented capabilities to significantly reduce the time needed to build them, following a decision to do so. Despite Taiwan's efforts to hide these activities, the United States was able to gather incriminating evidence that allowed it to act, effectively denuclearizing a dangerous, destabilizing program, that if left unchecked, could have set up a potentially disastrous confrontation with the People's Republic of China (PRC). The Taiwan case is rich in findings for addressing today's nuclear proliferation challenges.

How well do strategic export controls function to stop the spread of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction? The Peddling Peril Index (PPI) is the first comprehensive and in-depth ranking of the effectiveness of strategic export controls by country. It ranks 200 countries, territories, and entities according to their capabilities and demonstrated successes in implementing export controls. These controls are key to thwarting the spread of nuclear weapons, other destructive weapons, and the means to make them to additional states or non-state actors. The PPI assesses the actual implementation of strategic export controls by each nation, among groups of countries such as suppliers and transshipment countries, and thematically. It evaluates a broad set of indicators that build on an extensive survey of countries' export controls, including international commitment, legislation, ability to detect illicit trade, proliferation financing, and enforcement. The PPI project grew out of more than two decades of work by the Institute on understanding and characterizing illicit nuclear trade. A 2010 book, Peddling Peril, by Institute founder and president David Albright, is the project's namesake. The PPI seeks to highlight where countries are lagging in implementing strategic export controls and to provide information and a basis for countries to improve their efforts. Its goal is to work for strengthened export control systems worldwide.