12 August 1968: Report by J. Koop, Defence Research Board - New Technology and Strategic Stability

As a fellow at Harvard University’s Centre for International Affairs, J. Koop of Canada’s Defence Research Board was exposed to the views of influential American strategic thinkers. Koop wrote this report on how scholar-practitioners in the Harvard-MIT academic community approached nuclear weapons and Soviet-American relations.

Koop concluded that “If no substantial progress emerges soon from the talks, escalation of the arms race appears inevitable — if both sides wish to maintain a credible and viable second-strike assured-destruction capability against the other.” In other words, Canada’s arms control agenda could be threatened if the long-anticipated Soviet-U.S. talks on offensive and defensive weapons failed to produce results.