Hans M. Kristensen

Hans Møller Kristensen (born April 7, 1961) is director of the Nuclear Information Project at the Federation of American Scientists. He writes about nuclear weapons policy there; he is coauthor of the Nuclear Notebook^[2] column in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists,^[3] and the World Nuclear Forces appendix in Stockholm International Peace Research Institute's annual SIPRI Yearbook.^[4]

His work especially relies on using the Freedom of Information Act to compel US government agencies to release documents. He maintains an on-line overview of the number of nuclear weapons in the world,^[5] and writes frequently on the FAS Strategic Security Blog.^[6]

He is critical of the development and deployment of nuclear weaponry by the United States, the United Kingdom, and France.^[7] In 2005 he discovered a draft document on a Pentagon website that proposed a change in U.S. nuclear doctrine to include the possibility of a preemptive nuclear strike. Even though Secretary Rumsfeld had not approved the change, its publication provoked a reaction from some members of Congress.^[8] In 2022, US President Joe Biden announced that the United States would use nuclear weapons as a first strike in "extreme circumstance," without any objection from Kristensen or the Federation of American Scientists.^[9]