Published Aerospace Power Journal - Winter 1997

The New Tug-of-War: Congress, the Executive Branch and National Security by Jeremy D. Rosner. The Brookings Institution, Department 029, Washington, D.C. 20042, 1995, 118 pages, $10.95.

Collective Insecurity-U.S. Defense Policy and the New World Disorder by Stephen J. Cimbala. Greenwood Press, 88 Post Road West, Westport, Connecticut 06881, 1995, 240 pages, $59.95.

Nuclear Proliferation: Diminishing Threat? by William H. Kincade. Institute for National Security Studies, US Air Force Academy, 2354 Fairchild Drive, Suite 5D33, Colorado Springs, Colorado 80840, 1995, 56 pages, free.

Strategic Views from the Second Tier-The Nuclear Weapons Policies of France, Britain, and China edited by John C. Hopkins and Weixing Hu. Transaction Publishers, Rutgers-The State University, New Brunswick, New Jersey 08903, 1995, 279 pages, $21.95.

The United States, Japan and the Future of Nuclear Weapons edited by Rosemarie Philips. Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2400 N. Street, NW, Washington, D.C. 20037, 1995, 179 pages, $12.95.

The cold war justified the possession and stockpiling of nuclear weapons. Over the decades, concern about these weapons grew to the point that some nuclear-weapon nations created the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), and most of them agreed to its provisions. However, after signing the NPT, these same nations quadrupled their inventories. Now that the cold war is over and one-time adversaries are "partners for peace," many parties feel that the five nuclear powers no longer need their very large nuclear arsenals. However, these nations argue that (1) they have to keep them because others have them, (2) they need them to defend against strategic uncertainties, (3) they cannot be sure that Russian democratization and marketplace reform will work, and (4) they need to ensure that rogue states like Iraq and North Korea do not develop nuclear weapons and pose a threat to international peace and security. The five books reviewed here counter these arguments with answers, solutions, and information that increase immeasurably the small number of facts regarding the role of nuclear weapons within national security dimensions.

In The New Tug-of-War, Jeremy Rosner, special assistant to President Clinton from 1993 to 1994, makes a detailed analysis of post-cold-war changes on national security policy between the National Security Council (White House) and Capitol Hill. Because the Hill believes that nuclear warfare is no longer inevitable, it is paring budgets, shifting security spending, and decreasing deficit pressures accordingly. Rosner contends that Congress is intent on dominating the budget and is not likely to relinquish control again. Therefore, the more savvy members of the executive branch (especially the Department of Defense [DOD]) should pay close attention to upcoming budget battles because they are likely to be contentious and could lead to a feeling of insecurity in a nation obsessed with global security.

Collective Insecurity is one of Prof. Stephen Cimbala's better works. He offers an excellent analysis of where US nuclear warfare strategy has been, up to the demise of the Soviet Union, and then describes in superb detail the major problems of nuclear disarmament in a time when nations professing to abhor nuclear weapons are proliferating them. Chapter 7 offers an excellent synopsis of the book, with its description of nuclear realism, a concept that helped to stabilize a bipolar world but now-for all the same reasons-threatens to destabilize the post-cold-war international environment of multipolarism.

Cimbala also addresses what the military's coercive capability has become and will continue to become with the elimination of nuclear weaponry. "Military persuasion" is the use of armed forces for purposes other than destruction, and these armed forces use either "coercive" or "basically noncoercive" actions to carry out their missions. Coercive actions include blockades, ultimatums, maneuvers accompanied by threat, and faits accomplis, while noncoercive actions run the gamut from civic actions to military diplomacy (confidence-building measures). Regardless, nuclear warfare is a thing of the past. Future warfare, according to Cimbala, is "likely to be marked by a mixture of high technology equipment and low technology strategy."

William Kincade, associate professor at American University in Washington, D.C., discusses in Nuclear Proliferation: Diminishing Threat how the pace of nuclear-weapons testing and deployment has slowed in recent decades while nuclear knowledge has increased. This knowledge illustrates a point neglected in much nonproliferation literature: the crucial demarcation line in the current phase of the nuclear era lies between nuclear-weapons initiatives and viable, deployable nuclear forces. Kincade calls for a new mind-set in the examination of nonproliferation opportunities and techniques for ending nuclear weaponry, but he urges a very different perspective.

The Clinton administration has already adopted this attitude by discarding the Bush administration's threat-based approach in dealing with former Soviet republics that possess nuclear weapons. Clinton used a conciliatory policy with the Ukraine that proved successful in eliminating that country's nuclear weapons. The administration's approach to North Korea's drive to build a nuclear weapon, emphasizing rewards rather than punishment, has met with mixed results so far. Only toward Iraq has the administration kept up the pressure, using the stick every time Saddam gives only partial or temporary compliance. According to Kincade, any way of handling nonproliferation by an administration will cause problems until we can improve the outdated mind-set of the cold war.

Strategic Views from the Second Tier, edited by Dr. John Hopkins and Dr. Weixing Hu, is a collection of papers presented in June 1993 during a research conference that explored the new strategic environment that "second tier" nations (France, Britain, and China) now find themselves in following the end of the cold war and the collapse of the Soviet Union. Their roles as independent deterrents in international politics have either been neglected or taken for granted. For example, France, Britain, and China account for less than 10 percent of the nuclear strength of the United States and probably 7 percent of that of the former Soviet Union. However, as the former Soviet Union and America draw down their nuclear stockpiles, this percentage gap will narrow considerably-to about 50 percent by the year 2000. This ratio, according to the authors, will influence future nuclear strategies and arms control. These three countries will have to be considered in all future negotiations if global nuclear disarmament is to become a reality.

Strategic Views from the Second Tier is a very important book, not only for examining nuclear-weapons policies of second-tier nations but also for understanding their rationale, deterrent strategy, and arms control policies. Because there is very little literature on these subjects, this work makes a significant contribution.

The Future of Nuclear Weapons presents the June 1993 conference report of the US-Japan Study Group on Arms Control and Nonproliferation after the Cold War. The purpose of the meeting was to deepen the understanding between the United States and Japan on sensitive arms control and nonproliferation issues since many people feel that Japan will go nuclear to protect itself as the US withdraws its presence from Japan, Korea, and Okinawa. Both sides wanted to head off potential conflicts by identifying opportunities for constructive partnership in promoting progress toward a nuclear-free world.

The group addressed seven key issues, the first of which entailed the desirability of eliminating nuclear weapons. The group concluded that such a proposal "is a plan for making the world safe for conventional warfare." A nuclear-disarmed world would be inherently unstable because, at the first sign that one state might be in noncompliance, the others would follow suit, lest they acquire or reacquire nuclear weapons too late.

The second key issue dealt with the future of the NPT. Since neither nation could agree, the study group urged that the nuclear powers give nonnuclear countries some consideration by concluding a comprehensive test ban treaty and further reducing nuclear weapons. Issues three through six addressed overcoming obstacles to a comprehensive test ban, dismantling and disposing of nuclear weapons, cutting off exports of weapons-grade fissile material, and understanding the role of civilian plutonium production in the context of global and regional energy needs and nonproliferation concerns.

The seventh issue dealt with arms control and the reduction of tension in East Asia. Japan is eager to use the regional forums of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) to discuss issues of tension reduction. The United States has always been cool to the idea of regional security dialogues, viewing them as a potential threat to the role of US security in the region. However, that attitude is changing, and some progress is being made to expand the dialogue and reduce the nuclear-acquisition needs of nations in the region.

These five books make an important contribution to the issues of nonproliferation and the reduction and final elimination of nuclear weapons. Each postulates a world in which nuclear warfare is not an option. Whether this assumption will make operations other than war (OOTW) the wars of the future or will make conventional wars like Desert Storm the norm, no one knows. However, all the books stress that the day of deterrence is quickly coming to an end. Some of the books entertain the possibility of a new wave of nuclear-weapons acquisition by countries who would challenge American military power. A retired Indian army chief of staff who was discussing lessons of the Gulf War allegedly said, "Do not fight the Americans without nuclear weapons." Such statements do not augur well for the future of warfare. Policy planners should take note of these books and use their well-thought-out ideas to help determine whether the threat of nuclear warfare can really be put to rest or whether it will continue to be the sword we cannot sheath.

Lt Col D. G. Bradford, USAF
Maxwell AFB, Alabama