A refereed journal concerned with the spread of nuclear, chemical, biological, and conventional weapons. Featuring viewpoints, articles, and reports on programs, treaties and export controls, terrorism, and the economic and environmental effects of weapons proliferation.

Updated: Jul 13, 2008

Summer 2003 • Volume 10 • Number 2
Abstracts

Articles

German National Identity and WMD Proliferation
By Harald Müller

U.S.-German differences over nonproliferation policy, highlighted by the 2002-2003 Iraqi crisis, are not just a spat between two allies. Instead, they reflect deep-seated differences between the two countries and their leaders on both the causes of WMD proliferation and the best ways to counter it. Far from being the result of short-term political calculations, the present German position represents a half-century of policy evolution in which Germany emerged from being the main target of nonproliferation policy into a proactive advocate of the international nonproliferation regime.

This article by Harald Müller of the Peace Research Institute Frankfurt reviews this evolution and describes present German attitudes and strategic preferences regarding proliferation and nonproliferation. Arguing that a constructivist approach is best suited to explaining German nonproliferation policy, Müller argues that German national identity and role concepts have evolved in a way that puts Germany at odds with the current U.S. leadership. Germany is now moving away from the traditional power politics, emphasis on military force, and unilateral decisionmaking that characterize current U.S. nonproliferation policy. Given the deep ideational roots of German policy, Müller concludes that U.S.-German disagreement is likely to prove enduring, not temporary.
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Chinese-Pakistani Nuclear/Missile Ties and Balance of Power Politics
By T.V. Paul

As China emerges as a stakeholder great power, its nonproliferation policy has become more attuned to maintaining its status, which means outwardly supporting norms prohibiting nuclear acquisition by new states. Yet many analysts argue that regional and global balance of power considerations simultaneously pull Chinese policy in other directions, pointing to China's persistent support for Pakistani nuclear and missile programs.

T.V. Paul of McGill University argues that Beijing's motivations in transferring nuclear and missile materials and technology to Pakistan derive from its concerns about regional balance of power in South Asia and are part of a strategy of containment in its enduring rivalry with India. Paul asserts that the tension between China's role as a great power that favors the international system and its interest in balancing the rising power of India explains the current contradictions in Chinese nonproliferation policy in South Asia.
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Running in Place: An Institutional Analysis of U.S. Nonproliferation Organization Since the Cold War
By Amy B. Zegart

In the post-9/11 world, WMD proliferation threats include regional rivals, rogue states, and more than a dozen global terrorist organizations. As a result, nonproliferation policy challenges are not just more prominent today than they have been in the past, they are also more varied. American policymakers confront a host of thorny new issues, chief among them the protection of the U.S. homeland, safeguarding Russian fissile materials, and managing export controls in a fast-paced technological age.

This article by Amy B. Zegart of the School of Public Policy and Social Research at the University of California, Los Angeles, argues that while nonproliferation threats have changed, U.S. government organization for nonproliferation has not adapted adequately. Zegart argues that the U.S. government remains poorly equipped to deal with proliferation because of the fragmented structure of American democracy, human nature, the dynamics of bureaucratic organization, and the nature of nonproliferation policy. She concludes that if the United States is to better organize its efforts to combat WMD proliferation, reformers need to recognize fleeting windows of opportunity when they arise, yet resist the temptation to focus narrowly on problems at hand. Instead they need to concentrate on the fundamentals: day-to-day coordination, programmatic coherence, effective leadership, and budgetary management.
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Controlling Unmanned Aerial Vehicles: New Challenges
By Dennis M. Gormley and Richard Speier

The use of the Hellfire missile-armed Predator in Afghanistan raises important questions, not only about how unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) will help shape America's military transformation, but also about to what extent other countries or terrorist groups might emulate U.S. actions.

In this article, Dennis M. Gormley of the Center for Nonproliferation Studies and Richard Speier, an independent consultant on proliferation issues, analyze the large global inventory of UAVs and anti-ship cruise missiles, loopholes in the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), and the last decade's quantum leap in dual-use technologies. They argue that these developments raise the possibility of a knowledgeable person or small group building a simple, autonomous, self-guided cruise missile with a significant payload, possibly capable of delivering WMD. The authors conclude that cruise missile and UAV proliferation is an underappreciated challenge to international and U.S. security.
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EU Enlargement: Implications for EU and Multilateral Export Controls
By Scott Jones

As a consequence of the West's complicity in arming Iraq during the 1980s, U.S., European, and multilateral export controls have been strengthened. But it is at the level of the European Union (EU) that export controls have undergone their most radical change with the creation of an EU dual-use export control regime. While the EU's dual-use regime is binding on all member and prospective member states, the less developed export control systems in the candidate countries that are slated to join the EU in 2004 create potential weak points in the newly expanded internal market.

This article by Scott Jones, of the Center for International Trade and Security at the University of Georgia, examines the current status of the export control system of the EU and ongoing development and assistance efforts in candidate states. It also addresses the logistical and policy ramifications of multilateral regime membership, with particular emphasis on the accession of regime nonmembers. The article concludes by suggesting that the export control challenges posed by an enlarged EU may offer another venue to address common security threats at the European and multilateral levels.
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Viewpoint

No First Use of Nuclear Weapons
By Harold A. Feiveson and Ernst Jan Hogendoorn

Many analysts believe that nothing would make the use of nuclear weapons by terrorists or states more likely than their prior use by the United States or any other country. They argue that once the post-1945 nuclear taboo is broken, it could open the door to widespread nuclear use. Reflecting this point of view, the United States has generally disavowed the use of nuclear weapons except in extreme circumstances. At the same time, this U.S. disavowal has also been hedged to allow the greatest possible latitude for nuclear use under certain circumstances.

In this viewpoint, Harold A. Feiveson and Ernst Jan Hogendoorn of the Program on Science and Global Security at the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University argue that the policies of the Bush administration, which have further hedged the U.S. commitment not to use nuclear weapons first, are unwise. In the global context of emerging terrorist nuclear threats, regional conflicts, and rogue leadership, Feiveson and Hogendoorn contend that the United States needs not only to stop the persistent hedging, but reverse course and adopt a stark, unambiguous no-first-use policy. It would be a serious misstep for the United States, the authors conclude, to distance itself any more from a no-first-use policy on nuclear weapons, as the Bush administration seems inclined to do.
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Seeking a Better Approach to Space Security
By Zhong Jing

With the rapid development of advanced technologies and the increasing blurring of civilian and military technologies--particularly with the extensive use of satellites in high technology warfare--space security and its relationship to global stability have become a major topic of debate at the international level. The use of outer space has become part and parcel of the everyday activities of many states in areas such as telecommunications, navigation, meteorology, remote sensing, and, especially, high technology development. As a result, secure access to space has become a necessity for economic, social, and cultural development.

This viewpoint by Zhong Jing from the National Defense University in Beijing, discusses some of the challenges facing the international community as it attempts to manage the future development of outer space. Jing argues that current U.S. policies will lead to the militarization of space and seriously impede its use for economic and developmental purposes. The viewpoint concludes that the best way to ensure space security and allow the peaceful use of space by all nations is to conclude a legally binding international agreement banning the weaponization of space.
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Report

U.S.-Russian Security Cooperation and SORT
By Stephen J. Cimbala

Those who support the May 2002 Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty (SORT) between Russia and the United States contend that it preserves and improves strategic stability while reducing the numbers and cost of both states' deployed nuclear arsenals. Whether the treaty will produce the results its advocates contend, however, depends at least in part on whether either or both countries will, or should, deploy missile defenses.

This report by Stephen J. Cimbala of Pennsylvania State University, Delaware County considers how SORT reductions would affect U.S. and Russian security by comparing alternative U.S. and Russian SORT-compliant force postures. It considers the implications of introducing various levels of antimissile defenses into the equation of U.S.-Russian offensive force reductions. The report concludes by analyzing the relationship between offensive force reductions and pending defense deployments and the possible impact of such deployments on the U.S.-Russian deterrence relationship.
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Statements of fact and opinion expressed in The Nonproliferation Review are the responsibility of the authors alone and do not imply the endorsement of the editors, the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, or the Monterey Institute of International Studies.

The Nonproliferation Review ISSN 1073-6700
Copyright © 2003 by Monterey Institute of International Studies