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Begin New Search Topic Defense Policy Political Geography United States Content Type Working Paper

321. Revising the Two-Major Theater War Standard

Author:
Hans Binnendijk and Richard L. Kugler
Publication Date:
04-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
One of the toughest challenges facing the Department of Defense (DOD) is translating strategic policy into concrete guidelines for preparing U.S. military forces. A defense planning standard is a set of judgments and directives for performing this key function. Normally this standard has three associated roles: to determine the size of forces and their main missions; to establish program and budgetary priorities; and to inform the Congress and the public of the rationale behind the defense strategy and force posture. For example, the Kennedy administration standard was a two and one-half war strategy, and the Nixon administration had a one and one-half war strategy. To guide its planning, the Carter administration used the standard of multitheater war with the Soviet Union in Europe and the Persian Gulf. The Reagan administration applied an Illustrative Planning Scenario that contemplated global war with the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact
Topic:
Security and Defense Policy
Political Geography:
United States and Europe

322. Renovating U.S. Strategic Arms Control Policy

Author:
Richard D. Sokolsky
Publication Date:
02-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
There has been a tectonic shift in the strategic landscape since the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) negotiations concluded in the early 1990s. The Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact are defunct. America and Russia are no longer enemies and the nuclear arms race between the two countries is, for all intents and purposes, over. The threat of a surprise nuclear attack has all but vanished along with any plausible scenario between the two countries that could escalate to a nuclear war. The strategic warning time for reconstitution of a credible conventional military threat to Europe can now be measured in years. The likelihood that Russia could marshal the economic resources for clandestine production of new nuclear weapon systems on a militarily significant scale is extremely remote. The most serious security threats emanating from Russia today—poorly safeguarded nuclear warheads and materials and the potential proliferation of such material and expertise to states of concern—reflect profound weakness. Simply put, the proliferation risks attendant to a Russia in the throes of a long-term structural crisis are a far more serious security threat than SS–18 heavy missiles destroying U.S. intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) in a preemptive first strike.
Topic:
Defense Policy and Nuclear Weapons
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, and Europe

323. The U.S. Strategic Posture Review: Issues for the New Administration

Author:
M. Elaine Bunn and Richard D. Sokolsky
Publication Date:
02-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
Before the next administration decides on a strategic force posture, national missile defense (NMD) architecture, and arms control objectives for both offensive and defensive forces, it needs to grapple with questions of strategy and doctrine. Any consideration of alternative defense strategies and their implications for nuclear forces and missile defenses should start with a basic set of questions: For what purposes will we need nuclear weapons and missile defenses in the future and under what conditions would these missions be carried out? What countries will pose strategic threats to vital U.S. national interests over the next 10–20 years? What hostile actions are we trying to deter, and what are the proper character, size, and mix of nuclear weapons and defenses in deterring these threats?
Topic:
Security and Defense Policy
Political Geography:
United States

324. The Strategic Implications of a Nuclear-Armed Iran

Author:
Judith S. Yaphe and Kori N. Schake
Publication Date:
05-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
Scholars and other spcialists on Iran have argued about that country's political intentions and strategic amibitions since the overthrow of Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi and the establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1979. In the 1980s Iran's efforts to export its revolution and support international terrorism raised the question of whether a moderate Islamic republic that was able to deal with the West could ever exist. The death of the Ayatollah Khomeini in 1989 and the succession of Ali Hashimi-Rafsanjani as president raised new issues for the 1990s. As the European and American oil and investment communities considered the race to open Iran commercially, scholars and diplomats debated Iranian efforts to recover from nearly a decade of war and revolution. They compared the merits of the European approach of initiating critical dialogue with the U.S. policy of containing and isolating Iran. Neither approach seemed to have much impact, both conceded, and Iranians continued to sort out their domestic political agenda and to decide how best to protect their strategic and national interests. The U.S. Government, for example, tried to estimate how much time and money Iran would need to modernize its military and to acquire new weapons systems despite projected low oil prices and the country's need to rebuild its damaged and neglected civilian and industrial infrastructure.1 The assumption underlying the U.S. projections was that Iran would be pursuing weapons of mass destruction, especially nuclear technology and longrange missile systems.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, International Law, Nuclear Weapons, and Religion
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, Iran, and Middle East

325. Nasty, Brutish and Long: America's War on Terrorism

Author:
Ivo H. Daalder and James M. Lindsay
Publication Date:
12-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Brookings Institution
Abstract:
The post–cold war era ended abruptly on the morning of September 11, 2001. From the moment terrorists turned jetliners into weapons of mass destruction, the United States was inescapably engaged in a new “war” against global terrorism. The Bush administration now intends to make that war the central organizing principle of America's foreign and defense policies.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
United States and America

326. The Aid and Reconstruction Agenda for Afghanistan

Author:
Michael E. O'Hanlon
Publication Date:
12-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Brookings Institution
Abstract:
With the Taliban and al Qaeda largely defeated, a temporary coalition government taking power in Afghanistan, the Freedom Bridge near Uzbekistan finally open to relief efforts, and foreign donors promising significant aid more generally, the future looks increasingly promising for the Afghan people. But many challenges remain, even beyond the immediate priority of completing the military operation. Without rapid delivery of sufficient food, shelter, and medical supplies, Afghanistan could still experience a humanitarian catastrophe this winter. Without great care to shore up the coalition government, it could fail, just as state-building efforts have failed with disastrous consequences in places such as Angola, Rwanda, and Somalia in recent years. Without sufficient delivery of reconstruction aid, Afghanistan could remain mired in the same poverty and chaos that gave rise to the Taliban in the first place.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
Afghanistan, United States, Uzbekistan, Rwanda, Somalia, and Angola

327. Pakistan's Madrassahs: Ensuring a System of Education not Jihad

Author:
P.W. Singer
Publication Date:
11-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Brookings Institution
Abstract:
Pakistan's religious schools, Madrassahs, trace their traditions back through nearly a thousand years of Islamic teaching. Over the last decades, however, they increasingly have played a role contrary to their original intent. Founded as centers of learning for the next generation of Islamic scholars and clerics, the schools now increasingly dominate the education sphere. The present danger is that a minority of these schools have built extremely close ties with radical militant groups and play a critical role in sustaining the international terrorist network. Madrassahs. displacement of a public education system is also worrisome to the stability of the Pakistani state and its future economic prospects.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
Pakistan and United States

328. Globalization in the Aftermath: Target, Casualty, Callous Bystander?

Author:
Lael Brainard
Publication Date:
11-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Brookings Institution
Abstract:
No sooner had Americans digested the horror of September 11 than voices on both sides of the debate began making the connection to globalization. Advocates argued that the attacks were directed at globalization, or, if not the target, globalization was the chief casualty. Others bemoaned an even more troubling possibility: globalization would callously continue its crusade unmoved by the events of September 11.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
United States and America

329. Missile Defence and European Security

Author:
François Heisbourg, Klaus Becher, Alexander Pikayev, and Ivo H. Daalder
Publication Date:
05-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS)
Abstract:
European NATO countries have been spectators to the debate about defending the US against ballistic missile attacks. While there have been national differences in Europe's reactions to the national missile defence (NMD) programme, it is obvious that most Europeans don't like it. The French seem somewhat more convinced than others that missile defence is inherently foolish and unworkable. Some British experts seem to insist more than others that any programme that might undermine NATO's nuclear deterrence and strategic unity should be avoided. And perhaps Germans, more than others, worry about perceived dangers to the ABM and other arms control treaties, and generally about relations with Russia. Most Europeans at present believe that US defence against long-range ballistic missiles is a slap in the face for Russia, a dangerous provocation for China and an inadequate response to the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and missile technology.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, NATO, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, China, Europe, and Germany

330. Defending America: Redefining the Conceptual Borders of Homeland Defense

Author:
Anthony H. Cordesman
Publication Date:
09-2000
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
There is a wide spectrum of potential threats to the American homeland that do not involve the threat of overt attacks by states using long-range missiles or conventional military forces. Such threats include covert attacks by state actors, state use of proxies, independent terrorist and extremist attacks by foreign groups or individuals, and independent terrorist and extremist attacks by residents of the US. These threats are currently limited in scope and frequency. No pattern of actual attacks on US territory has yet emerged that provides a clear basis for predicting how serious any given form of attack will be in the future, what means of attack will be used, or how lethal new forms of attack will be if they are successful.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, Nuclear Weapons, Terrorism, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
United States and America