scholarly journals Offensive Weapons and the Future of Arms Control

2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 79-102
Author(s):  
Nancy Jane Teeple

With a focus on the strategic competition between the United States and Russia, this paper explores the prospects for the future of arms control under an intensifying nuclear security dilemma. The end of stability-enhancing agreements such as the INF Treaty and Open Skies has accelerated the arms race. What is the future of New START and are we likely to see any extension beyond 2021? The relationship between arms control and strategic stability is part of this evaluation, particularly with respect to how states view the concept framed within their national security interests. The provocative role that offensive – deterrence by denial – capabilities play in contributing to strategic instability is central to this study. This work looks particularly at new systems designed for asymmetric advantage, including those that can defeat strategic defences, such as longer-range cruise missiles and hypersonic vehicles. Under conditions of modernizations and upgrades to nuclear arsenals, including the entanglement of conventional and nuclear systems that can threaten a first strike, this work considers how a dialogue on limiting dangerous systems could be initiated between the US and Russia. Could New START be revised – or a new treaty established – to limit advances in cruise missile technology, hypersonics, missile defences, and tactical nuclear weapons?

Subject The US arms control agenda. Significance Despite having less than a year in office, President Barack Obama's administration is sustaining a high-profile arms control agenda in 2016. The administration wants to restore several damaged treaties with Russia, broaden Russia-China-US cooperation on various non-proliferation issues and leave Obama's successor a firm nuclear security architecture. Arms control is a consultative, long-term diplomatic process, and is susceptible to the political imperatives of more immediate regional crises. Impacts Tacit US support of Israeli nuclear opacity will undermine arms control efforts in the Middle East. Post-Obama arms control efforts are likely to focus on the security of nuclear material, rather than strategic arms reductions. Senate retirements will undermine US arms control advocacy in Congress. The United States will retain its nuclear arsenal indefinitely despite criticism from its allies.


Author(s):  
Natalia Shapiro

Two weeks after Joseph Biden took office as President, the U.S. and Russia extended the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty for five years. This landmark arms control treaty limits the number of strategic offensive weapons each country can have. A ‘window of opportunity’ for a new stage of strategic stability discussions on arms control has opened. Strategic competition between the world’s most powerful countries, escalating global and regional threats, accelerating technological advances in the military sphere, which hold the potential to have a transformative impact on arms forces and military conflicts, have given added urgency to the bilateral dialogue on arms control between the two nuclear superpowers. Political barriers to a new agreement are significant. The perilous state of U.S.-Russia relations, lack of trust and mutual suspicion make it more difficult for the two powers to have sustainable negotiations toward a new treaty. However, if political will is in place coupled with a realistic approach and the United States’ readiness to address Russia’s concerns, a follow-on agreement could be reached.


Author(s):  
Frédéric Grare

India’s relationship with the United States remains crucial to its own objectives, but is also ambiguous. The asymmetry of power between the two countries is such that the relationship, if potentially useful, is not necessary for the United States while potentially risky for India. Moreover, the shift of the political centre of gravity of Asia — resulting from the growing rivalry between China and the US — is eroding the foundations of India’s policy in Asia, while prospects for greater economic interaction is limited by India’s slow pace of reforms. The future of India-US relations lies in their capacity to evolve a new quid pro quo in which the US will formulate its expectations in more realistic terms while India would assume a larger share of the burden of Asia’ security.


2009 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 1125-1141 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Chen ◽  
J. Avise ◽  
B. Lamb ◽  
E. Salathé ◽  
C. Mass ◽  
...  

Abstract. A comprehensive numerical modeling framework was developed to estimate the effects of collective global changes upon ozone pollution in the US in 2050. The framework consists of the global climate and chemistry models, PCM (Parallel Climate Model) and MOZART-2 (Model for Ozone and Related Chemical Tracers v.2), coupled with regional meteorology and chemistry models, MM5 (Mesoscale Meteorological model) and CMAQ (Community Multi-scale Air Quality model). The modeling system was applied for two 10-year simulations: 1990–1999 as a present-day base case and 2045–2054 as a future case. For the current decade, the daily maximum 8-h moving average (DM8H) ozone mixing ratio distributions for spring, summer and fall showed good agreement with observations. The future case simulation followed the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) A2 scenario together with business-as-usual US emission projections and projected alterations in land use, land cover (LULC) due to urban expansion and changes in vegetation. For these projections, US anthropogenic NOx (NO+NO2) and VOC (volatile organic carbon) emissions increased by approximately 6% and 50%, respectively, while biogenic VOC emissions decreased, in spite of warmer temperatures, due to decreases in forested lands and expansion of croplands, grasslands and urban areas. A stochastic model for wildfire emissions was applied that projected 25% higher VOC emissions in the future. For the global and US emission projection used here, regional ozone pollution becomes worse in the 2045–2054 period for all months. Annually, the mean DM8H ozone was projected to increase by 9.6 ppbv (22%). The changes were higher in the spring and winter (25%) and smaller in the summer (17%). The area affected by elevated ozone within the US continent was projected to increase; areas with levels exceeding the 75 ppbv ozone standard at least once a year increased by 38%. In addition, the length of the ozone season was projected to increase with more pollution episodes in the spring and fall. For selected urban areas, the system projected a higher number of pollution events per year and these events had more consecutive days when DM8H ozone exceed 75 ppbv.


2018 ◽  
Vol 04 (02) ◽  
pp. 241-258 ◽  
Author(s):  
You Wang ◽  
Dingding Chen

Both China and the United States are international leaders in artificial intelligence (AI). Although there remains a significant gap between them in cutting-edge technologies, and they have adopted different methods of planning and implementation, both countries have been mobilizing national resources and formulating policies to promote AI development, so as to achieve a strategic advantage over the other, especially against the backdrop of ever more intense and complicated strategic competition between them in recent years. As an epitome of their changing relationship, Sino-U.S. competition in AI development is manifested in economic, political, security, technological and other fields. It is expected that artificial intelligence will become an even more important field of competition between China and the United States, and that the trends of AI development and competition will to some extent determine the future dynamics of their bilateral relations.


2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (7) ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Syed Muhammad Saad Zaidi ◽  
Adam Saud

In contemporary times, the geo-political agenda and geo-economic strategy of the world is being dominated by the ongoing US-China hegemonic competition. Where the United States is trying to prolong the ‘unipolar moment’ and deter the rise of China; China is trying to establish itself as the hegemon in the Eastern hemisphere, an alternate to the US. The entirely opposite interests of the two Great Powers have initiated a hostile confrontational competition for domination. This paper seeks to determine the future nature of the US-China relations; will history repeat itself and a bloody war be fought to determine the leader of the pack? or another prolonged Cold War will be fought, which will end when one side significantly weakens and collapses? Both dominant paradigms of International Relations, Realism and Liberalism, are used to analyze the future nature of the US-China relations.


2021 ◽  
Vol 70 (4/2020) ◽  
pp. 123-149
Author(s):  
Marina Kostic

Treaty between the United States of America and the Russian Federation on measures for further reduction and limitation of strategic offensive arms (“New START”) is the last pillar of the arms control regime on which the end of the Cold War and the new world order rested. Its expiration on 5 February 2021 is a top security challenge and indicates a possible new strategic arms race. However, can the United States and Russia still preserve the existing strategic arms control by extending the Treaty for another five years? What are the prospects, the opportunities and obstacles for this extension? What are the most pressing issues USA and Russia face with in order to preserve strategic arms control and are they willing to do so? In order to answer to these research questions author analyses several key issues that are of paramount importance for extension of the New START: nuclear modernization processes, invention of new weapons and emergence of new warfare domains; transparency and verification and broader confidence building measures; missile defence and prompt global strike; tactical nuclear weapons in Europe and Asia; general US-Russia relations which include question of democratic capacity; and broader influence of this Treaty on nuclear non-proliferation regime. By using content and discourse analysis author concludes that, although it is obvious that the extension of the New START would be primarily in favour of Russia and that the USA has not much to gain, the character of strategic stability in the Third Nuclear Age gives reasons to believe that the New START will be extended for another five years.


Author(s):  
A Subotin

Abstract. The demise of the bipolar system of international politics has revived interest in such closely related and contested terms as "superpower", "hegemon", "empire" and "imperialism". This article represents an attempt to define the most probable trend in the future evolution of the international system with regard to the role of the United States of America as the most prominent state power of today's world. This article seeks to analyse the US power posture in today's world politics by comparing its core capabilities to those of the classical empire of the previous century - the British Empire - with analytical emphasis on both the "hard power" and the "soft power" dimensions. The author maintains that the notion of US hegemony or even American Empire is still relevant despite a clear historic tendency of hegemonic decline seen throughout the second part of the 20th century. The United States still ranks high on the scale of most traditional power factors and, what is by far more important, they continue to be able to shape and control the scale and the volume of international exposure of all other major players within the framework of contemporary global international system. The relative decline of US influence upon world politics at the beginning of the new millennia has been effectively off-set by the profound change in the nature of American power which is now assuming the form of a structural dominance. The author's personal view is that US hegemony is not doomed to wane, given the enormous impact the United States have already made economically, politically and intellectually upon the post World War II international relations. The continuance of the US playing the pivotal role in the international politics of the 21st century will be dependent on the ability of the US political class to adapt to and to harness the social power of numerous non-state international actors that are due take over the leading role in the future world's politics.


Jurnal ICMES ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 179-196
Author(s):  
Firmanda Taufiq

Throughout 2018, relations between Turkey and the United States seemed to deteriorate. The leaders of the two countries issued sharp diplomatic statements and the US even imposed economic sanctions on Turkey. This article aims to analyze how the future of relations between Turkey and the United States. Cooperation between the two has a long historical side after the Cold War. Relations between the two countries are based on various interests, both economic, political, military and security interests. The theory used in this study is the theory of national interest. The US has great interests in the Middle East and Turkey is the front-line ally in achieving those interests. However, there are many US foreign policies that ignore the Turkish concern and create tensions between the two countries. On the contrary, Turkey also has considerable economic interests, but the role of the government elite (in this case, President Erdogan) has a significant influence in the determination of Turkish foreign policy. The findings of this study, although it will go through complex challenges and processes, the US and Turkey will continue to maintain their relations.


Author(s):  
Jon B. Mikolashek

Patton’s wound is slow to heal; during this time, however, Patton is promoted to colonel. Discharged from the hospital, Patton returns to duty as the war ends. He hopes for the Medal of Honor but is awarded the Distinguished Service Cross. With the war over, Patton spends the rest of his time overseas maintaining discipline, giving lectures on armored warfare and the future of tanks, and preparing for his return to the United States and his family. Patton prepares himself also for the fight to keep tanks in an independent Tank Corps as a vital weapons system for the US Army.


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