Some Thoughts on the Logic of Strategic Arms Control: Three Perspectives

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lewis Dunn ◽  
Andrey Baklitskiy ◽  
Tong Zhao
Keyword(s):  
Arms Control ◽  
Nuclear Disarmament ◽  
Nuclear Deterrence ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Lewis A

Who are the proponents of strategic arms control? Why do they advocate it? What are their major assumptions? What are the important uncertainties of arms control? What is the relationship between strategic arms control and nuclear disarmament and nuclear deterrence? This paper, the fifth in UNIDIR’s nuclear dialogue series, explores these questions building on the perspectives of US, Chinese and Russian experts—Lewis A. Dunn, Andrey Baklitskiy and Tong Zhao—and drawing in the views of diverse and informed participants in UNIDIR’s Dialogue on Nuclear Disarmament, Deterrence and Strategic Arms Control.

Some Thoughts on the Logic of Strategic Arms Control: Three Perspectives

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lewis Dunn ◽  
Andrey Baklitskiy ◽  
Tong Zhao
Keyword(s):  
Arms Control ◽  
Nuclear Disarmament ◽  
Nuclear Deterrence ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Lewis A

Who are the proponents of strategic arms control? Why do they advocate it? What are their major assumptions? What are the important uncertainties of arms control? What is the relationship between strategic arms control and nuclear disarmament and nuclear deterrence? This paper, the fifth in UNIDIR’s nuclear dialogue series, explores these questions building on the perspectives of US, Chinese and Russian experts—Lewis A. Dunn, Andrey Baklitskiy and Tong Zhao—and drawing in the views of diverse and informed participants in UNIDIR’s Dialogue on Nuclear Disarmament, Deterrence and Strategic Arms Control.

scholarly journals Identifying Collaborative Actions to Reduce Today’s Nuclear Dangers

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Arms Control ◽  
Nuclear Disarmament ◽  
Nuclear Deterrence

Key propositions, findings, and recommendations from the UNIDIR dialogue on Nuclear Disarmament, Nuclear Deterrence, and Strategic Arms Control.

A Bifurcated Global Nuclear Order

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ramesh Thakur
Keyword(s):  
Public Opinion ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
Arms Control ◽  
Full Range ◽  
Nuclear Deterrence ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
The World ◽  
The United Nations

The very destructiveness of nuclear weapons makes them unusable for ethical and military reasons. The world has placed growing restrictions on the full range of nuclear programs and activities. But with the five NPT nuclear powers failing to eliminate nuclear arsenals, other countries acquiring the bomb, arms control efforts stalled, nuclear risks climbing, and growing awareness of the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of nuclear war, the United Nations adopted a new treaty to ban the bomb. Some technical anomalies between the 1968 and 2017 treaties will need to be harmonized and the nuclear-armed states’ rejection of the ban treaty means it will not eliminate any nuclear warheads. However, it will have a significant normative impact in stigmatizing the possession, use and threat of use of nuclear weapons and serve as a tool for civil society to mobilize domestic and world public opinion against the doctrine of nuclear deterrence.

5. Nuclear deterrence and arms control

2020 ◽  
pp. 60-79
Author(s):  
Joseph M. Siracusa
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Long Range ◽  
Arms Control ◽  
Nuclear Deterrence ◽  
World War ◽  
Nuclear Age ◽  
Ballistic Missiles ◽  
Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles

Did the nuclear revolution contribute to an era of peace? ‘Nuclear deterrence and arms control’ looks at the post-World War II stalemate and Cold War détente. The concept of deterrence did not come up until the second decade of the nuclear age. The introduction of thermonuclear weapons and nuclear-tipped, long-range intercontinental ballistic missiles turned foreign policy on its head. Mutual deterrence was less of a policy than a reality. With the Cuban Missile Crisis, Moscow mounted a show of defiance at a moment when it was relatively weak. The Carter and Reagan administrations were beset by external and internal disagreements, but prudence and luck prevailed.

5. Soviet–American Relations: Avoiding Hot War and the Search for Stability

2020 ◽  
pp. 145-158
Author(s):  
John W. Young ◽  
John Kent
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Arms Control ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
German Question ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter examines US–Soviet relations during the Cold War as well as the question of the genuineness of efforts by the United States and the Soviet Union to achieve disarmament and resolve troublesome disputes. It begins with a discussion of the German question, noting that Germany’s future position was vital to the future of Europe and a particular concern of the Soviets. It then considers the progress of arms control and peace efforts by the United States and the Soviet Union, before concluding with an analysis of the relationship of arms control to the use of armaments in hot war and to some aspects of fighting the Cold War.

13. Military Security

2018 ◽  
pp. 191-205
Author(s):  
Michael Sheehan
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Traditional Approach ◽  
Arms Control ◽  
Nuclear Deterrence ◽  
Military Security ◽  
Important Field ◽  
Key Aspects ◽  
The Military ◽  
The Impact

This chapter discusses the continuing importance of military security, noting how International Relations has historically seen security almost entirely in terms of the military dimension. It first examines the impact of the broadening of the concept of security on approaches to the study of its military dimension before considering the key aspects of the traditional approach to military security and some of the most common ways in which states have sought to acquire it historically, such as war, alliances, and nuclear deterrence. The chapter then explores some of the difficulties in acquiring military security and how its pursuit can sometimes reduce, rather than increase, security. In particular, it analyses arms control as a means of achieving military security. Finally, it shows that military security remains an important field to study, even within a significantly broadened understanding of security as a multifaceted concept.

International Humanitarian Law and Arms Control

1988 ◽  
Vol 28 (267) ◽  
pp. 491-504 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Frei
Keyword(s):  
Arms Control ◽  
Red Cross ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Chemical Weapon ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Public Attention ◽  
Nuclear Arms Control ◽  
Self Examination ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Proper Consideration

For almost two decades, the International Red Cross Movement has been engaged in a continuing process of self-examination regarding its contribution to peace and disarmament. At the same time, public attention is being focused on, and sometimes even captivated by, various bilateral and multilateral efforts to achieve progress in nuclear and non-nuclear arms control in fields such as the reduction of strategic and intermediate-range nuclear weapons, nuclear and chemical weapon-free zones, confidence- and security-building measures, and so on. The two lines of action are usually dealt with individually without proper consideration of the manifold interconnections existing between them. Only recently have efforts been made to clarify the relationship between the two. The purpose of this article is to bring them together and to do so by asking the question: To what extent can the effort to promote and implement international humanitarian law be seen as a contribution in terms of arms control?

The Great Debate

2018 ◽  
pp. 333-349
Author(s):  
Daniel Deudney
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Arms Control ◽  
State System ◽  
Nuclear Deterrence ◽  
World State ◽  
Great Debate ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Political Question

In the wake of the development of nuclear weapons, the survival of civilization, and perhaps humanity, hinges on answering the “nuclear political question”: Which political arrangements are needed to provide security from large-scale nuclear violence? Over the course of the nuclear era, a great debate on this question has occurred in three quite different rounds. In the first round, “nuclear one world” ideas about the obsolescence of the state-system and necessity of a world state predominated, but reached both conceptual and practical impasses. In the second round, across much of the Cold War, a trinity of deterrence-centered approaches, simple deterrence, war strategism, and arms control, prevailed. In the currently unfolding third round, proliferation and leakage have weakened confidence in nuclear deterrence, while both war strategism and arms control have become more radical, offering opposite “bombs away” answers of coercive counter-proliferation and preventive war, and deep arms control and nuclear abolition.

Bargaining over Weapons: Justice and Effectiveness in Arms Control Negotiations

2014 ◽  
Vol 19 (3) ◽  
pp. 426-458 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cecilia Albin ◽  
Daniel Druckman
Keyword(s):  
Distributive Justice ◽  
Procedural Justice ◽  
Arms Control ◽  
Statistical Analyses ◽  
Multilateral Negotiations ◽  
The Relationship

This article explores the relationship between justice and effectiveness in bilateral and multilateral arms control negotiations. A set of hypotheses, derived from earlier research about the impacts of procedural and distributive justice on negotiation outcomes is evaluated. The sample consists of twenty cases, ten bilateral and ten multilateral. The results of statistical analyses show strong effects of procedural justice on the effectiveness of bilateral, but not multilateral, negotiations. Further analyses indicate that the effects are largely accounted for by half of the bilateral cases. Case-by-case analyses reveal some of the conditions that explain the correlation between pj principles and effective outcomes. Distributive justice correlated with more substantial agreements in the multilateral cases. Reasons for the limited effects of procedural justice on multilateral outcomes are discussed. The article concludes with more general implications and suggestions for further research.

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