Asia has the world's highest concentration of nuclear weapons and the most significant recent developments related to nuclear proliferation, as well as the world's most critical conflicts and considerable political instability. The containment and prevention of nuclear proliferation, especially in Asia, continues to be a grave concern for the international community. This book provides a comprehensive overview of the state of nuclear arsenals, nuclear ambitions and nuclear threats across different parts of Asia. It covers the Middle East (including Israel), China, India-Pakistan and their confrontation, as well as North Korea. It discusses the conventional warfare risks, risks from non-state armed groups, and examines the attempts to limit and control nuclear weapons, both international initiatives and American diplomacy and interventions. The book concludes by assessing the possibility of nuclear revival, the potential outcomes of international approaches to nuclear disarmament, and the efficacy of coercive diplomacy in containing nuclear proliferation.

The Maghreb--Morocco, Algeria, Libya, and Tunisia--is a region overburdened by unnecessary military expenditures. Despite persistent civil conflicts and militarized regimes in a number of countries in the region, there are actually few genuine external threats, and the armed forces are now largely used to maintain internal security.

A detailed country-by-country assessment of the effectiveness of military forces, and their impact on regional economics, shows that the region remains a mosaic of conflicting national ambitions, but strategic ambitions have been supplanted by internal conflicts, tensions, and politics. Declining military budgets are leading to declining military strength and capability, but they belie the Maghreb's potential for armed conflict and human suffering. Even though the Maghreb is a supplier of oil and natural gas, which usually ensures the attention of the West, this tragedy of arms gets little attention from the outside world. This means that the prospects for the region are continued wasteful military spending, and the resultant harm to national economic and political health.

More than ten million poison gas' shells, mortar bombs, etc., lie hidden in Europe, many of them relics from World War I. Some were fired and failed to detonate, others were abandoned in old ammunition dumps. Most retain their load of chemical warfare (CW) agents. They are turned up daily in the course of farming and construction. Many European nations have permanent departments concerned with their collection and destruction. Old munitions, when discovered, are usually heavily corroded and difficult to identify. Is it a CW munition? Or an explosive? If CW, what agent does it contain? Once identified, one has to select a destruction method. Some of the methods that have been proposed are less than perfect, and are often complicated by the presence of extraneous chemicals, either mixed with the CW agents during manufacture or formed over decades in the ground. Of particular interest are the insiders' reports on the German CW programmes of both World Wars, and the current status of Russian chemical armaments.

As the public increasingly questioned the war in Vietnam, a group of American scientists deeply concerned about the use of Agent Orange and other herbicides started a movement to ban what they called "ecocide."

David Zierler traces this movement, starting in the 1940s, when weed killer was developed in agricultural circles and theories of counterinsurgency were studied by the military. These two trajectories converged in 1961 with Operation Ranch Hand, the joint U.S.-South Vietnamese mission to use herbicidal warfare as a means to defoliate large areas of enemy territory.

Driven by the idea that humans were altering the world's ecology for the worse, a group of scientists relentlessly challenged Pentagon assurances of safety, citing possible long-term environmental and health effects. It wasn't until 1970 that the scientists gained access to sprayed zones confirming that a major ecological disaster had occurred. Their findings convinced the U.S. government to renounce first use of herbicides in future wars and, Zierler argues, fundamentally reoriented thinking about warfare and environmental security in the next forty years.

Incorporating in-depth interviews, unique archival collections, and recently declassified national security documents, Zierler examines the movement to ban ecocide as it played out amid the rise of a global environmental consciousness and growing disillusionment with the containment policies of the cold war era.

With the United States producing almost 90,000 AFVs during World War II, American tanks made up the bulk of those deployed by the western Allies, and were even supplied through the lend-lease scheme to the Soviet army on the Eastern Front. American Tanks of World War II explores the tanks, self-propelled guns, halftracks and armoured cars deployed by American forces, from the Torch landings in Algeria to the hard fighting in Normandy and the bitter Ardennes offensive. Organised chronologically by type, the entries include the M3 Stuart, the first American-crewed tank to engage the enemy in tank combat in the war; the ubiquitous M4 Sherman, which proved cheap and reliable and was built in great numbers and in many variants; the M22 Locust light tank, designed to be air-dropped in support of airborne units; and the M26 Pershing, a heavy tank that arrived late in the war and was capable of beating the best tanks Germany had to offer. There are also chapters on the many motor gun carriages used by US forces, including the M8 HMC and T12 halftrack, both designed to provide close support for infantry. Illustrated with expert colour profile artworks for each entry and completed with technical specifications, American Tanks of World War II is a detailed reference guide for modellers and enthusiasts with an interest in World War II AFV technology.

This book provides an analysis of the development and deployment of chemical weapons from 700 BC to the present day. The First World War is examined in detail since it remains the most significant experience of the chemical threat, but the Second World War and post-war conflicts are also evaluated. Additionally, protocols attempting to control the proliferation and use of chemical weapons are assessed. Finally, the book examines the threat (real and imagined) from a chemical warfare attack today by rationally assessing to what extent terrorist groups around the world are capable of making and using such weapons.

During the 1980s, millions of ordinary individuals around the world mobilized in support of nuclear disarmament. Although U.S. President Ronald Reagan and Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev were not part of these grassroots movements, they too wanted to eliminate nuclear weapons. Nuclear abolitionism was a diverse and global phenomenon. In Dreams for a Decade, Stephanie L. Freeman draws on newly declassified material from multiple continents to examine nuclear abolitionists’ influence on the trajectory of the Cold War’s last decade. Freeman reveals that nuclear abolitionism played a significant yet unappreciated role in ending the Cold War. Grassroots and government nuclear abolitionists shifted U.S. and Soviet nuclear arms control paradigms from arms limitation to arms reduction. This paved the way for the reversal of the U.S.-Soviet nuclear arms race, which began with the landmark 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. European peace activists also influenced Gorbachev’s “common European home” initiative and support for freedom of choice in Europe, which prevented the Soviet leader from intervening to stop the 1989 East European revolutions. These revolutions ripped the fabric of the Iron Curtain, which had divided Europe for more than four decades. Despite their inability to eliminate nuclear weapons, grassroots and government nuclear abolitionists deserve credit for playing a pivotal role in the Cold War’s endgame. They also provide a model for enacting dramatic, positive change in a peaceful manner.

The threat of bioterrorism has become a major challenge for the twenty-?rst century. However, the potentials of infectious agents as bioweapons have been recognized for centuries. Throughout history there have been attempts to i- tiate infectious disease outbreaks and epidemics during warfare. In the last decade the attention of the biomedical community, as well as governments and the United Nations, has increasingly focused on the threat of bioterr- ism, especially the use of biological and/or chemical weapons against military and civilian populations. As an example, there is now much interest conce- ing microbial infection and bioterrorism in the medical microbiology and - munologycommunities. Thisvolumeaddressessuchconcernsandemphasizes bothbasicandclinicalconcepts, aswellasproblematicimplicationsofinfection by various microbes now recognized as potential bioterrorism agents. The ?rst chapter by Drs. Andrew Canons, Philip Amuso, and Burt And- son from the University of South Florida is an overview of the biotechnology of bioterrorismbothinthepublichealthresponsetopossibleactsofbioterrorism, aswellasfortheconcernsaboutthemisuseofbiotechnology. Thesecondch- ter is a historical perspective of microbial bioterrorism by Dr. Steven Morse, Director of the Bioterrorism Division at the Center for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, GA. This chapter describes in detail historical aspects concerning the early use of biological agents in warfare, development and international conventions to prohibit the use of such weapons, and a brief - scription of important incidents of infectious agents as bioterrorist agents and use during the last few centuries. The next chapter by Dr. Sandra Gompf from the University of South Florida discusses the role of public health physicians and infectious diseases specialists in the control of microbial bioterrorism

How Effective is Strategic Bombing is a thought provoking analysis on the subject of air power and bombing and the use of surveys to explain the effects of air power on the enemy in conflict."
-- "Parameters"

In the wake of World War II, Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson and President Harry S. Truman established the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey, to determine exactly how effectively strategic air power had been applied in the European theater and in the Pacific. The final study, consisting of over 330 separate reports and annexes, was staggering in its size and emphatic in its conclusions. As such it has for decades been used as an objective primary source and a guiding text, a veritable Bible for historians of air power.

In this aggressively revisionist volume, Gian Gentile examines afresh this influential document to reveal how it reflected to its very foundation the American conceptual approach to strategic bombing. In the process, he exposes the survey as largely tautological and thereby throwing into question many of the central tenets of American air power philosophy and strategy.

With a detailed chapter on the Gulf War and the resulting Gulf War Air Power Survey, and a concluding chapter on the lessons of the Kosovo air war, How Effective is Strategic Bombing? is the most comprehensive and important book on air power strategy in decades.

The end ofthe Cold War opened unprecedented opportunities for reductions in weapons of mass destruction. With these opportunities came new challenges, both scientific and political. Traditionally approached by different groups, the scientific, technical and political challenges are inextricably intertwined. Agreements to dismantle and destroy chemical, nuclear and conventional weapons, after having been negotiated via diplomatic channels, require the expertise of scientists associated with their development to determine the safest and most environmentally sound methods of destruction. It is in this context that representatives from sixteen countries and five international organizations were convened jointly by NATO, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Federal Republic of Germany and the State Government of North Rhine Westphalia 19-21 May, 1996 in a meeting near Bonn to take stock of worldwide efforts to destroy and dismantle chemical, nuclear and conventional weapons remaining after the end ofthe Cold War. NATO support was provided under the auspices of the NATO Science Committee's Panel on Disarmament Technologies. The conference brought together the major actors involved in the dismantlement and destruction of chemical, nuclear and conventional weapons, highlighted the substantial accomplishments achieved in this area and pinpointed the remaining technical obstacles still to be overcome. It also underlined the critical importance of transparency, data exchange and verification as indispensable preconditions for disarmament and cooperative security.

Drawing parallels between tribal behavior and international relations to demonstrate that societies are not inherently aggressive but are led into conflict when pride or in-group pressures push people to fight, this profound look at the chilling reality of cold war and its arsenal of nuclear destruction offers valuable new insights into how prejudices and stereotypes contribute to what may seem like an inexorable drift to war. Yet the authors conclude that war is not inevitable, as they offer suggestions for an end to the arms race in the nuclear age. Based on original research, this is a long overdue contribution to the study of war and peace in our time and a text for newly emerging courses on the subject.

The Russian Air Force is the world's second largest military air arm, capable of deploying more than 4,000 military aircraft, including 1,522 helicopters, 497 trainers, 873 fighters, 424 transports, and more. Illustrated throughout with detailed artworks with authentic markings and exhaustive specifications, Technical Guide: Modern Russian Military Aircraft is a compact guide to the military aircraft deployed by the Russian Air Force from the end of the Cold War to the present. Organised by type, this book includes every significant aircraft used by the Russian military over the last 30 years, from the latest Sukhoi Su-57 stealth fighter and Kamov Ka-50 'Black Shark' attack helicopter to the evergreen Sukhoi Su-25 close air-support aircraft and the venerable Ilyushin Il-76 airlifter transport. The guide is illustrated with profile artworks, three-views, and dynamic view artworks of the more famous aircraft still in service, such as the Sukhoi Su-27 'Flanker', Mikoyan MiG-29 multirole fighter and Tupolev Tu-160 heavy bomber. Illustrated with more than 110 detailed artworks, Technical Guide: Modern Russian Military Aircraft is an essential reference guide for modellers and aviation enthusiasts with a passion for modern military aircraft.

The pilot-less drones, smart bombs and other high-tech weapons on display in recent conflicts are all the outcome of weapons research. However, the kind of scientific and technological endeavour has been around for a long time, producing not only the armaments of Nazi Germany and the atomic bombs dropped on Japan, but the catapults used in ancient Greece and Rome and the assault rifles used by child soldiers in Africa. In this book John Forge examines such weapons research and asks whether it is morally acceptable to undertake such an activity. He argues that it is in fact morally wrong to take part in weapons research as its primary purpose is to produce the means to harm others, and moreover he argues that all attempts to then justify participation in weapons research do not stand up to scrutiny.

This book has wide appeal in fields of philosophy and related areas, as well to a more general audience who are puzzled about the rate at which new weapons are accumulated.

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This book provides an important picture of India's nuclear intentions and capabilities at the beginning of the 21st century. Academic and governmental experts from both the United States and India explore the strategic, technological, military and economic dimensions of India's nuclear world. The contributors bring their expertise together in an unusual mix of viewpoints from three continents on the several dimensions of a nuclear India at the turn of the century. It is an important resource in the United States to help policymakers respond to the regional and global proliferation problems that have resulted from India and Pakistan's nuclear tests of 1998. It is an important aid to India in exploring and evaluating its nuclear strategy and the political, economic and military consequences of its nuclear decisions.

Facing Down the Soviet Union reveals for the first time the historic deliberations regarding the Chevaline upgrade to Britain's Polaris force, the decisions to procure the Trident C-4 and then D-5 system from the Americans in 1980 and 1982. It also details the decision to base Ground Launched Cruise Missiles in the UK in 1983.

This book presents a detailed look at the design and development of the legendary MiG-21, including its powerplant, armament, upgrades, and variants. The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21 was the standard fighter/interceptor aircraft of the Warsaw Pact and it stood up to its western counterparts for decades. This single-engine, supersonic jet fighter entered service in 1959, and in addition to the Soviet Union, almost every eastern European military operated the Mach 2 fighter, including East Germany (which flew more than 500 aircraft of this type), Poland, Romania, Yugoslavia, and others. With approximately 11,000 of all types built, the MiG-21 has been produced in greater numbers than almost any other combat aircraft in history, and has also seen combat with such countries as Vietnam, China, Syria, Iraq, Angola, and others.

This book tells the story of the Cuban missile crisis in 1962, the struggle that President Kennedy and his advisers (including the author, who was head of intelligence at the State Department) went through to try to understand why the Soviet Union had put nuclear missiles in Cuba, the alternative policies they debated to deal with the presence of the missiles, the aftermath of the crisis, and the lessons learned about defense and foreign policy in an age dominated by intercontinental missiles tipped with nuclear warheads capable of obliterating the northern hemisphere. The purpose of the book is to focus the world's attention on the fact that something must be done-and soon-if we are to avoid Armageddon. The world has never been as close to nuclear war as it was in November 1962. In this book, Roger Hilsman, head of intelligence at the U.S. State Department at that time, details the struggles that President Kennedy and his advisers went through to understand why the Soviet Union had deployed nuclear missiles in Cuba, describes the debate over alternative policy choices to force the removal of the missiles, and determines how and why each particular course of action was eventually chosen. He relates how the U.S. government dealt with the public and with its allies, and traces the step-by-step negotiations between the Soviets and the United States. In his discussion, Hilsman reveals how Khrushchev chose a back-channel, deniable way of communicating with President Kennedy by sending messages to the head of the KGB in Washington, who passed them to Hilsman, who then took them to the president. This book shows how President Kennedy and his brother Robert used this information to bring about the withdrawal of the missiles without war. This book analyzes the motives behind the massive Soviet deployment of nuclear missiles to Cuba, which were capable of destroying every major city in the United States except Seattle, backed up by anti-aircraft and ground forces to defend those missiles. One ship could carry 20-to-30 freight-train loads of war materiel and over 100 shiploads were sent-a total of between 2,000 and 3,000 train loads. Hilsman tells the story of how American intelligence found out-just in time-and, in a post-mortem, addresses the question of U.S. success and/or failure. He concludes with an assessment of the significance of the only nuclear crisis in the world's history, pointing out the lessons for humankind about war in a nuclear age. Hilsman's book is one of only two accounts of the Cuban missile crisis written by one of the principals, and has added significance in light of the turbid state and uncertain future of nuclear weapons throughout the world.

In this book, Michael Krepon analyzes nuclear issues such as missile defenses, space warfare, and treaties, and argues that the United States is on a dangerous course. During the Cold War, Mutual Assured Destruction, or MAD, facilitated strategic arms control. Now that the Cold War has been replaced by asymmetric warfare, treaties based on nuclear overkill and national vulnerability are outdated and must be adapted to a far different world. A new strategic concept of Cooperative Threat Reduction is needed to replace MAD. A balance is needed that combines military might with strengthened treaty regimes.

Leading international security scholars and policy advisors from universities, think-tanks, and nuclear weapons laboratories in the United States analyze the future of nuclear weapons proliferation. In April 1995, the earlier 1970 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty was renewed indefinitely and without change to the original clauses of the treaty. The authors examine the continuing relevance or irrelevance of the old treaty, the role of coercive sanctions in enforcing restraint, and the impact of biological, chemical and missile proliferation on the nuclear motives and ambitions of various states. Attention is given to proliferation conditions in the former Soviet republics, East and South Asia and the Middle East.

Bousquet's landmark book examines the impact of key technologies and scientific ideas on the theory and practice of warfare and the handling of the perennial tension between order and chaos on the battlefield. Spanning the entire modern era, from the Scientific Revolution to the present, it offers a systematic account of modern warfare as the constitution of increasingly complex assemblages of bodies and machines whose integration rests upon a military assimilation of scientific thought. Reflecting the pervasive influence of scientific conceptual frameworks upon warfare, modern armies have been successively organised by reference to the paradigmatic technologies of the clock, engine, computer, and network. Conversely, major scientific developments and technological breakthroughs have become intertwined with the experience of war, especially since the Second World War's unprecedented mobilisation of scientific rationality and technical expertise. This increasingly tight symbiosis between science, technology, and war is at the heart of both the tremendous powers and enduring pathologies displayed by the contemporary military machine. In this new and revised edition, Bousquet extends the analysis to encompass the latest developments in the scientific way of warfare in the midst of renewed great power competition and a wave of technological innovation in artificial intelligence and robotics.

A thorough handbook covering the facts, history, and controversies surrounding our most controversial and misunderstood unconventional weapons. Unlike most books on this topic, the expanded second edition of Mauroni's popular reference handbook is neither sensationalistic nor moralistic. Instead, it offers readers a reasoned, thorough, and fact-based introduction to this highly charged issue. Covering the period from World War I through the Iraq War, Chemical and Biological Warfare not only describes the development of key chemical and biological agents, such as anthrax, tularemia, brucellosis, VEE, Q fever, and botulinum toxin, it also assesses the threats we face, compares military CB warfare with terrorist incidents, explains effective defensive measures, and clarifies the responsibilities of the various federal agencies charged to address these issues. With extensive new material, this edition provides an authoritative and up-to-date introduction to this vitally important topic. Outstanding research aids include key Internet and published references and an index offering rapid access to entries on key figures, government agencies, and defensive equipment A chronology of chemical-biological warfare incidents from the mid-20th century onward offers a thorough historical overview

Examines the present weapons of the United States and the Soviet Union and discusses the development of new nuclear, biological, chemical, and beam weapons.