This work provides insightful analyses of the major national security issues faced by the United States today. The authors analyze a broad range of subjects including the direction of United States' ballistic missile defense program, the problems that surround the intelligence community in the wake of 9/11, defense management in the wake of the Cold War, technology and the "American way of war," the United States' response to the North Korean, nuclear weapons program, strategy and counter-intelligence, and the utility of nuclear weapons today for the advancement of America's interests.

American National Security Policy: Essays in Honor of William R. Van Cleave

Bradley A. Thayer

National Institute Press

The Great American Gamble examines the past, present, and prospective future of U.S. deterrence theory, strategic forces, nuclear weapons and policy. It provides a detailed explanation of the competing schools of deterrence theory that emerged during the late 1950s and early 1960s. Based on an extensive review of previously classified documents, it demonstrates how and why U.S. Government policies came to adhere to the guidelines established by the theory of deterrence popularly called the 'balance of terror.' Dr. Payne presents the assumptions, judgments, and hopes that led U.S. policy makers in consecutive Republican and Democratic administrations to that choice.

The Great American Gamble: Deterrence Theory and Practice from the Cold War to the Twenty-First Century

History

Keith B. Payne

Military

The Great American Gamble examines the past, present and prospective future of U.S. deterrence theory, strategic forces, nuclear weapons and policy. It provides a detailed explanation of the competing schools of deterrence theory that emerged during the late 1950s and early 1960s. Based on an extensive review of previously classified documents, it demonstrates how and why U.S. Government policies came to adhere to the guidelines established by the theory of deterrence popularly called the balance of terror. Dr. Payne presents the assumptions, judgments and hopes that led U.S. policy makers in consecutive Republican and Democratic administrations to that choice. Acceptance of a balance of terror as official policy was challenged on occasion during the Cold War under both Democratic and Republican administrations, but it persisted as the lodestar for U.S. strategic policies. Most Americans presumed they were defended, but U.S. Government choices were predicated on the belief, as noted by Henry Kissinger; that vulnerability contributed to peace, and invulnerability contributed to war. 
 Looking forward, the key question is to what extent the basice tenets of Cold War academic deterrence theory provide useful guidance to contemporary strategic policy given contemporary threats and conditions? The conclusion offered herein is that familiar Cold War guidelines are a manifestly imprudent basis for U.S. policy. Much of what we believed we knew about deterrence during the Cold War now appears to have been more fleeting hope than wisdom.

Americas

On December 19, 2003, Libya announced to a surprised world that it had decided to abandon its nuclear and chemical weapons programs, as well as its longer-range missiles. Within hours, Prime Minister Blair and President Bush made separate but coordinated statements welcoming Tripoli's decision. Both made clear that Colonel Qadaffi had made this historic choice following months of secret contacts with the United States and United Kingdom. The author of The Libyan Experience, Ambassador Robert Joseph was at the center of this single most successful counterproliferation event of the decade. As the director of the National Security Council's counterproliferation activities, he was one of very few involved in, or even aware of, the secret face-to-face negotiations that preceded Libya's renunciation of its programs to acquire weapons of mass destruction. In fact, he headed the policy discussions with the Libyans that led to this historic and dramatic outcome. What occurred during those months has never before been made available publically or recorded in sufficient detail to answer key questions about Libyan motivations or to identify the lessons learned from this case that may apply to other proliferation challenges. In The Libyan Experience, Robert Joseph fills the void by providing this first hand account of the events that led to this great counterproliferation. Here is the actual history presented by a central figure involved in that success story. The narrative is both scholarly and highly-readable; at times it as much a real-life thriller as it is an historical text. As only a direct participant can, he describes the interactions with the Libyans and assesses their implications for both Tripoli's decision and for the future. This is the definitive, true story that now is told thanks to the author's intrepid work and to his meticulous, highly readable accounting and assessment of events. This is a story that is profoundly important to our understanding of proliferation and of the tools and processes most helpful to its prevention and rollback. As such, it is profoundly important to our future.

Countering WMD: The Libyan Experience

Politics & Social Sciences

Robert Joseph

Politics & Government

The recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, coupled with subsequent U.S. efforts to promote democracy in those countries, have raised a fundamental question as old as the Republic itself. Should the United States intervene, directly or indirectly, to bring about the change of a foreign regime, even to the point of governing other peoples without their consent? In Search of Monsters to Destroy? American Foreign Policy, Revolution, and Regime Change, 1776-1900, explores five notable occasions during which Americans debated seriously the feasibility and morality of foreign regime change. The principal protagonists in these debates - including Franklin, Jefferson, John and John Quincy Adams, Webster, Clay, Steven Douglas, Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, and William Jennings Bryan - were among the leading statesmen of their day. These case studies demonstrate certain consistent patterns of American thought about regime change, but also a significant evolution of views to accommodate new condition

In Search of Monsters to Destroy? American Foreign Policy, Revolution, and Regime Change 1776-1900

Patrick J. Garrity

"Shadows on the Wall: Deterrence and Disarmament examines and contrasts the three alternative philosophical positions about the nature of the international system and patterns of human behavior that underlie three competing narratives seen in U.S. public debate regarding nuclear deterrence and disarmament. For over six decades, these three competing narratives, built on contrary philosophical traditions, have been the basis for contending positions regarding U.S. nuclear policy-ranging from advocacy for complete global nuclear disarmament to advocacy for the maintenance of robust U.S. nuclear capabilities for deterrence. Each of these three different narratives is based on different speculative expectations about developments in the international system and future patterns of human behavior. Given the inherent uncertainties about future developments in the international system and human behavior, none of these narratives can be deemed to objectively correct, or certainly wrong. They may, nevertheless, be judged to entail different levels of prudence for U.S. and allied security"--

Shadows on the Wall: Deterrence and Disarmament

U.S. Czech Missile Defense Cooperation: Alliance Politics in Action is a case study of U.S.-Czech ballistic missile defense cooperation between 2002 and 2011. The book advances understanding of factors that contribute to, or hamper, ballistic missile defense cooperation between two states in the context of alliance cooperation and management and maps Russia's influence operations during the same timeframe. More generally, the book develops a methodology to help policymakers assess and evaluate the progress their countries are making on missile defense cooperation, and alerts them to potential pitfalls that can derail it

U.S.-Czech Missile Defense Cooperation--Alliance Politics in Action

Michaela Dodge

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Books by National Institute Press

See the best price to sell, buy or rent books by the National Institute Press publisher. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

American National Security Policy: Essays in Honor of William R. Van Cleave

The Great American Gamble: Deterrence Theory and Practice from the Cold War to the Twenty-First Century

The Great American Gamble: Deterrence Theory and Practice from the Cold War to the Twenty-First Century

Countering WMD: The Libyan Experience

In Search of Monsters to Destroy? American Foreign Policy, Revolution, and Regime Change 1776-1900

Shadows on the Wall: Deterrence and Disarmament

U.S.-Czech Missile Defense Cooperation--Alliance Politics in Action