Book reviews

European Security in the New Political Environment by James H. Wyllie, London: Addison, Wesley Longman, 1997, ISBN 0-582-24403-X (pbk), £13.99

Russia and Europe: The Emerging Security Agenda edited by Vladimir Baranovsky, Oxford: Oxford University Press, SIPRI, 1997, ISBN 0-19-829201-5 (hbk), £45.00

The Defeat of Japan by David Rees, Westport, Connecticut and London: Praeger, ISBN 0-275-95955-4 (hbk), £46.50

The Collective Naval Defence of the Empire, 1900-1940 by Nicholas Tracy (ed.), London: Ashgate, for the Navy Records Society, 1997, ISBN 1859-284-027 (hbk), £59.50

Knights in White Armour The New Art of War and Peace by Christopher Bellamy, London: Pimlico Press, 1997, ISBN 0-7126-739-03 (pbk), £12.50

Regional Orders: Building Security in a New World by avid A. Lake and Patrick M. Morgan (eds), University Park: Penn State Press, 1997, ISBN 0-271-01703-i (hbk), £49.50/$55, ISBN 0-271-01704-X (pbk), £7.95/$19.95

Contested Social Orders and International Politics by David Skidmore (ed.), Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 1997, ISBN 0-8265-1284-4 (hbk), $32.95

The Politics of Threat: Minuteman Vulnerability in American National Security Policy by David H. Dunn. London: Macmillan Press, 1997, ISBN 0-333-67816-8 (hbk), £45.00

The Sociology of the Military by Guiseppe Caforio (ed.), Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 1998, ISBN 1-85898-619-2, 704 pp., £150

The Nordic Nations in the New Western Security Regime by Ingemar Dorfer, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997, ISBN 0-943875-83-8 (hbk), £27, ISBN 0-943875-82-X (pbk), £13     

Worst‐case performance of approximation algorithms for tool management problems

Since the introduction of flexible manufacturing systems, researchers have investigated various planning and scheduling problems faced by the users of such systems. Several of these problems are not encountered in more classical production settings, and so‐called tool management problems appear to be among the more fundamental ones of these problems. Most tool management problems are hard to solve, so that numerous approximate solution techniques have been proposed to tackle them. In this paper, we investigate the quality of such algorithms by means of worst‐case analysis. We consider several polynomial‐time approximation algorithms described in the literature, and we show that all these algorithms exhibit rather poor worst‐case behavior. We also study the complexity of solving tool management problems approximately. In this respect, we investigate the interrelationships among tool management problems, as well as their relationships with other well‐known combinatorial problems such as the maximum clique problem or the set covering problem, and we prove several negative results on the approximability of various tool management problems. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 46: 445–462, 1999     

Scheduling deteriorating jobs to minimize makespan

We consider a single-machine problem of scheduling n independent jobs to minimize makespan, in which the processing time of job J_j grows by w_j with each time unit its start is delayed beyond a given common critical date d. This processing time is p_j if J_j starts by d. We show that this problem is NP-hard, give a pseudopolynomial algorithm that runs in time and O(nd) space, and develop a branch-and-bound algorithm that solves instances with up to 100 jobs in a reasonable amount of time. We also introduce the case of bounded deterioration, where the processing time of a job grows no further if the job starts after a common maximum deterioration date D > d. For this case, we give two pseudopolynomial time algorithms: one runs in O(n²d(D − d) time and O(nd(D − d)) space, the other runs in p_j)²) time and p_j) space. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 45: 511–523, 1998     

Safety in international security: a view point from the practice of accident investigation

While security points to a deliberate harming of humans and/or the environment, safety refers to unintended damage. In this view point, I will analyse how the distinction between safety and security matters in the practice of accident investigation and I will argue that the division between the fields is problematic for the assessment of security-related safety risks. Drawing on the case of the our accident investigation into the downing of flight MH17 above Ukraine in 2014, I highlight key dilemmas the Dutch Safety Board dealt with.