America's regions and US foreign policy

Peter Trubowitz, Defining the National Interest: Conflict and Change in American Foreign Policy. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1998. Pp.xvi + 353, biblio., figs, maps, index. $55 (cloth); $18.95 (paper). ISBN 0–226–81302–9.     

The salvo combat model with area fire

This article analyzes versions of the salvo model of missile combat where area fire is used by one or both sides in a battle. Although these models share some properties with the area fire Lanchester model and the aimed fire salvo model, they also display some interesting differences, especially over the course of several salvos. Although the relative size of each force is important with aimed fire, with area fire, it is the absolute size that matters. Similarly, although aimed fire exhibits square law behavior, area fire shows approximately linear behavior. When one side uses area fire and the other uses aimed fire, the model displays a mix of square and linear law behavior. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 60: 652–660, 2013     

Countering terrorism in Northern Ireland: the role of intelligence

This article aims to review some of the key lessons learnt by the Royal Ulster Constabulary's (RUC) Special Branch in the 37 years of the troubles in Northern Ireland. Above all counter-terrorism is an intelligence led operation and Special Branch are the key agency for this in all UK police forces, who have now benefited enormously from the expertise that the RUC's Special Branch built up over the years and have passed on to their colleagues throughout the UK. Intelligence is more often than not a human role and relies on human agencies, which was the case in Northern Ireland. The bulk of intelligence gathering was carried out at quite low levels although the sifting and analysing of it became a more specialist skill. Electronic intelligence and computerised systems were often quite low down in the order of priorities and uses, which tends to confound popular impressions. Agents, informers and good old fashioned ‘coppers’ who knew their patch were much more important both in terms of gathering information and in terms of undermining the terrorists morale from within and it was these factors that fundamentally defeated the IRA in Northern Ireland.     

Alternatives for defense in the Post‐Soviet World: A guide for economists to the U.S. debate

The defense establishments of all major powers are changing to reflect changes in the foundations of national security strategy and resource allocation. The authors believe economists should play an active role in formulating these changes and offer an orientation to the U.S. debate, presenting three major alternatives: the “Base Force” (Bush Administration), Mr. Aspin's Force “C,” and the “Low” Alternative (Prof. Kaufmann and Dr. Steinbruner). These alternatives are compared using first‐order measures of capabilities, budgets and risk. Budgetary estimates are based on newly‐developed analytical tools.     

The financing factor in military trade

Available sources value transfers of weapons irrespective of whether they are paid for and how. Data from the U.S. indicates that the shares of arms given for free or on credit are high. If other arms exporters, all military aid and all credits used for military purposes are considered, which is done here on the basis of rough estimates and an opportunity cost model, the true cash costs of weapons in the year of the actual transfer are small. On the other hand, the financial burden of earlier arms imports via debt service has grown over time. It most probably exceeded the true cash cost of imports of arms in the late 1980s. Large differences between arms transfer data and the actual true costs of arms transfers means that analysis of the economic effects of arms imports without considering these financial aspects makes little sense.     

Optimal versus required defence expenditure: The case of the Greek-Turkish arms race

The aim of this paper is to indicate the extent to which the arms race against Turkey, in which Greece and Cyprus have been entangled, imposes a defence expenditure burden that is tough for the two allies to bear. To do so we have resorted to evaluating the optimal military expenditure for the two countries, allied in the context of the Integrated Defence Doctrine, which is compatible with the constraints imposed by the resources of their economies. All experiments and scenarios examined lead to the conclusion that the current defence burden of the two allies seems to be driving their economies beyond capacity limits. The fact remains, however, that under the circumstances, a one-sided disarmament policy like the one currently followed by Greece, is a risky choice given that the long-term armament programmes pursued by Turkey, whose role in this arms race has been proven as leading, leave very small room to the Greek and Cypriot sides to reduce their own defence expenditure.     

Budgetary trade-offs of security expenditures in Turkey

This paper investigates the budgetary trade-off structure of security (defence+internal security) expenditures in Turkey for the period 1983-1998. A modified version of Todaro's distributive share index of social welfare is used to quantify the impacts on the growth of primary budget expenditures of Security, Education, Health, General Administration, Infrastructure, and Social Services. We find that defence expenditures dominate overall security expenditures and are less affected in times of bottlenecks in the economy. A systematic pattern of negative budgetary trade-offs of security expenditures in terms of other components is not identified. We also analyse the expenditures of the Defence Industry Support Fund in an attempt to find the cost of the modernisation program to the economy.