Reward,punishment or inducement? US economic and military aid, 1946–1996

If the US has wielded power as global hegemon, then there should be evidence of a linkage between American resources and the ability to influence behavior. However, there is widespread disagreement on how this power is manifested (see Krause, ). Methodological and epistemological issues have hampered empirical studies of US hegemonic behavior. For example, does the US reward past behavior or does it offer inducements for future behavior? We document and discuss these issues in terms of the aid–foreign policy compliance nexus. The empirical portion of our paper tests whether US military and non‐military aid are correlated with foreign policy similarity. The main merits of our study are that: (1) we test a new measure of foreign policy similarity developed by Signorino and Ritter () and compiled by Gartzke et al. (); (2) we relax the causality issue and test using vector autoregression (VAR) for 76 developing countries; and (3) our time horizon is a minimum of 30 years for each country. Our central finding is that aid is most often used as a reward. More specifically, foreign policy similarity leads to greater economic aid for most African countries, foreign policy similarity leads to greater military aid for a majority of Latin American states, and there are no overarching patterns for Asia and the Middle East. We discuss the implications of our findings in the context of the bargaining and structural approaches to statecraft.     

AGENDA FOR DEFENSE AND PEACE ECONOMICS

This brief introduction celebrates the 20th Anniversary of the Journal, Defence and Peace Economics. Suggesting elements of an agenda for the future of this branch of economics, I raise several topics that are new and that seem to indicate that the field will expand and shift focus substantially in future years.     

The Republic of Korea and Its Navy: Perceptions of Security and the Utility of Seapower

Abstract

Understanding the development of Republic of Korea (ROK) seapower is central in exploring the evolution and nature of its security consciousness. This article aims to examine how the wider East Asian maritime sphere has influenced ROK perceptions of its own security and how such perceptions have come into conflict with the needs of maintaining its deterrent capabilities within the peninsular context. In doing so it concludes that for the ROK seapower has been an expression of wider engagement and international developing security concerns but that it is curtailed and influenced by the realities of the threat from the North.     

Expansion of Chinese maritime power in the Indian Ocean: implications for India

This paper examines the ongoing expansion of China’s maritime power in the Indian Ocean region and analyses its potential impact on the extant balance of Sino-Indian maritime power in the region. It posits that the expanding Chinese maritime power in the Indian Ocean could seriously challenge India’s geostrategic advantage in the near future and that India can no longer take for granted its strategic location at the centre of the Indian Ocean nor the strength of its historical ties with the various regional states. It further argues that the current Indian maritime strategy for the Indian Ocean region, to be the “net security provider” for the entire region, is unsustainable and thus needs to be reviewed and rebuilt leveraging the geographic advantage enjoyed by India over China in the Indian Ocean.     

Russia,America and missile defense

Russia has sharply objected to US plans for ballistic missile defense. The Russian official explanation is that the real purpose of the US missile defense plan is to make it impossible for Russia to retaliate against a US nuclear (or massive conventional) attack, thus making Russia subject to military blackmail by the US. The Russian response has been the result of a sum total of various factors, mostly political and cultural, while the technical capabilities of the proposed system have played a secondary role.     

How to Last Alone at the Top: US Strategic Planning for the Unipolar Era

This article investigates how key actors within the US defence policy community realigned their interests to forge a new consensus on the redirection of US defence strategy following the ‘peace shock’ they faced with the collapse of bipolarity. This consensus centred on the idea that achieving US security in the ‘age of uncertainty’ demanded overwhelming US military power, which was widely interpreted as necessitating military capabilities to fight multiple major theatre wars simultaneously against regional ‘Third World’ adversaries. This helped to preserve many of the principal pillars of US Cold War defence policy through deflecting calls for more radical organisational changes and deeper cuts to defence budgets.     

近期美国陆军旅战斗队建设发展

美军认为,近年来中俄等大国的军事实力不断增强,成为美国的主要安全威胁,长期的反叛乱作战也使美国陆军应对正规战争的能力有所下降,必须推进面向大国竞争的转型建设以适应未来的作战环境。随着美国陆军转型建设的大幕拉开,提升大规模作战能力成为其建设发展的焦点。本文认为,旅战斗队作为美国陆军的主要合成兵种部队与实施近距离地面作战的主要梯队之一,其建设发展必将服务于美国陆军的战略目标。据此,美国陆军旅战斗队围绕“跨域、集中、持续、聚合”四个指导原则,重点采取各种举措提升其指挥机构生存力、火力集中打击力、空中威胁防护力、战术网络杀伤力四项基本能力。总结分析美国陆军旅战斗队发展建设的举措,对军队未来作战能力建设具有一定的启示作用。     

The rise and fall of counterproliferation policy

The US government initiated a Defense Counterproliferation Initiative to address the concern that, in the post-Cold War years, the proliferation of nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons would be widespread and create a significant challenge to the US military’s combat operations. In particular, non-nuclear states might use chemical or biological warfare agents against US forces with the belief that nuclear weapons would not be used against them in retaliation. Following the events of September 11, 2001, defense strategy and policy shifted to a wider view of the threat of adversarial use of “weapons of mass destruction” (WMD) and the term “counterproliferation” was replaced by “combating” or “countering WMD.” Over time, the Defense Department increasingly moved away from counterproliferation principles with the detrimental effect of losing capabilities that US forces still need for contemporary adversaries. This shift has been aggravated by other US government agencies’ use of “counterproliferation” in lieu of what would have been termed “nonproliferation” activities in the 1990s. The loss of clarity within the US government on these terms has led to the inability to focus the “whole of government” on this significant national security challenge. To alleviate this challenge, the US government needs a top-down initiative to refocus policy on the distinctly different aspects of WMD with respect to military combat operations, combating terrorism, and homeland security.     

美英海军舰船远海维修保障体系特点

我国海军执行远海护航与南海领海巡航任务已成常态化,同时随着"一带一路"国家战略的稳步实施,海军舰船必将走得更远,为经济建设与世界和平、地区稳定保驾护航。为了科学地构建我国远海舰船维修保障体系,本文分析总结美英国家海军舰船远海维修保障体系基本模式、特点及利弊,并在合理界定远海及远海维修保障概念的基础上,提出构建我国海军舰船远海维修保障体系的基本策略。     

美军航母战斗群空袭火力对地攻击效能分析

以美军航母战斗大队标准编成为例,简要分析了美军航母战斗群的空袭火力构成.进而分别建立了机载普通对地攻击弹药和巡航导弹、空地导弹对地面目标的毁伤能力的模型.然后以此为基础,从空袭兵器的突防概率、对目标的发现概率、对各类目标的毁伤概率和空袭某一目标所需的兵力四个方面,对航母战斗群空袭火力体系的对地攻击效能进行了深入研究,并建立相应的数学模型.最后根据在历次战争中得到的经验数据,对美军航母战斗群空袭火力对地攻击效能进行了计算,并分析了计算结果,为科学判断敌情提供了依据.