Russian Reactions to Reagan's ‘Maritime Strategy’

The US Navy's audacious Maritime Strategy of the 1980s is often credited with acting as a key catalyst to the demise of the USSR. In assessing the role of strategic missile submarine “bastions” in the country's overall military strategy, the authors are skeptical of the above thesis, explaining that Moscow actually viewed deployments of Tomahawk land-attack cruise missiles on to US submarines (versus direct threats against the Soviet Navy itself) as the most alarming threat. The authors concede that the arms race played a role in the collapse of the USSR, but deny a direct connection with Soviet naval development citing the relatively minor naval proportion of overall defense spending. For the difficulties facing the fleet at the end of the Cold War, they instead blame deep systemic problems internal to the Soviet Navy.     

Saudi Arabia,Wahhabism, and the Taliban of Afghanistan: ‘Puritanical reform’ as a ‘revolutionary war’ program

This article argues that the Taliban's revolutionary war (RW) program is puritanical reform informed by the Islamic legal duty of al-amr bi'l-ma‘ruf wa'l-nahy ‘an al-munkar (‘commanding what is good and forbidding what is reprehensible’). It also examines the history of this duty with examples of puritanical reform movements emerging from Berber tribes in North Africa and tribes in Arabia. Furthermore, the importance of this duty in Wahhabi Saudi Arabia, and its exportation to Pakistan where Taliban leaders imbibed this ideology, are discussed. Finally the article shows that corruption and abuses by the Afghan regime have given impetus to puritanical reformers: the condition precedent for puritanical reform is pervasive wrongdoing in an Islamic society.     

高功率电磁环境下导弹发射阵地近地面电磁脉冲波形仿真*

主要研究在高功率电磁环境下高空核爆到达导弹预设作战阵地近地面时的电磁脉冲环境.首先给出高空核爆电磁脉冲场近地面计算的理论基础,然后分析不同条件下近地面的电磁脉冲环境参数,编程实现了基于时域有限差分算法的电磁脉冲波形数值仿真,完成了多种特定预设战场环境下的电磁脉冲计算,最后给出由于电磁脉冲武器的发展和HEMP波形表述形式变化,给导弹武器系统抗电磁脉冲性能研究带来的影响和新动态趋势.结论认为:应加强对前沿更陡、强度更强电磁脉冲的抵抗能力,防御重点放在机动作战样式方面,提高战地战时抗毁生存能力.     

The sixteenth-century antecedents of special operations ‘small war’

The first conceptual, theoretical treatises about small war (la petite guerre) as special operations appeared only from the middle of the seventeenth century. The term is not used in the eighteenth-century sense of ‘special operations’ in older sources. The supposed absence of any treatment of the subject is surprising considering the obsession with the ‘art of war’ in the Renaissance, but other authors attribute it to a supposed antinomy between chivalric ideals and irregular warfare. But the absence of explicit manuals on the subject is not evidence of absence of advanced reflection on this kind of operations in the Middle Ages and in Early Modern times. We should thus look elsewhere, in other genres, for writings that contain and pass on military knowledge. Epics, romances, educational and military treatises, and memoirs in fact contain elements of a theory of special operations, even though these genres differ from our conception of rationality inherited from the Enlightenment.     

Pakistan’s nuclear weapons: how safe is safe enough? Transparency versus opacity

Due to expanding and increasing religious extremism and terrorism coupled with political instability in Pakistan, most western observers believe that Pakistan's nuclear weapons are not secure and could be taken over by terrorists. This would have adverse implications for the region and for global peace, especially for the security of USA and Europe. This article argues that this perception is based on a flawed understanding and knowledge of how Pakistan's command and control setup has evolved and operates. Pakistan's nuclear weapons are as safe as any other state's nuclear weapons. Pakistan has also been active in supporting and participating in global efforts to improve nuclear safety and security. Over the years, Pakistan has been quite open in sharing information regarding how it is improving its command and control system with western governments as well as scholars. This article argues that the steps Pakistan has taken to secure its nuclear weapons are adequate and that Pakistan would continue to further strengthen these measures; however, it is the expanding religious extremism, terrorism and anti-Americanism in the country which make the international perception of Pakistan extremely negative and then seep into the perception of Pakistan's nuclear weapons safety and security.     

Strategic “defensivism” and post-reset blues: US–Russian nuclear arms reductions,missile defenses and minimum deterrence

US nuclear deterrence and arms control policy may be moving, by design and by inadvertence, toward a posture of strategic “defensivism”. Strategic “defensivism” emphasizes the overlapping and reinforcing impact of: (1) reductions in US, Russian and possibly other strategic nuclear forces, possibly down to the level of “minimum deterrence,” (2) deployment of improved strategic and/or theater antimissile defenses for the US, NATO allies and other partners; and (3) additional reliance on conventional military forces for some missions hitherto preferentially assigned to nuclear weapons. This article deals with the first two of these aspects only: the interaction between missile defenses and offensive force reductions in US–Russian strategy and policy. The findings are that stable deterrence as between the USA and Russia is possible at lower than New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty levels, but reductions below 1000 deployed long-range weapons for each state, toward a true minimum deterrent posture, will require multilateral as opposed to bilateral coordination of arms limitations. Missile defenses might provide some denial capability against light attacks by states with small arsenals, but they still fall short of meaningful damage limitation as between powers capable of massive nuclear strikes.