Arms trade,arms control,and security: Collective action issues

This article puts forth collection action as a unifying theme for the conference essays on arms trade, control, and production. For each of these topics, collective action failures are related to group size and group composition considerations. Other issues are also examined including the manner in which individual contributions determine the overall level of the associated collective good ‐ the so‐called aggregation technology of public supply. Based on alternative aggregation technologies, the game‐theoretic underpinnings of these arms issues are explored.     

Territorial contestation and repressive violence in civil war

This study models the structural sources of variation in the use of selective (discriminate) repression within 89 civil wars fought between 1981 and 2005. The severity of repressive violence is modeled as a function of the amount of territory being contested by the insurgents. This idea is operationalized using measures of the location, size, and density of insurgency violence. The analysis finds evidence that the repressive behavior of both governments and rebel groups is linked to conflict geography. Governments violate physical integrity rights more frequently and kill more civilians the greater the overall amount of territory under contestation. Rebels kill more civilians in highly dispersed insurgencies that lack a clear epicenter.     

SPARRING ON THE SUBCONTINENT

South Asian Security and International Nuclear Order: Creating a Robust Indo-Pakistani Nuclear Arms Control Regime, by Mario Esteban Carranza. Ashgate, 2009. 208 pages, $99.95.     

VISIONS OF FISSION

For many years, non-nuclear weapons states have sought binding commitments from nuclear armed states that they would not be the victim of either the threat or use of nuclear weapons—so-called negative security assurances (NSAs). The nuclear weapon states have traditionally resisted granting such unconditional NSAs. Recent U.S. efforts to use nuclear deterrence against the acquisition and use by other states of chemical, biological and radiological weapons, however, have further exacerbated this divide. This article analyzes the historical development of NSAs and contrasts U.S. commitments not to use nuclear weapons with the empirical realities of current U.S. nuclear weapons employment doctrines. The authors conclude that NSAs are most likely to be issued as unilateral declarations and that such pledges are the worst possible manner in which to handle the issue of security assurance.     

一类具有时滞和Gompertz增长率的捕食系统的稳定性与Hopf分支

研究一类具有时滞和Gompertz增长率的捕食系统,通过分析系统的特征方程,得到正平衡点的局部稳定性和系统出现Hopf分支的条件,并利用中心流形定理和规范型理论,得到确定Hopf分支方向和分支周期解稳定性的计算公式．     

一类具有时滞的生态一流行病系统的稳定性和Hopf分支

讨论一类食饵染病的时滞捕食一被捕食者模型,通过分析特征方程,得到正平衡点局部稳定和Hopf分支存在的条件．同时,应用中一tl,流形定理和规范型理论研究正平衡点处Hopf分支方向和分支周期解的稳定性．最后,通过数值模拟对理论结果进行了说明．     

US–Russia relations and the future of arms control: how the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty could restore engagement on nuclear issues

ABSTRACT

Relations between the United States and Russia are in a prolonged downward spiral. Under these circumstances, cooperation on nuclear issues—once a reliable area of engagement even in difficult political environments—has all but completely halted. There are urgent reasons to find a way out of this situation, particularly the expiration of the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty in 2021. However, seemingly intractable disagreements about noncompliance with the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty and US ballistic-missile defense, compounded by the Ukraine crisis, the conflict in Syria, and the accusations of Russian interference in the US election of 2016, threaten the future of arms control. Against this backdrop, policy makers and practitioners should identify ways to re-engage on nuclear issues now so they can be ready to implement them as soon as feasible. This article considers how the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) could serve as a platform for US–Russia cooperation on nuclear issues when circumstances permit. Taking into account the challenges posed by ongoing US non-ratification, it identifies a menu of CTBT-related activities short of ratification that the two countries could undertake together. It explores how joint work on this issue would advance shared US and Russian interests while helping to create the circumstances necessary for further arms-control work.     

The end of the “INF Treaty” and the US-China military balance

ABSTRACT

Whereas much of the debate about the demise of the 1987 Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty has focused on the European context and Russia’s alleged treaty violations, Asia looms large in the minds of proponents of the United States’s immediate withdrawal from the treaty. For many proponents, the fast-changing military balance in Asia and China's conventionally armed missiles constitute a sufficient cause for withdrawal. What does the end of the INF Treaty bode for the US-China military balance? This article argues that, although there are some near-term benefits for the US position in the conventional military balance with China, the advantages offered by prohibited missiles are minor and can be readily substituted by extant capabilities that are compliant with the treaty. Given the negative implications of the end of the INF Treaty for the future of arms control, the costs and benefits of withdrawing from the treaty require further examination; the military balance in Asia is an unpersuasive rationale for withdrawing from an important part of the arms-control architecture.     

ASSESSING RUSSIAN ATTITUDES TOWARD PHASED,DEEP NUCLEAR REDUCTIONS

As the United States and Russia contemplate the next stage of nuclear arms reductions beyond the 2010 New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, another issue enters the agenda—that of the impact of possible deep reductions on the shape of the global nuclear balance. As the gap between the US/Russian arsenals and the arsenals of “second-tier” nuclear weapon states narrows, the familiar shape of the global balance, which remains, to a large extent, bipolar, is likely to change. The article explores the Russian approach to the relationship between further US-Russian reductions and the prospect of “nuclear multipolarity,” and assesses the relative weight of this issue in Russian arms control policy as well as the views on the two specific regional balances—the one in Europe (including UK and French nuclear weapons) and in Asia (the possible dynamic of the Russian-Chinese nuclear balance).     

NUCLEAR STABILITY AT LOW NUMBERS

Chinese writings on the workings of nuclear stability, deterrence, and coercion are thin and politicized. Nevertheless, it is possible to glean, from direct and inferential evidence, rather pessimistic conclusions regarding Chinese views of nuclear stability at low numbers. While China has been living with low numbers in its own arsenal for decades, today it views missile defense and advanced conventional weapons as the primary threat to nuclear stability. More generally, China views nuclear stability as wedded to political amity. Because none of these would be directly addressed through further US and Russian arsenal reductions, China is unlikely to view such reductions as particularly stabilizing. While there is little in Chinese writing to suggest lower US and Russian numbers would encourage a “race to parity,” there are grounds to worry about China becoming more assertive as it gains confidence in Beijing's own increasingly secure second-strike forces.