Shield of Dreams: Missile Defenses and Nuclear Strategy

by CIMBALA STEPHEN J.

• ISBN13: 9780275975340
• ISBN10: 0275975347
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2008-06-30
• Publisher: Greenwood Pub Group

Summary

Missile defenses are back. As Cimbala shows, the end of the Cold War revived interest in U.S. ballistic missile defenses because they now seem more feasible, with the Soviet Union gone and the perceived threat defined as light or accidental nuclear attacks, and because technology is thought by some experts and missile defense advocates to provide options not previously viable. Opponents of U.S. missile defenses claim that they will wreck the ABM Treaty, cause deterioration in the poliitcal relationship between the United States and Russia, alienate some NATO allies, and provoke China into offsetting increases in its long-range, nuclear-armed ballistic missile forces.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Missile Defenses in the Cold War

American Defense Policy and the Nuclear Revolution: Challenges to Traditional Strategy

Soviet Military Strategy and Cold War Exigency: No Escape from Mutual Deterrence

Arms Control and Missile Defense

Strategic Nuclear Arms Control and Missile Defense: U.S. and Russian Choices

Russian Nuclear C3 and Defenses: Accident Prone or Incident Proof?

Missile Defense, Nulear Deterrence, and Friction

Missile Defenses, Nuclear Deterrence, and Friction: the Revenge of Clausewitz

Alarm in Moscow: Did SDI Help to Provoke the 1983 "War Scare"?

Missile Defense, Proliferation, and Control

Nuclear Proliferation and Missile Defense: Is the Cure Worse than the Disease?

Israeli Security Dilemmas and Nuclear Weapons: Deterrance, Defense, and Disclosure

Conclusion

Bibliography

Index