Summary
The Preventive Defense Project conducted the latest in its series of Washington WMD Workshops entitled “Iran Plan B Design” on May 22, 2006. The purpose of the Workshop was to collect the best thinking on the design of a plan for dealing with Iran’s nuclear program should diplomacy fail and the Iranians continue on the path to nuclear capability.
While it is important for the United States and its international partners to design Plan B now, it is premature to abandon the current diplomatic course, Plan A.
For one thing, Iran’s known nuclear program is several years away from being able to produce its first bomb’s worth of fissile material. Unlike the case of North Korea which has already obtained fissile material and is producing more, there is time to let diplomacy with Iran play out.
Second, and again unlike North Korea, the Iranian government has exhibited at least a smidgen of sensitivity to international opinion and to the possibility of further isolation and punishment if it persists, and acceptance and trade if it stops – i.e., to diplomatic carrots and sticks.
Third, while the cat-and-mouse diplomacy led by the EU3 has not led to conclusive results, it has caused Iran to slow the progress of its uranium enrichment program through intermittent suspensions. It is not yet time to switch to Plan B. But it is time to devise Plan B. And the time available for diplomacy is only valuable if it is used effectively.
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Abstract
U.S. scholars and policymakers commonly worry that a lack of “energy security” hurts U.S. national security, yet few have analyzed the links between states’ energy requirements and the probability of military conflict. An investigation of these links identifies threats to U.S. national security flowing from other countries’ consumption of oil, rather than just U.S. consumption. Furthermore, while many of the security threats associated with Persian Gulf oil have decreased, new oil-driven dangers are emerging in Northeast Asia.
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The United States needs support from other states to carry out global governance, particularly from rising powers such as China and Russia. Securing cooperation from China and Russia poses special problems, however, because neither state is part of the liberal Western community, ruling out appeals to common values and norms. Nevertheless, an alternative approach that is rooted in appreciation of China’s and Russia’s heightened status concerns may be viable. Since the end of the Cold War, Chinese and Russian foreign policy has been shaped by the goal of restoring both countries’ great power status, which received major blows after China’s Tiananmen Square repression and the Soviet Union’s breakup and loss of empire. This desire for status can be explained by social identity theory, which argues that social groups strive for a distinctive, positive identity. Social identity theory provides a typology of strategies that states may use to enhance their relative status and suggests appropriate responses to status concerns of rising powers. Redirecting scholarly attention to status considerations and incentives could contribute to a diplomatic strategy for engaging rising powers.
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Robert Ross of Boston College considers the prospects for a U.S.-China war over Taiwan. Ross praises the first Bush administration and the Clinton administration for maintaining the U.S. commitment to protect Taiwan from a potential Chinese invasion while furthering U.S. engagement with the mainland. In contrast, he criticizes the current Bush administration’s policy of constructing “a U.S.-Taiwan defense relationship focused on wartime cooperation.” The administration’s decision to increase U.S. arms sales to Taiwan and to consider selling missile defense technologies to Taiwan unnecessarily challenges Chinese security interests in the Taiwan Strait and increases the likelihood of conflict. Instead, Ross asserts that as long as Taiwan does not declare independence from China, the United States can be confident that it can continue to deter the Chinese use of force against Taiwan for decades to come.
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Recent developments in Chinese politics and defense policy indicate that China will soon embark on an ambitious maritime policy that will include construction of a power-projection navy centered on an aircraft carrier. But just as nationalism and the pursuit of status encouraged past land powers to seek great power maritime capabilities, widespread nationalism, growing social instability, and the leadership’s concern for its political legitimacy drive China’s naval ambition. China’s maritime power, however, will be limited by the constraints experienced by all land powers: enduring challenges to Chinese territorial security and a corresponding commitment to a large ground force capability will constrain China’s naval capabilities and its potential challenge to U.S. maritime security. Nonetheless, China’s naval nationalism will challenge U.S.-China cooperation. It will likely elicit increased U.S. naval spending and deployments, as well as politicization of China policy in the United States, challenging the United States to develop policy to manage U.S.-China naval competition to allow for continued political cooperation.
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North Korea’s foreign relations are a blend of contradiction and complexity. They start from the incongruity between Pyongyang’s highly touted policy of juche, or self-reliance, and North Korea’s extended and heavy reliance on foreign aid and assistance over the 6 decades of its existence. This aid—both military and economic—in the first 4 decades came from China, the Soviet Union, and communist bloc states; in the past 2 decades, this aid has come from countries including China, South Korea, and the United States.
In this monograph, Dr. Samuel Kim examines North Korea’s foreign relations with China, Russia, Japan, the United States, and South Korea during the post-Cold War era. He argues that central to understanding North Korea’s international behavior in the 21st century is the extent to which the policies of the United States have shaped that behavior. Although some readers may not agree with all of Dr. Kim’s interpretations and assessments, they nevertheless will find his analysis simulating and extremely informative.
This publication is the fifth in a series titled “Demystifying North Korea,” the products of a project directed by Dr. Andrew Scobell. The first monograph, North Korea’s Strategic Intentions, written Dr. Scobell, was published in July 2005. The second monograph, Kim Jong Il and North Korea: The Leader and the System, also written by Dr. Scobell, appeared in March 2006. The third monograph, North Korean Civil-Military Trends: Military-First Politics to a Point, written by Mr. Ken Gause, appeared in October 2006. The fourth monograph, North Korea’s Military Conventional and Unconventional Military Capabilities and Intentions (forthcoming March 2007), was written by Captain John Sanford (USN) and Dr. Scobell. Future monographs will examine North Korea’s economy and assess future scenarios. The Strategic Studies Institute is pleased to make this monograph publicly available.
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This book explores Korea’s place in terms of multiple levels and domains of interaction pertaining to foreign-policy behaviors and relations with the four regional/global powers (China, Russia, Japan, and the United States). The synergy of global transformations has now brought to an end Korea’s proverbial identity and role as the helpless shrimp among whales, and both North Korea and South Korea have taken on new roles in the process of redefining and projecting their national identities. Synthetic national identity theory offers a useful perspective on change and continuity in Korea’s turbulent relationships with the great powers over the years. Following a review of Korean diplomatic history and competing theoretical approaches, along with a synthetic national-identity theory as an alternative approach, one chapter each is devoted to how Korea relates to the four powers in turn, and the book concludes with a consideration of inter-Korean relations and potential reunification.
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Robert Ross of Boston College reaches a more optimistic conclusion about the future of East Asian security. He focuses on the role of geography and structure in maintaining the current East Asian balance of power into the twenty-first century. Ross argues that U.S.-China bipolarity in the region will continue for at least the next quarter century. East Asia’s two lesser great powers, Russia and Japan, will not be able to challenge this regional bipolarity because they “lack the geopolitical prerequisites to be poles.” Although the United States and China may challenge each other in the future, the combination of “regional balancing trends, interests conditioned by geography, and the mitigating influence of geography on the security dilemma” bodes well for regional stability and relative peace in the decades to come.
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Defining and conceptualizing Northeast Asia’s security complex poses unique quandaries. The security architecture in Northeast Asia to date has been predominately U.S.-dominated bilateral alliances, weak institutional structures and the current Six Party Talks dealing with the North Korean nuclear issue. There has been a distinct lack of desire among regional countries as well as the U.S. to follow in the footsteps of Europe with its robust set of multilateral institutions. However, since the late 1990s, there has been burgeoning interest among regional states towards forming new multilateral institutions as well as reforming and revitalizing existing mechanisms. Much of this effort has been in the economic and political arenas, with the creation of bodies such as the East Asian Summit, but there have also been important initiatives in the security sphere.
This book offers detailed examinations about how this potentially tense region of the world is redefining certain longstanding national interests, and shows how this shift is the result of changing power relations, the desire to protect hard-won economic gains, as well as growing trust in new processes designed to foster regional cooperation over regional conflict.
Presenting new and timely research on topics that are vital to the security future of one of the world’s most important geographical regions, this book will be of great value to students and scholars of Asian politics, regionalism, international politics and security studies.
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Is Northeast Asia primed for peace or ripe for great-power rivalry? In this turbulent region, all the world-order challenges of arms control and disarmament, global North-South tensions, human rights and humanitarian intervention, environmental protection and eco-development, and democratization and humane governance are concentrated. More than any other part of the world, the divided Korean peninsula is the strategic crossroad where the four major regional/global powers—the United States, Russia, China, and Japan—uneasily interact. This authoritative work explores the complex and evolving interplay of national, regional, and global forces influencing Northeast Asia’s security, economy, and identity. Written by a team of leading scholars, the book presents a variety of theoretical perspectives and case studies to offer a comprehensive analysis of the pressures that shape the policy choices of China, Russia, Japan, the United States, North and South Korea, and Taiwan. The authors’ historically and culturally informed narratives help track and explain the changes and continuities of relationships within the region and with the United States and Russia. Concise and current, this book will be essential reading for all those concerned with the role of a changing Northeast Asia in world politics.
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Have Japan’s relative economic decline and China’s rapid ascent altered the dynamics of Asian regionalism? Peter Katzenstein and Takashi Shiraishi, the editors of Network Power, one of the most comprehensive volumes on East Asian regionalism in the 1990s, present here an impressive new collection that brings the reader up to date.
This book argues that East Asia’s regional dynamics are no longer the result of a simple extension of any one national model. While Japanese institutional structures and political practices remain critically important, the new East Asia now under construction is more than, and different from, the sum of its various national parts. At the outset of a new century, the interplay of Japanese factors with Chinese, American, and other national influences is producing a distinctively new East Asian region.
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Most studies of Asia-Pacific security are marked by pessimism and continuing belief in the virtues of a balance of power. Pacific Asia? goes against the grain by pointing to a number of positive developments—especially economic—in regional relationships, the absence of an arms race, the growth of multilateral groups, and an emerging consensus on the importance of nonmilitary paths to national security. Above all, Mel Gurtov stresses a definition of security that focuses on basic human needs, social justice, and environmental protection. The author disagrees with proponents of a China threat, criticizes U.S. Cold War notions of security through forward-based power, and argues for new efforts at regional dialogue based on multilateral cooperation, sensitivity to Asian nationalism, and a role for Japan as a ‘global civilian power.’
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This book is the first systematic examination of the emerging arms race in Asia.
The global trade in arms is to a large degree underpinned by the strong demand for arms in Asia and the Middle East, the two largest arms export markets in the world. Of these two regions Asia has become particularly significant, led by the emergence of China and India as major powers. It is therefore not surprising that the rapid military modernisation in Asia, accompanied by significant increases in the size and sophistication of armed forces, has generated attention as to its trends, key characteristics, causes and implications. This phenomenon, which has become evident since the end of the Cold War, has also been widely described as an Asian ‘arms race’.
This book evaluates the key conceptual ideas which can shed light on this phenomenon, as well as examining the complex mix of internal, external and technological factors that have led to its emergence. The volume explores the way in which the arms race is leading ultimately to three distinctive blocs in the emerging geostrategic landscape: a loose bloc of US allies in the region; a counter-bloc of potential US adversaries; and a neutral bloc of states with industrial age armed forces whose allegiances will vary according to circumstances and geostrategic developments. The Arms Race in Asia concludes that if the emerging arms race is left unchecked, it is likely that Asia will increasingly become a region of instability, marked by conflicts and interstate wars.
The book will be of great interest to students of Asian politics, strategic studies, defence studies, security studies and IR in general.
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A cursory examination of the post-Cold War record shows significant successes in sustaining nonproliferation. Nevertheless, major challenges do exist, especially in the inability of the Non-proliferation Treaty system to deal with proliferation in North Korea and Iran. Here, Mohan presents a brief survey of the advances made in the nonproliferation arena and moves on to question one of the central assumptions of the Prague Agenda: that an inseparable link exists today between arms reductions among the great powers and weapons of mass destruction proliferation among non-nuclear states. He then discusses the domestic US factors which have uniquely shaped both the Prague Agenda and the global discourse on nuclear weapons and arms control from the beginning, and finally concludes with a discussion of the challenges that US nonproliferation policy might face amidst a plausible reorientation of US foreign policy.
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Despite the rise of ‘new’ security threats like terrorism, cyber-war and piracy, the terrible destructive power of nuclear weapons still hangs over the world. Discussion on further strategic nuclear arms reduction has tended to be dominated by the analysis of possible trade-offs between the US and Russia. But as the prospect of further cuts below ‘New START’ levels is contemplated, increasing attention needs to be paid to the possible shape of a new, multi-power approach to nuclear restraint.
While restraint at low numbers goes with the grain of thinking in most nuclear states, correct sequencing will be vital. Using the New START framework, attention could initially be focused on incremental decreases in US and Russian stocks of the most dangerous weapons. Thereafter, the other nuclear powers would need to take steps to limit the size and capabilities of their own arsenals in a process of mutual reductions. If successful, the benefits would be wide ranging: successful restraint amongst existing nuclear-armed states could engender trust, as well as provide mechanisms for reducing the risks of rapid escalation in the event of limited conflict.
Less is Better considers the various challenges and opportunities for ensuring restraint at low numbers in today’s complicated web of bilateral nuclear relationships and in the context of the debate on ‘Global Zero’.
