Articles

"...[T]he United States has spent several tens of billions of dollars on missile defense research-and yet China, Iran, North Korea and possibly others have continued to pursue increasingly effective long-range ballistic capabilities. If missile defenses are a deterrent, why do US competitors-to say nothing of outright enemies-seem undeterred?"

Nuclear weapons have had two destabilizing effects on the South Asian security environment. First, nuclear weapons’ ability to shield Pakistan against all-out Indian retaliation, and to attract international attention to Pakistan’s dispute with India, encouraged aggressive Pakistani behavior. Second, these Indo-Pakistani crises led India to adopt a more aggressive conventional military posture toward Pakistan. This development could exacerbate regional security-dilemma dynamics and increase the likelihood of Indo-Pakistani conflict in years to come. Thus nuclear weapons not only destabilized South Asia in the first decade after the nuclear tests; they may damage the regional security environment well into the future.

The notion of "tribal culture" in the West often brings to mind images of backward, uneducated and unsophisticated societies. Perpetual chaos in states like Afghanistan, Iraq and Somalia, for instance, is often attributed to tribal culture. It is a sweeping judgment as in many cases geopolitical, historical and even religious factors often play a more significant role than the impact of tribal ethos in defining what causes underdevelopment and violence. Pashtun tribal culture is generally portrayed as the root cause behind their support and sympathy for the Taliban and al-Qaeda. This analysis investigates these notions by studying the profiles of the Pashtun tribes that populate the seven tribal agencies that form Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas.

"...China is worried about how U.S. space weaponization plans might affect Chinese national security, international security, and protection of the space environment...."

"How has a state whose founding fathers were secular people who believed in rule of law and democracy drifted toward religious extremism and authoritarianism? Three primary factors—variations on the Triple A theory of influence (Allah, the Army, and America)—have led Pakistan down this path: a powerful independent military, the mushrooming of religious militant groups, and the hydra-headed monster that is the intelligence services."

"Chinese officials have expressed a growing concern that U.S. space and missile defense plans will stimulate a costly and destabilizing arms race...."

"China is concerned about U.S. missile defense and "space control"plans, which would lead to weaponization of outer space and stimulate a costly and destabilizing arms race. China is further concerned that the US missile defense program, as currently advertised, would neutralize China's strategic nuclear deterrent...."

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As with most of the other states of the Caucasus and Central Asia, the democratization of Azerbaijan has not progressed as Washington had hoped it would when the Soviet Union first began to dissolve. During the past six months, President Aliyev has been incapacitated by failing health. The problems that emerged as a result of his illness demonstrated that Azerbaijan has not yet succeeded in building government institutions that are sufficiently independent of the leadership. Hence, if the elections are not conducted in a fair and free manner, foreign disappointment with the government may increase."

A universal Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty (FMCT), which would ban the production of fissile material (separated plutonium, highly enriched uranium (HEU), and uranium-233) for nuclear weapons, has long been seen as a key building block in nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation.

Carter, Deutch, and Zelikow addresses the threat of Catastrophic Terrorism in Foreign Affairs.