Best of Intentions: America's Campaign Against Strategic Weapons Proliferation

Henry D. Sokolski

Greenwood Publishing Group, 2001 - History - 160 pages

Although the United States efforts to prevent the spread of strategic weapons have varied significantly since 1945, they all presumed to be avoiding one or another type of strategic war. To the extent their military scenarios were sound, so too were the nonproliferation remedies these initiatives promoted. But, as Sokolski demonstrates, the obverse was also true--when these intiatives' military hopes and fears were mistaken, their nonproliferation recommendations also missed their mark.

What is the best hope for breaking out of this box and securing a higher rate of nonproliferation success? The United States must base nonproliferation policies less on insights concerning strategic military trends and more on the progressive economic and political trends that have increased the number of relatively peaceful, prosperous, liberal democracies. For the proliferating nations that are exceptions to this trend, the U.S. and its allies need to devise ways of competing that will encourage these governments to expend more energies shoring up their weaknesses and eventually giving way to less militant regimes. A major resource for students and military professionals interested in arms control and international relations.

Contents

• The First Half Century: xi
• The Baruch Plan: 7
• Atoms for Peace: 19
• The Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty: 33
• Proliferation Technology Control Regimes: 57
• Counterproliferation: 85
• The Next Campaign: 95
• The Baruch Plan Presented to the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission June 14 1946: 109
• President Eisenhowers Address Before the General Assembly of the United Nations on the Peaceful Uses of Nuclear Energy December 8 1953: 117
• Treaty on the NonProliferation of Nuclear Weapons: 125
• Multilateral Export Control Regimes Membership and Related Websites: 131
• Remarks by Honorable Les Aspin Secretary of Defense National Academy of Sciences Committee on International Security and Arms Control Decem...: 135
• Selected Bibliography: 141
• Index: 153

About the author

HENRY D. SOKOLSKI is Executive Director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center./e From 1989 to early 1993 Mr. Sokolski served as Deputy for Nonproliferation Policy in the Office of the Secretary of Defense Cheney. In addition to his government service, Mr. Sokolski has lectured and written extensively on proliferation issues.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Best of Intentions: America's Campaign Against Strategic Weapons Proliferation; ABC-Clio ebook; Praeger Security International Series
• Author: Henry D. Sokolski
• Edition: illustrated
• Publisher: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2001
• ISBN: 0275967522, 9780275967529
• Length: 160 pages
• Subjects: History / Military / General; Political Science / International Relations / Arms Control