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SAIS Review 24.1 (2004) 169-172



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The Great Equalizer

Kerry M. Kartchner


The Spread of Nuclear Weapons: A Debate Renewed, by Scott D. Sagan and Kenneth N. Waltz. (New York: W.W. Norton, 2003). 224 pp. $19.

In the late 1800s, the proliferation of the Colt 45 revolver eventually tamed the lawless American West by allowing even the weak and socially disenfranchised, who lacked the traditional instruments of power and influence, to assert their will and defend themselves against those endowed with land, position, and political status. The revolver thus earned itself the moniker "the Peacemaker," or more aptly "the Great Equalizer." But in today's world, where some may consider nuclear weapons to be a modern version of "the Great Equalizer," a nuclear "shoot-out" at the OK Corral could have devastating consequences on a global scale.

Both the negative and positive aspects of the proliferation of nuclear weapons in an anarchic world are convincingly argued in the updated edition of The Spread of Nuclear Weapons: A Debate Renewed, by Scott D. Sagan and Kenneth N. Waltz. Sagan is a professor in the Department of Political Science at Stanford University and a widely respected author of many publications on nuclear strategy and deterrence. Waltz, known to all serious students of international relations as the author of several seminal works on modern international relations theory, is Emeritus Professor of Political Science at UC Berkeley. The first version of the book, published in 1995, comprised a debate between Waltz, the optimist, and Sagan, the pessimist, regarding the consequences of nuclear proliferation. In addition to the original material, this updated edition includes a timely and intriguing chapter extending the debate to the emerging nuclear relationship between India and Pakistan as well as some additional material on the impact of missile defenses.

Waltz's claims are logical extensions of the dominant school of thought that emerged in the post-1945 world. He argues that nuclear weapons are "absolute" in their effects on world politics and that "the dangerousness of war [End Page 169] has reduced the danger of war." Waltz has a great deal of faith in the inherent robustness of nuclear deterrence. His thesis is simple and straightforward: "The presence of nuclear weapons makes war less likely." Thus, Waltz asserts that "the gradual spread of nuclear weapons is more to be welcomed than feared." This assertion proceeds from his reasoning that "[s]tates are not deterred because they expect to suffer a certain amount of damage but because they cannot know how much damage they will suffer." Moreover, Waltz believes that even if some nuclear weapons are actually used in a conflict, the prospect of escalation is unlikely: "should deterrence fail, a few judiciously delivered warheads are likely to produce sobriety in the leaders of all of the countries involved and thus bring rapid deescalation."

Neither is Waltz intimidated by the prospect of weak, unstable, or violence-prone states acquiring nuclear weapons. For having once acquired nuclear weapons, "[t]he weaker and the more endangered a state is, the less likely it is to engage in reckless behavior." This tendency is informed by the knowledge that using nuclear weapons is certain to bring devastating reprisals by other members of the international community. The very process of acquiring nuclear weapons will actually impose rationality and caution on weak and unstable states.

Waltz moreover dismisses the notion that civil turmoil and instability or even civil war might lead to the use of nuclear weapons, stating pointedly that "[t]he domestic use of nuclear weapons is, of all the uses imaginable, least likely to lead to escalation and to global tragedy." Waltz also rejects the common assumption that the use of any nuclear weapon, anywhere, would automatically and inescapably lead to the firing of all nuclear weapons everywhere in a cataclysmic escalation. 1 "The use of nuclear weapons by lesser powers would hardly trigger their use elsewhere," he frankly states instead.

Sagan, on the other hand, presents a cogent argument, based primarily on his previous studies in organizational behavior and accident theory, that "more will be worse." To his credit...

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