Conventional Deterrence: Predictive Uncertainty and Policy Confidence

1985 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 153-179 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard K. Betts
Keyword(s):  
North Atlantic ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
The United States ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
Predictive Uncertainty ◽  
The North ◽  
Flexible Response ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Military Balance

For over three decades the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has based its deterrent on the principle that the United States would retaliate with nuclear weapons if a Soviet conventional attack against Western Europe succeeded. This notion has long troubled most strategic analysts. It remained generally acceptable to political elites, however, when U.S. nuclear superiority appeared massive enough to make the doctrine credible (as in the 1950s); when the conventional military balance in Europe improved markedly (as in the 1960s); or when détente appeared to be making the credibility of deterrence a less pressing concern (as in the 1970s). None of these conditions exists in the 1980s, and anxiety over the danger of nuclear war has prompted renewed attention to the possibility of replacing NATO's Flexible Response doctrine (a mixture of nuclear and conventional deterrence) with a reliable conventional deterrence posture that might justify a nuclear no-first-use (NFU) doctrine.1

Isolationism or discerning internationalism: Robert Taft, Mike Mansfield and US Troops in Europe

1982 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-38
Author(s):  
Phil Williams
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
American Foreign Policy ◽  
The United States ◽  
Executive Branch ◽  
The North ◽  
Troop Deployment ◽  
The North Atlantic ◽  
The 1960S

The United States security guarantee to Western Europe enshrined in the North Atlantic Treaty has been not only the most important and enduring of American foreign policy commitments since the late 1940s, but also the least controversial Few critics have challenged the view that the Atlantic Alliance is vital to American security. The manner in which the commitment has been implemented, however, and in particular the extent to which it requires a substantial presence of American conventional forces in Europe has been much more controversial Indeed, the troop deployment policy of the Executive Branch has been challenged by Congress on several occasions. The first challenge came in 1951 when leading members of the Senate questioned both the legitimacy and the wisdom of President Truman's decision to send US troops to Europe. During the latter half of the 1960s and the first half of the 1970s, the issue arose once again as Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield articulated doubts about the need to maintain the existing troop level in Europe. From 1966 to 1970 Mansfield introduced several Sense of the Senate Resolutions advocating troop reductions; in 1971 and again in 1973 and 1974 he pressed amendments to legislation which, had they been approved, would have mandated reductions.

Who was saving whom? The European Community and the Cold War, 1960s–1970s

2016 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-47 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kiran Klaus Patel
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
European Community ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
The United States ◽  
Main Role ◽  
Bilateral Agreements ◽  
Political Cooperation ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The Cold War

This article argues that during the 1960s, the European Community (EC) made little contribution to peace. What peace there was resulted mainly from other factors, most importantly the United States as benevolent hegemon, North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), and bilateral agreements. European integration under the auspices of the EC presupposed peace rather than contributing to it. At the time, the EC’s main role with regard to peace was at the symbolic level: it started to represent all attempts at peaceful co-operation and reconciliation in Western Europe. It was only in the 1970s, especially with the European Political Cooperation, that the EC began to actively promote peace beyond its borders.

Conflict and Cooperation in Intra-Alliance Nuclear Politics: Western Europe, the United States, and the Genesis of NATO's Dual-Track Decision, 1977–1979

2011 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 39-89 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristina Spohr Readman
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
The United States ◽  
Conflict And Cooperation ◽  
The North ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Nuclear Missiles ◽  
East West

On the basis of recently released archival sources from several member-states of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), this article revisits the making of NATO's landmark 1979 dual-track decision. The article examines the intersecting processes of personal, bureaucratic, national, and alliance high politics in the broader Cold War context of increasingly adversarial East-West relations. The discussion sheds new light on how NATO tried to augment its deterrent capability via the deployment of long-range theater nuclear missiles and why ultimately an arms control proposal to the Soviet Union was included as an equal strand. The 1979 decision owed most to West German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt's political thought and initiative. Intra-alliance decision-making, marked by transatlantic conflict and cooperation, benefitted from the creativity and agency of West German, British, and Norwegian officials. Contrary to popular impressions, the United States did not truly lead the process.

A Continent Bristling With Arms: Continuity and Change In Western European Security Policies After the Second World War

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leopoldo Nuti
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Security Policies ◽  
European Security ◽  
World War ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
Continuity And Change ◽  
The North ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The Stability

Since the end of World War II, Europe has known an unprecedented period of peace that has profoundly altered the political landscape of the continent. Yet at the same time, for much of the postwar period, this peace has been accompanied by frightening preparations for a global nuclear war – in the 1960s, the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) planned to deploy in Western Europe 7,000 tactical atomic warheads of different yields – and by a number of recurrent crises that repeatedly threatened the stability of the postwar order. Nor should one neglect the fact that two European powers – France and Britain – still field the third and fifth largest nuclear arsenals in the whole world respectively. This article explores the post World War II evolution of defence and security policies in Western Europe, as well as the role of nuclear weapons in European security and the shifting perceptions of war in European public opinion and mentality. After considering colonial empires, decolonisation and nuclear issues, it discusses the last years of the Cold War.

Rise and Decline of Latin American Dependency Theories

Itinerario ◽  
1998 ◽  
Vol 22 (4) ◽  
pp. 25-43 ◽  
Author(s):  
Walther L. Bernecker ◽  
Thomas Fischer
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
National Development ◽  
The United States ◽  
Cuban Revolution ◽  
Government Policies ◽  
Latin American Politics ◽  
The North ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The One

In order to understand the value of any theory, one has to know its origins and background. This is especially true of the various dependency theories, which have always been more than just ‘theories of theorists for theorists’. Dependency theories can only be understood against the background of Latin American politics in the 1960s. Taking this into account, there was an obvious connection between the Cuban Revolution on the one hand, and the unfulfilled expectations of development caused by the failure of modernisation efforts, on the other. The basic idea behind dependency theories is the explanation of the historically unequal relations between Latin America and the North Atlantic economies (Europe and the United States). Dependency theories are essentially attempts to justify government policies to acquire control of national development.

Western Alternatives for Development in the Global Cold War

2019 ◽  
pp. 50-67
Author(s):  
Sara Lorenzini
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Cold War ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
Public Discourse ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
The United States ◽  
Development Aid ◽  
The North ◽  
The North Atlantic

This chapter assesses how modernization worked its way into Cold War politics and how it influenced public discourse and foreign policy in the United States during the second half of the 1950s. Between 1957 and 1958, several events prompted the United States to shift toward a more active foreign aid policy. These events brought a consensus that a more vigorous approach to promoting economic growth and development as a way to contain communist influence was needed. The question of improved coordination of development assistance among the Atlantic nations was also a factor. Most of Western Europe shared America's concern about Soviet penetration, and several members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) insisted on activating economic collaboration according to article 2 of the North Atlantic Treaty, using it to provide aid cooperatively. The chapter then considers how, with the presidency of John F. Kennedy, modernization became the representative Western ideology for waging the Cold War, even as other coexisting traditions of imperial origin offered rival methods of using development aid as a tool of foreign policy to face radicalization in the decolonizing world.

scholarly journals Striking forest revival at the end of the Roman Period in north-western Europe

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Lambert ◽  
A. Penaud ◽  
M. Vidal ◽  
C. Gandini ◽  
L. Labeyrie ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
North Atlantic ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Anthropogenic Activities ◽  
Sedimentary Environment ◽  
Pollen Grains ◽  
Roman Period ◽  
Freshwater Microalgae ◽  
Environmental Signals ◽  
The North ◽  
North Western

AbstractThe Holocene period (last 11,700 years BP) has been marked by significant climate variability over decadal to millennial timescales. The underlying mechanisms are still being debated, despite ocean–atmosphere–land connections put forward in many paleo-studies. Among the main drivers, involving a cluster of spectral signatures and shaping the climate of north-western Europe, are solar activity, the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) varying atmospheric regimes and North Atlantic oceanic gyre dynamics. Over the last 2500 years BP, paleo-environmental signals have been strongly affected by anthropogenic activities through deforestation and land use for crops, grazing, habitations, or access to resources. Palynological proxies (especially pollen grains and marine or freshwater microalgae) help to highlight such anthropogenic imprints over natural variability. Palynological analyses conducted in a macro-estuarine sedimentary environment of north-western France over the last 2500 years BP reveal a huge and atypical 300 year-long arboreal increase between 1700 and 1400 years BP (around 250 and 550 years AD) that we refer to as the ‘1.7–1.4 ka Arboreal Pollen rise event’ or ‘1.7–1.4 ka AP event’. Interestingly, the climatic 1700–1200 years BP interval coincides with evidence for the withdrawal of coastal societies in Brittany (NW France), in an unfavourable socio-economic context. We suggest that subpolar North Atlantic gyre strengthening and related increasing recurrence of storminess extremes may have affected long-term coastal anthropogenic trajectories resulting in a local collapse of coastal agrarian societies, partly forced by climatic degradation at the end of the Roman Period.

Allied High Commission for Germany

1951 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 825-832
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
Foreign Minister ◽  
The United States ◽  
Scrap Metal ◽  
German Federal Republic ◽  
The North ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
The North Atlantic ◽  
Contractual Agreements

With the development of certain administrative frictions (concerning coal quotas, occupation costs, and the scrap metal treaty) between the western occupying powers and the German Federal Republic, early indications were that if the talk of “contractual agreements” did materialize it would reserve, for the occupying powers, wide controls over important areas of west Germany's internal and external affairs. In Washington, however, a general modification of approach was noted during the September discussions between the United States Secretary of State (Acheson), the United Kingdom Foreign Secretary (Morrison), and the French Foreign Minister (Schuman), preparatory to the Ottawa meetings of the North Atlantic Council.

Why Is There So Much Christianity in the United States? A Reply to Sommerville

2002 ◽  
Vol 71 (4) ◽  
pp. 858-864 ◽  
Author(s):  
David A. Hollinger
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
North Atlantic ◽  
Religious Affiliation ◽  
The United States ◽  
Church History ◽  
Voluntary Organizations ◽  
Secular Culture ◽  
The North ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Church

If we are going to explain the slow pace of de-Christianization for the United States relative to other industrialized societies in the North Atlantic West, we might well begin with the church-state relationship. The absence of an established church in the United States has enabled religious affiliation to function, like other voluntary organizations in “civil society,” as mediators between the individual and the nation. I conimented on this rather old idea in a book C. John Sommerville is kind enough to cite in another connection, Science, Jews, and Secular Culture, but since he does not take up this point, I will develop it a bit further here, before reacting to Sommerville's other concerns as expressed in his refreshingly fair-minded rejoinder to my essay in the March 2001 issue of Church History.

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