The age of Senator Robert Dole, the oldest man ever to run for the presidency, was a substantive issue in the election of 1996. But was it influential in the minds of the electorate as they cast their ballots? We consider in this article the association of aging with the likelihood of illness and of significant cognitive change. We also examine the risk factors revealed by Senator Dole's personal and family medical history. To determine how much of this information was available to the public, we analyze media content on these subjects across the election year. We then trace the sources of the public's assessment of whether Dole's age and health would affect his performance as president and whether this judgment, in turn, affected the likelihood of voting for him.

Proceedings of a conference, "Preventing Deadly Conflict: Strategies and Institutions," held in Moscow Aug. 14-16, 1996," that was a joint undertaking of the Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict, the Institute of Universal History of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the Center for International Security and Arms Control at Stanford University.

Dr. Lapidus, who co-edited the report, wrote the conclusion, "Lessons from the Russian Experience."

This report on non-binding, non-treaty approaches to arms control draws upon research and discussion at the Center for International Security and Arms Control during 1990 and 1991, after the Cold War had ended but before the disintegration of the Soviet Union. It was apparent at the time that the traditional approach to arms control--through detailed treaties resulting from long negotiations--might not be adequate to deal with the new situation in which arms reductions could be made quickly but coordination would still be needed in order to preserve stability. We examined the possibility of using reciprocal unilateral measures (RUMs) in place of treaties as a mechanism for achieving arms control.

A striking example of the approach we were recommending was when Presidents Bush and Gorbachev announced major withdrawals of non-strategic nuclear weapons in September and October 1991 (We describe the Bush-Gorbachev RUMs in this paper.) The strategic picture changed dramatically soon after those measures were announced. The Soviet Union was replaced by the Russian Federation and 14 other newly independent states. For several years, the treaty method worked well in U.S.-Russian arms control, alongside other forms of cooperation such as the Nunn-Lugar program. We put aside our work on RUMs.

Although we are far from a resumption of the Cold War, U.S.-Russian relations are no longer as cooperative as they were in the early 1990s. Besides, the treaty method has slowed almost to a standstill. We have therefore returned to the draft final report of 1991 and drawn from it the history we thought is relevant to the current problem of reducing the strategic nuclear threat Russia and the United States pose to each other--and to the rest of the world.

Late last year, we noted the tenth anniversary of what was probably the most remarkable of all the meetings between an American president and his Soviet counterpart, the Reykjavik Summit of October 1986. History has shown that Reykjavik was a true turning point. Three major treaties between the United States and the Soviet Union were negotiated by the end of 1992; they resulted in substantially reduced levels of nuclear weapons. That happened as the Cold War was ending and, as the Russians say, it was no coincidence. A dramatic change in the relationship between the Soviet Union and the United States made it possible. A readiness, both in Washington and in Moscow, to open a new chapter in their relationship prepared the way.

The world has moved on. The Soviet Union no longer exists. But can we say that the world has been freed from the incessant and pervasive fear of nuclear devastation? Not yet, as this report will show. Persuading three newly independent states to eliminate the nuclear weapons they inherited in the collapse of the Soviet Union was a major achievement. Cooperating with Russia to tighten controls over fissile materials has made a real difference in terms of international security. But illicit trafficking in nuclear materials is still a potential problem and this has happened just as a more brutal form of terrorism, more willing to engage in mass murder, has made its appearance. This threat requires a wide spectrum of responses, but at the heart of it is the need for strict controls over nuclear weapons and fissile materials from the laboratory to the missile silo and every point in between.

The idea of a safer strategic environment involving progressively less reliance on nuclear weapons is still valid and must be pursued. Abolishing nuclear weapons is a feat beyond our present capacity to achieve, but we can go much further than we have to date in eliminating these weapons. The recent U.S.-Russian summit meeting in Helsinki made a start in that direction.

The American relationship with Russia is one among many that require careful tending. It is one of the few that can be said to be vital. We can reduce the salience of nuclear weapons in the Russian-American relationship and that would open the door to many opportunities now denied us.

Scott D. Sagan notes that the question of why states seek to build nuclear weapons has scarcely been examined, although it is crucial to efforts at preventing proliferation. He challenges the traditional realist assumption, accepted uncritically by many scholars and policymakers, that states seek to acquire or develop nuclear weapons primarily for military and strategic reasons. Sagan examines alternate explanations for the demand for nuclear weapons.

Revised and updated versions of this article also appear as "The Causes of Nuclear Proliferation," Current History (April 1997), pp. 151-156; as "Why Do States Build Nuclear Weapons?" in Victor Utgoff, ed., The Coming Crisis: Nuclear Proliferation, U.S. Interests, and World Order (MIT Press, 1999), p. 17-50; and as "Why Do States Build Nuclear Weapons? Three Models in Search of a Bomb," in New Global Dangers: Changing Dimensions of International Security (International Security Reader, July 2004).

This paper describes the development of the first community service learning program for democratic education in South Africa. The Democracy Education Project, which is based on Swarthmore College's innovative Democracy Project, was designed and implemented by a Swarthmore College student working with a high school in a Black community near CapeTown. This case study demonstrates that the successful transposition of a model of community service learning from one country to another requires recognizing the complex relationships among history and culture, and theories and practices of democratic education. It is also crucial to involve the new community as an equal partner at every step of the process. Together, the Democracy and the Democracy Education Projects suggest the potential of community service learning for strengthening citizenship, and for bridging the gaps between races, in the United States as well as in South Africa.

This paper reports the results of a study of the special export control regime for high-performance computers. The history and purpose of this export control regime are reviewed, and a framework for analysis is established, which can be used to test the basic premises on which the control regime rests and to suggest viable control thresholds. The fact that the export of certain computer systems cannot be effectively controlled is established, and the limits of controllability are defined. U.S. government applications for high-performance computers are reviewed with respect to the requirement for and criticality of such computing for national security. Finally, judgments are made as to the levels of control that are possible, and the desirability and feasibility of maintaining Such controls. Near- and intermediate-term problems that may erode the liability of the basic premises underlying high-performance computer export controls are identified.

A remarkable tripartite collaboration. . . . A new and highly revealing account of how the Korean War began, based on a careful comparison of Chinese, Soviet, and even North Korean sources. The authors' achievement, from a historian's perspective, is roughly the equivalent of making a first flight around the hidden side of the moon. . . . An exemplary standard for the "new" Cold War history. -Atlantic Monthly

A fascinating and exciting book. Every expert on Soviet and Chinese foreign policy and every student of international relations and the Cold War will have to read it. I am awed by the materials that have been put together in this book; it is international collaboration at its very best. 

-Melvyn P. Leffler, University of Virginia

This title, the first using newly available resources from China and Russia, represents the opening of a new era in the study of Sino-Soviet relations and their effect on international politics. The credentials of the authors are the highest.
-Library Journal

This magisterial work provides the missing dimension of the Korean war - how policy was made on the communist side. Making use of previously unavailable Chinese and Soviet sources . . . this is likely to become the standard work on the subject.
-John Merrill, George Washington University.

This book is essentially a series of case histories of U.S.-Soviet nuclear arms control negotiations, as seen from the American side. It describes the processes of governmental decisionmaking for arms control in Washington, D.C., and the techniques for joint U.S.-Soviet decisionmaking at the negotiating table.

As general counsel of the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency and member of U.S. delegations to disarmament conferences for eight years, the author was in a unique position to assess the difficulties of fashioning an arms control treaty that could pass muster within the executive branch of the U.S. government, be approved by U.S. allies, be successfully negotiated with the Soviets, and then win the approval of the U.S. Senate. This process will be even more complex now that the United States will face at least four nuclear powers from the former U.S.S.R.

The book has three purposes. The first is to add to the recorded history of the following negotiations: the Limited Test Ban Treaty of 1963, the Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1968, the ABM Treaty of 1972 and its companion SALT Interim Agreements, and the 1987 INF Treaty. The author asks in each case, What did the president and his assistants do (or fail to do) to negotiate a successfulu agreement?

The second purpose is to use the case book approach, common in law schools and business schools, as a teaching device for those who wish to learn how the American government made decisions about arms control negotiations, how U.S.-Soviet negotiators reached decisions, and what the results of the decisions have been.

The book's third purpose is to generalize about what works and what does not work in the complex world of arms control negotiations, including information on the impact of negotiating committees and comparisons of the process for negotiating arms control treaties with that for achieving arms limits through action and reaction, without written agreement. The concluding chapter looks to the future: What changes will occur in the arms control process given the end of the Cold War and the disintegration of the Soviet Union?

This analysis argues that the basic purpose of NPT safeguards—to verify compliance with an obligation not to "manufacture" nuclear weapons—could be easily thwarted if a non-nuclear-weapon party is able to produce nuclear-explosive material and build bombs in facilities that are not declared to the IAEA and inspected by IAEA inspectors.  The language of the NPT, its negotiating history, and the subsequent agreement applying its safeguards provisions all support the conclusion that non-nuclear-weapon NPT parties agreed to permit inspection of activities.