The proliferation of chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons is now the single most serious security concern for governments around the world. Peter R. Lavoy, Scott D. Sagan, and James J. Wirtz compare how military threats, strategic cultures, and organizations shape the way leaders intend to employ these armaments. They reveal the many frightening ways that emerging military powers and terrorist groups are planning the unthinkable by preparing to use chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons in future conflicts.

Distinguished specialists consider several states and organizations that have this weaponry: Iraq, Iran, India, Pakistan, North Korea, and Israel, as well as the Aum Shinrikyo cult. The contributors expose plans for using unconventional weapons, highlighting the revolutionary effects these arsenals might have on international politics and regional disputes.

Work on ethnic and nationalist violence has emerged from two largely non-intersecting literatures: studies of ethnic conflict and studies of political violence. Only recently have the former begun to attend to the dynamics of violence and the latter to the dynamics of ethnicization. Since the emergent literature on ethnic violence is not structured by clearly defined theoretical oppositions, we organize our review by broad similarities of methodological approach: (a) Inductive work at various levels of aggregation seeks to identify the patterns, mechanisms, and recurrent processes implicated in ethnic violence. (b) Theory-driven work employs models of rational actions drawn from international relations theory, game theory, and general rational action theory. (c) Culturalist work highlights the discursive, symbolic and ritualistic aspects of ethnic violence. We conclude with a plea for the disaggregated analysis of the heterogenous phenomena we too caually lump together as "ethnic violence."

Nuclear war is generally believed to bring risks of destruction out of proportion to any gain that may be secured by the war, or to any loss that may be averted, except perhaps for the loss of national independence and group survival. Nuclear-armed states, however, continue to project military force outside their own territory in order to carry out rivalries for power and influence. Will these rival power projections lead to war, as they often did in the past? If not, how will they be resolved? This paper makes the case that, because of the recognized destructiveness of nuclear weapons, rivalries among major nuclear-armed states for power and influence outside their own territory are not likely to lead to central war among them, but that definite lines separating zones of exclusive security influence, such as prevailed during the Cold War, will reappear where circumstances prevent
other compromises. This conclusion does not hold in the case of nuclear powers that are centrally vulnerable to conventional attack from each other: in that case, nuclear deterrence is less likely to be stable. Where lines are established, they may facilitate rather than prevent cooperation in dealing with the next century's global problems.

This paper examines technical and institutional possibilities for improving the ability of the international safeguards regime to prevent or slow the spread of nuclear weapons. It relies strongly on the experience of the recently uncovered Iraqi nuclear-weapons program and the role of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the United Nations in the discovery of the program's extent and scope.

The Iraqi program and its exposure following the Gulf War surprised and disturbed much of the international community. However, the shock generated by the extent and the size of an effort that had been suspected but remained grossly underestimated and misunderstood has given a strong political impetus to the will of the international community for strengthening the non-proliferation regime.

This paper makes a number of suggestions based on a review of the Iraqi effort and on an assessment of possible future attempts by other nations to acquire nuclear weapons.

In recent years, world attention has been drawn to the acquisition by developing countries of delivery systems for nuclear weapons as distinct from the nuclear warheads themselves. In particular, concerns have been raised about the spread of ballistic-missile systems and technologies to areas such as theMiddle East, in which there are strong regional tensions.  The extensive use of ballistic missiles in the "war of the cities" in 1988 during the Iran-Iraq War and the use of Scud missiles by Iraq against Israel and Saudi Arabia during Desert Storm highlighted the rapid proliferation of these weapons, and served as a premonition of worse things to come if and when developing states deploy ballistic missiles armed with weapons of mass destruction.  The ballistic missiles of concern have ranges of a hundred to a few thousand kilometers (km) and can carry payloads of up to one or two thousand kilograms (kg). These systems are becoming increasingly prominent in Third World arsenals, and are perceived as threatening stability and regional military balances.

This study examines the impact of ballistic-missile proliferation, focusing on sixteen regional states which have or soon could have ballistic-missile capabilities.  Specifically, the study: (1) evaluates the military effectlveness of ballistic missiles in comparison with advanced strike aircraft, (2) identifies trends in the supply of and demand for ballistic missiles, (3) identifies key technologies and systems whose control is essential to a successful missile non-proliferation regime, (4) reviews the relevancy and effectiveness of present control mechanisms including the MlssiIe Technology Control Regime (MTCR), and (5) offers policy options for strengthening controls on the acquisition by developing states of longer-range ground strike delivery systems, including ballistic missiles and advanced combat aircraft.