Exploring the Causes of the Post-World War II Arms Race - Essay Example

Exploring the Causes of the Post-World War II Arms Race The conclusion of the Second World War in 1945 saw the emergence of a new world order, with the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) surfacing as the two most preponderant global powers. The American atomic bomb, used to telling effect to end the War in the east, became the symbol of US superiority; this technological advantage created a hegemonic international system where US power remained unchallenged. However, in 1949, the USSR achieved nuclear parity with the US, thus initiating a climate of competition that triggered the Cold War between these two superpowers. The pursuit of nuclear superiority continued unabated during the Cold War, leading to a potentially deadly arms race between the two adversaries. Indeed, at one point, they possesses enough nuclear weapons to destroy the world several times over (McNamara 1987: 154-155); the purpose of this paper is to analyze the causes of the perpetuation of this arms race. At the onset, it is prudent to recognize that there are two distinct approaches for explicating our subject at hand: one is theoretical and the other historical. We shall assess both of these, while also attempting to place the historical record within a theoretical context. It must be mentioned, however, that it is beyond the scope of this essay to consider every theoretical perspective of international relations. Instead, this paper shall only focus on the most (conventionally) dominant theory of the time, i.e. realism. The realist paradigm essentially looks at the world as it is rather than how it ought to be, and remains inherently pessimistic about the prospects of peace in the global society of states. All strands of the theory maintain that the international system is anarchical or without any central organizing mechanism, populated by nation-states that are in permanent conflict. Nation-states have lexical priority over all other institutions and their national interests are defined in terms of power; every state aims at the satisfaction of these interests by maximizing power (Donnelly 2000: 7-8). Therefore, as the US and the USSR (especially Soviet Russia) emerged as the two most important nation-states after World Wars II, their respective national interests increasingly became conflict ridden, setting off a global power struggle. Now, one of the central concepts of realism is the balance of power thesis, leading to the security dilemma. This thesis holds that “because states pursue power as a means to security, they frequently tend to expand,” and the increase of one state’s power – understood as military capability – is checked by the countervailing power of another (Wohlforth, Kaufman, & Little 2007: 8). Realism holds that states are security maximizers, and the increment of one state’s (or a group of states’) power breeds insecurity on the part of a rival state (or alliance). This insecurity is then serviced by an increment in the military capability of the second state, which subsequently insecuritizes the first. This vicious cycle of graduated military buildup eventually culminates in the security dilemma of an arms race that may finally break into open war. To elaborate, every state must be sensitive to the power and capabilities of other states; since any state may use nuclear weapons to advance its national interests, all states remain worried about their survival. Power, therefore, becomes a means to the end of security, that end being survival in the international system: “Because power is a possible useful means, sensible statesmen try to have an appropriate amount of it….In crucial situations, however, the ultimate concern of states is not for power but for security” (Waltz 1990: 40). So, nuclear weapons allow states to become security maximizers rather than power maximizers, and nuclear weapons offer a reasonable option for all states to acquire a deterrent capability that would ensure long-term security. Power maximization, Kenneth Waltz maintains, often distorts perceptions and proves dysfunctional, triggering counterbalancing coalitions of states (1989). Situating the Cold War conflict between the US and the USSR within this framework, we can see that the US nuclear superiority led to insecurity on the part of the USSR, which moved quickly to erase this gap. This military increment, however, induced the US to respond in kind, as the numbers of nuclear weapons possessed by both superpowers proliferated through the 1950s and 1960s, even as the same were witnessing constant qualitative improvement. This security dilemma was perpetuated by the distorted perception of power maximization; the US and the USSR sought to outdo one another by the sheer number of nuclear weapons, even though only a handful of them were enough to guarantee catastrophic damage on their opponent if used, hence ensuring nuclear deterrence. Deterrence became a key categorical imperative in international politics during the Cold War. The destructive potential of nuclear weapons made them the greatest weapon of mass destruction, and these could be utilized to raze strategic enemy locations to the ground in a matter of moments. Nuclear deterrence worked during the Cold War, however, because each side retained a second-strike capability. This would allow the US and the USSR to absorb nuclear attacks and retaliate in kind, and this action-reaction syndrome would lead to mutual assured destruction. Evidently, nuclear weapons are “…more useful for self-defense than for aggression. If both sides nuclear arsenals are secure from attack, creating an arrangement of mutual assured destruction, neither side can employ these weapons to gain a meaningful military advantage….Defenders have the advantage here, because defenders usually value their freedom more than aggressors value new conquests.” (Mearsheimer 1990: 4) Therefore, as the two superpowers gradually warmed to this idea, they also understood the follies of producing and maintaining vast arsenals of nuclear weapons. This realization paved the way for the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks and the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaties from the 1970s onwards. The historical evidence, too, provides a context for the post-Second World War arms race between the US and the USSR. The wartime alliance between these two great powers had slowly but surely crumbled after 1945, as both countries found an opportunity to fill the power vacuum on the world stage left by the decline of Great Britain, Germany, and France. There was a general feeling in the USSR that it had borne the greatest burden – more than 27 million of its citizenry perished during WWII – in bringing victory to the Allied forces. Therefore, it also desired the largest share of war reparations in the post-War settlements (Gaddis 2005: 27-28). However, till 1949, the Soviets could not challenge American positions beyond a point or harden their own, given the nuclear monopoly the latter enjoyed. When the USSR achieved nuclear parity, this domination was removed, and it could be more assertive while pursuing its national interests. Thus, nuclear weapons became the currency of power in the international system; it was imperative to have more of the same, with both superpowers striving to amass massive arsenals. Another important factor that explains the post-WWII arms race is the virtual division of the world into two security blocs; countries party to the North American Treaty Organization (NATO, 1949) were secured by the American nuclear capabilities, while those party to the Warsaw Pact (1955) came under the Soviet nuclear umbrella. As an ‘iron curtain’ descended upon Europe separating East and West according to ideological underpinnings, the struggle for power between the US and the USSR also became a struggle between two distinct conceptions of human life, capitalism in the former and communism in the latter. The US followed the military strategy of containment, which sought to surround the USSR by allies and client states to impede the process of communist expansion: “For the United States, commitments to NATO allies also provided pressures and opportunities to develop and deploy shorter-range (‘tactical’ or ‘theatre’) nuclear weapons. At the strategic (or long-range) level, qualitative change was as significant as quantitative change. In particular, the fear that one side would have sufficient weapons of sufficient accuracy to destroy the other side’s nuclear arsenal became a mutual fear.” (Scott 2001: 105) Of course, there were further complications on either side. While the threat perception in the US centered on Soviet nuclear capability and political ambitions, the USSR was faced with political encirclement and growing antagonism with socialist China in the south, which achieved nuclear capability in 1964 (Scott 2001: 105). For either side, the Cold War was a battle to be won at any cost, and one of the surest ways to guarantee national security was the production and deployment of nuclear weapons. Therefore, we find that the post-WWII arms race that shaped the nature of international politics in the second half of the previous century came about through a curious mix of mutual threat perceptions (that were oftentimes misperceptions), internal political and bureaucratic pressures, and a hegemonic zeal in either adversary to emerge as the unchallenged power in the international system. Indeed, the antagonism between the US and the USSR had provided most of the ground for this intense arms race; after the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 followed a period of détente between the two sides where they sought to maintain ‘peaceful coexistence’. This climate of (relative) cooperation helped settle the arms race to a certain extent, as the superpowers gradually moved from arms proliferation to arms control. References Donnelly, J. (2000) Realism and International Relations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gaddis, J. L. (2005) The Cold War: A New History. New York: Penguin. McNamara, R. (1987) Blundering into Disaster. London: Bloomsbury. Mearsheimer, J. J. (1990) ‘Why We Will Soon Miss the Cold War.’ The Atlantic Monthly, 266, 2: 35-50. Scott, L. (2001) ‘International History, 1945-1990.’ In The Globalization of World Politics: An Introduction to International Relations [3rd Edition]. Ed. by Baylis, J. & Smith, S. Oxford: Oxford University Press: 93-110. Waltz, K. N. (1989) ‘The Origins of War in Neorealist Theory.’ In The Origin and Prevention of Major Wars. Ed. by R. I. Rotberg & T. K. Rabb. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 39-52. Waltz, K. N. (1990) ‘Nuclear Myths and Political Realities.’ American Political Science Review, 84, 3: 731-745. Wohlforth, W. C., Kaufman, S. J., & Little, R. (2007) ‘Introduction: Balance and Hierarchy in International Systems.’ In The Balance of Power in World History. Ed. by Kaufman, S. J., Little, R., & Wohlforth, W. C. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Read More