Sleepwalking With the Bomb

S
LEEPWALKING
ITH THE
B
OMB

Description
Sleepwalking with the Bomb
shows how we can forestall nuclear catastrophe. It offers familiar faces, cases and places to illustrate how the civilized world can face the most pressing nuclear dangers. Drawing from both history and current events, John Wohlstetter assembles in one place an integrated, coherent and concise picture that explains how best to avoid the “apocalyptic trinity”—suicide, genocide and surrender—in confronting emerging nuclear threats.

Copyright Notice
Copyright © 2012 by John C. Wohlstetter. All Rights Reserved.

Library Cataloging Data
Sleepwalking with the Bomb
by John C. Wohlstetter
266 pages, 6 x 9 x 0.6 inches & 0.87 lb, 229 x 152 x 15 mm. & 0.396 kg
Library of Congress Control Number: 2012940396
ISBN-13 978-1-936599066 (paperback)
BISAC: HIS027030 History/Military/Nuclear Warfare
BISAC: POL001000 Political Science/International Relations/Arms Control
BISAC: HIS032000 History/Europe/Russia & the Former Soviet Union

Publisher Information
Discovery Institute Press, 208 Columbia Street, Seattle, WA 98104
Internet:
http://www.discoveryinstitutepress.com/
Published in the United States of America on acid-free paper.
First Edition, First Printing. June 2012.

J
OHN
W
OHLSTETTER HAS GIVEN US A TOUR DE FORCE OF OUR TROUBLED
nuclear condition, its roots and its prospects. It’s all here: an insightful history of the nuclear aspect of the Cold War and its crises, fictional as well as real; the chilling prospects of nuclear-armed rogue states and terrorists; the dangerous links between civilian nuclear power for the grid and nuclear weapons; the fuzzy and counterproductive dreams of the zero nukes movement.

For many years
Sleepwalking With the Bomb
will be the standard against which all other work on nuclear issues will be measured.
R. J
AMES
W
OOLSEY, FORMER
D
IRECTOR OF
C
ENTRAL
I
NTELLIGENCE, CHAIRS THE
F
OUNDATION FOR
D
EFENSE OF
D
EMOCRACIES.

In these perilous times of nuclear Jihad and amputational pacifism we acutely need John Wohlstetter’s Reverean ride through the night, ringing out strategic alarms and insights in the grand tradition of Herman Kahn and Albert Wohlstetter.
Sleepwalking With the Bomb
is as lucid, sophisticated, and wide awake as America’s current leadership is muddled, naive, and somnambulant.

G
EORGE
G
ILDER
, A
UTHOR OF
T
HE
I
SRAEL
T
EST
(E
NCOUNTER
B
OOKS
, 2012)
AND
W
EALTH
& P
OVERTY
(R
EGNERY
, 2012).

To family, friends, and others who educated me in coping with life’s challenges, including the challenge of thinking about how best to avoid man-made catastrophes—of which nuclear conflict is most fearsome and destructive of all.

F
OREWORD

P
REFACE

I
NTRODUCTION:
O
RGANIZATION OF THE
W
ORK

1.   T
HE
R
USH TO
N
UCLEAR
Z
ERO:
C
OURTING
C
ATASTROPHE

2.   T
HE
N
UCLEAR
A
GE:
F
ROM
“T
RINITY” TO
T
EHRAN

3.   R
USSIA:
L
INKING
A
RMS
C
ONTROL TO AN
A
DVERSARY’S
C
ONDUCT

4.   A
MERICA:
T
HE
L
IMITS OF
W
HAT
A
RMS
P
ACTS
C
AN
A
CCOMPLISH

5.   I
RAN AND THE
M
IDEAST:
S
LIDING
T
OWARDS
N
UCLEAR
W
AR

6.   N
ORTH
K
OREA:
N
UCLEAR
H
OSTAGE
T
AKING

7.   C
HINA:
I
MPERIAL
A
SPIRATION AMIDST A
S
HIFTING
N
UCLEAR
B
ALANCE

8.   P
AKISTAN AND
I
NDIA:
W
HO
G
UARDS THE
G
UARDIANS?

9.   I
RAQ:
T
HE
I
NFORMATION
L
IMITS OF
I
NTELLIGENCE

10: A
LLIES:
W
HY
F
RIENDS
P
ROLIFERATE

11. D
ISARMAMENT
I: S
UPERPOWER
A
RMAMENT
, P
OPULAR
D
ISARMAMENT

12. D
ISARMAMENT
II: S
OME
D
ISARM
, O
THERS
M
UST
B
E
D
ISARMED

13. I
NVITATION TO
S
TRIKE:
T
HE
S
MALL
P
OWER’S
N
UCLEAR
E
QUALIZER

14. T
HE
P
ERILOUS
P
RESENT:
B
EYOND
M
YTHIC
P
ASTS AND
F
ANTASY
F
UTURES

A
PPENDIX 1:
F
ICTION’S
W
AR AGAINST
N
UCLEAR
R
EALITIES

A
PPENDIX 2:
I
MPROVING
C
ONTROL OVER
N
UCLEAR
W
EAPONS

A
PPENDIX 3:
I
NTELLIGENCE
B
IASES AND THE
N
UCLEAR
B
ALANCE

A
PPENDIX 4:
M
ISSILE
D
EFENSE VERSUS
M
ULTIPLE
W
ARHEADS

B
IBLIOGRAPHY

W
HEN
R
ICHARD
N
IXON RETURNED FROM
M
OSCOW IN 1972 HE
brought with him the apparent triumph of a comprehensive agreement with Leonid Brezhnev that would end a nuclear weapons “arms race” and usher in a new era of constructive cooperation between the superpowers. Neither he, nor his grand strategist Henry Kissinger, understood that the ABM Treaty and separate offensive arms limitation agreements they negotiated would lead to a massive Soviet build-up that left the United States (and its allies) in a situation far worse than the one they hoped to improve.

Far from reducing the Soviets’ already vast nuclear arsenal, the agreements of 1972 actually increased both the number and lethality of Moscow’s nuclear forces. And they led directly to a challenge to the United States and its allies that was as grave as any in the Cold War.

The 1972 interim agreement fixed the number of launchers for nuclear armed intercontinental ballistic missiles, but it allowed for the enlargement of those launchers and the replacement of older, single warhead missiles by new missiles with multiple warheads. The Soviets promptly began to exploit both provisions of the agreement, first by replacing a class of missiles carrying a single warhead with a new class carrying three warheads. But not content with using an arms control “freeze” to triple the number of their warheads, they then proceeded to develop an entirely new missile, which was excluded from any limit because it lacked intercontinental range. The Soviets assigned this new missile (known as the SS-20) to the European targets that had been previously assigned missiles limited by the agreement. This freed up hundreds of missiles that could now be aimed at the United States. By the time Ronald Reagan took office in 1981, the SS-20 and NATO’s plan to respond had created a crisis in the NATO alliance, as our allies debated whether to approve a plan to balance the new SS-20s with American missiles of comparable range. For much of Reagan’s first term the crisis dominated America’s relations with Russia and its NATO allies.