The Origins of U.S. Nuclear Strategy, 1945-1953

The Origins of U.S. Nuclear Strategy, 1945-1953 PDF Author: Samuel R. Williamson Jr
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 113705882X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 231

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Book Description
The United States took almost a decade after Hiroshima and Nagasaki to develop a coherent strategy of nuclear deterrence. This comprehensive study by two careful and well-informed historians provides the best explanation we have of why this process took so long; it also suggests the inherent difficulties of relying on nuclear weapons to provide security in the first place. Required reading for anyone interested in the early history of the nuclear era.

The Origins of U.S. Nuclear Strategy, 1945-1953

The Origins of U.S. Nuclear Strategy, 1945-1953 PDF Author: Samuel R. Williamson Jr
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 113705882X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 231

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Book Description
The United States took almost a decade after Hiroshima and Nagasaki to develop a coherent strategy of nuclear deterrence. This comprehensive study by two careful and well-informed historians provides the best explanation we have of why this process took so long; it also suggests the inherent difficulties of relying on nuclear weapons to provide security in the first place. Required reading for anyone interested in the early history of the nuclear era.

The Origins of U.S. Nuclear Strategy, 1945-1953

The Origins of U.S. Nuclear Strategy, 1945-1953 PDF Author: Samuel R. Williamson Jr
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
ISBN: 9780312089641
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 224

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Book Description
The United States took almost a decade after Hiroshima and Nagasaki to develop a coherent strategy of nuclear deterrence. This comprehensive study by two careful and well-informed historians provides the best explanation we have of why this process took so long; it also suggests the inherent difficulties of relying on nuclear weapons to provide security in the first place. Required reading for anyone interested in the early history of the nuclear era.

Atomic Diplomacy

Atomic Diplomacy PDF Author: Gar Alperovitz
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780671061500
Category : Soviet Union
Languages : en
Pages :

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Building a Strategic Air Force

Building a Strategic Air Force PDF Author: Walton S. Moody
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781610011082
Category : Air defenses
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
"From the 50s to the 80s, the Strategic Air Command was the keystone of the American nuclear deterrent and its primary arm for waging nuclear war. This is the official US Air Force history of the SAC, covering the years from the end of World War Two to the mid-1950s when the Cold War reached its peak, and SAC grew from a tiny force with just a few nuclear weapons into the most powerful military organization in the world."--

Building a Strategic Air Force

Building a Strategic Air Force PDF Author: Walton S. Moody
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Air defenses
Languages : en
Pages : 552

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The Nuclear Taboo

The Nuclear Taboo PDF Author: Nina Tannenwald
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521524285
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 472

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Book Description
Why have nuclear weapons not been used since Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945? Nina Tannenwald disputes the conventional answer of 'deterrence' in favour of what she calls a nuclear taboo - a widespread inhibition on using nuclear weapons - which has arisen in global politics. Drawing on newly released archival sources, Tannenwald traces the rise of the nuclear taboo, the forces that produced it, and its influence, particularly on US leaders. She analyzes four critical instances where US leaders considered using nuclear weapons (Japan 1945, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and the Gulf War 1991) and examines how the nuclear taboo has repeatedly dissuaded US and other world leaders from resorting to these 'ultimate weapons'. Through a systematic analysis, Tannenwald challenges conventional conceptions of deterrence and offers a compelling argument on the moral bases of nuclear restraint as well as an important insight into how nuclear war can be avoided in the future.

Nuclear Weapons and American Strategy, 1945-1953

Nuclear Weapons and American Strategy, 1945-1953 PDF Author: Mark Bernard Schneider
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Tactical nuclear weapons
Languages : en
Pages : 718

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Book Description


The Cambridge History of the Cold War

The Cambridge History of the Cold War PDF Author: Melvyn P. Leffler
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521837197
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 663

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Book Description
This volume examines the origins and early years of the Cold War in the first comprehensive historical reexamination of the period. A team of leading scholars shows how the conflict evolved from the geopolitical, ideological, economic and sociopolitical environments of the two world wars and interwar period.

Building a Strategic Air Force

Building a Strategic Air Force PDF Author: Department of Defense
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781549643361
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 405

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Book Description
On March 21, 1946, by order of Headquarters, Army Air Forces, Continental Air Forces received a new name, becoming the Strategic Air Command. This administrative procedure was intended to give some suggestion as to what the mission of that command was to be under the new structure of the air arm. One effect the order had was upon the American language. Very soon after that order was issued, "SAC" -pronounced as a word of one syllable - would be commonplace usage of everyone in or involved with the command. This volume recounts how the Army Air Forces and its successor organization, the U.S. Air Force, organized, trained and equipped strategic air forces for a worldwide mission. The period of history covered in this volume has been heavily studied. It is the opening era of the "Cold War" between the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and the western countries led by the United States. This volume presents a larger focus. It concerns the American air force's efforts to build a strategic force. The emphasis is on the leaders, the political context, programs, and forces. A significant element of the subject concerns air doctrine, but here this is seen primarily in terms of the experience the leadership of the air arm had had with air warfare. The strategic force here described was not only by 1953 the premier command of the Air Force. It was the centerpiece of national strategy. The intention here will be to connect the development of the strategy of atomic deterrence with the actual composition and nature of that force. The importance of the Air Force as an institution in American life, and the role of the strategic force in that institution, would seem to establish the importance of the subject. American air leaders believed that the consequences of the air arm's not being ready to carry out such an offensive, through failure to plan or for any other reason, could be grave. These, then, were disturbing times. In this connection, there are many in the Soviet Union today who consider the practice of falsifying the historical record for current political purposes to have been one of the most corrupting factors in the life of that country. Part I * Postwar Reorganization, 1945 - 1947 * I. Air Power and the Airmen: 1945 * Air Power and Strategy * Building a Strategic Air Force, 1917-1945 * The Postwar Challenge * II. The Case for a Postwar Air Force * A New Strategic World * Demobilization and Occupation * Planning for Strategic Air Power * III. The Beginnings of a Strategic Air Force * Air Power Deferred * The Strategic Force and Demobilization * The Strategic Force and the Fifty-five Group Program * Modernizing the Bomber Force * IV. The Uncertain Phase * Understanding the Bomb * Command of Strategic Forces * Planning for Atomic War * Part II * Austerity and Strategic Air Power, 1947 -1950 * V. Decision for a Strategic Air Force * Making the Case for Air Power: Finletter and Brewster * A Program for Atomic Readiness: JCS 1745 / 5 * Aircraft for the Strategic Offensive * VI. The Year of Crisis * Toward a Crisis Budget * Roles, Missions, and Budgets * The Berlin Crisis * Containment, Deterrence, and NSC-20 / 4 * "The Hollow Threat" and LeMay * VII. The Priority Mission * Aircraft for Deterrence * Return to Austerity * Modernization and Standardization * VIII. Challenges to Strategy * The Challenge at Home * Facing the Challenge * The External Challenge: The Soviet Bomb * The Strategic Force at the Ready: SAC in 1950 * Part III * Expansion of the Strategic Force, 1950 -1953 * IX. Limited War, Atomic Plenty, and Rearmament * Deterrence at Risk * Rearmament Begins * The Role of Nuclear Weapons * Expanding the Strategic Force * An Investment in Air Power * X. "Never Before Surpassed" * Medium Bombers in Korea * Expansion and Professionalism * Planes and Weapons, 1950-1953 * Basing for a Global Strike Force * From New Phase to New Look

Getting MAD: Nuclear Mutual Assured Destruction, Its Origins and Practice

Getting MAD: Nuclear Mutual Assured Destruction, Its Origins and Practice PDF Author:
Publisher: DIANE Publishing
ISBN: 1428910336
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 369

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Book Description
Nearly 40 years after the concept of finite deterrence was popularized by the Johnson administration, nuclear Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD) thinking appears to be in decline. The United States has rejected the notion that threatening population centers with nuclear attacks is a legitimate way to assure deterrence. Most recently, it withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, an agreement based on MAD. American opposition to MAD also is reflected in the Bush administration's desire to develop smaller, more accurate nuclear weapons that would reduce the number of innocent civilians killed in a nuclear strike. Still, MAD is influential in a number of ways. First, other countries, like China, have not abandoned the idea that holding their adversaries' cities at risk is necessary to assure their own strategic security. Nor have U.S. and allied security officials and experts fully abandoned the idea. At a minimum, acquiring nuclear weapons is still viewed as being sensible to face off a hostile neighbor that might strike one's own cities. Thus, our diplomats have been warning China that Japan would be under tremendous pressure to go nuclear if North Korea persisted in acquiring a few crude weapons of its own. Similarly, Israeli officials have long argued, without criticism, that they would not be second in acquiring nuclear weapons in the Middle East. Indeed, given that Israelis surrounded by enemies that would not hesitate to destroy its population if they could, Washington finds Israel's retention of a significant nuclear capability totally "understandable."