Deterrence, Global Security and the Long Road to the Deployment of the Bush Administration’s Missile Defence System

Abstract

This thesis examines the theory of nuclear deterrence and its relationship to missile defence in the context of global security. The issue of whether missile defence would bolster deterrence – or undermine it – became a point of intense contestation during the Cold War between competing factions within the American security community. One group, dubbed the Arms Control School, held that security required agreeing to mutual destruction with the Soviet Union, which made banning missile defences essential. In contrast, another grouping known as the Nuclear Warfighters argued that missiles defences were morally and strategically necessary. The Arms Control School seemed to have prevailed by 1972 with the signing of the ABM Treaty that restricted missile defence capabilities and codified the idea of mutual vulnerability. Over time, this treaty came to be widely held as the cornerstone of great power strategic stability. However, the concept of missile defence was reinvigorated during the post-Cold War era, in general, and by the George W. Bush administration, in particular, between 2001 and 2008. Guided by an essentially state-centric appraisal of the security environment, the Bush team set out to abrogate the ABM Treaty in order to deploy a global missile defence system to counter supposedly irrational ‘rogue states’ and prevent the emergence of systemic disequilibrium. However, this rationale was questionable, and the initiative of missile defence appeared starkly out of step with a globalising strategic environment that went beyond the protection of the state. Furthermore, deployment risked straining relations with other non-democratic great powers, namely Russia and China, which had the capacity to undermine the anticipated security benefits of a newly deployed defensive system. Thus, this thesis seeks to address a central research question: what explains the emergence and rise of the missile defence project in U.S. strategic thinking? This thesis argues that deployment was ultimately shaped by the combined impact of a number of overlapping and mutually reinforcing factors within the U.S. state rather than objective external realities. It also contends that the empirical record has so far largely confounded the strategic expectations of missile defence advocates. The initial deployment proved to be rather destabilising as it created a new great power security dilemma with Russia and China, while the security gains vis-a-vis ‘rogue states’ appeared modest.