What is a realist response to nuclear weapons? This book is animated by the idea that contemporary attempts to confront the challenge of nuclear weapons and other global security problems would benefit from richer historical foundations. Returning to the decade of deep, thermonuclear anxiety inaugurated in the early 1950s, the authors focus on four creative intellectuals – Günther Anders, John H. Herz, Lewis Mumford and Bertrand Russell – whose work they reclaim under the label of ‘nuclear realism’. This book brings out an important, oppositional and resolutely global strand of political thought that combines realist insights about nuclear weapons with radical proposals for social and political transformation as the only escape from a profoundly endangered planet. Nuclear Realism is a highly original and provocative study that will be of great use to advanced undergraduates, graduates and scholars of political theory, International Relations and Cold War history.

Nuclear deterrence requires objective ethical analysis. In providing it, the authors face realities - the Soviet threat, possible nuclear holocaust, strategic imperatives - but they also unmask moral evasions - deterrence cannot be bluff, pure counterforce, the lesser (or greater) evil, or a step towards disarmament. They conclude that the deterrent is unjustifiable and examine the new question of conscience that this raises for everyone.

It is always appropriate to ask whether an expedient foreign policy is morally justifiable, just as it is always appropriate to ask whether a morally defensible policy is consistent with the national interest. The ongoing dialogue between morality and realpolitik gives much of foreign policy debate its characteristic bite. In this collection of essays, a distinguished group of philosophers, political theorists, and lawyers– including Russell Hardin and Marshall Cohen–explore these contrasting themes. In essays that are at once insightful and accessible, noted political thinkers examine the tension of the conflicting demands of morality and national self-interest in the context of the foundations of international order, the possession and use of nuclear weapons, recourse to war, and the prospects for peace. A final postscript addresses the question of the responsibility of intellectuals in the national foreign policy debate. This book will appeal to scholars and students in any discipline dealing with international affairs as well as to lay readers who wish to explore the implications of taking morality and reason seriously in foreign policy.

Publisher Description

Political realism in post-World War II America has not been about power alone, but about reconciling power with moral and ethical considerations. The caricature of realism as an expression of amoral realpolitik has been inadequate and false, for realism in the nuclear age has pivoted as much on moral principles as on power politics. Joel H. Rosenthal’s survey of five noteworthy self-proclaimed political realists explores the realists’ overarching commitment to transforming traditional power politics into a form of “responsible power” commensurate with American values. Hans Morgenthau, George Kennan, Reinhold Niebuhr, Walter Lippman, and Dean Acheson—the most important and prolific of the American realists—all fought the excesses of crusading moralism while simultaneously promoting a concept of power politics that retained a moral component at its core. This is the story of how architects of containment, present at the creation of the new bipolar world shaped by the threat of “mutual assured destruction,” became ardent critics of that world. It describes realism as a product of a particular time and place—a set of values, assumptions, processes of moral reasoning, and views about America’s role in the world. Much of the current scholarship on the modern American realists dwells on the alleged inconsistencies of realism as a political theory, and the tortuous mixture of piety and detachment exhibited in the lives of the realists themselves. Rosenthal takes the opposite tack, assembling the ties that bind realism into a coherent world view, rather than deconstructing it into irreconcilable fragments. Rosenthal maintains that the postwar American realists may be best understood as products of the historical and cultural context from which they emerged. Their attempts to articulate a “public philosophy” and integrate values into decision making in international affairs reflected their views on both the way the world “is” and the way the world “ought to be.” This study explains realism as an effort to articulate a prescriptive framework for working toward the ideal while living in the real. In doing so, it reveals the realists’ insistence on evaluating competing claims and on accepting paradox as an inevitable component of moral choice.

From climate change to nuclear war to the rise of demagogic populists, our world is shaped by doomsday expectations. In this path-breaking book, Alison McQueen shows why three of history's greatest political realists feared apocalyptic politics. Niccol- Machiavelli in the midst of Italy's vicious power struggles, Thomas Hobbes during England's bloody civil war, and Hans Morgenthau at the dawn of the thermonuclear age all saw the temptation to prophesy the end of days. Each engaged in subtle and surprising strategies to oppose apocalypticism, from using its own rhetoric to neutralize its worst effects to insisting on a clear-eyed, tragic acceptance of the human condition. Scholarly yet accessible, this book is at once an ambitious contribution to the history of political thought and a work that speaks to our times.

Two scholars of international politcs debate the issue of nuclear proliferation beyond the superpowers, presenting arguments for "more will be better" and "more will be worse"

The world is in a second nuclear age in which regional powers play an increasingly prominent role. These states have small nuclear arsenals, often face multiple active conflicts, and sometimes have weak institutions. How do these nuclear states—and potential future ones—manage their nuclear forces and influence international conflict? Examining the reasoning and deterrence consequences of regional power nuclear strategies, this book demonstrates that these strategies matter greatly to international stability and it provides new insights into conflict dynamics across important areas of the world such as the Middle East, East Asia, and South Asia. Vipin Narang identifies the diversity of regional power nuclear strategies and describes in detail the posture each regional power has adopted over time. Developing a theory for the sources of regional power nuclear strategies, he offers the first systematic explanation of why states choose the postures they do and under what conditions they might shift strategies. Narang then analyzes the effects of these choices on a state's ability to deter conflict. Using both quantitative and qualitative analysis, he shows that, contrary to a bedrock article of faith in the canon of nuclear deterrence, the acquisition of nuclear weapons does not produce a uniform deterrent effect against opponents. Rather, some postures deter conflict more successfully than others. Nuclear Strategy in the Modern Era considers the range of nuclear choices made by regional powers and the critical challenges they pose to modern international security.

This book explores the conditions under which Nuclear Weapons Free Zones (NWFZs) can be established. It analyzes four hypotheses that explain the factors contributing to the formation of NWFZs, building upon realist, constructivist and liberal theories from international relations. Through structured focused comparison, the book presents and compares the emergence of NWFZs in Latin America, the South Pacific, Southeast Asia, Africa, Central Asia, and the Middle East, which is a prospect for a NWFZ. The book argues that NWFZ projects depend on the following conditions: the security interest of regional states in avoiding nuclear threats, preexisting regional institutions and regional economic cooperation, leadership by a core of regional powers and shared interest in spreading non-proliferation norms. Democracy is not a necessary condition, but democratization can help overcome barriers presented by hesitant or opposed regional governments. As too many of the mentioned necessary conditions are lacking in the Middle East, a NWFZ project, thus, will be possible only after major political changes. This book will be of much interest to students of nuclear proliferation, arms control, security studies and International Relations.

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.