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11. Proliferation in the "Axis of Evil": North Korea, Iran, and Iraq

Author:
Anthony H. Cordesman
Publication Date:
01-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
Despite the June 2000 summit meeting and meetings between high level U.S. and North Korean officials on the one hand, and economic turmoil and continued food shortages on the other, we believe North Korea remains committed to maintaining strong military forces. These forces continue to be deployed close to the border with South Korea in an offensively oriented posture, and North Korea's NBC and missile programs likely remain key components of its overall security strategy. The most likely large- scale regional war scenario over the near term, which would involve the United States, would be on the Korean peninsula. In recent years, North Korea has continued to pose a complex security challenge to the United States and its allies. Prior to the 1994 Agreed Framework, North Korea is believed to have produced and diverted sufficient plutonium for at least one, and possibly two, nuclear weapons. In addition, although North Korea froze the production of plutonium in 1994, there are concerns that North Korea is continuing with some elements of a nuclear weapons program. North Korea also possesses stockpiles of chemical weapons, which could be used in the event of renewed hostilities on the peninsula. Research and development into biological agents and toxins suggest North Korea may have a biological weapons capability. North Korea has hundreds of ballistic missiles available for use against targets on the peninsula, some of which are capable of reaching tar-gets in Japan. Its missile capabilities are increasing at a steady pace, and it has progressed to producing medium-range ballistic missiles (MRBMs). North Korea also has continued development of even longer-range missiles that would be able to threaten areas well beyond the region, including portions of the continental United States. As a result of U.S. diplomatic efforts, however, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) has maintained a moratorium on launches of long-range missiles for over one year.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, Nuclear Weapons, Terrorism, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
United States, Iraq, Iran, and Korea

12. Weapons of Mass Destruction in the Middle East Regional Trends, National Forces, Warfighting Capabilities, Delivery Options, and Weapons Effects

Author:
Anthony H. Cordesman
Publication Date:
01-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
Reasons for proliferating outweigh disincentives,and motivation is growing. Arms control regimes harass proliferators without stopping stem and fail to offer non-proliferators security. War fighting concepts are likely to lack clear structure and be highly volatile in terms of enemy, targets, and crisis behavior. Only a few leadership and military elites -- such as Egypt and Israel -- have shown a concern with highly structured strategic planning in the past. Iran-Iraq and Gulf Wars have demonstrated missiles and weapons of mass destruction will be used. Israeli actions in 1967 and attack on Osirak, Egyptian and Syrian attack on Israel in 1973, demonstrate regional focus on surprise and preemption. Iraq has already demonstrated regional concern with launch on warning, launch under attack options. Syria probably has some option of this kind. Concentration of population and leadership in single or a few urban areas makes existential attacks possible.
Topic:
Security, Nuclear Weapons, Terrorism, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Syria, and Egypt

13. The Arab-Israeli Military Balance in 2002 Part Four: Trends in Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear Weapons

Author:
Anthony H. Cordesman
Publication Date:
01-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
Reasons for proliferating outweigh disincentives, and motivation is growing. Arms control regimes harass proliferators without stopping stem and fail to offer nonproliferators security. War fighting concepts are likely to lack clear structure and be highly volatile in terms of enemy, targets, and crisis behavior. Only a few leadership and military elites -- such as Egypt and Israel -- have shown a concern with highly structured strategic planning in the past. Iran - Iraq and Gulf Wars have demonstrated missiles and weapons of mass destruction will be used. Israeli actions in 1967 and attack on Osirak, Egyptian and Syrian attack on Israel in 1973, demonstrate regional focus on surprise and preemption. Iraq has already demonstrated regional concern with launch on warning, launch under attack options. Syria probably has some option of this kind. Concentration of population and leadership in single or a few urban areas makes existential attacks possible.
Topic:
Security, Nuclear Weapons, Terrorism, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
Iran, Middle East, Israel, Arabia, and Egypt

14. Defending America: Redefining the Conceptual Borders of Homeland Defense

Author:
Anthony H. Cordesman
Publication Date:
02-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
From a public policy viewpoint, these uncertainties mean the US must prepare for a wide variety of low probability attacks on the US, rather than to emphasize any given form of attack or group of attackers. The US must plan its Homeland defense policies and programs for a future in which there is no way to predict the weapon that will be used or the method chosen to deliver a weapon which can range from a small suicide attack by an American citizen to the covert delivery of a nuclear weapon by a foreign state. There is no reason the US should assume that some convenient Gaussian curve or standard deviation, will make small or medium level attacks a higher priority over time than more lethal forms.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, Nuclear Weapons, Terrorism, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
United States and America

15. Biological War and the "Buffy Paradigm"

Author:
Anthony H. Cordesman
Publication Date:
09-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
The most important single message that anyone can communicate in regard to biological weapons is that we face a very uncertain mix of existing threats politics, commercial development, and technology will change constantly as far into the future as we can look. The issue is not what we know, but how little we know and how little we can predict.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, Nuclear Weapons, Terrorism, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
United States

16. Defending America: Redefining the Conceptual Borders of Homeland Defense

Author:
Anthony H. Cordesman
Publication Date:
02-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
Chemical weapons have not been used effectively in attacks on the American homeland. Reports that the bombers of the World Trade Center considered trying to add a chemical weapon like sodium cyanide to their explosives seem to be untrue, and led to an unsubstantiated assertion by the trial judge. There have, however, been a number of attempts to use chemical weapons by domestic extremists and individuals. For example, in 1997, members of the KKK plotted to place an improvised explosive device on a hydrogen sulfide tank at a refinery near Dallas, Texas. There is a well-established, low-level risk that such weapons will be used in the future, although there is no way to predict the frequency of such attacks, their scale, potential success, or lethality.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, Nuclear Weapons, Terrorism, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
United States and America

17. Syria and Weapons of Mass Destruction

Author:
Anthony H. Cordesman
Publication Date:
10-2000
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
The Middle East is the scene of an ongoing process of proliferation. Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Libya, and Syria all have significant capabilities to deliver weapons of mass destruction Israel, and Syria has made considerable progress in acquiring weapons of mass destruction since the mid-1970s. Syria has never shown a serious interest in nuclear weapons, although it did seek to buy two small research reactors from the PRC in 1992, including a 24-megawatt reactor, and purchased a small 30-kilowatt research reactor from the PRC in 1991. It allowed inspection by the International Atomic Energy Agency for the first time in February 1992. Syria does, however, deploy sheltered missiles, armed with chemical warheads, as a means of both countering Israel's nuclear forces and maintaining its rivalry with Iraq. As the attached article Syrian Defense Minister Gen. Mustafa Tlas shows, Syria has a major interest in biological warfare, and the fact his article first appeared in public in an Iranian journal may not entirely be a coincidence.
Topic:
Security, Nuclear Weapons, Terrorism, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
Iraq, Iran, Middle East, Israel, Libya, Syria, and Egypt

18. Defending America: Redefining the Conceptual Borders of Homeland Defense

Author:
Anthony H. Cordesman
Publication Date:
09-2000
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
There is a wide spectrum of potential threats to the American homeland that do not involve the threat of overt attacks by states using long-range missiles or conventional military forces. Such threats include covert attacks by state actors, state use of proxies, independent terrorist and extremist attacks by foreign groups or individuals, and independent terrorist and extremist attacks by residents of the US. These threats are currently limited in scope and frequency. No pattern of actual attacks on US territory has yet emerged that provides a clear basis for predicting how serious any given form of attack will be in the future, what means of attack will be used, or how lethal new forms of attack will be if they are successful.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, Nuclear Weapons, Terrorism, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
United States and America