CONTENTS Acknowledgments ... xi Introduction ... xiii SECTION 1 FIRST AND SECOND THOUGHTS ... 1 1 The Arrival of the Bomb ... 3 The transformation of war ... 3 Strategic bombardment ... 4 The political science of airpower ... 6 The experience of World War Ⅱ ... 10 Retaliation and the 'V' weapons ... 12 The atom bomb ... 14 The strategy of Hiroshima ... 16 2 Offence and Defence ... 22 The persistence of the doctrine of strategic bombardment ... 22 The new strategic environment ... 24 The possibility of defence ... 30 3 Aggression and Retaliation ... 34 The vital first blow ... 34 The atom bomb and aggressors ... 36 Early thoughts on deterrence ... 40 SECTION 2 TOWARDS A POLICY OF DETERRENCE ... 45 4 Strategy for an Atomic Monopoly ... 47 Atom bombs and the American way of war ... 47 The limits of the bomb ... 48 First or last resort ... 51 The bomb enters war plans ... 53 Atom bombs and the Soviet way of war ... 56 The Permanently Operating Factors ... 58 5 Strategy for an Atomic Stalemate ... 63 The Soviet bomb ... 63 The 'super' bomb ... 65 Tactical nuclear weapons ... 68 NSC-68 ... 69 Korea ... 71 The conventional strategy ... 72 6 Massive Retaliation ... 76 The British conversion ... 76 The New Look ... 81 Dulles and massive retaliation ... 84 The spirit of the offence ... 89 SECTION 3 LIMITED WAR ... 91 7 Limited Objectives ... 93 Consensus on a nuclear strategy ... 93 The concept of limited war ... 97 Limited objectives ... 102 8 Limited Means ... 106 Limited nuclear war ... 106 The Soviet view ... 110 Graduated deterrence ... 112 On strategy and tactics ... 117 SECTION 4 THE FEAR OF SURPRISE ATTACK ... 121 9 The Importance of Being First ... 123 On winning nuclear wars ... 123 Prevention or pre-emption ... 125 The virtues of counter-force ... 127 The blunting mission ... 130 Preparing for war ... 132 A sense of vulnerability ... 134 The delicacy of the balance ... 137 10 Sputniks and the Soviet Threat ... 139 The impact of Sputnik ... 139 First strikes for whom? ... 140 Soviet strategy after Stalin ... 145 The logic of pre-emption ... 147 Conclusion ... 152 11 The Technological Arms Race ... 155 The Killian Report ... 158 The Gaither Report ... 160 Mutual fears of surprise attack ... 163 Technology and stability ... 165 SECTION 5 THE STRATEGY OF STABLE CONFLICT ... 173 12 The Formal Strategists ... 175 Military problems and the scientific method ... 177 Game theory ... 182 Prisoner's dilemma and chicken ... 185 13 Arms Control ... 190 The strategy of stable conflict ... 191 Disarmament to arms control ... 195 The disarmers disarmed ... 199 14 Bargaining and Escalation ... 208 Bargaining ... 208 Escalation ... 210 Tactics in escalation ... 211 Escalation dominance ... 215 The threat that leaves something to chance ... 219 SECTION 6 FROM COUNTER-FORCE TO ASSURED DESTRUCTION ... 225 15 City-avoidance ... 227 McNamara's band ... 228 A strategy of multiple options ... 232 City-avoidance ... 234 Retreat from city-avoidance ... 239 16 Assured Destruction ... 245 Assured destruction ... 246 Mutual assured destruction ... 247 Dissillusion with defence ... 249 The action-reaction phenomenon ... 254 17 The Soviet Approach to Deterrence ... 257 The strategic learning curve ... 257 Guidelines for stability ... 259 A 'second-best deterrent' ... 261 The American challenge ... 264 The Brezhnev years ... 269 18 The Chinese Connection ... 273 The People's War ... 274 Atom bombs as paper tigers ... 276 SECTION 7 THE EUROPEAN DIMENSION ... 283 19 A Conventional Defence for Europe ... 285 Theories of conventional war ... 287 European attitudes ... 293 Towards a conventional balance ... 296 Conclusion ... 301 20 The European Nuclear Option : (ⅰ) Anglo-Saxon Views ... 303 NATO and the Nth problem ... 304 The British nuclear force ... 307 21 The European Nuclear Option : (ⅱ) French and German Views ... 313 Gallois ... 314 Beaufre ... 318 De Gaulle ... 320 German strategy ... 324 The multilateral force(MLF) ... 327 Conclusion ... 329 SECTION 8 RETREAT FROM ASSURED DESTRUCTION ... 331 22 Military-Industrial Complexities ... 333 The McNamara legacy ... 335 The military-industrial complex ... 337 Force planning under Nixon ... 340 23 The Consensus Undermined ... 344 The Soviet build-up ... 345 The action-inaction phenomenon ... 347 The shame of assured destruction ... 348 New technologies ... 351 Arms control ... 354 24 Parity ... 359 Calm over Parity ... 360 Concern over superiority ... 364 Perceptions ... 367 Measuring the balance ... 369 25 Selective Options ... 372 If deterrence should 'fail' ... 372 The search for options ... 375 'The Schlesinger doctrine' ... 377 Options for a European war ... 383 ICBM vulnerability ... 387 The political science of nuclear strategy ... 392 26 Conclusion ... 396 Notes ... 401 Bibliography ... 441 Subject Index ... 461 Name Index ... 468