1 Military Globalization Military power central to globalization –Underwrites empires and territorial expansion –Military technologies shrink globe, permit global annihilation, and make war preparation constant –Global arms trade and weapons proliferation –Global regimes to govern security affairs

2 Globalization of Violence European imperial expansion drives globalization of military affairs Technologies of steamship, railroad, telegraph shrink geopolitical space “Firepower gap” aids imperial expansion in Africa, Asia, Middle East, China, and Latin America

3 Globalization of Violence age of “global conflict” World War I and World War II - total wars –geographic scope, mobilization of entire societies, scale of warfare Cold War –divides globe into rival camps, but unifies it under threat of nuclear Armageddon

4 Globalization of Violence Post-Cold War military deglobalization? –Decline in military expenditures and manpower –Resurgence of ethnic and nationalist conflict but number of conflicts and fatalities still less than Cold War –Greater interest by global civil society September 11 signals globalization of informal violence –Networks of non-state actors operating on intercontinental basis

5 Weapons Proliferation and the Global Arms Trade Proliferation as a global issue –transboundary –states unable to protect or monitor adequately –arms trade thrives in global economy Global arms trade emerges by 1860s –privately run big business –not controlled by states –commercial logic feeds global diffusion of arms

6 Types of Weapons Conventional –make up vast majority of military arsenals –little moral opposition to their use –few international agreements Weapons of mass destruction –devastating effect when used in small numbers –nuclear, chemical, biological

7 Nuclear Weapons Release vast amounts of energy through fusion or fission reactions Main technical barrier to nuke acquisition is access to fissile material –plutonium or highly enriched uranium Collapse of Soviet Union exposes large stockpiles of fissile material to risk of theft and diversion

8 Biological Weapons Release large quantities of infectious organisms to cause death Major technical barrier is aerosol dissemination International norms against use Suspected illegal production by states and non-state actors –fueled by easy access to information and biotechnology revolution

9 Chemical Weapons Lethal man-made poisons disseminated via gas, liquid, aerosol –choking agents, blood gases, vesicants, nerve agents Used frequently in warfare Easy and cheap to produce “Poor man’s nuke”

10 Conventional Proliferation Horizontal –Cold War arms transfer pattern displaced by globalization of arms industry –New suppliers, new recipients, new motives, higher volume of transfers, more sophisticated technology, co-production and co-development, easy access to dual-use technologies –Recent spread of ballistic and cruise missiles –Major suppliers - US, UK, France, Russia, China

11 WMD Proliferation Horizontal (Nth country problem) –spread of WMD driven less by market forces –nuclear proliferation slower than chem-bio spread –who is in the nuclear club? –WMD not openly traded so spread more difficult to monitor but more amenable to supplier control

12 The Nuclear Club Declared – US, Russia, Britain, France, China, India, Pakistan Inheritors – Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan De facto - Israel Rollback – Argentina, Brazil, Taiwan, S. Korea, S. Africa Aspiring – Iraq, Iran, N. Korea, Algeria, Libya, others? Abstaining – Japan, Germany, Hungary, etc. Non-state actors??

13 NBC Terrorism For states, NBC terrorism may be preferable to ICBM delivery Only one non-state actor has used WMD But capability growing and motivations changing from political objectives to inflicting mass casualties Issue is whether NBC will be weapon of choice

14 Solutions WMD - International regimes/arms control –Non-Proliferation Treaty –Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty –Chemical Weapons Convention –Biological Weapons Convention Improve safeguards in former Soviet Union Conventional –arms registries, supplier cartels, economic conversion

15 Globalization and Violence Summary Character of war may change, as it has in the past, but warfare will not disappear New forms of violence New actors that can wield force Globalization means many more entities have access to tools of violence, and are likely to use them for profit as well as political power