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Disruptive Technology and International Security

Leveraging Latency

How the Weak Compel the Strong with Nuclear Technology

Volpe, Tristan A. (Assistant Professor of Defense Analysis, Assistant Professor of Defense Analysis, Naval Postgraduate School)

Leveraging Latency

Disruptive Technology and International Security

Leveraging Latency

How the Weak Compel the Strong with Nuclear Technology

Disruptive Technology and International Security: Leveraging Latency

 

In Leveraging Latency, Tristan A. Volpe explores how weak nations compel concessions from superpowers by threatening to acquire atomic weapons. Volpe finds that there is a trade-off between threatening proliferation and promising nuclear restraint.


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Beschrijving Disruptive Technology and International Security: Leveraging Latency

Over the last seven decades, some states successfully leveraged the threat of acquiring atomic weapons to compel concessions from superpowers. For many others, however, this coercive gambit failed to work. When does nuclear latency--the technical capacity to build the bomb--enable states to pursue effective coercion?

In Leveraging Latency, Tristan A. Volpe argues that having greater capacity to build weaponry doesn't translate to greater coercive advantage. Volpe finds that there is a trade-off between threatening proliferation and promising nuclear restraint. States need just enough bomb-making capacity to threaten proliferation, but not so much that it becomes too difficult for them to offer nonproliferation assurances. The boundaries of this sweet spot align with the capacity to produce the fissile material at the heart of an atomic weapon.

To test this argument, Volpe includes comparative case studies of four countries that leveraged latency against superpowers: Japan, West Germany, North Korea, and Iran. In doing so, Volpe identifies a generalizable mechanism--the threat-assurance trade-off--that explains why more power often makes compellence less likely to work. This framework illuminates how technology shapes broader bargaining dynamics and helps to refine policy options for inhibiting the spread of nuclear weapons. As nuclear technology continues to cast a shadow over the global landscape, Leveraging Latency provides a systematic assessment of its coercive utility.


ISBN
9780197669532
Pagina's
256
Verschenen
Serie
Disruptive Technology and International Security
NUR
754
Druk
1
Uitvoering
Hardback
Taal
Engels
Uitgever
OUP USA

Politicologie