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The central concern of this paper is with what factors give momentum to the chain of decisions which result in a weapon that goes against the standards of performance. The defense policy literature suggests that the variations in the performance of American military hardware are tied to the government's difficulties in resolving fundamental disagreements on strategic and doctrinal matters, variations in the technological demands of military projects, and the need for bargaining and coalition building. These relationships yield three hypotheses which are tested using simple bivariate analysis. With the caveats appropriate to a small sample of cases, the hypotheses are stated as relations between conditions rather than as correlations, and the findings are suggestive. The data support all three of the primary hypotheses. The study concludes with reform recommendations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While Canadians have been called an "unmilitary people," Canada has played a significant role in many wars, from South Africa to Korea, and has been able to mobilize its resources to meet the demands of war. This paper concentrates entirely on the mobilization of military personnel: the process of moving armed forces from peacetime to wartime levels. Its analysis centers on the internal and external factors that influence force requirements and availability and on the means of filling the inevitable gaps between peacetime and wartime needs. Canada's mobilization policies are currently emerging from a period of neglect and must resolve the traditional tendencies of an unmilitary people with the demands of modern conventional war. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Canada's alliance relationships, NATO and NORAD, constitute nearly the sum total of Canadian defense policy. In addition to providing national security through collective Western defense, these alliances have been viewed in Canada as affording Ottawa a seat at the table, where important issues of international security and U.S.-Soviet relations are discussed. While enjoying this access, Canada has, nonetheless, been concerned about the overwhelming U.S. influence over its defense policy. For the Canadian military, the problem has been obtaining adequate funding for the Allied commitments made by the government. The 1987 White Paper on defense promised sufficient resources, but recent budget cuts have cast serious doubt on Canada's future role in its alliances and on Ottawa's ability to make use of its seat in Allied councils. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a structural analysis of the Belgian national defense policy domain. It offers two sets of findings: (1) It shows that among organizations involved in formulating defense policy in Belgium in the 1980s, governmental agencies and political parties were considered the most prominent. (2) Through the use of multidimensional scaling techniques and cluster analysis, it identifies five "issue publics." Such issue publics are groups of organizations concerned with similar kinds of issues—one with comparatively general interests; three concerned respectively with manpower, procurement, and general defense policies: and a marginal manpower public. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sociologists and political scientists have long fretted over the dangers that a politicized military poses to democracy. In recent times, however, civil–military relations experts in the United States accepted retired or indeed still serving generals and admirals in high-ranking political posts. Despite customary revulsion from scholars, the sudden waivers are an indicator that military participation in momentous national security decisions is inherently political without necessarily being partisan, including when civilian authority defers to a largely autonomous sphere for objective military expertise. Military politics is actually critical for healthy civil–military collaboration, when done prudently and moderately. Janowitz and Huntington, founders of the modern study of civil–military relations, understood the U.S. military's inevitable invitation to political influence. Here, we elaborate on two neglected dimensions, implicit in their projects, of military politics under objective civilian control based on classical virtues of civic republicanism: Aristotle's practical wisdom and Machiavelli's virtú. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reviews the history of military reserves in Australia with particular reference to the Army Reserve. It shows how the importance of reserves in Australia has waxed and waned across the past two centuries, from an early situation of primacy in the colonial period. The importance of reserves has reemerged in the post–Cold War era, with new forms of reserve organization evolving alongside ‘‘conventional’’ reserve forces. The authors discuss the extent to which these developments need to be accompanied by attention to cultural and personnel management issues and to enhanced reserves–regular integration. Despite the challenge of juggling civilian employment with reserve commitments, most reservists appear to welcome a greater, rather than a token, obligation to serve. There is a viable and meaningful role for the reserves provided that the Australian Defence Force and the government are prepared to devote sufficient effort to them and to assign them appropriate tasks. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

From a military standpoint, the European Union's Security and Defense Policy (ESDP) defies logic. Why would the European allies seek to create a competing military force outside NATO when worried about American isolationism and when unable and unwilling to dedicate the necessary resources? This article suggests an alternative motive behind the European Union's establishment of a defense program—the development and enhancement of a "European identity." In short, the ESDP is designed in no small part to further the project of nation-building in a broadening European Union. This article proposes a social-constructivist framework for analyzing this development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years nonlethal weaponry has become increasingly available for widespread application as a means of promoting national security. Among the fascinating questions raised by this development, the deterrence impact of nonlethal weaponry seems particularly ripe for scrutiny. After a background discussion of definition, motives, history, and dangers surrounding this trend, this article develops a set of highly tentative propositions about the conditions under which nonlethal weaponry is most beneficial and detrimental as an instrument of deterrence. It is hoped that these propositions provide guidance for policymakers in using this coercive instrument to manage domestic and foreign turmoil. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents a study that examined the actions of organized labor's approach to defense policy in the U.S. Background on labor campaign to protect the national security of the U.S.; Information on the war Korea in June 1950; Details on Operation Booster.

The article examines the impact of civil-military relations on the national security decision-making process in the U.S. It has been argued that whether the U.S. military is too influential at higher levels of U.S. political-military decision-making. According to social researchers, the debate over U.S. civil-military relations took place on two levels, "power" and "ideology." The crux of the issue has been the compatibility of certain ideology with the ethics of armed forces. The approach taken in the post-Cold War academic literature, which primarily treats the issue of power under the rubric of "civilian control," has been discussed in detail.

This article reports some preliminary results from a comparative research project on how security issues have been perceived in the twelve E.C. countries since the early 1970s among the mass public. This period has been characterized by breathtaking changes in the political and military world environment. How have Europeans reacted to these changes and what are their opinions on the future shape of European defense policy? The empirical evidence is based on a secondary analysis of public opinion surveys conducted in the European Community in the last twenty-one years. The trend analyses show that Europeans are overwhelmingly favorable to the creation of a common European security organization. This does not mean, however, that NATO is no longer thought to be essential or that the E.C. should supplant or replace NATO as the most important forum for making decisions about the security of Western Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]