Abstract
The centrality of arms control in U.S. nuclear strategy was clear in the cold war. Arms control was a tool for coping with instability in the nuclear relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union. After the cold war, arms control has been seen as both a tool for consolidating the new peace (by the Clinton Administration) and as a dangerous restraint on U.S. freedom of action (by the George W. Bush Administration). In the U.S.-China relationship, nuclear arms control has never played a significant role. Should it play such a role? Might it play such a role in the future? To explore answers to these questions, this chapter proceeds as follows. It begins with a short review of the limited current role of arms control in the bilateral relationship. It then examines first Chinese and then U.S. thinking about the potential future of nuclear arms control. The chapter then speculates about how conditions might change leading to a different view in the future of the role of arms control in enhancing strategic stability.1
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Notes
See Walter C. Clemens, Jr., “China,” in Encyclopedia of Arms Control and Disarmament, ed. Richard Dean Burns (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1993), 59–74.
For more on shifting U.S. priorities, see Avis Bohlen, “The Rise and Fall of Arms Control,” Survival 45, no. 3 (2003), 7–34; and “Reshaping U.S. Nonproliferation Strategy, An Interview with Undersecretary of State Robert Joseph,” Arms Control Today 36, no. 5 (June 2006), 18–22.
Chinese President Jiang Zemin, remarks to the Conference on Disarmament, March 26, 1999.
See Remarks by the President to Students and Faculty at National Defense University, May 1, 2001.
See “Administration Missile Defense Papers,” White House, July 11, 2001.
See “U.S., China to Discuss Missile Defense,” White House Press Release, September 4, 2001, which included the following: “Our consultations with China will make clear that the U.S. missile defense program does not threaten China but seeks to counter limited missile threats from rogue states and the danger of accidental or unauthorized launches. Only those foreign parties with hostile intent toward the United States have grounds to fear U.S. missile defense.”
Dmitri Trenin, Russicz’s China Problem (Moscow: Carnegie Center Moscow, 1999). See also Alexander Pikayev, “The Rise and Fall of Start II: The Russian View,” Working Paper, Carnegie Endowment Nonproliferation Project, Washington, D.C., November 6, 1999.
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© 2008 Christopher P. Twomey
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Roberts, B. (2008). Arms Control and Sino-U.S. Strategic Stability. In: Twomey, C.P. (eds) Perspectives on Sino-American Strategic Nuclear Issues. Initiatives in Strategic Studies: Issues and Policies. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230613164_13
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230613164_13
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, New York
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-37393-2
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