Description
This volume explores the implications of the doctrine of preemption for U.S. strategists and military planners.The authors examine the range of anticipatory attacks, including the differences between preemptive and preventive attacks; the costs, benefits, and risks associated with striking first; considerations of legality and legitimacy that must be weighed before striking first; and the prospects and implications of preemptive and preventive attacks in future U.S. national security policy.
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This Rand Corporation monograph explores the military implications of George W. Bush's announcement that the US will use preemptive attacks in response to anticipated threats, later codified with the publication of the 2002 National Security Strategy. Recognizing that the administration's definition of preemptive attack includes preventive attacks, the authors come to a number of principal conclusions about the implications for US defense planning of the use of preventive and preemptive attacks. These conclusions include the propositions that military requirements for anticipatory attacks will be case-specific, that anticipatory attack strategies place high demands on strategic intelligence capabilities, that the preemption of cross-border aggression requires quick and decisive strikes, that preventive attacks on nuclear threats call for extremely effective intelligence and strike capabilities, that sustained attacks on small groups of terrorists requires increasing special operations forces, and that reliance on anticipatory attack as a key strategy can be perilous and is not necessarily the sole prerogative of the United States. Annotation ©2007 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
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