Challenges of Nuclear Non-Proliferation

Richard D. Burns is professor emeritus and former chair of the History Department at California State University, where is also was the director of the Center for the Study of Armament and Disarmament. Philip E. Coyle III was associate director for national security and international affairs in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. He is a senior science fellow at the Center for Arms Control and Nonproliferation, a security study center based in Washington, DC.

• IntroductionGlossary of AcronymsChapter 1: The Nuclear Weapon StatesChapter 2: Seeking to Prevent Nuclear Proliferation: Baruch Plan, Atoms for Peace, IAEAChapter 3: The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty: Origins and EvolutionChapter 4: Nuclear Test Bans to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Chapter 5: Seeking Control of Nuclear Weapons MaterialsChapter 6: Geographical Denuclearization: Nuclear Weapon-Free ZonesChapter 7: “Proliferation in Reverse”: Cooperative/Restraining Measures Chapter 8: Foregoing Nuclear Weapons: Then and NowChapter 9: Assessing the Nonproliferation RegimeSelected References

This book provides a descriptive summary of international efforts to limit the spread of nuclear weapons over the past 70 years. Deliberately rejecting a theoretically informed analysis, the authors instead offer a historical survey of the evolution of various components of the modern nuclear nonproliferation regime. Although presenting the work as a factual account, Burns (emer., history, California State Univ., Los Angeles) and Coyle (formerly, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy) at times introduce ideological positions into the narrative that detract from the work’s objectivity. Relying mainly on secondary sources and offering no new interpretations of events, the authors essentially have written an up-to-date primer for those new to the study of nuclear nonproliferation. . . .Summing Up: Recommended. Lower-division undergraduate collections.