SOVIET INVASION OF AFGHANISTAN

The occupation of Afghanistan by Soviet troops, beginning in December 1979, raised Pakistani fears for their own
security. The government undertook three main approaches in dealing with the crisis. The first approach was to
explore a possible revitalizing of the relationship with the United States. Early in the year, the United States offered
$400 million in economic and military aid to Pakistan, in an attempt to provide a modicum of security, but Pakistan
turned it down, considering it an inadequate response to the grave threat facing the country and believing that only a
formal treaty approved by the U.S. Congress would send the necessary message to Moscow. The unwillingness of the
Carter administration to proceed along these lines was reportedly taken to indicate a lack of American seriousness. A
visit by the U.S. presidential national security adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski, to Pakistan failed to resolve many of the
two nations' differences.
A second approach was based on the belief that concerted action by the Islamic bloc would make it more difficult for
the Soviets to sustain the occupation or, at least, to move against other countries. Toward this end, an Islamic Foreign
Ministers Conference was held in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad in late January and again in May, and a special
group composed of representatives of three countries, including Pakistan, was set up to seek ways of resolving the
Afghan situation and securing the withdrawal of Soviet troops.
Pakistan's friendship with China suggested a third approach to the Afghan situation. While it was acknowledged that
Peking's options were somewhat limited, its support for Pakistan was expected to discourage Moscow from taking any
major action against the Pakistanisparticularly if China's support was coordinated with American assistance.
The presence of over a million Afghan refugees in Pakistan has been an additional source of potential trouble between
Pakistan and the Soviet Union. Two Pakistanis were killed in a border attack in late September, and the Soviets made
numerous reconnaissance flights over the refugee camps. In addition, the refugees are an economic burden that
Pakistan can ill afford. Pakistan's President Muhammad Zia ul-Haq met with U.S. President Jimmy Carter in early
October to discuss economic assistance for the refugees, among other matters of concern.

1. OTHER FOREIGN RELATIONS

The fall of the shah of Iran, in 1979, led to initial concern in Islamabad, because of the traditionally close relations
between Iran and Pakistan during the years of the monarchy. However, a rapport was established with the
revolutionary regime in Tehran on matters of regional interest. In September, Zia undertook a "goodwill" mission to
Tehran and Baghdad, aimed at exploring a possible end to the Iran-Iraq war; he was politely received but given no
encouragement.
Relations with India became critically important due to the sensitive situation on the Pakistani-Afghan border. Relations
had improved under the government of Morarji Desai; the return of Indira Gandhi to power was expected to lead to
difficulties, with India playing a tougher role as regional leader.
U.S. opposition to the Pakistani nuclear program continued, although public condemnation was muted by the events in
Afghanistan. When the United States agreed to send enriched uranium nuclear fuel to India, Pakistanis believed that
they were being singled out for punishment and that there was a legitimate need to continue the program. On August
31, Pakistan announced that the country had become self-sufficient in nuclear fuel production for the Karachi nuclear
power plant.

2. GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS

The grave repercussions that had been predicted following the execution of former Premier Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in 1979
did not materialize in 1980. Domestic political demands were toned down somewhat, in light of the Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan, although there was some pressure for a return to civilian government. Political activity remained banned,
and the military government made vague promises for free elections, but no date was set. In the meantime, the
population was polarized between leftist and rightist elements, with strong grass-roots support for an increased
Islamization of the country.
This summer, the government announced the formation of "Zakat" committees for the collection of taxes to be
distributed to the poor and needy, as prescribed under Islamic law. The Shiite community, comprising some 15 million
people, objected to the mandatory program and also contended that their contributions should be distributed within
their own community and not dispersed by the government. This led to a major demonstration by the Shiite Muslims in
Islamabad, as a result of which the government exempted them from these laws.

3. ECONOMY
Pakistan's economic performance improved during 1979-1980. The overall growth rate was 6.2 percent, with
manufacturing improving by 8.1 percent (up from a 7.4 percent increase in 1978-1979) and agriculture by 6 percent
1

(up from 4.2 percent in the previous year). The government reported that the average annual growth rate in Pakistan
over the past three years was 6.4percent, in sharp contrast with an annual growth of 3.7 percent during 1970-1977.
There were record harvests of wheat, at 10.87 million tons, and cotton, at 4.2 million tons, not only because of an
increase in the area under cultivation but also because of a significant increase in the yield per acre. Specific efforts
were taken to move the country toward food self-sufficiency, such as price supports, promotion of rust-resistant wheat
varieties, provision of fertilizer and irrigation water, encouragement of the use of farm machines, and educational
programs for farmers.
Despite these gains, the economic situation remained precarious. In the absence of national savings, the country
remained heavily dependent on external borrowing, which totaled $822 million for the period from December 1979 to
July 1980. Foreign aid commitments during 1979-1980 totaled $939 million, compared with $1,426 million for 19781979. Total pledges from the Aid Pakistan consortium (both bilateral and multilateral) amounted to $675 million, as
compared with $845 million for 1978-1979. U.S. assistance remained limited to $40 million in agricultural commodities.
Pakistan's current foreign debt stood at $5.5 billion, which constituted nearly 32 percent of the gross national product,
and Pakistan was unable to get any debt rescheduling.
Pakistan's oil import bill (a factor in its debt problems) amounted to $1.2 billion for 1979-1980. Efforts to offset this high
cost from indigenous sources have thus far yielded modest results, with only 10 percent of the 1980 oil consumption
being met from domestic output.

4. AREA AND POPULATION

Area, 310,724 sq. mi. Pop. (est. 1980), 86.5 million. Principal cities (est. 1975): Islamabad (cap.), 250,000; Karachi,
3,500,000; Lahore, 2,100,000.

5. GOVERNMENT
Islamic republic under martial law. Pres. and chief martial law administrator, Gen. Muhammad Zia ul-Haq.

6. FINANCE.
Monetary unit: Pakistani rupee; 1 rupee = US$0.1030.

7. TRADE (EST. 1979-1980)

Exports, $1.8 billion; imports, $3.2 billion. Principal exports: rice, raw cotton, cotton yarn, cotton cloth, wool carpets,
leather, fish, sports goods. Principal imports: petroleum products, wheat, edible oils, fertilizers, tea, chemicals, tires,
medicines, iron and steel.

8. EDUCATION (EST. 1979-1980)

Enrollment: primary schools, 5.9 million; secondary schools, 1.3 million; high schools, 500,000; junior colleges,
195,000; universities, 28,500. Literacy rate, 19.8%.

9. AGRICULTURE (EST. 1979-1980)

Production (in millions of tons): wheat, 10.87; cotton, 4.2; rice, 3.2; sugarcane, 27.

10. ARMED FORCES (EST. 1980)

Army, 408,000; navy, 13,000; air force, 17,600; paramilitary forces, 109,000.
__________________

IRAN-IRAQ WAR
2.1. INTRODUCTION
Iran-Iraq War, armed conflict that began when Iraq invaded Iran in September 1980 and ended in August 1988 after
both sides accepted a cease-fire sponsored by the United Nations (UN). The war was one of the longest and most
destructive of the 20th century, with likely more than one million casualties. Despite the conflict's length and cost,
neither Iran nor Iraq made significant territorial or political gains, and the fundamental issues dividing the countries
remained unresolved at the end of the war.
2.2. BACKGROUND
The border between Iraq and Iran has been contested diplomatically and sometimes militarily for several centuries.
After the Ottoman Empire conquered present-day Iraq in 1534, making it the easternmost part of its empire, Iran, its
eastern neighbor, became a frequent rival. More recently, when Iraq was made a separate state in the aftermath of
World War I (1914-1918), Iraq and Iran disagreed sharply over the precise border between them, especially in the area
of the Shatt al Arab, a river channel providing Iraq's only outlet to the sea, via the Persian Gulf. In 1937 the two sides
came to an agreement establishing a boundary that gave Iraq control of the Shatt al Arab.
Despite the border agreement, relations between Iran and Iraq continued to suffer periodic crises for two reasons.
First, although Iraq is predominantly Arab and Iran is predominantly Persian, the border still cut across some political
loyalties. In the north, a large population of Kurds (who are neither Arab nor Persian) straddled both sides of the
border. Along the southern part of the border, an Arab minority inhabited the Iranian province of Khzestn among a
Persian majority. Furthermore, the largest portion of the Iraqi population is Shia Muslim (see Shia Islam), as is the
majority of the Iranian population. Shia religious leaders at odds with the secular (nonreligious) government of their
own country sometimes sought refuge in the other, straining Iranian-Iraqi relations. The most prominent refugee was
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, a leading Shiae religious scholar who settled in Iraq after being exiled from Iran in 1964.
The second reason Iran and Iraq continued to suffer crises was that both countries were politically unstable. When
either Iran or Iraq experienced a revolution or coup, the other country would exploit the troubled countrys political
weakness to gain a diplomatic advantage. As Western countries, especially the United Kingdom, gradually lost
influence in the area in the mid-20th century, both Iran and Iraq felt freer to pursue more ambitious foreign policies,
unhindered (and at times even supported) by external powers. By the beginning of the 1970s both Iran and Iraq
sought broader influence in the region. Under Muhammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, Iran felt it could assert its authority in
the area, partly with the backing of the United States. Iraq, governed by the Arab nationalist regime of Major General
Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr, sought to unite and strengthen the Arab world and reject Western influence. These opposing
views created a bitter rivalry between the neighboring countries.
2.3. PRELUDE TO WAR
In the early 1970s Iraq's Kurdish population rebelled against the country's government, and Iran joined several other
countries in supporting the insurgency. At peace talks in Algiers, Algeria, in 1975, Iran agreed to abandon its support
for the Kurdish rebellion in return for an agreement by Iraq to share the Shatt al Arab waterway with Iran. Thereafter,
the border between Iran and Iraq was drawn down the middle of the Shatt al Arab rather than along its eastern
(Iranian) bank as agreed in 1937.
In January 1979 followers of Ayatollah Khomeini led a revolution that toppled the shah. The following month, Khomeini
returned to Iran and began to take control of the new government. In April, after a popular referendum, Khomeini
declared the establishment of an Islamic republic. The revolution posed what seemed to be both an enormous
opportunity and a dire threat to the Iraqi government, now under the control of Saddam Hussein. On the one hand,
Iran was in disarray. The various elements in the coalition that overthrew the shah were badly divided and the army
was being purged. Further, the taking of American hostages in November 1979, combined with the desire of the new
government to free the country from all foreign influence, left Iran internationally isolated. Never had Iraqs rival been
so vulnerable.
On the other hand, Iranian Shia Muslims had carried out the successful revolution against the shahs secular
government. Their success excited many Iraqi Shias with the possibility of similar gains in their country. Although
Shiaes also constitute the majority of Muslims in Iraq, the Sunnis (Sunni Islam) had long held political power in Iraqs
secular government. Cautiously, the domestic opposition to Husseins strong-handed government became
emboldened. One Iraqi religious leader in particular, Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr, emerged with ideas very similar to
Khomeinis. Al-Sadr was soon arrested and executed, bringing protests from some Iraqi Shias as well as a crisis in
Iranian-Iraqi relations.
While these events were unfolding, some Iranian officials made no secret of their desire to have other Muslim
countries follow their path of Islamic revolution. A crisis between Iran and Iraq escalated during 1980 as the two
3

countries accused each other of border violations and interfering in each others internal affairs. Iraq responded to the
escalation by repudiating the 1975 agreement giving Iran access to the Shatt al Arab. On September 22, Iraq further
escalated the conflict, launching the full-scale invasion of Iran that initiated eight years of warfare.
2.4. INVASION AND COUNTERATTACK
Iraqi troops invaded Iran along a front some 500 km (300 mi) long. Numerous and well-equipped Iraqi forces
overwhelmed the small Iranian border units and advanced into southwestern Iran. With the far side of the Shatt al Arab
thus secured, Iraq captured the southern border city of Khorramshahr in the oil-rich Khzestn province and began
besieging other towns along the frontier. However, the Iranian resistance was stiffer than Iraq expected. Using its
superior naval power, Iran quickly mounted an effective sea blockade. Standing up to Iraqs larger air force, the Iranian
air force issued retaliatory raids that checked Iraqs advance on the ground. In January 1981 Iran launched its first
counteroffensive, but Iraq decimated the assault. The war entered a protracted stalemate.
The stalemate did little to encourage either country to engage in diplomatic dialogue. The Iraqi government accused
Iran of being bent on regional domination, while the Iranian government called for revolution in Iraq. Briefly in 1981
Iraq stopped fighting and expressed some willingness to consider a cease-fire, but Iran rejected any attempt to stop
the war while Iraq occupied Iranian territory. Thereafter, the Iranian leadership staked out a very firm diplomatic
position, claiming that it would never accept negotiations with the Iraqi government.
As the stalemate continued, Iran was able to mobilize irregular forces (groups not normally part of the army but drafted
and armed in response to a crisis), including the Revolutionary Guard, an ill-trained but dedicated core of fighters. By
early 1982, the struggle for political power in postrevolutionary Iran was resolved, allowing the government to pursue a
more coherent war policy. Iran seized the initiative with several offensives that pushed Iraq out of much of Iran and
brought the fighting into Iraqi territory. Throughout the summer and fall of 1982, Iranian attacks along the border
focused on splitting the south of Iraq, where the majority of the Shias lived, from the north and capturing the southern
Iraqi city of Al Barah.
The Iranian offensives of 1982 set a pattern that continued for the rest of the war. Exploiting their superiority in
numbers, Iran sent its Revolutionary Guard on the attack, supported by regular military forces. Outnumbered Iraqi
forces inflicted heavy losses on the Iranians but ultimately fell back. As soon as the initial Iranian thrust had exhausted
itself, however, the Iraqi army exploited Iranian disorganization and lack of equipment to retake much of the lost
territory.
As the war continued, Iraqs defense grew increasingly desperate. Probably as early as 1983 the armed forces used
poison gas against Iranian troops. Iraq also widened the war to civilian targets, launching missiles against Iranian
cities, bombing Iranian oil installations, and attacking Iranian shipping in the Persian Gulf. Iran responded with attacks
against civilian and economic targets in Iraq.
2.5. DIPLOMACY AND INTERNATIONAL INVOLVEMENT
The diplomatic situation mirrored the battlefield. Iraq had initiated the war with the conviction that a weak and isolated
Iran would surrender and accept border modifications. The Iraqi leadership undoubtedly hoped to constrain and
perhaps even bring down the Iranian revolutionary leadership.
As the war progressed, however, Iraq scaled down its aims drastically. While it continued its harsh criticism of the
Iranian leadership (and sometimes of the Iranian people) and supported dissident Iranian groups, Iraq accepted the
idea of a cease-fire and negotiations concerning the border dispute.
The Iranian leadership probably perceived the Iraqi diplomatic retreat as a sign of further weakness. After evicting Iraq
from most Iranian territory by 1982, Iran was reluctant to end the war until Iraq acknowledged that, as instigator, it bore
full responsibility for the wars disastrous consequences. Iran continuously rejected a cease-fire on terms that Iraq
could accept, demanding huge reparation payments and an end to Husseins rule before it would stop fighting. These
conditions effectively killed any hope of a peaceful resolution.
International reaction to the Iran-Iraq War was remarkably muted, at least at the outset. Although the United Nations
Security Council called for a cease-fire after a week of fighting and renewed the call on later occasions, the initial call
was made while Iraq occupied Iranian territory. Moreover, the UN refused to come to Irans aid to repel the Iraqi
invasion. The Iranians thus interpreted the UN as subtly biased in favor of Iraq. Outside the UN, other governments
took few constructive steps to end the fightingwhich was unusual for a war of such proportions. The international
silence was partly caused by Irans international isolation and the mutual hostility between Iran and the West in the
wake of Irans Islamic revolution. Further, Iran did not actively seek international support, wanting to remain free of
relationships that might make it beholden to other nations. Iraq, expecting an easy victory against a vulnerable
opponent, also did not seek international support in the early stages of the war.
Only within the Middle East did either side seek to win diplomatic support. Most Arab states regarded Iraq warily but
were even more frightened by the prospect of a victory by the revolutionary Iranian regime. Slowly at first, then more
quickly after 1982, most Arab statesespecially Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and the other states of the Arabian
4

Peninsulaaided Iraq militarily and diplomatically. Iran had few friends in the region: Syria, a longtime rival of Iraq,
stood out in the Arab world for its support of Iran, and at times Libya offered its support.
As the war wore on and Iraq failed to persuade Iran to accept a cease-fire, Iraq sought increasingly to internationalize
the conflict. It first made clear that it would accept international mediation, casting pressure on Iran to do the same.
Iraq also attacked Iranian shipping; this brought Iranian reprisals against not only Iraqi shipping but also the shipping
of Iraq's backers (such as Kuwait). Western powers, including the United States and the Union of Soviet Socialist
Republics (USSR), were eventually drawn to the Persian Gulf to protect the valuable shipments of oil from the Middle
East.
The prolonged fighting forced both sides to search desperately for military equipment, even if it meant dealing with
former enemies. At the start of the war, Iraq had no diplomatic relations with the United States due to its friendly
relations with the USSR and its longstanding conflict with Israel, the main U.S. ally in the Middle East. As the war
continued, however, Iraq toned down its rhetoric to gain American support. The United States responded by giving
trade credits to Iraq and supplying the Iraqi armed forces with intelligence information through Saudi Arabia. Equally
important, the United States dropped objections to efforts by its allies, especially France, to give weapons and other
supplies to Iraq. The United States was motivated in part by a desire to back its friends in the region (most of whom
supported Iraq), and in part by its fear of the broader consequences of an Iranian victory. Iraq also relied heavily on the
USSR for military supplies.
Iran was also willing to accept support from its former enemies. Since Irans military had been built under the rule of
the pro-American shah, most of its equipment was of American origin. So while the new revolutionary government was
hostile to both the United States and Israel, it needed American spare parts. Israel could supply some of these and
chose to do so early in the war. Israel was anxious to undercut Iraq, a potential Arab adversary. Equally remarkable,
the United States government opened a secret channel for selling arms to Iran in 1985, even as it urged other
governments to stop all military sales to the country (see Iran-Contra Affair). American motives seemed designed
partly to induce pro-Iranian groups in Lebanon to release Americans held captive there, and partly to improve relations
with Iran. Profits from the arms sales were channeled to right-wing guerrillas in Nicaragua, known as contras, to supply
arms for use against the leftist Nicaraguan regime. The exposure of the secret policy in 1986 greatly embarrassed the
government of U.S. president Ronald Reagan.
2.6. MOUNTING LOSSES
As the war continued, Iraq, no longer believing it could achieve the sweeping victory it had hoped for at the outset,
concentrated more and more on simply preventing an Iranian victory. Nevertheless, by 1986 Iraq's condition grew
increasingly desperate. Its ability to hold its defensive positions was threatened by Irans willingness to suffer
enormous casualties. Iran sent massive numbers of older men, children, and sometimes women as human waves
against Iraqs better-equipped forces. Although thousands upon thousands of these poorly armed forces were
slaughtered with each assault, the Iranian government continued to send them to the front. With its larger population,
Iran seemed confident that it would ultimately prevail. Iraq also mustered civilians not normally called on to fight, and
by the mid-1980s its population was severely strained.
In 1986 Iran captured the Iraqi gulf town of Al Fw. Iraq responded with more effective techniquesespecially the use
of massive amounts of poison gasto thwart Irans frontal assaults. Iraq also stepped up its attacks on Iranian cities,
oil installations, and shipping, drawing severe Iranian reprisals against Iraqi oil production and shipping that prompted
more American activity in the gulf. Although clashes between American and Iranian forces fell far short of full-scale
battles, the American presence nevertheless brought an end to Iranian superiority over Iraq at sea, giving Iraq time to
resupply its weaponry and stop the Iranian ground advance.
2.7. CEASE-FIRE
In 1987 Iran's leaders prepared for what they hoped would be a last round of offensives to end the war and topple the
Iraqi government. As the situation became steadily graver, international concern mounted. In July the United Nations
Security Council passed Resolution 598, calling for both sides to stop fighting, withdraw to the prewar border, and
submit to an international body to determine responsibility for the war. Iraq seized on the resolution, but Iran refused to
end hostilities with victory so near. Iran continued its attacks but did not achieve the victory for which it had hoped.
By 1988 Iraq, sufficiently rearmed and regrouped, drove the Iranians out of Al Fw and several other border areas.
Iran was in no position to launch a counterattack, and the international situation seemed increasingly favorable to Iraq.
Many Iranian leaders concluded that the war could not be won and worked to persuade Khomeini to accept Resolution
598. Although the resolution failed to provide key Iranian aimssuch as an end to Husseins government, payment of
reparations, or clear identification of Iraq as the initiator of the warKhomeini endorsed the cease-fire in July. On
August 20, 1988, both sides ceased fighting in accordance with the terms of Resolution 598.
2.8. CONSEQUENCES AND AFTERMATH
5

The Iran-Iraq War lasted just short of eight years and resulted in catastrophic destruction in both countries. Because
both Iran and Iraq used irregular military units, attacked civilian populations, and played down their own losses while
playing up those of their opponents, reliable casualty figures do not exist. For example, Iran claimed to have lost
200,000 or fewer of its own citizens, while Iraq claimed to have killed 800,000 Iranians. Neutral estimates come closer
to the Iranian claim but are uncertain. Because of different battlefield techniques, Iraqs deaths were probably about
half those suffered by Iran. The total number of people killed almost certainly exceeds 300,000. Wounded and
captured soldiers push the casualty total over one million, and some estimates of total casualties exceed two million.
The war was also extremely destructive to each countrys economy. Estimates vary, but the wars total cost, including
military supplies and civilian damages, probably exceeded $500 billion for each side. Both Iran and Iraq sacrificed their
considerable oil wealth to the war for nearly a decade, and Iraq was forced to borrow heavily, especially from its allies
on the Arabian Peninsula.
Remarkably, the war led to no tremendous political change in either country. Despite having led his country into a
disastrous military conflict, Hussein emerged from the war more secure than before; he even claimed the Iranian
failure to unseat him represented a tremendous Iraqi victory. The Iranian government could have ended the war in
1982 on only marginally different terms from those obtained six years later, yet the ensuing years of fruitless struggle
consolidated rather than undermined Iranian popular support for the Islamic republic.
Internationally, the war resolved few issues between the two countries. Although Resolution 598 called for both sides
to withdraw to the prewar border, release prisoners, and negotiate all outstanding issues, these terms proved difficult
to implement and negotiations remained deadlocked for two years. In some ways the Iran-Iraq War contributed to the
outbreak of the Persian Gulf War in 1991: It left Iraq with a strong army and large debts to Arab nations, including
Kuwait. Iraq cited Kuwaits refusal to forgive Iraqs war debt as one reason for invading its oil-rich neighbor. Only when
Iraq was forced into desperate straits during the Gulf War did it move to repair its relationship with Iran. Iraq withdrew
from Iranian territory, agreed to restore the 1975 border, and engaged in a large-scale prisoner exchange. Both sides
charged the other with retaining some prisoners, however, and the border demarcation remained incomplete. A
decade after the 1988 cease-fire, Iran and Iraq had yet to settle these differences.
__________________

PERSIAN GULF WAR

3.1. INTRODUCTION
Persian Gulf War, conflict beginning in August 1990, when Iraqi forces invaded and occupied Kuwait. The conflict
culminated in fighting in January and February 1991 between Iraq and an international coalition of forces led by the
United States. By the end of the war, the coalition had driven the Iraqis from Kuwait.

3.2. CAUSES OF THE WAR

The Iraqi-Kuwaiti border had been the focus of tension in the past. Kuwait was nominally part of the Ottoman Empire
from the 18th century until 1899 when it asked for, and received, British protection in return for autonomy in local
affairs. In 1961 Britain granted Kuwait independence, and Iraq revived an old claim that Kuwait had been governed as
part of an Ottoman province in southern Iraq and was therefore rightfully Iraqs. Iraqs claim had little historical basis,
however, and after intense global pressure Iraq recognized Kuwait in 1963. Nonetheless, there were occasional
clashes along the Iraqi-Kuwaiti border, and relations between the two countries were sometimes tense.
Relations between the two countries improved during the Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988), when Kuwait assisted Iraq with
loans and diplomatic backing. After the war ended in 1988, the Iraqi government launched a costly program of
reconstruction. By 1990 Iraq had fallen $80 billion in debt and demanded that Kuwait forgive its share of the debt and
help with other payments. At the same time, Iraq claimed that Kuwait was pumping oil from a field that straddled the
Iraqi-Kuwaiti border and was not sharing the revenue. Iraq also accused Kuwait of producing more oil than allowed
under quotas set by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), thereby depressing the price of oil,
Iraqs main export.
Iraqs complaints against Kuwait grew increasingly harsh, but they were mostly about money and did not suggest that
Iraq was about to revive its land claim to Kuwait. When Iraqi forces began to mobilize near the Kuwaiti border in the
summer of 1990, several Arab states tried to mediate the dispute. Kuwait, seeking to avoid looking like a puppet of
outside powers, did not call on the United States or other non-Arab powers for support. For their part, the U.S. and
other Western governments generally expected that at worst Iraq would seize some border area to intimidate Kuwait,
so they avoided being pulled into the dispute. Arab mediators convinced Iraq and Kuwait to negotiate their differences
in Jiddah, Saudi Arabia, on August 1, 1990, but that session resulted only in charges and countercharges. A second
session was scheduled to take place in Baghdd, the Iraqi capital, but Iraq invaded Kuwait the next day, leading some
observers to suspect that Iraqi president Saddam Hussein had planned the invasion all along.

3.3. IRAQ INVADES

The Iraqi attack began shortly after midnight on August 2. About 150,000 Iraqi troops, many of them veterans of the
Iran-Iraq War, easily overwhelmed the unprepared and inexperienced Kuwaiti forces, which numbered about 20,000.
By dawn Iraq had assumed control of Kuwait city, the capital, and was soon in complete control of the country.
Husseins political strategy was less clear than his military strategy. The Iraqis initially posed as liberators, hoping to
appeal to Kuwaiti democrats who opposed the ruling Sabah monarchy. When this claim attracted neither Kuwaiti nor
international support, it was dropped. In place of the Sabahs, most of whom fled during the invasion, Iraq installed a
puppet government.
The United Nations Security Council and the Arab League immediately condemned the Iraqi invasion. Four days later,
the Security Council imposed an economic embargo on Iraq that prohibited nearly all trade with Iraq. Iraq responded to
the sanctions by annexing Kuwait on August 8, prompting the exiled Sabah family to call for a stronger international
response. In October, Kuwaits rulers met with their democratic opponents in Jiddah, with the hope of uniting during
the occupation. The Sabah family promised the democrats that if returned to Kuwait, they would restore constitutional
rule and parliament (both of which had been suspended in 1986).
In return, the democrats pledged to support the government in exile. The unified leadership proved useful in winning
international support for an eviction of Iraq. Fewer than half of all Kuwaitis stayed in Kuwait through the occupation; of
those who stayed, some formed resistance organizations but with little effect.
Any armed attempt to roll back the Iraqi invasion depended on Saudi Arabia, which shares a border with both Iraq and
Kuwait. Saudi Arabia had neither the power nor the inclination to fight Iraq alone; if the Saudi government invited
foreign troops into the country to attack Iraq, however, it risked appearing to be under their influence. Saudi rulers did
eventually open the country to foreign forces, in large part because they were alarmed by Iraqs aggressive diplomacy
and because U.S. intelligence reports claimed that Iraqi forces were well positioned for a strike against Saudi Arabia.
7

Other Arab countries, such as Egypt, Syria, and the smaller states along the Persian Gulf, feared that even if Iraqs
conquests stopped at Kuwait, Iraq could still intimidate the rest of the region. Western powers supported a rollback of
Iraqi forces because they were afraid Iraq could now dominate international oil supplies. Finally, other members of the
United Nations (UN) did not want to allow one UN member state to eliminate another.
Beginning a week after the Iraqi takeover of Kuwait and continuing for several months, a large international force
gathered in Saudi Arabia.
The United States sent more than 400,000 troops, and more than 200,000 additional troops came from Saudi Arabia,
the United Kingdom, France, Kuwait, Egypt, Syria, Senegal, Niger, Morocco, Bangladesh, Pakistan, the United Arab
Emirates, Qatar, Oman, and Bahrain. Other countries contributed ships, air forces, and medical units, including
Canada, Italy, Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Greece, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Czechoslovakia, New
Zealand, the Netherlands, Poland, and South Korea. Still other countries made other contributions: Turkey allowed air
bases on its territory to be used by coalition planes, and Japan and Germany gave financial support. The initial goal of
the force was to prevent further Iraqi action, but most countries were aware the force might ultimately be used to drive
Iraq from Kuwait.
The Iraqis tried to deter and split the growing international coalition through several means. They made it clear that
their adversaries would pay heavily if war broke out, and they hinted they would use chemical weapons and missile
attacks on cities, as they had against Iran during the Iran-Iraq War. Iraq also detained citizens of coalition countries
who had been in Kuwait at the time of the invasion and said they would be held in militarily sensitive areasin effect
using them as human shields to deter coalition attacks. Iraq eventually released the last of the foreigners in December
1990 under pressure from several Arab nations. In an effort to weaken Arab support within the coalition, Iraq tried to
link its occupation of Kuwait to the larger Arab-Israeli conflict in the region. The Iraqis argued that since the UN had not
forced Israel to leave Arab territories it occupied during and after the Six-Day War of 1967, it should not force Iraq to
leave Kuwait. The Iraqis further implied they might leave Kuwait if Israel withdrew from the Occupied Territories.
Several Arab countries responded positively to Iraqs statements; however, most of these were states such as Jordan
and Yemen, which were not part of the coalition. Only in Morocco and Syria did government support for coalition
involvement weaken as a result of Iraqs initiative.
The coalitions greatest military concern during the closing months of 1990 was that Iraqi forces would attack before
coalition forces were fully in place, but no such attack took place. The coalition was also troubled that Iraq might
partially withdraw from Kuwait, which could split the coalition between nations eager to avoid fighting and nations
wanting to push for full withdrawal. The United States in particular feared that signs of progress might lessen the
resolve of some coalition partners and so discouraged attempts to mediate the crisis. Iraqs uncompromising stand
helped build support among coalition members for the American hard line.
On November 29, with coalition forces massing in Saudi Arabia and Iraq showing no signs of retreat, the UN Security
Council passed a resolution to allow member states to use all necessary means to force Iraq from Kuwait if Iraq
remained in the country after January 15, 1991. The Iraqis rejected the ultimatum. Soon after the vote, the United
States agreed to a direct meeting between Secretary of State James Baker and Iraqs foreign minister. The two sides
met on January 9. Neither offered to compromise. The United States underscored the ultimatum, and the Iraqis
refused to comply with it, even threatening to attack Israel. For the United States, the meeting was its way of showing
the conflict could not be resolved through negotiation.
A large minority of the U.S. population opposed military action. Opponents were concerned that the armed forces
would suffer large casualties and argued that the only reason for the invasion was to guarantee a cheap supply of oil.
Many such opponents thought economic sanctions would eventually force Iraq to leave Kuwait. President George
Bush maintained that larger political principles were involved and that economic sanctions would not work. He also
argued that the UN resolution gave him the authority to use military force. Other Americans believed the president did
not have the constitutional authority to order an attack without a congressional declaration of war. On January 12,
1991, the U.S. Congress narrowly passed a resolution authorizing the president to use force, nullifying the domestic
debate.

3.4. THE COALITION ATTACKS BY AIR

When the UN deadline of January 15 passed without an Iraqi withdrawal, a vast majority of coalition members joined
in the decision to attack Iraq. A few members, such as Morocco, elected not to take part in the military strikes. In the
early morning of January 17, 1991, coalition forces began a massive air attack on Iraqi targets.
The air assault had three goals: to attack Iraqi air defenses, to disrupt command and control, and to weaken ground
forces in and around Kuwait. The coalition made swift progress against Iraqs air defenses, giving the coalition almost
uncontested control of the skies over Iraq and Kuwait. The second task, disrupting command and control, was larger
and more difficult. It required attacks on the Iraqi electrical system, communications centers, roads and bridges, and
other military and government targets. These targets were often located in civilian areas and were typically used by
both civilians and the military. Although the coalition air forces often used very precise weapons, the attacks caused
8

many civilian casualties and completely disrupted Iraqi civilian life. The third task, weakening Iraqs ground forces, was
larger still. The coalition used less sophisticated weaponry to strike Iraqi defensive positions in both Iraq and Kuwait, to
destroy their equipment, and to undermine morale. After five and a half weeks of intense bombing and more than
100,000 flights by coalition planes, Iraqs forces were severely damaged.
In an attempt to pry the coalition apart, Iraq fired Scud missiles at both Saudi Arabia and Israel, which especially
disrupted Israeli civilian life. Iraq could thus portray its Arab adversaries as fighting on the side of Israel. The strategy
failed to split the coalition, in part because the Israeli government did not retaliate. Iraq also issued thinly veiled threats
that it would use chemical and biological weapons. The United States hinted in return that such an attack might
provoke a massive response, possibly including the use of nuclear weapons. Iraqi ground forces also initiated a limited
amount of ground fighting, occupying the Saudi border town of Khafji on January 30 before being driven back.
One month into the air war, the Iraqis began negotiating with the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) over a
plan to withdraw from Kuwait. Had this initiative come before the start of the coalitions attack, it might have split the
coalition; now it simply seemed a sign that the war was weighing heavily on Iraq. The war made diplomacy difficult for
Iraq: officials had to travel overland to Iran and then fly to Moscow to ferry messages back and forth. Sensing victory,
the coalition united behind a demand for Iraqs unconditional withdrawal from Kuwait.

3.5. LAND WAR

On February 24 the coalition launched its long-anticipated land offensive.
The bulk of the attack was in southwestern Iraq, where coalition forces first moved north, then turned east toward the
Iraqi port of Al Barah. This maneuver surrounded Kuwait, encircling the Iraqi forces there and in southern Iraq, and
allowed coalition forces (mainly Arab) to move up the coast and take Kuwait city. Some Iraqi units resisted, but the
coalition offensive advanced more quickly than anticipated. Thousands of Iraqi troops surrendered. Others deserted.
Iraq then focused its efforts on withdrawing its elite units and sabotaging Kuwaiti infrastructure and industry. Many oil
wells were set on fire, creating huge oil lakes, thick black smoke, and other environmental damage. Two days after the
ground war began, Iraq announced it was leaving Kuwait.
On February 28, with the collapse of Iraqi resistance and the recapture of Kuwaitthereby fulfilling the coalitions
stated goalsthe coalition declared a cease-fire. The land war had lasted precisely 100 hours. The cease-fire came
shortly before coalition forces would have surrounded Iraqi forces. On March 2the UN Security Council issued a
resolution laying down the conditions for the cease-fire, which were accepted by Iraq in a meeting of military
commanders on March 3. More extensive aims, such as overthrowing the Iraqi government or destroying Iraqi forces,
did not have the support of all coalition members. Most Arab members, for example, believed the war was fought to
restore one Arab country and not to destroy another. The United States also worried that extending the goal would
have involved them in endless fighting.
The Iraqis achieved none of their initial goals. Rather than enhancing their economic, military, and political position,
they were economically devastated, militarily defeated, and politically isolated. Yet because the government and many
of the military forces remained intact, the Iraqis could claim mere survival as a victory. The surviving military forces
were used a short time later to suppress two postwar rebellions: one involving Shia Muslims in southern Iraq and one
involving Kurds in the north.
Almost all of the casualties occurred on the Iraqi side. While estimates during the war had ranged from 10,000 to
100,000 Iraqis killed, Western military experts now agree that Iraq sustained between 20,000 and 35,000 casualties.
The coalition losses were extremely light by comparison: 240 were killed, 148 of whom were American. The number of
wounded totaled 776, of whom 458 were American.

3.6. CONSEQUENCES OF THE WAR

The end of the fighting left some key issues unresolved, including UN sanctions against Iraq, which did not end with
the war. On April 2, 1991, the Security Council laid out strict demands for ending the sanctions: Iraq would have to
accept liability for damages, destroy its chemical and biological weapons and ballistic missiles, forego any nuclear
weapons programs, and accept international inspections to ensure these conditions were met. If Iraq complied with
these and other resolutions, the UN would discuss removing the sanctions. Iraq resisted, claiming that its withdrawal
from Kuwait was sufficient compliance.
Many Western observers believed the victory was hollow because Saddam Hussein was still in power. At first, when
Hussein was greatly weakened, Western powers believed a rebellion might succeed in overthrowing him.
Meanwhile, potential rebels within Iraq believed they might receive international help if they rebelled. But when the
Shia population of southern Iraq rebelled shortly after the cease-fire, they were greeted not with international help but
with Iraqi military forces returning from the southern front. It quickly became clear that the rebels would receive no
9

international help, although several governments gave them verbal support. Under the terms of the cease-fire, which
established no-fly zones in the north and south, Iraqis could not attack the Shias with airplanes, but could use
helicopters, which they did to great effect. Spontaneous and loosely organized, the rebellion was crushed almost as
quickly as it arose.
The defeat of the Shias made the debate over helping Iraqi rebels even more urgent. Ultimately, however, most
Western governments decided that if Hussein collapsed, Iraq might disintegrate, ushering in a new round of regional
instability. A short while later, Kurds in the north of the country rebelled, and they too received no help. The Kurds were
able to withstand Hussein longer than the Shias, in part because they had a history of organized, armed resistance. In
the end, though, the Kurds achieved only a very modest success: a UN-guaranteed haven in the extreme north of the
country. No permanent solutionsuch as Kurdish self-rulewas negotiated.
Elsewhere the effects of the war were less severe. In Kuwait the prewar regime was restored, and in 1992 the emir,
Sheikh Jaber al-Ahmad al-Jaber al-Sabah, honored his pledge in exile to reconvene the countrys parliament.
Palestinians in Kuwait fared poorly after the war, in large part because Yasir Arafat of the Palestine Liberation
Organization (PLO) and other prominent Palestinians had endorsed Hussein and his anti-Israeli rhetoric. Blamed for
collaborating with the Iraqis, most of the Palestinian population (estimated at 400,000 before the war) was expelled
from Kuwait or forbidden to return.
Following the war, thousands of American soldiers developed mild to debilitating health problems, including abdominal
pain, diarrhea, insomnia, short-term memory loss, rashes, headaches, blurred vision, and aching joints.
The symptoms became known collectively as Gulf War syndrome but their cause was unknown. Speculation about the
cause centered on exposure to chemical and biological weapons; experimental drugs given to troops to protect
against chemical weapons; vaccinations against illness and disease; insecticides sprayed over troop-populated areas;
and smoke from burning oil wells ignited by retreating Iraqis. The U.S. Department of Defense originally stated it had
no conclusive evidence that troops had been exposed to chemical or biological weapons. However, in 1996 the
department acknowledged that more than 20,000 American troops may have been exposed to sarin, a toxic nerve gas
(see Chemical and Biological Warfare). In 1997 the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) suggested the deadly gas
may have spread farther than previously thought, affecting perhaps hundreds of thousands of troops.
The UN continued to maintain most of the economic embargo on Iraq after the war, and several coalition countries
enforced other sanctions, such as the no-fly zones. In 1995 the UN amended the sanctions to allow Iraq to sell limited
amounts of oil for food and medicine if it also designated some of the revenue to pay for damages caused by the war;
Iraq initially rejected this plan but then accepted it in 1996.
__________________

10

VIETNAM WAR
4.1. INTRODUCTION
Vietnam War, also known as the Second Indochina War, military struggle fought in Vietnam from 1959 to 1975,
involving the North Vietnamese and the National Liberation Front (NLF) in conflict with United States forces and the
South Vietnamese army. From 1946 until 1954, the Vietnamese had struggled for their independence from France
during the First Indochina War. At the end of this war, the country was temporarily divided into North and South
Vietnam. North Vietnam came under the control of Vietnamese Communists who had opposed France and who aimed
for a unified Vietnam under Communist rule. The South was controlled by non-Communist Vietnamese.
The United States became involved in Vietnam because American policymakers believed that if the entire country fell
under a Communist government, Communism would spread throughout Southeast Asia. This belief was known as the
domino theory. The U.S. government, therefore, helped to create the anti-Communist South Vietnamese
government. This governments repressive policies led to rebellion in the South, and in 1960 the NLF was formed with
the aim of overthrowing the government of South Vietnam and reunifying the country.
In 1965 the United States sent in troops to prevent the South Vietnamese government from collapsing. Ultimately,
however, the United States failed to achieve its goal, and in 1975 Vietnam was reunified under Communist control; in
1976 it officially became the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. During the conflict, approximately 3.2 million Vietnamese
were killed, in addition to another 1.5 million to 2 million Lao and Cambodians who were drawn into the war. Nearly
58,000 Americans lost their lives.

4.2. BACKGROUND
From the 1880s until World War II (1939-1945), France governed Vietnam as part of French Indochina, which also
included Cambodia and Laos. Vietnam was under the nominal control of an emperor, Bao Dai. In 1940 Japanese
troops invaded and occupied French Indochina. In May 1941 Vietnamese nationalists established the League for the
Independence of Vietnam, or Viet Minh, seeing the turmoil of World War II as an opportunity to overthrow French
colonial rule. The Viet Minh, a front organization of the Indochinese Communist Party, sought popular support for
national independence, as well as social and political reform.
The United States demanded that Japan leave Indochina, warning of military action. The Viet Minh began guerrilla
warfare against Japan and entered an effective alliance with the United States. Viet Minh troops rescued downed U.S.
pilots, located Japanese prison camps, helped U.S. prisoners to escape, and provided valuable intelligence to the
Office of Strategic Services (OSS), the forerunner of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Ho Chi Minh, the principal
leader of the Viet Minh, was even made a special OSS agent.
When the Japanese formally surrendered to the Allies on September 2, 1945, Ho used the occasion to declare the
independence of Vietnam, which he called the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV). Emperor Bao Dai had
abdicated the throne a week earlier. The French, however, refused to acknowledge Vietnams independence, and later
that year drove the Viet Minh into the north of the country. There they regrouped as the Lien Viet Front, which sought a
broader base of support, including moderates; it was replaced in 1955 by the Fatherland Front, which served as the
Communist-front organization of the DRV. (The NLF later served as the southern front.)
However, the term Viet Minh continued to be commonly used for supporters of the movement for a unified Vietnam.
Also in 1951 some Vietnamese nationalists created the Lao Dong (Workers Party) as the successor to the
Indochinese Communist Party, which had been operating clandestinely since 1945 in the war against the French. The
Lao Dong was conceived as a nationwide, united party, and it was formally based in the DRV capital of Hanoi. By 1953
most Viet Minh were members of the Lao Dong.
Immediately after Ho declared the formation of the DRV, he wrote eight letters to U.S. president Harry Truman,
imploring him to recognize Vietnams independence. Many OSS agents informed the U.S. administration that despite
being a Communist, Ho Chi Minh was not a puppet of the Communist-led Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR)
and that he could potentially become a valued ally in Asia. Tensions between the United States and the USSR had
mounted after World War II, resulting in the Cold War.
The foreign policy of the United States during the Cold War was driven by a fear of the spread of Communism. After
World War II Communist governments came to power in Eastern European nations that had fallen under the
domination of the USSR, and in 1949 Communists took control of China. United States policymakers felt they could
not afford to lose Southeast Asia as well to Communist rule. The United States therefore condemned Ho Chi Minh as
an agent of international Communism and offered to assist the French in reestablishing a colonial regime in Vietnam.
11

In 1946 United States warships ferried elite French troops to Vietnam where they quickly regained control of the major
cities, including Hanoi, Haiphong, Da Nang, Hue, and Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City), while the Viet Minh controlled
the countryside. The Viet Minh had only 2,000 troops at the time Vietnams independence was declared, but recruiting
increased after the arrival of French troops. By the late 1940s, the Viet Minh had hundreds of thousands of soldiers
and were fighting the French to a draw. In 1949 the French set up a government to rival Ho Chi Minhs, installing Bao
Dai as head of state.
In May 1954 the Viet Minh mounted a massive assault on the French garrison at Dien Bien Phu, in northwestern
Vietnam near the border with Laos. The Battle of Dien Bien Phu resulted in perhaps the most humiliating defeat in
French military history. Already tired of the war, the French public forced their government to reach a peace agreement
at the Geneva Conference.
France asked the other world powers to help draw up a plan for French withdrawal from the region and for the future of
Vietnam. Meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, from May 8 to July 21, 1954, diplomats from France, Great Britain, the
USSR, the Peoples Republic of China, and the United States, as well as representatives from Vietnam, Laos, and
Cambodia, attended delegations to draft a set of agreements called the Geneva Accords.
These agreements provided for a cease-fire throughout Vietnam and a temporary partition of the country at the 17th
parallel. French troops were to withdraw to the south of the dividing line until they could be safely removed from the
country, while Viet Minh forces were to retreat to the north. Ho Chi Minh maintained control of North Vietnam, or the
DRV, while Emperor Bao Dai remained head of South Vietnam. Elections were to be held in July 1956 throughout the
North and South under the supervision of the International Control Commission, comprised of representatives from
Canada, Poland, and India. Following these elections, Vietnam was to be reunited under the government chosen by
popular vote. The Viet Minh reluctantly agreed to the partitioning of Vietnam in the expectation that the elections would
reunify the country under Communist rule.
The United States did not want to allow the possibility of Communist control over Vietnam. In June 1954, during the
Geneva Conference, the United States pressured Bao Dai to appoint Ngo Dinh Diem prime minister of the government
in South Vietnam. The United States chose Diem for his nationalist and anti-Communist credentials. With U.S.
support, Diem refused to sign the Geneva Accords. The United States, which acted as an observer during the
delegations, also did not become a signatory. Immediately after the Geneva Conference, the U.S. government moved
to establish the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO), a regional alliance that extended protection to South
Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos in cases of Communist subversion or insurrection. SEATO, which came into force in
1955, became the mechanism by which Washington justified its support for South Vietnam; this support eventually
became direct involvement of U.S. troops.
Meanwhile, Diem announced he had no intention of participating in the planned national elections, which Ho Chi Minh
and the Lao Dong were favored to win. Instead, Diem held elections only in South Vietnam, in October 1955.
He won the elections with 98.2 percent of the vote, but many historians believe these elections were rigged, since
about 150,000 more people voted in Saigon than were registered. Diem then deposed Bao Dai, who had been the
only other candidate, and declared South Vietnam to be an independent nation called the Republic of Vietnam (RVN),
with himself as president and Saigon as its capital. Vietnamese Communists and many non-Communist Vietnamese
nationalists saw the creation of the RVN as an effort by the United States to interfere with the independence promised
at Geneva.

4.3. THE BEGINNING OF THE WAR: 1959-1965

Diem represented the interests of the urban, Catholic minority in South Vietnam. Although Diem also found some
support in the countryside among non-Communists, he did not enjoy a broad base of support. The repressive
measures of the Diem government, designed to persecute Viet Minh activists and gain control of the countryside,
eventually led to increasingly organized opposition within South Vietnam. The United States initially backed Diems
government with military advisers and financial assistance to keep it from collapsing. The political situation in South
Vietnam became even more unstable after Diem was killed in a military coup in 1963, leading to more direct
involvement by the United States. The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution of 1964 gave President Lyndon B. Johnson
permission to launch a full-scale military intervention in Vietnam. The first American combat troops arrived in Vietnam
in March 1965.

REBELLION IN SOUTH VIETNAM

When Vietnam was divided in 1954, many Viet Minh who had been born in the southern part of the country returned to
their native villages to await the 1956 elections and the reunification of their nation. When the elections did not take
place as planned, these Viet Minh immediately formed the core of opposition to Diems government and sought its
overthrow. They were greatly aided in their efforts to organize resistance in the countryside by Diems own policies,
which alienated many peasants.
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Beginning in 1955, the United States created the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) in South Vietnam. Using
these troops, Diem took land away from peasants and returned it to former landlords, reversing the land redistribution
program implemented by the Viet Minh. He also forcibly moved many villagers from their ancestral lands to controlled
settlements in an attempt to prevent Communist activity, and he drafted their sons into the ARVN.
Diem sought to undermine the Viet Minh, whom he derogatorily referred to as Viet Cong (the Vietnamese equivalent of
calling them Commies), yet their influence continued to grow. Most southern Viet Minh were committed to the Lao
Dongs program of national liberation, reunification of Vietnam, and reconstruction of society along socialist principles.
By the late 1950s they were anxious to begin full-scale armed struggle against Diem but were held in check by the
northern branch of the party, which feared that this would invite the entry of U.S. armed forces. In 1960, however,
widespread opposition to Diem in rural areas convinced the party leadership to officially sanction the formation of the
National Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam (commonly known as the National Liberation Front, or NLF).
The NLF was a classical Communist-front organization; although Communists dominated the NLF leadership, the
organization also embraced non-Communists who opposed the South Vietnamese government. The aim of the NLF
was to overthrow the Diem government and reunify Vietnam. Toward this end, the NLF began to train and equip a
guerrilla force that was formally organized in 1961 as the Peoples Liberation Armed Forces (PLAF).
Diems support was concentrated mainly in the cities. Although he had been a nationalist opposed to French rule, he
welcomed into his government those Vietnamese who had collaborated with the French, and many of these became
ARVN officers. Catholics were a minority throughout Vietnam, amounting to no more than 10 percent of the population,
but they predominated in government positions because Diem himself was Catholic. Between 1954 and 1955,
operatives paid by the CIA spread rumors in northern Vietnam that Communists were going to launch a persecution of
Catholics, which caused nearly 1 million Catholics to flee to the south. Their resettlement uprooted Buddhists who
already deeply resented Diems rule because of his severe discrimination against them.
In May 1963 Buddhists began a series of demonstrations against Diem, and the demonstrators were fired on by
police. At least 7 Buddhist monks set themselves on fire to protest the repression. Diem dismissed these suicides as
publicity stunts and promptly arrested 1,400 monks. He then arrested thousands of high school and grade school
students who were involved in protests against the government. After this, Diem was viewed as an embarrassment
both by the United States and by many of his own generals.
The Saigon governments war against the NLF was also going badly. In January 1963 an ARVN force of 2,000
encountered a group of 350 NLF soldiers at Ap Bac, a village south of Saigon in the Mekong River Delta. The ARVN
troops were equipped with jet fighters, helicopters, and armored personnel carriers, while the NLF forces had only
small arms. Nonetheless, 61 ARVN soldiers were killed, as were 3 U.S. military advisers. By contrast, the NLF forces
lost only 12 men. Some U.S. military advisers began to report that Saigon was losing the war, but the official military
and embassy press officers reported Ap Bac as a significant ARVN victory. Despite this official account, a handful of
U.S. journalists began to report pessimistically about the future of U.S. involvement in South Vietnam, which led to
increasing public concern.
President John F. Kennedy still believed that the ARVN could become effective. Some of his advisers advocated the
commitment of U.S. combat forces, but Kennedy decided to try to increase support for the ARVN among the people of
Vietnam through counterinsurgency. United States Special Forces (Green Berets) would work with ARVN troops
directly in the villages in an effort to match NLF political organizing and to win over the South Vietnamese people.
To support the U.S. effort, the Diem government developed a strategic hamlet program that was essentially an
extension of Diems earlier relocation practices. Aimed at cutting the links between villagers and the NLF, the program
removed peasants from their traditional villages, often at gunpoint, and resettled them in new hamlets fortified to keep
the NLF out. Administration was left up to Diems brother Nhu, a corrupt official who charged villagers for building
materials that had been donated by the United States. In many cases peasants were forbidden to leave the hamlets,
but many of the young men quickly left anyway and joined the NLF. Young men who were drafted into the ARVN often
also worked secretly for the NLF. The Kennedy administration concluded that Diems policies were alienating the
peasantry and contributing significantly to NLF recruitment.
The number of U.S. advisers assigned to the ARVN rose steadily. In January 1961, when Kennedy took office, there
were 800 U.S. advisers in Vietnam; by November 1963 there were 16,700. American airpower was assigned to
support ARVN operations; this included the aerial spraying of herbicides such as Agent Orange, which was intended to
deprive the NLF of food and jungle cover. Despite these measures, the ARVN continued to lose ground.
As the military situation deteriorated in South Vietnam, the United States sought to blame it on Diems incompetence
and hoped that changes in his administration would improve the situation. Nhus corruption became a principal focus;
Diem was urged to remove his brother, but he refused. Many in Diems military were especially dissatisfied with Diems
government and the ARVNs inability to rout the NLF, and they hoped for increased U.S. aid.
General Duong Van Minh informed the CIA and U.S. ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge of a plot to conduct a coup
dtat against Diem. Although the United States wanted to remove Diem from power, it did not give formal support for a
coup. When the military generals finally staged the coup on November 1, 1963, it resulted in the murder of both Diem
13

and Nhu. In the political confusion that followed, the security situation in South Vietnam continued to deteriorate.
Meanwhile, the CIA was forced to admit that the strength of the NLF was continuing to grow.

THE GULF OF TONKIN RESOLUTION

Succeeding to the presidency after Kennedys assassination on November 22, 1963, Lyndon B. Johnson felt he had to
take a forceful stance on Vietnam so that other Communist countries would not think that the United States lacked
resolve. Kennedy had begun to consider the possibility of withdrawal from Vietnam and had even ordered the removal
of 1,000 advisers shortly before he was assassinated, but Johnson increased the number of U.S. advisers to 27,000
by mid-1964. Even though intelligence reports clearly stated that most of the support for the NLF came from the south,
Johnson, like his predecessors, continued to insist that North Vietnam was orchestrating the southern rebellion. He
was determined that he would not be held responsible for allowing Vietnam to fall to the Communists.
Johnson believed that the key to success in the war in South Vietnam was to frighten North Vietnams leaders with the
possibility of full-scale U.S. military intervention. In January 1964 he approved top-secret, covert attacks against North
Vietnamese territory, including commando raids against bridges, railways, and coastal installations. Johnson also
ordered the U.S. Navy to conduct surveillance missions along the North Vietnamese coast. He increased the secret
bombing of territory in Laos along the Ho Chi Minh Trail, a growing network of paths and roads used by the NLF and
the North Vietnamese to transport supplies and troops into South Vietnam. Hanoi concluded that the United States
was preparing to occupy South Vietnam and indicated that it, too, was preparing for full-scale war.
On August 2, 1964, North Vietnamese coastal gunboats fired on the destroyer USS Maddox, which had penetrated
North Vietnams territorial boundaries in the Gulf of Tonkin. Johnson ordered more ships to the area, and on August 4
both the Maddox and the USS Turner Joy reported that North Vietnamese patrol boats had fired on them. Johnson
then ordered the first air strikes against North Vietnamese territory and went on television to seek approval from the
U.S. public. (Subsequent congressional investigations would conclude that the August 4 attack almost certainly had
never occurred.) The U.S. Congress overwhelmingly passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which effectively handed
over war-making powers to Johnson until such time as "peace and security" had returned to Vietnam.
After the Gulf of Tonkin incident Johnson declared, We seek no wider war. United States bombing was significantly
reduced. Meanwhile, North Vietnam began to dispatch well-trained units of its Peoples Army of Vietnam (PAVN) into
the south. The NLF guerrillas coordinated their attacks with PAVN forces. On February 7, 1965, the NLF launched
surprise attacks on the U.S. helicopter base at Pleiku, killing 8 Americans, wounding 126, and destroying 10aircraft; on
February 10 they struck again at Qui Nhon, killing 23 U.S. servicemen and wounding 21 at the U.S. enlisted
personnels quarters there.
The attacks coincided with two high-level diplomatic visits: one in Hanoi by
Soviet premier Aleksey Kosygin, and the other in Saigon by U.S. national security adviser McGeorge Bundy.
Within hours of the attacks, Johnson approved reprisal air strikes against North Vietnam. In Hanoi, Kosygin
abandoned his initiative to persuade North Vietnamese leaders to consider negotiations with the United States, and
instead promised them unconditional military aid. Johnsons advisers, chiefly Bundy and Defense Secretary Robert
McNamara, believed it was imperative to conduct an intensive air campaign against the North, in part to demonstrate it
would pay a price for supporting the NLF. Johnson authorized a sustained bombing campaign to begin on March 2.
Johnsons senior planners reached the consensus that U.S. combat forces would be required to protect U.S. air bases,
as the ARVN was considered to be too weak for the task. On March 8 the first of these forces, 3,500 U.S. Marines,
landed at Da Nang. By the end of April, 56,000 other combat troops had joined them; by June the number had risen to
74,000.

4.4. ESCALATED UNITED STATES INVOLVEMENT: 1965-1969

When some of the soldiers of the U.S. 9th Marine Regiment landed in Da Nang in March 1965, their orders were to
protect the U.S. air base, but the mission was quickly escalated to include search-and-destroy patrols of the area
around the base. This corresponded in miniature to the larger strategy of General William Westmoreland.
Westmoreland, who took over the Military Assistance Command in Vietnam (MACV) in 1964, advocated establishing a
large American force and then unleashing it in big sweeps. His strategy was that of attritioneliminating or wearing
down the enemy by inflicting the highest death toll possible. There were 80,000 U.S. troops in Vietnam by the end of
1965; by 1969 a peak of about 543,000 troops would be reached.
Having easily pushed aside the ARVN, both the North Vietnamese and the NLF had anticipated the U.S. escalation.
With full-scale movement of U.S. troops onto South Vietnamese territory, the Communists claimed that the Saigon
regime had become a puppet, not unlike the colonial collaborators with the French. Both the North Vietnamese and
NLF appealed to the nationalism of the Vietnamese to rise up and drive this new foreign army from their land.
14

DRV AND NLF STRATEGY

The strategy developed against the United States was the result of intense debate between the northern and southern
members of the Lao Dongs Political Bureau in Hanoi. Truong Chinh, a northerner and the leading Communist
ideologist in Hanoi, argued that the southern Vietnamese must liberate themselves, in accordance with a peoples
war strategy that would, if successful, result in a reunified Vietnam; Le Duan, a southerner who became secretary
general of the Lao Dong, advocated the Norths full support of the armed struggle in the South, on the premise that
Vietnam was one nation and therefore dependent on all Vietnamese for its independence and reunification.
Ho Chi Minh, revered widely throughout Vietnam as the father of independence, and other party leaders ultimately
sided with Duans point of view. Duans triumph represented a major turning point within the party in which southerners
came to dictate party policy in Hanoi. The Central Committee Directorate for the South (also known as the Central
Office for South Vietnam, or COSVN), formed in 1961 as the leadership group of the newly merged southern and
central branches of the Lao Dong, was able to coordinate a unified strategy. COSVN was under the direction of
Nguyen Chi Thanh, a southerner and a PAVN general, for most of the war.
After the United States initiated large-scale bombing against the DRV in 1964, in the wake of the Gulf of Tonkin
incident, Hanoi dispatched the first unit of northern-born regular soldiers to the south. Previously, southern-born Viet
Minh, known as regroupees, had returned to their native regions and joined NLF guerrilla units. Now PAVN regulars,
commanded by generals who usually had been born in the south, began to set up bases in the Central Highlands of
South Vietnam in order to gain strategic position.
Unable to cross the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) at the 17th parallel separating North from South Vietnam, PAVN
regulars moved into South Vietnam along the Ho Chi Minh Trail through Laos and Cambodia. In use since 1957, the
trail was originally a series of footpaths; by the late 1960s it would become a network of paved highways that enabled
the motor transport of people and equipment. The NLF guerrillas and North Vietnamese troops were poorly armed
compared to the Americans, so once they were in South Vietnam they avoided open combat. Instead they developed
hit-and-run tactics designed to cause steady casualties among the U.S. troops and to wear down popular support for
the war in the United States.

UNITED STATES STRATEGY

In June 1964 retired general Maxwell Taylor replaced Henry Cabot Lodge as ambassador to South Vietnam. A former
chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the military advisory group to the president, Taylor at first opposed the
introduction of American combat troops, believing that this would make the ARVN quit fighting altogether. By 1965 he
agreed to the request of General Westmoreland for combat forces. Taylor initially advocated an enclave strategy,
where U.S. forces would seek to preserve areas already considered to be under Saigons control. This quickly proved
impossible, since NLF strength was considerable virtually everywhere in South Vietnam.
In October 1965 the newly arrived 1st Cavalry Division of the U.S. Army fought one of the largest battles of the
Vietnam War in the Ia Drang Valley, inflicting a serious defeat on North Vietnamese forces. The North Vietnamese and
NLF forces changed their tactics as a result of the battle. From then on both would fight at times of their choosing,
hitting rapidly, with surprise if possible, and then withdrawing just as quickly to avoid the impact of American firepower.
The success of the American campaign in the Ia Drang Valley convinced Westmoreland that his strategy of attrition
was the key to U.S. victory. He ordered the largest search-and-destroy operations of the war in the Iron Triangle, the
Communist stronghold in the rural provinces near Saigon. This operation was intended to find and destroy North
Vietnam and NLF military headquarters, but the campaign failed to wipe out Communist forces from the area.
By 1967 the ground war had reached a stalemate, which led Johnson and McNamara to increase the ferocity of the air
war. The Joint Chiefs of Staff had been pressing for this for some time, but there was already some indication that
intensified bombing would not produce the desired results. In 1966 the bombing of North Vietnams oil facilities had
destroyed 70 percent of their fuel reserves, but the DRVs ability to wage the war had not been affected.
Planners wished to avoid populated areas, but when 150,000 sorties per year were being flown by U.S. warplanes,
civilian casualties were inevitable. These casualties provoked revulsion both in the United States and internationally. In
1967 the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Earle Wheeler, declared that no more major military targets
were left. Unable to widen the bombing to population centers for fear of Chinese and Soviet reactions in support of
North Vietnam, the U.S. Department of Defense had to admit stalemate in the air war as well. The damage that had
already been inflicted on Vietnams population was enormous.

THE TET OFFENSIVE AND BEYOND

In 1967 North Vietnam and the NLF decided the time had come to mount an all-out offensive aimed at inflicting serious
losses on both the ARVN and U.S. forces. They planned the Tet Offensive with the hope that this would significantly
affect the public mood in the United States. In December 1967 North Vietnamese troops attacked and surrounded the
U.S. Marine base at Khe Sanh, placing it under siege. Westmoreland ordered the outpost held at all costs. To prevent
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the Communists from overrunning the base, about 50,000 U.S. Marines and Army troops were called into the area,
thus weakening positions further south.
This concentration of American troops in one spot was exactly what the COSVN strategists had hoped would happen.
The main thrust of the Tet Offensive then began on January 31, 1968, at the start of Tet, or the Vietnamese lunar new
year celebration, when a lull in fighting traditionally took place. Most ARVN troops had gone home on leave, and U.S.
troops were on stand-down in many areas. Over 85,000 NLF soldiers simultaneously struck at almost every major city
and provincial capital across South Vietnam, sending their defenders reeling. The U.S. Embassy in Saigon, previously
thought to be invulnerable, was taken over by the NLF, and held for eight hours before U.S. forces could retake the
complex. It took three weeks for U.S. troops to dislodge 1,000 NLF fighters from Saigon.
During the Tet Offensive, the imperial capital of Hue witnessed the bloodiest fighting of the entire war. South
Vietnamese were assassinated by Communists for collaborating with Americans; then when the ARVN returned, NLF
sympathizers were murdered. United States Marines and paratroopers were ordered to go from house to house to find
North Vietnamese and NLF soldiers. Virtually indiscriminate shelling was what killed most civilians, however, and the
architectural treasures of Hue were laid to waste. More than 100,000 residents of the city were left homeless.
The Tet Offensive as a whole lasted into the fall of 1968, and when it was over the North Vietnamese and the NLF had
suffered acute losses. The U.S. Department of Defense estimated that a total of 45,000 North Vietnamese and NLF
soldiers had been killed, most of them NLF fighters. Although it was covered up for more than a year, one horrifying
event during the Tet Offensive would indelibly affect Americas psyche. In March 1968 elements of the U.S. Armys
Americal Division wiped out an entire hamlet called My Lai, killing 500 unarmed civilians, mostly women and children.
After Tet, Westmoreland said that the enemy was almost conquered and requested 206,000 more troops to finish the
job. Told by succeeding administrations since 1955 that there was light at the end of the tunnel, that victory in
Vietnam was near, the American public had reached a psychological breaking point. The success of the NLF in
coordinating the Tet Offensive demonstrated both how deeply rooted the Communist resistance was and how costly it
would be for the United States to remain in Vietnam.
After Tet a majority of Americans wanted some closure to the war, with some favoring an immediate withdrawal while
others held out for a negotiated peace. President Johnson rejected Westmorelands request for more troops and
replaced him as the commander of U.S. forces in Vietnam with Westmorelands deputy, General Creighton Abrams.
Johnson himself decided not to seek reelection in 1968. Republican Richard Nixon ran for the presidency declaring
that he would bring peace with honor if elected.

4.5. ENDING THE WAR: 1969-1975

Promising an end to the war in Vietnam, Richard Nixon won a narrow victory in the election of 1968. Slightly more than
30,000 young Americans had been killed in the war when Nixon took office in January 1969. The new president
retained his predecessors goal of a non-Communist South Vietnam, however, and this could not be ensured without
continuing the war. Nixons most pressing problem was how to make peace and war at the same time. His answer was
a policy called Vietnamization. Under this policy, he would withdraw American troops and the South Vietnamese
army would take over the fighting.

NIXONS VIETNAMIZATION
During his campaign for the presidency, Nixon announced that he had a secret plan to end the war. In July 1969, after
he had become president, he issued what came to be known as the Nixon doctrine, which stated that U.S. troops
would no longer be directly involved in Asian wars. He ordered the withdrawal of 25,000 troops, to be followed by
more, and he lowered draft calls. On the other hand, Nixon also stepped up the Phoenix Program, a secret CIA
operation that resulted in the assassination of 20,000 suspected NLF guerrillas, many of whom were innocent civilians.
The operation increased funding for the ARVN and intensified the bombing of North Vietnam. Nixon reasoned that to
keep the Communists at bay during the U.S. withdrawal, it was also necessary to bomb their sanctuaries in Cambodia
and to increase air strikes against Laos.
The DRV leadership, however, remained committed to the expulsion of all U.S. troops from Vietnam and to the
overthrow of the Saigon government. As U.S. troop strength diminished, Hanois leaders planned their final offensive.
While the ARVN had increased in size and was better armed than it had been in 1965, it could not hold its own without
the help of heavy U.S. airpower.

FAILED PEACE NEGOTIATIONS

Johnson had initiated peace negotiations after the first phase of the Tet Offensive. Beginning in Paris on May 13, 1968,
the talks rapidly broke down over disagreements about the status of the NLF, which the Saigon government refused to
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recognize. In October 1968, just before the U.S. presidential elections, candidate Hubert Humphrey called for a
negotiated settlement, but Nixon secretly persuaded South Vietnams president, Nguyen Van Thieu, to hold out for
better terms under a Nixon administration. Stating that he would never negotiate with Communists, Thieu caused the
Paris talks to collapse and contributed to Humphreys defeat as well.
Nixon thus inherited the Paris peace talks, but they continued to remain stalled as each faction refused to alter its
position. Hanoi insisted on the withdrawal of all U.S. forces, the removal of the Saigon government, and its
replacement through free elections that would include the Provisional Revolutionary Government (PRG), which the
NLF created in June 1969 to take over its governmental role in the south and serve as a counterpart to the Saigon
government. The United States, on the other hand, insisted that all North Vietnamese troops be withdrawn.

INVASION OF CAMBODIA
In March 1969 Nixon ordered the secret bombing of Cambodia. Intended to wipe out North Vietnamese and NLF base
camps along the border with South Vietnam in order to provide time for the buildup of the ARVN, the campaign failed
utterly. The secret bombing lasted four years and caused great destruction and upheaval in Cambodia, a land of
farmers that had not known war in centuries. Code-named Operation Menu, the bombing was more intense than that
carried out over Vietnam. An estimated 100,000 peasants died in the bombing, while 2 million people were left
homeless.
In April 1970 Nixon ordered U.S. troops into Cambodia. He argued that this was necessary to protect the security of
American units then in the process of withdrawing from Vietnam, but he also wanted to buy security for the Saigon
regime. When Nixon announced the invasion, U.S. college campuses erupted in protest, and one-third of them shut
down due to student walkouts. At Kent State University in Ohio four students were killed by panicky national
guardsmen who had been called up to prevent rioting. Two days later, two students were killed at Jackson State
College in Mississippi.
Congress proceeded to repeal the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. Congress also passed the Cooper-Church Amendment,
which specifically forbade the use of U.S. troops outside South Vietnam. The measure did not expressly forbid
bombing, however, so Nixon continued the air strikes on Cambodia until August 1973.
Three months after committing U.S. forces, Nixon ordered them to withdraw from Cambodia. The combined effects of
the bombing and the invasion, however, had completely disrupted Cambodian life, driving millions of peasants from
their ancestral lands. The right-wing government then in power in Cambodia was supported by the United States, and
the government was blamed for allowing the bombing to occur. Farmers who had never concerned themselves with
politics now flooded to the Communist opposition group, the Khmer Rouge. After a gruesome civil war, the Khmer
Rouge took power in 1975 and became one of the bloodiest regimes of the 20th century.

CAMPAIGN IN LAOS
The United States began conducting secret bombing of Laos in 1964, targeting both the North Vietnamese forces
along sections of the Ho Chi Minh Trail and the Communist Pathet Lao guerrillas, who controlled the northern part of
the country. Roughly 150,000 tons of bombs were dropped on the Plain of Jars in northern Laos between 1964 and
1969. By 1970 at least one-quarter of the entire population of Laos were refugees, and about 400,000 Lao had been
killed.
Prohibited by the Cooper-Church Amendment from deploying U.S. troops and anxious to demonstrate the fighting
prowess of the improved ARVN, Nixon took the advice of General Creighton Abrams and attempted to cut vital
Communist supply lines along the Ho Chi Minh Trail. On February 8, 1971, 21,000 ARVN troops, supported by
American B-52 bombers, invaded Laos. Intended to disrupt any North Vietnamese and NLF plans for offensives and to
test the strength of the ARVN, this operation was as much a failure as the Cambodian invasion. Abrams claimed
14,000 North Vietnamese casualties, but over 9,000 ARVN soldiers were killed or wounded, while the rest were routed
and expelled from Laos.
The success of Vietnamization seemed highly doubtful, since the Communist forces showed that the new ARVN could
be defeated. Instead of inhibiting the Communist Pathet Lao, the U.S. attacks on Laos promoted their rise. In 1958 the
Pathet Lao had the support of one-third of the population; by 1973 a majority denied the legitimacy of the U.S.supported royal Lao government. By 1975 a Communist government was established in Laos.

BOMBING OF NORTH VIETNAM

In the spring of 1972, with only 6,000 U.S. combat troops remaining in South Vietnam, the DRV leadership decided the
time had come to crush the ARVN. On March 30 more than 30,000 North Vietnamese troops crossed the DMZ, along
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with another 150,000 PRG fighters, and attacked Quang Tr Province, easily scattering ARVN defenders. The attack,
known as the Easter Offensive, could not have come at a worse time for Nixon and his national security adviser, Henry
Kissinger. A military defeat of the ARVN would leave the United States in a weak position at the Paris peace talks and
would compromise its strategic position globally.
Risking the success of the upcoming Moscow summit, Nixon unleashed the first sustained bombing of North Vietnam
since 1969 and moved quickly to mine the harbor of Haiphong. Between April and October 1972 the United States
conducted 41,000 sorties over North Vietnam, especially targeting Quang Tr. North Vietnams Easter Offensive was
crushed. At least 100,000 Communist troops were killed. Vo Nguyen Giap, head of the PAVN and chief military
strategist, was perceived as too conservative in his use of force and was compelled to resign. His successor, Van Tien
Dung, adopted more aggressive military tactics but also counseled the renewal of negotiations with the United States.
Further negotiations were held in Paris between Kissinger and Le Duc Tho, who represented North Vietnam. Seeking
an end to the war before the U.S. presidential elections in November, Kissinger made remarkable concessions. The
United States would withdraw completely, while accepting the presence of ten North Vietnamese divisions in South
Vietnam and recognizing the political legitimacy of the PRG. Hanoi also made important concessions, such as
dropping its insistence on the immediate resignation of Nguyen Van Thieu, who had become president of South
Vietnam in 1967. Kissinger announced on October 27 that peace was at hand. The negotiations had not involved
South Vietnam, however, and the Saigon governments acceptance of the terms was not set as a precondition. Thieu
was outraged by the agreement, and Nixon subsequently refused to sign it.
After the 1972 elections, Kissinger attempted to revise the agreements he had already made. North Vietnam refused
to consider these revisions, and Kissinger threatened to renew air assaults against North Vietnam unless the new
conditions were met. Nixon then unleashed at Christmas the final and most intense bombing of the war over Hanoi
and Haiphong.

UNITED STATES WITHDRAWAL

While many U.S. officials were convinced that Hanoi was bombed back to the negotiating table, the final treaty
changed nothing significant from what had already been agreed to by Kissinger and Tho in October. Nixons Christmas
bombings were intended to warn Hanoi that American air power remained a threat, and he secretly promised Thieu
that the United States would punish North Vietnam should they violate the terms of the final settlement. Nixons
political fortunes were about to decline, however. Although he had won reelection by a landslide in November 1972, he
was suffering from revelations about the Watergate scandal. The presidents campaign officials had orchestrated a
burglary at the Democratic National Committee headquarters, and Nixon had attempted to cover it up by lying to the
American people about his role.
The president made new enemies when the secret bombing of Cambodia was revealed at last. Congress was
threatening a bill of impeachment and in early January 1973 indicated it would cut off all funding for operations in
Indochina once U.S. forces had withdrawn. In mid-January Nixon halted all military actions against North Vietnam.
On January 27, 1973, all four parties to the Vietnam conflictthe United States, South Vietnam, the PRG, and North
Vietnamsigned the Treaty of Paris. The final terms provided for the release of all American prisoners of war from
North Vietnam; the withdrawal of all U.S. forces from South Vietnam; the end of all foreign military operations in Laos
and Cambodia; a cease-fire between North and South Vietnam; the formation of a National Council of Reconciliation to
help South Vietnam form a new government; and continued U.S. military and economic aid to South Vietnam. In a
secret addition to the treaty Nixon also promised $3.25 billion in reparations for the postwar reconstruction of North
Vietnam, an agreement that Congress ultimately refused to uphold.

CEASE-FIRE AFTERMATH
On March 29, 1973, the last U.S. troops left Vietnam. The Paris peace treaty did little to end the bloodshed for the
Vietnamese, however. Problems arose immediately, primarily over the delineation of two separate zones, as required
by the agreement, and the mutual withdrawal of troops to these respective zones. Northerners in the Lao Dong
leadership wanted to keep hostilities to a minimum in order to keep the United States out of Vietnam. However,
southerners on both sides refused to give up the fight. Thieu quickly showed that he had no desire to honor the terms
of the treaty, which he had signed under duress. In his view, the continued presence of North Vietnamese soldiers in
South Vietnam absolved him of honoring the cease-fire agreement. Thieu immediately began offensives against PRG
villages, and he issued an order to the ARVN: If Communists come into your villageshoot them in the head. In
October Hanoi authorized southern Communists to strike back against ARVN troops.
Meanwhile, the withdrawal of U.S. personnel resulted in a collapsing economy throughout South Vietnam. Millions of
people had depended on the money spent by Americans in Vietnam. Thieus government was ill-equipped to treat the
mass unemployment and deepening poverty that resulted from the U.S. withdrawal. The ARVN still received $700
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million from the U.S. Congress and was twice the size of the Communist forces, but morale was collapsing. More than
200,000 ARVN soldiers deserted in 1974 in order to be with their families.
The apparent weakening of South Vietnam led Hanoi to believe it could win control over the south through a massive
conventional invasion, and it set 1975 as the year to mount a final offensive. Hanoi expected the offensive to last at
least two years; the rapid collapse of the ARVN was therefore a surprise even to them. After the initial attack by the
North Vietnamese in the Central Highlands northeast of Saigon on January 7, the ARVN immediately began to fall
apart. On March 25 the ancient imperial city of Hue fell; then on March 29, Da Nang, site of the former U.S. Marines
headquarters, was overtaken. On April 20 Thieu resigned, accusing the United States of betrayal. His successor was
Duong Van Minh, who had been among those who overthrew Diem in 1963. On April 30 Minh issued his unconditional
surrender to the PRG. Almost 30 years after Ho Chi Minhs declaration of independence, Vietnam was finally unified.

4.6. THE TROOPS

In the United States, military conscription, or the draft, had been in place virtually without interruption since the end of
World War II, but volunteers generally predominated in combat units. When the first U.S. combat troops arrived in
Vietnam in 1965 they were composed mainly of volunteers. The Air Force, Navy, and Marines were volunteer units.
The escalating war, however, required more draftees. In 1965 about 20,000 men per month were inducted into the
military, most into the Army; by 1968 about 40,000 young men were drafted each month to meet increased troop levels
ordered for Vietnam. The conscript army was largely composed of teenagers; the average age of a U.S. soldier in
Vietnam was 19, younger than in World War II or the Korean War. For the first time in U.S. military history, tours of duty
were fixed in length, usually for a period of 12 or 13 months, and an individuals date of estimated return from overseas
(DEROS) was therefore set at the same time as the assignment date.
Those conscripted were mostly youths from the poorer section of American society. They did not have access to the
exemptions that were available to their more privileged fellow citizens. Of the numerous exemptions from military
service that Congress had written into law, the most far-reaching were student deferments. The draft laws effectively
enabled most upper- and middle-class youngsters to avoid military service. By 1968 it was increasingly evident that
the draft system was deeply unfair and discriminatory.
Responding to popular pressures, the Selective Service, the agency that administered the draft, instituted a lottery
system, which might have produced an army more representative of society at large. Student deferments were kept by
Nixon until 1971, however, so as not to alienate middle-class voters. By then his Vietnamization policy had lowered
monthly draft calls, and physical exemptions were still easily obtained by the privileged, especially from draft boards in
affluent communities.
Both North and South Vietnam also conscripted troops. Revolutionary nationalist ideology was quite strong in the
north, and the DRV was able to create an army with well-disciplined, highly motivated troops. It became the fourthlargest army in the world and one of the most experienced. South Vietnam also drafted soldiers, beginning in 1955
when the ARVN was created. Although many ARVN conscripts were committed anti-Communists, the Saigon
leadership did little to educate ARVN soldiers on the nature of the war or boost their morale. In 1965, 113,000 deserted
from the ARVN; by 1972, 20,000 per month were slipping away from the war.
Although equipped with high-tech weaponry that far exceeded the firepower available to its enemies, the ARVN was
poorly led and failed most of the time to check its opponents actions. United States troops came to dislike and mistrust
many ARVN units, accusing them of abandoning the battlefield. The ARVN also suffered from internal corruption.
Numerous commanders would claim nonexistent troopers and then pocket the pay intended for those troopers; this
practice made some units dangerously understaffed. Some ARVN soldiers were secretly working for the NLF,
providing information that undermined the U.S. effort. At various times, battles verging on civil war broke out between
troops within the ARVN. Internal disunity on this scale was never an issue among the North Vietnamese troops or the
NLF guerrillas.
The armed forces of the United States serving in Vietnam began to suffer from internal dissension and low morale as
well. Racism against the Vietnamese troubled many soldiers, particularly those who had experienced racism directed
against themselves in the United States. In Vietnam, Americans routinely referred to all Vietnamese, both friend and
foe, as gooks. This process of dehumanizing the Vietnamese led to many atrocities, including the massacre at My
Lai, and it provoked profound misgivings among U.S. troops. The injustice of the Selective Service system also turned
soldiers against the war. By 1968 coffeehouses run by soldiers had sprung up at 26 U.S. bases, serving as forums for
antiwar activities. At least 250 underground antiwar newspapers were published by active-duty soldiers.
After Nixons troop-withdrawal policy was initiated in 1969, many soldiers became reluctant to risk their lives for a war
without a clear purpose. No soldier wished to be the last one killed in Vietnam. Especially toward the end of the war,
the fixed one-year tours of duty in Vietnam resulted in a short-timer mentality in which combat troops became more
reluctant to engage in risky military operations as their departure date approached. In some cases, entire units refused
to go out on combat patrols, disobeying direct orders.
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Soldiers sometimes took out their frustrations and resentments on officers who put their lives at risk, especially officers
they deemed to be incompetent or overzealous. The term fragging came to be used to describe soldiers attacking
their officers, most often by tossing fragmentation grenades into the officers sleeping quarters. This practice, which
took place mostly late in the war, was a clear sign that military discipline had broken down in Vietnam. As the war
dragged on and morale sagged within the U.S. armed forces, U.S. military personnel in Vietnam found it increasingly
difficult to carry out their service.
Incidents in which soldiers were absent without leave (AWOL) also became more frequent toward the end of the war.
Some soldiers who were AWOL for 30 days or more were administratively classified as deserters. Most deserted for
personal, rather than political, reasons. Of 32,000 reported deserters who were assigned to combat duty in Vietnam,
7,000 had failed to report for deployment to Vietnam, and 20,000 had completed a full tour of duty in Vietnam but still
had obligations of military service; the remaining 5,000 reported desertions occurred in or near Vietnam. Most who
went AWOL or deserted later returned or were found, and they received less-than-honorable discharges.
Consequently, they received fewer veterans benefits and little, if any, postcombat rehabilitation.

4.7. RESPONSE TO THE WAR IN THE UNITED STATES

Opposition to the war in the United States developed immediately after the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, chiefly among
traditional pacifists, such as the American Friends Service Committee and antinuclear activists. Early protests were
organized around questions about the morality of U.S. military involvement in Vietnam. Virtually every key event of the
war, including the Tet Offensive and the invasion of Cambodia, contributed to a steady rise in antiwar sentiment. The
revelation of the My Lai Massacre in 1969 caused a dramatic turn against the war in national polls.
Students and professors began to organize teach-ins on the war in early 1965 at the University of Michigan, the
University of Wisconsin, and the University of California at Berkeley. The teach-ins were large forums for discussion of
the war between students and faculty members. Eventually, virtually no college or university was without an organized
student movement, often spearheaded by Students for a Democratic Society (SDS).
The first major student-led demonstration against the war was organized by the SDS in April 1965 and stunned
observers by mobilizing about 20,000 participants. Another important organization was the Student Non-Violent
Coordinating Committee (SNCC), which denounced the war as racist as early as 1965. Students also joined The
Resistance, an organization that urged its student members to refuse to register for the draft, or if drafted to refuse to
serve. Vietnam Veterans Against the War was organized in the United States in 1967. By the 1970s the participation of
Vietnam veterans in protests against the war in the United States had an important influence on the antiwar
movement.
While law enforcement authorities usually blamed student radicals for the violence that took place on campuses, often
it was police themselves who initiated bloodshed as they cleared out students occupying campus buildings during sitins or street demonstrations. As antiwar sentiment mounted in intensity from 1965 to 1970 so did violence,
culminating in the killings of four students at Kent State in Ohio and of two at Jackson State College in Mississippi.
Stokely Carmichael, Malcolm X, and other black leaders denounced the U.S. presence in Vietnam as evidence of
American imperialism. Martin Luther King, Jr., had grown increasingly concerned about the racist nature of the war,
toward both the Vietnamese and African American soldiers, who suffered disproportionately high casualty rates early in
the war. In 1967 King delivered a major address at New Yorks Riverside Church in which he condemned the war,
calling the United States the worlds greatest purveyor of violence.
On October 15, 1969, citizens across the United States participated in The Moratorium, the largest one-day
demonstration against the war. Millions of people stayed home from work to mark their opposition to the war; college
and high school students demonstrated on hundreds of campuses. A Baltimore judge even interrupted court
proceedings for a moment of reflection on the war. In Vietnam, troops wore black armbands in honor of the home-front
protest. Nixon claimed there was a great silent majority who supported the war and he called on them to back his
policies. Polls showed, however, that at that time half of all Americans felt that the war was morally indefensible,
while 60 percent admitted that it was a mistake.
In November 1969 students from all over the country headed for Washington, D.C., for the Mobilization Against the
War. More than 40,000 participated in a March Against Death from Arlington National Cemetery to the White House,
each carrying a placard with the name of a young person killed in Vietnam.
Opposition existed even among conservatives and business leaders, primarily for economic reasons. The government
was spending more than $2 billion per month on the war by 1967. Some U.S. corporations, ranging from beer
distributors to manufacturers of jet aircraft, benefited greatly from this money initially, but the high expense of the war
began to cause serious inflation and rising tax rates. Some corporate critics warned of future costs to care for
wounded veterans. Labor unions were also becoming increasingly militant in opposition to the war, as they were
forced to respond to the concerns of their members that the draft was imposing an unfair burden on working-class
people.
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Another factor that turned public opinion against the war was the publication of the Pentagon Papers on June 13,
1971, by the New York Times. Compiled secretly by the U.S. Department of Defense, the papers were a complete
history of the involvement of numerous government agencies in the Vietnam War. They showed a clear pattern of
deception toward the public. One of the senior analysts compiling this history, Daniel Ellsberg, secretly photocopied
key documents and gave them to the New York Times. Subsequently, support for Nixons war policies plummeted, and
polls showed that 60 percent of the public now considered the war immoral, while 70 percent demanded an
immediate withdrawal from Vietnam.
The Vietnam War cost the United States $130 billion directly, and at least that amount in indirect costs, such as
veterans and widows benefits and the search for Americans missing in action (MIAs). The war also spurred serious
inflation, contributing to a substantially increased cost of living in the United States between 1965 and 1975, with
continued repercussions thereafter. Nearly 58,000 Americans lost their lives in Vietnam. More than 300,000 U.S.
soldiers were wounded, half of them very seriously. No accurate accounting has ever been made of U.S civilians (U.S.
government agents, religious missionaries, Red Cross nurses) killed throughout Indochina.
After returning from the war, many Vietnam veterans suffered from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, which is
characterized by persistent emotional problems including anxiety and depression. The Department of Veterans Affairs
estimated that 20,000 Vietnam veterans committed suicide in the wars aftermath. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s,
unemployment and rates of prison incarceration for Vietnam veterans, especially those having seen heavy combat,
were significantly higher than in the general population.
Having felt ignored or disrespected both by the Veterans Administration (now the Department of Veterans Affairs) and
by traditional organizations such as the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the American Legion, Vietnam veterans have
formed their own self-help groups. Collectively, they forced the Veterans Administration to establish storefront
counseling centers, staffed by veterans, in every major city. The national organization, Vietnam Veterans of America
(VVA), has become one of the most important service organizations lobbying in Washington, D.C.
Also in the capital, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial was dedicated in 1982 to commemorate the U.S. personnel who
died or were declared missing in action in Vietnam. The memorial, which consists of a V-shaped black granite wall
etched with more than 58,000 names, was at first a source of controversy because it does not glorify the military but
invites somber reflection. The Asian ancestry of its prizewinning designer, Maya Lin, was also an issue for some
veterans. In 1983 a bronze cast was added, depicting one white, one black, and one Hispanic American soldier. This
led to additional controversy since some argued that the sculpture muted the original memorials solemn message. In
1993 a statue of three women cradling a wounded soldier was also added to the site to commemorate the service of
the 11,000 military nurses who treated soldiers in Vietnam. Despite all of the controversies, the Vietnam Veterans
Memorial has become a site of pilgrimage for veterans and civilians alike.
While the United States has been involved in a number of armed interventions worldwide since it withdrew from
Vietnam in 1973, defense planners have taken pains to persuade the public that goals were limited and troops would
be committed only for a specified duration. The war in Vietnam created an ongoing debate about the right of the United
States to intervene in the affairs of other nations.

4.8. EFFECTS AND RECOVERY IN VIETNAM

Although South Vietnam was ostensibly the U.S. ally in the conflict, far more firepower was unleashed on South
Vietnamese civilians than on northerners. About 10 percent of all bombs and shells went unexploded and continued to
kill and maim throughout the region long after the war, as did buried land mines. Vietnam developed high rates of birth
defects, probably due to the use of Agent Orange and other chemical defoliants. The defoliants used during the war
also destroyed about 15 percent of South Vietnams valuable timber resources and contributed to a serious decline in
rice and fish production, the major sources of food for Vietnam.
There were 800,000 orphans created in South Vietnam alone. At least 10 million people became homeless refugees in
the south. Vietnams government punished those Vietnamese who had been allied with the United States by sending
thousands to reeducation camps and depriving their families of employment. These measures, combined with
economic hardships throughout Vietnam, led to the exodus of about 1.3 million people, most as refugees to the United
States. The children of U.S. soldiers and Vietnamese women, often called Amerasians, were looked down upon by
the Vietnamese, and many of them immigrated to the United States.
Nixon promised $3.25 billion in reconstruction aid to Vietnam, but the aid was never granted. Neither Gerald Ford, who
became president after Nixons resignation, nor Congress would assume any responsibility for the devastation of
Vietnam. Instead, in 1975 Ford extended the embargo already in effect against North Vietnam to all of newly unified
Vietnam. In the Foreign Assistance Appropriation Act of 1976, Congress forbade any assistance for Vietnam or
Cambodia.
President Jimmy Carter attempted to resume relations with Vietnam in 1977, declaring that the destruction was
mutual. Talks broke down, however, over the issue of American MIAs and over the promised reparations, especially
after the Vietnamese released a copy of Nixons secret letter of 1973, which promised aid without any preconditions.
21

Fearing that reparations would amount to an admission of wrongdoing, Congress added amendments to trade bills
that also cut Vietnam off from international lending agencies like the International Bank for Reconstruction and
Development (World Bank) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Normalization of relations was suspended,
deepening the economic crisis facing Vietnam in the aftermath of the wars destruction. The crisis was worsened by
new wars with China and Cambodia in 1978 and 1979; China canceled any further aid to Vietnam in June 1978.
Cut off from most major sources of aid, the SRV increasingly relied on the Soviet Union for loans and technical
advisers. Faced with widespread hunger and enormous health problems, the SRV placed an emphasis on restoring
agricultural production. The government vigorously pursued Communist economic policy, seizing private property,
collectivizing plantations, and nationalizing businesses. About 1 million civilians were forcibly moved from cities to new
economic zones.
Mismanagement and corruption became common, and popular disillusion with the regime grew. At the Sixth Party
Congress in 1986, the SRV leadership declared Communism a failed experiment and vowed radical change. Calling
the reforms doi moi (economic renovation), the SRV opened Vietnam to capitalism. After the collapse of the USSR in
1991, the SRV leadership was forced to move further in this direction.
Stepping up efforts to find American MIAs and cooperating with World Bank and IMF guidelines for economic reform,
Vietnam worked to improve relations with the United States. In 1994 President Bill Clinton lifted the trade embargo,
and in 1995 the United States formally restored full diplomatic relations with Vietnam. This initiated a process of
normalization that was completed in 2001 when the U.S. Congress approved an agreement that established normal
trade relations with Vietnam.
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22

COUP DTAT
Coup dtat, seizure of an existing government by a small group. This overthrow is sometimes accompanied by limited
violence, as when the head of state is killed in the coup. A coup d'tat involves relatively few members of the
population, and these few frequently are military officers. Participants generally control strategic elements of the armed
forces and police and have the cooperation of at least some civilian and political leaders.
For many years the coup d'tat has been used to overthrow governments in Latin America. Poverty and illiteracy
among the people and a long tradition of military leadership have made these governments especially susceptible to
overthrow from within. This pattern now seems to be appearing in some of the newly independent nations of Africa.

DE FACTO
De Facto, in law, phrase used to signify the exercise of a power in spite of the absence of legal authority. De facto
contrasts with de jure, which signifies the lawful exercise of a power. The phrase is applied when a person or group
occupies public office or purports to exercise political or other authority without legal right.
In constitutional and international law, de facto means a power exercised but without established legal basis. It has
been applied to a revolutionary government, such as the Continental Congress, which had no legal basis but which
showed that its authority was effective by its victorious conduct of the American Revolution. Success in the war
resulted in recognition of the independence of the 13 colonies and in de jure recognition of the Continental Congress
by Britain and other countries. For various reasons, if a country wishes to enter into relations with a government,
revolutionary or otherwise, but is unwilling to accord de jure recognition, it will generally accord de facto recognition.
In business law, a de facto corporation is one that is functioning and in pursuance of an effort made in good faith to
organize a corporation within existing law. If a de facto corporation that has exercised corporate powers for a
considerable period of time inadvertently omits a requirement for establishing a regular corporation, most courts hold
that the corporation is entitled to practically the same rights and protection as a regularly constituted, or de jure,
corporation.
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23

GOLAN HEIGHTS
Golan Heights, region in southwestern Syria, occupied by Israel since 1967. The Golan Heights covers 1,250 sq km
(483 sq mi). The territory has been disputed between Israel and Syria since the Six-Day War of 1967.
The Golan Heights is a hilly, basalt plateau with a largely rocky terrain. A high escarpment overlooks Israel to the west
and provides a vantage point over the city of Damascus and the southern Syrian plain to the north and east. In the
northern part of the region is a mountain range that extends into Lebanon and rises to a peak of 2,814 m (9,232 ft) at
Mount Hermon, the highest point on the Golan Heights. Mount Hermon is divided among Lebanon, Israel, Syria, and
several United Nations (UN) demilitarized zones. The foothills surrounding Mount Hermon are used primarily as
pastureland for livestock raising, while more fertile, agricultural land is located mainly in the south. The Golan Heights
and its surrounding area contain various freshwater sources that are of great economic importance to Israel; these
include the Sea of Galilee (Lake Tiberias), a large reservoir located below the region's western boundary.
Prior to 1967 the Golan Heights was home to approximately 100,000 Syrians, many of whom were of Druze or
Circassian ethnicity. The principal religions of the Golan were the Druze religion and the Sunni and Alawite sects of
Islam. Much of the population was involved in supporting Syrian-army bases located in the region. When Israel drove
the Syrian army from the Golan in the Six-Day War, most of the local population fled into Syria. Several thousand
members of the Druze community remained, however, as well as a small number of Alawites. Today the Golan has a
population of about 33,500 (2002 estimate).
This number includes about 15,000 Druze, 17,000 Israelis, and 1,500 Alawites. The Druze live in a number of towns
and villages, particularly in Majdal Shams, the largest non-Jewish town in the Golan Heights. Much of the Druze and
Alawite population is engaged in orchard agriculture, cattle grazing, and wage labor in Israeli communities. The Israelis
live in approximately 32 agricultural communities in the southern Golan Heights. Many Israeli army officers stationed at
military bases in the Golan Heights have settled their families in the government-planned town of Katzrin. Most of the
Israeli population is involved in cereal, cotton, vegetable, and dairy farming and the region's growing wine industry.
In recent years, the Israeli government has made efforts to expand tourism in the Golan Heights. Local tourist
attractions include the archaeological sites at Gamla, the Bniys Spring, an ancient synagogue in Katzrin, and the
ruins at Hamat Gader, where ancient baths from natural hot springs have been rehabilitated. Another point of interest
is the Valley of Tears, where one of the largest tank battles in history took place during the Arab-Israeli War of 1973.
Scenic and recreational attractions in the Golan Heights include natural pools, waterfalls, gorges, and the ski slopes of
Mount Hermon.
The Golan Heights became part of the French mandate of Syria following World War I (1914-1918), and the region
was later passed to independent Syria. After the founding of Israel in 1948, Israelis started a number of kibbutzim, or
farming cooperatives, in northern Israel near the Syrian border (see Kibbutz). Syrians fired on the settlements from
fortified posts on the western ridge of the Golan. The dispute that ensued over the strategically important region was
one of the factors that precipitated the Six-Day War of 1967. During the last two days of the war, Israeli armed forces
attacked the Golan Heights. Most of the Syrian army and civilian population fled, and the area was immediately placed
under Israeli military administration. In the years that followed, numerous Israeli settlements were established in the
region on formerly Arab-held land.
Syria tried but failed to recapture the area in October 1973, when Syrian and Egyptian armies attacked Israel in the
1973 war. The Israeli army suffered heavy casualties in the surprise attack, but defeated the Arab forces, thereby
gaining additional territory from Egypt and Syria. Part of the Golan Heights was demilitarized as a result of the
disengagement agreements signed following the war. By the terms of these agreements, Al Qunayirah, a former
center of Circassian settlement destroyed in the fighting of 1967, was returned to Syria along with some of the
additional land captured in 1973.
Since that time, a buffer zone between the two armies has been patrolled by UN forces. In 1981 Israel effectively
annexed the Golan Heights by extending Israeli civil law to the region. Syria has refused to recognize Israeli authority
in the region, as have most other countries.
Peace talks between Israel and Syria began in October 1991, centering largely on the status of the Golan Heights. By
1994 the negotiations were deadlocked. In March 1995 Israeli and Syrian leaders agreed to meet for a new round of
talks in Washington, D.C. Israel offered to withdraw from the Golan over a four-year period, and Syria countered with a
demand for an 18-month withdrawal. Neither side compromised significantly, and in March 1996, following several
attacks on Israelis by fundamentalist Muslims, Israel suspended the talks.
The talks were further postponed after Israel's conservative Likud Party, which was far less likely to cede territory than
its predecessor, won the country's May election. Whereas Syrian president Hafez al-Assad wanted to continue the
talks from the point reached with Israels former leadership, Likud prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted that
future negotiations would have to start over from the beginning. Neither course was pursued, and negotiations were
nonexistent during the tenure of the next Israeli prime minister, Ehud Barak (1999-2001). Subsequent Israeli prime
24

minister Ariel Sharon shows little sign of willingness to compromise, and the same is true of Syrian president Bashar
al-Assad, who took office upon his fathers death in 2000.
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25

INTERNATIONAL MONETARY FUND

I -INTRODUCTION
International Monetary Fund (IMF), international economic organization whose purpose is to promote international
monetary cooperation to facilitate the expansion of international trade. The IMF operates as a United Nations
specialized agency and is a permanent forum for consideration of issues of international payments, in which member
nations are encouraged to maintain an orderly pattern of exchange rates and to avoid restrictive exchange practices.
The IMF was established, along with the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, at the UN Monetary
and Financial Conference held in 1944 at Bretton Woods, New Hampshire. The IMF began operations in 1947.
Membership is open to all independent nations and included 183 countries in 2001.
II -ACTIVITIES
Members undertake to keep the IMF informed about economic and financial policies that impinge on the exchange
value of their national currencies so that other members can make appropriate policy decisions. On joining the fund,
each member is assigned a quota in special drawing rights (SDRs), the fund's unit of account, whose value is based
on the weighted average value of five major currencies. (In October 2001 the SDR was worth about U.S. $1.29.) Each
member's quota is an amount corresponding to its relative position in the world economy. As the world's leading
economy, the United States has the largest quota. In 2001 the U.S. quota was about SDR 37.1 billion. The smallest
quota, that of the Republic of Palau, was about SDR 3.1 million. The amount of the quota subscription determines how
large a vote a member will have in IMF deliberations, how much foreign exchange it may withdraw from the fund, and
how many SDRs it will receive in periodic allocations.
Members who have temporary balance-of-payments difficulties may apply to the fund for needed foreign currency from
its pool of resources, to which all members have contributed through payment of their quota subscriptions. The
member may use this foreign exchange for a certain time (up to about five years) to extricate itself from its balance-ofpayments problem, after which the currency is to be returned to the IMF's pool of resources. The borrower pays a
below-market rate of interest for the IMF resources it uses; the member whose currency is used receives almost all of
these interest payments; the remainder goes to the fund for operating expenses.
III -ORGANIZATION
The board of governors, made up of leading monetary officials from each of the member nations, is the highest
authority in the IMF. Day-to-day operations are the responsibility of the 24-member executive board, which represents
member nations individually (for larger countries) or in groups. The managing director serves as chairperson of the
executive board. The IMF has its main headquarters in Washington, D.C.
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26

BALANCE OF POWER
I -INTRODUCTION
Balance of Power, theory and policy of international relations that asserts that the most effective check on the power of
a state is the power of other states. In international relations, the term state refers to a country with a government and
a population. The term balance of power refers to the relatively equal power capabilities of rival states or alliances. For
example, the United States and the Soviet Union maintained equivalent arsenals of nuclear weapons in the 1970s and
1980s, which helped sustain a military balance of power.
The balance of power theory maintains that when one state or alliance increases its power or applies it more
aggressively; threatened states will increase their own power in response, often by forming a counter-balancing
coalition. For example, the rise of German power before and during World War I (1914-1918) and World War II (19391945) triggered the formation of an anti-German coalition, consisting of the Soviet Union, Britain, France, the United
States, and other countries.
II -SIGNIFICANCE TO INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
As a policy, balance of power suggests that states counter any threat to their security by allying with other threatened
states and by increasing their own military capabilities. The policy of forming a geographically based coalition of states
to surround and block an expansionist power is known as containment. For example, the United States followed a
containment policy towards the Soviet Union after World War II by building military alliances and bases throughout
Europe, the Middle East, and Asia.
As a theory, balance of power predicts that rapid changes in international power and statusespecially attempts by
one state to conquer a regionwill provoke counterbalancing actions. For this reason, the balancing process helps to
maintain the stability of relations between states.
A balance of power system functions most effectively when alliances are fluid, when they are easily formed or broken
on the basis of expediency, regardless of values, religion, history, or form of government. Occasionally a single state
plays a balancer role, shifting its support to oppose whatever state or alliance is strongest. Britain played this role in
Europe in the 18th and 19th centuries, particularly in its relations with France, Russia, and Germany. China acted as a
balancer during the Cold War, when it shifted its support between the Soviet Union and the United States.
A weakness of the balance of power concept is the difficulty of measuring power. Ultimately a states power derives
from the size of its land mass, population, and its level of technology. But this potential powermeasured roughly by a
states Gross Domestic Product (GDP)translates imperfectly into military capability. The effective use of military force
depends on such elements as leadership, morale, geography, and luck. Furthermore, leaders misperceptions can
seriously distort the calculation of power. During the Vietnam War (1959-1975), for example, U.S. presidents
consistently underestimated the strength of the Vietnamese Communists because by conventional measures of power
they were much weaker than the United States.
III -FROM ANCIENT TIMES TO WORLD WAR II
Historical examples of power balancing are found throughout history in various regions of the world, leading some
scholars to characterize balance of power as a universal and timeless principle. During the Period of the Warring
States in China (403-221 BC), the development of large, cohesive states accompanied the creation of irrigation
systems, bureaucracies, and large armies equipped with iron weapons. These Chinese states pursued power through
a constantly shifting network of alliances. In ancient Greece during the Peloponnesian War (431-404 BC), the rising
power of Athens triggered the formation of a coalition of city-states that felt threatened by Athenian power. The
alliance, led by Sparta, succeeded in defeating Athens and restoring a balance of power among Greek cities.
In the 17th century the Habsburg dynasty, which ruled Austria and Spain, threatened to dominate Europe. During the
Thirty Years War (1618-1648), a coalition that included Sweden, Britain, France, and the Netherlands defeated the
rulers of the Habsburg Empire. Early in the 19th century, french emperor Napoleon I repeatedly made efforts to
conquer large areas of Europe. A broad coalition of European statesincluding Britain, Russia, Austria, and Prussia
defeated France in a series of major battles that climaxed with Napoleons defeat at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815.
The classical European balance of power system emerged thereafter in an alliance known as the Concert of Europe,
organized in 1815 by Austrian statesman Klemens von Metternich.
This loose alliance between Britain, Russia, Austria, Prussia, and France ensured that a handful of great powers would
coexist, with none able to dominate the others. Under this system, and with Britain playing a balancer role, peace
largely prevailed in Europe during the 19th century. During World War II, Germanys rising power, aggressive
conquests, and alliance with Italy and Japan triggered yet another coalition of opposing statesnotably the capitalist
democracies of Britain and the United States, and the Communist Soviet Union.
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IV -IN THE NUCLEAR AGE

The Cold War standoff between the United States and the Soviet Union shaped the global balance of power after
World War II. Although an actual war between these two superpowers never occurred, the balance of power process
instead took the form of a massive arms race, in which each superpower responded by adding to their military buildup.
The possession of large arsenals of nuclear weapons by both the United States and the Soviet Union ensured that any
potential war would prove disastrous for both.
Because of the threat to human survival posed by nuclear weapons, military strategists often referred to the balance of
power as a balance of terror.
During the Cold War, the U.S. policy of containment encircled the Soviet Union with military and political alliances in
Western Europe, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia. The major U.S. and Soviet military interventions of the Cold
Warin Korea, Vietnam, and Afghanistantook place in politically contested regions of the world where both
superpowers jockeyed for influence. Small states sometimes benefited from the superpower competition. In the 1960s,
for example, Cubas relations with the United States soured. At that time, Cuba allied itself with the Soviet Union and
received large economic and military subsidies.
V -IN THE POST-COLD WAR ERA
The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the worlds sole superpower. Balance of power
theory suggests that without the Soviet threat the United States, as the dominant world power, will face difficulties in its
relations with such states as China and the European powers. For example, in 1995 and 1996 France openly
challenged U.S. actions or proposals on a range of issues. These included Middle East policy, the command structure
of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the United Nations, world trade regulations, and responses to
conflicts in Africa and the former Yugoslavia. At the same time, Russian-Chinese relations, which had been very hostile
in the 1970s and 1980s, improved dramatically in the 1990s. This improvement occurred largely because both
countries feared the predominant power of the United States.
In regional conflicts, balance of power continues to operate in a traditional manner in the post-Cold War era. For
example, in the 1991 Persian Gulf War, aggression by Iraq catalyzed a broad alliance against that nation. In the future,
the balance of power principle should continue to reduce the likelihood of aggression. Great powers such as China
and Russia, along with smaller states such as Iraq and North Korea, generally understand that aggression creates
new sources of resistance and is thus self-defeating.
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28

GROSS DOMESTIC PRODUCT

Gross Domestic Product (GDP), the total value of goods and services produced in a country over a period of time.
GDP may be calculated in three ways: (1) by adding up the value of all goods and services produced, (2) by adding up
the expenditure on goods and services at the time of sale, or (3) by adding up producers incomes from the sale of
goods or services. However, it is difficult to measure GDP precisely, partly because every country has an unofficial
economy, often called a black economy, that consists of transactions not reported to government.
GDP measures a countrys economic activity regardless of who owns the productive assets in that country. For
example, the output of United States-owned companies based in Australia is considered part of Australias GDP rather
than part of the U.S. GDP. Most countries now consider GDP to be the best measure of economic activity. However,
until as recently as the early 1990s, the United States, Germany, and Japan commonly used the Gross National
Product (GNP) to measure economic activity. GNP is the total of incomes earned by residents of a country regardless
of where the assets are located. In other words, the income earned by a U.S.-owned business based in Australia
would be considered part of the U.S. GNP, not Australias.
Many economists use the GDP to measure the standard of living in a country. They divide a countrys GDP by its
population to arrive at GDP per head. The figure is then often converted into U.S. dollars to allow for comparisons
between countries. If GDP grows at a higher rate than the population, standards of living are said to be rising. If the
population is growing at a higher rate than GDP, living standards are said to be falling. GDP per head does not take
the cost of living into account. As a result, some people believe it more accurate to judge living standards in other
ways.
One estimate of living standards is the Human Development Index, published for the first time in 1990 by the United
Nations Development Program. It uses a scale of 1 to 100 and takes into account GDP per head, adult literacy, and life
expectancy.

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29

INTERNATIONAL BANK FOR RECONSTRUCTION AND

DEVELOPMENT
I -INTRODUCTION
International Bank for Reconstruction and Development or World Bank, specialized United Nations agency established
at the Bretton Woods Conference in 1944. A related institution, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), was created at
the same time. The chief objectives of the bank, as stated in the articles of agreement, are to assist in the
reconstruction and development of territories of members by facilitating the investment of capital for productive
purposes [and] to promote private foreign investment by means of guarantees or participation in loans [and] to
supplement private investment by providing, on suitable conditions, finance for productive purposes out of its own
capital
The bank grants loans only to member nations, for the purpose of financing specific projects. Before a nation can
secure a loan, advisers and experts representing the bank must determine that the prospective borrower can meet
conditions stipulated by the bank. Most of these conditions are designed to ensure that loans will be used productively
and that they will be repaid. The bank requires that the borrower be unable to secure a loan for the particular project
from any other source on reasonable terms and that the prospective project be technically feasible and economically
sound. To ensure repayment, member governments must guarantee loans made to private concerns within their
territories. After the loan has been made, the bank requires periodic reports both from the borrower and from its own
observers on the use of the loan and on the progress of the project.
In the early period of the World Bank's existence, loans were granted chiefly to European countries and were used for
the reconstruction of industries damaged or destroyed during World War II. Since the late 1960s, however, most loans
have been granted to economically developing countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. In the 1980s the bank gave
particular attention to projects that could directly benefit the poorest people in developing nations by helping them to
raise their productivity and to gain access to such necessities as safe water and waste-disposal facilities, health care,
family-planning assistance, nutrition, education, and housing. Direct involvement of the poorest people in economic
activity was being promoted by providing loans for agriculture and rural development, small-scale enterprises, and
urban development. The bank also was expanding its assistance to energy development and ecological concerns.
II -SOURCES OF FUNDS
Subscriptions to, or purchase of, capital shares are worth SDR 100,000 (about $120,000) each. The minimum number
of shares that a member nation must purchase varies according to the relative strength of its national economy. Not all
the funds subscribed are immediately available to the bank; only about 8.5 percent of the capital subscription of each
member nation actually is paid into the bank (a total of $7.3 billion in mid-1987). The remainder is to be deposited only
if, and to the extent that, the bank calls for the money in order to pay its own obligations to creditors. There has never
been a need to call in capital. The bank's working funds are derived from sales of its interest-bearing bonds and notes
in capital markets of the world, from repayment of earlier loans, and from profits on its own operations. It has earned
profits every year since 1947.
All powers of the bank are vested in a board of governors, comprising one governor appointed by each member
nation. The board meets at least once annually. The governors delegate most of their powers to 24 executive
directors, who meet regularly at the central headquarters of the bank in Washington, D.C. Five of the executive
directors are appointed by the five member states that hold the largest number of capital shares in the bank. The
remaining 19 directors are elected by the governors from the other member nations and serve 2-year terms. The
executive directors are headed by the president of the World Bank, whom they elect for a 5-year term, and who must
be neither a governor nor a director. The bank currently has 183 members.
III -AFFILIATES
The bank has two affiliates: the International Finance Corporation (IFC), established in 1956; and the International
Development Association (IDA), established in 1960. Membership in the bank is a prerequisite for membership in
either the IFC or the IDA. All three institutions share the same president and boards of governors and executive
directors.
IDA is the bank's concessionary lending affiliate, designed to provide development finance for those countries that do
not qualify for loans at market-based interest rates. IDA soft loans, or credits, are longer term than those of the bank
and bear no interest; only an annual service charge of 0.75 percent is made. The IDA depends for its funds on
subscriptions from its most prosperous members and on transfers of income from the bank. The IDA had 161
members in 2001.
30

All three institutions are legally and financially separate, but the bank and IDA share the same staff; IFC, with 174
members, has its own operating and legal staff, but uses administrative and other services of the bank. Membership in
the International Monetary Fund is a prerequisite for membership in the World Bank and its affiliates.
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31

INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION
I -INTRODUCTION
International Organization, membership group that operates across national borders for specific purposes. Scholars of
international relations consider international organizations to have growing importance in world politics. Examples of
international organizations include the United Nations (UN), the World Bank (see International Bank for Reconstruction
and Development), the International Committee of the Red Cross, and Green peace.
Most international organizations operate as part of one or more international regimes. An international regime is a set
of rules, standards, and procedures that govern national behavior in a particular area. Examples of international
regimes include arms control, foreign trade, and Antarctic exploration. International organizations are often central to
the functioning of an international regime, giving structure and procedures to the rules of the game by which nations
must play. For example, the World Trade Organization (WTO), the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA),
and the European Union (EU) are key organizations that define the international trade regime.
II -TYPES OF INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS
International organizations fall into two main categories: intergovernmental organizations and nongovernmental
organizations. Intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) have national governments as members. Hundreds of IGOs
operate in all parts of the world. Member nations have created each of these organizations to serve a purpose that
those nations find useful.
Membership can range from as few as two member nations to virtually all nations. The UN and its various agencies
are IGOs. So are most of the worlds economic coordinating institutions, such as the World Bank and the International
Monetary Fund (IMF). The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) seeks to coordinate the production
and pricing policies of its 12 member states. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) seeks to regulate the flow
of nuclear technology to developing nations. The WTO helps negotiate and monitor agreements among 128 nations to
lower trade barriers. Military alliances, such as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Southeast Asia
Treaty Organization (SEATO), and political groupings, such as the Arab League, and the Organization of African Unity
are also IGOs. In general, regional IGOs have experienced more success than global ones, and those with specific
purposes have worked better than those with broad aims.
Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) are private organizations whose memberships and activities are international
in scope. NGOs do not possess the legal status of national governments. However, the UN and other international
forums recognize many NGOs as important political institutions. Examples of NGOs include the Roman Catholic
Church, Green peace, the International Olympic Committee, and the International Committee of the Red Cross.
Although multinational corporations (MNCs) share many characteristics of NGOs, they are not international
organizations because they do not coordinate the actions of members for mutual gain.
III -HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT OF INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS
Historically, international organizations and regimes have reflected the interests of the worlds most powerful nations,
or great powers. Many international organizations and regimes were established during times of global hegemony
that is, when one nation has predominated in international power. These periods have often followed a major war
among the great powers. Todays international organizationssuch as the UN, the Organization of American States
(OAS), and the World Bankwere created after World War II ended in 1945, when the United States was powerful
enough to create rules and institutions that other countries would follow.
Although rooted in power, international organizations and regimes generally serve the interests of most participating
nations and usually endure even when hegemony wanes. Most countries share mutual interests, yet find it hard to
coordinate their actions for mutual benefit because of the lack of a central authority. Nations also face the temptation to
bend the rules in their own favor. For example, it is in everyones interest to halt production of chemicals that damage
the earths ozone layer. However, a country can save money by continuing to use those chemicals. The coordination of
efforts to write new rules and monitor them requires an international organization.
For example, the United Nations Environment Program helped countries negotiate a treaty to stop producing ozonedestroying chemicals. Thus, nations find it useful to give international organizations some power to enforce rules. Most
countries follow the rules most of the time.
In the 18th century, German philosopher Immanuel Kant and French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau broadly
outlined the concept of a global federation of countries resembling todays UN. Nations joined the first IGOs in the 19th
century. These were practical organizations through which nations managed specific issues, such as international mail
service and control of traffic on European rivers. Such organizations proliferated in the 20th century to cover a wide
32

variety of specific issues. At the same time, the scope of international organizations expanded, culminating with the
creation of the League of Nations in 1920.
The development of European regional organizations after World War II ended in 1945 mirrored the growth of IGOs
historically, in that narrowly focused organizations preceded broader and more encompassing international institutions.
The European Coal and Steel Community, predecessor of the European Union, coordinated coal and steel production.
In the 1990s, the European Commission, executive agency of the European Union, enforces regulations concerning
labor, the environment, and a host of other issues that affect the daily lives of virtually every citizen in Europe.
NGOs similarly developed from the need to coordinate specific, narrowly defined activities across national borders.
Beginning in the 19th century, churches and professional and scientific occupational groups formed the first NGOs.
Some political partiesnotably Communist Parties in the early 20th centuryorganized internationally and began to
function as NGOs. In the 20th century, specialized NGOs also sprang up in such areas as sports, business, tourism,
and communication.
Between 1945 and 1995, the number of IOs increased fivefold, reaching about 500 IGOs and 5000 NGOs. On
average, a new NGO is created somewhere in the world every few days. This trend reflects the growing importance of
international coordination for both governmental and private institutions in an interdependent world.
IV -INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS IN THE POST-COLD WAR ERA
One sign of the important role of international organizations is how they have endured as international power relations
shift. In 1991, the Soviet Union dissolved and the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States ended. At
this time, one might have expected the NATO military alliance to Russia and other formerly Communist countries in
Eastern Europe ceased to pose a threat to the capitalist democracies of Western Europe. One might have expected
NATO, which defended Western European nations, to go out of business, but it did not. Similarly, the creation of the
WTO did not cause smaller free-trade associations such as NAFTA to end. Instead, the mosaic of IOs continues to
expand, particularly as new communications and information-processing technologies make international groups more
practical and effective.
The interdependence of nations in the modern world means that no single nation can dictate the outcome of
international conflicts. Nor can private groups and individuals rely on national governments to solve major world
problems. Therefore, both governments and individuals will continue to turn to IOs as an important way to address
these problems and to protect their own interests.
__________________

33

1945: GREAT BRITAIN AND BRITISH COLONIES

The story of Great Britain in 1945 is in part the story of a nation at war. The cessation of hostilities, which occurred in
Europe in May and in Asia in September, has not meant that the life of the British people is no longer affected by the
pattern set by the stern necessities of warfare. The effects of the war, the general election that brought a new
administration into office, and the measures taken or announced for dealing with the problems of the peace are the
three topics of chief significance to be touched upon in this account; but some attention is directed also to what may
be termed the normal occurrences of the national life.
Area and Population.
The Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland has an area of 94,269 square miles, of which 5,534 square miles
are in Northern Ireland; the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands add 296 square miles to the total. In 1941 the
population of Great Britain was given as 46,467,000 and that of Northern Ireland as 1,288,000. The estimated total
today is between 48,000,000 and 49,000,000; of this, somewhat less than 2,000,000 persons live in Northern Ireland,
while, in Britain somewhat more than 5,000,000 persons live in Scotland, which in 1941 had a population of 5,007,000.
The birth rate has risen during the war. Wartime additions to maternity and child welfare services are credited with
reducing the number of still births from 36 per 1,000 in 1940, to 28 per 1,000 in 1944, and in lowering maternity
mortality from 2.61 per 1,000 in 1940, to 1.94 per 1,000 in 1944.
Resignation of War Cabinet.
At the opening of the year 1945, Great Britain had a coalition Government, in which the Prime Minister, Winston
Churchill, who took office on May 10, 1940, was a Conservative as had been his immediate predecessor, Neville
Chamberlain. Members of other political parties were in the Cabinet, but the Conservative Ministers were in a sense
the senior partners of the coalition.
The rule of Cabinet unanimity, which means that all members of the Government must agree, at any rate on major
issues, with the Prime Minister, was in force for the coalition. Responsibility for the conduct of the war rested with Mr.
Churchill; few, if anyone, would deny that as a War Prime Minister his performance was magnificent. After the German
surrender, the Prime Minister asked his Liberal and Labor colleagues to continue in the Government until the defeat of
Japan. This they were unwilling to do. The 1940 coalition ended on May 23 when Churchill resigned, effecting the
resignation of the entire ministry. He resumed office on the same day at the king's request, with a new and wholly
Conservative Cabinet. Its members were referred to in the press as the "Caretaker Ministers." Dissolution of
Parliament was announced to take place on June 15, to be followed by a general election on July 5.
The parliament, thus terminated, had a life of almost ten years, from November 14, 1935, during which great events
transpired. In England, one king died, a second abdicated, a third was crowned; and three Conservative Prime
Ministers held office, Stanley Baldwin, Neville Chamberlain, and Winston Churchill. The greater part of Europe was
overrun by the Germans. For a time Great Britain stood alone against the Nazi menace; then the German invasion of
Russia and the Japanese attack on the United States turned a European struggle into a global war. When the people
of Great Britain went again to the polls in a parliamentary election, victory had come in Europe and was not far off in
Asia. The great issues of this 1945 election were not concerned with the prosecution of the war but with postwar
reconstruction and the problems of the peace.
July Elections.
The results of the election were not made known for three weeks, until July 26. In three constituencies the candidates
were unopposed; for the other 637seats there were almost 1,700 candidates, of whom 88 were women; there were
291 three cornered, 39 four-cornered, and 7 five-cornered contests. After the election, but before the results had been
tabulated and made public, the best guess seemed to be that the Conservatives were returned with a small majority.
What happened was a Labor landslide. One of the most significant features of the election was the fate of the
"Caretaker Ministers": of forty members of the Government, (sixteen Cabinet Ministers, twenty-four without Cabinet
rank), thirty-one, including some of the most prominent, lost their parliamentary seats.
New House of Commons.
The July elections resulted in a Labor victory, astonishing in its scope. Of the 640 members of the new House of
Commons 393 are Laborites and 189 Conservatives; lesser groups elected 44 members, of whom 20 may be counted
as supporters of the Labor Government and 24 as in the Opposition; 14 members are listed as Independents. Of the
Labor members, only 119 belong to trade unions; more than 40 are lawyers; 16 are journalists; 10 are physicians; a
34

considerable number are teachers. The total includes some with many years of parliamentary experience, and more
than 100 who have been concerned in local government work.
New Cabinet.
The new Prime Minister was Clement Attlee. His Cabinet which has twenty members is in size close to prewar
standards; there were twenty-three Cabinet Ministers in 1939, twenty-one in 1929, and twenty in 1924.
Of the members of the new Cabinet several besides Mr. Attlee were Ministers in the coalition Government. Herbert
Morrison, now Lord President of the Council, was Secretary for Home Affairs and Minister for Home Security; a
Member of Parliament in 1923-1924, 1929-1931, and since 1935, Morrison was Minister of Transportation in his
second term. Ernest Bevin, now Secretary for Foreign Affairs, was Minister of Labor and Minister of National Service.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Hugh Dalton, was President of the Board of Trade; he has had seventeen years'
experience in the House of Commons, a distinguished career at Cambridge and the University of London, and a high
reputation as university lecturer and author. Mr. Dalton has been succeeded at the Board of Trade by Sir Stafford
Cripps, formerly Minister for Aircraft Production, who has been in Parliament since 1931 and has served also as
Solicitor General and Ambassador to Russia. A. V. Alexander retains his post as First Lord of the Admiralty, which he
has held since 1940. The new Lord Chancellor, Sir William A. Jowitt, raised to the peerage as Lord Jowitt, was Minister
without Portfolio; a Member of Parliament from 1920 to 1931 and again since 1939, he was Attorney General from
1929 to 1932.
In addition to members of the preceding Cabinet, several of the new Ministers held lesser administrative positions
under the coalition. The Secretary for the Home Department, James Chuter Ede, with wide experience in county and
local government, was Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Education.
The Secretary for the Colonies, George Henry Hall, a Member of Parliament since 1922, was Financial Secretary to
the Admiralty. Joseph Westwood, now Secretary for Scotland, was Parliamentary Under-secretary for Scotland.
George Alfred Isaacs, who has succeeded Ernest Bevin as Minister of Labor and of National Service, was
Parliamentary Private Secretary to the First Lord of the Admiralty. The new Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, Tom
Williams, was Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture; a Member of Parliament since 1922, he was in
the Ministry of Labor from 1929 to 1931 and in the Ministry of Agriculture in 1924. The Minister of Education, Miss
Ellen Wilkinson, who is the only woman in the Cabinet, was Parliamentary Secretary for the Ministry of Home Security;
she was on the Manchester City Council from 1923 to 1926, and Member of Parliament from 1924 to 1931 and since
1935.
New Cabinet Ministers whose administrative experience in government antedates the coalition are the Secretary for
War, John James Lawson, who was Financial Secretary for the War Office in 1924, Parliamentary Secretary to the
Ministry of Labor from 1929 to 1931; and the Minister of Fuel and Power, Emanuel Shinwell, who was Parliamentary
Secretary to the Department of Mines in 1924 and in 1930-1931, and Financial Secretary to the War Office in 19291930. The two peers (other than Lord Jowitt) in the new Government have both been Cabinet Ministers. The Secretary
for Dominion Affairs, Lord Addison, (formerly Dr. Christopher Addison) who was given a peerage in 1937 and is Leader
of the Labor Party in the House of Lords, was for a time Minister of Munitions in World War I and in 1921 became the
first Minister of Health. The Secretary for Air, Viscount Stansgate, (William Wedgwood Benn), who joined the Labor
Party in 1927 after twenty-one years in Parliament as a Liberal, was Secretary for India from 1929 to 1931.
Background of Members of Labor Government.
The Labor Government like the whole group of Labor Members of Parliament, is a cross-section of society, but
predominantly middle class. There are two somewhat overlapping groups. About 200 members of the Labor Party in
Parliament are or have been engaged in some professional work or occupation; the other big group includes trade
union organizers and secretaries, miners, railway men, and so on. To return to the Cabinet, the Minister of Health,
Aneurin Bevan, began working as a coal miner when he was thirteen years old; the Secretary for War, Mr. Lawson,
and the Secretary for the Colonies, Mr. Hall, both worked in the collieries as lads of twelve. On the other hand, there
are Ministers who are university-trained and have made a name for themselves in learned professions. Nobody has
jumped from colliery to Cabinet; a vast deal of parliamentary experience, of experience in local government, of dealing
with social and economic problems is to be found in the careers of such Ministers as Hall and Lawson and Bevan. It is
interesting, too, to note that of the twenty-three women in the House of Commons, only one is a Conservative and one
a Liberal; the others belong to the Labor Party. The present House of Commons has an unusually large proportion of
new members: 240 Labor M.P.'s were elected for the first time. Among the Labor members, 126 have been in the
fighting services during the war. An immediate problem that Mr. Attlee's administration may have to face is the salary of
members; a good many M.P.'s, without private means and with no support from trade union treasuries, will find that the
salary of 600 a year is altogether too small.
The War.
35

Civilian Casualties.
During the first months of the year 1945, Great Britain was still subject to enemy attack. In December, 1944, there
were 367 civilians killed in Great Britain and 847 injured; that brought the total of civilian casualties from air raids in
1944 to 30,449, of whom 8,465 were killed and 21,985 injured. In January, 1945, there were 585 persons killed and
1,629 injured. After a break of more than eight months, raids by piloted aircraft were resumed by the Germans in
March. The great majority of civilian casualties in the last phase of the war came from the V-2 rocket bombs that were
aimed at London and did most of their damage in and about the metropolis. The first V-2 bomb was fired on
September 8, 1944; the last on March 27, 1945. Between these dates 1,050 V-2 bombs reached England; they killed
2,754 persons and injured 6,523 others; the property damage, which was considerable, included the whole or partial
destruction of thirty-five hospitals and forty-five churches. The total number of civilians killed in Great Britain by air
raids to V-E Day was 60,585, of whom 26,920 were men, 25,392 were women, 7,736 were children, and 537 were
unidentified. There were also 86,175 persons injured in the air raids: 40,736 men, 37,816 women, and 7,623 children.
The total number of civilian air raid casualties were thus 146,760. Air raid casualties among the armed forces in Great
Britain seem not to have been published; among the civilian casualties, "children" means all persons under sixteen,
and "injured" is a term restricted to those who were hospitalized.
Property Damage.
As regards the destruction effected by enemy attacks on Britain, by the autumn of 1944 there had been some
4,500,000 houses damaged or destroyed by enemy action, and one-quarter of these had been bombed after D-Day.
There were in London alone 719,000 bomb-damaged houses in January 1945; fifty-one percent of these had been
repaired and made "tolerably comfortable." The destruction wrought by the V-2 bombs after the beginning of 1945 was
mostly, though not wholly, in London and its environs; this would add considerably to the figure here given.
Military Casualties.
Since the cessation of hostilities figures have been published that give additional details regarding British military
operations and their cost. In the great invasion and the campaigns following it, the British casualties in western
Europe, including Canadian casualties, numbered 184,512, between D-Day and V-E Day; of these, 39,599 were killed,
18,368 missing, and 126,545 wounded. In the armed forces, and thus excluding civilians, merchant seamen, and
members of the Home Guard, casualties for the war reached a total of 750,338; of these, 233,042 were killed, 57,472
missing, 275,975 wounded, and 183,849 were taken prisoner. These are for the British forces alone and they do not
include losses suffered by troops from the Dominions, India, or the Colonies; they are figures listed as of May 31, and
therefore include no losses incurred in operations against Japan between that date and V-J Day. The casualties
incurred in the armed forces from the Dominions, India, and the Colonies numbered 483,458; of these 103,730 were
killed, 40,641 were missing, 192,413 were wounded, and 330,523 were prisoners. India led with a total of 177,315
casualties; Canada had 101,008; Australia 92,211; the remainder were almost evenly divided among New Zealand,
South Africa, and the Colonies. From the beginning of the war to V-E Day, 730 vessels of the Royal Navy were lost: 5
battleships, 8 aircraft carriers, 26 cruisers, 128 destroyers, 77 submarines, 51 minesweepers, 48 drifters, and 240
trawlers. In addition to these, note may be made of the loss of 23 vessels of the Canadian Navy, and of 13 Australian,
5 Indian, 4 South African, and 1 New Zealand vessel, a total of 46 vessels belonging to the naval forces of other parts
of the empire. The British lost also 16,385 aircraft, of which 9,163 were Bomber Command, 3,558 Fighter Command,
70 Army Cooperation Command, 1,479 Coastal Command, and 2,115 of the Second Tactical Air Force.
Total Cost of War.
It is probably true that no measurably accurate estimate can be made of the total cost of any great war, yet
1,200,000,000 has been suggested as the figure for property damage that the British people have suffered on land,
and 225,000,000 as the figure for their losses on the seas. Of greater significance than the disastrous effects of
warfare on the wealth and resources of a nation is the effect on the people. It would be idle to maintain that the recent
long-continued war has had no unfortunate effects on the British people; yet the great fires which enemy air raids set
blazing and which damaged or destroyed millions of buildings did not weaken British determination to continue the
struggle to its successful conclusion, nor is there reason to believe that the war has undermined or shattered the finer
qualities of the British people. Enemy attacks made much more difficult all kinds of war work, but they did not end or
seriously decrease it. The Port of London, for instance, was one of the special targets of German air attacks, and it
suffered grievously; none the less, between the beginning of June and the end of August, 1944, there were there
loaded and dispatched 311,000 personnel of the British Liberation Army, with 123,400 vehicles and 666,000 tons of
general stores and ammunition, in 2,000 ships. (The round numbers are in each case less than the exact figure.)
Taxation.

36

Some indication of the effects of the war on the tax-payer can be found by comparing the numbers of persons in
various ranges of income, after income-tax has been paid, immediately before the war with the numbers during the
war. In the lower brackets the numbers showed a marked increase, the 150 to 250 group rose from 4,500,000 to
7,000,000, the 250 to 500 group from 1,820,000 to 5,300,000, and the 500 to 1,000 group from 450,000 to
550,000. The higher bracket income groups decreased in size: the 1,000 to 2,000 group from 155,000 to 117,000
and the 2,000 to 4,000 group from 56,000 to 31,700. In the top brackets the reduction was yet sharper: the 4,000
to 6,000 group fell from 12,000 to 1,170; in the year 1938 there were some 7,000 persons with an income of 6,000
or more, but in 1942-1943there were only 80 persons who, after the tax, had so much income. At the rate of $4- to 1
that means that in Great Britain there were then only eighty persons who after paying income tax had an income of
$24,000 or more. Steady employment and a marked increase in wages account for the marked increase in the number
of persons in the lower income groups, with, of course, the addition of persons whose incomes, after the payment of
the greatly increased income taxes of war years, were smaller than in prewar years; the decline in the number of
persons with large incomes is presumably attributable to the heavy taxes.
Expenditures.
In January, 1945, the British Government was spending money at the rate of about 14,500,000 a day, of which
12,500,000 was spent on the fighting forces. Five months later it was stated that the average expenditure "for the last
few days" had lessened to about 12,250,000, of which 11,000,000 went to the fighting services. The Chancellor of
the Exchequer, Sir John Anderson, in his interim Budget presented to the House of Commons in April, estimated the
expenditures for the fiscal year 1945-46 at 5,565,000,000 and the revenue at 3,265,000,000, leaving an estimated
deficit of 2,300,000,000 to be met by borrowing. This allowed 4,500,000,000 for the prosecution of the war and
1,065,000,000 for other purposes. This was less by 372,000,000 than the 5,937,000,000 estimate for the
preceding fiscal year; the difference was more than taken up by the decrease in the estimate for war expenditure. The
estimated deficient was 534,000,000 less than that of the preceding year and was also a smaller percentage of the
total; in other words, a larger proportion of Government spending in 1945-46 would be raised by taxes. Early in June
the Commons passed a vote of credit for 1,750,000,000, and four months later another vote of credit,
2,000,000,000, for war expenditures. When the first Labor Budget was presented to Parliament on October 23 the
new Chancellor of the Exchequer said that Sir John Anderson's estimate made six months before was about correct.
New Income Taxes.
The Budget introduced by the Labor Government provided for a number of changes in the income tax. Personal
allowances were raised from 80 to 110 for single persons and from 140 to 180 for married couples. The
exemption limit was raised to 120. On the first 50 of taxable income, three shillings in the pound is to be paid; on the
next 75, six shillings in the pound; for the remainder, the standard rate is nine shillings in the pound. Stated in terms
of American money: the standard British rate is fifteen per cent on the first $200 of taxable income, thirty per cent on
the next $300, and forty-five per cent beyond that. Income tax surtax is now increased on a graduated scale.
Beginning with January 1, the excess profits tax is to be reduced from 100 per cent to 60 per cent, and the purchase
tax is to be abolished on some household equipment, for example, heating and cooking appliances.
Living Costs.
Food Subsidies.
One means that the British Government has adopted to keep down the cost of living has been the subsidization of
foods. In January, the estimated cost of paying these food subsidies was 218,000,000; three months later the
estimates had been revised upward to 225,000,000. Among the principal items in the schedule were bread, flour, and
oatmeal, 65 million; meat, 24 million; potatoes, 28 million; and eggs, 16 million. A year before, the food subsidies
had cost 205,000,000; when bread, flour, and oatmeal were figured at 60 million; meat at 23 million; potatoes at
28 million; and eggs at 11 million.
Exports.
Great Britain, it has been said, must export at least fifty per cent more than in 1938 if it is to pay its debts. This will
require a decided increase over the value of exports during the war. The figures, including those for Northern Ireland,
are 271,000,000 in 1942; 233,000,000 in 1943; and 258,000,000 in 1944. The exports for 1944, it will be noted,
were 25,000,000 over the amount for 1943, but 13,000,000 short of the 1942 figure. The exports for the year 1938
were valued at 471,000,000. These figures do not tell the whole story: the rise in prices has been such that the
volume of exports in 1944 was only thirty-one per cent of that for 1938.
Bicycles.
37

The manner in which British manufacturers are endeavoring to meet the need of increasing their exports may be
illustrated by reference to the bicycle industry. Before the war, Great Britain produced 2,000,000 bicycles a year; this
output was valued at about 11,500,000 (the 1935 value). In the year 1938, there were 576,000 bicycles exported,
valued at 1,700,000. The manufacturers' present program is to produce 1,500,000 bicycles, two thirds of them for
export, with a like volume of spare parts. A difficulty that stands in the way is the shortage of labor: the bicycle industry
needs 20,000 men. In view of the large number of bicycles used in Great Britain itself, 10,000,000 in 1939, the
program seems to call for building up the foreign market even at the cost of the customers at home.
Imports.
Imports in 1944, munitions excluded, were only twenty-one per cent below the 1938 figure; but with a great increase in
costs. The average value of imports was ninety-one per cent over that of 1938. Retained imports, still excluding
munitions, reached 1,298,836,000 in 1944. The 1943 figure had been 1,226,554,000. In 1938, British retained
imports came to 857,984,000. Total imports, including munitions, came to 2,361,000,000 in 1944, an increase of
476,000,000 over the 1943 total of 1,885,000,000; so munitions and re-exports were in 1943 658,446,000 and in
1944 they were 1,062,164,000.
Balance of Trade.
In the first six months of 1945, exports amounted to 173,000,000 and imports to 598,000,000; the adverse balance
of 425,000,000 was slightly reduced by re-exports amounting to 23,000,000. Again, these figures do not include
munitions. Of the imports into Great Britain, more than one half come from North America (principally the United
States) as compared with just over one-fifth in 1938. British exports to North America in the first six months of 1945
were 20,800,000 in value, not very far below the 22,000,000 for the same period in 1938. In July, exports were
32,500,000 and imports were 97,751,000; in August, exports increased to 36,523,000 and imports to 99,289,000.
The August export figure was within 3,000,000 of the monthly average for 1938, but the volume of exports was barely
fifty per cent of the prewar volume.
Employment.
Unemployment was reduced to a minimum by the war. In mid-January, there were 63,213 men and boys unemployed,
1,056 temporarily laid off or on short time, and 804 casual laborers out of work; the figures for mid-April were 61,208,
348, and 752. There were 32,060 women and girls unemployed in January and 27,761 in April, with 1,539 temporarily
laid off in January and 258 in April. There was a relaxation of labor controls at the beginning of June: men over 50,
women over 40, girls and boys under 18, and all part-time workers doing less than 30 hours a week were freed from
direction.
Labor Disputes.
Only two labor disputes of 1945 call for mention. In August, there was a settlement between the railways and three
railway trade unions, providing a 7 shilling weekly increase in minimum adult pay, time and two-thirds for Sunday work,
and up to 12 holidays with pay yearly; the demand for a 40-hour week was rejected. A dockers' strike at Liverpool,
affecting some 17,000 men, began in October and soon spread to become a national strike. The dockers demanded
25 shillings a day, a 40 hour week, and extra pay for overtime, instead of 4.85 ($17.60) for a 44-hour week. They
returned to work on November 5 on a truce during which their claims were to be settled. Resumption of the strike was
threatened when in December the Central Strike Committee urged the dockers to reject the arbitration committee's
recommendation to increase the pay by only 2 shillings a day.
Rationing.
The end of the war has brought little relief to the British in the way of any relaxation of rationing. In the middle of May,
the restoration of the petrol (gasoline) ration was promised for a long time there was no gas allotted for civilian nonessential use; but the amount promised was small enough, ranging from 4 gallons a month to 7, depending on the car
horse-power. So far as food is concerned and clothing, the British people seem likely to find the first years of peace
harsher and more austere than were the years of war. Much of this is owing to British willingness to have supplies of
which they are in need go to people who are in yet greater need on the continent.
Municipal Elections.
The municipal elections in November showed that the Labor Party was trusted by the people in local as well as in
national affairs. In 182 large boroughs, Labor won 2,977 seats, a gain of 1,245, while the Conservatives lost heavily.
These Labor gains were mainly in the North, the Midlands, and in London; they gave Labor control in 60 or more
38

principal towns in England and Wales, and 5 more London boroughs; but generally Labor did not win control of the
largest cities, Manchester, Birmingham, and Liverpool, for example, though in those towns the number of seats held by
Labor was increased.
Government Program for Future.
The Government program calls for bringing the Bank of England under national ownership, the repeal of the
objectionable Trade Disputes Act, a version of the Beveridge Plan for workmen's compensation, the nationalization of
the coal mines, already accepted in principle by owners and miners, and a state medical service. In December, it was
further announced that the Government would in time introduce legislation for the nationalization of gas and electric
utilities, railways and other inland transport, docks and harbors, and iron and steel works. Whatever may be thought of
the wisdom of some of these proposals, and it must be remembered that British conditions are so different from those
in America that it is questionable whether the average American should express an opinion on British internal policies,
there is no doubt that the men who were elected last summer to grapple with the problems of the peace are doing so
boldly and courageously.
BRITISH COLONIES
General.
As the year opened, preparations were being made for the United Nations Conference on International Organization
called to meet at San Francisco in the spring. Included among the provisions suggested for the proposed Charter were
a number dealing with dependent areas. Many students of colonial affairs, particularly in the United States, felt that the
proposed Charter afforded an excellent opportunity to create a modified mandate, or trusteeship, system covering the
colonies and dependencies of all the Powers, not merely those of the defeated countries. It was clear, however, that
the United Nations which possessed colonial empires Britain, France, Holland and Belgium were of no mind to
accede to any such suggestion.
The Churchill Government had frequently gone on record as being opposed to sharing the responsibility for
administering Britain's colonies with any other Power. During the months preceding the San Francisco Conference,
Colonel Oliver Stanley, Secretary of State for Colonies, reaffirmed this policy quite categorically. At the Conference
itself, the British delegation opposed including in the Charter's section on Trusteeships any general promise of
independence for colonial peoples.
The victory of the British Labor Party in the July elections was expected by many observers to result in a change of
direction and emphasis in British colonial policy. In the long run this expectation may turn out to have been justified,
but there was little evidence of it during the latter part of 1945. Indeed, on August 18 the Foreign Office stated that
Hong Kong "is a part of the British Empire and we intend to occupy it just as any other part."
At the same time, it should be pointed out that the British Government was manifesting an ever-increasing sense of
responsibility for the economic well-being of its colonial peoples. As Colonel Stanley said in a speech on March 19,
"There can be no true self-government without an improved economic standard and a proper social development."
These words were far from idle, for on January 31, Colonel Stanley had presented to the House of Commons a bill in
which Parliament was asked to appropriate 120,000,000 for development and research in the colonies during the ten
years beginning April 1, 1946. With this sum the Colonial Office intended to expand the activities already initiated
under the Colonial Development and Welfare Act of 1940. This work had, in fact, become so important that in January
the Colonial Office announced that Sir Frank Stockdale had been called to fill the new post of Advisor on Development
Planning. He had previously been Comptroller of Development and Welfare in the British West Indies and Cochairman of the Anglo-American Caribbean Commission created in 1942.
The colonial empire was estimated to have contributed some 450,000 soldiers to the British war effort. Up to the end of
May, 6,741 of these had been killed.
Asia.
The surrender of Japan resulted in the liberation of various British territories in Southeast Asia: Malaya, Sarawak,
North Borneo, Hong Kong and others. (Burma had already been largely freed before the end of hostilities.) The
surrender, coming with unexpected swiftness, caught Admiral Mountbatten's Command unprepared to occupy Malaya
and the other Japanese-held areas at once. Eventually, however, they were all taken over and the process of
rehabilitation was begun.
Malaya.
39

In Malaya the rubber plantations were found to be in better shape than had been generally anticipated. Considerable
stocks of raw rubber were also discovered. By the end of December, some 16,500 tons had been shipped to England,
and more was ready to go. The revival of the tin-mining industry was slower but was under way by the close of the
year. Even before the Japanese surrender, the British had begun to formulate plans for a new political set-up in
Malaya. Hitherto this area had consisted of three separate parts: the Straits Settlements (a crown colony), four
federated Malay States and five unfederated ones.
Many observers felt that this anomalous, though typically British, arrangement should be overhauled in order to insure
greater unity in Malaya and thereby help prepare its peoples to assume a larger share of their own government. On
October 10, the Labor Secretary of State for Colonies, Mr. George Hall, speaking in the House of Commons, outlined
a plan for creating a Malayan Union consisting of the States and the Straits Settlements, with Singapore left as a
separate colony. Critics of this scheme pointed out that Britain had treaty relations with the various Malay rulers which
had to be respected and that the mixed racial composition of the population less than half are Malays would
make it extremely difficult to develop a common set of political interests or traditions.
North Borneo.
The liberation of North Borneo reopened the problem of how long that area would continue to be under the control of a
chartered company. In August, it was officially announced that the government and the British North Borneo Company
were negotiating a transfer of the colony's administration from the latter to the former.
Burma.
A brighter political future was also promised to Burma, where civil government was restored in October. Upon this
occasion King George, in a communication to the governor of Burma, stated that "Burma shall at the earliest possible
moment attain complete self-government as a member of the British Commonwealth." He declared that later on there
would be elections for a House of Representatives with a responsible ministry and a new constitution.
Ceylon.
Ceylon also experienced constitutional growing pains during the year. In January, there arrived a commission, headed
by Lord Soulbury, which had been sent out to investigate the possibility of confering more self-government on the
island. Its sessions ran from January 22 to March 13, during which time much testimony was taken despite a virtual
boycott by the Ceylon State Council. In Ceylon, as in India, the constitutional problem is complicated by the presence
of various self-contained religious and racial communities. On the State Council a Sinhalese majority prevailed, and in
the spring this body passed a bill providing for Dominion status which the British Government had already refused
to grant.
On October 9, the report of the Soulbury Commission was released. It proposed certain steps for getting the island
ready for Dominion status through the practice of wide self-government. However, the minorities attacked it as not
insuring them adequate protection. On October 31, the British Government announced that a constitution along the
lines of the Soulbury report would be conferred as an interim step. The Ceylon State Council accepted this proposal by
a vote of 51 to 3 on November 9.
Singapore.
September 5, at 11:30 A.M., British and Indian troops went ashore. They found the city undamaged except for the
docks. (American Indiabased Superforts sank the great King George V dock on February 1.) A British Military
Administration was set up, and the Japanese were put to work on the waterfront. It was found that the Japanese had
cultivated the Malays, and persecuted the Chinese.
Surrender of Japanese.
A considerable naval force, headed by HMS Nelson, arrived on September 10, and on the 12th Itagaki made formal
surrender to Mountbatten of all enemy forces in Southeast Asia. Present as witnesses were Allied representatives, the
Sultan of Johore, the Maharajah of Cooch-Behar, the Bishop of Singapore, representatives of the Chinese community
and former POW.
Singapore was specifically omitted from a proposal by the Colonial Secretary, October 10, for a Malayan Union and
establishment of Malay citizenship. The question of ultimate union of Singapore with the state would be decided later.
Education.
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The report of the Asquith Commission, July 19, on higher education in the colonies, stating that a good university was
an inescapable corollary of self-government, proposed the creation of a University of Malaya based on the King
Edward VII Medical College and Raffles College. Until its degrees acquired reputation, preparation would be for a
degree from the University of London.
A sequel to the defeat of 1942 was the inquiry begun in Australia in November into the ethics of the escape of Lt.
General H. Gordon Bennett on February 15 and 16, 1942.
West Indies.
Finally, in the fall of 1945, and after its contents could no longer be distorted by Nazi propaganda, the British
Government published the report of the Royal Commission which investigated West Indian conditions just before the
war. The Commission's recommendations had been made public in February, 1940, and had been instrumental in
getting Parliament to vote the Colonial Development and Welfare Act of that same year. The Commission's Report,
with its wealth of information on the islands' economic and social problems, was a landmark in British colonial policy.
In order to carry out the terms of the 1940 Act, there had been created the office of Comptroller of the West Indies
Development and Welfare Department, occupied by Sir Frank Stockdale. Up to July, 1945, grants of 21,500,000 had
been made to various colonies for development and welfare, of which one-third went to the West Indies. This
represented 291 out of the 497 schemes approved for the whole empire.
Anglo-American Caribbean Commission.
The size of the Anglo-American Caribbean Commission was altered during the year by adding one more member for
each side, thus increasing each delegation from three to four. The new American seat was filled by Mr. Ralph Bunche,
a Negro who was currently serving as Associate Chief of the Division of Dependent Area Affairs in the State
Department. The British delegation was to be reshuffled so as to include two non-official West Indian members.
Political Federation Proposed.
One of the recommendations of the Royal Commission had been that political federation should be one of the
objectives of British policy in the West Indies. Colonel Stanley disclosed in June that he had circulated a dispatch
among the governors of Britain's eight Caribbean colonies in which he stated that the Government favored the
development of federation only if there were a popular demand for it from within the colonies themselves. He was
opposed to any attempt to force it on the West Indian peoples against their will. The ultimate aim of such federation
would be, he declared, full self-government within the British Commonwealth. He suggested the possibility that
perhaps two federations, one for the eastern and one for the western group, might be preferable, and that the Bahama
Islands might choose to remain outside of either one. Indeed, on July 3, the Bahamas House of Assembly
unanimously rejected the federation proposed. Elsewhere in the West Indies federation met with greater approval.
Caribbean Labor Conference.
In September, a Caribbean Labor Conference met in Barbados and adopted a draft constitution for a new organization
to be called the Caribbean Labor Congress and to include representatives of trade unions, cooperative societies and
Socialist political bodies in the colonies. The Conference came out strongly for federation and for a number of
economic and social reform measures, including the establishment of a West Indian university. This latter suggestion
had the express support of the Secretary of State for Colonies in the Labor Government. It was generally agreed that
Jamaica, the most populous of the colonies, should be the seat of such an institution.
Jamaica.
In Jamaica, the new liberalized constitution of 1944 was on trial. As Colonel Stanley remarked in Kingston early in
January, it was an experiment which might affect the future of all colonial peoples. In April, the Jamaican Government
released a report on economic conditions prepared by a special committee chosen to investigate the problem. While
recommending various social security measures, it also emphasized the importance of increasing production through
harder and more efficient work. Another committee, reporting late in the summer, made a number of suggestions for
improving Jamaican agriculture, including the establishment of an island Land Authority. Some idea of the wretched
living conditions of the great mass of Jamaicans was given by census figures showing that nearly half of the island's
322,000 dwellings were classified as bad. For example, only 10 per cent had water closets, 18 per cent were without
any toilet facilities at all, and less than one-half of one per cent had inside washing facilities.
Bahamas.
41

The Duke of Windsor resigned as Governor and Commander-in-Chief in the Bahamas, it was officially stated in a
Colonial Office announcement on March 15. Thus came to an end his nearly five-year tenure of office. Later in the
same month, he expounded to the Nassau Chamber of Commerce a fourpoint program for the economic and social
rehabilitation of the islands.
West Africa.
Some 200,000 men from British West Africa served in Britain's armed forces during the war, many of them in the
Burma campaign of 1945. The West African colonies also played a vital part in Allied strategy by providing sites for
airfields, new roads, improved railway facilities, and antimalaria drainage projects to protect the health of the Allied
forces serving along the trans-African air route to the Middle East and India.
West African Council.
As a means of carrying on the coordination among the four colonies which had been developed during the war, the
Secretary of State for Colonies, Mr. George Hall, stated in October that a West African Council was to be set up
consisting of the four colonial governors and with its seat in the Gold Coast. Presumably a more rapid and productive
economic development of the West African colonies would be one of the objectives of this Council. In Nigeria, it was
planned to spend 40,000,000 on general development work during the next ten years, with lesser sums earmarked
for the smaller colonies. In an article in the London Times for October 31, Lord Balfour, former Resident Minister in
West Africa, drew attention to the imminent danger that Nigeria would lose its market for palm oil and kernels to
Malaya, Dutch East Indies and the Belgian Congo, unless its growers improved the quality of their product.
Nigeria.
A White Paper containing proposals for revising and liberalizing the constitution of Nigeria was published on March 5.
The unofficial (i.e., native) members of the Nigerian Legislative Council expressed general approval of the proposals in
a debate that took place on the 23rd.
Cocoa.
Approximately one-half of the world's supply of cocoa comes from British West Africa, notably the Gold Coast. Early in
the year, American cocoa importers protested against the British Government's announced intention to control the
prices and marketing of the West African crop. This policy was later scrapped by the Churchill Cabinet. However,
considerable anxiety was felt after the Labor victory in July that the new Cabinet would nationalize the cocoa industry.
In mid-September, a report from Accra stated that the imperial government was going to buy the 1945-46 crop through
the West African Produce Control Board at an increased price. In November, American importers were complaining
about the way the British authorities were holding up cocoa shipments from West Africa.
East Africa.
East African troops distinguished themselves in the Ethiopian, Mediterranean and Burma campaigns. But with the end
of hostilities, the problem of how to reintegrate these men into their African communities was causing considerable
anxiety in colonial circles. In East Africa, tribal life has been breaking down without there being offered to the natives
any satisfactory alternative. In southern and central Africa, the Bantu who have become dissatisfied with tribal life can
go into industrial work in the cities or into the mines. There is no such outlet in East Africa and some observers feared
that the stress of postwar readjustments might jeopardize the functioning of indirect rule. In a few cases native Africans
had been able to utilize their war experience to learn trades and to aspire to becoming artisans and shopkeepers
aspirations which caused much anxiety among the Indian population who had hitherto largely monopolized these
occupations.
Kenya.
In Kenya, a scheme for decentralizing the administration was published during the summer, and met with an
acceptance "in principle" from the Legislative Council of that colony. However, the Indians opposed it as being
inadequate, and both the natives and Arabs expressed disappointment at not being given larger representations. The
scheme did not alter fundamentally the set-up under which Kenya has been controlled by its very small European
minority.
Uganda.
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Early in 1945 there were riots and a general strike in Uganda, which were put down with speed and energy by the
British authorities. On September 5, "Prime Minister" Martin Luther Nsibirwa of the Buganda Kingdom was
assassinated just outside the Cathedral at Kampala. On October 2, Sir John Hathorn Hall, the Governor of Uganda,
swore in three regents who were to serve while the young Kabaka (king) was studying in Cambridge. He took this
occasion to say that the assassination of the Prime Minister had cast a slur on all Buganda since it was not just the
work of one man but of a number of traitors and self-seekers. Later in the month the Colonial Office announced a new
departure by appointing three native Africans to the Protectorate Legislative Council for Uganda.
For a number of years many of the European inhabitants of East Africa have been desirous of political amalgamation
or the "closer union" of Kenya, Uganda and Tanganyika. They were therefore disappointed when Major-General
Sir Philip Mitchell, Governor of Kenya, declared on November 6 that his recent discussions in London had not included
this suggestion and that he did not believe it could be considered "practical politics today." He also reported that there
were many applications from members of the British armed forces who wished to settle in Kenya, and that the London
authorities had recently approved the admission of an additional 500 new farmers to the Kenya highlands.
Central Africa.
Central African Council.
In British Central Africa, progress towards amalgamation was made early in April when the Colonial Office announced
the creation of a Standing Central African Council. The chairman of this body was to be the Governor of Southern
Rhodesia, with the Governors of Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland and the Prime Minister of Southern Rhodesia
serving as ex-officio members. In addition, the three latter officials were to appoint three members each to serve twoyear terms. The first meeting of this Council took place at Salisbury on April 24. The Chairman, Sir Campbell Tait,
asserted that, while the government of Southern Rhodesia favored the amalgamation of the three territories, the
authorities in London believed that such a step was not practicable for the moment. The Council, he added, should not
be regarded as the halfway house to amalgamation, though it could provide a foundation on which the fullest
cooperation between the three territories could later be built.
Southern Rhodesia.
In Southern Rhodesia, the gold mining industry reported that its production was handicapped by high taxes and labor
scarcity. In April, Mr. Danziger, the Minister of Finance, announced that the gold premium tax would be lifted in order to
help the industry mine lower grade ore. The authorities at Salisbury also expressed concern at the attempt by the
United States to persuade Britain to reduce the imperial preference on tobacco, since this product stood second in
value among Southern Rhodesia's exports. Otherwise the picture for the colony's agriculture and stock-raising was
bright. Earlier in the summer, a commission which had been appointed in April, 1944, to investigate native affairs,
reported that it had found a widespread lack of leadership among the natives. It therefore suggested measures for
bolstering the authority and prestige of the chiefs and thus curbing "indiscipline."
Northern Rhodesia.
In Northern Rhodesia, the first session of the Legislative Council, with an unofficial majority, met during the summer.
On at least one occasion this majority defeated a government proposal concerning war pensions by a vote of 12 to 8.
Even so, representatives of the small European population in the colony expressed disappointment at not being
accorded greater self-government. One member even urged that Northern Rhodesia have a representative in the
House of Commons in London, comparable to the colonial representation in the French Parliament at Paris.
Nyasaland.
In Nyasaland, an African Provincial Council was set up in each of the two provinces composed of chiefs and other
responsible African members. Its function was to facilitate consultation by the colonial authorities and to give
expression to African opinion. A grant of 345,000 under the Colonial Development and Welfare Act was made in order
to provide for a five-year plan of educational expansion in the colony. Other local funds were also set aside for the
social and economic development of the native population. The July report of the British Central Africa Company
showed that the colony's tobacco, tea, soybean and sisal crops were all becoming increasingly productive.
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43

SEEDS OF GLOBALIZATION
The term "globalization" refers to the increasing interconnectedness of nations and peoples around the world through
trade, investment, travel, popular culture, and other forms of interaction. Many historians have identified globalization
as a 20th-century phenomenon connected to the rise of the Western-dominated international economy. However,
extensive interaction between widespread peoples, as well as travel over vast distances across regions of the world,
has existed for many centuries. By 1000, the seeds of globalization had already taken root in the eastern hemisphere,
particularly in the lands bordering the Indian Ocean and South China Sea. These were the most dynamic regions in
the world at that time, and their interactions were extensive.
To understand how globalization first took root between 1000 and 1500, one must focus on contact between distant
peoples in Asia, especially contact carried on through long-distance trade. Interregional trade has been a major force
throughout world history because it fosters other forms of exchange, including the spread of religions, cultures, and
technologies. For many centuries, the most outstanding example of overland interaction was the Silk Road, a trade
route through Central Asia. Maritime trade flourished as well; the Indian Ocean became the heart of the most
extensive seagoing trade network in the premodern world. Islamic merchants dominated this network, spreading their
religion far and wide. Islamic expansion established a huge cultural region that stretched across the entire eastern
hemisphere.
Trading ports such as Melaka in Malaya became vibrant, globalized centers of international commerce and culture.
Chinese ships would later follow this trading network in undertaking the greatest oceanic explorations in world history
to that point. This exploration confirmed the crucial role played by this Afro-Eurasian maritime commerce and the
dynamism of some Asian civilizations. The exchanges across Asia at this time, including the spread of Islam, were
significant enough that we can speak of a globalized economy and culture.
Trade and Interregional Contact
One characteristic of globalization in the modern age has been expanding commerce between countries around the
world. The roots of this phenomenon reach far back in history. Long-distance trade routes grew out of the
transportation systems that developed out of the need to move resources by land and sea. In turn, trade and
expansion led to increased contact between different civilizations and societies. This contact enabled Indian influence,
including that of Buddhism, to spread over the land and sea trading routes into Central Asia, Tibet, China, Japan, and
Southeast Asia between 200 BC and AD 1500.
From around 200 BC to around AD 1000, the most significant example of interaction and long-distance trade was the
Silk Road, which stretched across central and southwest Asia, linking China to India, western Asia, and the
Mediterranean. Along the Silk Road, goods, people, and ideas traveled thousands of miles between China, India, and
Europe. Silk, porcelain, and bamboo from China were carried west across the deserts, mountains, and grasslands to
Baghdad and the eastern Mediterranean ports, and then shipped by sea to Rome.
The maritime system established on the Indian Ocean grew more important between 1000 and 1500, eventually
surpassing overland trade. The oceanic routes between Southeast Asia and the Middle East greatly expanded.
Traders from Arabia, Persia, and India visited the East African coast, and many Asians and Africans enjoyed a long
period of lucrative and relatively free seagoing trade.
The Silk Road and the Mongol Empire
Between 1250 and 1350, the Mongols established and controlled the largest land empire in world history. This empire
stretched from Korea to Vienna, placing a huge bloc of the world's population under Mongol control. The Mongols
brutally conquered Siberia, Tibet, Korea, Russia, much of Eastern Europe, Afghanistan, Persia, Turkey, and parts of
Arab civilization in the Middle East. Western Europeans were too remote and underdeveloped to give reason for
conquest and thus did not suffer the ravages experienced by other peoples. In 1279, China, a more formidable foe and
tempting prize than Western Europe, was added to the Mongol-ruled realm.
One cannot underestimate the importance of the Mongol era to world history or its role in establishing an early form of
globalization. In the 20th century, globalization enabled Western technology to reach other parts of the world. Some
historians consider the Mongols the great equalizers of history because during their rule, they permitted the transfer of
technology from the more developed East Asia to the more backward Western Europe. They did this by reopening and
protecting the Silk Road, however briefly. During the Mongol era, Chinese inventions such as gunpowder, printing, the
blast furnace, silk machinery, paper money, and playing cards found their way to Europe, as did many medical
discoveries and such domesticated fruits as the orange and lemon. The Mongols paved the way for greater global
communication, opening China's doors to the world. One Chinese monk, a Nestorian Christian, became the first
eastern Asian visitor to Rome, England, and France. In addition, some Chinese people settled in Persia, Iraq, and
Russia. This movement was possible because travel from one end of Eurasia to the other was easier than ever before.
44

Furthermore, the Mongols unwittingly set in motion changes that would later allow Europe to catch up with and
eventually surpass China. Some of these changes were based on European improvement of such Chinese inventions
as printing, gunpowder, the stern-post rudder, and the magnetic compass. For example, in about 1050, the Chinese
invented movable type. The Europeans later developed a better technology, and in the 1450s Johannes Gutenberg
used movable type to produce multiple printings of the Bible. Likewise, the Chinese invented the first flamethrower. By
the 13th century the flamethrower had evolved into a primitive gunone major reason the Mongols took so much
longer to conquer China than other civilizations. As these weapons were transported to Europe during the Mongol Era,
and then improved, late medieval European warfare became far deadlier than it had been before.
Today's globalized world has been characterized by a brain drain, or exodus of talented people from various continents
to Europe and North America. The world in the 14th century witnessed the same phenomenon; however, the flow
moved the other way, from west to east. In China, the Mongol administration relied on a large number of foreigners
who came to serve in what was effectively an international civil service. These included many Muslims from West and
Central Asia as well as a few Europeans who found themselves drawn to the fabled Cathay, as they called it. One
such person was the Italian traveler and author, Marco Polo. Polo claimed to have spent seventeen years in China,
mostly in government service. Eventually he returned home to tell unbelieving Europeans of the wonders he
encountered or heard about from other travelers. Polos reports seemed incredible because at that time China was
well ahead of other Eurasian civilizations in many fields.
For these reasons, the Mongol Empire was one of the most important land empires in history. Yet in spite of the
success of Mongol civilization during the 1200s, their empire would prove short-lived. Unlike other empires, the
Mongols never took advantage of the maritime commerce developing at the time.
The Globalization of Islam and the Indian Ocean Maritime Trade System
Between the 8th and 15th centuries, Islam ventured out of its Arabian heartland in the Middle East to become the
dominant religion in many parts of Africa and Asia and in Iberia. Muslim groups emerged in such different and
geographically distant locations as China and the Balkans. In the process, an interlinked Islamic world called dar alIslam (the Abode of Islam) emerged, a world that was joined by both a common faith and trade connections. The dar
al-Islam stretched from Morocco to Indonesia.
This global Islamization spread Arab names, words, alphabet, architecture, social attitudes, and cultural values to
peoples around the world. The great 14th-century Moroccan traveler Ibn Batttah spent decades touring the extensive
dar al-Islam. He traveled from Mali in Africa and Spain in the west to Southeast Asia and the coastal ports of China in
the east. Whereas the Christian Marco Polo was always a stranger in his travels, everywhere Ibn Batttah went, he
encountered people who shared his general worldview and social values.
Muslim-dominated trade routes, which ultimately reached from the Sahara to Spain to the South China Sea, fostered
travel. The key to their success was a more complex and increasingly integrated maritime trade throughout the Indian
Ocean. This trade network linked China, Japan, Vietnam, and Cambodia in the east through Malaya and the
Indonesian archipelago. From there it crossed into India and Sri Lanka, and then moved westward to Persia, Arabia,
the East African coast as far south as Mozambique, and the eastern Mediterranean, finally connecting to Venice and
Genoa.
The Strait of Hormuz on the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Melaka in Southeast Asia were the major pillars of what
became the most important mercantile system of the premodern world. It was through this mercantile system that the
spices of Indonesia and East Africa; the gold and tin of Malaya; the batik and carpets of Java; the textiles of India; the
gold of Zimbabwe; and the silks, porcelain, and tea of China made their way to distant markets. When many of these
products reached Europe, people there yearned to find their sources in the East, sparking the European age of
exploration. Maritime trade flourished, especially in the 14th century after the Mongol empire ended and the spread of
the Black Death, the bubonic plague, throughout Eurasia disrupted overland trade. The maritime network reached its
height in the 1400s and 1500s, when Muslim political power was reduced but its economic and cultural power
remained strong.
Islam and the Rise of Melaka
Various states around the Indian Ocean and South China Sea were closely linked to maritime trade. For example, East
African city-states such as Mombasa and Kilwa, with their mixed African-Arab Swahili culture, thrived for many
centuries. Merchants in India, including many Jews and Arabs, maintained close ties to Western Asia, North and East
Africa, Southeast Asia and China. No political power was dominant along the maritime trading route. Its vigor
depended on cosmopolitan port cities such as Hormuz on the Persian coast, Cambay in northwest India, Calicut on
India's southwest coast, and Melaka near the southern tip of Malaya. Of all the cities, historians probably know the
most about Melaka, and this city well illustrates premodern patterns of globalization. Southeast Asia had long been a
cosmopolitan region where peoples, ideas, and products met. Some rulers of coastal states in the Malay Peninsula
and Indonesian archipelago, anxious to attract the Muslim traders who dominated interregional maritime commerce
and attracted by the universality of Islam, adopted the faith.
45

The arrival of Islam in Southeast Asia coincided with the rise of Melaka, which became the region's political and
economic power. Melaka became the main base for the expansion of Islam in the archipelago, as well as the last stop
on the eastern end of the Indian Ocean trading network. Melaka's pivotal role in world trade was confirmed by an early
16th-century Portuguese visitor, who wrote that it had "no equal in the world" and proclaimed its importance to peoples
and trade patterns as far away as Western Europe. "Melaka is a city that was made for merchandise, fitter than any
other in the world he wrote. Commerce between different nations for a thousand leagues on every hand must
come to Melaka. Whoever is lord of Melaka has his hands on the throat of Venice."
During the 1400s, Melaka was a flourishing trading port attracting merchants from many lands in Asia and Africa. More
ships dropped anchor in Melakas harbor than in any other port in the world; seagoing merchants were attracted by its
stable government and free trade policy. Among Melaka's population of 100,000 to 200,000 people were about 15,000
foreign traders, among them Arabs, Egyptians, Persians, Turks, Jews, Armenians, Ethiopians, East Africans, Burmese,
Vietnamese, Javanese, Filipinos, Chinese, Japanese, and Indians from all over the subcontinent. On the city's streets,
some 84 languages were spoken.
Melaka had a special connection to the Gujerati port of Cambay, which was nearly 3,000 miles away, because
merchants from Gujerat in northwest India were Melakas most influential foreign community. Every year trading ships
from around the Middle East and South Asia would gather at Cambay and Calicut to make the long voyage to Melaka.
The ships carried grain, woolens, arms, copperware, textiles, and opium for exchange. Melaka had become one of the
major trading cities in the world, a multiethnic center of globalized culture and commerce, much like New York, Los
Angeles, or Hong Kong are today.
Ming China and the World
The extent of globalization by the early 15th century is suggested by the great Chinese voyages of discovery. The
emperor of the Ming dynasty, Yonglo (or Yung-lo), dispatched a series of grand maritime expeditions to southern Asia
and beyond, expeditions that were the greatest the world had ever seen. Admiral Zheng He (or Cheng Ho), a Muslim
whose father had visited Arabia, commanded seven voyages between 1405 and 1433. These voyages were huge
undertakings, with the largest fleet including 62 vessels carrying nearly 28,000 men. (By contrast, a few decades later,
Christopher Columbus would sail forth from Spain in three small vessels crewed by a hundred men.) The massive
Chinese junks were far superior to any other ships of the time. In fact, the world had never before seen such a largescale feat of seamanship.
During these extraordinary voyages, ships carrying the Chinese flag followed the maritime trade routes through
Southeast Asia to India, the Persian Gulf and Red Sea, Arabia, and down the East African coast as far as Kilwa in
Tanzania. Melaka became their southern base, and Melakas rulers made occasional trips to China to cement the
alliance. Had the Chinese ships continued, they would have had the capability of sailing around Africa to Europe;
however, Europe offered few products the Chinese valued. The Chinese expeditions expressed the exuberance of an
era of great vitality. Although the Chinese traveled mostly in peace and fought only a few military actions, some 36
countries, including a few in western Asia, acknowledged allegiance to China. In this period, China was the greatest
power in a globalizing hemisphere.
Historians still debate the reasons for Zheng He's great voyages. Some see diplomacy as the primary goal, with the
recognition by so many foreign countries reaffirming the emperor's position. Others point to commercial motives, since
the voyages came at the time Chinese merchants were becoming more active in Southeast Asia. In the early Ming
period, China remained the most advanced civilization in the world. Commercially vibrant and outward-looking, Ming
China could have opened greater communication between the continents and become the dominant world power well
beyond eastern Asia. However, it never did. The grand voyages to the west and the commercial thrust in Southeast
Asia came to a sudden halt when the Ming emperor ordered a return to isolationism and recalled all Chinese people
living outside the empire.
How can we account for this stunning reversal that, in the perspective of later history, seemed so counterproductive?
Perhaps the voyages were too expensive even for the wealthy Ming government. The voyages were not cost-effective
because the ships returned chiefly with exotic goods, such as African giraffes for the imperial zoo, rather than mineral
resources and other valuable items. It seems that the full possibilities of globalization were not apparent to Chinese
leaders. Furthermore, in the Chinese social system, merchants lacked status. And unlike Christian Europe, China had
little interest in spreading its religion and culture. The Mongols were regrouping in Central Asia, and the Ming court
was forced to shift its resources to defend the northern borders. As a result, the oceans were left open to the Western
Europeans, who improved upon Chinese and Arab naval and military technology and soon challenged Arabs, Indians,
and Southeast Asians for supremacy in the Indian Ocean trading system.
The End of the First Globalized System
By the end of the 1400s, the reputation of such cities as Melaka, Canton, Calicut, and Hormuz as treasure troves of
Asian luxuries had reached Europe. Anxious to gain direct access to Asian trade, the Portuguese finally made their
way to India in 1498 and Melaka in 1509, inaugurating a new era of European activity in Asian history. Indeed, the
46

Portuguese seized Melaka in 1511. Despite Portugals superiority in ships and weaponry, its standard of living was
probably inferior to that of people in the more developed societies of Asia. This no doubt contributed to the tendency of
Europeans to use armed force to obtain their commercial and political goals. This tendency ensured that the
globalization of the world over the next five centuries would be under the auspices of Western Christians rather than
the Muslims, Indians, and Chinese who established the basic framework between 1000 and 1500.
About the author: Craig Lockard is the Ben and Joyce Rosenberg Professor of History in the Department of Social
Change and Development at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay. He is the author of "Dance of Life": Popular
Music and Politics in Modern Southeast Asia.
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47

NUCLEAR WEAPONS PROLIFERATION

I -INTRODUCTION
Nuclear Weapons Proliferation, the spread of nuclear weapons to countries or terrorist organizations that formerly did
not possess them. Many observers believe that the problem of nuclear weapons proliferation is likely to be one of the
most important issues facing the United States and the world for many years to come. The 1968 Treaty on the NonProliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) attempted to address the problem, but the number of countries possessing
nuclear weapons has grown since the treaty went into effect.
II -WHO POSSESSES NUCLEAR WEAPONS?
Nuclear weapons were first developed by the United States during World War II (1939-1945) as a result of a massive,
secret program known as the Manhattan Project. The United States tested the first nuclear weapon in July 1945 at
Alamogordo in the New Mexico desert, and then used two nuclear weapons against the Japanese cities of Hiroshima
(August 6, 1945) and Nagasaki (August 9, 1945). These are the only times nuclear explosives have been used as a
weapon, although there have been more than 2,000 nuclear weapon tests and more than 100 experiments using
nuclear explosives for peaceful purposes, such as excavation.
Today, the United States and seven other countries have openly declared that they possess nuclear weapons and
have conducted one or more nuclear test explosions to demonstrate this capability. The countries and the dates of
their first nuclear test are: Russia (first test conducted by the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, 1949); Britain
(1952); France (1960); China (1964); India (peaceful nuclear explosion, 1974; nuclear weapons test, 1998); Pakistan
(1998); and North Korea (2006). Israel is generally believed to possess nuclear weapons, although it has not
acknowledged this and is not known to have conducted a nuclear test. Including Israel, the total number of countries
generally recognized as possessing nuclear weapons is nine.
A tenth country, South Africa, has also admitted that it developed a small arsenal of nuclear weapons (first weapon
completed, 1977), but it dismantled this arsenal in the early 1990s. When the Soviet Union broke apart in 1991, 3 of
the 15 newly independent countries, in addition to Russia, had nuclear weapons on their territory. By the mid-1990s,
the three countriesBelarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukrainehad transferred all of these nuclear weapons to Russia.
Virtually all countries of the worldother than the nine nations believed to possess nuclear weapons todayhave
formally pledged not to manufacture them. This pledge was made under the 1968 Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of
Nuclear Weapons (NPT), which entered into force in 1970. The treaty has been ratified by 187 nonnuclear weapon
states. Many nations have expressed concern, however, that one such party to the treaty, Iran, may be actively
seeking to develop such weapons.
No terrorist organizations possess nuclear weapons. Al-Qaeda is known to desire them, however, and a Japanese
cult, the Aum Shinrikyo, began an effort to develop them in the late 1980s, but was unsuccessful.
III -HOW ARE NUCLEAR WEAPONS MADE?
The nuclear weapons that the United States developed through the Manhattan Project are known as atomic or
fission weapons because they obtain their energy from the splitting (or fissioning) of certain highly unstable atoms.
Two materials have been used as the core of fission weapons: highly enriched uranium and plutonium. Highly
enriched uranium is uranium in which one type of unstable uranium atom, an isotope known as uranium 235 or U-235,
has been artificially concentrated. In naturally occurring uranium, U-235 makes up only 0.7 percent of a typical
uranium sample, but in fission weapons U-235 is concentrated to much higher levels. Concentrations of more than 90
percent U-235 are considered best for fission weapons, but lower concentrations can also be used. The IAEA and
virtually all countries, including the United States, treat uranium enriched to more than 20 percent U-235 as potentially
usable for weapons. Material enriched above this level is known as highly enriched uranium and is protected by
special security measures. The process of increasing the concentration of U-235 is performed in a facility known as a
uranium enrichment plant.
Irradiating uranium fuel in a nuclear reactor produces plutonium. During the reactors operation some uranium atoms
absorb an atomic particle known as a neutron, ultimately creating a new element, plutonium. Roughly 1 percent of
uranium atoms are transformed into plutonium by this means. The irradiated uranium material is then removed from
the reactor in the form of spent fuel rods, and chemical processes extract the plutonium from them in a facility known
as a reprocessing plant.
To cause a nuclear explosion, the highly enriched uranium or plutonium must be compressed by means of
conventional high explosives. The compression causes the nuclear materials to become more dense so as to achieve
a supercritical mass that leads to an uncontrolled chain reaction. A nuclear explosion is an uncontrolled chain reaction,
whereas the energy generated by a nuclear power plant is a controlled chain reaction. Highly enriched uranium can be
detonated by means of a relatively simple, gun-type device, in which one quantity of highly enriched uranium is fired
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into another within a gun-barrel-like cylinder, thereby achieving the necessary supercritical mass. Plutonium must be
compressed much more rapidly than highly enriched uranium, however, because plutonium spontaneously emits
neutrons that can interfere with the chain reaction that produces the explosion. To detonate plutonium, a much more
complicated implosion-type design is required, in which a hollow plutonium sphere is crushed inward with great
precision by a series of shaped, high-explosive charges, known as lenses, that surround the plutonium and are
detonated at exactly the same moment.
During the Manhattan Project, the United States simultaneously pursued several means for enriching uranium and
also produced plutonium. The Manhattan Project scientists had such confidence in the gun-type design that the highly
enriched uranium bomb was not tested before it was used against Hiroshima. The scientists were less sure about the
more complex implosion design for the Nagasaki bomb, however, and this was the design tested at Alamogordo.
Today, nuclear weapons inspectors with the IAEA assume that 25 kg (55 lb) of highly enriched uranium or 8 kg (18 lb)
of plutonium would be sufficient to manufacture a nuclear weapon. However, depending on the design of the weapon,
considerably less could be used. According to some estimates, it is theoretically possible to develop a nuclear weapon
with less than 8 kg of plutonium.
In the late 1940s the United States began to develop a far more potent type of nuclear armament, known as
thermonuclear weapons, or the hydrogen bomb. These bombs use small fission weapons to create extreme
conditions that cause certain types of hydrogen atoms (deuterium and tritium) to fuse together, releasing vast
quantities of explosive energy. Some thermonuclear weapons release the equivalent of millions of tons of TNT.
Only five of the states possessing nuclear weapons are known to have developed thermonuclear arms: the United
States (first test 1952), Russia (1953), Britain (1957), China (1967), and France (1968). Developing these weapons
requires extensive nuclear test detonations. The other, more recent nuclear states have conducted very few (and in
some cases no) nuclear tests to avoid calling attention to their nuclear weapon programs, which are often the subject
of international criticism. This has slowed their development of thermonuclear weapons.
IV -HOW EASY IS IT TO MAKE THE BOMB?
The most difficult challenge for a country that seeks to build nuclear weapons is obtaining the necessary highly
enriched uranium or plutonium. In addition to access to uranium supplies, this requires considerable industrial and
scientific capabilities. Even less developed countries, however, such as China, India, North Korea, and Pakistan, have
succeeded by concentrating their resources on this effort and, in most cases, by obtaining help from governments or
individuals in more advanced countries. For example, Chinas nuclear weapon program benefited from early
assistance provided by the Soviet Union. Indias program took advantage of Canadian and U.S. assistance provided
for peaceful nuclear research, and Pakistans program relied on assistance from China, along with technology and
equipment secretly obtained from Western European supplier companies. Without such assistance, nuclear weapon
programs in these states would have been greatly delayed and might not have succeeded.
A -Enriched Uranium Bombs
Uranium can be enriched using several techniques. The United States nuclear weapons program has relied on the
gaseous diffusion method, invented during the Manhattan Project, in which uranium is transformed into a gas (uranium
hexafluoride) and pumped through membranes that permit U-235 atoms to pass through slightly more often than other
uranium atoms. By repeating this process through many cycles, concentrations of U-235 can be increased to the level
needed for nuclear weapons. Britain, France, and China also have relied exclusively on the gaseous diffusion method
to produce highly enriched uranium for nuclear weapons. The Soviet Union did so for many years before shifting to the
gas centrifuge method.
The gaseous diffusion method uses great quantities of energy. Indeed, during the Manhattan Project, the United
States built a hydroelectric dam, under the Tennessee Valley Authority, solely to power the gaseous diffusion
enrichment facility at Oak Ridge, Tennessee. A country seeking to develop nuclear weapons secretly would find it
difficult to do so using this method today because the energy requirements would be nearly impossible to hide.
Uranium enrichment using high-speed gas centrifuges is far more efficient than gaseous diffusion. In the gas
centrifuge process, uranium is also first converted to gaseous uranium hexafluoride. It is then introduced into the
centrifugesrapidly spinning vertical cylinderswhere it is swirled at great speed. Under the centrifugal forces
created, the bulk of uranium atoms, which are heavier than U-235 atoms, move toward the outside of the centrifuge,
allowing product slightly concentrated in U-235 to remain at the center and be drawn off. By linking the gas centrifuges
together in what is known as a cascade, this process is then repeated until weapons-usable material is created.
Pakistan relies on this method of enrichment for producing highly enriched uranium for nuclear weapons. It is also
used in India and, possibly, North Korea. Iran has also built a centrifuge uranium enrichment facility, which it states is
intended for its peaceful nuclear energy program.
Other enrichment techniques are the jet nozzle process, used by South Africa, and the electromagnetic isotope
separation process, which Iraq used in its unsuccessful effort to enrich uranium before the 1991 Persian Gulf War.
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Lasers can also be used to enrich uranium, although to date no country is known to have employed this method for the
development of nuclear weapons. In this method, known as laser isotope separation, uranium is transformed into a
metal, vaporized, and then targeted with specialized lasers that excite U-235 atoms differently from other uranium
atoms, permitting a concentrated product to be collected. The process is considered very difficult technically, but it can
be conducted in small-scale facilities that can evade detection by the IAEA or foreign intelligence agencies. In 2004
South Korea acknowledged that in 2000 it had conducted secret laser enrichment experiments, creating a tiny amount
of very highly enriched uranium. Because it is very hard to detect and can be extremely efficient, the laser enrichment
method could pose a significant proliferation risk in the future.
B -Plutonium Bombs
The technology to produce plutonium is technically simpler than that needed to enrich uranium. Nonetheless,
plutonium production requires the construction of a series of expensive and relatively complex facilities, including a
nuclear research, nuclear power, or plutonium-production reactor; a plant for the manufacture of uranium fuel or
targets; and a reprocessing plant. The United States, the Soviet Union (now Russia), Britain, France, and China all
produced plutonium for their nuclear weapons programs, in addition to highly enriched uranium. Plutonium is the
principal nuclear weapon material used in the Indian, North Korean, and presumed Israeli nuclear weapon programs.
Pakistan is also believed to produce plutonium for nuclear weapons.
Because reactors and reprocessing plants, as well as large-scale enrichment plants, are difficult to hide, they may be
discovered by other countries, which may attempt to halt their completion by diplomatic pressure or by military attack.
In 1981 Israel launched a surprise air strike that destroyed an Iraqi reactor, which Israel feared would be used for
plutonium production.
Nonmilitary programs for producing electricity using nuclear power reactors may also employ uranium enrichment and
reprocessing. Most nuclear power reactors use uranium fuel that has been enriched to 3 to 5 percent, for example.
Today, this material is produced in commercial uranium enrichment plants in Britain, China, France, Germany, Japan,
Netherlands, Russia, and the United States. In 2006 Iran declared that its gas centrifuges had enriched uranium to
about 3.5 percent. Gas centrifuge enrichment facilities that produce low-enriched uranium for fuel can be reconfigured
to produce highly enriched uranium for weapons.
In addition, a number of countries are currently reusing, or plan to reuse, plutonium produced in nuclear power plant
fuel. This requires separating the plutonium from the spent nuclear power plant fuel in a reprocessing facility and then
mixing the plutonium with unenriched uranium to form new fuel, which is then used in a reactor instead of low-enriched
uranium. Britain, France, India, Japan, and Russia are separating plutonium from spent nuclear power plant fuel.
C -Nuclear Bomb Design
Countries seeking to produce nuclear weapons must also develop a reliable design for the weapon. With computer
simulations and extensive testing of the nonnuclear components, it is possible for a country to develop a reliable
design for a fission weapon without the need for a full-scale nuclear detonation. Some countries also benefit from
nuclear weapon design assistance provided by other nations. For example, Pakistan is believed to have received a
nuclear weapon design from China in the early 1980s. A senior Pakistani official is known to have provided a copy of
this design to Libya and, possibly, Iran and North Korea. A country may wish to forgo a full-scale nuclear test because
a test would be clear proof that it was developing nuclear weapons, which, in turn, could lead to international criticism
and diplomatic isolation. Israel has adopted this strategy of nuclear ambiguity, as did Pakistan from the late 1980s,
when it is believed to have produced its first nuclear weapons, until 1998, when it conducted its first nuclear tests.
V -WHY PREVENTS THE SPREAD OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS?
Nuclear war would have devastating consequences. Even a conflict that involved only the use of one or two fission
weapons could cause many hundreds of thousands of deaths and destroy the centers of major cities. Large-scale
nuclear war, involving the use of hundreds of thermonuclear weapons, could cause many millions of casualties,
destroy nations, and permanently affect the global environment. Although some scholars argue otherwise, virtually all
governments believe that the spread of nuclear weapons to additional states will increase the likelihood of nuclear war.
Many of the nations that possess nuclear weapons or have sought to develop them have long had regional conflicts
with each other. For example, India and Pakistan have had a serious border dispute over Kashmr, China and India
had a brief border conflict, Israel has fought several wars with neighboring nations in the Middle East, and Iran and
Iraq fought an eight-year-long war. North and South Korea, now separated by a demilitarized zone, fought against
each other in the Korean War (1950-1953). These regional conflicts and other potential conflicts provide the
fundamental reason for the international community to seek to halt the spread of nuclear weapons.
The spread of nuclear weapons can also permit aggressor nations to intimidate neighbors and dominate their regions.
Iraq under Saddam Hussein, its former president, is believed to have sought nuclear weapons for this purpose prior to
the 1991 Persian Gulf War. In addition, nuclear weapons could be used as a threat by a country seeking to advance a
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global ideological cause, such as the spread of radical Islamic fundamentalism. A growing new danger is that a
national government, or senior officials within that government, might provide nuclear weapons or the materials for
making them to terrorist organizations whose views they shared. While nations differ on the particulars of such
dangers, they generally agree that their own security is best served by curbing the further spread of nuclear arms.
Nuclear proliferation also inevitably increases the risk of accidents involving nuclear weaponsfor example, during
transportwhich could cause great devastation. This risk may be greatest in less technologically advanced countries
whose weapons may not include the built-in safety features found in the nuclear weapons of the more advanced
nuclear powers. In some countries, nuclear weapon programs can divert scarce financial and technical resources from
urgently needed development projects, a challenge that can be severely worsened for states engaged in open-ended
nuclear arms races with rivals.
V -HISTORY OF NONPROLIFERATION EFFORTS
In 1946, in an effort to prevent a nuclear arms race with the Soviet Union and avoid the spread of nuclear weapons to
other countries, the United States proposed that all materials usable for nuclear weapons be placed under
international control. The Soviet Union, which was not yet a nuclear weapons state, rejected the proposal, known as
the Baruch Plan. Fearing that growing interest in nuclear energy would lead nuclear technology to spread
uncontrollably, the United States in 1953 launched the Atoms for Peace program. Under the program, the United
States offered to share nuclear technology for peaceful purposes with friendly states. U.S. inspections would ensure
that transferred items were not diverted for nuclear weapon programs. A new organization, the International Atomic
Energy Agency (IAEA), was established in 1957 to take over the inspections. By this time, the Soviet Union had
initiated a similar program for its allies, also relying on IAEA inspections.
A -Non-Proliferation Treaty
During the 1960s, as concerns grew that nuclear weapons were continuing to proliferate and as the U.S.-Soviet
nuclear arms race accelerated, negotiations began on a global treaty to halt the further spread of nuclear weapons.
These negotiations resulted in the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). The treaty was opened
for ratification in 1968 and entered into force in 1970.The treaty establishes two classes of states: nuclear weapon
states and nonnuclear weapon states. Nuclear weapon states are those that had conducted nuclear tests before
January 1, 1967the United States, Soviet Union (now Russia), Britain, France, and China. All other countries are
nonnuclear weapon states for the purposes of the treaty.
1 -Terms of the Treaty
Under the treaty, the nuclear weapon states party to the agreement pledge not to transfer nuclear weapons or any
other nuclear explosive devices (such as possible peaceful nuclear explosives for large-scale excavations) to any
recipient or to assist, encourage, or induce any nonnuclear weapon state to manufacture nuclear weapons or any
other nuclear explosive devices. The nuclear weapon states are not required by the treaty to give up nuclear weapons.
Nonnuclear weapon states party to the treaty pledge not to manufacture or receive nuclear weapons or any other
nuclear explosive devices. To verify that they are complying with these pledges, the nonnuclear weapon states agree
to accept IAEA inspections on all of their nuclear activities, an arrangement known as full-scope safeguards. All
parties to the treaty are prohibited from exporting nuclear equipment or materials to nonnuclear weapon states unless
the exported items will be placed under IAEA inspection in the recipient country.
The treaty reaffirms the inalienable right of all parties to pursue the peaceful uses of nuclear energy consistent with
the prohibition on the development of nuclear explosives and calls on all parties to facilitate the fullest possible sharing
of nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.
The treaty states that all parties shall undertake to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to
cessation of the (U.S.-Soviet) nuclear arms race and to achieve complete and general nuclear disarmament.
Any party may withdraw from the treaty on three months notice if it decides that extraordinary events, related to the
subject matter of this Treaty, have jeopardized the supreme interests of its country.
To persuade the nonnuclear states to agree to the treaty, the nuclear states indicated that they would not use nuclear
weapons in an attack on a nonnuclear state unless the state was allied with a nuclear power. However, this pledge
was informal and not part of the treaty itself. Since then, Britain and the United States have stated that they might
respond with a nuclear attack against a nonnuclear state that used chemical or biological weapons. Some observers
believe that preventive war doctrines, such as those articulated by the administration of U.S. President George W.
Bush, may have the unintended effect of encouraging some nonnuclear states to develop nuclear weapons for selfprotection.
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2 -Treaty Limitations
The treaty currently has five nuclear weapon state members and 187 nonnuclear weapon state members. India, Israel,
and Pakistan never joined the treaty, thereby reserving the legal right to develop nuclear weapons. North Korea
became a party to the treaty in 1985 but renounced it in 2003, exercising its rights under the treatys withdrawal
provisions. North Koreas action highlighted one of the treatys important limitations.
The treatys provision affirming the right of parties to pursue the peaceful uses of nuclear energy can also be exploited
by states seeking nuclear weapons. The provision has been interpreted as permitting states to operate nuclear
reactors and the facilities needed to fuel them, including enrichment and reprocessing plants, provided they are all
placed under IAEA inspection. This arrangement could permit a country to stockpile highly enriched uranium (used in
some research reactors) or plutonium while under IAEA supervision and to then withdraw from the treaty on 90 days
notice. This would leave the country with the materials needed for nuclear weapons. Some countries have expressed
concern that Iran, a nonnuclear weapon state party to the NPT, is constructing a uranium enrichment plant with this
strategy in mind.
B -Nuclear Suppliers Group
In the early 1970s the NPT Exporters Committee was established to implement the export control provisions of the
treaty. In 1974 India conducted a nuclear explosion that it claimed was intended to demonstrate that such explosions
could be used for peaceful purposes. Indias test explosion nevertheless underscored the dangers of further
proliferation. In 1978 the principal nuclear supplier countries, including states such as France that were not then
parties to the NPT, established the Nuclear Suppliers Group to better control nuclear commerce intended for peaceful
purposes. In 2004 the group had 40 members and had gradually tightened the groups common export control rules.
C -Nunn-Lugar Program
The breakup of the Soviet Union in late 1991, which brought an end to the rigid controls of the Soviet internal security
apparatus and began a period of social and economic turmoil, introduced a major new proliferation threat. This was
the risk that portions of the massive Soviet nuclear weapons arsenal might leak to countries or terrorist organizations
seeking nuclear weapons. The Soviet nuclear legacy included tens of thousands of nuclear weapons, hundreds of tons
of highly enriched uranium and plutonium not yet incorporated into weapons, and many thousands of scientists with
expertise in the production of nuclear arms.
To address this threat, in 1991, the United States launched the Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, also known as
the Nunn-Lugar Program, after the two U.S. senators who launched the initiativeDemocrat Sam Nunn and
Republican Richard Lugar. The program, whose budget in the United States is roughly $1 billion annually and which is
being matched by similar contributions from other leading industrialized countries, provides monetary and other
assistance for Russia. This assistance is intended to help Russia improve security over nuclear weapons and nuclearweapons material, eliminate excess highly enriched uranium and plutonium, and employ former Soviet nuclear
weapon scientists in nonmilitary research activities. Assistance is also provided to other countries of the former Soviet
Union to address similar proliferation risks within their borders.
D -Proliferation Security Initiative
In 2003 the United States launched a major new effort to address the threat of nuclear smuggling, the Proliferation
Security Initiative. The initiative seeks to aggressively enforce national and international laws to seize cargoes
containing equipment and material that could be used to manufacture weapons of mass destruction equipment before
they can reach their intended destinations. More than 30 nations are now participating in this effort.
E -UN Resolution 1540 and Other Measures
In April 2004 the United Nations (UN) Security Council adopted Resolution 1540. The resolution requires UN members
to implement effective measures to secure within their borders the know-how, equipment, and materials that could be
used to make weapons of mass destruction and to adopt effective export controls. This resolution was passed
because of growing concerns about terrorist acquisition of weapons of mass destruction and the revelations that a
senior Pakistani nuclear scientist, Abdul Qadeer Khan, had sold uranium enrichment equipment to Iran, Libya, and
North Korea and a nuclear weapon design to Libya and possibly the other states.
Many other measures have helped slow proliferation. Under some military alliances, such as the U.S.-led North
Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), for example, nuclear weapon states promise to extend protection to nonnuclear
weapon states, making their development of independent nuclear arsenals unnecessary. Concerned nations can also
direct intensive diplomatic and economic pressureincluding public criticism, breaking off relations, or imposing trade
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embargoesagainst states seeking nuclear weapons. Such efforts have led some target countries to abandon these
programs. Libyas renunciation of weapons of mass destruction in 2004 was partly the result of such efforts.
VII -PROBLEMS AND ISSUES IN NONPROLIFERATION EFFORTS
A-Nuclear Smuggling
Efforts to curb nuclear proliferation face a series of major new challenges. First, the nuclear smuggling network
established by Abdul Qadeer Khan demonstrated that proliferation can be actively assisted not only by national
governments, as in the past, but also by private, nonstate persons and organizations that have access to key
knowledge and equipment. Khans sale to Libya of all the key elements needed to build a gas centrifuge uranium
enrichment plant and his sale of a proven nuclear weapon design was unprecedented. Khan appears to have
transferred most, if not all, of these to Iran and North Korea, as well.
In addition, Khans network established machining shops in Malaysia and perhaps in other locations to manufacture
key centrifuge components, making these activities extremely difficult to detect for foreign intelligence services seeking
to slow proliferation. It is not known whether elements of Khans network still survive and how many customers may
have received copies of highly sensitive documents. These nonstate actors are far less visible and can be far more
difficult to influence than nations, which can be pressured diplomatically, or threatened militarily, to change their
behavior.
UN Security Council Resolution 1540 will encourage states such as Pakistan and Malaysia to better control activities
related to weapons of mass destruction within their borders and to prevent improper exports. The effectiveness of this
new element of the nonproliferation regime remains uncertain, however.
The IAEA is also encouraging NPT nonnuclear weapon states to give the agency broader inspection authority under
an additional protocol to their basic inspection agreements with the agency. The new authority will give the agency the
right to demand access to any site in a country where the agency believes activities related to nuclear weapons
development may be taking place. This authority, if widely granted, could significantly restrict future nuclear smuggling
networks.
B -Secret Activities
A second challenge is the growing number of cases in which countries have pursued secret activities that violated the
NPT and were not detected by the IAEA. In early 2002, for example, the international community first became aware
that Iran was pursuing a major gas centrifuge uranium enrichment program, including a pilot enrichment facility, a gas
centrifuge manufacturing plant, and early construction of a large-scale enrichment plant. In 2004 Libyas secret
acquisition of uranium gas and of a portion of the equipment for a similar gas centrifuge facility was also revealed.
Similarly, in 2004, South Koreas previous experiments with laser isotope enrichment came to light.
All of these countries were parties to the NPT and were obligated to place all other nuclear materials (and facilities
using such materials) under IAEA inspection. They were also required to disclose plans for the construction of new
nuclear facilities to permit the agency to verify their design. None of these states, however, complied with these
requirements. The IAEA was unaware of this situation, and so apparently were foreign intelligence services. The
episodes raise serious questions about the effectiveness of key parts of the international nonproliferation system.
The widespread acceptance of enhanced IAEA inspections by NPT nonnuclear weapon states through the signing of
additional protocols could go far toward addressing this challenge. Since the disclosure of its uranium enrichment
program, for example, Iran has permitted the IAEA to use the new inspection techniques. This has allowed the IAEA to
uncover many new details about the previously secret program. Strict IAEA inspections in that country have been
strongly supported by the agencys member states through the IAEA Board of Governors, an essential element of
efforts to enforce IAEA rules, which may bolster the agency in future cases. In late 2004, as the result of information
uncovered by IAEA inspectors and strong international pressure, Iran agreed to freeze its uranium enrichment
program, under an agreement with the European Union (EU), negotiated by Britain, France, and Germany.
In February 2006, however, Iran announced that it was resuming its uranium enrichment program. In March the United
Nations Security Council issued a statement demanding that Iran cease its program. In April Iranian president
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad declared that by using a cascade of 164 linked gas centrifuges Iran had succeeded in
enriching uranium to about 3.5 percent, which is suitable only for use as nuclear reactor fuel. The IAEA subsequently
confirmed this achievement and said Iran was in violation of the Security Councils demand to cease uranium
enrichment. Ahmadinejad also boasted that Iran had developed a more advanced type of gas centrifuge, known as the
P-2, which is capable of enriching uranium much more quickly. The IAEA said Iran had refused to provide details about
the program, which the IAEA needs to inspect effectively. Iran continued to declare its support for the NPT, but many
proliferation experts and officials in other countries worried that Iran might have a secret nuclear weapons program.
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Nonproliferation may also be facing a more basic challenge: Some states may believe that they need nuclear weapons
to protect themselves against bullying or military intervention by more powerful states. North Korea has justified its
development of nuclear arms as a deterrent against U.S. aggression. Iran, similarly, may be developing the option to
manufacture nuclear weapons out of concern that, without them, it would be vulnerable to U.S. intervention, as Iraq
was.
The United States has attempted to address such concerns. In the case of North Korea, the United States has held
discussions on a package of arrangements that might include a nonaggression agreement, diplomatic recognition, and
economic assistance. The package would be provided in return for North Koreas giving up its nuclear weapons
program under strict verification. In the case of Iran, the United States has emphasized that it seeks a diplomatic
solution to limiting Irans uranium enrichment program. Iran has emphasized that its nuclear program is exclusively for
peaceful purposes and appears reluctant to withdraw from the NPT. This is an indication that the norm of
nonproliferation remains a powerful influence internationally.
C -Nuclear Lobbies
Another challenge to nonproliferation comes from individual scientists and nuclear-related organizations within
individual countries that are strong champions of nuclear weapons development. Pressure by such groups is believed,
for example, to have led India to conduct a series of nuclear tests in 1998, reversing the countrys no-nuclear-test
policy of 24 years. In states with existing nuclear arsenals, the desire to sustain budgets and influence can lead
organizations to oppose arms reduction initiatives. Advocates of nuclear exports in some states can also lead to
governmental decisions that some argue promote proliferation, such as Russias decision to help Iran build a nuclear
power plant at Bshehr.
In most nations, however, advocates of policies of nuclear restraint counter these pressures. In Libya, for example,
those promoting the countrys secret uranium enrichment program were overruled by others who believed it was wiser
for the country to renounce weapons of mass destruction and become accepted as a valued member of the
international community. Initiatives by outside countries to curb proliferation can take advantage of these different
perspectives within nations, by emphasizing the advantages such nations will enjoy by remaining non-nuclear weapon
statesand the penalties they may suffer if they pursue nuclear arms.
D -The Terrorist Threat
Among the most dangerous proliferation challenges is the threat that a terrorist organization might acquire a nuclear
weapon or the highly enriched uranium or plutonium that would allow it to manufacture one. Given the unrestrained
injury some terrorist groups seek to inflict upon their enemies and their disregard for their own survival, it must be
feared that a group, such as al-Qaeda, would use a nuclear weapon, causing catastrophic harm. Preventing this
outcome requires rapid completion of efforts to secure nuclear weapons and nuclear weapons materials worldwide,
particularly in Russia, through cooperative threat reduction programs.
VIII -DISARMAMENT
Nuclear disarmament appears a very distant and, possibly, unachievable, prospect. Nonetheless, at least one country,
South Africa, has taken this step, Libya has chosen to end its pursuit of weapons of mass destruction, and Iran insists
that, although it will pursue its uranium enrichment program, it will not develop nuclear arms. Negotiations with North
Korea may ultimately result in the elimination of its nuclear weapons. Thus, despite current challenges, international
nonproliferation efforts have accomplished much, even if the record is far from perfect.
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ARMS CONTROL
I -INTRODUCTION
Arms Control, attempts through treaties, proclamations, convention, and tacit agreement to limit the destructiveness of
war by controlling the acquisition and use of weapons and military technology.
Historically, warfare appears to be an integral part of human affairs. In 3,000 years of recorded history, most
historiansbelieve that not a single year has been free of armed conflict. Yet people have always recognized the folly,
waste, and inhumanity of warfare and have continually attempted to limit its devastation and the spread of increasingly
destructive weapons.
II - HISTORY
One of the earliest formal attempts to limit the scope of war was organized by the Amphictyonic League, a quasireligious alliance of most of the Greek tribes, formed before the 7th century BC. League members were pledged to
restrain their actions in war against other members. For example, they were barred from cutting a besieged city's
water supply. The league was empowered to impose sanctions on violating members, including fines and punitive
expeditions, and could require its members to provide troops and funds for this purpose.
A -The Middle Ages
Because arms technology remained nearly static from the 3rd century BC to the Middle Ages, few attempts were made
to control the spread of new weapons. In feudal societies, such as those of medieval Europe or Japan, laws and
customs developed to keep weapons a monopoly of the military classes and to suppress arms that might democratize
warfare. These customs tended to disappear as soon as some power saw a decisive advantage in the use of a new
weapon. In medieval Europe the Roman Catholic Church attempted to use its power as a supranational organization
to limit both new weapons and the intensity of warfare. The Peace of God, instituted in 990, protected church-owned
property, defenseless noncombatants, and the agrarian base of the economy from the ravages of war. In 1139 the
Second Lateran Council prohibited the use of the crossbow against Christians, although not against those the church
considered infidels.
B -Early Modern Period
Firearms widened the scope of war and increased the potential for violence, culminating in the devastation of central
Europe in the Thirty Years' War (1618-1648). Widespread revulsion against the horrors of that conflict led to attempts
in many countries to lessen the brutality of warfare by limiting combat to recognized armed forces, by formulating
conventions for the humane treatment of prisoners and wounded, and by organizing logistics to end supply by pillage.
These rules prevailed throughout the 18th century, making war a relatively limited and civilized game of kings. Many
utopian plans for the total abolition of war were also formulated during this period by men such as French philosopher
Jean Jacques Rousseau and Charles Castel, Abb de Saint Pierre. Frederick the Great, king of Prussia, commented
that all these plans needed to succeed was the cooperation of all the kings of Europe. The rise of mass armies during
the American Revolution (1775-1783) and Napoleonic Wars (1799-1815) again enlarged the size and devastation of
war; yet throughout that period no attempts were made to reduce or limit national arsenals other than those imposed
by the victors upon the defeated. The one exception was the Rush-Bagot Treaty (1817), under which Britain and the
United States reduced, equalized, and eventually eliminated their naval forces on the Great Lakes.
C -The Hague Conferences
In the 19th century the manufacturing capabilities created by the Industrial Revolution were applied to the production
of war matriel. Technological innovation led to the development of rifled artillery, breech-loading rifles, machine guns,
and other weapons that revolutionized warfare. The resources of entire nations could now be turned to war, making
possible conflicts of unprecedented scale and destructiveness. Although many government leaders saw the arms
buildup in Europe as potentially disastrous, nothing was done to reduce armaments until the First Hague Disarmament
Conference of 1899.
The First Hague Conference was convened at the initiative of Nicholas II of Russia to control arms development and
improve the conditions of warfare. Twenty-six nations attended the conference, which codified the laws and customs of
land warfare, defined the status of belligerents, and drafted regulations on the treatment of prisoners, the wounded,
and neutrals. It also banned aerial bombardment (by balloons), dumdum (expansion) bullets, and the use of poison
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gas. Most important, it established the Permanent Court of Arbitration to arbitrate international disputes (although this
court had no enforcement powers).
The Second Hague Disarmament Conference of 1907 was marked more by discord than discourse, a sign of the
deteriorating world situation. It did further the cause of mediation and arbitration of disputes by establishing additional
courts to arbitrate cases involving ships' cargoes seized during war and resolution of international debts. A Third
Hague Conference was scheduled for 1915. Ironically, World War I (1914-1918) caused its abandonment.
III -MODERN INTERNATIONAL AGREEMENTS
After the carnage of World War I, the international climate was more receptive to the idea of arms control. During the
years between the two world wars, many formal arms-control conferences were held and many treaties were drawn
up. The Covenant of the League of Nations established criteria for reducing world armaments. The league's Council
was to establish reasonable limits on the military forces of each country and submit them for consideration to the
member governments. Members of the league were also called upon to limit the private manufacture of arms and
munitions and to exchange information on the size and status of their military establishments and arms industries. The
league's lack of enforcement capability, however, made compliance strictly voluntary.
A -Washington Conference
From 1921 to 1922 the Washington Naval Conference was held to establish stable relationships among the naval
forces of the various powers. Three treaties were enacted at the conference: the Four-Power Treaty, the Five-Power
Treaty, and the Nine-Power Treaty. By the terms of the first, France, Britain, Japan, and the United States agreed to
respect the status quo in the fortification of Pacific possessions and promised consultation in the event of a dispute. An
associated agreement was signed with The Netherlands regarding the Netherlands Indies (now Indonesia).
The second treaty focused on arms limitations. A 5-5-3-1.75-1.75 ratio was established between United States, British,
Japanese, French, and Italian battleships. That is, for every 5 United States and British battleships, Japan was allowed
3 and France and Italy were allowed 1.75. Maximum total tonnage was limited, as well as specification of a maximum
single-ship tonnage of 35,000 tons. A ten-year moratorium on battleship building (except to fill out the treaty) and a
limit on size and armament were also included. The third treaty was an attempt to accommodate the signatories
interests in China.
B -Geneva Conference and the Kellogg-Briand Pact
In 1925 a convention in Geneva, Switzerland, banned the use of toxic gas in warfare. By the time World War II began
in 1939, most of the Great Powers, except Japan and the United States, were signatories. (Japan signed it in 1970
and the United States in 1974.) This accord has been observed by most of the signatories, although Italy used gas in
Ethiopia in 1936. See also Chemical and Biological Warfare. In 1928 the Kellogg-Briand Pact, initiated by France and
the United States, was signed by 63 nations. The pact renounced war as an instrument of foreign policy. It made no
provisions, however, for enforcing compliance, and many nations only signed it with sweeping qualifications. It had no
effect on international affairs.
C -The Fate of Disarmament in the 1930s
In 1930 a naval conference was held in London to amend the Washington Conference treaties. Its most important
effect was to change the U.S.-Japanese battleship ratio to 5-3.5. It also extended the battleship moratorium through
1936. In 1932, after nearly ten years of preliminary discussions, a World Disarmament Conference was held in
Geneva under the auspices of the League of Nations. The keystone of the conference was the so-called Hoover Plan,
which consisted of proposals put forth by the United States based on the concept of qualitative disarmamentthat is,
the progressive elimination of offensive weapons. The result was to have been an increasingly unfavorable ratio
between offensive and defensive power.
Qualifications imposed by many of the major nations, however, diluted the Hoover Plan until little remained but a
statement of principles.
A final naval conference was held in London in 1936. There the United States and Britain reaffirmed the naval
limitation treaties, with an acceleration clause (that is, one providing for proportional increase in the U.S.-to-British
ratio) to counteract any German or Japanese violations. The Japanese, increasingly militaristic and fearful of American
and British superiority, withdrew from further negotiations. This was the last major arms-control conference before
World War II (1939-1945).
IV -CONTROL OF THE MEANS FOR MASS DESTRUCTION
After World War II ended in 1945, considerable support again developed for arms control and for alternatives to
military conflict in international relations. The United Nations (UN) Charter was designed to permit a supranational
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agency to enforce peace, avoiding many of the weaknesses of the League of Nations covenant. Thus, Article 11 of the
charter stated that the General Assembly could consider the general principle of disarmament and the regulation of
armaments. Article 26 required the Security Council to submit plans for a system of armament regulation. Article 47
established a military staff committee to assist the Security Council in this task.
A -Atomic Arms Race
The development of the atomic bomb by the United States toward the end of World War II brought with it the capability
of devastating whole civilizations (see Nuclear Weapons). While the United States still maintained a monopoly on
nuclear weapons, it made overtures in the UN for the control and elimination of atomic energy for military purposes. In
June 1946, American representative Bernard Baruch presented a plan to the UN Atomic Energy Commission, calling
for the abolition of nuclear weapons, international control over the processing of nuclear materials, full sharing of all
scientific and technological information concerning atomic energy, and safeguards to ensure that atomic energy would
be used only for civilian purposes. The government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) vetoed the
Baruch Plan in the Security Council, objecting to the UNs authority over disarmament and citing the domination of that
body by the United States and Western Europe.
In 1949 the USSR exploded an atomic weapon of its own, ending the U.S. monopoly. The possibility of a nuclear war
was now present, because relations between the USSR and the West were tense (see Cold War). Both the United
States and the USSR were engaged in a race to develop thermonuclear (hydrogen) devices, which have many times
the destructive power of atomic bombs. These weapons raised the possibility of ending all life on Earth in all-out war.
After 1954, when the USSR exploded its first hydrogen bomb, the primary concern of arms control was to reduce
nuclear arsenals and prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons technology
B -Agreements Limiting Nuclear Weapons
In 1957 the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was established to oversee the development and spread of
nuclear technology and materials. Two years later a treaty was negotiated to demilitarize the Antarctic and to prohibit
the detonation or storage of nuclear weapons there. Both the United States and the USSR were among the
signatories.
In 1961 the UN General Assembly passed the Joint Statement of Agreed Principles for Disarmament Negotiations. It
was followed in 1963 by a treaty that bound the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union not to test
nuclear weapons in space, in the atmosphere, or under water. In 1967 another treaty between the same nations
limited the military use of outer space to reconnaissance only. The deployment of nuclear weapons in orbit was
expressly prohibited. A second treaty in 1967 banned nuclear weapons from Latin America. One of the most important
agreements on arms control was the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty of 1968. Signatories pledged to restrict the
development, deployment, and testing of nuclear weapons to ensure that weapons, materials, or technology would not
be transferred outside the five countries that then had nuclear weapons (Great Britain, France, China, the United
States, and the USSR). In 1995 more than 170 countries agreed to permanently extend the treaty.
In the late 1960s the United States and the USSR initiated negotiations to regulate strategic weapon arsenals. These
negotiations became known as the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks. The SALT I negotiations produced two important
agreements in 1972: the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty (ABM Treaty), which drastically limited the establishment of
defensive installations designed to shoot down ballistic missiles, and the Interim Agreement on the Limitation of
Strategic Offensive Arms. That same year the two superpowers also signed a treaty barring the testing of nuclear
weapons on the ocean floor. The SALT II negotiations, which began in 1972, produced another treaty in 1979 that
would limit the total number of U.S. and USSR missile launchers. After the USSR invaded Afghanistan in 1979,
relations between the United States and the USSR rapidly deteriorated, and the U.S. Senate never ratified the treaty.
During the early 1980s controversy surrounded the placement by the United States of ballistic missiles on the territory
of some of its Western European allies. Opposition to this within West Germany (which became part of the united
Federal Republic of Germany in 1990) played a part in unseating Chancellor Helmut Schmidt in 1982. In 1983 U.S.
antinuclear groups rallied to support a bilateral arms freeze, and U.S. Roman Catholic bishops approved a pastoral
letter with a similar aim.
Controversy also surrounded the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) introduced by President Ronald Reagan in 1983.
This research program for developing a defense against ballistic missiles appeared likely to undermine the ABM Treaty
and challenged the assumptions of nuclear strategy since the beginning of the arms race. Since the late 1940s both
deployment of nuclear arms by the superpowers and restrictions upon their use had been founded upon a theory of
deterrence. According to this theory, the mutual likelihood of destruction in the event of a nuclear confrontation
between the United States and the USSR preserved a delicate balance between the two superpowers. Stable
relations between the nations required that they possess a roughly equal capacity to harm each other. Critics of SDI
believed that efforts to construct a defense against nuclear weapons would destroy that balance and remove the
conditions that prevented nuclear weapons from being used.

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Despite these concerns, U.S.-Soviet arms negotiations resumed in 1985. At a summit meeting in Washington, D.C., in
December 1987, President Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev signed the Intermediate Range Nuclear
Forces Treaty (INF), which eliminated many nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles that had been deployed throughout
Europe and the western Soviet Union. The treaty called for the destruction of all U.S. and Soviet missiles with ranges
of about 500 to 5,500 km (about 300 to 3,400 mi) and established a 13-year program to verify compliance. The INF
treaty was ratified by the U.S. Senate and the Soviet Presidium in May 1988.
C -No nuclear Weapons Agreements
Agreements to restrict or eliminate the production and use of biological and chemical weapons date back to the
Geneva Convention of 1925. In 1972 the United States, the USSR, and most other nations signed a convention
prohibiting development, production, and stockpiling of biological and chemical weapons. In the late 1980s and early
1990s, Iraqs use of chemical weapons against Iran during the Iran-Iraq War, and in subsequent attacks on its own
Kurdish population, prompted renewed international efforts to ban the use of such weapons. In 1993 representatives
from 160 nations approved the Chemical Weapons Convention. This agreement banned production, use, sale, and
storage of all chemical weapons. It also mandated destruction of existing stocks of weapons by the year 2005. The
United States ratified this convention in 1997, despite concerns about the proliferation of chemical weapons among
nations such as Libya, Syria, Iraq, and North Korea that were not signatories to the agreement.
Conventional weapons such as booby traps and land mines also possess enormous destructive capacity. Land mines
are especially troubling because they retain their destructive power for indefinite periods of time. The International
Committee of the Red Cross estimates that nearly 2 million land mines around the world kill or maim nearly 15,000
civilians every year. Global sentiment against land mines led more than 120 countries to sign a treaty in 1997 banning
the use, production, transfer, and stockpiling of the weapons. The effectiveness of the ban was called into question,
however, by the refusal of major powers such as the United States, Russia, Turkey, and China to sign the agreement.
V -COLD WAR AFTERMATH
As the 1990s began, the United States and the USSR continued to negotiate arms-control accords. In May 1990
Gorbachev and U.S. president George H. W. Bush approved a treaty to end production and reduce stockpiles of
chemical weapons. In 1991 the United States and the USSR signed the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START I),
requiring both nations to reduce their strategic nuclear arsenals by about 25 percent. Both sides also moved to reduce
conventional weapons and to continue phased withdrawal of their forces from Europe.
The collapse of the USSR in late 1991 raised complex new problems. The location of strategic nuclear weapons at
multiple sites in Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Belarus raised concerns about the safety and security of these
weapons. The U.S. Congress appropriated $1.5 billion to help these former Soviet states dismantle nuclear weapons
and develop safe storage of weapons-grade nuclear materials. In 1992 these countries and the United States agreed
to abide by the terms of the 1991 START I agreement.
In 1993 President Bush and Russian president Boris Yeltsin signed the START II treaty. This treaty called for the
elimination of almost two-thirds of the nuclear warheads and all the multiple-warhead land-based missiles held by the
United States and the former Soviet republics. In January 1996 the U.S. Senate ratified the START II treaty, but the
Russian parliament never approved the accord. The START II treaty never went into effect, and in 2002 it was
replaced by a new strategic arms reduction agreement known as the Treaty of Moscow.
In September 1996 leaders of the five major nuclear powersthe United States, Russia, China, France, and Britain
and dozens of other countries signed the landmark Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which banned most types of
nuclear weapons testing. In order to take effect, however, the treaty must be formally approved, or ratified, by all
nations believed to be capable of producing nuclear arms. In 1999 the U.S. Senate rejected the treaty by a vote of 51
to 48. China, Israel, Pakistan, and India are among other known nuclear powers that have not ratified the treaty.
The Senate vote against the treaty drew criticism from many U.S. allies, including Britain, Germany, and France.
Senate opponents of the treaty argued that it was unenforceable, and they raised concerns that the treaty left open the
possibility that rogue powers, such as Iraq or North Korea, could stockpile nuclear weapons, while at the same time it
blocked the United States from upgrading its nuclear arsenal.
The Senates refusal to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty came on the heels of another setback. In mid-1998
India conducted a series of underground tests of nuclear weapons. About two weeks later, Indias archrival, Pakistan,
detonated its own nuclear devices to demonstrate that it also possessed the powerful weapons. Both nations were
internationally condemned for the tests. The United States, the International Monetary Fund, the European Union, and
individual nations imposed economic sanctions on India and Pakistan in retaliation. Roughly a year later India tested a
ballistic missile capable of delivering a nuclear warhead to any target within Pakistan, and days later Pakistan
responded by testing a missile with similar capabilities. In 2002 tensions between the two nations over the disputed
territory of Kashmr raised fears of a nuclear war.

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Meanwhile, the United States under the administration of President Bill Clinton reached an important arms control
arrangement with North Korea in 1994. Although relations between the United States and North Korea remained
tense, under the arrangement North Korea agreed to freeze all work on the infrastructure of reactors and reprocessing
plants needed to produce plutonium for nuclear weapons. In exchange, Japan, South Korea, and the United States
agreed to provide fuel oil and other economic aid to North Korea.
In 2002, however, this arrangement began to unravel. United States intelligence agencies reported that while being
paid not to produce plutonium, there was evidence that North Korea might be at work to enrich uranium or to create
the facilities needed to enrich uranium, the other way of obtaining nuclear weapons. That triggered North Koreas
inclusion in the axis of evil cited by U.S. president George W. Bush in his State of the Union speech in January 2002.
The United States also responded to this intelligence report by halting supplies of fuel oil to North Korea. In October
2002 a U.S. official reported that a North Korean official had admitted that North Korea had a uranium enrichment
program. North Korean officials, however, subsequently denied that North Korea had a covert program to develop
nuclear weapons with enriched uranium. In January 2003 North Korea expelled United Nations (UN) monitors with the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and withdrew from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.
In April 2003 North Korea told U.S. officials that it possessed nuclear weapons, and in October 2003 North Korean
officials said they were extracting plutonium from spent nuclear fuel rods to produce nuclear weapons. In November
2003 the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency repeated its belief that North Korea possessed at least one and possibly
two nuclear bombs. However, other former and current U.S. intelligence officials said they were skeptical that North
Korea had the technological know-how to produce nuclear weapons. In February 2004 North Korea entered talks with
China, Japan, Russia, South Korea, and the United States to discuss an agreement that would end North Koreas
nuclear weapons program. In October 2006 North Korea tested a nuclear weapon. In February 2007 the six-nation
talks resulted in an agreement in which North Korea pledged to shut down its main nuclear reactor at Yongbyon, which
produces plutonium as a byproduct, in exchange for aid. That agreement led to a subsequent North Korean pledge in
October 2007 to disable its Yongbyon reactor by the end of the year in exchange for 950,000 metric tons of fuel oil or
its equivalent in economic aid. North Korea also agreed to disclose all of its nuclear programs and promised not to
transfer its nuclear materials, technology, or know-how beyond its borders.
VI -OUTLOOK FOR THE 21ST CENTURY
As the world entered the 21st century, both progress and setbacks occurred in arms control. In 2001 the administration
of U.S. president George W. Bush announced that it would unilaterally withdraw from the ABM Treaty, laying the
groundwork for the deployment of defenses against long-range ballistic missiles. For the first time the U.S. government
also announced a policy that under extreme circumstances it would consider using nuclear weapons against a
nonnuclear state that employed biological or chemical weapons. The Bush administration, however, also pursued an
arms reduction agreement with the Russian Federation, and the two nations signed a treaty in 2002 to deactivate
about 75 percent of their strategic nuclear arsenals.
Under the 2002 agreement, both nations were to reduce their active inventories of strategic nuclear warheads from
about 6,000 each to about 2,200 warheads each by the year 2012. The agreement, known as the Treaty of Moscow,
required ratification by both the U.S. Senate and the Russian Duma (parliament) before it could go into effect. Once
ratified the new treaty was to replace the previous START II treaty.
Observers noted that the new treaty contained a number of escape clauses. Either side could withdraw from the treaty
with only three months notice, and the reductions did not have to take effect until 2012, the same year the treaty
expires. The treaty also enabled both nations to place the deactivated warheads in storage or to set them aside as
operational spares that could be quickly reactivated. Critics of the agreement argued that the deactivated warheads
should be destroyed, rather than stored, because of the danger that terrorists could obtain access to stored weapons,
which are presumably less well guarded than those in active service.
A -Spread of Nuclear Weapons Technology
In February 2004 Pakistans leading nuclear scientist, Abdul Qadeer Khan, admitted that he and other Pakistani
scientists shared nuclear weapons technology with several other nations for more than a decade, from 1989 to 2000.
The countries were identified as Iran, Libya, and North Korea. In a nationally televised address, Khan apologized for
his actions. The next day Pakistan president Pervez Musharraf pardoned Khan, whose ties to Pakistans leading
nuclear weapons laboratory had been severed in 2001 due to financial irregularities.
The initial evidence against Khan came from the UNs International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and various
Western intelligence agencies, including the United States. The evidence included the discovery of documents
detailing designs for nuclear weapons and equipment built to enrich uranium for making nuclear weapons. Iranian and
Libyan officials themselves turned over some of the evidence to the IAEA. In addition, the United States seized a ship
in August 2003 that was bound for Libya with parts for making specialized gas centrifuges, which are used to enrich
uranium. Khan had assembled a vast network for sharing nuclear weapons technology that included intermediaries in
Dubai, Germany, South Africa, Sri Lanka, and The Netherlands. Khan was reportedly motivated by his desire to see
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other Muslim nations obtain nuclear weapons, both to help the Islamic cause and to deflect attention from Pakistans
nuclear weapons program. He was also reportedly motivated by money and had grown enormously wealthy, despite a
modest government salary.
Although the disclosure of Khans network added more knowledge about the extent of the secret nuclear weapons
programs maintained by Iran and Libya, the IAEA concluded that neither Libya nor Iran were close to building a
nuclear weapon. The IAEA did find, however, that Irans program was more advanced than Libyas. Libya in 2004
renounced its program to develop weapons of mass destruction, and Iran agreed to an additional protocol with the
IAEA to give its weapons experts greater authority to inspect Irans territory and facilities. In 2006 Iran announced that
it had demonstrated the ability to enrich uranium for use in nuclear power plants, and this ability was confirmed by the
IAEA. The UN Security Council subsequently imposed limited economic sanctions on Iran for violating the terms of an
earlier agreement. Irans leaders also said they intended to set up 3,000 gas centrifuges in a cascade, which would
demonstrate an ability to enrich uranium on an industrial scale. Iran continued to insist that its nuclear program was
only for peaceful purposes. In August 2007 the IAEA verified that Iran had been able to set up a cascade of about
2,000 centrifuges, well short of its goal of 3,000 centrifuges. The IAEA said Iran was enriching uranium at levels that
could only be used for generating electricity.
B -New U.S. Research Program
In late 2003 the United States began funding a research program that could lead to a new type of nuclear weapon
known as a mininuke. The mininuke would be the equivalent of 5 kilotons, or 5,000 tons of TNT. By comparison, the
atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, had an explosive power equivalent to 15 kilotons. The purpose of the
mininuke is to destroy underground command-and-control bunkers, underground arms depots, and other underground
facilities. The research is aimed at developing a nuclear weapon that could penetrate the layers of steel and concrete
designed to protect such bunkers without exploding on impact. Some arms control advocates objected to the research,
saying it would lead to a new type of nuclear weapon, which would violate the intent of the Comprehensive Test Ban
Treaty.
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POVERTY
I -INTRODUCTION
Poverty, condition of having insufficient resources or income. In its most extreme form, poverty is a lack of basic
human needs, such as adequate and nutritious food, clothing, housing, clean water, and health services. Extreme
poverty can cause terrible suffering and death, and even modest levels of poverty can prevent people from realizing
many of their desires. The worlds poorest peoplemany of whom live in developing areas of Africa, Asia, Latin
America, and Eastern Europestruggle daily for food, shelter, and other necessities. They often suffer from severe
malnutrition, epidemic disease outbreaks, famine, and war. In wealthier countriessuch as the United States,
Canada, Japan, and those in Western Europethe effects of poverty may include poor nutrition, mental illness, drug
dependence, crime, and high rates of disease.
Extreme poverty, which threatens peoples health or lives, is also known as destitution or absolute poverty. In the
United States, extreme poverty is traditionally defined as having an annual income that is less than half of the official
poverty line (an income level determined by the Bureau of the Census). Extreme poverty in developing nations, as
defined by international organizations, means having a household income of less than U.S.$1 per day. Relative
poverty is the condition of having fewer resources or less income than others within a society or country, or compared
to worldwide averages. In developed countries, relative poverty often is measured as having a family income less than
one-half of the median income for that country.
The reasons for poverty are not clear. Some people believe that poverty results from a lack of adequate resources on
a global levelresources such as land, food, and building materialsthat are necessary for the well-being or survival
of the worlds people. Others see poverty as an effect of the uneven distribution of resources around the world on an
international or even regional scale. This second line of reasoning helps explain why many people have much more
than they need to live in comfort, while many others do not have enough resources to live.
II -POVERTY THROUGHOUT HISTORY
Poverty has been a concern in societies since before the beginning of recorded history. According to sociologists and
anthropologists, social stratificationthe division of a society into a hierarchy of wealth, power, and statuswas a
defining characteristic of the earliest civilizations, including those of ancient Egypt, Sumer in the Middle East, and the
Indus Valley of what is now India. The rulers and other powerful or wealthy members of these civilizations frequently
mistreated the poor, sometimes subjecting them to hard labor or enslaving them.
Babylonian, Talmudic, and early Christian writings from later times entreat people with resources and good fortune to
relate to the poor with compassion. As the powerful nations of Western civilization became established, they codified
relationships between the poor and nonpoor into law, as was done in Babylonia (see Code of Hammurabi). The
present-day welfare systems of the United Kingdom, the United States, and Canada evolved from a 17th-century
British legal act known commonly as the Poor Laws.
The rise of civilizations also led to stratification among nations and territories around the globe. Powerful and wealthy
nations maintained and increased their power and wealth and built empires by using the labor and resources of less
powerful regions. This dynamic took on a new form in the era of colonialism (see Colonialism and Colonies). Through
two colonial periodsfrom the 15th century to the early 19th century and from the early 19th century to the mid-20th
centurycountries in western Europe, and later the United States and Japan, laid claim to territories and created
colonies and new countries in Asia, Africa, and the Americas. These were areas where people still lived directly off the
land and where natural resources were plentiful. Colonizers variously sought to acquire new resources and productive
land, to spread religion, to find religious freedom, and to gain strategic positions against rival nations in political and
military confrontations.
During the first period of colonialism, several western European countriesled by Portugal, The Netherlands, Spain,
France, and Britainused their colonial territories to provide them with goods for consumption and trade. In the late
18th century, the Industrial Revolution brought mechanized production to many nations and ushered in a second
period of colonialism. Industrialization began in Britain and soon spread to North America, much of western Europe,
and some Pacific nations, such as Japan. Industrialized countries could produce much larger quantities of goods and
resources than had previously been possible. To achieve this level of production they relied on colonies to provide raw
materials for building and powering machines and for supplying their factories. The industrialized countries, and many
of the people living in them, experienced increases in wealth and ease of access to essential resources, including
clothing, building materials, and staple foods.
The colonies in Africa, South and East Asia, and what is now Latin America did not share in these gains. Often, the
resources of the colonies were exploited by the colonizing countries, especially geographically smaller ones such as
Britain and The Netherlands, to supply raw materials such as metal ores for smelting or sugarcane for the production
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of rum. In the colonies, the production of food and raw materials for manufacturing diverted indigenous peoples from
doing subsistence work, such as gardening or tending livestock. Others were simply displaced from their land. Native
Africans, Asians, and Americans had been self-sufficient as farmers, herders, or hunter-gatherers; now they became
dependent, for the first time, on outsiders for their basic needs, and many became poor. An exception to this pattern
occurred in two of the worlds largest countries, Russia and China. These countries used primarily their own
hinterlands to obtain resources.
In other cases, colonies were centers of trade in slaves (see Slavery: Modern Period). Many European nations,
including Portugal, Britain, Spain, France, The Netherlands, and Denmark, set up outposts in West Africa from which
they shipped slaves to the colonies of the Americas and the Caribbean. These countries also used slaves for free labor
in their own lands. Slaves suffered a total loss of home, land, and livelihood.
The economies of the former colonies in Africa, Asia, and Latin America began to change only in the mid-20th century
when they gained political independence. Most former colonies came to be known as developing countries or,
collectively, as the Third World. The Third World is home to the worlds poorest people. The countries of eastern
Europewhich were formerly part of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) and the Communist blocand
the Peoples Republic of China are sometimes referred to as the Second World. These countries have vast rural
territories and a legacy of state-owned property, facilities, and equipment (as for farming) from the years of Communist
rule. They have become industrialized but many still have high levels of poverty. The former colonizing countries,
which have highly industrialized and postindustrial (service- and information-based) economies, have become known
generally as developed countries.
The unequal distribution of wealth and resources generated in the colonial period has become even more pronounced
in the postindustrial or information age. Members of societies with access to good educational opportunities and
advanced technology profit far more from the emerging global economy than do members of less developed societies.
III -CAUSES OF POVERTY
Poverty has many causes, some of them very basic. Some experts suggest, for instance, that the world has too many
people, too few jobs, and not enough food. But such basic causes are quite intractable and not easily eradicated. In
most cases, the causes and effects of poverty interact, so that what makes people poor also creates conditions that
keep them poor. Primary factors that may lead to poverty include (1) overpopulation, (2) the unequal distribution of
resources in the world economy, (3) inability to meet high standards of living and costs of living, (4) inadequate
education and employment opportunities, (5) environmental degradation, (6) certain economic and demographic
trends, and (7) welfare incentives.
A -Overpopulation
Overpopulation, the situation of having large numbers of people with too few resources and too little space, is closely
associated with poverty. It can result from high population density (the ratio of people to land area, usually expressed
as numbers of persons per square kilometer or square mile) or from low amounts of resources, or from both.
Excessively high population densities put stress on available resources. Only a certain number of people can be
supported on a given area of land, and that number depends on how much food and other resources the land can
provide. In countries where people live primarily by means of simple farming, gardening, herding, hunting, and
gathering, even large areas of land can support only small numbers of people because these labor-intensive
subsistence activities produce only small amounts of food.
In developed countries such as the United States, Japan, and the countries of western Europe, overpopulation
generally is not considered a major cause of poverty. These countries produce large quantities of food through
mechanized farming, which depends on commercial fertilizers, large-scale irrigation, and agricultural machinery. This
form of production provides enough food to support the high densities of people in metropolitan areas.
A countrys level of poverty can depend greatly on its mix of population density and agricultural productivity.
Bangladesh, for example, has one of the worlds highest population densities, with 938 persons per sq km (2,430
persons per sq mi). A large majority of the people of Bangladesh engage in low-productivity manual farming, which
contributes to the countrys extremely high level of poverty. Some of the smaller countries in western Europe, such as
The Netherlands and Belgium, have high population densities as well. These countries practice mechanized farming
and are involved in high-tech industries, however, and therefore have high standards of living.
At the other end of the spectrum, many countries in sub-Saharan Africa have population densities of less than 30
persons per sq km (80 persons per sq mi). Many people in these countries practice manual subsistence farming; these
countries also have infertile land and lack the economic resources and technology to boost productivity. As a
consequence, these nations are very poor. The United States has both relatively low population density and high
agricultural productivity; it is one of the worlds wealthiest nations.
High birth rates contribute to overpopulation in many developing countries. Children are assets to many poor families
because they provide labor, usually for farming. Cultural norms in traditionally rural societies commonly sanction the
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value of large families. Also, the governments of developing countries often provide little or no support, financial or
political, for family planning (see Birth Control); even people who wish to keep their families small have difficulty doing
so. For all these reasons, developing countries tend to have high rates of population growth. Most developed countries
provide considerable political and financial support for family planning. People tend to limit the number of children they
have because of the availability of this support. Cultural norms in these countries also tend to affirm the ideal of small
family size. Recently, however, some developed countries with declining population levels have begun experimenting
with incentives to increase the birth rate. See also Population: World Population Growth and Distribution.
B -Global Distribution of Resources
Many experts agree that the legacy of colonialism accounts for much of the unequal distribution of resources in the
world economy. In many developing countries, the problems of poverty are massive and pervasive. In recent decades
most of these countries have tried to develop their economies with industry and technology with varying levels of
success. Some nations have become fairly wealthy, including the Republic of Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, South
Korea, and Thailand. Many developing countries, however, lack essential raw materials and the knowledge and skills
gained through formal education and training. They also often lack the infrastructure provided by, for example,
transportation systems and power-generating facilities. Because these things are necessary for the development of
industry, developing countries generally must rely on trade with developed countries for manufactured goods, but they
cannot afford much.
Some social scientists argue that wealthier developed countries continue to practice a form of colonialism, known as
neocolonialism. The affluence of these countries is based to a large extent on favorable trade with the developing
world. Developed countries have been able to get inexpensive natural resources from poorer countries in Asia, Africa,
and Latin America, including oil for power, ores and minerals for manufacturing durable goods, and manufactured
goods made by low-wage workers in factories operated by multinational corporations. This practice contributes to the
dependency of poorer countries while not raising their standards of living.
C -High Standards of Living and Costs of Living
Because people in developed nations may have more wealth and resources than those in developing countries, their
standard of living is also generally higher. Thus, people who have what would be considered adequate wealth and
resources in developing countries may be considered poor in developed countries. People in the United States, for
example, may expect to make, on average, about $30,000 each year. They also probably expect to rent an apartment
or own a house with electricity and running water, to be able to afford to eat and dress well, and to receive quality
health care. In addition, many people aspire to afford discretionary expensesthat is, purchases unessential to
survival, such as cars, higher-priced foods, and entertainment.
In contrast, people in developing countries may consider themselves to be doing well if they have productive gardens,
some livestock, and a house of thatch or mud-brick. In rural areas, people may be accustomed to not having plumbing,
electricity, or formal health care. By the standards of developed countries, such living conditions are considered
hallmarks of poverty.
Developed countries also tend to have a high cost of living. Even the most basic lifestyle in these countries, with few or
no luxuries, can be relatively expensive. Most people in the United States, Canada, Japan, Australia, western
European nations, and other developed countries cannot obtain adequate food, clothing, and shelter without ample
amounts of money. In some areas, even people with jobs that pay the legal minimum wage may not be able to cover
their basic expenses. People who cannot find or maintain well-paying jobs often have no spare income for
discretionary or emergency expenses, and many rely on government welfare payments to survive.
D -Inadequate Education and Employment
Illiteracy and lack of education are common in poor countries. Governments of developing countries often cannot
afford to provide for good public schools, especially in rural areas. Whereas virtually all children in industrialized
countries have access to an education, only about 60 percent of children in sub-Saharan Africa even attend
elementary school. Without education, most people cannot find income-generating work. Poor people also often
forego schooling in order to concentrate on making a minimal living. In addition, developing countries tend to have few
employment opportunities, especially for women. As a result, people may see little reason to go to school.
Even in developed countries, unemployment rates may be high. When people do not have work, they do not make any
money; thus, high unemployment leads to high levels of poverty. Availability of employment also tends to fluctuate,
creating periods of high joblessness (see Business Cycle). Countries such as Japan, South Korea, Singapore,
Switzerland, and Luxembourg have managed at times to keep unemployment as low as 2 percent. Unemployment
figures during the 1990s in the United States and most of Europe, on the other hand, ranged from about 5 percent to
more than 20 percent. In countries with high populations, unemployment levels of only a few percentage points mean
that millions of working-age people cannot find work and earn an adequate income. Because unemployment figures
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indicate only the number of people eligible to work who have no job but are seeking employment, such figures are not
necessarily an accurate indicator of the number of people living in poverty. Other people may not be able to find
enough work or may earn wages too low to support themselves.
E -Environmental Degradation
In many parts of the world, environmental degradationthe deterioration of the natural environment, including the
atmosphere, bodies of water, soil, and forestsis an important cause of poverty. Environmental problems have led to
shortages of food, clean water, materials for shelter, and other essential resources. As forests, land, air, and water are
degraded, people who live directly off these natural resources suffer most from the effects. People in developed
countries, on the other hand, have technologies and conveniences such as air and water filters, refined fuels, and
industrially produced and stored foods to buffer themselves from the effects of environmental degradation.
Global environmental degradation may result from a variety of factors, including overpopulation and the resulting
overuse of land and other resources. Intensive farming, for instance, depletes soil fertility, thus decreasing crop yields.
Environmental degradation also results from pollution. Polluting industries include mining, power generation, and
chemical production. Other major sources of pollution include automobiles and agricultural fertilizers.
In developing countries, deforestation has had particularly devastating environmental effects. Many rural people,
particularly in tropical regions, depend on forests as a source of food and other resources, and deforestation damages
or eliminates these supplies. Forests also absorb many pollutants and water from extended rains; without forests,
pollution increases and massive flooding further decreases the usability of the deforested areas.
F -Economic and Demographic Trends
Poverty in many developed countries can be linked to economic trends. In the 1950s and 1960s, for example, most
people in the United States experienced strong income growth. Taking inflation into account, average family income
almost doubled during this period. However, between the early 1970s and the early 1990s typical incomes, adjusted
for inflation, grew little while the cost of living increased. Periods of economic recession tend to particularly affect
young and less-educated people, who may have difficulty finding jobs that pay enough to support themselves.
Changes in labor markets in developed countries have also contributed to increased poverty levels. For instance, the
number of relatively high-paying manufacturing jobs has declined, while the demand for workers in service- and
technology-related industries has increased. Historically, people have learned the skills required for jobs that involve
manual labor, such as those in manufacturing, either on the job or through easily accessible school vocational
programs. As these jobs are replaced by service- and technology-related jobsjobs that usually require skills taught at
the college levelpeople who cannot afford a college education find it increasingly difficult to obtain well-paying work.
In many developed nations the number of people living in poverty has increased due to rising disparities in the
distribution of resources within these countries. Since the 1970s, for instance, the poorest 20 percent of all U.S.
households have earned an increasingly smaller percentage of the total national income (generally less than 5
percent) while the wealthiest 5 percent of households have earned an increasingly greater percentage (about 45
percent of the total). During most of this period, those in the middle and the bottom of the income distribution have
become progressively worse off as the cost of living has risen.
Some researchers also cite demographic shifts (changes in the makeup of populations) as contributing to increases in
overall poverty. In particular, demographic shifts have led to increases in poverty among children. In the United States,
for instance, typical family structures have changed significantly, leading to an increase in single-parent families, which
tend to be poorer. Single-parent families with children have a much more difficult time escaping poverty than do twoparent families, in which adults can divide and share childcare and work duties. In 1970 about 87 percent of children
lived with both of their parents, but by the turn of the century this figure had dropped to 69 percent. The divorce rate in
the United States more than doubled between 1960 and 1980, although it stabilized in the 1980s and fell somewhat in
the 1990s. More importantly, perhaps, the proportion of children born to unmarried parents grew from about 5 percent
in the early 1960s to more than 33 percent by 2000.
G -Individual Responsibility and Welfare Dependency
There are differing beliefs about individual responsibility for poverty. Some people believe that poverty is a symptom of
societal structure and that some proportion of any society inevitably will be poor. Others feel that poverty results from a
failure of social institutions, such as the labor market and schools. These people feel that poverty is beyond the control
of those who experience it, but might be remedied if appropriate policies were enacted. Other people feel that the poor
intentionally behave in ways that cause or perpetuate their poverty. For instance, if people voluntarily choose to use
drugs and this leads them to poverty, it can be argued that they are to blame for their situation. However, such an
argument cannot completely explain cases in which poverty leads to drug dependence.
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In addition, many people in developed countries blame cycles of poverty, or the tendency for the poor to remain poor,
on overly generous welfare programs. Supporters of this position, including some politicians, argue against
government spending and initiatives to help the poor. They believe that these programs provide incentives for people
to stay poor in order to continue receiving payments and other support. This argument also suggests that welfare
discourages work and marriage. In the United States and other developed countries, getting a job results in reduced
welfare support; the same is true when a single parent gets married. However, cash welfare benefits for the typical
poor U.S. family with children fell in value by half between the early 1970s and the mid-1990s, taking inflation into
account. Such benefits may have been too meager to motivate people to stay on welfare or to avoid work or marriage.
In the United States, the belief that cash welfare assistance actually encouraged personal decisions leading to poverty
dominated policy discussions of the 1990s. In response, in 1996 the U.S. Congress created a new welfare program
called Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF). This program ended the guarantee of cash benefits for poor
families with children, shifted more control to the states, and established stricter work requirements for recipients. The
numbers of poor families with children receiving cash welfare fell dramatically, from 4.6 million in 1996 to 2.1 million at
the end of 2001. The poverty rate for children also fell during the 1990s, from more than 20 percent in the early part of
the decade to about 16 percent by the end of the decade. Experts disagree, however, on what drove the reductions in
both welfare caseloads and poverty: changes in welfare policy or the dynamic economy that prevailed during most of
this period.
IV -EFFECTS OF POVERTY
Poverty has wide-ranging and often devastating effects. Many of its effects, such as poor nutrition and physical health
problems, result directly from having too little income or too few resources. As a result of poor nutrition and health
problems, infant mortality rates among the poor are higher than average, and life expectancies are lower than
average. Other effects of poverty may include infectious disease, mental illness, and drug dependence. Some effects
of poverty are not as easily understood. For example, studies link poverty to crime, but by no means are all poor
people also criminals. In many cases, the primary effects of poverty lead to other problems. Extended hunger and lack
of employment, for instance, may lead to depression, which may sometimes contribute to criminal behavior.
The relationship between poverty and personal or social problems is very complex. For example, studies of mothers
on welfare reveal that those with multiple problemssuch as depression, substance abuse, and being a victim of
domestic violenceare much less likely to find work and escape poverty. What is less clear, however, is whether these
problems result from the disadvantages of poverty.
A -Malnutrition and Starvation
Malnutrition is one of the most common effects of poverty. In developing countries, the poorest people cannot obtain
adequate calories to develop or maintain their appropriate body weight. In Ethiopia, for example, it is estimated that
almost half of all children under the age of 5 suffer from malnutrition. Poor children in developing countries often suffer
the most, commonly from a deficiency known as protein-energy malnutrition. In these cases, children lack protein in
their diets, especially from an insufficient amount of mothers milk. Protein-energy malnutrition leads to a variety of
problems, including gastrointestinal disorders, stunted growth, poor mental development, and high rates of infection.
Prolonged malnutrition can lead to starvation, a condition in which the bodys tissues and organs deteriorate. Longterm starvation almost always results in death.
In addition to caloric malnutrition, most poor children and adults suffer from severe vitamin and mineral deficiencies.
These deficiencies can lead to mental disorders; damage to vital organs; failure of the senses, such as poor vision;
problems conceiving or delivering babies; and gastrointestinal distress.
Even in the major cities of developed nations, the poor often have unhealthful diets. Resulting in part from a lack of
health care and nutritional education and in part from the lower availability and higher cost of better-quality foods, the
urban poor tend to eat too much of the wrong kinds of foods. The urban poor commonly eat foods that are fatty or
fried, high in sugar and salt, and made of mostly processed carbohydrates. Their diets are often high in low-grade fatty
meats, chips, candies, and desserts and low in vegetables, fruits, whole grains, and high-quality lean meats and fish.
Such diets commonly cause obesity and hypertension, both of which can contribute to heart disease and other
ailments.
B -Infectious Disease and Exposure to the Elements
In addition to the effects of malnutrition, the poor experience high rates of infectious disease. Inadequate shelter or
housing creates conditions that promote disease. Without decent protection, many of the poor are exposed to severe
and dangerous weather as well as to bacteria and viruses carried by other people and animals. In the tropics,
monsoons and hurricanes can destroy the flimsy shelters of the poor. Once exposed, people are vulnerable to
fluctuations in temperature that lower their resistance to disease. They also are more likely to become infected with
diseases carried by insects or rodents. For instance, mosquitoes carry malaria, a debilitating disease that is common
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in the tropics. In arid regions, drought leaves the poor without clean water for drinking or bathing. In temperate
climates, including in the major cities of developed countries, homelessness is a growing problem. Many of the
homeless poor are harmed by or die of exposure to extreme winter cold.
Inadequate sanitation and unhygienic practices among the poor also lead to illness. Inadequate sanitation almost
always accompanies inadequate shelter. Because the poor in developing nations commonly have no running water or
sewage facilities, human excrement and garbage accumulate, quickly becoming a breeding ground for disease. In
cities, especially in ghettoes and shantytowns that house only poor people, overcrowding can lead to high
transmission rates of airborne diseases, such as tuberculosis. The poor are also often uneducated about the spread of
diseases, notably sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). As a resultand because prophylactic devices such as
condoms may be hard to obtain or afford, especially in developing countriesSTD rates are high among the poor. In
particular, the incidence of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) among poor people is higher than average.
Along with the problem of a high incidence of disease, developing countries also have shortages of doctors. Medicine
and treatment are often both scarce and too expensive for the poor. For example, only 18 percent of children in
Somalia had been immunized against diphtheria, pertussis, and tetanus in 1999; the comparable rate in the United
States was 96 percent. In addition, many people who live in rural areas of developing countries cannot get to doctors
located in urban areas. In developed countries, the poor may have no health insurance, making the costs of health
care unaffordable.
C -Mental Illness and Drug Dependence
In most developed countries, rates of mental illness are highest among the poor. The most common disorders
associated with poverty are depression and anxiety disorders. Without meaningful, well-paying work and the resources
and social affirmation that come with it, many poor people develop low self-esteem and feelings of worthlessness.
People who are stressed by the uncertainty of where they will get their next meal or spend the night often develop high
anxiety. Because the poor experience high rates of severe mental illness, they also have high rates of suicide.
Some poor people attempt to relieve feelings of anxiety and depression associated with poverty through the use of
mind-altering drugs. A common drug among the poor is alcohol, which is legal and affordable. Many of those who drink
develop alcoholism, becoming physically and emotionally dependent on drinking. Others use and often become
addicted to more dangerous and often illegal drugs, including heroin, methamphetamines, and cocaine. Of these drug
users, those who take drugs intravenously (by injection into a vein) and share needles with others also suffer from high
rates of diseases transmitted through blood and other bodily fluids, including AIDS.
Mental illness and drug dependence demonstrate the difficulties of distinguishing between povertys causes and its
effects. Mentally ill and drug-dependent people tend to have trouble holding steady jobs and maintaining relationships,
causing them to fall into poverty. They may also have difficulty lifting themselves out of poverty. At the same time, in
some cases poverty itself appears to promote mental illness and drug dependence.
D -Crime and Violence
Some experts believe that poverty leads people to commit acts of violence and crime. Anger, desperation, and the
need for money for food, shelter, and other necessities may all contribute to criminal behavior among the poor. Other
experts caution that the link of cause and effect between poverty and crime is unclear. In some cases, poverty
undoubtedly motivates people to commit crimes, although it may not be the only factor involved. Other problems
associated with poverty are often linked to crime. For example, to obtain money some poor people commit the crime of
selling illegal drugs; others may steal to obtain the money to buy drugs on which they are dependent.
E -Long-Term Effects
People who grow up in poverty may experience lifelong problems because of it. They are at a disadvantage in things
such as education because they have limited income and resources. All children also need adequate nutrition and
health care for good physical and mental development, and poor children are often malnourished and sick from a
young age. Studies have shown that people who grow up in persistently poor households experience more difficulties
throughout their lives than those raised in households that are above the poverty level. Overall, they do not do as well
in school, have more difficulties in marriage, and more frequently become single parents. In addition, poverty tends to
perpetuate itself. In many cases, those who had poor parents are poor themselves, earning lower-than-average
incomes. They may also have learned a mindset that keeps them from getting out of poverty. All of these negative
long-term effects are much more likely to occur if children experience prolonged poverty, an unfortunate circumstance
much more likely to affect minority children.
V -POVERTY IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES
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Many developing nations experience severe and widespread poverty, which often leads to disease epidemics,
starvation, and deaths. In the past few decades, millions of people have starved and died as a result of famine in such
countries as Bangladesh, Ethiopia, North Korea, Somalia, and Sudan. As recently as 1998, almost one person in four
(23 percent) residing in developing countries lived on less than $1 a day.
Poverty disproportionately affects women, children, the elderly, and people with disabilities. In many developing
nations, women have low social status and are restricted in their access to both education and income-generating
work. Without adequate income, they commonly depend on men for support, but often get little. In some developing
countries, including in Southeast Asia and eastern Europe, poor women seeking to work or immigrate to other
countries are tricked and sold into prostitution or indentured servitude. They receive little or no pay, and are forced to
stay to pay off debts incurred through their immigration. Many women end up in sweatshopsillegal factories, usually
for making clothing, that have poor working conditions and long hours. Asian countries such as China, India, Korea,
and Thailand have been widely accused of permitting or encouraging poor families to kill their female babies, a
practice known as female infanticide. These countries are overpopulated, and their cultures promote the belief that
men contribute more to economies and bring more wealth to their families than do women.
People who do not worksuch as young children, the elderly, and many people with disabilitiesdepend on families
and other support networks for basic necessities. However, neither poor families nor the governments of many
developing countries can adequately support the nonworking. Poor children in particular suffer the consequences.
Children have underdeveloped immune systems, and they easily acquire diseases in unsanitary living conditions. Thus
the poorest countries have high rates of child morbidity (disease) and mortality. Children also have very low social
status, and often suffer from parental neglect and abuse because they are not considered important. Like women in
many developing countries, children may be exploited as prostitutes or as workers for little or no pay.
Throughout the developing world, ethnic and racial minorities experience prejudice from majority groups and have
difficulty attaining an average standard of living. For example, under the system of apartheid, enforced in South Africa
from 1948 to the early 1990s, the government systematically denied rights, fair treatment, and educational and
employment opportunities to nonwhites, leaving them in massive poverty. Migrants and refugees, who have left their
native land and settled elsewhere, also experience high degrees of poverty. Migrants commonly lose the immediate
economic support of their families and enter into societies in which they may have difficulty finding good work,
especially if they do not speak the language (see Migration).
A -Africa
Africa includes some of the poorest countries in the world. In much of Africa south of the Sahara, harsh environmental
conditions exacerbate the conditions of poverty. Dry and barren land covers large expanses of this region. As the poor
try to eke out livings through farming and other subsistence practices, they exhaust the land, using up the soil nutrients
needed to grow crops. Over time this has led to desertification, a process in which once fertile land turns to desert.
During the late 20th century, desertification contributed to famines in a number of African nations, including Somalia,
Ethiopia, and Mali. Political instability and wars in many sub-Saharan countries have also contributed to poverty. As a
result of such factors, the number of people living in extreme poverty in sub-Saharan Africa grew from 217 million in
1987 to more than 300 million in 1998.
B -South and East Asia
In 1998 Asia (including South Asia, East Asia, and the Pacific region) accounted for about two-thirds of the worlds 1.2
billion poorest people. These people all lived on less than $1 per day. South Asiathat is, the Indian subcontinent,
which includes India, Nepal, and Bangladeshhad about 522 million people living in extreme poverty in 1996. India
had the greatest number of poor of any country in the worldmore than 300 million people, more than one-third of its
population. The caste system associated with Hinduism, the dominant religion in India, helps perpetuate some of this
poverty. This system keeps many families poor from generation to generation by assigning certain groups of people to
low status.
Approximately 267 million people in East and Southeast Asia lived on less than $1 per day in 1998. China has very
large numbers of poor due to the great size of its rural population. Such Southeast Asian countries as Vietnam, the
Philippines, and Indonesia also rank among the worlds poorest.
Several wars have contributed to poverty in South and East Asia. World War II (1939-1945) and the wars in Korea
(1950-1953) and Vietnam (1959-1975) damaged land, crops, and forests; prevented many people from making a
living; and killed and dislocated millions. In the late 20th century, governments and industries around these regions
sponsored massive deforestation, mining, and damming projects that damaged or hindered access to forests, fields,
and water resources. Such projects also forced many people to abandon their homes and fields, making them more
susceptible to poverty.

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C -Latin America
In Latin America (Central America, South America, and the Caribbean), the poorest people are commonly Native
American, people of African ancestry, and mestizos (persons of mixed Native American and European ancestry).
People of European descent who live in Latin America generally have higher standards of living. Political instability has
contributed to poverty in many Latin American countries, including Chile, Cuba, Nicaragua, and Panama. These
countries have gone through long periods of military rule or dictatorship in which leaders have hoarded land and
natural resources and impaired peoples ability to make an adequate living. For many years the Caribbean country of
Haiti has suffered economically from the effects of both political upheaval and environmental degradation. Brazil has
the greatest number of people living in poverty in all of Latin America. This is in part because of its size, but also
because of encroachment by urban populations on the land and forest resources of its many native peoples. Largescale urban poverty, marked by crowded and unsanitary slums, plagues cities such as Rio de Janeiro in Brazil and
Mexico City. It is estimated that slightly more than 60 million people in this region of the world lived in extreme poverty
in 1998.
D -Eastern Europe and Central Asia
Many countries formerly part of the Communist bloc (the Communist countries of eastern Europe), including those of
the former Soviet Union, have relatively high levels of poverty. Historians and economists blame the legacy of
Communism for much of the poverty in these countries. Communist governments owned and distributed most of their
countries property and resources. Leaders of these governments proclaimed the benefits of this centralized system,
but many people who lived under Communism experienced lower standards of living than people who lived in
countries with democratic governments and free-market economies, such as the United States and the nations of
western Europe.
Since the fall of Communism in 1989, poverty in much of eastern Europe and Central Asia has increased. The number
of people living in extreme poverty in these areas grew from 1.1 million in 1987 to an estimated 17.6 million in 1998.
The fall of Communism ended a political and economic system in which all people had been virtually guaranteed jobs
and basic needs, such as food and housing. Sudden uncertainty about the future led to decreases in the value of
currencies in all formerly Communist countries. Wars and instability ravaged many of these countries. In the most
devastating conflict, the former Yugoslavia erupted in violent civil war in 1991 (see Yugoslav Succession, Wars of). In
several formerly Communist countries, political and economic upheaval has led to a wide array of problems, including
a dramatic increase in the number of orphaned children. The high number of orphans has stretched the capacity of
orphanages, and many orphans live in extreme poverty and suffer from malnutrition, disease, and starvation.
VI -POVERTY IN DEVELOPED COUNTRIES
The nature of poverty in the developed world differs greatly from that in the developing world. In developed countries,
the majority of people commonly earn over 200 times the per capita (per person) income of the poorest developing
countries. For this reason, developed nations usually measure the income level of poverty as a portion of average
income or as an amount below which a person or family cannot afford basic needs, including housing. For people with
low or no income, poverty often takes the form of homelessness; those in less extreme poverty often live in
substandard and sometimes dangerous housing. Many of the poor in developed countries are also exposed to high
levels of violence associated with drug dealing, spouse or child abuse, and other crime.
For reasons that are only partly understood, the United States has higher rates of poverty than most other developed
countries. A study of 16 developed nations conducted in the early 1990s used a single measure for comparison:
Poverty was defined as earning below half the median (middle) of all incomes. The results showed that about 19
percent of the U.S. population lives in some degree of poverty. The rates were between 10 and 15 percent in Australia,
Canada, Ireland, Japan, Spain, and the United Kingdom. Many of the other countries of western Europeincluding
Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, and the Scandinavian countries (Finland, Norway, and Sweden)
all had poverty rates of between 5 and 8 percent.
Poverty rates in some developed countries, including the United States and the United Kingdom, are higher among
racial minorities. Indigenous people in developed countries also tend to suffer from very high rates of poverty. In the
United States, many Native Americans live and work on economically depressed Native American reservations and
experience high rates of joblessness and alcoholism. In Australia, many Aboriginal people live in similar conditions
(see Aboriginal Australians).
A -The United States
In 2001 the Census Bureau reported about 33 million residents living in poverty in the United States, or about 12
percent of the total population. About 6.8 million families, or 9 percent of all U.S. families, lived in poverty in 2001.
These poverty rates were similar to those of the 1970s, but were about half of the historically high rates of the early
1960s. While little seems to have changed in aggregate, or total, levels of U.S. poverty since the 1970s, the
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composition of the people living in poverty has changed significantly. That is, the probability of being poor has changed
significantly across demographic groups, which are based on age, race, family status, and geographic location. Some
groups of people are now much more likely to be poor than in the past while other groups are less likely to be poor.
The census divides the total U.S. population into three basic age groups: children (up through 17 years of age), primeaged adults (18 years to 64 years), and the elderly (65 years of age and over). About 16 percent of children were poor
in 2001, more than in any other age group. Poverty among prime-aged adults, who generally work, has fluctuated with
changes in the U.S. economy. In 1996, when the economy was performing well, about 10 percent of prime-aged adults
lived in poverty. The numbers of elderly living in poverty dropped dramatically between 1959 and 2001, from over 30
percent to around 10 percent.
An estimated 8 percent of whites of all ages (not including those of Hispanic origin) were poor in 2001. By contrast,
more than one in five blacks (23 percent) and about the same proportion of Hispanics (21 percent) lived in poverty.
Blacks and Hispanics are the largest U.S. minority groups, and most smaller groups, including Asians, experience less
poverty. However, because of the different sizes of these groups in the United States, whites make up the largest
percentage of the poor overall. In 2001 about 6 percent of all married couples were poor. On the other hand, 35
percent of single-mother households lived in poverty at this time. Rates were even higher for Hispanic (43 percent)
and black (42 percent) single-mother households.
Higher percentages of people are poor in the southern and western parts of the country than in the Northeast and
Midwest. One reason for this difference may be that the South and West contain more, and more sparsely populated,
rural areas, which have fewer higher wage jobs. Poverty is more prevalent in rural areas, and also in central cities,
than it is in suburbs. Although pockets of high poverty exist, poor people live in all areas of the United States.
B -Other Developed Countries
There are many factors that might account for the differences in rates of poverty among developed countries. Some
countries, such as the United Kingdom, have greatly imbalanced income distributions. In these countries, a relatively
small proportion of the population has a large share of money, property, and other resources. This imbalance can
make the overall median income fairly high, with the result that more people earn less than the median. In many
developed countries, the wealthiest people have money and other resources that might otherwise be available to the
rest of society. The great ethnic and racial diversity of countries such as Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom
may also contribute to high poverty rates because minority groups tend to have low social and economic status. The
Scandinavian countries, which have the lowest poverty rates of all developed countries, have fairly homogenous
populations.
Differences in the history and scope of social welfare systems among developed countries also may contribute to
differences in their poverty rates. For instance Spain and Japan have welfare systems that are not well established or
expansive; the poverty rates in these countries are moderate. On the other hand, most of the countries of western
Europe and, in particular, the Scandinavian countries, have mature, large social welfare systems that provide a great
deal of support for people who have inadequate income. The Scandinavian countries, whose unemployment rates are
generally far higher than their poverty rates, have both substantial social welfare systems and relatively equal
distributions of income. For example, in the mid-1990s, the estimated child poverty rate in the United States was about
seven times the rate measured in Sweden.
VII -MEASURING POVERTY
How people and institutions portray and try to cope with poverty depends to a considerable extent on how poverty is
measured. The differences between relative poverty (having less than others) and absolute poverty (not having
enough to survive) are great. However, there are a wide variety of options for measuring wealth and well-being and for
establishing lines that separate the poor from the nonpoor. Economists have traditionally chosen income as the basis
for measuring and defining poverty, but even that choice allows for a multitude of options. While no one measure is
necessarily correct, experts argue that some are better than others.
A -International Measurements
In international economics, such as in statistics kept by the United Nations (UN), the measure of a countrys wealth is
generally based on its gross domestic product (GDP). GDP measures the aggregate yearly monetary income of all of
a countrys people and businesses. For the purposes of figuring poverty levels, GDP figures are usually calculated as
GDP (sometimes referred to as income) per capita. If two countries have the same aggregate GDP, the one with a
smaller population will have a higher GDP per capita. In other words, each person in the smaller country has a greater
share of the total national income.
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In the 1990s developed countries typically enjoyed average per capita yearly incomes in excess of $15,000 and often
$20,000. At the other extreme, the poorest countries often had per capita yearly incomes substantially under $1,000.
For example, according to one figure, the per capita income in Mozambique, a country in southeastern Africa and one
of the worlds poorest countries, was about $100 at the end of the 1990s. While people with such low incomes might
be able to produce or obtain some food and other basic needs, they generally have difficulty providing for themselves.
Levels of poverty also depend on how income and resources are distributed. Countries with high GDPs can have low
levels of poverty if people have relatively equal amounts of income and resources, such as in Scandinavia. On the
other hand, countries with equally high GDPs will have higher poverty rates if a few people have far more income and
resources than the rest. The United States is such a country.
B -U.S. Poverty Measurements
Each year the Bureau of the Census publishes the official poverty figures of the United States. People are said to be
poor if their incomes fall below a certain level called a threshold, also known as the poverty line. In this definition, the
poor do not have enough income to purchase or have easy access to basic goods and services, such as food,
clothing, housing, transportation, and education. The official U.S. poverty rate equals the number of people whose
incomes fall below the poverty threshold divided by the number of people counted in the census. Rates are also
determined for various groupings within the population, such as sex, age, and race.
A staff economist in the Social Security Administration (SSA), Mollie Orshansky, established the first U.S. poverty
thresholds in the early 1960s. They were calculated as the cost of a minimum adequate diet (the least expensive of
four nutritionally adequate food plans developed by the U.S Department of Agriculture) multiplied by three to account
for other expenses, such as clothing, housing, and medical costs. Since then, the thresholds have only been updated
to account for inflation in the prices of basic goods and services (see Inflation and Deflation).
The poverty line does not, however, change in real dollars (value in terms of what the dollar can purchase). In
principle, the 2001 threshold of $17,960 for a family of four (two adults and two children) represents the same
purchasing power as the 1963 threshold value of about $3,100 for the same type of family. Also, in contrast with the
governments of most developed countries, the U.S. government does not adjust poverty thresholds up or down with
changes in overall average income.
The government determines poverty status by comparing an individuals or familys income to a threshold limit. This
calculation defines income as money earned before taxes, plus transfers (grants to the poor) of cash from the
government. Welfare payments, therefore, can put people above the poverty level. The thresholds vary according to
family size, peoples age, and family composition. They do not change, however, across geographic regions, even
though the costs of living in different parts of the country can vary widely.
The government uses Census Bureau figures to determine how many people qualify for public assistance programs
for the poor. Different poverty thresholds apply to people in different living situations. For example, the U.S. poverty
threshold in 2001 was $8,494 for a single individual under the age of 65 with no dependents, rising to $39,223 for a
nine-person household. The official poverty threshold for a typical struggling family of a single mother with two children
was $14,269 in 2001.
In 1995 an expert panel organized by the National Academy of Sciences proposed many changes in the way the U.S.
government measures poverty. Foremost among these changes was a plan to gauge poverty each year according to
how much the average person or family spends on goods and services. The existing measurement relies on
government definitions of basic goods and services developed in 1967. A new measurement would be a step toward
defining U.S. poverty based on standards of living rather than only on costs of living. No changes have yet been
implemented.
C -Other Concepts of Poverty
Several other options exist in addition to definitions of poverty based on GDP per capita or on threshold income. Some
developed countries, such as most nations of the European Union, define poverty as having significantly fewer
resources than average, generally less than half of typical earnings or income. This definition bases the poverty figure
on mean (average) or median (the middle) income. These types of measurements contrast with the U.S. poverty line,
which is derived from the value of basic consumption rather than from average incomes. For example, the U.S.
poverty line for an individual amounted to only about 36 percent of typical earnings in 1996.
Another measure of poverty defines it in terms of human capitalthat is, a persons earning potential (generally
related to work skills). From this perspective, people with relatively high earning potentials are not poor because they
should be able to easily find work. People can increase their skill levels and earning potentials in a variety of ways,
such as by attending college, entering an apprenticeship program, or participating in an on-the-job or workplacesponsored training program. If the job market changes, new skills may become valuable and old ones less in demand,
as has happened with the introduction of computers to the workplace. Some governments have considered human
capital problems in their attempts to reduce poverty. Changes in the U.S. welfare system in 1996, for example,
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included a mandate to take money that had previously been budgeted for welfare transfers and channel it to jobtraining programs.
While income and skills can be measured fairly easily, other definitions of poverty are based on more subjective
concepts. A basic subjective definition of poverty is that people are poor if they believe they do not have enough
resources. Studies have shown, for example, that when people say they are poor, they tend to spend more on basic
goods, such as food, and less on discretionary items, such as televisions or cars. Other subjective definitions of
poverty focus on peoples quality of life. Quality-of-life measures might include the opportunity to freely choose
professions and lifestyles, the right to receive a full and free education, and freedom from political oppression. The
United Nations Development Program (UNDP) annually publishes The Human Development Report, which ranks the
degree of poverty in different countries using quality-of-life measures such as these.
VIII -ANTIPOVERTY PROGRAMS
National governments use poverty measurements to develop programs that provide assistance to the poor. All
developed countries have extensive antipoverty programs, primarily in the form of social security and welfare systems.
Most developing countries have some form of social security, but these programs typically do not provide enough to
keep many people out of poverty. International organizations also use poverty measurements to decide how much
money to give to national governments and how to advise countries on strategies for reducing poverty.
A -Fighting Poverty in Developing Countries
The governments of most developing countries provide limited assistance to prevent some poverty. Most have at least
minimal social security programs, which provide benefits during periods of unemployment, illness, or disability; at
retirement; and to the families of deceased workers. These programs usually provide support only for people who are
employed full-timea very small percentage of the population in most developing countries. Some countries, such as
Bangladesh and Nepal, provide mandatory full support only to government employees. A variety of organizations
support antipoverty programs in developing countries. They include (1) international government organizations, such
as the UN, (2) aid agencies run by developed countries, (3) nongovernmental (mostly nonprofit) organizations, and (4)
private development banks.
A1 -International Government Organizations
Many international governmental organizations have antipoverty programs. These include many regional
organizations, such as the Organization of American States and the European Union, as well as the UN, which
encompasses countries around the world. The UN operates many of the largest antipoverty programs through its
branch agencies. The UN Development Program runs a variety of programs in developing countries to increase
literacy rates, create jobs, share technologies from developed countries with developing countries, protect the
environment and natural resources, and ensure womens rights. Other UN agencies involved in alleviating poverty in
the developing world include the United Nations Childrens Fund, which provides food, medicine, and education
programs for children worldwide, and the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, which supports increased
agricultural productivity and improved food distribution and nutrition.
A2 -Government Aid Agencies
The governments of all developed nations have agencies devoted to international economic assistance. These
agencies lend or grant money to developing countries and also operate antipoverty programs in those countries. The
United States Agency for International Development (USAID), an arm of the State Department, sponsors many efforts
similar to those run by the UNDP. Economic and other kinds of assistance given to one nation by another, known as
bilateral aid, have humanitarian as well as political and economic aims. For instance, AID designs many of its
programs to reduce human suffering from poverty; the same programs may also aim to decrease the power of
unfriendly and undemocratic governments and to increase free trade, which are politically and economically beneficial
goals for the United States. Multilateral aid, such as that provided jointly by the many countries belonging to the UN,
has more directly humanitarian aims. For instance, the UN and its member countries support democratic governments
based essentially on the belief that democracy improves peoples well-being.
A3 -Nongovernmental Organizations
Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) operate with support from private citizens and foundations, volunteer
workers, and government grants. Developing countries themselves run some NGOs. Other NGOs operate out of
developed countries and are often associated with large church organizations. International NGOs that work to
alleviate poverty in the developing world include Cooperative for Assistance and Relief Everywhere, Inc. (CARE),
Oxfam International, and Catholic Relief Services, all of which sponsor programs that provide health services, food,
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education, and economic support. Doctors Without Borders and the Red Cross both provide medical assistance in
poor countries, especially during crises such as famines, wars, and disease epidemics.
A4 -Private Development Banks
Private development banks provide loans on favorable terms to governments or citizens of developing countries. They
do not give grants or charitable donations. Like NGOs, some of these banks operate within developing countries.
Bangladeshs Grameen Bank, one of the best-known small private development banks, has made small loans to
thousands of citizens experiencing hardship, including women who would otherwise have difficulty accessing funds
because of their social status. The World Bank (see International Bank for Reconstruction and Development), the bestknown large private development bank, operates internationally and has its headquarters in the United States. The
World Bank makes large loans to governments of developing countries to finance projects intended to strengthen the
economies of these nations. World Bank-financed projects have included building roads, dams for power generation,
and industries.
B -U.S. Antipoverty Programs
A number of U.S. government agencies use poverty statistics to decide how much to spend on welfare programs and
transfers of money, goods, and services to help the poor. Federal programs that aim directly at helping poor people in
the United States include Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), which provides short-term cash benefits
to many unemployed adults with children; Supplemental Security Income (SSI), which provides extra income to poor
people who are elderly, have disabilities, or are visually impaired (see Social Security); Medicaid, which provides
health care to those unable to afford to buy health insurance (see Medicare and Medicaid); the Earned Income Tax
Credit (EITC), which reduces the amount of federal tax owed by low-income working families and can result in a
refund check for those who owe no taxes; and the Child Tax Credit, which provides tax credits of $600 per eligible child
and may result in a refund check for poor families. The U.S. government also has invested heavily in strengthening the
child support enforcement system, resulting in increased collections of child support from parents not living with their
children.
In addition to the Census Bureaus official poverty thresholds used for guiding welfare programs, the U.S. Department
of Health and Human Services (HHS) publishes a set of poverty guidelines. For 2002, in the continental United States,
HHS poverty guidelines allowed targeted (restricted) benefits to go to individuals with incomes below $8,860 and
families with incomes lower than that figure plus $3,080 for each additional person in the family. These guidelines are
simplifications of the Census Bureau thresholds and are used for determining eligibility in a number of programs
targeted to low-income groups. Such targeted programs include Head Start, a supplemental education program for
young children of poor families; Food Stamps, a program that provides vouchers for the purchase of food; the National
School Lunch Program, which pays for poor students meals in public schools; and the Low-Income Energy Assistance
Program, which subsidizes the expense of electric and heating bills for poor people. For more information on U.S.
antipoverty programs and their history, see Welfare: Early Welfare Programs in the United States and Welfare:
Development of the Modern U.S. Welfare System.
In addition to government programs, many NGOs in the United States provide aid to the poor at local, state, and
national levels. One of the largest national NGOs addressing the problems of poverty is the United Way, which
provides a variety of types of assistance to people in need. Habitat for Humanity, another NGO with programs
throughout the country, recruits volunteers to build affordable housing for the poor.
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WESTPHALIA
Westphalia, Peace of, treaty, signed October 24, 1648, that closed the Thirty Years' War and readjusted the religious
and political affairs of Europe. It is so called because the negotiations, which began in 1644, took place in the German
cities of Mnster and Osnabrck, in Westphalia. The main participants were France and Sweden and their opponents
Spain and the Holy Roman Empire. By the terms of the treaty, the sovereignty and independence of each state of the
Holy Roman Empire was fully recognized, making the Holy Roman emperor virtually powerless.
Among the territorial provisions of the treaty were the following: France was confirmed in the possession of the city of
Pinerolo in Piedmont (Piemonte) and the bishoprics of Metz, Toul, and Verdun in Lorraine. Also, the town of Breisach
on the east bank of the Rhine River and most of Alsace were ceded to France. Sweden obtained western Pomerania,
with Stettin, Wismar, and the islands of Rgen and Poel, thus gaining control of the Baltic Sea.
The archbishopric of Bremen and the bishopric of Verden were also ceded to Sweden, and both Sweden and France
obtained the right to vote in the diet of the Holy Roman Empire. As compensation for its cessions in Pomerania,
Brandenburg obtained Cammin and the bishoprics of Halberstadt and Minden, together with succession to the
archbishopric of Magdeburg. Mecklenburg-Schwerin was enlarged by the bishoprics of Schwerin and Ratzeburg in
compensation for Wismar. Hessen-Kassel obtained the rich abbacy of Hersfeld, and Saxony (Sachsen) was allowed to
retain Lusatia. The Lower Palatinate was restored to Charles Louis, eldest son of the elector of the Palatinate
Frederick V, and an eighth electorate was created in his favor; the Upper Palatinate was confirmed to Bavaria. Also,
the de facto independence of Switzerland and of the United Provinces of the Netherlands was recognized. The overall
result of this political reorganization was that France, mainly at the expense of the Austrian Habsburgs, emerged as
the chief power on the Continent.
The provisions with respect to ecclesiastical affairs included the interdiction of all religious persecution in Germany and
the confirmation of the Treaty of Passau (1552) and the religious Peace of Augsburg (1555). According to the treaty,
the religion of each German state was to be determined by the religion of its princeRoman Catholic, Lutheran, or
Calvinist. If a prince changed his religion he would forfeit his lands; this provision was included as a method of
checking the spread of the Reformation. The Peace of Westphalia marked the close of the period of religious wars.
Thereafter, European armed struggles were waged principally for political ends.
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LEAGUE OF NATIONS
I -INTRODUCTION
League of Nations, international alliance for the preservation of peace. The league existed from 1920 to 1946. The first
meeting was held in Geneva, on November 15, 1920, with 42 nations represented. The last meeting was held on April
8, 1946; at that time the league was superseded by the United Nations (UN). During the league's 26 years, a total of
63 nations belonged at one time or another; 28 were members for the entire period.
II -THE COVENANT AND THE UNITED STATES
In 1918, as one of his Fourteen Points summarizing Allied aims in World War I, United States president Woodrow
Wilson presented a plan for a general association of nations. The plan formed the basis of the Covenant of the League
of Nations, the 26 articles that served as operating rules for the league. The covenant was formulated as part of the
Treaty of Versailles, which ended World War I, in 1919.
Although President Wilson was a member of the committee that drafted the covenant, it was never ratified by the U.S.
Senate because of Article X, which contained the requirement that all members preserve the territorial independence
of all other members, even to joint action against aggression. During the next two decades, American diplomats
encouraged the league's activities and attended its meetings unofficially, but the United States never became a
member. The efficacy of the league was, therefore, considerably lessened.
III -LEAGUE STRUCTURE
The machinery of the league consisted of an assembly, a council, and a secretariat. Before World War II (1939-1945),
the assembly convened regularly at Geneva in September; it was composed of three representatives for every
member state, each state having one vote. The council met at least three times each year to consider political disputes
and reduction of armaments; it was composed of several permanent membersFrance, Britain, Italy, Japan, and later
Germany and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR)and several nonpermanent members elected by the
assembly. The decisions of the council had to be unanimous. The secretariat was the administrative branch of the
league and consisted of a secretary general and a staff of 500 people. Several other bodies were allied with the
league, such as the Permanent Court of International Justice, called the World Court, and the International Labor
Organization.
IV -WORLD INVOLVEMENT
The league was based on a new concept: collective security against the criminal threat of war. Unfortunately, the
league rarely implemented its available resources, limited though they were, to achieve this goal.
One important activity of the league was the disposition of certain territories that had been colonies of Germany and
the Ottoman Empire before World War I. Supervision of these territories was awarded to league members in the form
of mandates. Mandated territories were given different degrees of independence, in accordance with their stage of
development, their geographic situation, and their economic status.
The league may be credited with certain social achievements. These include curbing international traffic in narcotics
and prostitution, aiding refugees of World War I, and surveying and improving health and labor conditions around the
world. In the area of preserving peace, the league had some minor successes, including settlement of disputes
between Finland and Sweden over the land Islands in 1921 and between Greece and Bulgaria over their mutual
border in 1925. The Great Powers, however, preferred to handle their own affairs; France occupied the Ruhr, and Italy
occupied Corfu (Krkira), both in 1923, in spite of the league.
Although Germany joined the league in 1926, the National Socialist (Nazi) government withdrew in 1933. Japan also
withdrew in 1933, after Japanese attacks on China were condemned by the league. The league failed to end the war
between Bolivia and Paraguay over the Chaco Boreal between 1932 and 1935 and to stop the Italian conquest of
Ethiopia begun in 1935.
Finally, the league was powerless to prevent the events in Europe that led to World War II. The USSR, a member
since 1934, was expelled following the Soviet attack on Finland in 1939. In 1940 the secretariat in Geneva was
reduced to a skeleton staff, and several small service units were moved to Canada and the United States. In 1946 the
league voted to effect its own dissolution, whereupon much of its property and organization were transferred to the
UN.
V -LEGACY
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Never truly effective as a peacekeeping organization, the lasting importance of the League of Nations lies in the fact
that it provided the groundwork for the UN. This international alliance, formed after World War II, not only profited by
the mistakes of the League of Nations but borrowed much of the organizational machinery of the league.
VI -MEMBERSHIP
The accompanying table lists the countries that were members of the international organization. Where no date is
given, the country was an original member of the league. The year in parentheses is the year of admission to the
league unless otherwise indicated.
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NORTH ATLANTIC TREATY ORGANIZATION

I -INTRODUCTION
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), regional defense alliance created by the North Atlantic Treaty signed on
April 4, 1949, at the beginning of the Cold War. NATO has its headquarters in Brussels, Belgium. The original purpose
of NATO was to defend Western Europe against possible attack by Communist nations, led by the Union of Soviet
Socialist Republics (USSR). The original signatories were Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy,
Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Greece and Turkey
were admitted to the alliance in 1952, West Germany in 1955, and Spain in 1982. In 1990 the newly unified Germany
replaced West Germany as a NATO member.
After the formal end of the Cold War in 1991, NATO reached out to former members of the Warsaw Pact, the
Communist military alliance created in 1955 by the USSR to counter NATO. In 1999 former Warsaw Pact members
Hungary, Poland, and the Czech Republic became members of NATO, bringing the total membership to 19 nations. In
2002 Russia, once the USSRs largest republic, became a limited partner in NATO as a member of the NATO-Russia
Council. The same year NATO invited the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, formerly part of the USSR, to
join, along with Slovenia, formerly part of Communist Yugoslavia, and Bulgaria, Romania, and Slovakia, once part of
Czechoslovakia. These countries were expected to become members of NATO in 2004. Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia,
and Romania were all former Warsaw Pact members.
NATO's purpose is to enhance the stability, well-being, and freedom of its members through a system of collective
security. Members of the alliance agree to defend one another from attack by other nations. Over the years the
existence of NATO has led to closer ties among its members and to a growing community of interests. The treaty itself
has provided a model for other collective security agreements.
II -BACKGROUND
In the years after World War II (1939-1945), many Western leaders believed the policies of the USSR threatened
international stability and peace. The forcible installation of Communist governments throughout Eastern Europe,
territorial demands by the Soviets, and their support of guerrilla war in Greece and regional separatism in Iran
appeared to many as the first steps of World War III. Such events prompted the signing of the Dunkirk Treaty in 1947
between Britain and France, which pledged a common defense against aggression. Subsequent events, including the
rejection by Eastern European nations of the European Recovery Program (Marshall Plan) and the creation of
Cominform, a European Communist organization, in 1947, led to the Brussels Treaty signed by most Western
European countries in 1948. Among the goals of that pact was the collective defense of its members. The Berlin
blockade that began in March 1948 led to negotiations between Western Europe, Canada, and the United States that
resulted in the North Atlantic Treaty.
III -TREATY PROVISIONS
The North Atlantic Treaty consists of a preamble and 14 articles. The preamble states the purpose of the treaty: to
promote the common values of its members and to unite their efforts for collective defense. Article 1 calls for peaceful
resolution of disputes. Article 2 pledges the parties to economic and political cooperation. Article 3 calls for
development of the capacity for defense. Article 4 provides for joint consultations when a member is threatened. Article
5 promises the use of the members' armed forces for collective self-defense. Article 6 defines the areas covered by
the treaty. Article 7 affirms the precedence of members' obligations under the United Nations Charter. Article 8
safeguards against conflict with any other treaties of the signatories. Article 9 creates a council to oversee
implementation of the treaty. Article 10 describes admission procedures for other nations. Article 11 states the
ratification procedure. Article 12 allows for reconsideration of the treaty. Article 13 outlines withdrawal procedures.
Article 14 calls for the deposition of the official copies of the treaty in the U.S. Archives.
IV -STRUCTURE
The highest authority within NATO is the North Atlantic Council, composed of permanent delegates from all members,
headed by a secretary general. It is responsible for general policy, budgetary outlines, and administrative actions, and
is the decision-making body of NATO. The Secretariat, various temporary committees, and the Military Committee are
among the committees that report to the North Atlantic Council. The secretary general runs the Secretariat, which
handles all the nonmilitary functions of the alliance. The temporary committees deal with specific assignments of the
council. The Military Committee consists of the chiefs of staff of the various armed forces; it meets twice a year.
Between such meetings the Military Committee, in permanent session with representatives of the members, defines
military policies. Below the Military Committee are the various geographical commands: Allied Command Europe,
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Allied Command Atlantic, and the Canada-U.S. Regional Planning Group. These commands are in charge of
deploying armed forces in their areas.
V -HISTORY
A -Early Years
Until 1950 NATO consisted primarily of a pledge by the United States to defend other members of the alliance under
the terms of Article 5 of the treaty. However, there was no effective military or administrative structure to implement this
pledge. The outbreak of the Korean War in June 1950 convinced the allies that the Soviets might act against a divided
Germany. The result was not only the creation of a military command system, but also the expansion of the
organization. In 1952 Greece and Turkey joined the alliance, and in 1955 West Germany was accepted under a
complicated arrangement whereby Germany would not be allowed to manufacture nuclear, biological, or chemical
weapons. In its first decade NATO was mainly a military organization dependent on U.S. power for security and for the
revival of Europe's economy and national governments.
B -The Cold War Era
NATOs importance grew with the worsening of relations between the Soviet Union and Western powers. As the Soviet
Union achieved parity in nuclear weaponry with Western powers, some European nations feared that the United
States would not honor its pledge to defend other members of the alliance. The 1960s were characterized by two
consequent developments in NATO: the withdrawal of France, under President Charles de Gaulle, from the
organization but not from the alliance in 1966; and the rising influence of the smaller nations, which sought to use
NATO as an instrument of dtente as well as defense.
The crisis in Czechoslovakia in 1968 was a turning point for NATO; thereafter it was viewed as a source of security for
Europe. America's involvement in the Vietnam War (1957-1975) further diminished U.S. authority and contributed to
dissatisfaction within NATO. Although the 1970s began with some agreements as a result of the Strategic Arms
Limitation Talks (SALT I), the decade ended in disillusionment as the Soviets rapidly built up their military arsenal.
NATO resolved this problem with the dual-track program of 1979, in which new defense efforts were accompanied by
new efforts at dtente. The 1980s opened with a deepening crisis between the East and West. In 1983 the USSR
failed to prevent the deployment of intermediate-range ballistic missiles, designed to cope with Soviet weapons
targeted on European cities. The signing of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) in 1987 presaged the
breakdown of the Warsaw Pact (see Arms Control). The decade ended with the apparent success of NATO in
surmounting the challenge of the Communist bloc.
C -End of the Cold War
In the late 1980s Communist governments began to crumble throughout Eastern Europe. West Germany absorbed
East Germany to form the Federal Republic of Germany in 1990, and the Warsaw Pact dissolved in early 1991. The
Soviet Union broke apart later that year, drastically reducing the military threat to NATO. Nevertheless, many Western
observers saw NATO in the post-Cold War era as an umbrella of security in a Europe buffeted by the nationalist
passions unleashed in Eastern Europe and the former USSR.
Following the dissolution of the USSR, NATO sought to strengthen relations with the newly independent nations that
had formerly made up the USSR and with other Central Eastern European countries that belonged to the Warsaw
Pact. The North Atlantic Cooperation Council, established in November 1991, provides a forum for consultations
between NATO members, Eastern European nations, and the former Soviet republics. In 1993 NATO members
endorsed a proposal to offer former Warsaw Pact members limited associations with NATO. Under the plan, known as
Partnership for Peace (PFP), nonmembers could be invited to participate in information sharing, joint exercises, and
peacekeeping operations. The Partnership for Peace was a step toward providing security and cooperation throughout
all of Europe.
Many former Soviet satellites were eager to join. Although Russia opposed their membership and threatened to
abstain from the Partnership for Peace, it did join eventually. Members of PFP may eventually attain full membership in
NATO if other membership requirements, such as a trained army to join NATO troops, are met.
In 1995, after a 30-year boycott, France returned to NATO, accepting a seat on the military committee after U.S.
president Bill Clinton accelerated plans for NATO's expansion. Also at this time, the United States and NATO began
serious efforts to bring to an end the continuing war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which threatened European stability.
Leaders of the NATO alliance authorized a campaign of air strikes against Bosnian Serb positions to force the Bosnian
Serbs to negotiate a peace settlement. After weeks of air attacks, the Bosnian Serb leaders agreed to be represented
at a peace conference near Dayton, Ohio, and in December 1995 the warring parties signed a peace accord that
ended the war (see Dayton Peace Accord).
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The following month, as part of the Dayton agreement, NATO deployed a multinational force of tens of thousands of
troops, known as the Implementation Force (IFOR), to monitor and enforce the cease-fire in Bosnia. A year later NATO
replaced this force with a smaller Stabilization Force (SFOR). Its mission was extended indefinitely to ensure stability
in the region.
D -Recent Developments
In March 1999 three former members of the Warsaw PactHungary, Poland, and the Czech Republicjoined the
alliance. The same month, NATO forces began a campaign of air strikes against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
(FRY, now the republic of Serbia and Montenegro). The NATO strikes were launched after Yugoslav president
Slobodan Miloevi refused to accept an international peace plan that would have granted a period of autonomy for
the Yugoslav province of Kosovo. The province was populated mainly by ethnic Albanians, many of whom were
fighting for autonomy or independence for Kosovo. Western leaders hoped the NATO attacks would bring Miloevi
back to the bargaining table. They also hoped to end the ongoing repression of the minority ethnic Albanians by the
FRY's ethnic Serbian majority.
The first NATO attacks were limited to a few dozen military targets, but the alliance dramatically expanded the air
campaign against the FRY after reports of widespread atrocities by Serb forces against Kosovo's ethnic Albanian
civilian population. By April 1999 more than 1,000 warplanes under NATO command were involved in strikes
throughout the republic. It was the largest military operation ever undertaken by NATO.
Instead of persuading Yugoslav leaders to accept a negotiated peace, the air strikes appeared to deepen Serbian
resolve to oppose NATO demands and intensified the violence directed at ethnic Albanians. Serbian army and police
forces destroyed villages, killed civilians in Kosovo, and forced hundreds of thousands of ethnic Albanians to flee the
province. The flight of refugees was the largest mass migration in Europe since World War II. Critics charged that
NATO failed to anticipate the refugee crisis.
International opposition to the NATO assault came swiftly. Russia, China, and India accused NATO of violating
international law by not seeking the approval of the United Nations (UN) before striking Yugoslavia. Russia broke off all
diplomatic ties with NATO and introduced a resolution to the UN Security Council that called for an end to the
bombardment. The resolution was rejected decisively. (Russia and NATO did not formally resume contact until early
2000.)
NATO was further criticized after warplanes under its command bombed civilian structures and convoys of ethnic
Albanians trying to flee Kosovo. NATO leadership apologized for the attacks, which it maintained were accidental, but
insisted that Miloevi was responsible for the continuing conflict. After NATO warplanes bombed China's embassy in
Belgrade by mistake, Chinese officials called on NATO to end the air campaign.
In June 1999, after 11 weeks of NATO bombing had incapacitated or destroyed much of Yugoslavia's infrastructure,
the FRY consented to most of the alliance's demands. FRY leaders signed an agreement that ended the bombing and
placed Kosovo under international control. As part of the agreement, a NATO-led multinational force of thousands of
troops occupied Kosovo to help ensure the safe return of ethnic Albanian refugees. The Kosovo peacekeeping force,
known as KFOR, saw its mission extended indefinitely to protect public safety, demilitarize Kosovo, and provide
humanitarian assistance. The agreement also mandated the disarmament of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), a
guerrilla army organized prior to the NATO campaign that had attempted to drive Serb troops and police forces from
the province.
The campaign against the FRY revealed the difficulty of sustaining military action that requires the consensus of the
entire 19-country NATO alliance, and it exposed differences of opinion in the expanded organization. During the
conflict, British leaders advocated attacking the FRY with ground forces, while other members of the alliance publicly
opposed plans to invade Kosovo. Despite these disagreements, the core members of the alliance continued to support
the air campaign.
NATO's involvement in Kosovo also indicated the expanded role of the alliance in European and world affairs. Prior to
the hostilities, military forces under NATO command served primarily to deter would-be attackers. During the Kosovo
operation, NATO attempted to use its military might to advance humanitarian goals, to force compliance with the
alliance's wishes, and to prevent the possibility of a wider conflict in Europe. NATO intervened in Kosovo despite the
fact that none of the alliance's members were directly attacked by the FRY.
In 2002 Russia became a limited partner in NATO as part of the NATO-Russia Council. The creation of the council
gave Russia the opportunity to take part in discussions about NATO decisions but without having a binding vote. Most
key decisions, such as NATOs expansion, remained exclusive to the 19-member council of ministers.
Also in 2002, NATO invited seven other countriesBulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovenia, and
Slovakiato become members of the organization. All seven were expected to be admitted in 2004, bringing NATOs
total membership to 26.
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KYTO PROTOCOL
Kyto Protocol, international treaty adopted in 1997 that sets concrete targets for developed countries to reduce the
greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to global warming, also known as climate change. The Kyto Protocol is a
supplementary treaty to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and went into force
in February 2005. More than 130 countries are party to it, with this figure set to rise; so far, however, the United States
has refused to ratify the treaty.
Under the Kyto Protocol, developed, or industrialized, countries are subject to legally binding commitments to curb
their emissions of the six main greenhouse gases: carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons,
perfluorocarbons, and sulfur hexafluoride. The targets are based mostly on the emission levels of these pollutants in
1990. In general the treaty calls for industrialized nations to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by 5 percent
below 1990 levels. The target goals must be accomplished by 2012, and commitments to start achieving the targets
begin in 2008. Developing countriesthat is, most countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin Americaare only subject to
general commitments.
The Kyto Protocol is a flexible treaty, allowing individual governments to decide what specific policies and reforms to
implement to meet their commitments. It also allows countries to offset some of their emissions by increasing the
carbon dioxide absorbed, or sequestered, by trees and other vegetation. However, eligible sequestration activities, and
the amount of offsetting allowed, are tightly controlled. In addition, the Kyto Protocol established three market-based
mechanisms to help bring down the costs of lowering emissions. These mechanisms are known as joint
implementation, the clean development mechanism (CDM), and emissions trading. Under joint implementation and the
CDM, a country can invest in a project to curb emissions in another country, where it is cheaper to do so, and thereby
acquire the resulting credit to offset against its own target. Under emissions trading, a country that exceeds its own
target of lowering emissions can transfer the surplus credits to another country that is finding it more difficult to reduce
its emissions. Developing countries can participate, but only through the CDM. Safeguards are in place to ensure that
emission credits are genuine.
Developed countries are subject to stringent reporting requirements, and a compliance committee considers any
suspected noncompliance. Countries commit to achieve a certain level of their target goal beginning in 2008. Any
country that fails to meet its emissions target may be penalized by having to meet a proportionally higher target for the
following commitment period and by having to prepare an action plan to show how emissions will be reined in.
The entry into force of the Kyto Protocol was delayed for several years while countries finalized its details. A package
of decisions, known as the Marrakech Accords, was finally agreed to in 2001, setting out in detail how the protocols
rules and mechanisms will work. Implementation is now underway, with the CDM already operational. Many
businesses are especially keen to participate in the market mechanisms, and the European Union (EU) launched a
regional emissions trading system in January 2005. Meeting the protocols targets, however, will be a challenge for
many countries.
Talks are due to start soon on next steps in the international effort to control climate change. Key controversial issues
will include when and how to negotiate stronger commitments for developing countries, and how to secure the
participation of the United States. Under the administration of Democratic president Bill Clinton, the United States
supported the protocol but never submitted it to Congress for ratification because of opposition from the Republican
Party. When Republican George W. Bush became president in 2001, the United States withdrew its support for the
protocol. Bush claimed that the treaty would harm the U.S. economy and was unfair to industrialized nations because
developing countries were not required to control their emissions.
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ASSOCIATION OF SOUTHEAST ASIAN NATIONS

ESTABLISHMENT
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations or ASEAN was established on 8 August 1967 in Bangkok by the five
original Member Countries, namely, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand. Brunei Darussalam
joined on 8 January 1984, Vietnam on 28 July 1995, Lao PDR and Myanmar on 23 July 1997, and Cambodia on 30
April 1999.
As of 2006, the ASEAN region has a population of about 560 million, a total area of 4.5 million square kilometers, a
combined gross domestic product of almost US$ 1,100 billion, and a total trade of about US$ 1,400 billion.
OBJECTIVES
The ASEAN Declaration states that the aims and purposes of the Association are:
(1) to accelerate economic growth, social progress and cultural development in the region and
(2) to promote regional peace and stability through abiding respect for justice and the rule of law in the relationship
among countries in the region and adherence to the principles of the United Nations Charter.
The ASEAN Vision 2020, adopted by the ASEAN Leaders on the 30th Anniversary of ASEAN, agreed on a shared
vision of ASEAN as a concert of Southeast Asian nations, outward looking, living in peace, stability and prosperity,
bonded together in partnership in dynamic development and in a community of caring societies.
In 2003, the ASEAN Leaders resolved that an ASEAN Community shall be established comprising three pillars,
namely, ASEAN Security Community, ASEAN Economic Community and ASEAN Socio-Cultural Community.
FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES
ASEAN Member Countries have adopted the following fundamental principles in their relations with one another, as
contained in the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia (TAC):

mutual respect for the independence, sovereignty, equality, territorial integrity, and national identity of all nations;

the right of every State to lead its national existence free from external interference, subversion or coercion;

non-interference in the internal affairs of one another;

settlement of differences or disputes by peaceful manner; renunciation of the threat or use of force; and

effective cooperation among themselves.

ASEAN SECURITY COMMUNITY

Through political dialogue and confidence building, no tension has escalated into armed confrontation among ASEAN
Member Countries since its establishment more than three decades ago.
To build on what has been constructed over the years in the field of political and security cooperation, the ASEAN
Leaders have agreed to establish the ASEAN Security Community (ASC). The ASC shall aim to ensure that countries
in the region live at peace with one another and with the world in a just, democratic and harmonious environment.
The members of the Community pledge to rely exclusively on peaceful processes in the settlement of intra-regional
differences and regard their security as fundamentally linked to one another and bound by geographic location,
common vision and objectives. It has the following components: political development; shaping and sharing of norms;
conflict prevention; conflict resolution; post-conflict peace building; and implementing mechanisms. It will be built on
the strong foundation of ASEAN processes, principles, agreements, and structures, which evolved over the years and
are contained in the following major political agreements:

ASEAN Declaration, Bangkok, 8 August 1967;

Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality Declaration, Kuala Lumpur, 27 November 1971;

Declaration of ASEAN Concord, Bali, 24 February 1976;

Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia, Bali, 24 February 1976;

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ASEAN Declaration on the South China Sea, Manila, 22 July 1992;

Treaty on the Southeast Asia Nuclear Weapon-Free Zone, Bangkok, 15 December 1997;

ASEAN Vision 2020, Kuala Lumpur, 15 December 1997; and

Declaration of ASEAN Concord II, Bali, 7 October 2003.

In recognition of security interdependence in the Asia-Pacific region, ASEAN established the ASEAN Regional Forum
(ARF) in 1994. The ARFs agenda aims to evolve in three broad stages, namely the promotion of confidence building,
development of preventive diplomacy and elaboration of approaches to conflicts.
The present participants in the ARF include: Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Canada, China, European
Union, India, Indonesia, Japan, Democratic Republic of Korea, Republic of Korea (ROK), Lao PDR, Malaysia,
Mongolia, Myanmar, New Zealand, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, the Russian Federation, Singapore,
Thailand, the United States, and Viet Nam.
The ARF discusses major regional security issues in the region, including the relationship amongst the major powers,
non-proliferation, counter-terrorism, transnational crime, South China Sea and the Korean Peninsula, among others.
ASEAN ECONOMIC COMMUNITY
The ASEAN Economic Community shall be the end-goal of economic integration measures as outlined in the ASEAN
Vision 2020. Its goal is to create a stable, prosperous and highly competitive ASEAN economic region in which there is
a free flow of goods, services, investment and a freer flow of capital, equitable economic development and reduced
poverty and socio-economic disparities in year 2020.
The ASEAN Economic Community shall establish ASEAN as a single market and production base, turning the
diversity that characterises the region into opportunities for business complementation and making the ASEAN a more
dynamic and stronger segment of the global supply chain. ASEANs strategy shall consist of the integration of ASEAN
and enhancing ASEANs economic competitiveness.
In moving towards the ASEAN Economic Community, ASEAN has agreed on the following:

institute new mechanisms and measures to strengthen the implementation of its existing economic initiatives
including the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA), ASEAN Framework Agreement on Services (AFAS) and ASEAN
Investment Area (AIA);

accelerate regional integration in the following priority sectors by 2010: air travel, agro-based products,
automotives, e-commerce, electronics, fisheries, healthcare, rubber-based products, textiles and apparels, tourism,
and wood-based products.

facilitate movement of business persons, skilled labour and talents; and

strengthen the institutional mechanisms of ASEAN, including the improvement of the existing ASEAN Dispute
Settlement Mechanism to ensure expeditious and legally-binding resolution of any economic disputes.

Launched in 1992, the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) is now in place. It aims to promote the regions competitive
advantage as a single production unit. The elimination of tariff and non-tariff barriers among Member Countries is
expected to promote greater economic efficiency, productivity, and competitiveness.
As of 1 January 2005, tariffs on almost 99 percent of the products in the Inclusion List of the ASEAN-6 (Brunei
Darussalam, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand) have been reduced to no more than 5
percent. More than 60 percent of these products have zero tariffs. The average tariff for ASEAN-6 has been brought
down from more than 12 percent when AFTA started to 2 percent today. For the newer Member Countries, namely,
Cambodia, Lao PDR, Myanmar, and Viet Nam (CLMV), tariffs on about 81 percent of their Inclusion List have been
brought down to within the 0-5 percent range.
Other major integration-related economic activities of ASEAN include the following:

Roadmap for Financial and Monetary Integration of ASEAN in four areas, namely, capital market development,
capital account liberalisation, liberalisation of financial services and currency cooperation;

trans-ASEAN transportation network consisting of major inter-state highway and railway networks, including the
Singapore to Kunming Rail-Link, principal ports, and sea lanes for maritime traffic, inland waterway transport, and
major civil aviation links;

Roadmap for Integration of Air Travel Sector;

interoperability and interconnectivity of national telecommunications equipment and services, including the ASEAN
Telecommunications Regulators Council Sectoral Mutual Recognition Arrangement (ATRC-MRA) on Conformity
Assessment for Telecommunications Equipment;
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trans-ASEAN energy networks, which consist of the ASEAN Power Grid and the Trans-ASEAN Gas Pipeline
Projects;

Initiative for ASEAN Integration (IAI) focusing on infrastructure, human resource development, information and
communications technology, and regional economic integration primarily in the CLMV countries;

Visit ASEAN Campaign and the private sector-led ASEAN Hip-Hop Pass to promote intra-ASEAN tourism; and

Agreement on the ASEAN Food Security Reserve.

ASEAN SOCIO-CULTURAL COMMUNITY

The ASEAN Socio-Cultural Community, in consonance with the goal set by ASEAN Vision 2020, envisages a
Southeast Asia bonded together in partnership as a community of caring societies and founded on a common regional
identity.
The Community shall foster cooperation in social development aimed at raising the standard of living of disadvantaged
groups and the rural population, and shall seek the active involvement of all sectors of society, in particular women,
youth, and local communities. ASEAN shall ensure that its work force shall be prepared for, and benefit from,
economic integration by investing more resources for basic and higher education, training, science and technology
development, job creation, and social protection.
ASEAN shall further intensify cooperation in the area of public health, including in the prevention and control of
infectious and communicable diseases. The development and enhancement of human resources is a key strategy for
employment generation, alleviating poverty and socio-economic disparities, and ensuring economic growth with equity.
Among the on-going activities of ASEAN in this area include the following:

ASEAN Work Programme for Social Welfare, Family, and Population;

ASEAN Work Programme on HIV/AIDS;

ASEAN Work Programme on Community-Based Care for the Elderly;

ASEAN Occupational Safety and Health Network;

ASEAN Work Programme on Preparing ASEAN Youth for Sustainable

Employment and Other Challenges of Globalisation;

ASEAN University Network (AUN) promoting collaboration among seventeen member universities ASEAN;

ASEAN Students Exchange Programme, Youth Cultural Forum, and the ASEAN Young Speakers Forum;

The Annual ASEAN Culture Week, ASEAN Youth Camp and ASEAN Quiz;

ASEAN Media Exchange Programme; and

Framework for Environmentally Sustainable Cities (ESC) and ASEAN Agreement on Transboundary Haze
Pollution.

EXTERNAL RELATIONS
The ASEAN Vision 2020 affirmed an outward-looking ASEAN playing a pivotal role in the international community and
advancing ASEANs common interests.
Building on the Joint Statement on East Asia Cooperation of 1999, cooperation between the Southeast and Northeast
Asian countries has accelerated with the holding of an annual summit among the leaders of ASEAN, China, Japan,
and the Republic of Korea (ROK) within the ASEAN Plus Three process.
ASEAN Plus Three relations continue to expand and deepen in the areas of security dialogue and cooperation,
transnational crime, trade and investment, environment, finance and monetary, agriculture and forestry, energy,
tourism, health, labour, culture and the arts, science and technology, information and communication technology,
social welfare and development, youth, and rural development and poverty eradication. There are now thirteen
ministerial-level meetings under the ASEAN Plus Three process.
Bilateral trading arrangements have been or are being forged between ASEAN Member Countries and China, Japan,
and the ROK. These arrangements will serve as the building blocks of an East Asian Free Trade Area as a long term
goal.
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ASEAN continues to develop cooperative relations with its Dialogue Partners, namely, Australia, Canada, China, the
European Union, India, Japan, the ROK, New Zealand, the Russian Federation, the United States of America, and the
United Nations Development Programme. ASEAN also promotes cooperation with Pakistan in some areas of mutual
interest.
Consistent with its resolve to enhance cooperation with other developing regions, ASEAN maintains contact with other
inter-governmental organisations, namely, the Economic Cooperation Organisation, the Gulf Cooperation Council, the
Rio Group, the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation, the South Pacific Forum, and through the recently
established Asian-African Sub-Regional Organisation Conference. Most ASEAN Member Countries also participate
actively in the activities of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM), and the
East Asia-Latin America Forum (EALAF).
STRUCTURES AND MECHANISMS
The highest decision-making organ of ASEAN is the Meeting of the ASEAN Heads of State and Government. The
ASEAN Summit is convened every year. The ASEAN Ministerial Meeting (Foreign Ministers) is held annually.
Ministerial meetings on the following sectors are also held regularly: agriculture and forestry, economics (trade),
energy, environment, finance, health, information, investment, labour, law, regional haze, rural development and
poverty alleviation, science and technology, social welfare, telecommunications, transnational crime, transportation,
tourism, youth. Supporting these ministerial bodies are committees of senior officials, technical working groups and
task forces.
To support the conduct of ASEANs external relations, ASEAN has established committees composed of heads of
diplomatic missions in the following capitals: Beijing, Berlin, Brussels, Canberra, Geneva, Islamabad, London,
Moscow, New Delhi, New York, Ottawa, Paris, Riyadh, Seoul, Tokyo, Washington D.C. and Wellington.
The Secretary-General of ASEAN is appointed on merit and accorded ministerial status. The Secretary-General of
ASEAN, who has a five-year term, is mandated to initiate, advise, coordinate, and implement ASEAN activities. The
members of the professional staff of the ASEAN Secretariat are appointed on the principle of open recruitment and
region-wide competition.
ASEAN has several specialized bodies and arrangements promoting inter-governmental cooperation in various fields
including the following:
ASEAN Agricultural Development Planning Centre, ASEAN-EC Management Centre, ASEAN Centre for Energy,
ASEAN Earthquake Information Centre, ASEAN Foundation, ASEAN Poultry Research and Training Centre, ASEAN
Regional Centre for Biodiversity Conservation, ASEAN Rural Youth Development Centre, ASEAN Specialized
Meteorological Centre, ASEAN Timber Technology Centre, ASEAN Tourism Information Centre, and the ASEAN
University Network.
In addition, ASEAN promotes dialogue and consultations with professional and business organisations with related
aims and purposes, such as the ASEAN-Chambers of Commerce and Industry, ASEAN Business Forum, ASEAN
Tourism Association, ASEAN Council on Petroleum, ASEAN Ports Association, Federation of ASEAN Shipowners,
ASEAN Confederation of Employers, ASEAN Fisheries Federation, ASEAN Vegetable Oils Club, ASEAN Intellectual
Property Association, and the ASEAN-Institutes for Strategic and International Studies. Furthermore, there are 58 NonGovernmental Organizations (NGOs), which have formal affiliations with ASEAN.
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NON-ALIGNED MOVEMENT
Nonaligned Movement (NAM), loose association of countries that, during the Cold War, had no formal commitment to
either of the two power blocs in the world, which were led by the United States and the Union of Soviet Socialist
Republics (USSR). The group was formed in September 1961 by a conference of 25 heads of state in Belgrade,
Yugoslavia. The conference was organized by leaders of countries that had recently freed themselves from foreign
domination and rejected renewed ties to any big power. Prominent among these leaders were Prime Minister
Jawaharlal Nehru of India and Presidents Sukarno of Indonesia, Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt, Kwame Nkrumah of
Ghana, Skou Tour of Guinea, and Josip Broz Tito of Yugoslavia.
The movement has grown to include more than 110 countries, mostly from Africa, Asia, and Latin America. NAM
conferences are held every three years. The group has no formal administrative body; at each NAM conference the
office of chairperson rotates to the head of state of the host country.
Membership in NAM is distinct from neutrality in that it implies an active participation in international affairs and
judgment of issues on their merits rather than from predetermined positions. Thus, a large majority of NAM nations
opposed the United States during the Vietnam War (1957-1975) and the USSR after its 1979 invasion of Afghanistan.
In practice, however, many NAM nations leaned heavily toward one power bloc or the other.
The early members of NAM saw themselves as an important buffer between rival military alliances, decreasing the
possibility of a major confrontation. Any pretension of being a force, however, was tempered by the diversity of the
nations governments, which ranged from leftist to ultraconservative and from democratic to dictatorial, and by the
economic and military weaknesses that often made them dependent on foreign aid from the big power blocs.
The dissolution of the USSR in 1991 required NAM nations to redefine their role in a world where intense ideological
and military rivalry between two superpowers was no longer a factor. Today the movement focuses on promoting
cooperation between developing countries and on advocating solutions to global economic and political problems.
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WARSAW PACT
Warsaw Pact (formally the Warsaw Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation, and Mutual Assistance), military alliance of eight
European Communist nations, enacted to counter the rearmament of West Germany, officially called the Federal
Republic of Germany (FRG), and its admission to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The treaty was
signed in Warsaw, Poland, on May 14, 1955, by Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia (now the Czech Republic and
Slovakia), East Germany (now part of the united Federal Republic of Germany), Hungary, Poland, Romania, and the
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). The alliance was dominated by the USSR, which kept strict control over
the other countries in the pact.
In 1961 Albania broke off diplomatic relations with the USSR because of ideological differences and in 1968 withdrew
from the pact. From the mid-1950s through the 1980s, two major bodies carried out the functions of the Warsaw Pact:
the Political Consultative Committee and the Unified Command of Pact Armed Forces, both headquartered in Moscow.
Under the terms of the treaty, the Political Consultative Committee coordinated all activities, except those purely
military, and the Unified Command of Pact Armed Forces had authority over the troops assigned to it by member
states. It was agreed that the supreme commander would be from the USSR. The Warsaw Pact's only military action
was directed against Czechoslovakia, a member state. (In the autumn of 1956, the USSR took unilateral military action
against Hungary, another Warsaw Pact member state, killing thousands of Hungarians and causing 200,000 to flee the
country.) In August 1968, after the Czech government enacted reforms offensive to the USSR, forces of the USSR,
Poland, Hungary, East Germany, and Bulgaria invaded Czechoslovakia and forced a return to a Soviet-style system.
Romania opposed the invasion and did not participate, but remained a member.
Although the Warsaw Pact was officially renewed in 1985 for another 20 years, the political transformation of Eastern
Europe at the end of the 1980s profoundly weakened the organization. The USSR began withdrawing its troops from
other Warsaw Pact countries, and East Germany pulled out to join West Germany as the reunified nation of Germany
in October 1990. All joint military functions ceased at the end of March 1991, and in July leaders of the remaining six
member nations agreed to dissolve the alliance.
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