Asymmetric Conflict 2010
Abstract
The objective of this task was to evaluate how the challenges of asymmetric conflict will have changed over the two-decade period from the wake-up call provided by the Persian Gulf War to 2010. As a result of investments made under the Defense Counterproliferation Initiative, U.S. forces ought to be much better prepared to project and prevail against regional adversaries armed with chemical and biological weapons. But the nature of the asymmetric challenge is increasingly debated within the U.S. defense community, leading many to conclude that the asymmetric problem of the future may not be an attack on power projection forces in theater with weapons of mass destruction. Various camps have emerged. One emphasizes terrorist-style attacks on U.S. civilians (and thus Homeland Defense). Another emphasizes strategies in theater that play on the perceived American aversion to casualties and/or quagmires. A third camp coalesces around the view that the major asymmetric challenge of the future is posed not by a small power in a regional war of aggression but by China in a war over Taiwan under a nuclear shadow. The fourth camp is focused on the canonical problem -- major theater war against a WMD-armed regional aggressor, and the so-called lesser-included smaller scale contingencies. Think of a replay of the Persian Gulf War or the Korean War, but this time against an aggressor willing and able to exploit robust NBC assets. The strategic value of counterproliferation is that it helps to ensure that nuclear threats are credible where they are necessary -- to deter large-scale exploitation of NBC weapons to gain strategic advantage -- and are not necessary where they are not clearly credible -- for less damaging uses of NBC.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Nov 01, 2000
- Accession Number
- ADA457554
Entities
People
- Brad Roberts
Organizations
- Institute for Defense Analyses