Nuclear Blackmail and Nuclear Balance Paperback – July 1, 1987

In the first three decades of the Cold War, both the United States and the Soviet Union threatened to use nuclear weapons against one another and against China. The term used to describe these threats depends on the frame of reference. Regardless of which country made the threat, the recipient called these threats "nuclear blackmail," while the aggressor referred to the threat as "coercion" or "deterrence." Betts uses unclassified documents from the 1940's to the 1970's to analyze the circumstances and results of nuclear threats made by the United States and the Soviet Union. He acknowledges that one primary weakness in his study was, "that there is no reliable evidence about what leaders in Moscow or Beijing were thinking during the crises," (p. 18) and as a result, "the evidence does not permit precise conclusions about the coercive efficacy of the nuclear signal," (p. 44). Overall the book is well researched. Betts extensively used the personal notes and tapes recordings of presidents and their top advisors from meetings during each crisis in addition to press releases, speeches, and policy statements from other books and articles. The sources the author used are well documented in footnotes that frequently take up a third of the page. For the benefit of the reader not familiar with the theories of nuclear deterrence, Betts starts off his book with a chapter that gives an introduction to the theories and doctrines of nuclear deterrence. He covers basic deterrence versus extended deterrence. In order to help categorize and explain each president's approach to nuclear threats, Betts outlines two basic nuclear strategies: risk maximizing (Russian Roulette) and risk minimizing (chess). In each of the cases that Betts examines, he refers back to these basic principles of deterrence and defines the president's actions in terms of the risk maximizing or risk minimizing approach. The cases examined in the book are divided into two groups: low-risk and high-risk. They also happen to be arranged chronologically with one exception (the Soviet-Chinese border clashes of 1969). Otherwise, all the cases categorized as low-risk occurred prior to or during 1958, and all the cases that were categorized as high-risk occurred after 1958. In the low-risk category, Betts discusses the Berlin Blockade of 1948, the Korean War from 1950 to 1953, the Asian Crises of 1954 through 1955, the Suez Crisis of 1956, the Lebanon and Taiwan Straits in 1958, and the Soviet-Chinese border clashes of 1969. What distinguishes these low-risk cases was that the nuclear threats were not made directly to a nuclear opponent, they were made over issues that were of secondary interest to the super power, and the threats were made from a position of nuclear superiority. In the high-risk category, Betts covers the Berlin Deadline Crisis of 1958-59, the Berlin Aide-Mémoire Crisis of 1961, the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, the Middle East War of 1973, and the Carter Doctrine of 1980. These cases differ significantly from the low-risk cases in that the nuclear threats were made directly against nuclear powers, they involved the critical security zones of the super powers, and they were not necessarily made from a position of nuclear superiority. The remainder of the book discusses the theory behind American, Russian, and Chinese decision thought process, their attitudes about nuclear war, and why they were willing to risk such a war in each of the cases outlines in the low-risk and high-risk chapters. The underlying theme of this book is that all American Presidents from Truman to Carter at one point or another used nuclear coercion or blackmail against either the Soviet Union or against China. Each president had a different approach to making such threats. One very interesting trend to note from Betts' study was that nuclear blackmail was predominantly used by the Americans against the Soviets and the Chinese. This may come as a surprise to a younger American generation because of the education and belief that the United States upholds higher moral standards than the rest of the world. It does make sense though. Considering the American position of nuclear superiority and conventional inferiority during the first fifteen to twenty years of the Cold War, the nuclear card was the only trump card the American's had to deal with threats from the Soviets and the Chinese. Eventually the Soviets achieved a position of nuclear parity, so the frequency of American threats dropped substantially. Once parity had been achieved, there existed in any crisis an underlying threat of mutually assured destruction. Another important trend to notice in this book is the difference between statements of government officials at the time of a crisis and their recollections years later. Psychologists have done many studies of the fallibility of human memory-especially in the field of "eye-witness testimony." They have proven that witnesses to an event can be influenced within hours after the event and say they remember something that never actually happened. There are several good examples in this book. Key figures involved in a given crisis wrote or said their opinion at the time in speeches, interviews, and articles, but when asked about the crisis many years later they claim their opinion about the crisis was entirely different than what is reflected in the records. This is not to say that interviews with participants of an event are useless. They are considered extremely valuable, primary sources for historical research. However, it is important to understand the fallibility of human memory, and if someone's testimony is different than what their own records or statements claim at the time of the event-more value should be placed in the records or statements made at the time of the event than in the discrepant recollections made much later. Nuclear Blackmail and Nuclear Balance provides some very important historical perspectives on the threat of using nuclear weapons. After reading about how Eisenhower dealt with the Chinese in the Taiwan Straits crises of the 1950's and reading about Beijing's current saber-rattling over reunification with Taiwan, it will be very interesting to see the reaction of President Clinton and his successor to Chinese threats of nuclear war.