This essay aims to find a link between NATO policy in Europe from 2014-2022 to Russia’sdecision to invade Ukraine in February 2022. A process tracing methodology is used in conjunction with an offensive realist framework to demonstrate NATO’s role in influencing Russian defense policy. The investigation finds US global hegemony dictates NATOambitions, leading the Alliance to adopt aggressive policy in Eastern Europe. In turn, Russia identifies NATO as a threat in its military doctrine and proceeds to strengthen its defensive capabilities. Putin outlines Russia’s need for a buffer zone between it and NATO, a prime target for such a place being Ukraine. A failure by both parties to accommodate each others interests leaves Russia with a convincing rationale to seek military force in securing a more favorable defensive position.

This master's thesis focuses on Russian international trade of conventional weapons. Arms trade had played an important role during the Cold War as a tool to gain influence. Currently, Russia is using it to regain the influence it had lost after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in various regions around the world. At the same time, Russia is the second largest arms exporter after the United States. The thesis briefly addresses past Russian arms trade, but the main focus is on the decade between 2010 and 2020. It answers the question whether Russia currently uses its arms trade opportunistically to only maximalise its economic profit or whether it serves as a part of a larger strategy to balance the influence of the United States. The work focuses on Asia, the MENA region, and Latin America. It analyses circumstances surrounding arms deliveries from Russia into the countries in these regions. The thesis consists of several case studies, which illustrate the evolution of Russian approach towards arms trade. It reaches the conclusion that, for Russia, international arms trade is an important tool to help reach its foreign policy goals. Russia maintains strong and stable relations with the most important trade partners to support its defence industry. At the same time, other countries receive...

Nuclear weapons are considered to be the most destructive military weapons in the modem era. The combination of extensive destruction and the fact that nuclear missiles cannot be stopped makes nuclear weapons a major game changer in international security. When a country manages to weaponize nuclear material and is also able to make a delivery system the balance of power in the region is shifted. The roots of deterrence theory and modem balance of power theory are based on nuclear weapons capabilities between countries. In Southwest Asia, nuclear proliferation is common and has an important influence on the balance of power in the region. The combination of a turbulent history and a threatening environment are suitable for countries to try and develop nuclear weapons in order to overcome a security dilemma. This paper will attempt to demonstrate that nuclear proliferation in Southwest Asia is used as a deterrent against neighboring enemies and not a means to achieve regional dominance. This paper will illustrate this phenomenon through three case studies- Israel, Pakistan, and Iran. Each case will look at the historical evolution, political development, and military/security condition of each country and how each has influenced the decision of its leaders to commit to nuclear proliferation.

On t.p.: Master of Arts (International Studies) / Thesis (MA)--Stellenbosch University, 2001 / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This study attempts to examine the chances that South Africa's President Thabo Mbeki has in changing the unbalanced relations between the powerful countries of the North and the marginalised developing world. In doing so, it investigates how the leaders of Northern countries received the New Africa Initiative which was launched by a group of African heads of states, including Mbeki, at the G-8 summit in Genoa in July 2001. Unlike preceding works, this study takes a systemic perspective. The power relations in international affairs are pointed out with specific consideration of South Africa's status as an emerging middle power in the international system. Special recognition is furthermore given to the question as to whether there is currently a global re-think under way about globalisation, the ideology of neo-liberalism and the interaction with poor countries in the global political economy. The study comes to the conclusion that despite the fact that South Africa as a middle power is subordinate to the powerful countries of the North when it comes to effecting global change, and despite the outcomes of Genoa that do not indicate that an equitable global order is close, there are considerable trends and developments visible which support what Mbeki is trying to achieve. As a consequence, it is contended that his "Global Initiative" has a much better chance of being successful than the plea for a New International Economic Order in the 1970s. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Hierdie studie poog om die volgende te ondersoek: die waarskynlikheid dat Suid-Afrika se President, Thabo Mbeki, die ongebalanseerde verhoudinge tussen die magtige lande van die Noorde en die gemarginaliseerde ontwikkelende wêreld kan verander. Gevolglik word gekyk in hoe die leiers van die Noordelike lande die "New Africa Inititiative", wat in Julie 2001 by die G-8 spitsberaad in Genoa deur 'n groep staatshoofde van verskeie Afrikalande (Mbeki ingesluit) bekend gestel is, ontvang het. Anders as in vorige studies, word 'n sistematiese benadering in hierdie studie gevolg. Spesiale aandag word verder geskenk aan die vraag of daar huidiglik 'n globale heroorweging onderweg is. met petrekking tot _globalisering, die ideologie van neo-liberalisme en die hantering van arm lande binne die globale politeke ekonomie. Die studie 'kom tot die gevolgtrekking dat daar merkbare neigings en ontwikkelinge is wat Mbeki se werk ondersteun. Dit is ten spyte van die feit dat Suid-Afrika, as middelrnag, ondergeskik is aan die Noordelike lande wanneer invloede op globale veranderinge ter sprake is, en nieteenstaande die gevolge van Genoa, wat geensins aandui dat 'n regverdige globale bedeling naby is nie. Gevolglik word geargumenteer dat hierdie "Globale Inisiatief' 'n beter kans het om suksesvol te wees as die pleidooi vir 'n "Nuwe Internasionale Ekonomiese Orde" tydens die 1970s.

Em decorrência do fim da União Soviética, a China e os Estados Unidos perderam um rival importante no Leste Asiático, o que alterou substancialmente a balança de poder regional, levando-a da multipolaridade à bipolaridade, ou seja, desde 1991 a China e os Estados Unidos são os únicos polos de poder no Leste Asiático. Para melhorar sua posição relativa nesta balança de poder, a República Popular da China (RPC) vem investindo pesadamente na modernização do Exército de Libertação do Povo (ELP), que é o principal segmento das forças armadas chinesas. O tema deste estudo é a distribuição de poder no Leste Asiático entre China e Estados Unidos, precisamente o impacto da modernização militar do ELP sobre tal distribuição, considerando tanto os grandes agregados econômicos na análise da modernização, quanto os inventários militares e seus meios de emprego. Isso nos leva ao problema geral da presente pesquisa, que consiste na seguinte questão: qual o impacto da modernização militar da China sobre a balança de poder do Leste Asiático? O método utilizado será o de estudo de caso – comparação focada e estruturada, o que nos permitirá comparar os valores das variáveis independentes dos dois casos em tela (RPC e EUA). Tal comparação terá um caráter sincrônico, ou seja, considerará os valores das variáveis em um dado momento, apenas. Conclui-se que a modernização militar do ELP mudou a distribuição de poder no Leste Asiático em favor da China. / After the demise of Soviet Union, China and United States lost a great rival in the East Asian region, which shifted the regional balance of Power from multipolarity to bipolarity, in other words since 1991 China and United States are the remaining poles of power in the East Asia. To improve its relative position in this balance of power, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has invested continuously in the modernization of People’s Liberation Army (PLA), the main branch of the armed forces. The issue of this research is the distribution of power in the East Asian region between China and United States (US), precisely the meaning of PLA’s modernization for the regional balance of power, analyzing economic aggregate data, the military inventories, and its means of use. The general question of this research is: what’s the meaning of PLA’s modernization for the balance of power in the East Asian Region? Case study is our method, precisely the structured and focused comparison, which permits to compare the values of independent variables in both cases (PRC and US). The comparison approaches the values of variables in a single moment. One concludes that PLA’s modernization has shifted the regional balance of power in favor of China.

In my dissertation on 'Security Cooperation as a Way to Stop the Spread of Nu-clear Weapons? Nuclear Nonproliferation Policies of the United States towards the Federal Republic of Germany and Israel, 1945-1968', I study the use of security assistance as nonproliferation policy. I use insights of the Structural Realist and the Rational Institutionalist theories of International Relations to explain, respectively, important foreign policy goals and the basic orientation of policies, on the one hand, and the practical workings and effects of security cooperation on states’ behavior, on the other hand. Moreover, I consider the relations of the United States (US) with the two states in light of bargaining theory to explain the level of US ability to press other states to its preferred courses of action. The study is thus a combination of theory proposing and testing and historic description and explanation. It is also policy-relevant as I seek general lessons regarding the use of security cooperation as nonproliferation policy. I show that the US sought to keep the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) from acquiring nuclear weapons in order to avoid crises with Moscow and threats to the cohesion of NATO. But the US also saw it as necessary to credibly guarantee the security of the FRG and treat it well in order to ensure that it would remain satisfied as an ally and without own nuclear weapons. Through various institutionalized security cooperation schemes, the US succeeded in this – though the FRG did acquire an option to produce nuclear weapons. The US opposed Israel’s nuclear weapon ambitions in turn because of an expectation that Arab states’ reactions could otherwise result in greater tension and risks of escalation and a worse balance-of-power in the area. But as also a US-Israel alliance could have led to stronger Arab-Soviet ties and thus a worse balance-of-power, and as it was not in US in-terest to be tied to Israel’s side in all regional issues, the US was not prepared to guarantee Israel’s security in a formal, credible way like it did in West Germany’s case. The US failed to persuade Israel to forgo producing nuclear weapons but gradually, an opaque nu-clear status combined with US arms sales that helped Israel to maintain a conventional military advantage over Arabs emerged as a solution to Israel’s security strategy. Because of perceptions that Israel and the FRG had also other options than cooperation with the US, and because the US ability to punish them for unwanted action was limited, these states were able to offer resistance when the US pressed its nonproliferation stance on them. / In meiner Doktorarbeit ‘Security Cooperation as a Way to Stop the Spread of Nuclear Weapons? Nuclear Nonproliferation Policies of the United States towards the Federal Republic of Germany and Israel, 1945-1968’ forsche ich die Anwendung von Sicherheitshilfe als Nukleare Nichtverbreitungspolitik. Ich benutze Erkenntnisse der strukturell-realistischen und rational-institutionalistischen Theorien der Internationalen Beziehungen um respektive einerseits wichtige aussenpolitische Ziele und die grundlegende Orientierung der Politik, und andererseits Praxis und die Wirkungen der Sicherheitskooperation auf das Verhalten der Staaten zu erläutern. Überdies studiere ich die Beziehungen der Vereinigten Staaten der America (USA) zu der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (BRD) und Israel aus der Perspektive der Verhandlungstheorie, um zu erklären, wie weit die USA fähig waren, die beiden anderen Staaten zu drängen, nach seinen Prefärenzen zu verhalten. Die Studie ist also eine Kombination von Theorie-Vorschlägen und Theorie-Testen und von historischer Beschreibung und Erläuterung. Die Studie ist auch relevant für Politik: ich suche allgemeine Lehren über die Benutzung von Sicherheitskooperation als Nichtverbreitungspolitik. Ich zeige, dass um Krisen mit Moskau und Drohungen gegen die Kohäsion der NATO zu meiden, die USA zu verhindern versucht haben, dass die BRD eigene Kernwaffen schaffen würde. Aber die USA haben gleichzeitig eingesehen, dass es nötig war, die Sicherheit der BRD glaubhaftig zu garantieren und die BRD gut zu behandeln, um zu gewährleisten, dass sie zufrieden als eine Allierte und ohne eigene Kernwaffen bleiben würde. Dieses is der USA durch verschiedene institutionalisierte Anordnungen für Sicher-heitskooperation gelungen – obwohl die BRD sich eine Option angeschafft hat, Kernwaffen zu produzieren. Die USA waren gegen Israel’s Kernwaffenambitionen wegen der Erwartung, dass die Reaktionen der Arabstaaten sonst zu verstärkten Spannungen und Risiken der Eskalation und zu einem verschlechterten Machtgleichgewicht in der Region führen könnten. Aber weil auch eine US-Israel Allianz zu einem stärkeren Arab-Soviet Band und deswegen zu einen verschlechterten Machtgleichgewicht hätte führen können, und da es nicht im Interesse der USA war, in allen regionalen Fragen auf der Seite Israel’s gebunden zu bleiben, waren die USA nicht bereit, wie im Fall von der BRD, die Sicherheit Israel’s auf einer formalen, glaubhaften Weise zu garantieren. Die USA sind daran gescheitert, Israel davon zu überzeugen, auf Kernwaffenproduktion zu verzichten, aber graduell ist ein opaker Kernwaffenstatus, verbunden mit amerikanischen Waffen-verkaufen, die dem Israel geholfen haben, eine konventionelle militärische Überlegenheit über die Araber zu behalten, als eine Lösung zu Israel’s Sicherheitsstrategie entstanden. Wegen der Erkenntnisse, dass Israel und die BRD auch andere Optionen als die Kooperation mit der USA hatten, und weil die Fähigkeit der USA beschränkt war, die zwei Staaten wegen nichterwünschten Aktionen zu bestrafen, waren diese fähig, sich zu widersetzen, als die USA versucht haben, sie zu ihrer Einstellung der Nichtverbreitung zu drängen.

This dissertation investigates the balance of power theory of international relations in the works of Jonathan Swift and his mentor Sir William Temple. Both Temple and Swift are known to have championed balance-of-power foreign policy, yet no sustained study of the subject exists. To begin, I argue that Temple used balance as a metaphor for division or separation. His policy of preserving the “Balance of Christendom” translates to sowing division among European states, and for the same reason he rejects balance of power at home. Proceeding to Swift, while commentators have long known that he advocated the classical theory of constitutional balance, they have neglected his engagement with international balance. Swift assimilates Temple’s positions into a universal theory based on classical authors; he sees balance of power as an element in the broader quarrel of ancients and moderns. The ancient view posits an independent agent who operates within the constraints of a system; the modern, by contrast, either exaggerates agency to the point of divine-right absolutism or minimizes it to the extent that only an impersonal, clockwork-like system remains. In both cases, the moderns pursue material power at each other’s expense, neglecting the intangible benefits of due separation. This theory has important ramifications for Swift’s international writings. For years scholars have emphasized Swift’s conspiracy theorizing in the Conduct of the Allies, but I argue that he discredits the Whig war cry of “Balance of Europe,” which sought military power (the balance of forces) as an end in itself, and reasserts balance as a policy of slicing Europe into as many separate kingdoms as possible. Ultimately, however, Swift’s most lasting contribution appears in Gulliver’s Travels. Here he depicts maritime power as the quintessential means by which moderns pursue absolute power, and intimates a political “Balance of Earth” as a satirical correction. This study, the first to focus on the international dimension of Swift’s political theory, offers a corrective to literary studies that favor domestic politics and yields insights into the evolution of balance-of-power theory and the intersection of culture and foreign policy at the dawn of the British empire. / text

「關係平衡」運用於荷蘭與中國的關係 / The Balance of Relationship applied to Sino-Dutch relations

Em decorrência do fim da União Soviética, a China e os Estados Unidos perderam um rival importante no Leste Asiático, o que alterou substancialmente a balança de poder regional, levando-a da multipolaridade à bipolaridade, ou seja, desde 1991 a China e os Estados Unidos são os únicos polos de poder no Leste Asiático. Para melhorar sua posição relativa nesta balança de poder, a República Popular da China (RPC) vem investindo pesadamente na modernização do Exército de Libertação do Povo (ELP), que é o principal segmento das forças armadas chinesas. O tema deste estudo é a distribuição de poder no Leste Asiático entre China e Estados Unidos, precisamente o impacto da modernização militar do ELP sobre tal distribuição, considerando tanto os grandes agregados econômicos na análise da modernização, quanto os inventários militares e seus meios de emprego. Isso nos leva ao problema geral da presente pesquisa, que consiste na seguinte questão: qual o impacto da modernização militar da China sobre a balança de poder do Leste Asiático? O método utilizado será o de estudo de caso – comparação focada e estruturada, o que nos permitirá comparar os valores das variáveis independentes dos dois casos em tela (RPC e EUA). Tal comparação terá um caráter sincrônico, ou seja, considerará os valores das variáveis em um dado momento, apenas. Conclui-se que a modernização militar do ELP mudou a distribuição de poder no Leste Asiático em favor da China. / After the demise of Soviet Union, China and United States lost a great rival in the East Asian region, which shifted the regional balance of Power from multipolarity to bipolarity, in other words since 1991 China and United States are the remaining poles of power in the East Asia. To improve its relative position in this balance of power, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has invested continuously in the modernization of People’s Liberation Army (PLA), the main branch of the armed forces. The issue of this research is the distribution of power in the East Asian region between China and United States (US), precisely the meaning of PLA’s modernization for the regional balance of power, analyzing economic aggregate data, the military inventories, and its means of use. The general question of this research is: what’s the meaning of PLA’s modernization for the balance of power in the East Asian Region? Case study is our method, precisely the structured and focused comparison, which permits to compare the values of independent variables in both cases (PRC and US). The comparison approaches the values of variables in a single moment. One concludes that PLA’s modernization has shifted the regional balance of power in favor of China.

Em decorrência do fim da União Soviética, a China e os Estados Unidos perderam um rival importante no Leste Asiático, o que alterou substancialmente a balança de poder regional, levando-a da multipolaridade à bipolaridade, ou seja, desde 1991 a China e os Estados Unidos são os únicos polos de poder no Leste Asiático. Para melhorar sua posição relativa nesta balança de poder, a República Popular da China (RPC) vem investindo pesadamente na modernização do Exército de Libertação do Povo (ELP), que é o principal segmento das forças armadas chinesas. O tema deste estudo é a distribuição de poder no Leste Asiático entre China e Estados Unidos, precisamente o impacto da modernização militar do ELP sobre tal distribuição, considerando tanto os grandes agregados econômicos na análise da modernização, quanto os inventários militares e seus meios de emprego. Isso nos leva ao problema geral da presente pesquisa, que consiste na seguinte questão: qual o impacto da modernização militar da China sobre a balança de poder do Leste Asiático? O método utilizado será o de estudo de caso – comparação focada e estruturada, o que nos permitirá comparar os valores das variáveis independentes dos dois casos em tela (RPC e EUA). Tal comparação terá um caráter sincrônico, ou seja, considerará os valores das variáveis em um dado momento, apenas. Conclui-se que a modernização militar do ELP mudou a distribuição de poder no Leste Asiático em favor da China. / After the demise of Soviet Union, China and United States lost a great rival in the East Asian region, which shifted the regional balance of Power from multipolarity to bipolarity, in other words since 1991 China and United States are the remaining poles of power in the East Asia. To improve its relative position in this balance of power, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has invested continuously in the modernization of People’s Liberation Army (PLA), the main branch of the armed forces. The issue of this research is the distribution of power in the East Asian region between China and United States (US), precisely the meaning of PLA’s modernization for the regional balance of power, analyzing economic aggregate data, the military inventories, and its means of use. The general question of this research is: what’s the meaning of PLA’s modernization for the balance of power in the East Asian Region? Case study is our method, precisely the structured and focused comparison, which permits to compare the values of independent variables in both cases (PRC and US). The comparison approaches the values of variables in a single moment. One concludes that PLA’s modernization has shifted the regional balance of power in favor of China.