Collective Defense or Strategic Independence? by Ted Galen CarpenterReview by: Gregory F. TrevertonForeign Affairs, Vol. 68, No. 5 (Winter, 1989), p. 209Published by: Council on Foreign RelationsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20044218 .

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RECENT BOOKS 209

late?just as the nuclear issue recedes?but is nonetheless welcome. The

Chayes-Doty volume is a meticulous treatment by distinguished contribu tors of a very specific question: assuming that nuclear deterrence will continue to depend on second-strike retaliation, how can the assuredness,

provided by the paucity of strategic defense on both sides, be preserved?

COLLECTIVE DEFENSE OR STRATEGIC INDEPENDENCE? Edited by Ted Galen Carpenter. Washington: Cato Institute/Lexington (MA):

Lexington Books, 1989, 310 pp. $40.00. Those who are familiar with the work of the Cato Institute will not be

surprised by this volume. Its main chapters by institute stalwarts Earl

Ravenal, Christopher Layne, Alan Tonelson and the editor make the case for disengaging and limiting commitments. However, the volume does

present other views, and if the chapters are uneven, they still amount to a

thought-provoking attempt at assessing American interests and capabilities in a period of change.

SOVEREIGN ACTS: AMERICAN UNILATERALISM AND GLOBAL SECURITY. By John Tirman. Cambridge: Ballinger, 1989, 256 pp. $24.95.

It is hard to know what to make of this book. It is an argument for

restraint, not action, so its title misleads?in its use of the word "unilater alism" particularly. Those whom Tirman, a former editor for Time and also the Union of Concerned Scientists, calls "the technicians" will think he treads familiar ground without quite realizing it?for instance in discussing the difficulties of arms control or nonproliferation policy. Others will be

put off by the faintly Marxist analysis of American intervention even if they acknowledge that the analysis is not entirely wrong. Tirman's urging an

"organic" view of security, one that sees the connectedness of things, is

interesting, but his specific guidance is modest.

AMERICA'S DEFENSE. Edited by Michael Mandelbaum. New York: Holmes & Meier, 1989, 334 pp. $45.00 (paper, $24.95).

This carefully edited survey, originally a product of the now-defunct Lehrman Institute, takes up the issues that confront American defense

policy?from reforming procurement to what to do about the navy. The authors are the best of a generation that can still be called "younger" who know their subjects, who are mostly conservative but are not ideologues, and who are influential around and in some cases (Dennis Ross, for

example) in the Bush Administration.

NEW WEAPONS, OLD POLITICS: AMERICA'S MILITARY PRO CUREMENT MUDDLE. By Thomas L. McNaugher. Washington: Brook

ings, 1989, 251 pp.

Criticizing weapons procurement by comparison to private enterprise is

wrong-headed, for the system "has been shaped by a sustained and

necessary interaction with the political system"; indeed, that interaction is

responsible for the system's most controversial features, some of which "even protect the public interest." This terse history, a pleasure to read, argues for shifting investment away from production toward research and

development. It only begins to help the reader think about the politics of

reform, but it does begin. For instance, extending competition through

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