The Economic and Political Incentives to Acquire Nuclear Weapons

This chapter analyzes the economic and political incentives for a nation to acquire nuclear weapons and considers the effects of recent changes in the world situation on nuclear proliferation and their implications for policy using economic theory. A major development that has changed both the value and the cost of acquiring nuclear weapons is the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The emergence of Soviet successor nations has left strategic nuclear weapons on the territory of four economically and politically unstable states and has increased the chance of accidental or inadvertent use of these weapons. One of the major difficulties in using economic analysis in studying nuclear weapons is that there is no well defined or commonly accepted technology of warfare in which nuclear weapons play a role. Developments in precision guided munitions may address the problem of nonnuclear deterrence. Modern economies are vulnerable to disruptions in fuel, transportation, and communications.