ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the threats to American Security. This examination helps Americans to climb out of the post—Cold War predicament and to reduce defense dependence while building a peacetime economy. One huge problem that does not respect borders threatens the world's rich and poor alike: global warming. Bangladesh and Egypt would be most exposed to flooding; other coastlines, including those on both sides of the Atlantic, would be threatened as well. To avert such climate change, global emissions would have to fall sharply. Action to introduce alternative energy sources is urgently needed. Terrorists with a suitcase bomb might become a more realistic future threat than Iraqi or North Korean weapons, but military forces would probably be irrelevant in that scenario. Among the most common of post–Cold War conflicts, regional wars would indeed require fast, mobile forces if the United States decided to intervene.
