ABSTRACT
Non-proliferation and counter-proliferation are sometimes seen as competing concepts, but this is not necessarily so. They are complementary strategies that actually utilize many similar tools. The traditional architecture provides the norms, rules and institutions necessary for setting and enforcing the guidelines for the global non-proliferation regime. Iraq's nuclear weapons programme did not succeed, for various reasons, including traditional non-proliferation efforts. A report published by the US Air War College in 1998 claimed that US doctrine counter-proliferation refers specifically to Department of Defense activities and is the military component of the broader US non-proliferation policy. Aspin's Counter-proliferation Initiative derived from the premise that nuclear, chemical and biological weapons in the hands of adversaries were the only serious threat to US conventional superiority and that the US should do everything it could to prevent it. International efforts to prevent the spread of non-conventional weapons can be just as innovative, forward-looking and proactive as counter-proliferation.
