Decision Making in a Nuclear-Armed World

Abstract

Strategic analysis for the next generation prom ises to be preoccupied with the permutations and combina tions of multi-player nuclear games. The spread of nuclear arms to several new states will appreciably complicate the efforts of the two superpowers to maintain a high level of stability in their bilateral relationship, while posing further chal lenges to military planning and crisis management. The new strategic environment will place an unprecedented burden on the capacity of the U.S. government to integrate the several facets of national security policy; to execute it in a consistent, coordinated manner; and to take swift, informed action in crisis situations. This is the case whether one speaks of programming force options to assure presidential control over operational use; making necessary reconciliations be tween Soviet-oriented military planning and the require ments for addressing third country nuclear threats; or institutionalizing a closer cooperation with allies on such diverse issues as export regulations and concerted contin gency plans. There are three key ingredients to any plan for achieving a greater degree of coordination in making and implementing strategic policy: technical competence must be combined with decisional authority; senior national security officials should share a fund of ideas about the preferred direction of policy and the effective means for conducting it; an interagency committee of principals is needed that serves as the prime instrument for making executive de partments effective contributors to, and executors of, policy.