The Arms Race to Peace essays

The Arms Race to Peace essays The economic and technological changes that accompanied the Industrial Revolution fundamentally altered the nature of modern warfare. Unprecedented advances in machinery and mass production made the development and production of new weapons an inevitable component of the preparation for conflict. As industrialization spread across the globe, so too did the proliferation of weapons manufacturing. Indeed, these years of progress saw the advent of the modern arms race. For decades international relations scholars have engaged in theoretical discussions about the factors that contribute to arms races. Sides have been taken on this issue and whole schools of thought have developed. Some theories contend that arms races occur in a manner consistent with a spiral model. This philosophy contends that nations engage in vertical proliferation in response to such actions by their adversaries. Other scholars argue that the source of arms races can be found in domestic politics, tracing the motivation for weapons development to an embedded military-industrial complex or ideological stasis on the part of defense hawks (Kydd 2002). Inherent in many of these theories and beliefs is a position on the ultimate impact to these arms races. This paper will address the latter of these concerns, more specifically, whether or not arms races cause war. This paper will contend that arms races are not a cause of war. This is not to say that no arms race has ever contributed in any way to conflict. However, the historical record and the aforementioned scholarly theories about weapons buildups provide compelling evidence that arms races are not an innate component of conflict. This paper will begin by discussing several instances of arms racing which did not result in conflict. I will also discuss some of the prominent wars which some contend are the result of arms races and attempt to show that these examples are misgui...