| Publication |
2010.
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| Summary/Abstract |
Deterring Al Qaeda from using a nuclear weapon, should it acquire one, is a harder challenge than analysts have argued. Suggestions for "deterrence based on punishment" have severe limitations. Al Qaeda is not a state, has no clear command authority, and has no clear nuclear weapons-employment doctrine. Most analysts also ignore the dynamic of "crisis instability" ("use it or lose it"): should the West believe Al Qaeda has an improvised nuclear devise, it is unlikely (regardless of whether Al Qaeda leadership claimed the weapon would be held as a deterrent only) that the West would accept a mutually-assured-destruction relationship with the group. The West would hunt the weapon down, forcing Al Qaeda's hand. The best counter-Weapons of Mass Destruction-Nuclear Terrorism defense, therefore, is good counterinsurgency policy to starve it of recruits until the group dies.
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