News Release

March 29, 2001

As "rogue state" threat recedes, missile defense should be delayed
Missile defense policy should take account of intentions, not just capabilities, study says

WASHINGTON-The United States aims to deploy a national missile defense system, but unwarranted concern over "rogue states" has led to pressure for the U.S. to field the system far more quickly than it can or should, according to a new study from the Cato Institute.

In "The Rogue State Doctrine and National Missile Defense," Ivan Eland and Daniel Lee argue that the United States should take more time to develop and test the most technologically challenging weapon ever built. It can do so because the threat from so-called states of concern has declined, they argue. But although the international threat environment has changed, they say, policymakers have become stuck in a rogue state doctrine no longer grounded in reality.

Eland and Lee argue that the new administration should focus on the intentions of rogue states, not just on their technological capabilities. "After all, no U.S. policymaker believes that the nuclear forces of France and the United Kingdom threaten U.S. security, " they note. "The rush to build a missile defense system assumes a worst-case scenario that focuses on the possibility rather than the likelihood of an attack by a 'rogue' state."

The rogue state doctrine assumes that so-called rogue state actors are irrational and thus 'undeterrable,'" the authors say. But that assumption is wrong, they argue: Rogue states have developed ballistic missiles primarily in response to regional rivalries, not in any attempt to threaten the United States.

Those countries also develop longer-range missiles because they are nervous about the presence of American troops nearby: missiles offer a way of deterring American intervention. "If American forces were less likely to intervene, those nations would have less incentive to develop long-range missiles and much less reason to target them at the United States," Eland and Lee point out.

Recent developments within "rogue states" may well reduce the likelihood of antagonism between them and the United States in future, they say. But that depends on U.S. willingness to rethink its policies towards countries such as North Korea, Iran and Iraq. "If left alone, those small, poor states in remote parts of the world would have no quarrel with the United States," they argue. Less antagonistic relations would buy time to look at whether a missile defense system is needed and whether it would work.

"The Rogue State Doctrine and Missile Defense"