Lieutenant Colonel Usaf Mar Wojtysiak

Preventing Catastrophe: Us Policy Options for Management of Nuclear Weapons in South Asia: Maxwell Paper No. 25 Lieutenant Colonel Usaf Mar Wojtysiak

Publisher Marketing: In "Preventing Catastrophe: US Policy Options for Management of Nuclear Weapons in South Asia," Lt. Col. Martin J. "Marty" Wojtysiak, USAF, proposes a response to the dangerous proliferation of nuclear weapons in India and Pakistan. This paper highlights the threat in "The Nuclear Catastrophe of 2005," a gripping projection of the worst case scenario on the current realities of the Indian subcontinent. Written a year after the "catastrophe," it vividly describes the events leading up to the disaster as well as the grim aftermath of a South Asian nuclear war. The remainder of the paper looks at US regional objectives and suggests how they might be achieved. The author proposes a regional proliferation regime that realistically addresses the threat and moves the United States to a pragmatic approach to manage and limit the ongoing proliferation in South Asia. At present, India and Pakistan possess only marginal strategic delivery capabilities, and the tensions between them remain at the "simmering" stage. The United States is pursuing closer relations with India with tangible success, but its relations with Pakistan have soured over the last ten years and reached a low point following the military coup of October 1999. The author believes this imbalance contributes to regional instability and leaves disturbing questions on the horizon. Can the United States help prevent the deployment of nuclear weapon systems in India and Pakistan? How does the United States help prevent the spread of nuclear weapons technology to less friendly, perhaps even hostile, countries? Can Washington prevent either India or Pakistan, or both, from turning hostile to the United States? Contributor Bio:  Press, Air University Walter Gary Sharp Sr. serves as a senior associate deputy general counsel for intelligence at the US Department of Defense, where he advises on legal issues related to intelligence, covert action, intelligence and counterintelligence policy, intelligence oversight, information security, information sharing, security classification policy, information operations, and computer network operations. Prior to his appointment, Dr. Sharp served as an associate deputy general counsel for international affairs at the Department of Defense; the director of legal research for international, comparative, and foreign law at the Law Library of Congress; the director of global and functional affairs within the Bureau of Legislative Affairs at the State Department; and a principal information security engineer at The MITRE Corporation. A veteran with 25 years of service, Dr. Sharp retired as a decorated US Marine Corps lieutenant colonel with prior enlisted service. His military assignments include commanding officer of a field artillery battery, senior prosecutor, deputy legal counsel to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and international law adviser for the commanding general of the Unified Task Force in Somalia during Operation Restore Hope. Dr. Sharp's military decorations include the Defense Superior Service Medal, and his many awards for writing excellence and academic achievement include the Judge Advocate General's School Alumni Association Annual Professional Writing Award and an American Bar Association Award for Professional Merit. Dr. Sharp is the author of numerous articles and three books: UN Peace Operations (1995), CyberSpace and the Use of Force (1999), and Jus Paciarii (1999). He serves as an adjunct professor of law at Georgetown University Law Center where he currently teaches a counterterrorism course, The Law of 24. He has also taught graduate-level seminars on United Nations peace operations and international peace and security. He lectures internationally in universities and other diverse public forums on wide-ranging topics of international law and national security law, such as international peace and security, conflict management, and peacekeeping operations.