Defining Stability: Conventional Arms Control In A Changing Europe; Enhancing European Security: Living In A Less Nuclear World

Both books are sophisticated but readable primers to conventional forces in Europe; both were written before the events of the last half year, but neither is outdated. Foerster and his coauthors, four American military officers, provide a handy summary of arguments about the balance of, and proposals for, alternative defense concepts, offering a useful measure for assessing arms control proposals. Cuthbertson and Robertson, two Britons, ask how to cut forces to make them less capable of long-distance invasion. Their premise is more suggestive still in the light of recent events: more European independence from Washington does not mean a more unified European action, but rather, more freedom for "heterogeneous and fissiparous European national interests."