What is it about?

This paper examines the initial development of counterproliferation within the Department of Defense and how it fell out of favor after 2005. The term "combating WMD" or "countering WMD" overshadowed DOD's counterproliferation concept and forced it out of favor. US military forces now lack the common understanding of how to defend against adversaries using chemical and biological warfare agents.

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Why is it important?

There's a continued lack of policy focus on what the DOD needs in terms of capabilities and concepts to be able to prevent, protect against, and respond to chemical and biological incidents.

Perspectives

As we move away from the end of the Cold War, there are too many new civilians and military personnel who forget why we developed counterproliferation concepts. Even fewer are willing to critically examine and question current DOD concepts and policies. This article is an example how to do that correctly.

Albert Mauroni
Air University

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This page is a summary of: The rise and fall of counterproliferation policy, The Nonproliferation Review, January 2019, Taylor & Francis,
DOI: 10.1080/10736700.2019.1593691.
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