powerful nuclear weaponry, especiallyICBMs(Intercontinental Ballistic Mis-
siles), in the hope of achieving afirst strikecapacity over the enemy. In more
recent times the emphasis has shifted to competition for more and more
sophisticated and accurate conventional weapons; it was these weapons which
gave the US-led forces in theGulf Waroverwhelming superiority over the
Iraqi forces.
The arms race is a central part ofbalance of powertheory: any techno-
logical advance by one side threatens the other, which then tries to build better
weapons, forcing the first mover to improve its weapons, and so on. Often a
new stage in the arms race may be launched by a relatively small development;
for example, circular error probable (CEP—a measure of ballistic missile
accuracy) improvements by the Soviet Union led in the early 1970s to extra
investments by the USA, and the development of anti-ballistic missile systems
by the USA in the 1960s, although defensive in themselves, were seen as a
threat to the balance of power by the Russians, who therefore increased their
weapons developments still further.
At a lower level, arms races clearly happen between any group of countries
with potential conflicts, one of the best recorded being that between India and
Pakistan in the 1970s and 1980s. There is considerable theoretical confusion
about arms races: it is unclear, for example, whether actual or merely potential
military capacity in one country spurs another to build up its forces. Similarly,
many force enhancements seem to come about simply because the available
technology makes a new weapon system possible, with no reference to any
supposed threat elsewhere. It may be more sensible to see arms races as just one
element in the overallthreat assessmentthat any nation has to make.
Assembly
An assembly is a collection of people who either directly comprise, or
represent, a political or social entity. The common example of a school
assembly helps to explain the concept. In this case the entire body of people,
pupils and staff, who make up the social group of the school, assemble together
to discuss or to hear rules, information or instructions. In a political sense
assemblies are decision-making or rule-passing groups. In many cases there is
no real difference between an assembly and aparliament, house of repre-
sentatives, chamber ofdeputies, or whatever the local terminology of the
political system may be. Whereas the terms parliament andcongresscan be
used to refer to both houses of a bicameral system, although the meaning is
more often the lower chamber which does most of the legislative work,
assembly always means just the lower chamber or the single chamber in a
unicameral system (seesecond chamber).
Assembly