The availability of arms exacerbates the length and severity of identity-based strife. The United Nations High Representative for Disarmament Affairs pointed out that the illicit transfer of small arms and light weapons undermine peace and security at the national, regional, and global levels.

Conflict often revolves around identity politics, where one group views another group with hatred, resulting in conflict. Violence often stems from perceptions of who is inside or outside the group, especially when survival is at stake. When a group of people attaches meaning to political and economic forces and considers compromise and disagreement unbearable, it erupts into violence, making conflict resolution a formidable challenge.

In this volatile situation, the presence of light arms and small weapons only worsens the situation. One of the main reasons for having guns is that they bring safety. The existing relationship between safety, survival, and weapons, especially in developing states, makes the differences deadly. According to “The Psychology of Guns,” the availability of weapons can drive aggressive behavior, leading to violence. In this regard, the proliferation of small arms and light weaponry needs to be checked.

Armed conflicts are ubiquitous, and those based on ethnic and tribal lines are often the most brutal. One estimate suggests that around 3.8 million people died in such conflicts between 1989 and 2023.

For instance, in South Sudan, two groups, Dinka and Nuer, felt threatened by each other and launched into a violent war. It is important to understand the identity-borne roots of this dispute. Land and cattle hold significant prestige in South Sudanese society. With limited resources, achieving political power becomes a top priority.

In a bid to maintain political power and control over resources for one ethnic group, a political conflict between two leaders turned into an ethnic war, which resulted in the killing of nearly 400,000 people. It is important to note the destructive impacts of the proliferation of small arms and light weapons on the civil war in South Sudan.

Likewise, the ethnic unrest of the Kurds in the Middle East illustrates how the combination of small arms proliferation and ethnic grievances can burst into conflict. The struggle for autonomy, a free Kurdistan, is driving a war against Türkiye, Iraq, Iran, and Syria.

The region has witnessed chaos, with over 40,000 deaths in an insurgency against Türkiye. The presence of smuggling routes across the Iran-Iraq and Türkiye -Iraq borders aids in weapon proliferation. The recent decision to lay down arms by the Kurdish insurgents in Türkiye is a welcome step towards conflict resolution. The warring parties realised the economic and human cost of the conflict.

Hiruni Alwishewa notes that the international regime to control the proliferation of small arms exhibits serious dichotomies. For example, the Firearms Protocol and the European Union’s Programme of Action lack regulatory distinction between legal arms exports and illegal transfer of arms, so even legal transfers end up as illicit ones.

Likewise, the Wassenaar Arrangement and the Convention on Small Arms and Light Weapons of the West African States failed to address the proliferation of small arms. It is because both agreements do not scrutinise military aid, which flows undetected, causing arms proliferation. Similarly, the Arms Trade Treaty and United Nations Register of Conventional Arms (UNROCA) lack definitional clarity between small arms and firearms, thus hampering any substantial effort to curb the proliferation of small arms.

In resolving identity-based conflicts, a needs-based approach is an important tool because it works to build trust. It focuses on accepting needs, based on ethnic, religious, and resource-related issues that parties in conflict believe essential to their survival. Repression and tyranny only worsen a conflict.

Unlike other disputes, conflicts sparked by ethnic and religious differences cannot be settled by contractual arrangements. They rest on bringing structural reforms that involve either power redistribution or changing the political and economic systems to benefit all parties. Such efforts ensure that understanding and accepting diverse cultures run in tandem with each other.

After the fall of the Soviet Union, regionalism received significant attention in the form of trade agreements, economic integration, and increasing interdependence. Regional initiatives such as coordinating between border states to curb illicit arms transfer, strengthening national laws, and promoting transparency were useful in controlling the proliferation of small and light weapons.

Understandably, effectively controlling small arms is a challenging task. In this regard, significant attention must be given to improving the international structure of arms control. Theoretically, arms control agreements cover all weapons, but, practically, nuclear weapons are the primary focus. In this regard, these agreements must be revisited to fill the existing gaps. This includes removing definitional gaps and bringing military aid under scrutiny.

Similarly, artificial intelligence (AI) can be utilized to effectively trace and detect light weapons. AI’s utility in data analysis, detection, and surveillance makes it useful in controlling arms proliferation.

For example, AI-based weapon detection software combines video analysis, learning, and object recognition. This software can be used to identify and track weapons, which will be useful in controlling the proliferation of small arms.

In the end, the goal is to reduce needless casualties in needless conflicts. It is possible to undertake intelligent measures that deter arms traffickers from providing the weapons sowing so much death in the world today.

Kumail Mehdi is a researcher at the Center for International Strategic Studies (CISS), Islamabad.

Proliferation of Small Arms: Impact on Conflict Resolution was originally published on Global Security Review.

These early civil defense measures were eventually neglected and then forgotten after the Berlin Wall came down in 1989 and the Soviet Union ended in 1991. Such measures were mirrored in the USSR under General Secretary Nikita Khrushchev, but by no means neglected afterward.

Civil defense is, by nature, a community-wide activity. The more people participate and help, the better the results for the entire citizenry. This includes improved morale and will to resist, fewer combat casualties, and prolonged lifespans in case of conventional or nuclear war.

The organization of processes, the laying down and buildout of infrastructure, the first-responder rehearsals, and pervasive homefront readiness drills all require group dedication in the face of natural popular skepticism, even active resistance by a vocal few.

Although there is ample room for volunteerism, and for more formalized national service (especially for those well above military draft age), governments at different levels do need to take overall charge. This ensures efficient coordination, direction of available funding into the most pressing needs, and arranging for efficient communication and reasonable compliance.

With Vladimir Putin’s many nuclear threats, it is once again time to ensure the nation has effective civil defenses against nuclear employment. It may not be the 1950s and 1960s, but civil defense matters.

This is perhaps a prime case where today’s financial-industrial and high-tech oligarchs (billionaires) can work with and/or under contract to the federal government, or even on their own initiative, to assure that, for example, America is hardened against electromagnetic pulse attack, cyber assaults, and nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction attacks. These may not be traditional civil defense measures, but they are civil defense for the modern era.

This collaboration is already happening in the space domain where President Putin’s “Sputnuke” threatens to totally disrupt space operations, and where President Xi Jinping’s growing space-dominance capabilities threaten to disrupt current civil society.

Effective civil defense measures are as central to effective nuclear deterrence and ally assurance as is nuclear modernization. Effective civil defense also includes ensuring the societal supporting infrastructure, such as housing, hospitals, and food stocks, are secure and survivable under even the most highly stressed circumstances.

In fact, an essential component of a truly superb American deterrence strategy must be a comprehensive program of being able to absorb an attack and nevertheless survive. Only in this way can the United States make it clear to adversaries, as President Richard Nixon said, “Not today, Comrades. Not ever.”

Church and synagogue groups, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), such as the Red Cross or Doctors without Borders, and fraternal organizations, such as the Shriners or the Boy Scouts can also play a significant role in providing the ultimate in community civil defense. Examples of such efforts abound from the current conflict in Ukraine and Israel.

Exactly how much civil defense is the right amount? Nuclear strategists Thomas Schelling and Herman Kahn were never able to agree. Such agreement is even less likely today.

The right answer to civil defense is likely a programmatic solution that is affordable and optimizes the strengths of local communities. The right amount of civil defense should be a discussion between the federal, state, and local governments. The challenge for any civil defense effort is that more than two-thirds of all federal spending and about half of all state spending are dedicated to mandatory social programs. This leaves very little room for civil defense programs, which must compete with all other government functions for an ever-dwindling percentage of federal and state budgets.

For most Americans, the threat of nuclear strikes on the homeland is an abstract threat. Thus, they would rather have immediate government services than look to an event that may never happen. This leaves the prospects for improving civil defenses low. Much as in the Cold War, it may be up to Americans to look to their survival in the event of the unthinkable.

Joe Buff is a Senior Fellow at the National Institute for Deterrence Studies. The views expressed are his own.

Modernizing Civil Defense Is Wise was originally published on Global Security Review.