Abstract
While the academic interest in the arms race as a research theme has steadily diminished since the collapse of the bipolar world order, the arms race in the Middle East has continuously been in the center of political and academic attention since the early 2000s. More recently, this interest was reinforced by the US withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in 2018 (Zunes, 2019) and the Middle Eastern states involvement in the war in Ukraine. Aiming at a better understanding of the dynamics that sustain the regional arms race, the present volume untangles its complexities in the Middle East, addressing it from the national, regional, and international perspectives.
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Notes
- 1.
The current volume employs a relatively narrow definition of the Middle East that also corresponds to the term “the West Asia” and includes the states of the Levant region, all members of the Gulf Cooperation Council, as well as Iran, Turkey, and Yemen (contrary to the broad definition of the Middle East referring to 22 members of the Arab League in addition to Israel, Iran, Egypt, and Turkey).
- 2.
The Middle East region has about 57% of the world’s proven oil reserves and 41% of proven natural gas resources.
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Eslami, M., Vieira, A.V.G. (2023). Introducing the Arms Race in the Middle East in the Twenty First Century: A “Powder Keg” in the Digital Era?. In: Eslami, M., Guedes Vieira, A.V. (eds) The Arms Race in the Middle East. Contributions to International Relations. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32432-1_1
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