JOHN MUELLER: LINKS, PAPERS, AND PUBLICATIONS AVAILABLE ON THE WEB
January 6, 2012
Curriculum
Vita
Biography
Profile in U.S. News & World Report
Courses
Dance Film
Archive
Recent books
(with Mark G. Stewart) Terror, Security, and Money:
Balancing the Risks, Costs, and Benefits of Homeland Security (New York and London:
Oxford University Press, 2011) information and
website about this book.
War and Ideas: Selected Essays
(New York and London: Routledge, 2011) information and website
about this book
Atomic Obsession: Nuclear Alarmism from Hiroshima
to Al-Qaeda (New
York and London:
Oxford University Press, 2010) information and
website about this book
Overblown: How Politicians, the Terrorism Industry and Others Stoke
National Security Fears, (New York: Free Press,
2006) information
and website about this book
The Remnants of War (Cornell
University Press, 2004; paperback edition with new preface, 2007) information
Capitalism, Democracy, and Ralph's Pretty Good Grocery (Princeton University Press, 1999) information
Books and monographs available for free downloading in pdf
format and/or in reprinted editions
(ed.),
Terrorism After 9/11: The American Cases, Web
book published by Mershon Center,
Ohio State University, 2011 information
Quiet Cataclysm: Reflections on the Recent Transformation of World
Politics (HarperCollins, 1995) 2009 reprint edition
information
about downloading
Retreat from Doomsday: The Obsolescence of Major War (Basic Books, 1989) updated 2009 reprint
edition information
about downloading
War, Presidents and Public Opinion (Wiley, 1973) 2009 reprint edition
Canada as a Non-Nuclear Power.
National Security Studies Program, UCLA, 1963. pdf
Astaire Dancing: The Musical Films (New York: Knopf, 1985).
Improved and expanded reprint edition, 2010 information about the reprint
Also available by arrangement with the author and publisher: Robert H. Johnson,
Improbable Dangers: U.S. Conceptions of Threat in the Cold War and After
(St. Martin's Press, 1997) 2009 reprint edition
information
about downloading
Papers and articles available on the web
“New Year Brings Good News on Terrorism: Experts Wrong
Again,” The Skeptics blog, nationalinterest.org, January 4, 2012 html
(with Mark G. Stewart) Cost-Benefit Analysis of Aviation
Security: Installed Physical Secondary Barriers (IPSB), Federal Air Marshal
Service (FAMS), and Federal Flight Deck Officer (FFDO) Program. Research
Report No. 281.12.2011, Centre for Infrastructure Performance and Reliability,
University of Newcastle, Newcastle, Australia, December 2011 html
to pdf
(with Mark G. Stewart)
"Dueling Delusions: Terrorism and Counterterrorism in the United States
Since 9/11," paper delivered at the Program on International Security
Policy, University of Chicago,
November 15, 2011 pdf
“Embracing
Threatlessness: Reassessing U.S. Military Spending,”
in Michael Gerson and Alison Lawler Russell (eds.),
American Grand Strategy and Seapower, Conference
Report, Center for Naval Analysis, Washington, DC,
November 2011, 47-59 pdf
(with Mark G. Stewart) "Assessing the Risks, Costs, and
Benefits of Counter-Terrorism Protective Measures for Infrastructure," CIP
Report, Vol. 10, No. 5, November 2011, 3-5, 31 pdf
(with Mark G. Stewart)
"The Price is Not Right: The U.S. spends too much money to fight
terrorism," Playboy, October 2011, 149-50 pdf
(With Mark G. Stewart) Three essays in Slate: "Does the
United States Spend Too Much on Homeland Security? The government refuses to
subject homeland security to a cost-benefit analysis," September 7, 2011 html, "Probability Neglect:
Why the government massively overestimates the risks of terrorism,"
September 8, 2011 html,
"1,667 Times Square-Style Attacks Every Year: That's how many terrorism
plots we would have to foil to justify our current spending on homeland
security," September 9, 2011 html
(with Mark G. Stewart)
"Witches, Communists, and Terrorists: Evaluating the Risks and Tallying
the Costs," ABA Human Rights Magazine, Vol. 38, No. 1, Winter 2011, 18-20 pdf
(with Mark G. Stewart and Bruce R. Ellingwood)
"Homeland Security: A Case Study in Risk Aversion for Public
Decision-Making," International Journal of Risk Assessment and
Management, Vol. 15, nos. 5/6, 2011 pdf
(with Mark G. Stewart) “At Issue: Does Al Qaeda still
pose a serious threat to the U.S.?
No,” CQ Researcher, September 2,
2011, 723 pdf
(with Mark Stewart)
"Terrorism cash could save lives elsewhere," Newcastle Herald, August 26, 2011 pdf
(with Mark G. Stewart) "Balancing the Risks,
Costs, and Benefits of Homeland Security," Homeland Security
Affairs,
August 2011 html and pdf
(with Mark Stewart)
"Money Can't Buy Zero Risk," Australian Financial Review, May
20, 2011, p. 3 pdf Also published in
slightly revised form as "Ten years and $1 trillion later, what has all
our security spending achieved?" Nieman
Watchdog, Ask This, June 2, 2011 html
(with Mark G. Stewart) "Cost-Benefit Analysis of
Advanced Imaging Technology Full Body Scanners for Airline Passenger Security
Screening," Journal of Homeland Security and Emergency Management,
2011 pdf
"'Clocking' Nuclear Weapons," ISN Insights, May 30, 2011 html
(with Mark Stewart) "Money Can't Buy Zero Risk," Australian
Financial Review, May 20, 2011, p. 3. pdf Also
published in slightly revised form as "Ten years and $1 trillion later,
what has all our security spending achieved?" Nieman
Watchdog, Ask This, June 2, 2011 html
(with Mark G.
Stewart) "Terror, Security, and Money: Balancing the Risks, Benefits, and
Costs of Homeland Security." Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the
Midwest Political Science Association, Chicago,
IL, April 1,
2011 pdf
"The Iraq Syndrome Revisited: U.S. Intervention, From
Kosovo to Libya,"
foreignaffairs.com, March 28, 2011 html
“Security at What
Price?” review of David K. Shipler,
The Rights of the People: How Our Search of Safety Invades Our Liberties. Wilson Quarterly, Spring 2011, 97-98 pdf
"'Iraq
Syndrome' and fear of Libya
war," cnn.com, March 12, 2011 html
"Room for
Debate: Should the U.S.
Move Against Qaddafi? What We Should Know by Now," nytimes.com, March 2,
2011 html
"Think
Again: Nuclear Weapons: President Obama's pledge to rid the world of atomic
bombs is a waste of breath. But not for the reasons you might imagine,"
Foreign Policy, January-February 2010, pp. 38-44 html
“Exaggerating the
alarm over a nuclear attack,” washingtonpost.com, January 21, 2010 html
"Atomic
Overreaction: The dangerously obsessive sway of worst-case fantasies about Iran," The Chronicle Review, Chronicle of Higher
Education, January 10, 2010 html
“The
Atomic Terrorist?” Nuclear
Proliferation Update, Cato Institute, January 2020 pdf
"Nuclear Bunkum: Don't
panic: bin Laden's WMD are mythical, too," American Conservative, January 2010, pp. 20‑21 html
"The 'Safe
Haven' Myth," Nation, November 9, 2009
html
"Mueller on the Zazi case: This is It?"
Informed Comment, www.juancole.com, November 4, 2009 html
"The Rise of Nuclear
Alarmism: How we learned to start worrying and fear the bomb‑‑and
why we don't have to," www.foreignpolicy.com, October 23, 2009 html
"War Has Almost
Ceased to Exist: An Assessment," 124 Political
Science Quarterly 297-321 (Summer 2009) pdf
(with Karl Mueller), "The Rockets' Red Glare: Just what
are 'weapons of mass destruction, anyway?" www.foreignpolicy.com, 7 July
2009 html
"Abolition? Why?" No
Nukes: Possibility or Pipe Dream? Room for
Debate, nytimes.com, June 7, 2009 html
How Dangerous Are the Taliban?
foreignaffairs.com, April 15, 2009 html
(with Ian S. Lustick) "Israel's Fight-or-Flight
Response," National Interest, Nov./Dec. 2008, pp. 68-71 html
"Faulty Correlation, Foolish Consistency, and Fatal Consequence:
Democracy, Peace, and Theory in the Middle East," in Steven H. Hook (ed.),
Democratic
Peace and Promotion: Critical Perspectives (Kent State University Press, forthcoming) prepublication draft in pdf
"Establishing Principles for Evaluating Measures Designed to Protect the
Homeland from Terrorism." Paper presented at the National Convention
of the International Studies Association, New
York, NY, February
16, 2009 pdf
"Ask This: Will Obama reassess the threat posed by Al Qaeda?" Nieman Watchdog,
Nieman Foundation for Journalism, Harvard University,
February 2, 2009 html
(with Mark G. Stewart) Cost-Benefit Assessment of United States Homeland Security
Spending. Research Report No. 273.01.2009, Centre for Infrastructure
Performance and Reliability, University of Newcastle, Newcastle, Australia,
January 2009 html to pdf
"Fearing Fear," www.cato‑unbound.org, January 9, 2009 html
"The Costs and Consequences of Efforts to Prevent Proliferation."
Paper delivered at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science
Association, Boston, MA, August 2008 pdf
"Evaluating the Terrorist Threat," Los Angeles Times
Syndicate/Tribune Media, May 19, 2008 pdf Published
in Spanish as "EE UU exagera la amenaza de Al Qaeda" in El País (Spain), June 2, 2008 html
"Terrorphobia: Our False Sense of
Insecurity," American Interest, May/June 2008, pp. 6-13
html
(with Mark G. Stewart) "A risk and cost-benefit assessment of United States
aviation security measures," 1 Journal of Transportation Security 143-59 (2008) pdf
(with Mark G. Stewart) "A Risk and Cost-Benefit Assessment of Australian
Aviation Security Measures," 4 Security Challenges 45-61 (Spring 2008) pdf
"Terror, without terrorists," Ottawa Citizen, April 25, 2008, p. a15 html
also published as: Terror threat is overblown, Montreal Gazette, April 29, 2008, p. a17 html
"The Quixotic Quest for Invulnerability: Assessing the Costs, Benefits,
and Probabilities of Homeland Security." Paper presented at the
National Convention of the International Studies Association, San Francisco,
California, March 28, 2008 (for revised, updated version, see February 2009 ISA
paper here in pdf)
"Dead and deader," Los Angeles Times, January 20, 2008, p. M7 op-ed on the Rambo movies with additional material
pdf
"The Atomic Terrorist: Assessing the Likelihood." Paper presented at
the Program for International Security Policy, University of Chicago, January
15, 2008 pdf
"Apocalypse Later," National Interest, Nov./Dec. 2007, pp. 19-20 html
"Radioactive Hype," The National Interest, Sep./Oct. 2007, pp. 59-65 pdf pdf reformatted for easier reading
"Reactions and Overreactions to Terrorism: The Atomic Obsession."
Paper presented at the Annual Meetings of the American Political Science
Association, Chicago, Illinois, August 31, 2007 pdf
"Fear Not: Notes from a naysayer," Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, March/April 2007, pp. 30-37. pdf
"The Demise of War and of Speculations about the Causes
Thereof." Paper presented at the National Convention of the
International Studies Association, Chicago,
Illinois, February
29, 2007. pdf
"Reacting to Terrorism: Probabilities, Consequences, and the Persistence
of Fear." Paper presented at the National Convention of the
International Studies Association, Chicago,
Illinois, February
28, 2007. pdf
"What If We Leave? When nightmare scenarios are used to justify endless
war, it's time to wake up," American Conservative, February 26, 2007. html
"Terror doesn't add up," Guardian (UK) comment is
free website, November 20, 2006. html
"Reflections on What, If Anything, 'Are We Safer' Might Mean,"
September 2006. Lead essay and discussion (Clark Kent Irwin, Veronique de Rugy, and Timothy Naftali) on Cato Unbound web site
"Is There A Still a Terrorist Threat? The Myth of the Omnipresent
Enemy," Foreign
Affairs, September/October 2006. Article and
roundtable discussion (with James Fallows, Jessica Stern, Fawaz
Gerges, and Paul Pillar) on Foreign Affairs web site
"This Just In: Was Has Almost Ceased to Exist" pdf Paper delivered at the
International Studies Association Meetings, San Diego, California, March 24,
2006
"Force,
Legitimacy, Success, and Iraq,"
31 Review of International Studies 109-25 (2005) pdf
figure in Powerpoint
"The Iraq
Syndrome," 84 Foreign Affairs 44-54
(November/December 2005) article in html without the figures figures (updated) in Powerpoint
"Six Rather
Unusual Propositions about Terrorism," Terrorism
and Political Violence, Autumn 2005 article in pdf
The journal also published comments on the article by Richard Betts, Daniel Byman, and Martha Crenshaw. Response to these comments in pdf
"Reactions
and Overreactions to Terrorism." Paper presented at the Conflict
Studies Conference, "Terrorism in History: The Strategic Impact of
Terrorism from Sarajevo 1914 to 9/11," University of New Brunswick, October 14-15, 2005 pdf
Transcript from
presentation on panel dealing with issues of risk (together with Paul Slovic and Detlof von Winterfeldt), Data Privacy and Integrity Advisory
Committee, Department of Homeland Security, Bellingham, Washington, September
28, 2005 pdf (panel
begins on page 16 of the document)
"Simplicity
and Spook: Terrorism and the Dynamics of Threat Exaggeration." pdf
Paper presented at the National Convention of the International Studies
Association, Honolulu, Hawaii, March 2, 2005 (later and longer version of the International Studies Perspectives article below)
"Simplicity
and Spook: Terrorism and the Dynamics of Threat Exaggeration," 6 International Studies Perspectives, 155-73 (May
2005) pdf
Short paper:
"This Just In: War Has Almost Ceased to Exist," January 2005. in English in pdf
in Spanish in pdf
related Powerpoint presentation
Related article from The New Republic, "The End of War?" (word)
by Gregg Easterbrook, May 30, 2005
"What Was the
Cold War About? Evidence from Its Ending," 119 Political
Science Quarterly 609-31 (Winter 2004-05) pdf
"A False Sense of Insecurity?" Regulation, Fall 2004, pp. 42-46 pdf
"Why Isn't
There More Violence?" 13 Security Studies 191-203 (Spring
2004) pdf
The Role of Business Virtue in Economic Development:
Six Propositions Provoked in Part by P.T. Barnum with an Extrapolation to the
Post-Communist Experience. Paper presented at the roundtable on "Political
Economy and Socialism," Central European University,
Budapest, Hungary, June 14, 2004 (pdf)
The Politics of Cutting and Running
History News Network, May 24, 2004
Anti-War? Unenthusiastic About Kerry? The Recipe
for a Bush Victory History News Network,
May 3, 2004
"Policing the Remnants of War" (pdf), 40 Journal of Peace
Research 507-18 (September 2003) (pdf)
"American
Public Opinion and Military Ventures Abroad: Attention, Evaluation,
Involvement, Politics, and the Wars of the Bushes." Paper delivered at the
Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Philadelphia, PA,
August 2003 paper in pdf
figures in Powerpoint
Op-ed suggesting U.S was heading toward debacle in Iraq,
July 2003. Rejected by Washington
Post.
"Blip
or Step Function?" Paper delivered at the International Studies
Association Meetings, Portland, Oregon, February 27, 2003 pdf
"Should We Invade Iraq?" (html) A
reason.com on line debate with Brink Lindsey posted October 2002, as published
in Reason, January 2003
"False Alarms," Washington
Post,
September 29, 2002, p. B7 pdf
"Harbiner or
Aberration?" (pdf) National
Interest, Fall 2002, pp. 45-50
St. Phineas: How P.T. Barnum
helped create business ethics (htm)
Reason, March 2001, pp. 54-57
The Banality of "Ethnic War": Yugoslavia and
Rwanda (pdf) Paper delivered at the
American Political Science Association Convention, Washington, DC,
September 2, 2000 (longer and more detailed version of the International Security article below)
The Banality of "Ethnic War" (pdf) 25 International
Security 42-70 (Summer 2000)
Public Opinion as a Constraint on U.S. Foreign Policy:
Assessing the Perceived Value of American and Foreign Lives.
Paper given at Annual Convention of the International Studies Association, Los Angeles, CA,
March 15, 2000
Democracy: Optimal Illusions and Grim Realities
(htm) Research Monograph Series, Center for the Study
of Democracy, University of California, Irvine, 1999
The Rise, Decline, Shallowness, and Banality of Militant
Nationalism in Europe: Hobbes, Thugs, "Ethnic Conflict," and the
Future of Warfare (pdf) Paper
delivered at the American Political Science Association Convention, Atlanta, GA,
September 2, 1999
"Duelling Counterfactuals," in John Lewis Gaddis,
Philip H. Gordon, Ernest R. May, and Jonathan Rosenberg (eds.), Cold War Statesmen Confront the Bomb: Nuclear Diplomacy
Since 1945 (London: Oxford University Press, 1999), pp. 272-83 pdf (does not
contain the notes)
Fifteen Propositions about American Foreign Policy and
Public Opinion in an Era Free of Compelling Threats. Paper
given at Annual Convention of the International Studies Association, San Diego,
CA, April 19, 1996 (pdf)
American Public Opinion and the Gulf War: Some Polling
Issues 57 Public Opinion
Quarterly 80-91 (Spring 1993) (pdf)
Pearl
Harbor: Military Inconvenience, Political Disaster 16 International Security 172-203 (Winter 1991-92) (pdf)
Is War Still Becoming Obsolete? Paper
delivered at American Political Science Association Convention, Washington, DC,
August 30, 1991 (pdf)
The Essential Irrelevance of Nuclear Weapons: Stability in
the Postwar World 13 International
Security 55-79 (Fall 1988) (pdf)
Trends in Political Tolerance 52 Public Opinion Quarterly 1-25 (Spring 1988) (pdf)
Containment and the Decline of the Soviet Empire: Some
Tentative Comments on the End of the World As We Know It.
Paper delivered at the International Studies Association Convention, Anaheim,
CA, March 28, 1986 (pdf)
Reflections on the Vietnam Antiwar Movement and on the
Curious Calm at the War's End (htm)
in Peter Braestrup (ed.), Vietnam as History (Lanham, MD: University Press of
America, 1984), pp. 151-57.
"The Search
for the "Breaking Point" in Vietnam: The Statistics of a Deadly
Quarrel," 24 International Studies
Quarterly 497-531 (December 1980) pdf (includes
comments on the article by Richard K. Betts and Frederick Z. Brown, and a
rejoinder by John Mueller)
"Choosing
Among 133 Candidates," 34 Public Opinion
Quarterly 395-402 (Fall 1970) pdf
"Incentives for Restraint: Canada
as a Nonnuclear Power," 11 Orbis 864-84 (Fall 1967) pdf
Musical theater
A Foggy Day
One For My Baby