In the late 1970s and 1980s‎,‎ Middle Eastern states spent more than $600 billion expanding their military forces‎.‎ They acquired thousands of tanks‎,‎ advanced fighter aircraft‎,‎ ballistic missiles‎,‎ chemical weapons‎,‎ and‎-‎-in some cases‎-‎-nuclear devices‎.‎ These potent arsenals make the Middle East the tinderbox of world affairs‎.‎ In this book‎,‎ foreign policy analyst Yahya Sadowski shows that the arms race cannot be sustained in the 1990s‎.‎ Declining oil prices‎,‎ overpopulation‎,‎ economic mismanagement‎,‎ and foreign policy adventures‎-‎-such as the 1992 Gulf War‎,‎ which cost local states another $600 billion‎-‎-have sapped the economies of the Middle East‎.‎ Facing dwindling incomes and rising expenses‎,‎ growing numbers of Middle Easterners now favor diverting funds away from military expenditures and concentrating them on economic development programs‎.‎ Sadowski argues that arms control programs for the Middle East should be designed to reinforce and exploit these economic pressures for demilitarization‎.‎ He examines the strengths and weaknesses of various arms control proposals‎,‎ such as the U‎.‎S‎.‎ call for a cartel of weapons exporters and a Jordanian plan to liquidate the foreign debt of states that curb military expenditures‎.‎