Gorbachev's Third World dilemmas /

This solid, valuable collection of essays has a slightly misleading title. It might better have been called "The Limits to Soviet Power," since all eight contributors seem to agree that Gorbachev has merely admitted what his predecessors already recognized; namely that the USSR had become dangerously overextended in Africa, the Caribbean, and Afghanistan. The Soviets wanted to be recognized as a superpower, but Soviet diplomats and military strategists saw a growing imbalance between policy and power. This volume grew out of a conference held in February 1986, but all chapters are updated through mid-1988. It is unusually coherent and tightly edited, a welcome change from commonly spotty collections of essays. Chapters detailing Soviet misgivings about erratic clients in the Caribbean and southern Africa are especially valuable. There is hardly any mention of Vietnam or the Middle East, however, which must be accounted major omissions. Detailed tables in the chapter on arms transfers and extensive footnotes throughout will be useful to graduate students and upper-division undergraduates. -R. Marlay, Arkansas State University