Optimism for a more peaceful post-Cold War era has been tempered by greater international instability and the weakening of some nation-states. Former client states, no longer moderated by the influences of their pervious superpower patrons resort to violent suppressions of political opponents and ethnic minorities. Former nations divide along ethnic lines, often spawning new political divisions that are neither stable nor sustainable. Perhaps nowhere are these dynamics more evident than in the "arc of crises," a region extending from the Balkans through Asia Minor to the Caucasus and Central...