Commentary: Arms race exploding around the world

India, Australia, Thailand, Vietnam, North Korea, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and others are spending huge sums to acquire submarines, surface vessels, missiles and missile guidance systems (as my blog has illustrated the past two months).  Meanwhile, Russia, China, the United States and European powers are beefing up as well.  To me, it's akin to the arms buildup in the 1930s that plunged the world into war.  All it would take in this era is one provocative act to escalate things.  The defensive posture of most countries is "mutually assured destruction" to thwart an enemy from a preemptive strike.  But will the genie get out of the bottle?