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enged and removed may 2026 learn how and when to remove this message finally coercive credibility requires that in addition to calculations about costs and benefits of co operation the defending state convincingly conveys to the attacking state that failure to co operate has consequences threats uses of force and other coercive instruments such as economic sanctions must be sufficiently credible to raise the attacking state s perceived costs of noncompliance a defending state having a superior military capability or economic strength in itself is not enough to ensure credibility indeed all three elements of a balanced deterrence strategy are more likely to be achieved if other major international actors like the un or nato are supportive and opposition within the defending state s domestic politics is limited the other important considerations outlined by jentleson et al 34 that must be taken into consideration is the domestic political and economic conditions in the attacking state affecting its vulnerability to deterrence policies and the attacking state s ability to compensate unfavourable power balances the first factor is whether internal political support and regime security are better served by defiance or there are domestic political gains to be made from improving relations with the defending state the second factor is an economic calculation of the costs that military force sanctions and other coercive instruments can impose and the benefits that trade and other economic incentives may carry that is partly a function of the strength and flexibility of the attacking state s domestic economy and its capacity to absorb or counter the costs being imposed the third factor is the role of elites and other key domestic political figures within the attacking state to the extent that such actors interests are threatened with the defending state s demands they act to prevent or block the defending state s demands rational deterrence theory edit source one approach to theorizing about deterrence has entailed the use of rational choice and game theoretic models of decision making see game theory rational deterrence theory entails 36 rationality actors are rational 13 unitary actor assumption actors are understood as unitary 13 dyads interactions tend to be between dyads or triads of states strategic interactions actors consider the choices of other actors 13 cost benefit calculations outcomes reflect actors cost benefit calculations 13 37 deterrence theorists have consistently argued that deterrence success is more likely if a defending state s deterrent threat is credible to an attacking state huth 31 outlines that a threat is considered credible if the defending state possesses both the military capabilities to inflict substantial costs on an attacking state in an armed conflict and the attacking state believes that the defending state is resolved to use its available military forces huth 31 goes on to explain the four key factors for consideration under rational deterrence theory the military balance signaling and bargaining power reputations for resolve interests at stake the american economist thomas schelling brought his background in game theory to the subject of studying international deterrence schelling s 1966 classic work on deterrence presents the concept that military strategy can no longer be defined as the science of military victory instead it is argued that military strategy was now equally if not more the art of coercion intimidation and deterrence 38 schelling says the capacity to harm another state is now used as a motivating factor for other states to avoid it and influence another state s behavior to be coercive or deter another state violence must be anticipated and avoidable by accommodation it can therefore be summarized that the use of the power to hurt as bargaining power is the foundation of deterrence theory and is most successful when it is held in reserve 38 in an article celebrating schelling s nobel memorial prize for economics 39 michael kinsley washington post op ed columnist and one of schelling s former students anecdotally summarizes schelling s reorientation of game theory thus y ou re standing at the edge of a cliff chained by the ankle to someone else you ll be released and one of you will get a large prize as soon as the other gives in how do you persuade the other guy to give in when the only method at your disposal threatening to push him off the cliff would doom you both answer you start dancing closer and closer to the edge that way you don t have to convince him that you would do something totally irrational plunge him and yourself off the cliff you just have to convince him that you are prepared to take a higher risk than he is of accidentally falling off the cliff if you can do that you win military balance edit source deterrence is often directed against state leaders who have specific territorial goals that they seek to attain either by seizing disputed territory in a limited military attack or by occupying disputed territory after the decisive defeat of the adversary s armed forces in either case the strategic orientation of potential attacking states generally is for the short term and is driven by concerns about military cost and effectiveness for successful deterrence defending states need the military capacity to respond quickly and strongly to a range of contingencies deterrence often fails if either a defending state or an attacking state underestimates or overestimates the other s ability to undertake a particular course of action citation needed signaling and bargaining power edit source the central problem for a state that seeks to communicate a credible deterrent threat by diplomatic or military actions is that all defending states have an incentive to act as if they are determined to resist an attack in the hope that the attacking state will back away from military conflict with a seemingly resolved adversary if all defending states have such incentives potential attacking states may discount statements made by defending states along with any movement of military forces as merely bluffs in that regard rational deterrence theorists have argued that costly signals are required to communicate the credibility of a defending state s resolve those are actions and statements that clearly increase the risk of a military conflict and also increase the costs of backing down from a deterrent threat states that bluff are unwilling to cross a certain threshold of threat and military action for fear of committing themselves to an armed conflict reputations for resolve edit source main article credibility international relations there are three different arguments that have been developed in relation to the role of reputations in influencing deterrence outcomes the first argument focuses on a defending state s past behavior in international disputes and crises which creates strong beliefs in a potential attacking state about the defending state s expected behaviour in future conflicts the credibilities of a defending state s policies are arguably linked over time and reputations for resolve have a powerful causal impact on an attacking state s decision whether to challenge either general or immediate deterrence the second approach argues that reputations have a limited impact on deterrence outcomes because the credibility of deterrence is heavily determined by the specific configuration of military capabilities interests at stake and political constraints faced by a defending state in a given situation of attempted deterrence the argument of that school of thought is that potential attacking states are not likely to draw strong inferences about a defending states resolve from prior conflicts because potential attacking states do not believe that a defending state s past behaviour is a reliable predictor of future behavior the third approach is a middle ground between the first two approaches and argues that potential attacking states are likely to draw reputational inferences about resolve from the past behaviour of defending states only under certain conditions the insight is the expectation that decisionmakers use only certain types of information when drawing inferences about reputations and an attacking state updates and revises its beliefs when a defending state s unanticipated behavior cannot be explained by case specific variables an example shows that the problem extends to the perception of the third parties as well as main adversaries and underlies the way in which attempts at deterrence can fail and even backfire if the assumptions about the others perceptions are incorrect 40 interests at stake edit source although costly signaling and bargaining power are more well established arguments in rational deterrence theory the interests of defending states are not as well known attacking states may look beyond the short term bargaining tactics of a defending state and seek to determine what interests are at stake for the defending state that would justify the risks of a military conflict the argument is that defending states that have greater interests at stake in a dispute are more resolved to use force and more willing to endure military losses to secure those interests even less well established arguments are the specific interests that are more salient to state leaders such as military interests and economic interests furthermore huth 31 argues that both supporters and critics of rational deterrence theory agree that an unfavorable assessment of the domestic and international status quo by state leaders can undermine or severely test the success of deterrence in a rational choice approach if the expected utility of not using force is reduced by a declining status quo position deterrence failure is more likely since the alternative option of using force becomes relatively more attractive tripwires edit source tripwires entail that small forces are deployed abroad with the assumption that an attack on them will trigger a greater deployment of forces 41 dan reiter and paul poast have argued that tripwires do not deter aggression 41 42 dan altman has argued that tripwires do work to deter aggression citing the western deployment of forces to berlin in 1948 1949 to deter soviet aggression as a successful example 43 a 2022 study by brian blankenship and erik lin greenberg found that high resolve low capability signals such as tripwires were not viewed as more reassuring to allies than low resolve high capability alternatives such as forces stationed offshore their study cast doubt on the reassuring value of tripwires 44 nuclear deterrence theory edit source main articles nuclear strategy massive retaliation mutual assured destruction and flexible response nuclear weapons background nuclear explosion history warfare design testing delivery yield effects humanitarian workers ethics arsenals target selection arms race blackmail deterrence espionage no first use proliferation disarmament sharing strategy terrorism umbrella opposition winter pax atomica nuclear triad nuclear armed states npt recognized united states russia united kingdom france china others india israel undeclared pakistan north korea former south africa belarus kazakhstan ukraine v t e in 1966 schelling 38 is prescriptive in outlining the impact of the development of nuclear weapons in the analysis of military power and deterrence in his analysis before the widespread use of assured second strike capability or immediate reprisal in the form of ssbn submarines schelling argues that nuclear weapons give nations the potential to destroy their enemies but also the rest of humanity without drawing immediate reprisal because of the lack of a conceivable defense system and the speed with which nuclear weapons can be deployed a nation s credible threat of such severe damage empowers their deterrence policies and fuels political coercion and military deadlock which can produce proxy warfare according to kenneth waltz there are three requirements for successful nuclear deterrence 45 part of a state s nuclear arsenal must appear to be able to survive an attack by the adversary and be used for a retaliatory second strike the state must not respond to false alarms of a strike by the adversary the state must maintain command and control the stability instability paradox is a key concept in rational deterrence theory it states that when two countries each have nuclear weapons the probability of a direct war between them greatly decreases but the probability of minor or indirect conflicts between them increases 46 47 48 this occurs because rational actors want to avoid nuclear wars and thus they neither start major conflicts nor allow minor conflicts to escalate into major conflicts thus making it safe to engage in minor conflicts for instance during the cold war the united states and the soviet union never engaged each other in warfare but fought proxy wars in korea vietnam angola the middle east nicaragua and afghanistan and spent substantial amounts of money and manpower on gaining relative influence over the third world 49 bernard brodie wrote in 1959 that a credible nuclear deterrent must be always ready 50 a an extended nuclear deterrence guarantee is also called a nuclear umbrella 51 scholars have debated whether having a superior nuclear arsenal provides a deterrent against other nuclear armed states with smaller arsenals matthew kroenig has argued that states with nuclear superiority are more likely to win nuclear crises 52 53 whereas todd sechser matthew fuhrmann and david c logan have challenged this assertion 54 55 56 a 2023 study found that a state with nuclear weapons is less likely to be targeted by non nuclear states but that a state with nuclear weapons is not less likely to target other nuclear states in low level conflict 57 a 2022 study by kyungwon suh suggests that nuclear superiority may not reduce the likelihood that nuclear opponents will initiate nuclear crises 58 proponents of nuclear deterrence theory argue that newly nuclear armed states may pose a short or medium term risk but that nuclear learning occurs over time as states learn to live with new nuclear armed states 59 60 mark s bell and nicholas l miller have however argued that there is a weak theoretical and empirical basis for notions of nuclear learning 61 stages of us policy of deterrence edit source this section needs more citations please help improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources unsourced material may be challenged and removed may 2026 learn how and when to remove this message the us policy of deterrence during the cold war underwent significant variations containment edit source the early stages of the cold war were generally characterized by the containment of communism an aggressive stance on behalf of the us especially on developing nations under its sphere of influence the period was characterized ...
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