When the Stakes Are High: Deterrence and Conflict among Major Powers

by Vesna Danilovic

Overview

When the Stakes Are High is based on the premise that powers have continually played a decisive role in international conflicts. Consequently, one of the key questions concerns the conditions that are likely to trigger or abate dispute escalation into major power conflicts. In this book, Vesna Danilovic provides a rigorous theoretical and empirical analysis of these conditions.
Since the most precarious and common form of dispute between major powers arises over third nations, the author's primary focus is on so-called extended deterrence. In this type of deterrence, one side attempts to prevent another side from initiating or escalating conflict with a third nation. When the Stakes Are High addresses such questions as: When is extended deterrence likely to be effective? What happens if deterrence fails? In what circumstances is war likely to result from a deterrence failure? The author's main argument is that a major power's national interests, which shape the inherent credibility of threats and which are shaped by various regional stakes, set the limits to the relevance of other factors, which have received greater scholarly attention in the past. Strongly supported by the empirical findings, the arguments in this work draw important implications for conflict theory and deterrence policy in the post-Cold War era.
This book will appeal to the reader interested in international relations, in general, and in theories of international conflict, deterrence, causes of wars, great power behavior, and geopolitics, in particular.
Vesna Danilovic is Assistant Professor of Political Science, Texas A&M University.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780472026821
Publisher:	University of Michigan Press
Publication date:	06/04/2010
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	312
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Vesna Danilovic is Associate Professor of Political Science at Texas A&M University.

Read an Excerpt

When the Stakes Are High: Deterrence and Conflict Among Major Powers

---

By Vesna Danilovic

University of Michigan Press

Copyright © 2002 Vesna Danilovic
All right reserved.
ISBN: 0472112872

---

CHAPTER 1

Introduction

Great quarrels . . . arise from small occasions but seldom from small causes.

--Winston Churchill

Perfection of means and confusion of goals seem, in my opinion, to characterize our age.

--Albert Einstein

For several decades during the Cold War, the "unrestricted globalism" of containment policy left a strong imprint on U.S. strategic thought. The question of what, if any, national interests the United States, or any other power for that matter, might have had in different parts of the world was not generally raised. Instead, many scholars and policy-makers were puzzled over two issues regarding effective deterrence. The first of these issues concerned the development of the capabilities that would provide an effective deterrent and, if deterrence failed, give the capacity to carry out a threat. Central to this problem was the question of whether the strategic parity between two superpowers, reinforced by the threat of mutually assured destruction (MAD), was sufficient enough to deter the escalation of a minor dispute into a nuclear confrontation. Although prima facie disconnected, this pivotal concern of nuclear strategic thinkers was perfectly consistent with the research of a number of scholars in the general literature of international relations. Their similar focus on relative capabilities was largely shaped by the realist paradigm, which considered power as the omnipresent factor in world politics.

The second predominant issue in strategic theory and policy resulted from the belief that the failure to stand firm against an opponent in one region would reflect negatively on the U.S. reputation to meet threats in other parts of the world. Consequently, strategic thought was mainly directed toward developing the techniques of signaling U.S. intention to use force, even when its stakes were low in the particular area of dispute. In the post-Cold War era, however, the demise of a major global adversary has prompted the question of whether U.S. national interests and goals should be uniform across all world regions. Strategic theories, mainly shaped in the context of superpower deterrence, do not always have well-developed answers to this important policy question.

To understand the intricate nature of credible threats in the nuclear age, the deterrence literature has thus centered almost exclusively on the problems of relative power and manipulative strategies. Astonishingly, it has almost completely bypassed the key question of what creates a genuinely credible reason to want to use force in the first place. What issues are at stake? How strong do the stakes, that is, a deterrer's national interests, have to be for an opponent to believe the deterrer will carry out the threat? Is the belief about the deterrer's credibility predicated on the perceptions of the deterrer's inherent interests, regardless of how costly the intentions are communicated? The question of what, if any, political goals a deterrer and potential attacker have in the dispute over a third nation--the paradigmatic situation between major powers, and the one where the credibility of threats is most questioned--has been largely ignored.

This book takes the position, rarely analyzed elsewhere, that regional stakes are a main ingredient of the credibility of deterrence between major powers. Specifically, the salience of a particular region for a major power's national interests indicates the inherent credibility of its (Defender's) threat to retaliate if another major power (Challenger) attacks the third nation located in such a region. The regional stakes refer to the various forms of linkages between the Defender and the area in which the third nation (Protege) is located, such as politico-military, diplomatic, and alliance ties, or the degree of economic interdependence measured by a high volume of trade and investments. Besides issues directly related to their own territory, I believe that it is regional ties that precisely provide the key cues to the national interests of major powers.

Since "the criterion of 'national interest' should assist the policy-maker to cut through the complex, multivalued nature of foreign policy issues" (George 1980, 234), it is one of the goals here to clarify the concept of threat credibility in terms of national interests. My main argument is that the national interest, shaping the inherent credibility of threats, sets the limits to the impact of the other two factors on the opponent, i.e., a deterrer's capacity to carry out its threat and manipulative strategies it uses to communicate a strong resolve. It is national interest--in other words, the involved stake in the dispute--that shapes the opponent's perception of the deterrer's resolve. If there is an asymmetry of stakes to a potential attacker's advantage, for instance, the deterrer's persuasive power to retaliate if another nation is attacked is significantly diminished. On the other hand, if the asymmetry of stakes is to the deterrer's advantage, the maintenance of overkill capacity or the use of various commitment strategies to defend an ally could be quite costly and, more important, superfluous.

Why assume that an opponent is oblivious of a deterrer's vital national interests? It could be the case, but only if the deterrer has not defined its vital interests and prioritized its foreign policy goals. "Of course in many cases the balance of interest is ambiguous. . . . But at minimum, states seem able to separate peripheral from vital interests" (Jervis 1991, 42). Remarkably, this simple, but fundamental logic of foreign policy calculations, nuclear or nonnuclear alike, driven by differentiation between vital and peripheral interests, has been overshadowed by other concerns, as discussed previously. The main point is that simple power calculations and building a reputation for strong resolve should follow rather than precede the issue of foreign policy goals and the priority of stakes, which, in turn, shape inherently credible threats in deterrence situations.

The occasional confusion about foreign policy goals seems then to be yet another legacy of the Cold War era. Phrases such as "conceptual poverty," "from containment to confusion," or "paradigm lost" are consequently found as descriptors of U.S. foreign policy in recent critical literature (e.g., Haas 1995; Posen and Ross 1997; Nye 1999). An emerging number of critics point to the problematic nature of foreign interventions based on reputational reasons, instead advocating the need to formulate a "grand strategy" as the guiding principle for post-Cold War policy. It is the strategy that "would be based on the belief that concrete vital interests should determine U.S. commitments (rather than credibility determining commitments and commitments, in turn, determining interests)" (Layne 1997, 115; see also Johnson 1994, 144; Haas 1995; Nye 1999).

Clearly, current world events require a fresher look at and a reinterpretation of a number of old premises inherited from the past. This book points to one of the ways to rethink current and past events as they have emerged in relations between major powers. It is closely related to recent literature that emphasizes the need for grand strategy as opposed to ad hoc micromanagement of foreign policy crises. In order to make such a transition in the post-Cold War era, I argue that it is essential to bring back into focus the long-neglected question of the role of national interests in both deterrence theory and strategic policy. This argument is strongly supported in my quantitative analysis of deterrence crises involving major powers during the ninety-year period from 1895 to 1985. A number of historical sources were consulted (see list at end of References) to generate a new data set of major power deterrence cases, which provided the grounds for the empirical analysis. Those cases of general deterrence failure that escalated into immediate deterrence crises between major powers are also summarized in appendix A.

This book provides both a theoretical and rigorous empirical analysis of deterrence between major powers. The first three chapters (part I) introduce key debates in deterrence research and clarify the main phenomenon that this study attempts to explain. In this introduction, I present alternative theoretical explanations of deterrence and conflict. In particular, the main arguments of those theories that focus on either relative power or manipulative strategies of costly signals are compared to the approach emphasizing the importance of inherent credibility. Later in the book I expand the notion of inherent credibility tying it to regional stakes. This conceptual expansion provides a criterion for identifying major powers' national interests in extended deterrence. As this study is looking at the behavior of major powers, chapter 2 and appendix B provide a theoretical rationale for their ongoing relevance to international relations research. Conceptual criteria and historical background for identifying major powers during the observed period are also presented in detail. Chapter 3 further explores a number of conceptual and operational problems involved in any deterrence analysis and introduces the new data set of deterrence cases.

Each chapter of part II gives a detailed theoretical discussion and empirical test of the individual impact of key factors on deterrence. These include relative power (chap. 4), regional stakes (chap. 5), and domestically driven stakes (chap. 6). Chapter 7, dealing with manipulative strategies of commitments and costly signals, is included in part III because it also probes the possibility of these factors' interactive effects through a series of combined models. As the empirical results point to the vital role of regional stakes for understanding the dynamics of major power relations, whether individually tested or in combination with other factors, part III concludes with a discussion of their implications for conflict theory and deterrence policy, particularly in the post-Cold War period.

Most theories of international conflict and deterrence that we explore and implement today were formulated or reformulated in the nuclear context of the Cold War. They were meant to provide a logical roadmap for an age in which world stability and survival appeared to rest upon "the irrationality of the rational" logic of nuclear threats. The archetypal situation was that of two nuclear states facing each other with threats of mutual annihilation if either should launch an attack. If a side's home territory was attacked, the response would be less uncertain since its survival would be at stake. The precarious nature of nuclear deterrence arose, however, when such threats were expected to deter attacks on a third nation, usually the deterrer's ally or protege, that is, in the situation of "extended deterrence."

In the nuclear setting of mutually assured destruction (MAD), the inherent value of a protege for the deterrer's national interests becomes a secondary question as this value could not possibly compensate for the costs the deterrer would have to sustain if its threat were carried out. Consequently, the problem of nuclear threats primarily concerns their credibility, which "depends on being willing to accept the other side's retaliatory blow. It depends on the harm he can do, not on the harm we can do" (Kahn, cited in Freedman 1989, 134). To solve the credibility problem, i.e., to make irrational nuclear threats look rational, attention centered on the techniques of signaling intentions. This new focus, in turn, gradually overshadowed the issue of whether the protege was vital for the deterrer's national interests in the first place.

Hence, the deterrer of the nuclear age faced the difficult task of persuading its adversary that it would be willing to endure costs disproportionate to the issues at stake whenever its international commitments were challenged. Otherwise, its reputation for strong resolve would be compromised, and the adversary was expected to interpret the deterrer's threats as bluffs in other places as well. To prevent such a chain of events, triggered by the failure to stand firm, the deterrer had to effectively signal a strong commitment to retaliate, even at the cost of its own annihilation. Would the United States be willing to trade Washington or New York for Paris or Bonn? This was not just a rhetorical question Charles de Gaulle asked at the height of the Cold War.

A number of modern strategic studies, born out of this puzzle, are still in the process of solving it. The questions being asked, and the carefully analyzed answers, delve into the best strategies for signaling foreign policy interests, especially when those interests are weak. Yet, it appears to be forgotten that the interest in costly signals and reputation was predicated on a very specific idea: that it was not rational for an adversary to believe that the deterrer's interests were worthy of retaliation. While it is clear why this was the quintessential premise of nuclear deterrence analysis, it is questionable whether it is useful as a general theory of international conflict. Nevertheless, this approach finds advocates, both in theory and policy, even for nonnuclear deterrence encounters. Moreover, it seems that a reputation for standing firm itself often becomes the key aspect of national interest. Such an approach can almost completely marginalize the critical question of politics, that is, which political goals are at stake in specific situations, apart from the reputational issue.

The dilemma regarding relative power capabilities that provide an effective deterrent is another issue that has dominated the conflict and deterrence research. In strategic studies, the emphasis has been on the precarious nature of deterrence brought up by the advent of nuclear weapons. The idea that the strategic balance between superpowers, forged by their second-strike capabilities, assured deterrence stability, found both its advocates and skeptics. Critics of the MAD strategy pointed to its inadequacy to respond to limited attacks or solve the credibility problem. Instead of relying on the strategic balance of terror, they advocated nuclear superiority as a means of solving the credibility problem of nuclear threats in a nonsuicidal manner. The disagreement over the adequate balance of nuclear power that can provide an effective deterrent roughly corresponds to one of the major debates about the relationship between power distribution and war in the general international relations literature.

The realists are divided over the question of whether power balance or imbalance is more likely to lead to deterrence failure and ultimately to war. However, whether considered in the nuclear or nonnuclear setting, the analysis of relative power alone can provide only partial understanding of conflict behavior. It misses the motivational aspect or, in other words, the important factor of each side's willingness to fight over an issue. An asymmetry of motivation, for instance, can reverse the impact of capabilities on the probability of war. Theories and strategies that rest on simple power calculations, without considering motivation or willingness to fight, are at best only incomplete.

It is not by any means argued here that we should forsake the analysis of relative power or its undeniably significant impact on world politics. This study is also not suggesting a minor role of communication and bargaining strategies in crises. In fact, the use of adequate bar gaining strategies has been shown to de-escalate even the most acute international crises. Rather, the issue that is raised here points to the danger of applying the logic of nuclear deterrence to nonnuclear situations. The "irrationality of the rational" premise behind nuclear threats is largely unsuitable for nonnuclear milieus. Evidently, deception and costly signaling were considered by some strategic thinkers to be workable solutions to the problem of "unthinkable" scenarios implicit in nuclear threats. However, their unquestioned generalization to other conflict situations, ones void of the irrational logic of nuclear threats, is potentially erroneous and even dangerously risky. Moreover, the focus on signaling techniques or simple power calculations--at the expense of understanding the inherent issues at stake--obscures the fundamental question of what constitutes vital national interests. Even in cases of nuclear deterrence, the question of national interests needs to be clarified before commitments are made and subsequently honored. As previously discussed, it is reasonable to assume that there is a connection between a deterrer's national interests and an opponent's perception of its threat resolve.

The Requirements of Deterrence and Conflict Avoidance

Traditionally, strategic thinkers were engaged in the study of deterrence, while international relations scholars focused on the causes of conflicts and their avoidance. It is reasonable to argue that separation of subject matter, however, is simply artificial, disguised by differences in terminology. The question of what constitutes the "requirements of deterrence" (Kaufmann 1956) is in fact similar to the problem of conflict avoidance. The factors that presumably contribute to deterrence failure can also be considered as the same factors leading to crisis escalation and, ultimately, the outbreak of war. Accordingly, an analysis of the requirements of deterrence should be seen as a special case of conflict escalation theory if deterrence fails and, at the same time, as a theory of conflict avoidance if deterrence succeeds.

The traditional view of the necessary conditions for successful deterrence is that the potential attacker must perceive the deterrer's threats of retaliation as sufficiently capable and credible for retaliation. Simply put, the potential attacker needs to be convinced that the deterrer can and will execute its threats if the attack occurs. "Deterrence requires a combination of power, the will to use it, and the assessment of these by the potential aggressor. Moreover, deterrence is a product of those factors and not a sum. If any one of them is zero, deterrence fails" (Kissinger 1957, 12).



Continues...

---

Excerpted from When the Stakes Are High: Deterrence and Conflict Among Major Powers by Vesna Danilovic Copyright © 2002 by Vesna Danilovic. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

---

Table of Contents

Contents List of Figures List of Tables Preface Part I 1. Introduction 2. Major Powers and Global Contenders 3. Deterrence and Conflict Part II 4. Balance of Power and Power Shifts: Global Interests at Stake 5. Credibility and Geopolitics: Regional Interests at Stake 6. Resolve and Domestic Costs: Internal Interests at Stake Part III 7. Predicting Major Power Conflicts: High Stakes or Costly Signals? 8. Theoretical and Policy Implications Appendixes A. Case Summaries and Sources B. Conceptual and Operational Rules for Major Powers C. Sources and Data for Colonial Possessions and Foreign Trade D. Questions of Statistical Analysis and Discrete Choice Models Notes References Index