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Page 153
APPENDIX G.3
Protecting Weak and Medium-Strength States: Issues of Deterrence,
Stability, and Decision Making1
Paul K Davis, Rand
ABSTRACT
Deterring the invasion or coercion of weak or medium-strength
states that are important but not vital interests of major states
is a key strategic challenge of the new era. This paper describes
strategies for doing so. It begins by using decision-modeling
methods to identify factors that would influence the decisions of
would-be aggressors, including factors idiosyncratic to individual
leaders. It then discusses how both immediate and general
deterrence might be strengthened by a variety of political,
economic, and military measures. The measures discussed include
reasonably capable defensive forces that cannot easily be bypassed,
operational arms control to make surprise attack more difficult,
forward-deployed protector forces, and formal arrangements through
regional security structures that would assure the long-term
punishment of aggressors through political and economic isolation
and, perhaps, military measures. The paper also encourages
identifying and rooting out "dangerous ideas" that increase
regional tensions and hatreds, and that could encourage aggression
during a crisis. The following pages document the methods described
here and include extensive references to relevant literature in
political science, psychology, history, and strategy.
INTRODUCTION
A Central Premise
This paper was developed for an international conference dealing
with long-term stability and security in a multipolar world. Rather
than discussing stability and security in the broad, however, it
focuses on the challenges that follow from my central premise that
a principal strategic issue for the developed world is how to deter
invasion or coercion of weak and medium-strong states
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OCR for page 153
Page 153
APPENDIX G.3
Protecting Weak and Medium-Strength States: Issues of Deterrence,
Stability, and Decision Making1
Paul K Davis, Rand
ABSTRACT
Deterring the invasion or coercion of weak or medium-strength
states that are important but not vital interests of major states
is a key strategic challenge of the new era. This paper describes
strategies for doing so. It begins by using decision-modeling
methods to identify factors that would influence the decisions of
would-be aggressors, including factors idiosyncratic to individual
leaders. It then discusses how both immediate and general
deterrence might be strengthened by a variety of political,
economic, and military measures. The measures discussed include
reasonably capable defensive forces that cannot easily be bypassed,
operational arms control to make surprise attack more difficult,
forward-deployed protector forces, and formal arrangements through
regional security structures that would assure the long-term
punishment of aggressors through political and economic isolation
and, perhaps, military measures. The paper also encourages
identifying and rooting out "dangerous ideas" that increase
regional tensions and hatreds, and that could encourage aggression
during a crisis. The following pages document the methods described
here and include extensive references to relevant literature in
political science, psychology, history, and strategy.
INTRODUCTION
A Central Premise
This paper was developed for an international conference dealing
with long-term stability and security in a multipolar world. Rather
than discussing stability and security in the broad, however, it
focuses on the challenges that follow from my central premise that
a principal strategic issue for the developed world is how to deter
invasion or coercion of weak and medium-strong states
1 Presented at the
International Symposium on Modeling and Analysis of Stability
Problems in Multipolar International Systems, June 7-9, 1995,
Universität der Bundeswehr, München, Germany, and the
NATO Symposium on Military Stability, June 12-14, 1995, NATO
Headquarters, Brussels, Belgium. The paper is an adaptation of a
longer paper by the author, "Protecting Weak and Medium-Strength
States: A Major Challenge for Strategic Planning," MR-643-OSD,
Rand, Santa Monica, Calif., forthcoming.
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when the security of the threatened states is important but is
not a "vital" national interest of the powers that might be the
protectors.
This premise is provocative, primarily because of the reluctance
of democracies to face up to challenges that do not clearly affect
their truly vital interests. To some, it conjures up images of
entangling alliances, world policeman functions, strategic
overextension, and quagmires. To others like myself, it seems to be
a sober expression of reality. If accepted, it has a considerable
impact on how one thinks about foreign policy and defense
planning.
Approach
In what follows, I start by illustrating how this deterrent
challenge may arise and why it is so difficult. I then describe how
deterrence issues can be examined with the aid of an analytic
approach that focuses on influencing the decisions of human beings.
This includes actually modeling the decisions of such leaders.2I
next abstract from this discussion a way to summarize deterrence
factors in the form of a "success tree" that can help guide the
development of strategies. Finally, I draw on insights from the
decisionmodeling approach to describe potential deterrent
strategies that might be recommended to weak or medium-strong
states, on the one hand, and strategies that might be recommended
to the United States and its partners of the developed world, on
the other. Many features of the strategies are familiar from other
approaches, but some reflect more uniquely the decision-modeling's
emphasis on the perceptions and reasoning of adversaries.
DETERRENCE AT THE BEGINNING OF A NEW
CENTURY
Let us begin by considering the challenge of deterrence in
rather general terms. Who is to be deterred from doing what, what
kinds of deterrence are worth distinguishing, why is deterrence
sometimes difficult, and why are there some reasons for believing
it is feasible to do better in the future than in the past?
Potential Threats
The major states of the developed world want to deter
international aggression as part of maintaining regional stability.
Usually, however, the objective is discussed in abstract terms. To
be more concrete, consider the following range of threats that
might arise in the next 20 years as viewed from one American
perspective.3
2 See Davis (1994a) for the best available
summary of the approach. For more details, including applications
to issues of nuclear and conventional crisis stability, deterrence,
and counterproliferation, see Davis (1987), Davis and Arquilla
(1991a,b), and Arquilla and Davis (1994).
3 For more extensive discussion of possible
contingencies, see Kugler (1995).
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• The old standbys of U.S. planning: a renewed threat by
Iraq against Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, or an invasion of South Korea
by North Korea.
• A future invasion (or coercion) of Poland, Ukraine, or
the Baltic states by a future Russia gone sour; an invasion of
Taiwan, Vietnam, or a unified Korea by a more militant China; or an
invasion of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia by a combination of Iran and
Iraq.
• Something that might be called "The Next Bosnia," perhaps
once again in the Balkans.
None of these is implausible in the long run. Some, however, are
more difficult to contemplate than a repeat of Saddam Hussein's
invasion of Kuwait. For example, the threats involving Russia or
China are uncomfortable because neither state is behaving
aggressively today toward its neighbors and there is no interest in
labeling either of them as a future "enemy." If matters go well,
Russia and China will develop, liberalize, prosper, and interact
continuously with other states as partners in developing a better
world. On the other hand, that is not guaranteed and the extreme
nationalist movement in Russia is certainly a matter of concern, as
is the degree of bitterness expressed by some Russian military
officers about the state of affairs in Russia and what amounts to
the loss of empire. Although Russia's army is currently in
disarray, it will remain huge and may pull itself together. It is
also unclear whether, in the years ahead, China will view the world
in classic balance-of-power terms or take the more liberal
perspective reflected in the U.N. charter and the actual behavior
of nearly all developed states.
The other complication in thinking about future threats is that
many of the threats are to particular weak and medium-strong
nations whose security is desirable but is not necessarily a
"vital" national interest of the United States or other major
states. As a result, it is difficult for governments even to
discuss such threats within the context of national defense
planning.4Nonetheless, any of the aggressions
indicated could be a serious affront to broad interests, even if
not vital interests. But how do we deal with such threats,
especially when they seem so remote and less than vitally
important?
In this regard, consider that one of the paramount blunders of
the last decade was the judgment by national leaders and
strategists as they observed the disintegration of Yugoslavia that
a war among the various emerging factions, although highly
regrettable, would not strongly affect their own national
interests. This view changed grudgingly with CNN's broadcasts of
ethnic cleansing, émigrés flowing into neighboring
countries, and the partial dashing of
4 It has taken several
years of debate even to begin the process of expanding NATO to
include, e.g., Poland, even though the security of Poland should
rather clearly be a vital interest of Western Europe. See, e.g.,
Asmus, Kugler, and Larabee (1995).
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hopes for a new world order, but it seems clear that current
world leaders do not yet know how to deal with threats to less than
vital interests. Even if they had personal concepts on the matter,
there is great public reluctance to get involved in unnecessary
conflicts in foreign lands.
Useful Distinctions
Given, then, the existence of potential challenges, especially
to weak and medium-strong states that are not obviously vital
interests of the United States or other major states, let us next
consider deterrence and what we mean by the term, since it has many
variants. In this paper:
• General deterrence refers to a continuing
influence over a period of years. It may exist whether or not there
are crises to demonstrate it.
• Immediate deterrence refers to deterring actions
at a particular time, as in deterring actions that would create a
crisis or escalate it.
• Direct deterrence refers to an actor (e.g., nation
or coalition) deterring actions against itself.
• Extended conventional deterrence refers to an
actor deterring actions of a second actor against yet a third
actor. It can be general or immediate.
By and large, the security challenges facing the United States
and its NATO allies involve extended conventional deterrence.
America's ally South Korea, of course, has a direct threat today
from North Korea. In the distant future, Korea may have a virtual
threat from China. Ukraine, the Baltic states, and Poland see
direct threats. In what follows, I shall consider challenges of
both direct and extended deterrence, of both the general and
immediate varieties.
Sobering Realities
There has been so much said about deterrence that one might
think that the issues and necessary strategies are well understood.
Nuclear deterrence, to be sure, has succeeded for many decades, and
the leaders of major states fully appreciate the reasons for
avoiding nuclear warfare. The reality is much less happy, however,
when one looks at direct and extended conventional deterrence.
Although it seems to have worked for NATO's Central Region, Huth
and Russett have demonstrated that immediate deterrence has failed
more often than it has succeeded over a large set of crises in the
19th and 20th centuries--even though the aggressor ultimately
failed roughly two-thirds of the time, which suggests that
deterrence "should" have had a better track record.5
5 See Huth (1988) and
Huth and Russett (1988). This work has stimulated a great debate on
whether democracies do not go to war against each other, and
whether a no answer can be
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That it has failed so often under such circumstances is sobering
and even alarming.
Some of the myriad reasons for deterrence having failed are as
follows:
• Nations often fail to appreciate their own interests or
to make them known adequately to the aggressor ahead of time.
• Potential aggressors often fail to appreciate the
capability that can be brought to bear against them when that
capability is distant and abstract, as was the British Navy of the
19th century or the U.S. projection forces of 1990 (Arquilla,
1992).
• Sometimes, aggressors believe that the reasons for their
actions are compelling. That is, they "have no choice." Such was
apparently the Japanese view prior to Pearl Harbor.
• Nations, especially democracies, have difficulty taking
decisive action in response to ambiguous strategic warning. Taking
such actions can be considered provocative and dangerous, thereby
making such actions politically quite troublesome (Davis and
Arquilla, 1991b).
• Military leaders are often extremely conservative about
taking the kinds of prompt but risky actions necessary to establish
or reestablish deterrence in a crisis. They worry about being
dragged incrementally into a quagmire, about depending on a trip
wire that might be tripped with the loss of their soldiers, or
about political authorities acting without first establishing
consensus.6
Even this list is not long enough. Consider that aggressive
personalities such as Saddam Hussein and Slobodan Milosevic still
seem to ascend to power all too frequently. Consider also that
expectations have changed because of the alleged lesson taught by
Bosnia about ethnic and religious differences being enduring and
fundamental. And, finally, we should also face up to the sober
reality that the United Nations is thoroughly ineffective in
dealing with security threats requiring prompt and decisive
actions.
inferred from history. See, for example, Layne
(1994), Russett (1995), Spiro (1995), and Doyle (1995), which
contain citations to the earlier literature. See also Arquilla
(1995), which expresses pessimism about regional deterrence.
6 This conservatism is discussed
sympathetically but critically by Davis and Finch (1993). It can be
argued that the uniformed military exaggerated greatly the forces
that would be required for intervention in the former Yugoslavia,
especially in the early phases when it is plausible that firm
military actions such as air strikes and deployments would have
convinced Serbia to cease its aggression (Huber, 1994). On the
other hand, it can be argued that such actions might not have
succeeded and that far greater commitments would then have become
necessary.
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More Cheerful Considerations
In light of these discouraging observations (see also Watman and
Wilkening, 1995, and Arquilla, 1995), is deterrence even feasible
in difficult cases? There are in fact several reasons for
optimism:
• By and large, potential aggressors usually seek quick and
easy conquest with low risks, thereby suggesting that deterrence
"should not" be so difficult (Mearsheimer, 1983).
• Invasion is usually difficult without massed armies,
indeed, without massed and mechanized armies with extensive
logistics. Such armies are now extremely vulnerable to modern
weapons unless the aggressor has air superiority. The issue here is
not just modern air forces, but also the advent of highly accurate
and lethal long-range artillery and shorter-range accurate mortar
systems.7
• Conquering territory is arguably not as useful as it once
was. Further, conquering territory no longer creates international
respect.
• The dark side of nationalism appears to be diminishing on
average, although events in the former Yugoslavia show how easily
it can be uncovered again.8
• There are continuing movements toward democratic
processes and shared responsibilities rather than dictatorships of
conquest-oriented individuals.
To put it differently, despite the Bosnian debacle, one can
argue that overall trends are still favorable. We should not focus
unduly on exceptional cases.
AN APPROACH TO THE STUDY OF
DETERRENCE
Observations and Motivations
Against this background let us now move to a discussion of
deterrence theory. Although much has been written on the subject,
the usual tendency has been to treat only some aspects of the
subject while ignoring or giving short
7 See Bennett, Gardiner,
and Fox (1994) and Davis (1994b, Ch. 2) for discussion of how the
nature of war has been changing and how that affects analysis
requirements.
8 The events in Bosnia
were not inevitable (Zimmerman, 1995). Arguably, Bosnia is a
tragedy made possible by the wrong thugs having too much military
power at a time when no one could or would stand up to them, in
large part because the European powers did not yet have any
consensus of views (Gompert, 1994). Nonetheless, it could not have
happened without the dark side of ethnicity and nationality
existing.
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shrift to others. There is nonetheless a substantial volume of
serious thought on which to draw in considering deterrent
challenges and potential strategies.9
Over the last decade I have taken a rather different approach to
the study of deterrence than has been customary. It focuses on the
decision making of leaders and on "natural" variables. The approach
is motivated by several observations. First, the incentives and
perceptions of aggressors are often intensely personal, as one can
appreciate by thinking of Saddam Hussein's 1981 reaction to the
threats of Iran's Khomeni, of current-era North Korean leaders who
must worry about their personal survival, of Saddam Hussein in 1990
as he compared trends to his self-image, or to Slobodan Milosevic
with his dreams of a Greater Serbia. Historically, we might think
of Hitler in this century or, for example, Alexander the Great of
antiquity.
A second observation here is that "great men of history,"
whether appropriately identified as such or merely self-proclaimed,
are "special." Many do not reason in the same way we think normal
political leaders do. Their values are different, their attitudes
toward risk are different, and their interpretation of information
is different.10 So also is the
reasoning of states dominated by ideological and ethnic-hatred
considerations "special."
All of this suggests an approach to deterrence that focuses on
influencing the decisions of human leaders or groups of leaders.
That is, instead of everything being a matter of abstract power
balances, successful deterrence depends on one or more human beings
reaching certain conclusions after thinking about the situation and
alternatives. The decision makers are attempting to be rational,
but an observer might think the reasoning or actions to be
"irrational" or "crazy." It is preferable to avoid that terminology
because it is misleading and generates the notion that worrying
about how to deter will be fruitless.
Modeling the Decision Making of
Adversaries
With such motivations in mind, my colleagues and I have
developed an approach for modeling the decision making of
adversaries. Consider first a view of the proximate issues at the
time of a decision. It can be used in group discussions about
decision makers, by decision makers themselves, or by analysts
reasoning about what opposing leaders are up to.
Assessment of Options
As mentioned above, potential aggressors attempt to make
rational decisions. The approach represents this in a simple but
unusual way by having the modeled adversary consider options and
examine likely and possible
9 For discussion of
conventional deterrence theory, see Mearsheimer (1983), Cimbala
(1992), Watman and Wilkening (1995), and, for a survey, Allan
(1994). For the related subject of causes of war see Howard (1984)
and Blainey (1973).
10 For a closely relevant
analysis critical of western deterrence theory, see Dror
(1971).
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Table G.3.1 Generic Decision-Table Format for Assessing
Options
consequences of those options, as suggested in Table G.3. 1. The
format here is that for each option the reasoner estimates the
likely outcome, most favorable outcome, and worst-case outcome. He
then makes an overall assessment of the options for action based on
these estimates. Each outcome is characterized by one of the values
Very Bad, Bad, Marginal, Good, or Very Good.11
Table G.3.2 illustrates how a table might be filled in for two
different models of the same leader viewing a particular situation
(not defined here). In the example the two models see the same
facts differently. Model 1 is perhaps more pragmatic, risk-averse,
and pragmatically incremental. He chooses the incremental option,
which has low risks. Model 2 is perhaps more ambitious, more risk
taking, and quite unhappy with the status quo and mere marginal
improvements. He chooses the aggressive option despite the
substantial risks, primarily because he sees great upside potential
and also assesses the likely outcome to be at least Good.
This simple representation of the decision can be very useful in
thinking about someone else's reasoning or one's own reasoning. In
its highlighting of likely outcome and both upside opportunities
and downside risks, it is a ''natural" representation of what we do
every day. It is arguably much more natural than expressions in
terms of utilities, for example. At the same time, there is much
that is implicit, just as there is much implicit when we make our
own decisions.
Information Needed
To understand how a potential opponent might reach individual
judgments about, for example, the worst-case outcome (would it be
Very Bad, Bad, Marginal, Good, or Very Good?), we need:
• Alternative mental images of the opponent,
11 Humans seldom reason
in so linear and reductionist a manner, but the assumption here is
that, at the end of the day, the decision maker is effectively
comparing options by considering the array of judgments shown in
Table G.3.2.
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Table G.3.2. Illustrative Judgments for Two Models
Considering Options
• An understanding of what factors are most likely to
affect the opponent's reasoning, and
• A way to go systematically from the image and factors to
estimates of the opponents' various judgments. This should
recognize that reasoning may be psychologically flawed and that the
way in which people balance benefits and risks (i.e., their
algorithms, not just the factors in the algorithms) depends on
their attitudes about the status quo.
Alternative Images
Developing alternative images is a crucial antidote to
the normal focus on so-called best-estimate thinking. To develop
alternative "images" of the opponent's reasoning, one can use a
combination of essay writing, attribute lists, influence diagrams,
and cognitive maps. As in the example of Table G.3.2, in one image
the opponent may be pragmatic and incrementalist; in another he may
be exceedingly ambitious and frustrated. Perhaps he will also feel
cornered, surrounded by enemies, and desperate. These images may
incorporate (Davis and Arquilla, 1991 la) a variety of well-known
psychological phenomena such as those discussed in the literature
under "prospect theory," which may encourage greater or lesser risk
taking than deemed rational by students of decision analysis.
To illustrate some of these concepts, Figure G.3.1 shows
contrasting cognitive maps or influence diagrams used in a study of
Saddam Hussein (Davis and Arquilla, 1991b). They represent
different images of Saddam's perceptions about the economic
situation in mid-1990. Figure G.3.1 a represents the causeeffect
relationships emphasized in the intelligence community's
"best-estimate"
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Figure G.3.1 Saddam's image of the 1990 economic
situation: two models.
understanding of Saddam prior to the invasion. Figure G.3. lb
represents an alternative image that could readily have been
formulated and disseminated at the time, except for the pressures
to focus on a single best estimate. It includes additional factors
such as Saddam's perception that his problems were the direct
result of Iraq being squeezed deliberately by his enemies (the
United States, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia among them). It also
highlights the connection between his economic travails and his
grandiose ambitions.
Although nearly all experts would have agreed on the factors in
either diagram being "significant," the dominant mental image (see
Figure G.3. 1a) gave some of the factors little emotional weight.
The diagrams highlighted differences of perspective about how
Saddam might be viewing the world. We used a number of such diagram
pairs in depicting our two images or models of Saddam Hussein.
Although we started our work after the invasion and therefore had
no trouble constructing a model to explain it, our work proved both
insightful and predictive for Saddam's subsequent behavior through
February
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Figure G.3.2 A generic proliferator's cognitive
map.
1991 (i.e., his failure to pull out of Kuwait in the kind of
compromise American strategists feared).
As a side note, the decision-modeling approach can be applied
not only to crisis decision making but also to peacetime decisions.
For example, a recent study (Arquilla and Davis, 1994) applied the
methods to understanding the decisions of potential proliferators.
Figure G.3.2 is a composite cognitive map developed in that study
to indicate the factors potentially affecting the reasoning of
states considering development of nuclear weapons. Note that in our
work the most important factor is security. Other factors may
include the desire to keep superpowers (read "United States") out
of the region or the desire to coerce neighboring states. More
recently, my colleague Zalmay Khalilzad and I applied the methods
to assessing strategies for dealing with North Korea
(unpublished).
Factors and Judgments
The next step in the approach is to identify the practical
real-world factors that dictate judgments about things such as
risks (i.e., in the terms of Table G.3.1, about worst-case
outcome). For the case of Saddam Hussein before the invasion
decision, the factors affecting perceived risks might have been as
indicated in Figure G.3.3.
By merely "eyeballing" Figure G.3.3, one can reason about what
judgments Saddam would have made given the information available on
the various
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percentage of "offensive" weapons, notably tanks16and
related support logistics (Møller, 1995).
Don't See Nuclear Weapons as a
Panacea
It is difficult to argue from some high moral position that a
weak state faced with a large and worrisome neighbor should not
have nuclear weapons. Indeed, thoughtful American presidents have
for decades chosen to quietly tolerate nuclear activities by
Israel. It may have been hypocritical at one level, but the
ultimate judgment was sound. The question is how far should this
go? Again, what advice would an honest and objective strategist
give to a weak, or even a medium-strong, state?
I admit ambivalence and, on bad days, some fatalism about
proliferation. Mearsheimer and others arguing the case for the
stabilizing role of nuclear weapons have a point (Mearsheimer,
1990). However, the following arguments in the form of advice
appear to me persuasive on balance:17
• Nuclear weapons will assuredly create
problems and may or may not solve the security problem. Also, be
very skeptical about claims that conventional deterrence is
infeasible. Unless the neighbor has strong incentives for invasion,
a moderate defense may very well be adequate. Over time, historical
and cultural factors will improve general deterrence further.
• Having nuclear weapons guarantees that you will be seen
as a threat and targeted in detail by your strong neighbor. In a
confusing crisis the urge to "preempt" or to engage in preventive
war might be very high for the neighbor.
• Making nuclear weapons survivable is extremely difficult
for most states. Even supposedly secure facilities (hardened silos,
missiles in caves, etc.) are subject to attacks by special
operations forces and missiles or aircraft with specialized
weapons. Command and control is likely to be far more vulnerable in
reality than its owners will admit.
16 The subject of
nonoffensive defenses is complex. See, for example, Huber (1990)
and Huber and Avenhaus (1993). Recent work (NATO, 1995) tends to
dim hopes for finding distinctions between offensive and defensive
weapons. For example, it gives simulation results undercutting
claims that infantry is more stabilizing than tanks, at least in
tacticallevel engagements. Nonetheless, there are clear differences
at the operational and strategic levels between force structures
suited or not suited to large-scale offensives. Further, it is
difficult for a weak or medium-strong state to have a force
structure that truly threatens a strong neighbor. All this suggests
that any negotiation of nonoffensive defense concepts should not
focus unduly on weapon-level formulas.
17 These extend points developed in
the spring of 1993 for lectures in Ukraine on defense planning.
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• Controlling nuclear weapons is a nontrivial challenge and
could be a critical factor if internal conflicts arise (civil war,
a military coup, terrorist events).
• To a greater or lesser extent, ownership of nuclear
weapons will impose costs. The nuclear-club states, and indeed the
NonProliferation Treaty states more generally, will
discriminate-not completely because of their own self interest, but
to some extent, which could be expensive and humiliating. Bucking
the system in this respect will make being in "the club" of
developed states more difficult.18
• Do not imagine that actually using nuclear weapons is so
easy as proponents of nuclear deterrence theory sometimes seem to
suggest. If one uses nuclear weapons against a neighbor's city, the
response will be annihilation. Nuclear weapons arguably do nothing
but deter nuclear use. Do you imagine yourself truly capable of a
"Samson option?"
None of these arguments is ultimately compelling, but they seem
persuasive in most cases of practical interest. Israel still
appears to be the obvious exception, primarily because it is so
small and its neighbors remain strongly and implacably hostile,
despite the continuing peace process, which may change this in
time. In a situation where religious or ethnic-hatred issues reign,
we should not expect the normal rules of conventional deterrence to
apply readily. Ideologues are willing to take greater risks,
greater casualties, and even losses in pursuit of their goals.19
EXTENDING DETERRENCE IN DEFENSE OF
WEAK OR MEDIUMSTRONG STATES
Let us next turn to what major states can do to extend
deterrence to weak or medium-strong states. The challenges are
great, but there are nonetheless some principles.
Recognize and Express Interests,
Including Less-than-vital Interests, Explicitly and Credibly
The recurring problem here has been that nations have been
ambivalent in peacetime about whether to get involved in events
elsewhere, especially in the absence of an immediate threat, and
especially when "getting involved" could
18 One of the major
factors that influenced Sweden to quit its nuclear weapons program
was apparently the desire to be part of the "good-guy club." The
issues were both practical and matters of self-image. See Cole
(1994).
19 See Dror (1971) for an
early discussion of this and other nonstandard threats such as
terrorism.
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antagonize another nation with which better rather than poorer
relations are desired. This was the problem with the United States
deterring Iraqi invasion. We see the same kinds of issues arising
today in debates about NATO expansion. NATO expansion could, on the
one hand, fill vacuums and establish the interests of the West in
the continued security of various eastern and Central European
states. On the other hand, it could antagonize Russia and provide
fuel for the dangerous Russian nationalist movement.
Interestingly, even the "aggressive" proponents of NATO
expansion have so far limited their goals to countries such as
Poland. But what about Ukraine and the Baltic states? On the one
hand, it is difficult to imagine NATO defending these states in a
traditional manner. It is also clear that NATO's interests in
Ukraine and the Baltic states are less than "vital." I would argue,
however, that aggression against either of them would be altogether
unacceptable in the modern world and that their security is very
much a matter of NATO interest. Strategy, then, would include
expressing those interests frequently.
Prepare Politically and Militarily for
Prompt Intervention Given Strategic Warning
If there is a single fatal flaw in extended deterrent strategies
based on decisive military moves in a crisis, it is that
democracies have a great deal of trouble being decisive in
ambiguous circumstances. Even "obviously" prudent military measures
such as prepositioning military forces in the region and enhancing
states of readiness for deployment are often politically difficult
because of concerns about provocation or escalation of
tensions.20
Such difficulties could perhaps be greatly mitigated by facing
up to them in peacetime and developing much of the necessary
political consensus, both domestically and politically, by
including appropriate people in seriously conducted crisis games.
Then, upon receiving strategic warning of a real crisis, the key
people (including legislators and major allied leaders) could be
brought into such gaming early so that they could themselves work
through the logic for acting rather than dissembling. If this were
successful, leaders such as the U.S. president could take
appropriate hedging measures without being savagely attacked on the
political front.
Beware of "Deterrent Actions" Without
Backup
Many of those who would support early intervention to deter
invasion of weak states or debacles such as in the Balkans tend to
assume that a clear show
20 A good example of this is the refusal by
General Colin Powell to deploy American maritime prepositioning
ships from Diego Garcia and elsewhere when strategic warning
existed of a possible Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Apparently, Powell
felt that such a move would potentially be a step toward commitment
of U.S. forces to a war that did not yet have any political
consensus and which did not merit U.S. intervention (Woodward,
1991).
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of force would suffice. Often, however, their "clear show of
force" would be long on show and short on capability. This is
inherently dangerous when the object of attention is a strong and
aggressive personality willing to take risks. Such figures tend to
be impressed by power, not empty threats. And, indeed, shows of
strength by Western European nations or NATO might well be empty
because there might not be the political support for going further.
An important distinction here is shows of force that do and do not
put that force in harm's way, with the latter being far more
effective than the former because they reduce the room for
dithering if war begins. To put it differently, there is still a
role for trip wires. However, when dealing with risk-taking
aggressors, wise leaders will not deploy trip wires without
starting the process of providing massive follow up. Military
conservatism on this score is well justified.
Enhance the Credibility of Defense
with Forward Presence
Continuing the theme of the importance of communicating credibly
the willingness to fight, it seems important to increase rather
than decrease forward deployments, preferably in forms that cannot
be readily bypassed.
Important alternatives to permanent stationing of trip wires
include (1) prepositioning equipment in the country at issue to
permit rapid reinforcement in crisis; (2) creating other
infrastructure to facilitate rapid reinforcement; (3) conducting
frequent joint exercises in the country to remind everyone of
security ties, even if informal; and (4) maintaining naval and air
forces in the region.
Plan to Supplement the Defender's
Defenses Quickly and Optimally
If we turn from abstractions to specifics, considering the real
or virtual threat to a particular weak or middle-strength state, it
is usually the case that quick substantial enhancements of defense
capability are possible if merely the right basis is laid in
advance. This, however, may involve extensive coordination in the
realm of command and control, logistics, and combined operations.
Further, it may involve deploying tailored capabilities, some of
them in short supply, rather than mere masses of equipment. Often,
"smart" intervention is likely to mean providing air forces with
precision-strike capability and superb theater-level reconnaissance
and intelligence capabilities, along with the necessary command and
control to exploit it.
Another form of "smart" intervention might be to supplement the
defender's forces with high-quality indirect fire weapons that
would greatly increase the vulnerability of attacker tanks and
permit a kind of defense in depth (see also Kelley, Fox, and
Wilson, 1994)
Deter Use of Weapons of Mass
Destruction
An important element of extended deterrence is avoiding
self-deterrence, as well as coercion of regional allies. The
problem, again, is weapons of mass
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destruction (WMD). Although defense against the WMD threat is
essential, the preferred strategy here is to deter use of
WMD, essentially by credibly threatening massive response (see,
e.g., Gompert, Watman, and Wilkening, 1995). With today's precision
weapons, such a response could be conventional. Further, it could
have a "countervalue" or "counterforce" character, depending on
needs. Countervalue attacks could be quite discriminating.
Use Arms Control and Other
International Mechanisms to Limit Forces and Constrain Force
Postures in Ways Promoting Stability
Here there is a complete commonality with the advice offered to
countries concerned about direct deterrence. Operational arms
control in particular (e.g., limits on the deployment locations and
states of readiness) of forces can drastically alter the quality of
strategic warning, even to the point of making justified preemptive
attacks plausible. This, in turn, is becoming increasingly
important as the result of the proliferation of weapons of mass
destruction and missiles: were the United States to intervene in a
regional crisis 5 or 10 years from now, there might be a high
premium on early and decisive counterforce attacks on the
aggressor's means for delivering nuclear, chemical, and biological
weapons.
Develop Theater Missile Defenses
WMD issues are becoming so important that it seems clear that
defenses against WMD are now essential. In this context defense
includes counterforce, post-boost intercept, terminal intercept,
and passive measures such as dispersal and hardening. Without such
defenses, the option for intervention and, therefore, the
credibility of extended deterrence may be severely undercut.
Seek Alternatives to Current U.N.
Mechanisms
With very few exceptions, it seems exceedingly unlikely that the
United States or its allies will be willing to intervene in
regional conflicts without clear legitimacy in the international
community. Unfortunately, the United Nations currently is
incompetent in dealing with military crises, especially when
competence includes speediness and decisiveness in circumstances of
ambiguity. Further, the prospect of depending on U.N. military
operations, as distinct from U.N.-sanctioned operations led by the
United States or some other major power, should be sobering for
anyone thinking about the challenges of successful immediate
deterrence. The major nations need to develop alternative ways of
legitimizing and conducting the necessary actions. Ideally, this
would mean changes within the U.N. structure and decision making,
but that may not prove feasible.
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RECOGNIZING THAT IMMEDIATE EXTENDED
DETERRENCE MAY FAIL
A key element of deterrence planning should be recognition that
immediate deterrence, however important, is a slender reed on which
to base security. Immediate deterrence has failed too many times in
the past, and the reasons for it having failed are still salient.
It follows that in addition to plans for military and other
measures in a crisis, an overall strategy of extended deterrence
should:
• Seek to accomplish as much as possible through
general extended deterrence-e.g., creation of security ties,
interdependence, etc.; also, reduction of the causes of
conflict.
• Make it plain (e.g., through prior security agreements)
that aggressors will be severely punished by the international
community, whether or not their invasions are successful. The
punishments could be military (including countervalue attacks),
political (pariah-state status), and/or economic (e.g., isolation),
but they should be certain and tough, even if not perfectly
enforced.
• Punishment options should be tailored to address what
matters to the decision makers of interest.
• Military planning should recognize the potential
necessity of operations to restore lost territory, perhaps over a
period of many months or years, and perhaps with operations
launched over many hundreds of kilometers away because of the
original invasion having been successful and established defenses.
Potential aggressors should not believe that a quick success ends
the game.
Punishment as a Strategic Option
Because immediate deterrence may fail, especially with respect
to attacks on weak or medium-strong states, defense of which does
not represent vital interests of potential protectors, the United
States and the civilized and forward-looking world community as a
whole should worry more about developing and advertising credible
options for severely punishing aggressor states-not just in the
immediate aftermath of an attack, but for many years thereafter.
Perhaps the metaphor should be of "putting aggressor states in
jail" for terms of, say, 5 to 10 years. In other instances, an
appropriate response might include military attacks to destroy
substantial portions of the aggressor's military forces or
infrastructure (e.g., its navy) or appropriate elements of the
civilian value structure, all with conventional weapons. With
sufficiently high accuracy and targeting, such attacks could be
relatively discriminative. The attacks could be one-time events,
"punishment," but not the start of a continuing war. There need be
no quagmire.
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The principal issue here is that of credibility. Would the world
community or leader states punish militarily a successful aggressor
that also possessed nuclear capabilities and the means to delivery
nuclear weapons against their own countries (either by missiles or
by terrorists smuggling devices into them)? The initial reaction of
many observers is "decidedly not," unless there were vital
interests at stake. Although the argument is plain enough, its
implications seem puzzling in instances in which the potential
punisher states have escalation dominance in every dimension and
the aggressor is rational, however unpleasant. Certainly, military
punishment options would be risky, but the long-run stakes could be
high.
The argument is unlikely to be resolved, but a few observations
appear to be objectively valid. In particular, general
deterrence by threat of punishment options could be much enhanced
by (1) missile defenses; (2) well-exercised and advertised military
options for selective but severe punishment, coupled into
long-term isolation activities politically and militarily; and (3)
pooling of risk by international cooperation (e.g., a punishment
option by NATO might be better than a punishment option only by the
United States).
This enhancement of general deterrence seems to be a good
investment. Enhancement of immediate deterrence through threat of
punishment will be a risky proposition, but competition in risk
taking is hardly a new issue.
CONCLUSIONS: CHALLENGES FOR SECURITY
STRATEGY, DEFENSE PLANNING, AND CRISIS DECISION MAKING
What, then, can be said in summary about deterrence in defense
of weak states, especially when one takes the perspective that
deterrence is ultimately about influencing decisions? The principal
conclusions of this paper are as follows:
• Successful deterrence depends on a net assessment by
human decision makers of many different factors. The "soft"
factors, such as the quality of relations between the states in
question, matter as much as the "harder," military factors.
• Conventional deterrence should not in most instances be
particularly difficult for medium-strong states so long as they can
deny the potential invader high confidence in a quick and
relatively painless victory. The principal exception is when the
potential invader sees compelling stakes, usually in the form of a
very serious threat to itself. The stakes may be "personal" rather
than national, which implies the need to model the leaders as well
as the situation.
• The ingredients of a deterrent defense include avoiding
major vulnerabilities such as vulnerability to surprise attack,
attack from a
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nonstandard direction, or a sudden breakthrough of a brittle
front line with no depth.
Although nuclear capability could enhance deterrence, it is also
likely in most instances to excacerbate tensions and assure that
careful military plans will be laid for attack. Nuclear
capabilities are likely to be vulnerable and therefore might be
destabilizing in a crisis.
• Nations such as the United States and its major allies
can extend conventional deterrence to less-than-vital interests,
but it is not trivial to do so. Tactics that can help include
forward-basing, prepositioning, joint exercises to supplement the
defender's capabilities with specialized high-leverage capabilities
such as air power, precision strike, and information dominance.
• The likely effectiveness of conventional deterrence and
extended conventional deterrence could be greatly enhanced by
"operational arms control" constraining the location and readiness
of offensively capable forces. Arms control could also help
shepherd the movement of force structures toward compositions more
suitable for defense of borders and internal-security actions than
for long-distance offensive force projection.
• Because immediate deterrence will not always work,
especially if it depends on denial capability or prompt actions
such as the dispatch of trip wires backed up by protector states,
the United States and the international community more generally
need to focus more on the development of credible and effective
punishment options. These should include the ability to destroy
both military and civilian infrastructure, as well as military
forces, but they should also consider mechanisms for highly certain
political and economic isolation (e.g., prior agreement within
regional security frameworks to punish aggressors in such
ways).
• Extended deterrence's credibility will depend
increasingly on the ability of the protector states to trump
threatened use of weapons of mass destruction. The trumps may
include the threat of massive conventional retaliation, nuclear
retaliation, preemption against WMD and delivery means, and the
capacity to defend forces and allied countries, at least
significantly, with missile defenses.
• When thinking both of general and extended deterrence, it
is fruitful to model the reasoning of the states to be deterred,
developing alternative models to reflect different mind sets that
may well be at work. Such models can be very helpful in assessing
alternative strategies by making it easier to understand their
likely and possible effects on the
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thinking of human beings with personal agendas, many
misperceptions, and a range of options that include not
invading.
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Representative terms from entire chapter:
conventional deterrence
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