Deterrence theory
Deterrence is widely defined as any use of threats (implicit or explicit) or limited force intended to dissuade an actor from taking an action (i.e. maintain the status quo).
They claimed that the success of US foreign policy often depends upon a president withstanding "the inevitable charges of appeasement that accompany any decision to negotiate with hostile powers.
If armed conflict is avoided at the price of diplomatic concessions to the maximum demands of the potential attacking nation under the threat of war, it cannot be claimed that deterrence has succeeded.
Furthermore, as Jentleson et al.[28] argue, two key sets of factors for successful deterrence are important: a defending state strategy that balances credible coercion and deft diplomacy consistent with the three criteria of proportionality, reciprocity, and coercive credibility and minimizes international and domestic constraints and the extent of an attacking state's vulnerability as shaped by its domestic political and economic conditions.
A successful nuclear deterrent requires a country to preserve its ability to retaliate by responding before its own weapons are destroyed or ensuring a second-strike capability.
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.
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.
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.
Huth[26] 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.
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.
In that regard, rational deterrence theorists have argued that costly signals are required to communicate the credibility of a defending state's resolve.
[36] 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).
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.
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.
George F. Kennan, who is taken to be the founder of this policy in his Long Telegram, asserted that he never advocated military intervention, merely economic support, and that his ideas were misinterpreted as espoused by the general public.
Therefore, the period of détente was characterized by a general reduction in the tension between the Soviet Union and the United States and a thawing of the Cold War, which lasted from the late 1960s until the start of the 1980s.
Reagan attempted to justify the policy by concerns of growing Soviet influence in Latin America and the post-1979 revolutionary government of Iran.
While the army was dealing with the breakup of the Soviet Union and the spread of nuclear technology to other nations beyond the United States and Russia, the concept of deterrence took on a broader multinational dimension.
[55] It explains that while relations with Russia continue to follow the traditional characteristics of MAD, but the US policy of deterrence towards nations with minor nuclear capabilities should ensure by threats of immense retaliation (or even pre-emptive action) not to threaten the United States, its interests, or allies.
By the beginning of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, many western hawks expressed the view that deterrence worked in that war but only in one way – in favor of Russia.
[58] Timo S. Koster who served at NATO as Director of Defence Policy & Capabilities similarly argued: A massacre is taking place in Europe and the strongest military alliance in the world is staying out of it.
[59] Philip Breedlove, a retired four-star U.S. Air Force general and a former SACEUR, said that Western fears about nuclear weapons and World War III have left it "fully deterred" and Putin "completely undeterred."
[69] There are various ways to engage in cyber deterrence:[62][63][64] There is a risk of unintended escalation in cyberspace due to difficulties in discerning the intent of attackers,[73][74] and complexities in state-hacker relationships.
[72] According to Lennart Maschmeyer, cyber weapons have limited coercive effectiveness due to a trilemma "whereby speed, intensity, and control are negatively correlated.
[80] Here it's argued that misestimations of perceived costs and benefits by analysts contribute to deterrence failures,[81] as exemplified in case of Russian invasion of Ukraine.
"[93] Paul Nitze argued in 1994 that nuclear weapons were obsolete in the "new world disorder" after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and he advocated reliance on precision guided munitions to secure a permanent military advantage over future adversaries.
[97] In the post cold war era, philosophical objections to the reliance upon deterrence theories in general have also been raised on purely ethical grounds.
Scholars such as Robert L. Holmes have noted that the implementation of such theories is inconsistent with a fundamental deontological presumption which prohibits the killing of innocent life.
Holmes further argues that it is therefore both irrational and immoral to utilize a methodology for perpetuating international peace which relies exclusively upon the continuous development of new iterations of the very weapons which it is designed to prohibit.
