4 thoughts on “Deterrence”

  1. Deterrence is a strategy by which governments threaten an immense retaliation if attacked in an effort to deter away any potential attackers in the first place. Deterrence differs from defense in that it focuses on retaliation and punishment. There are two types of deterrence: Type 1 and Type 2.

  2. Deterrence is the threat to punish another actor if it takes a certain negative action, specifically towards ones own nation or ones allies. It aims to prevent violence all together and is arguably easier than compellence. Furthermore, deterrence is broken up into two categories, type 1, which refers to ones own state deterring another from attacking (usually through the building of military might), and type 2, which refers to deterring violence from one actor against an ally of another (trip wire is usually the most effective way to achieve type 2).

  3. Deterrence is a strategy by which actors try to prevent attacks from an enemy actor through the promise of retaliation and punishment in return. Type I deterrence refers to an "A" to "B" relationship where actor "A" is trying to prevent actor "B" from attacking “A”. Type II deterrence involves an "A," "B," "C" relationship with actor "A" trying to prevent actor "B" from attacking actor "C." Type II deterrence is markedly more difficult than Type I, usually requiring the use of the "trip wire" strategy to effectively involve actor "A" with cause in the conflict.

Comments are closed.