Summary
Thomas Schelling's "Arms and Influence" argues that military capabilities, real or imagined, function as bargaining power. This power can be exploited through the "diplomacy of violence" to preserve peace or threaten war, redefining war as an alternative to diplomacy and military strategy as more than just the science of victory. The book concentrates on how these military capabilities are used as bargaining tools, emphasizing that actions taken during crises, like those of the US in Berlin and Cuba, serve as signals to an adversary.
Schelling's framework, originally developed in the context of superpowers and mutually assured destruction, highlights the use of military force as a threat rather than direct engagement. He posits that an adversary's own military intelligence reports are crucial diplomatic communications. The book's enduring relevance lies in its application to contemporary multipolar worlds where conflict extends beyond physical battlegrounds.
Key concepts
- Diplomacy of violence — Exploiting military capabilities as bargaining power to negotiate peace or initiate conflict.
- Bargaining power — The utilization of real or imagined military capabilities as a tool in negotiations.
- Signals to an enemy — Actions taken during crises that communicate intent and capability to an adversary.
- Military intelligence as diplomatic communications — The use of an opponent's own intelligence reports as key sources for diplomatic messaging.
From the book
Description: Traditionally, Americans have viewed war as an alternative to diplomacy, and military strategy as the science of victory. Today, however, in our world of nuclear weapons, military power is not so much exercised as threatened. It is, Mr. Schelling says, bargaining power, and the exploitation of this power, for good or evil, to preserve peace or to threaten war, is diplomacy - the diplomacy of violence. The author concentrates in this book on the way in which military capabilites - real or imagined - are used, skillfully or clumsily, as bargaining power. He sees the steps taken by the US during the Berlin and Cuban crises as not merely preparations for engagement, but as signals to an enemy, with reports from the adversary's own military intelligence as our most important…
Description: "This is a brilliant and hardheaded book. It will frighten those who prefer not to dwell on the unthinkable and infuriate those who have taken refuge in stereotypes and moral attitudinizing."--Gordon A. Craig, New York Times Book Review Originally published more than fifty years ago, this landmark book explores the ways in which military capabilities--real or imagined--are used, skillfully or clumsily, as bargaining power. Anne-Marie Slaughter's new introduction to the work shows how Schelling's framework--conceived of in a time of superpowers and mutually assured destruction--still applies to our multipolar world, where wars are fought as much online as on the ground.