Cuban Missile Crisis and Credibility
Following up on yesterday's post on credibility, here is a very interesting paper by Daryl Press (a professor at Dartmouth) which I see later became a book about how leaders assess credibility. He argues that prior to the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Soviet Union had bluffed several times and had not followed through with threats. Yet U.S. policy makers were unanimous in believing that Soviet credibility was very high, meaning that any wrong move and they would attack.
Why? Because assessment of power and interests is far more important. The Soviets might have been bluffing before, but that doesn't mean they would be bluffing now. In fact, Soviet credibility grew even as Khruschev bluffed all over the place.
In the case of Syria today, the Obama administration has made abundantly clear that it believes U.S. credibility is on the line. If we do not attack now when we said we will, then no one will believe us in the future. There is, however, simply no evidence or even logic behind this. The world knows that the United States, like the Soviet Union in the example above, will not hesitate to bomb just about any adversary for just about any reason, real or imaginary. We have plenty of examples just in recent years. Not following through with this one particular especially ill-made threat will not change that.
3 comments:
"If we do not attack now when we said we will, then no one will believe us in the future. There is, however, simply no evidence or even logic behind this. The world knows that the United States, like the Soviet Union in the example above, will not hesitate to bomb just about any adversary for just about any reason, real or imaginary. We have plenty of examples just in recent years. Not following through with this one particular especially ill-made threat will not change that."
I appreciate your promoting the idea that a policy built on credibility arguments has risks and can be very dangerous. Certainly many of these same risks exist when making a policy decision based on power and interest as well. I will look forward to reading the article but would caution about the straw man argument. Just because the US credibility on its willingness to bomb is beyond doubt, it should not be held up as the only issue here.
The international system is blocked by a potential Russian (and Chinese) veto from acting militarily on humanitarian grounds and the use of chemical weapons. The Security Council can't claim exclusivity in its decision- making and offer nothing in the way of a solution. The Putin govt. in calling this so much "foolishness," in arming the Syrian govt., in acting as sponsor and protector, is hiding behind the fig leaf of international law. The Syrian people are dying, and while the Western powers have been reluctant to intervene, they at least struggle with the obligation to act. What means can be used to promote international solutions--legally, morally, and strategically to address these kinds of problems? It is not enough to criticize the Obama administration while it tries to justify the use of force, always a greater challenge in a democratic system, without offering alternatives that would be more likely to succeed.
My understanding of the Syrian conflict is very limited, but what I'm hearing is that the powerful groups within the Syrian rebel forces have ties to Al Quaeda. Thus, what I'm wondering is how assisting these forces --even if inadvertently-- would serve any humanitarian objectives, recognizing, of course, that Assad's forces are also very brutal. I'm also of the understanding that rebel forces are responsible for a considerable amount of the carnage in Syria. In addition, there are some seemingly credible reports suggesting that Assad's forces are responsible for the chemical attacks, although the investigations are obviously ongoing. Thus, it seems to me that there are an awful lot of question marks about what the purpose of this bombing would be.
Oops, I meant there are some seeming credible reports suggesting that Assad's forces are not responsible for the chemical attacks...
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