A Game-Theoretic Evaluation of the Cease-Fire Alert Decision of 1973

Bibliographic Data

ID4893628
AuthorsFrank C Zagare (0000-0002-9672-9263, Boston University, corresponding author)
Year1983
Volume20
Issue1
Pages73-86
Publication date1983-03-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Peace Research (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0022-3433 • E-ISSN: 1460-3578
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/002234338302000107
OpenAlexW2027247696
LanguageEN
Citations received5
References cited13

This article uses a game-theoretic framework to evaluate the decision of the Nixon Administration to place United States forces on a world-wide alert to deter Soviet intervention in the October 1973 war in the Middle East. It finds that the alert decision can be justified and explained if the Nixon Administration's perception of the game is accepted, but only when the long-term rationality of Soviet decision-makers is assumed. It further finds that a less provocative strategy, such as approaching the Soviet leadership and reasserting an American willingness to compromise, would have produced a more tenuous stability than that produced by the alert decision, and that the equilibrium resulting from this alternative policy rested upon a view that the Soviets would not seek unilateral advantages in the conflict. Finally, it demonstrates that under certain con ditions, statesmen may have an incentive to create, rather than avoid, Prisoners' Dilemma games in interna tional crises

Administration (probate law) · Compromise · Computer security · Dilemma · Economics · Game theory · Incentive · Intervention (counseling) · Microeconomics · Political economy · Political science · Rationality · Computer Science · Game Theory and Applications · International Relations and Foreign Policy · Law · Mathematics · Political Conflict and Governance · Psychology

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