Exam 2 Study Guide Chapter 5 International Institutions and War 1 Alliances and alignments Alliances institutions that help their members cooperate militarily in the event of war Specify standards of behavior or expectations about how states are to behave under certain conditions also help codify bargains b w each member Form when states have common interests that motivate them to cooperate 2 At the core of all alliances is an alignment of interests b w at least 2 states Impact on the bargaining range If State A and C have common interests then both will be affected by bargain outcome with state B 3 Balancing versus bandwagoning Balance of Power a situation in which the military capabilities of two states or groups of states are roughly equal Alliances form to create or preserve this Bandwagoning a strategy in which states join forces with the stronger side in a conflict Often offensive shared interests that underlie them arise not from common fear but from a desire to cooperate for a common goal 4 Alliances and the likelihood of war If State A is going to fight state B in a war State C will join in as an ally of state A State B will suffer greater costs and State A will suffer lower costs causing a shift in the bargaining range to the right in State A C s favor War for State B will be less attractive This shows that allies often influence the bargaining interaction b w states by influencing the states beliefs about what 3rd parties will do Alliances are used as a signal 5 Establishing credibility What an alliance must accomplish to enhance its chances of success How to improve the members ability to fight effectively together 1st they must make it more likely that allies will fight on one another s behalf than they would in the absence of an alliance Accomplished by decreasing the costs of fighting increasing the benefits of fighting and or increasing the costs of not fighting abandoning 2nd alliances must do these things in a way that leads adversaries to believe that the allies will indeed fight together Allies engage in joint military planning and exercises station troops on one another s soil 6 How to increase the costs of abandonment Alliances are often made public abandonment could tarnish a state s reputation could hurt their credibility in future conflicts 7 What s the historic record for states honoring their alliance commitments States have honored alliances 75 of the time 8 Why aren t alliances ironclad US China Taiwan Ironclad alliances guarantees that effectively deter challenges to the weaker party also enhances the risk that the weaker party will demand more of the target or become intransigent in negotiations State doesn t want to be entrapped with a reckless ally China wants Taiwan US is allies with Taiwan but doesn t want to fight a war with China US couldn t be too straightforward with Taiwan b c they will start war and China will if US looks like it will abandon Taiwan Therefore US uses strategic ambiguity making its intentions less than fully clear in the hopes that China would be deterred from attacking while Taiwan would act with restraint 9 The success and failure of alliances three periods Pre World War I 2 Armed Camps Triple Alliance Germany Austria Hungary and Italy Triple Entente Britain France Russia Rise of Germany was the cause of this Interwar Period Recovering from the devastating war the euro powers passed the buck among themselves hoping others would bear the costs of containing Germany and failed to form a set of alliances to balance Germany until another war was already imminent Hitler exploited weak alliances Italy Soviet Union and Japan bandwagoned alliances with Germany The Cold War the long peace in Europe No wars among the major euro powers in this period Soviet Union v US Led to the division of Europe into two opposing blocs 10 What does success or failure depend on 1 The strength of the common interests that brought the allies together 2 The ability of the alliances to alter the members preferences so that in the event of war fighting is preferable to abandonment 3 The effectiveness of the alliance in convincing the adversary of this fact 4 The ability of the partners to limit the risk of entrapment 11 NATO v Warsaw Pact NATO North American Treaty Organization Most of western Europe with US Attack to one member is an attack to all members Warsaw Pact Eastern Europe with USSR if attacked by the USSR 12 How did the US credibly signal that it would come to Western Europe s defense NATO alliance provided for close integration of the US and EU militaries a joint command led by an American officer and the basing of over a quarter of a million US troops on EU soil primarily in West Germany 13 Collective security How does it work When one states attacks or threatens to attack another if it is determined that these events constitute an act of aggression then all members of the organization are called on to act against the state that has committed the offending action 14 Three ways it effects bargaining interaction between adversaries 1 The prospect of outside involvement makes war less attractive by changing the likely outcome of the interaction b w states or in the case of civil wars b w groups The status quo is stable if both sides know that they will surely lose if they attempt to change the status quo by force 2 Outsiders can help resolve the commitment problems by promising to enforce what would otherwise be an unbelievable commitment by one state not to exploit its power against another A shift in relative power b w 2 states might be rendered less dangerous if the weakened state can count on others to defend it 3 Collective security organizations may play a positive role in promoting peace not through a threat of direct intervention for or against any particular side but by serving as neutral observers and peacekeepers Peacekeepers diminish first strike advantages by interposing themselves b w 2 adversarial factions Particularly useful in cases in which previously warring parties have each pledged to disarm and demobilize 15 Collective security faces two major challenges 1 Collective action problem Collective security organizations do not have the power to tax or to raise and field military forces Wholly dependent on their members to provide troops fund and military equipment for any operation members face the costs and risks associated with sending troops into combat or foregoing trade due to economic sanctions Face free rider problem
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