Fear of surprise attack feeds back into raising each side’s own probability of attacking

Evidence

But now we can have a model of a rational decider who responds to an estimate of the probability of being attacked not by an overt decision to act or abstain, but by adjusting the likelihood that he may mistakenly attack. One’s response to an increase in the probability of being attacked is to shift the criteria for decision that are used in the warning system in the direction of lesser likelihood of a failure to respond, and hence in the direction of greater likelihood of a false alarm that provokes one’s own “retaliation.” If each player’s response to an increased danger of surprise attack is to enhance his own proclivity toward inadvertent attack, the probability of each player’s attack is now a rising function of the other’s. — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 491

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The core destabilizing mechanism of the chapter: rational players, by adjusting warning thresholds, generate a mutual-aggravation spiral from purely defensive responses — no irrationality required.
• XREF: Connects to the reader’s Gambetta/Milgrom framework: the same mechanism applies to any private-enforcement or deterrence setting where defense against betrayal itself raises one’s own preemptive aggression. — connects to: Preclusive self-defense can itself provoke the attack it tries to avert — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 461; Small first-strike temptations can compound into attack through interacting expectations alone — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 462; Even a player sure of his own restraint inherits the other’s amplified fears — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 471 (+5 more)

Related

• Fear of surprise attack produces all-or-none outcomes, not probability multiplication. (similarity 0.89)
• Small first-strike temptations can compound into attack through interacting expectations alone (similarity 0.88)
• Even a player sure of his own restraint inherits the other’s amplified fears (similarity 0.87)
• Mutual fear can amplify exogenously into runaway escalation via feedback loops. (similarity 0.85)
• First-strike advantage converts defensive fear into preemptive violence spirals. (similarity 0.84)
• Preclusive self-defense can itself provoke the attack it tries to avert (similarity 0.83)
• Rational actors need not calculate beyond first-order attack likelihoods. (similarity 0.80)
• A losing side rationally abandons containment for deliberate risk-creation. (similarity 0.79)
• Security against false alarm and against surprise have opposite externalities (similarity 0.79)
• Unforeseeable escalation risk alone can deter aggression even among cautious rational actors. (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• First-strike advantage converts defensive fear into preemptive violence spirals. #corroborates (0.90) — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 530
• Sudden escalation of stakes can transform iterated trust into one-shot opportunism #complicates (0.75)