Governments can enter major wars inadvertently through imperfect decision processes

Evidence

Underlying this threat that one “may” retaliate or precipitate war—the decision being somewhat beyond his control—is the notion that some of the most momentous decisions of government are taken by a process that is not entirely predictable, not fully “under control,” not altogether deliberate. It implies that a nation can get even into a major war somewhat inadvertently, by a decision process that might be called “imperfect” in the sense that the response to particular contingencies cannot exactly be foretold by any advance calculations, that the response to a particular contingency may depend on certain random or haphazard processes, or that there will be faulty information, faulty communication, misunderstanding, misuse of authority, panic, or human or mechanical failure. — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 453

Categorization

• XREF: This is the core of Schelling’s ‘threat that leaves something to chance’ — mechanically parallel to the Godfather-bonds / third-party enforcement credibility mechanisms the reader is mapping onto Gambetta and Milgrom. The involuntary, uncontrollable element substitutes for the station of a commitment device. — connects to: Externalizing war risks makes violence the default policy option; Limited war deters partly by exposing both sides to uncontrollable risk of escalation — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 425; Bureaucratic war preparation can produce anticlimax rather than combat — Julien Gracq, Balcony in the Forest, 49 (+3 more)

Related

• Limited war deters partly by exposing both sides to uncontrollable risk of escalation (similarity 0.80)
• Limited war’s main function is signaling escalation risk, not local military gain. (similarity 0.79)
• Refusing to prepare for limited war can be a deliberate deterrent strategy (similarity 0.78)
• Risk-prone expansion drives state intervention beyond mere apparatus preservation (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• Externalizing war risks makes violence the default policy option #expands (0.80)
• Limited war deters partly by exposing both sides to uncontrollable risk of escalation #qualifies (0.75) — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 425
• Exhaustive bureaucratic planning can create false psychological closure about danger #expands (0.75) — Julien Gracq, Balcony in the Forest, 49
• Bureaucratic war preparation can produce anticlimax rather than combat #expands (0.72) — Julien Gracq, Balcony in the Forest, 49