The Protection of

US Allies

Hoover Institution Working Group on Military History

A Single British Soldier

ON EXTENDED DETERRENCE AND SECURITY GUARANTEES FOR AMERICAS ALLIES
JOSEF JOFFE
The Ways and Means of Extended Deterrence
In The Guns of August, Barbara Tuchman recounts a conversation between the British
andFrench general staffs about joint force planning against the Kaisers Germany. For the
French, Britains Entente ally, the life-and-death issue was: Would the BritishPerfidious
Albionactually fight on their side when the war broke out?
To reassure the French, the British asked General Ferdinand Foch (later Marchal de
France):What is the smallest British military force that would be of any practical assistance
to you? Foch replied: A single British soldierand we will see to it that he is killed.
This is the best single-sentence definition of a reliable security guarantee to allies, also
known as extended deterrence in the nuclear era. To reassure confederates and deter foes,
a guarantee must be credible. Credibility must rest on a sturdier foundation than paper
treaties. Compacts have been and will be broken in the moment of truth. Nations may not
be prepared to fight. They may be loath to bear the costs of war. Or, they may hope to be
spared by the aggressor.
Hence the Foch Injunction: make sure that our enemy has to attack our ally, as well. How?
Embroil him ab initio. Tie his hands so that he cannot abscond. Alliances must feed on the
blood of fallen allied soldiers, to put it as cynically as did Foch. Even honored treaties are
not reliable, as the Polish case in World War II demonstrated. When Nazi Germany invaded
on September 1, 1939, Britain and France dutifully declared war two days later. But they did
not open up a second front in the west. They did so only on May 10, 1940, when France
itself was attacked after eight months of drle de guerre (phony war).
So treaties may not be worth the paper. Conversely, the most credible and efficient
guarantee in history did not rest on iron-clad treaty commitments. This one was Americas
to Cold War Europe. The NATO treaty does not contain automatic obligations. It merely
says that an armed attack on one or more [members] shall be considered an attack on all
and that members will assist the victims forthwith. According to Article 5, the response
may include armed force, but it does not mandate it. The vague pledge urges NATO to take
such action as it deems necessary to restore security. Like what? Nuclear war? Or merely
athundering diplomatic dmarche?

Military History

A HOOVER INSTITUTION ESSAY ON THE PROTECTION OF US ALLIES

The solidity of the worlds longest-lived alliance rested on harder stuff than words. In the
shadow of cataclysmic nuclear war, the forward-deployment of a single US soldier was a
quantit ngligeable. To raise the risk to the Russians and to bestow peace of mind on the
allies, it had to be divisions, air armies, and nuclear weapons. This strategy was known
as tripwire, forward defense, and layer cake. All three were to make sure that the
Soviets would have to attack all, above all the United States, when attacking one. Hence,
America deployed up to six divisions plus six thousand tactical nuclear weapons to the
Central European theater, close to the intra-German border. For good measure, the alliance
added the layer cake consisting of US, German, British, Dutch, Belgian, and, farther back,
Frenchforces.
Thus was dArtagnans motto, All for one, and one for all, implemented with steel and
men. And powerful the deterrent was. As the Cold War unfolded, the Fulda Gap turned into
the worlds most stable border. Crises erupted aplenty, but they were self-limiting. By bloody
contrast, the Korean War broke out a few months after the United States had excluded
SouthKorea from its defense perimeter.
Add the nuclear dimension of extended deterrence. The silent signal of intermediate-range
nuclear forces (INF), deployed in 1983, spelled out to the Soviets in so many words:you
cannot count on limiting nuclear war to Europe. In attacking our allies, you will have
to strike those American PershingII and cruise missiles that are de facto strategic forces
because they can reach Soviet lands. By dint of their range, they are part and parcel of
our entire retaliatory potentialjust like our intercontinental MinutemenIII back home.
If you lob nukes at them, you cant help but turn a limited attack into a general nuclear
exchange by triggering Americas strategic forces. Hence, if you want to preempt, you cant
just go for the Euromissiles. You must strike at Americas entire arsenal. This was called
coupling back in the day. In short, an attack on Europe will be an attack on America.
The Soviets had calculated that they could intimidate Europe with a low-risk separate threat
when deploying SS-20 missiles and Backfire bombers, neither of which could reach the
United States. The counter-deployment in 1983 brought about the opposite: the fusion of
Americas and Europes fates, and hence the reassertion of extended deterrence. Three years
later, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev conceded the point by agreeing to scrap his INF
along withAmericas Euromissiles.

Lessons from the Past of Extended Deterrence

What lesson does extended deterrenceeffective and credible guarantees to allieshold
fortoday?
One, the guarantor has to tie his own hands, signaling to his allies that Mr. Big wont be
able to defect and sit this one out. So entrapment is the essence of credibility, the very

Josef Joffe A Single British Soldier: On Extended Deterrence and Security Guarantees for Americas Allies

opposite of President Jeffersons entangling alliances with none. This is the stuff from
which reassurance is made.
Two, the guarantor has to present himself to the would-be aggressor as a victim among
victims, signaling that his own and his wards fates are fused: hit the weak, and you will hit
the strongest member of the alliance. Thus, the credibility of deterrence soars.
Three, the most important part of the message derives from the guardians forces in situ.
In the nuclear age, being there rather than coming from afar is the essence of deterrence.
Being therejust sitting tight while demonstrating ready and ample powersignals to the
potential aggressor: you will have to fire the first shot and escalate from there. The onus of
starting a war with incalculable risks is on you. Is grabbing a piece of real estate really worth
it to you when compared to your own survival? Better not take that first, fateful step into
anexistential gamble.
To protect the status quo in the shadow of all-out war is morally legitimate and militarily
cost-effective. Yet lunging across the line comes with neither legitimacy nor economy.
Breaking the status quo brands the assailant as aggressor. Nor is it cheap, given therule
of thumb that the offense requires a three-to-one advantage over the defense. The
psychological and moral burden weighs on the assailant, not on the defender who confronts
the invader with deadly choices just by being in place. Conversely, this burden falls on the
shoulders of the status quo power when it has to counter-attack to dislodge the aggressor.
Now, the onus of escalation is on the formernot a pretty position to be in. Better to
concede than suffer major war.
Lets put these abstractions in historical terms. The Kennedy administration did not strike
at Cuba when it discovered Soviet missiles there. Instead of taking the momentous first step
into war with the Soviets, it threw up a quarantine around the island, drawing a line in the
Caribbean waters. Now, the Soviets would have to escalate by breaking the blockade. That
was too much for Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, and so he beat a face-saving retreat by
demanding, and getting, the removal of obsolete US Jupiter missiles in Turkey. Note that
no American or Soviet soldier ever fired a shot in anger at each other during the Cold War.
Thehigh-pitched confrontation remained ultra-stable.1
Farther back into history: defying the rules of effective extended deterrence, Britain and
France validated them e contrario. Deterrence failed because British and French forces were
far away, not in place. London and Paris had not tied their hands by positioning themselves
in harms way. Nor were they mentally and militarily prepared for the kind of force
projection that would have sobered up Hitler. So he well understood that the destinies of
Britain, France, and Poland were not one, calculating that they were neither able nor willing
to cross vast distances to man the line, let alone drive him back. The rest, as they say, is
history.

Hoover Institution Stanford University

Extended Deterrence in the Twenty-first Century

Being there is better than going therethat is the briefest possible moral of this tale
of efficient guarantees. Eager to retract for a little nation-building at home, the Obama
administration has forgotten the lessons of the Pax Americana.
At the end of its life, the Obama administration began to re-engage fitfully and halfheartedly. But the damage is done, and it will take years to reverse, if ever. As nature
abhors a vacuum, so does the international system. Would the Taliban be on a roll again
if a credible US fighting force had remained to protect its Kabul ally? Would the Iraqi
government have fallen under the sway of Tehran while proceeding to sidle up to Putins
Russia? Had the United States intervened in Syria first, lining up behind its rebel allies,
Russia and Iran would have thought twice about entering the fray and putting ever more
chips on the table. Now, the United States faces a sophisticated air defense as well as firstline Russian fighter planes. The choice is between costly escalation and backing down
whilehoping for heavens help.
In the aftermath of Americas retraction, the old strategic alignment in the Middle East, as
underwritten by the United States, is in tatters. The Russians, extruded by Kissinger and
Nixon in the early 1970s, are back in force. The United States, trying to straddle the interests
of each and all while committing to none, has hardly any friends left in the Middle East,
but plenty of rivals and fence-sitters. Take away protection, sound an uncertain trumpet,
and you lose leverage.
Alliance leaders must always balance between entanglement by tying their own hands and
abandonment by defecting allies. Add the age-old dilemma of buck-passing (let them
take care of themselves) vs. bandwagoning (by which reassured nations entrust their
safety to the alliance leader). These complex balances have come unhinged. At the end of
its second term, the Obama administration was left with a dearth of options and a surfeit
ofheadaches.
In the fifth year of the Syrian war, Washingtons alienated ally Israel began to coordinate
with Russia on divvying up bombing sectors in the area. Jerusalem could continue to
attack Hezbollahs supply lines from Iran via Syria into Lebanon. Also in 2015, Damascus,
Moscow, Tehran, and Baghdad (theoretically a US client) committed to sharing intelligence.
Saudi Arabia, once completely reliant on American security guarantees, counter-aligned
with the Sunni powers against the embryonic US-Iran alignment. Riyadh is working on
thenot-so-fanciful assumptions that:
The nuclear agreement hashed out by the United States in the P5+1 framework will
notrob Iran of a nuclear-weapons option.

Josef Joffe A Single British Soldier: On Extended Deterrence and Security Guarantees for Americas Allies

The rapprochement will not divert the Islamic Republic from its expansionist drive
stretching from Afghanistan to the Mediterranean or turn Iran from a revolutionary
into a responsible regional power.
So, Saudi Arabia has been gathering the Sunni nations from Cairo to Kuwait into a subtly
woven anti-American coalition. There goes half a century of continuity during which
Riyadh acted as a pillar of American strategy in the worlds most dangerous arena. Vexed
by Washingtons human rights agenda, the other pillarEgyptbegan to angle for
Russianarms.
True, security guarantees breed free-riding. But tattered umbrellas have worse strategic
consequences for a great power, as they discourage bandwagoning and prompt clients to go
shopping for new partners. The extreme model is Israel. Never quite sure of Washingtons
reliability, it long ago acquired the ultimate guarantee of nuclear weapons while building
a world-class arms industry. Now, it is in a silent alliance with key Sunni powers. In short,
shed the burden of alliance, and your clients will go their own way, as they must.
Will that path lead them to national nuclear deterrents? Saudi Arabia and Egypt are hardly
more backward than were Pakistan and North Korea. So the option exists. With their
sophisticated technological bases, Japan and South Korea could build nuclear weapons
tomorrow. Whether they will be ready to face the backlash from China and East Asia
depends on how they assess the longer-term credibility of US guarantees. The critical
measuring rod will be the size of the American military presence in their countries and
throughout the region.
From Eastern Europe to the Pacific: In both areas, international security has been
weakened by Americas retraction. Once numbering 300,000, US forces in Europe have
dwindled to one-tenth that number. Surely, Russian leader Vladimir Putin must have
noted the vacuum when weighing a lunge into the Crimea, followed by the de facto
dismemberment of Ukraine by Russian surrogates in the southeast. Farther west, Putin
could see opportunities beckoning on NATOs eastern flankthe Baltics, Poland, Bulgaria,
Romaniawhere no US troops are manning the line, as they once did in Germany.
Symbolic NATO contingents moved forward in 2015, but they number in the hundreds
aslender tripwire indeed. Putin can also read the 2012 Defense Stategic Guidance, as
reasserted in 2014. The gist is that US ground forces should no longer be sized for largescale prolonged stability operations. However the battle of the budget turns out, the
USArmy will not be able to carry out such operations. Counting in the Marines, the Army
is already smaller than Chinas or North Koreas. Not to put too fine a point on it, but
Americas adversaries are looking at a force structure that spells isolationism with drones
and specialforces.

Hoover Institution Stanford University

Maybe America need not contemplate large-scale war in the twenty-first century in the ways
of the twentieth century. Iraq II may have been the last one of its kind, replaced by hybrid
warfare and opportunistic forays promising more gain than risk. But the oldest military
principle continues to hold: deterrence beats defense, that is, war-fighting. Deterrence, alas,
requires sizable fighting forces in place to reassure allies and to discourage rivals. What goes
for Eastern Europe goes for the Pacfic, where China has been occupying or building islands
in a kind of hare-and-tortoise gambit. While the furry Lepus was napping, the plodding
leatherneck was already over the finish line. Try to dislodge the winner after waking up.
Aesop delivers yet another lesson. As the turtle kept forging ahead, the other animals
were cheering. In strategic terms, they began to bandwagon with the winning contestant.
Translated into Pacific terms, this fable signals that the Pacific powers wont necessarily
balance against China, but throw in their lot with the Middle Kingdom as they watch
America falling behind. The vaunted pivot has not brought new American military assets
into the Pacific theater. Yet there is no profit in containment without investing lots of men
and materiel.
America is the mightiest Everything: the largest economy, technological top-dog, and
wellspring of cutting-edge science, with unmatched cultural magnetism and the worlds
most sophisticated armed forces. Yet all of these wondrous assets dont undo the oldest
lawsof grand strategy:
Deterrence is better than defense, let alone re-conquest.
Allies are better for deterrence than going it alone.
Keeping allies requires credible commitments, which rest on forces in place,
notacrossthe sea.
Being there is better than going back, because a police force is better than a
firebrigade. Firefighters can only douse, not prevent, the conflagration.

NOTE
1 The Cuban model is difficult to generalize, as the advantages were all on the United States side. The
balance of strategic power, regional power, and interests (close to the American heartland) massively
favored America, and the Kremlin knew it.

Josef Joffe A Single British Soldier: On Extended Deterrence and Security Guarantees for Americas Allies

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Working Group on the Role of Military History

inContemporary Conflict

About the Author

JOSEF JOFFE
Josef Joffe, a research fellow
at theHoover Institution, is
publisher/editor of the German
weekly Die Zeit. His areas of
interest are US foreign policy,
international security policy,
European-American relations,
Europe and Germany, and the
Middle East. A professor of
political science at Stanford, he is
also a senior fellow at Stanfords
Freeman-Spogli Institute for
International Studies. In 199091,
he taught at Harvard, where he
remains affiliated with the Olin
Institute for Strategic Studies. His
essays and reviews have appeared
in the New York Review of Books,
Times Literary Supplement,
Commentary, New York Times
Magazine, New Republic, Weekly
Standard, Newsweek, Time, and
Prospect (London).

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The Working Group on the Role of Military History in

Contemporary Conflict examines how knowledge of past
military operations can influence contemporary public
policy decisions concerning current conflicts. The careful
study of military history offers a way of analyzing modern
war and peace that is often underappreciated in this age of
technological determinism. Yet the result leads to a more
in-depth and dispassionate understanding of contemporary
wars, one that explains how particular military successes
and failures of the past can be often germane, sometimes
misunderstood, or occasionally irrelevant in the context
ofthe present.
The core membership of this working group includes David
Berkey, Peter Berkowitz, Max Boot,Josiah Bunting III, Angelo
M.Codevilla, Thomas Donnelly, Admiral James O. Ellis Jr.,
ColonelJoseph Felter, Victor Davis Hanson (chair), Josef Joffe,
Frederick W. Kagan, Kimberly Kagan, Edward N. Luttwak,
Peter Mansoor, General Jim Mattis, Walter Russell Mead, Mark
Moyar, Williamson Murray, Ralph Peters, Andrew Roberts,
Admiral Gary Roughead, Kori Schake, Kiron K. Skinner, Barry
Strauss, Bruce Thornton, Bing West, Miles Maochun Yu, and
Amy Zegart.
For more information about this Hoover Institution Working
Group visit us online at www.hoover.org/research-topic/military.

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