Strategic Studies z5012301 Why do states choose to fight limited and/or proxy wars?
How effective is this as a strategy?
With the conclusion of World War Two, a thirty-five year period of political and military tension erupted primarily between two superpowers: the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR). This period of time is known as the Cold War. The Cold War was a conflict of differing ideologies amid the superpowers and formed the basis of conflict; war fought by proxy and limitation. Proxy and limited wars are fought in order to secure National interests through means other than unrestricted war or state-on-state conflict to mitigate the risk of an existential war or potentially unacceptable strategic consequences.
This essay will analyse the reasons states seek to secure their national interests through limited and proxy wars and examine their effectiveness as a strategy. In doing so this essay will argue that both can be effective as a strategy, but the extent to which they are is dependent on the effective application of certain enduring tenets.
Limited wars are defined as those in which the weapons used, the nations or territory involved, or the objectives pursued are restricted in some way, in particular one in which the use of nuclear weapons is avoided. The belligerents involved in a limited war do not aim for complete ‘domination or extinction’. States often choose to fight a limited war to lower the risk of escalation, reduce the economic and
Robert Jervis in ‘Security dilemma’ states that “states can neither neglect the possibility that others will become aggressive in the future nor credibly guarantee that they themselves remain peaceful”. He argued that although other motives such as ‘greed, glory and honour’ come into play, much of international politics is
Between the cessation of the Second World War and the onset of the 21st Century, the United States of America and the Soviet Union were embroiled in a geopolitical standoff known as the Cold War. In this international “game” of strategic maneuvers and incidents, both nations attempted to assert their influence over other states in what was essentially an ideological clash between democracy/capitalism and communism/socialism. Although the Cold War did not involve a full-scale, direct military confrontation between both powers, this notion manifested itself in the form of proxy wars and sub-conflicts. The United States and the Soviet Union backed countries that aligned with their respective interests, and through financial, political, and
In the wake of World War II as the decades-long force of Germany’s reign came to its conclusion, an extensive repositioning of authority among the world’s top powers began. The war wielded devastating consequences for most countries involved and effectively diminished the dominance Britain and France once employed across the globe. Out of this devastation rose the two new dominating forces of the world who were triumphant in the aftermath of the war: the United States and the Soviet Union. The United States desired to spread democracy across the globe, while the Soviet Union remained ambitious in the hopes of ending capitalism and inciting communist revolutions. The Cold War began in 1947 as a result of the ideological tension steadily built between these two superpowers throughout both World Wars and their prolonged rivalry over the division of power in the postwar world.
At the close of WWII, only two world superpowers remained in tact: the United States and the Soviet Union. The United States believed that the Soviet Union wanted to spread communism and the United States wanted to stop the Soviet Union from doing so. The resulting conflicts between the United States and Soviet Union became known as the Cold War. The two countries clashed over communism, nuclear arms and “other policy matters” for several decades.
The Cold War started immediately after World War II, when the two strongest nations (United States and Soviet Union), considered ‘superpowers”, decided to present their different ideas about economics and government.
The Cold War was a geological, ideological, political, and economic struggle between the USA and the Soviet Union, which where the two superpowers of the world following the end of world war 2. The Cold War had begun following the end of World War 2. The Cold War had conflicts that ranged from the worlds largest cities, to Vietnam. Essentially the Cold War was a struggle between the two political ideologies, Democracy and Communism. Once world war 2 had come to an end, the two superpowers had begun.
By realists’ theory, alliances and military mobilization can be seen as practices that can avoid war, but critics argue that it can cause the security dilemma – I build up my armed forces because you built up yours. (Packer 2015) Mutual fear and threats push neighbors to arms with the resulting arms race making all sides insecure and more likely to go to war. There will always be conflict between alliances and armament by satisfied powers versus by dissatisfied powers, major power alliances versus major-minor, and minor-minor alliances. (Packer,
The Cold War was an era of ideological and economic struggle characterized by the threat of nuclear of war and regional wars between the two world superpowers, the USA and the USSR. This Cold era started in 1947 at the end of World War II until the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. It is commonly referenced as cold because it supposedly never heated up into an actual armed conflict despite some action in Korea, Afghanistan, and Vietnam. However, the ultimate and inevitable struggle occurred between the United States and other democracies of western Europe against the Soviet Union with their communist bloc countries due to the decreasing power of European nations, ideological differences, and the greed to become the world’s greatest
The Cold War was the most important historic event in the 20th century after the Second World War, from 1945 till 1991 between two most powerful countries in that period – Soviet Union and USA. The Cold War invested a lot in world politics. What is the Cold War? This was a war for dominance in the world. In 1945 the USA was the only one country in the world that had the nuclear weapons. But in the 1949 USSR started to learn their nuclear weapons. In further developments forced the USSR was soon created by nuclear, and then thermonuclear weapons. (Isaacs J, 2008) Fight has become very dangerous for all.
The Cold War was a time of anxiety between the Soviet Union and the United States because if their respective beliefs over political, economic and military issues. The results of World War Two left the US and Russia as the commanding military forces throughout the world. Each side viewed the Cold War as an engagement between society’s; In the international clash between American capitalism and Soviet communism and only one could conquer.
The Cold War was the relationship developed between the Unites States of America (USA) and the Union of Soviets Socialist Republics (USSR) after the end of World War II. The globe buckled under the two superpowers’ stress, creating a bipolar world fractured between the communism and capitalism ideology. Several times, this relationship came close to resulting in an open confrontation. However, the USA and the Soviets both possessed the nuclear bomb by 1949 onwards and war would have only resulted in mutual destruction.
At the end of the Second World War, two superpowers emerged – the USA and the USSR. These two superpowers drove the world into a “cold war”, a war between two ideologies. When the Nazi regime was crushed,
As you look back into history you see that war is created for several different reasons. In this paper I will be reviewing the relationship between war, territory, and arms races on a dyadic level of analysis. Scholars have come to various conclusions on different aspects of these two theories and I will discuss and evaluate a few different perspectives or angles of each theory to see how they help contribute to the creation of war between two interstates.
Similarities are found within the basic aspects between traditional and critical security studies. The use of historical studies on issues such as nuclear crises and US grand strategies through military and diplomatic means have still been used on security studies to understand and identify challenges in for the state. (Walt 1991, Pg. 218) Conventional warfare and the challenge to rational deterrence theory which sets territorial boundaries for states are also unescapable concepts.
War has been one of the major features of the twentieth century. An extensive percentage of people have been participants or victims of the interstate or civil wars. Nowadays wars still exist and large populations suffer from it. The book Why Nations Fight by Richard Ned Lebow analyzes war in the past and the motives for war in the future. This book is extremely interesting to me, because of the current civil war in Ukraine that has been going on for almost 2 years. Lebow uses different scholarly references and shows that civil wars have been in a sharp decline after the Cold War, however some of the most violent civil wars were sparked after the collapse of the USSR (like in case of Ukraine). In this paper I am going to discuss the critical analysis of the book and the constructivist argument of the factors that influence the international behavior.