Military power and political objectives in armed interventions
| Published date | 01 March 2015 |
| Date | 01 March 2015 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0022343314557688 |
| Author | Aaron Rapport |
| Subject Matter | Research Articles |
Military power and political objectives
in armed interventions
Aaron Rapport
Department of Politics and International Studies, University of Cambridge
Abstract
What effect do political objectives have on the level of force used in military interventions? Studies have found that
states seeking to capture and defend territory are most likely to escalate militarized disputes. However, other research
holds that conflicts over policy issues increase uncertainty about an opponent’s willingness to resist coercion, obscur-
ing bargains both sides would prefer to fighting. These different findings yield contradictory conclusions about what
types of issues should be associated with higher levels of violence. This article contends that the lower levels of force
used by states seeking to coerce policy change can be accounted for by the moderating effects of military power. Pow-
erful countries may use low levels of force as a way of gathering information about their opponent’s resolve, primarily
when the value of this information offsets the costs of screening a target. This will more often be the case in disputes
over policy rather than territory, providing an additional reason why such conflicts exhibit lower levels of force.
Conversely, weaker powers are less likely to possess the necessary resources to use limited military operations to
reduce uncertainty about opponents, and will use similar levels of force regardless of the object of contention. The
preceding argument is supported by an analysis of over 170 military interventions carried out from 1945 to 2001.
Keywords
military intervention, military power, policy coercion, territory
Among militarized conflicts, research consistently finds
that territorial disputes exhibit the highest levels of vio-
lence (Senese & Vasquez, 2003, 2008; Vasquez & Hene-
han, 2001). State leaders are presumed to attach higher
stakes to conflicts over land than other issues, such as
those that arise when a state seeks to change the policies
or behavior of another actor. However, the latter type of
conflicts have been argued to involve higher levels of
uncertainty because success depends upon the compli-
ance of the target, making the question of resolve more
central to these disputes (Sullivan, 2007, 2012). If uncer-
tainty is a primary cause of war (Fearon, 1995), it would
appear disputes over many non-territorial issues should
also involve high levels of force. Why then do researchers
consistently observe greater levels of violence when land,
not policy, is the object of contestation?
This article seeks to connect research on political
objectives and conflict with insights provided by strategic
bargaining models of war. Bargaining models lead to the
expectation that all parties to a territorial conflict will
know they share high levels of resolve, which should
decrease the uncertainty that contributes to war. How-
ever, this does not fit comfortably with the empirical
results from behavioral studies of conflict. To resolve this
puzzle, I argue that the level of violence associated with
different political objectives should depend not only on
issue salience and uncertainty, but also on the perceived
value and feasibility of using military action to reduce
uncertainty. Military action will tend to serve different
purposes depending on states’ strength and the type of
political goals states seek. States in territorial disputes
should be less uncertain about the costs of violence, and
can sometimes secure their objectives without their
opponent acquiescing. Military operations used to secure
land are unlikely to be used to screen opponents for
resolve since such information is both more evident
Corresponding author:
ar727@cam.ac.uk
Journal of Peace Research
2015, Vol. 52(2) 201–214
ªThe Author(s) 2014
Reprints and permission:
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DOI: 10.1177/0022343314557688
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