The Strategic Defense Initiative and the Prisoner's Dilemma.
Abstract
A Prisoner's Dilemma is a model used to assess certain situations where individuals or competitors have choices to make, the possible payoff combinations of which conform to a characteristic pattern. For nearly forty years the United States and the Soviet Union have been in a Prisoner's Dilemma as they have pursued military strategies of deterrence based in large measure on nuclear ballistic missiles. President Reagan initiated the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) program in 1983 in hopes that it would lead to defensive capabilities that would intercept and destroy ballistic missiles before they reached the United States, and in so doing, allow the United States to adopt a military strategy based on security from ballistic missile attack. Information was gathered using a review of the literature and through analysis of the views of key military and civilian leaders. While a strong case was made for the proposition that possession of a nuclear arsenal truly does represent a Prisoner's Dilemma for the United States and the Soviet Union, The evidence did not support the proposition that SDI provides a means of escape from the dilemma.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Mar 23, 1987
- Accession Number
- ADA180476
Entities
People
- David P. Kirby
Organizations
- United States Army War College