Measures one state takes for defence appear threatening to others, leaving everyone less secure.
Herz's 1950 term. It is why arms control is hard: verification is itself a concession, and defensive capability is indistinguishable from offensive from outside.
In practice
- A country builds a missile shield for defence, and its neighbour reads a shield as preparation to strike first without fear of reply.
- Two departments that each build private reporting to protect themselves make the other's reporting look like surveillance, and both expand it.
- Further reading
- Wikipedia
- Subject
- Law & Politics
- Essay
- Competing accounts of how power works