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1979 · réf. 40810 — Stanford CA: Hoover Institution Press Stanford University 1979. Presumed First Edition First printing. Trade paperback. Very good. 16 174 2 pages. Wraps Formulae. Figures. Map. Tables. Notes. Index. Foreword by Edward Teller. This is Hoover Institution Publication Number 214. The author was a physicist and senior defense analyst. He was formerly a consultant to the Air Force the National Academy of Sciences and to the Director of Naval Laboratories. Dr. Speed earned his Ph.D. in Applied Physics from the University of California. This work provides the most extensive discussion of the vulnerability of U.S. strategic forces available at the time in the open literature. If deterrence were to be preserved in the 1980s questions about the vulnerability of U.S. strategic forces arms control the defense of Western Europe and U.S. strategic targeting doctrine need to be addressed and resolved. The author addressed these and other issues offered possible solutions to the threat to U.S. strategic forces and suggested a policy to cope with Soviet power in the 1980s. Deterrence theory is the idea that an inferior force by virtue of the destructive power of the force's weapons could deter a more powerful adversary provided that this force could be protected against destruction by a surprise attack. This doctrine gained increased prominence as a military strategy during the Cold War with regard to the use of nuclear weapons and is related to but distinct from the concept of Mutual Assured Destruction which models the preventative nature of full-scale nuclear attack that would devastate both parties in a nuclear war. Deterrence is a strategy intended to dissuade an adversary from taking an action not yet started by means of threat of reprisal or to prevent them from doing something that another state desires. The strategy is based on the psychological concept of the same name. A credible nuclear deterrent Bernard Brodie wrote in 1959 must be always at the ready yet never used. Thomas Schelling's 1966 classic work on deterrence presents the concept that military strategy can no longer be defined as the science of military victory. Instead it is argued that military strategy was now equally if not more the art of coercion of intimidation and deterrence. Schelling says the capacity to harm another state is now used as a motivating factor for other states to avoid it and influence another state's behavior. To be coercive or deter another state violence must be anticipated and avoidable by accommodation. It can therefore be summarized that the use of the power to hurt as bargaining power is the foundation of deterrence theory and is most successful when it is held in reserve. Hoover Institution Press, Stanford University paperback