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x But what do we call the threatening action that is intended not to forestall some adversarial action but to bring about some desired action, through "fear of consequences"? ...I chose "compellance." It is now almost, but not quite, part of the strategic vocabulary. [JLJ - "coercion" works for me - it is more general-purpose.]
xiii One of the lamentable principles of human productivity is that it is easier to destroy than to create... The power to hurt - the... power to destroy things that somebody treasures... is a kind of bargaining power, not easy to use but used often.
xiv I have tried in this book to discern a few of the principles that underlie this diplomacy of violence. "Principles" may be too pretentious a term, but my interest has been in how countries do use their capacity for violence as bargaining power, or at least how they try to use it, what the difficulties and dangers are and some of the causes of success or failure.
xv Principles rarely lead straight to policies; policies depend on values and purposes, predictions and estimates, and must usually reflect the relative weight of conflicting principles.
p.3 brute force succeeds when it is used, whereas the power to hurt is most successful when held in reserve. It is the threat of damage, or of more damage to come, that can make someone yield or comply. It is latent violence that can influence someone's choice - violence that can still be withheld or inflicted, or that a victim believes can be withheld of inflicted. The threat of pain tries to structure someone's motives, while brute force tries to overcome his strength... it is not the pain and damage itself but its influence on somebody's behavior that matters. It is the expectation of more violence that gets the wanted behavior, if the power to hurt can get it at all.
p.3-4 To exploit a capacity for hurting and inflicting damage one needs to know what an adversary treasures and what scares him and one needs the adversary to understand what behavior of his will cause the violence to be inflicted and what will cause it to be withheld... The pain and suffering have to appear contingent on his behavior
p.34 Military strategy can no longer be thought of... as the science of military victory. It is now equally, if not more, the art of coercion, of intimidation and deterrence.
p.70 The threat that compels rather than deters often requires that the punishment be administered until the other acts, rather than if he acts.
p.87-88 why be reasonable, if results are what one wants?
p.128 it takes two to stop a war.
p.172 Coercion depends more on the threat of what is yet to come than on damage already done... Unless the objective is to shock the enemy into sudden submission, the military action must communicate a continued threat.
p.250 In a disarmed world, as now, the objective would probably be to destroy the enemy's ability to bring war into one's homeland, and to "win" sufficiently to prevent his subsequent buildup as a military menace. The urgent targets would be the enemy's available weapons of mass destruction (if any), his means of delivery, his equipment that could be quickly converted for strategic use, and the components, standby facilities, and cadres from which he could assemble a capability for strategic warfare.
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