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2 Maoz and Abdolali (fn. 1), 31.

3 For an extensive discussion on the inadequacy of many research designs in quantitative international politics, see Most, Benjamin A. and Starr, Harvey, Inquiry, Logic, and International Politics (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1989)Google Scholar, chaps. 3–5. For a similar argument, see Levy, Jack S., “The Diversionary Theory of War: A Critique,” in Midlarsky, Manus I., ed., Handbook of War Studies (Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1989), 282–83Google Scholar. It must be pointed out, however, that Levy intentionally limits his critique of the “quantitative empirical literature” to those studies on the relationship between internal and external conflict, which he calls “basically descriptive correlational analyses.”

4 Levy, Jack S., “Declining Power and the Preventive Motivation for War,” World Politics 40 (October 1987), 87CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Lebow, Richard Ned, “Windows of Opportunity: Do States Jump through Them?” International Security 9 (Summer 1984)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; idem, , Between Peace and war (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1981), 261–63Google Scholar, 265; Vagts, Alfred, Defense and Diplomacy (New York: King's Crown Press, 1956), 263–350Google Scholar; Jervis, Robert, “Cooperation under the Security Dilemma,” World Politics 30 (January 1978)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Evera, Stephen Van, “Causes of War” (Ph.D. diss., University of California, Berkeley, 1984), 72–76Google Scholar; Snyder, Jack L., “Perceptions of the Security Dilemma in 1914,” in Jervis, Robert, Lebow, Richard Ned, and Stein, Janice Gross, eds., Psychology and Deterrence (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1985), 160–61;Google ScholarNiou, Emerson M. S. and Ordeshook, Peter C., “Preventive War and the Balance of Power: A Game-Theoretic Approach,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 31 (September 1987)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 The logic of expected-utility theory posits that states go to war simply when they expect to do better than they would by remaining at peace. See Mesquita, Bruce Bueno de, “The War Trap Revisited,” American Political Science Review 79 (March 1985)Google Scholar; idem, , “The Con tribution of Expected Utility Theory to the Study of International Conflict,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 18 (Spring 1988)Google Scholar. Using the logic of expected-utility theory, Scott D. Sagan argues that, contrary to conventional wisdom, the Japanese decision to initiate war against the U.S. was rational. Sagan, See, “The Origins of the Pacific War,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 18 (Spring 1988)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

6 The Abbe Galiani, as cited in Vagts (fn. 4), 263.

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8 Gilpin, , War and Change in World Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981), 191CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Levy (fn. 4), 97.

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10 Levy (fn. 4), 86. Although I will refer to shifts in the actual distribution of power, the perception of a damaging power shift, real or imagined, is more precisely the necessary condition to motivate a preventive war. As William C. Wohlforth points out, “If ‘power’ influences international relations, it must do so through the perceptions of those who act on behalf of states. The quantitative measures of power used in the literature to test various power theories are thus estimators of perceived power.” See Wohlforth, , “The Perception of Power: Russia in the Pre-1914 Balance,” World Politics 39 (April 1987), 353CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

11 Henry Kissinger is perhaps the most notable exception. See Kissinger, Henry A., “Domestic Structure and Foreign Policy,” Daedalus 95 (Spring 1966), 503–29Google Scholar, reprinted in idem, , American Foreign Policy (New York: W. W. Norton, 1977), 11–50Google Scholar; and idem, , A World Restored (New York: Grosset and Dunlap, 1964)Google Scholar.

12 Here anarchy means not conflict but rather the absence of a sovereign arbiter to make and enforce agreements.

13 Waltz, Kenneth N., Man, the State, and War (New York: Columbia University Press, 1959), 159Google Scholar. For his discussion of the inadequacy of “second image” explanations of war, see pp. 120–23.

14 Levy, Jack S., “Domestic Politics and War,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 18 (Spring 1988), 662CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Maoz and Abdolali (fn. 1) found that “democracies rarely clash with one another, and never fight one another in war” (p. 3). For similar statements, see Dolye, Michael W., “Kant, Liberal Legacies, and Foreign Affairs, Part 1,” Philosophy and Public Affairs 12 (Summer 1983), 213–15Google Scholar; Babst (fn. 1), 55; Rummel (fn. 1, July 1983); idem (fn. 1, March 1983), 28–29; Chan (fn. 1). Small and Singer (fn. 1) also find that democracies do not fight against one another, but they do not attribute this to the inherent peacefulness of democracies or to a “pacific union” among them. Instead, they suggest that the dearth of contiguous democratic states since 1816 explains the long liberal peace (p. 67).

15 Rummel (fn. 1, July 1983), 34; emphasis in original.

16 Weede (fn. 1); Small and Singer (fn. 1); McGowan, P. J. and Shapiro, H. B., The Comparative Study of Foreign Policy (Beverly Hills, Calif.: Sage, 1973), 94Google Scholar; Zinnes, Dina, “Why War? Evidence on the Outbreak of International Conflict,” in Gurr, T. R., ed., Handbook of Political Conflict (New York: Free Press, 1980), 331–60Google Scholar.

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18 Chan (fn. 1). However, Maoz and Abdolali (fn. 1) find that “as the proportion of democratic-democratic interaction opportunities increased, so did the level of conflict in the system. On the other hand, the correlations between the proportion of autocratic-autocratic interaction opportunities and the same dispute measures were slightly negative, but … statistically insignificant” (p. 26).

19 Singer and Small (fn. 1), 55; Doyle (fn. 14), 212. Specifically, Doyle's definition requires male suffrage of at least 30% and female suffrage to be granted within a generation of its initial demand.

20 Weede (fn. 1) disagrees, stating that “economic freedom is usually not part of definitions of democracy” (p. 655). But the current democratization of Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union seems to demonstrate that, in addition to political freedom, a market and private-property economy may be an indispensable ingredient of democracy.

It is important to note, however, that the addition of juridical rights and economic freedom to the definition of democracy has had no effect on the coding (democratic or nondemocratic) of the cases in this study, as all politically free states also contained both of these elements.

21 Rummel defines freedom in the expansive sense as economic freedom plus political freedom (civil liberties plus political rights). See Rummel (fn. 1, March 1983), 30–31. Doyle (fn. 14) refers to the institution of a market and private-property economy in his definition of a “liberal regime” (p. 212). A liberal democracy obviously implies both economic and political freedom.

22 Kant, “Eternal Peace,” quoted in Waltz (fn. 17), 333.

23 As quoted in Friedrich, Carl, The Philosophy of Kant: Imtnanuel Kant's Moral and Political Writings (New York: Modern Library, 1977), 438Google Scholar.

24 I am using the definition of war developed by the Correlates of War (cow) Project, which requires at least 1,000 battle deaths to members of the interstate system. Under this definition the cow project has identified 118 international wars for the 1816–1980 period, of which 67 are interstate wars and 51 are extrasystemic wars. See Small, Melvin and Singer, J. David, Resort to Arms: International and Civil Wars, 1816–1980 (Beverly Hills, Calif.: Sage, 1982)Google Scholar. The major empirical studies of warfare differ in their definitions of war, however. For an excellent discussion of how these differences affect the data sets and conclusions of the studies, see Mansfield, Edward D., “The Distribution of Wars over Time,” World Politics 41 (October 1988)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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26 Brodie, , Strategy in the Missile Age (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1965), 237Google Scholar, 239.

27 Duroselle, , “Changes in French Foreign Policy since 1945,” in Hoffman, Stanley et al. , eds., In Search of France (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1963), 307–8Google Scholar.

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29 Downs, , An Economic Theory of Democracy (New York: Harper and Row, 1957), 64–68Google Scholar. This facet of my argument—that democratic public opinion and institutions militate against preventive war directed at strong but not weak opponents—is consistent with Downs's theory.

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32 See, e.g., Kennedy, Paul M., “The Tradition of Appeasement in British Foreign Policy, 1865–1939,” in Kennedy, Strategy and Diplomacy, 1870–1945: Eight Studies (London: Allen and Unwin, 1983), 15–39Google Scholar.

33 For instance, in response to Churchill's accusation that Baldwin had acted irresponsibly by not proposing a greater rearmament effort in 1935, the prime minister responded: “Supposing I had gone to the country and said that Germany was rearming and we must rearm, does anyone think that this pacific democracy would have rallied to that cry at that moment? I cannot think of anything that would have made the loss of the election from my point of view more certain.” Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, speech in the House of Commons, quoted in Craig, Gordon A. and George, Alexander L., Force and Statecraft: Diplomatic Problems of Our Time, 2d ed. (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990), 64Google Scholar.

34 Cohen, Eliot A., Citizens and Soldiers: Dilemmas of Military Service (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1985), 115Google Scholar.

35 Elbridge Gerry, as quoted in Huntington, Samuel P., The Soldier and the State: The Theory and Politics of Civil-Military Relations (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1967), 144Google Scholar.

36 For a discussion of America's military manpower dilemma, see Cohen (fn. 34), 183–89.

37 For the best discussions of French military reforms after Sadowa, see Challener, Richard D., The French Theory of the Nation in Arms, 1866–1939 (New York: Russell and Russell, 1965)Google Scholar; Kovacs, Arpad F., “French Military Institutions before the Franco-Prussian War,” American Historical Review 51 (January 1946)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Wright, Gordon, “Public Opinion and Conscription in France, 1866–70,” Journal of Modern History 14 (March 1942)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Howard, Michael, The Franco-Prussian War: The German Invasion of France, 1870–71 (New York: Macmillan, 1962), 29–39Google Scholar.

38 Huntington (fn. 35), 144.

39 Kennan, January 19, 1949, lecture to Foreign Service Institute, Kennan Papers, box 17, Seeley Mudd Library, Princeton University. Quoted in Gaddis, John Lewis, Strategies of Containment: A Critical Appraisal of Postwar American National Security Policy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982), 49Google Scholar.

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41 For the institutional preference of military organizations for offensive doctrines, see Posen, Barry R., Sources of Military Doctrine: France, Britain, and Germany between the World Wars (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1984), 47–50Google Scholar; for the necessity of an offensive doctrine in order to wage a preventive war, see pp. 69–70.

42 Vagts (fn. 4), 264.

43 Although he is inconsistent on this point, even Hans Morgenthau has written that the national interest of a state must be constrained by its own morality. See Morgenthau, , In Defense of the National Interest (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1952), 36–37Google Scholar; and idem, , “Letter to the editor,” International Affairs 35 (October 1959), 502Google Scholar. See also Thompson, Kenneth W., Political Realism and the Crisis of World Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1960), 167CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For a discussion of the skepticism of political realists about international morality, see Beitz, Charles R., Political Theory and International Relations (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1979)Google Scholar.

44 May, Ernest R., Imperial Democracy: The Emergence of America as a Great Power (New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1961), 159Google Scholar. May clearly distinguishes between the humanitarianism that produced the war and the imperialism that grew out of it.

45 Hofstadter, , The Age of Reform (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1965), 93, 271Google Scholar. See also Merk, Frederick, Manifest Destiny and Mission in American History (New York: Vintage Books, 1963)Google Scholar. Merk concludes that the true expression of the national spirit has always been mission, not imperialism, manifest destiny, or continentalism.

46 For Brodie's discussion of the moral issue of preventive war, see Brodie (fn. 26), 236–37; for his discussion of why preventive war has always been an unrealistic policy for the U.S., see pp. 223–41. Morgenthau also acknowledges that preventive war is “abhorrent to democratic public opinion” and states:

It is especially in the refusal to consider seriously the possibility of preventive war, regardless of its expediency in view of the national interest, that the moral condemnation of war as such has manifested itself in recent times in the Western world. When war comes, it must come as a natural catastrophe or as the evil deed of another nation, not as a foreseen and planned culmination of one's own foreign policy. Only thus might the moral scruples, rising from the violated moral norm that there ought to be no war at all, be stilled, if they can be stilled at all.

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47 Rawls, John, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1971), 379Google Scholar. See also Potter, R. B., War and Moral Discourse (Richmond, Va.: John Knox Press, 1969Google Scholar).

48 Bacon, Francis, “Of Empire,” in Warhaft, Sidney, ed., Francis Bacon: A Selection of His Worlds (New York: Macmillan, 1985), 94–95Google Scholar; emphasis in original.

49 Daniel Webster, quoted in Bowett, Derek W., Self-Defense in International Law (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1958), 59Google Scholar.

50 The International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg stated: “It must be remembered that preventive action in foreign territory is justified only in case of an ‘instant and overwhelming necessity for self-defense, leaving no choice of means and no moment for deliberation’ (Caroline Case).” Quoted in Bowett (fn. 49), 60.

51 The meaning of a preemptive attack is somewhat ambiguous. It sometimes implies that the preemptor is aware of an imminent enemy attack and thus is compelled to strike the first blow. At other times it refers to an “anticipatory counterattack” waged after the adversary's attack has been launched but before its impact has been felt. Under both definitions, the existence of an immediate threat and a very short time frame for decision making characterizes a preemptive attack; a preventive attack, by contrast, is motivated by long-term forecasting.

52 The classic doctrine of bellum justum did, however, include preventive war. See Osgood and Tucker (fn. 7), 292.

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54 Otto von Bismarck, quoted in Walzer (fn. 53), 63.

55 This is not to say that whenever a nondemocratic state is in the process of being overtaken by a rising challenger it will respond by unleashing a preventive war. In 1866, for example, France did not intervene to prevent either side in the Austro-Prussian War from winning and uniting the loose German confederation under its leadership.

56 Curiously, Engels believed that universal military service would democratize society. He declared in 1891 that “contrary to appearance, compulsory military service surpasses general franchise as a democratic agency.” History has proved otherwise, however. See Neumann, Sigmund and Hagen, Mark von, “Engels and Marx on Revolution, War, and the Army in Society,” in Paret, Peter, ed., Makers of Modern Strategy: From Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986), 277–80Google Scholar.

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58 Doyle (fn. 14), 213. By contrast, John Stuart Mill extends the principle of nonintervention to nondemocratic states undergoing a democratic revolution, arguing that intervention is only justified when a democratic state, or aspiring democratic state, is threatened by a foreign government. See Mill, , “A Few Words on Non-intervention,” in Mill, , Essays on Politics and Culture, ed. Gertrude Himmelfarb (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1962), esp. 410–13Google Scholar.

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74 Thomson (fn. 68), 171.

75 In addition, the Third Republic's history of political scandals, most notably the Stavisky affair of 1934, had entirely discredited the parliamentary system. One French officer exclaimed, “Literally I have never met a single one of my poilus who has not expressed his disgust for the parliamentary regime”; comments of a French officer, June 1940, quoted in Adamthwaite, Anthony, France and the Coming of the Second World War, 1936–1939 (London: Frank Cass, 1977), 12Google Scholar.

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82 The Soviet test in 1953 was not of a superbomb, as Soviet historians have claimed, but rather was of a type of thermonuclear weapon. It was not until November 1955 that the Soviets successfully tested a superbomb with a yield of 1.6 megatons. See Holloway, David, The Soviet Union and the Arms Race (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1983), 24Google Scholar.

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