| Summary/Abstract |
Intelligence analysis and national security decisionmaking are pervaded by uncertainty. The most consequential decisions that leaders make, such as whether to go to war, are mired in uncertainties not only reflecting what is unknown but also what is unknowable, such as the intentions of others who may not have made up their own minds.1 Those uncertainties not only make decisions about how to resolve international conflicts more difficult, they change the odds of going to war. Powerful countries seldom wage war to conquer weaker ones but rather to prevent them from developing breakout technologies that could threaten them in the long run.2 Such decisions are inevitably made under uncertainty, and the deeper and more vexing the uncertainties are, the more likely war is to follow as a conflict resolution strategy.
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