Anatomy of Mistrust: U.S.-Soviet Relations during the Cold War

by Deborah Welch Larson, Robert Jervis (Editor), Robert J. Art (Editor)

The United States and the Soviet Union missed numerous diplomatic opportunities to resolve differences and control the arms race because neither state trusted the other, according to Deborah Welch Larson. In Anatomy of Mistrust, She shows that the goals of Soviet and U.S. leaders were frequently complementary, and an agreement should have been attainable. Lost opportunities contributed to bankruptcy for the Soviet Union, serious damage to the economy of the United States, decreased public support for internationalist policies, and a proliferation of nuclear weapons. Synthesizing different understandings of trust and mistrust from the theoretical traditions of economics, psychology, and game theory, Larson analyzes five cases that might have been turning points in U.S.-Soviet the two-year period following Stalin's death in 1953; Khrushchev's peace offensive from the launching of Sputnik until the U-2 incident; the Kennedy administration; the Nixon-Brezhnev detente; and the Gorbachev period. Larson concludes that leaders in the United States often refused to accept Soviet offers to negotiate because they feared a trap. Mutual trust is necessary, she concludes, although it may not be sufficient, for states to cooperate in managing their security.

352 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1997

Reviews

[Tlazeni Citlalli · Rating 3 out of 5]

La autora intenta exponer desde el ámbito de las relaciones internacionales como la desconfianza entre diferentes Estados lleva a situaciones de crisis e incluso a guerras, utiliza de ejemplo momentos claves de la Guerra Fría en los cuales la autora considera se pudo haber detenido la contienda armamentistica.
Buen libro aunque los primeros capítulos más que un análisis son un recuento de los acontecimientos principales de la Guerra Fría y no es sino hasta en las conclusiones cuando verdaderamente expone su opinión. En la introducción menciona que hara un análisis psicológico de los principales líderes de los Estados Unidos y la Unión Soviética y como sus mentalidades formaron la política de la Guerra Fría pero nunca lo lleva a cabo, no llega a aterrizar ciertos puntos.

[Michael · Rating 2 out of 5]

One of those rare peace studies and international relations works that calls conventional wisdom into question without becoming polemical.

By treating the U.S. and Soveit Union as states acting on interest yet reacting to the other based on perceptions, whether correct or not, we find that due to the lack of open communication (standard to the security dilemma in international politics), each side has to make their best judgment as to the motivation and intent of the other. As released documents by the powers have shown, these judgments were incorrect due to mistrust and false perceptions of the other.
Larson uses counterfactuals to show how some of the most serious conflicts and close-calls of the Cold War could have been avoided if mistrust was mutually avoided, by ignoring ideological preconceptions and seriously attempting to discover the true interests of the other were.
The only problem I had with the book is that it assumes that the Soveit Union should have been treated as a typical state actor and not as an intrinsically freedom-depriving system (my perception).