ABSTRACT
The declaratory nuclear policy of the United States has stressed deterrence through the threat of massive punishment by attacking an aggressor’s homeland. This chapter examines the possible deterrent effect of one proposed missile defense, known as “point defense,” in providing protection to select and critical military targets. In considering the potential contribution to deterrence that point defense may offer, it compares it to the declaratory doctrine of deterrence through offensive threat and mutual vulnerability. The distinction between deterrence by punishment and by denial is sometimes made with respect to weapons categories. The Soviets seem to prefer deterrence by denial over the type of assured vulnerability preferred by the United States, which relies on mutuality to succeed. In deterrence terms offensive systems are those designed to attack first or to inflict punishment for an attack. Defensive systems are intended to raise the cost of such an attack; deterrence is achieved by making attack objectives more difficult to attain.
