ABSTRACT
Reassurance dictates that defenders try to communicate both their benign intentions and their interests in alternative ways of addressing the issues in dispute. General reassurance is designed to alter an adversary’s calculations of the relative advantages of the use of force in comparison to other alternatives. The more ambitious strategies of reassurance seek to shift the trajectory of the conflict and create alternatives to a use of force. The most striking example of the effective use of reassurance was President Anwar el-Sadat’s visit to Jerusalem in November 1977 to speak to Israel’s Knesset. Reciprocal reassurance between China and the United States in the 1960s, and Egypt and Israel following the war in 1973 helped to transform active hostility into relationships where conflict was managed without the threat of or resort to force. Deterrence and reassurance can elicit a range of responses. The analysis of obstacles to and strategies of crisis management is directly relevant to the Middle East.
