Why Maximum Pressure Fails, but Coercive De-Escalation Can Succeed

Decades from now, when historians seek to define the diplomacy of our age, the phrase “maximum pressure” will feature strongly. But how many of those historians will describe it as a success?

Consider Iran. The killing of Qassem Soleimani is a recent move to curb Iran’s malign influence in Syria, Iraq, and Yemen. Maximum pressure on Iran has now gone well beyond America’s departure from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action in May 2018. The U.S. has recently deployed the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group into the Arabian Gulf, used banks and businesses to exert economic pressure on Iran, and applied the full weight of the U.S. Treasury’s sanctions machinery. European allies and NATO have been asked to do more, and there have even been travel restrictions placed on Iran’s Foreign Minister, Mohammed Javad Zarif.

Despite all this, Iran is becoming more of a menace, not less. Tehran’s nuclear program has restarted, and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps continues to hound oil tankers off the Straits of Hormuz, while Iranian influence across the region still festers. Iran was even able to fire twenty-two missiles at U.S. sites in Iraq with impunity.

Kim Jong Un listens as U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during the one-on-one bilateral meeting at the second North Korea-U.S. summit in Hanoi, Vietnam. (Leah Millis/Reuters)

The original maximum pressure campaign was against North Korea, as a response to Kim Jung-Un’s provocative development and testing of rockets and nuclear weapons. New economic sanctions were imposed, and older ones applied more rigorously than before. Military assets were assembled, ready to strike. Even China was brought alongside. And in a speech at the United Nations in 2017, President Trump spoke ominously of ‘fire and fury like the world has never seen’ on the Korean peninsula.

The result? Maximum pressure led to a partial change in Kim Jung-Un’s tone, and summits with President Trump, but no real reversal to DPRK’s nuclear program. The East Asian dictatorship is still developing missiles on the peninsula.

And even consider Venezuela. Maximalist U.S. pressure to end Nicholas Maduro’s disastrous rule, which looked promising at the start of 2019, has fizzled. After a stalemate, Maduro was able to consolidate his control, and then extend it into the National Assembly. Once more, a minor despot has been able to defy the superpower’s will—maximum pressure has been blunted.

These outcomes may seem odd. After all, if the United States—still the world’s greatest superpower by far—applies its maximum pressure, how can it not succeed?

The Limits of Maximum Pressure

Part of the answer is in the approach itself: maximum pressure invites defiance. This is because the doctrine is almost always applied to regimes mostly concerned with maintaining power in their own country. Being tough with America plays well in Tehran, Caracas, Pyongyang, and Beijing. To the main audience of Iranian State TV, for example, if Hassan Rouhani can just hold out a little, Iran will have won a sort of victory. Like an amateur boxer in a title fight, just surviving into the fourth round is enough to delight hometown fans. They do not have to beat the world champion; they must only beat expectations.

Also, as academic Todd Sechser has shown, when a strong nation tries to coerce a weaker one, the state with less power will demonstrably resist in a bid to develop its reputation. The stronger the power that tries to compel, and the greater their demands, the more incentive there is on the smaller country to resist. So, when the world’s mightiest country applies maximum pressure, the urge to defy them is as great as it can be.

If a rogue dictator can hold out permanently, they present the U.S. with a grim dilemma: concede that even America’s maximum pressure is impotent to force events, or turn the dial up to eleven—an admission that the previous pressure was not really maximum after all.

A further problem with maximum pressure is that the U.S. shows its hand and removes any mystery about the potential impact of American power. A credible threat may be more effective at compelling a change of course, when delivered with a time limit and in private. Although, a private threat would not signal resolve to American-based foreign policy hawks—an audience maximum pressure can assuage.

In practice, maximum pressure has often been poorly conveyed to adversaries. Inconsistent messaging has meant two-thirds of the U.S. deterrence strategy—capability and credibility—have been undermined by the third—communication. For example, Beijing has been presented with moving goalposts on trade, making it hard for them to comply, while Secretary Pompeo’s twelve demands of Iran were not heard in Tehran as a realistic way forward.

General Qassem Soleimani attends a meeting with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khameneiand Revolutionary Guard commanders on September 18, 2016 (AP)

The Iran case shows how maximum pressure can even diminish U.S. power. American leadership among its allies was degraded by the unilateral American withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. By adopting maximum pressure, the U.S. isolated itself, and split the coalition of generally sympathetic allies, increasing Tehran’s capacity to make mischief. This was made even clearer after the death of Soleimani, when European leaders united around a line that diverged from Washington’s.

But there is something more fundamental at fault with maximum pressure. America usually confronts an adversary’s essential interests—a matter of existential importance to the renegade regime, and one where they have much more invested than the United States. This encourages the adversary to raise the stakes, hoping America will fold. Some, like Nicholas Maduro, have little to lose by betting their whole country’s livelihoods on their own survival. On the other hand, America’s overwhelming power advantage is handcuffed when it cannot match a rogue who goes all in.

The divergence between a rogue actor having greater interests at stake and the U.S. having greater capabilities leads to instability. In these scenarios, both sides think they can dominate—one through its superior capabilities and the other through its immovable will. It is the two combined—capabilities and the resolve to use them—that generates the credibility to compel. The U.S. cannot drive events with maximum pressure if it lacks more will than its adversary.

So, what can succeed where maximum pressure fails? The answer is perhaps best described as coercive de-escalation. Coercive de-escalation is about compelling an adversary to rein in their provocative behavior, usually by compelling them to either accept a deal or a tacit understanding, though it may not be in their immediate interests to do so.

There are two ways to do this, and they are strongest when combined. The first route is to degrade the adversary’s interests in maintaining their current behavior—ideally, so their will to persist falls below the level of U.S. resolve. This restores deterrence in America’s favor by re-aligning capability with will.

How does one reduce an actor’s resolve? It is about reducing their stakes, so the outcomes matter less. Rhetoric needs to shift from all-or-nothing and zero sum to win-win. At the same time, setting the U.S. position within a framework of internationally understood principles helps the adversary understand the American mindset, and invites them to contemplate a place within the international community if they comply.

This first route can be assisted by deft diplomacy, making it easier for an adversary to save face when they volte face and quelling risks that may provoke at a crucial moment. The U.S. can emphasize a new element of the relationship, and make clear it is on offer only if the adversary complies. American deterrent thresholds should be described qualitatively, not quantitatively, and pinned to appropriate international principles, thus reducing an adversary’s temptation to try their luck. When the U.S. is forced to act against a rogue regime, it should sanction them with reversible measures to maximize the adversary’s interests in a return to compliance.

Martial law in 20

For an example, consider President Reagan’s approach to communist Poland in the early 1980s. After Warsaw imposed martial law in December 1981, the White House enacted an array of sanctions to show their strong disapproval. By 1984 Reagan was able to reverse these measures to reward a partial change of behavior from the Polish leadership. Also, he could leverage membership of international institutions, including the International Monetary Fund, to encourage further improvements. Reagan was careful to frame his position not as maximum pressure, but as one grounded in high principles—both to signal American resolve, and to offer a route for Warsaw to acquiesce in a satisfactory resolution.

The second route for coercive de-escalation is to focus not on the substance of the confrontation, but the barter about how it will be resolved—what might be described as the meta-negotiation. It is in this meta-negotiation the coercive element of the approach comes in, because here the U.S. needs to be tough––it can apply an escalating portfolio of pressure, potentially up to maximum pressure, which its adversary will be unable to match.

The meta-negotiation differs from the negotiation itself because here the U.S. has broader interests than the adversary. The U.S. interest is that there is a deal, or at least a tacit understanding, just as the U.S. has an accommodation with almost every country in the world. And the U.S. can bring its overwhelming strength to bear, thus re-aligning will and capabilities. Hence, America can dominate the meta-negotiation far more easily than it can dominate the negotiation itself.

Through this second route for coercive de-escalation, the U.S. can deploy its unrivalled diplomatic capabilities to rally allies and cajole neutrals, bringing the international community together around the proposition that there must be an accommodation. Hardliners within a regime who advocate defiance of the American overture will face an overwhelming strategic communications campaign portraying their opposition as a foolhardy errand. America can up the stakes in this meta-negotiation by explaining how global principles are at stake in the localized stand-off. Presidential rhetoric can emote on the importance of coming to the table, enforced by a whip-handed message from the U.S. national security machine: the adversary cannot outmatch the U.S. will for a deal, nor its capabilities to make it happen, so it should not try.

In this meta-negotiation, the U.S. can coerce their opponent towards a win-win outcome, and one which is particularly favorable to the U.S. If the adversary is still intent on escalating, then the U.S. is obliged to follow through on its deterrence threats, to negate any benefit the adversary may derive from their refusal to reach an accommodation.

Consider the resolution of the Kosovo crisis in Spring 1999, in which the U.S. had initially tried to apply maximum pressure. Yugoslav President Milosevic refused to withdraw his troops from the southern Serbian Province, where they had been committing atrocities. After American led diplomacy failed, from 23 March until the end of May, NATO missiles and warplanes bombed targets in and around Belgrade. But Milosevic resisted, and—just like Iran and North Korea—found almost gleeful pride, and increased domestic support, as he faced down the international community.

President Clinton talking with Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic (CIA/Wikimedia)

Then President Clinton switched to coercive de-escalation. Instead of trying to force Milosevic to withdraw his troops, he moved to force him to restart talks. The shift to the meta-negotiation brought Russia along, depriving Milosevic of a key ally. It meant the United Nations, not NATO, would oversee any resolution of the crisis, depriving Milosevic of moral authority. And the shift gave Clinton license to contemplate ground troops: its stakes had risen to match its capabilities. Finally, on 9 June 1999, Milosevic agreed to terms.

So, how does coercive de-escalation play out with North Korea, the original international security challenge for which the maximum pressure approach was developed? It would mean compelling Kim Jong-Un back to a meaningful dialogue—talks in which he sincerely accedes to follow through on commitments he made. These commitments are likely to span his nuclear portfolio, the recent missile tests, and regional security in general. The exact nature of the commitments is for the talks themselves to determine, but the U.S. will be in a position to ensure its key concerns are addressed. Most importantly, through coercive de-escalation, the U.S. can make sure the negotiation happens.

Similarly, coercive de-escalation applied to Iran would mean deploying a credible threat to force the regime towards a new bargain—a bargain that would inevitably benefit the United States. The spike in tensions after the Soleimani killing suggests this may mean American allies in Europe, or the United Nations should convene the talks, and the ultimate outcome is likely to be one which allows Tehran to save face. But, the Iranian regime should be left in no doubt they will not be allowed to save face if they refuse to negotiate, and they should be forced to understand this point before they take such a fateful decision.

Coercive de-escalation is no less firm than maximum pressure, and certainly does not indicate a lack of resolve or interest. It is the opposite: it is about shifting the U.S. focus from an issue of substance where the adversary has a greater, potentially existential stake; and reapplying that pressure to force a negotiation––a negotiation in which the U.S. has at least as much interest as the adversary, thereby re-combining interest and capability in America’s favor. Unlike maximum pressure, coercive deterrence applies leverage at the meta-negotiation level. Coercive de-escalation compels an adversary to accept a win-win outcome which delivers fundamental U.S. interests.

By restoring U.S. leadership among allies, coercive de-escalation can muster the whole international community around an American position far better than maximum pressure. This refreshes America’s asymmetric advantage and enables it to focus more power onto a security challenge. By activating allies and partners, coercive de-escalation applies more pressure than maximum pressure ever can.

Decades from now, when historians come to write about the diplomacy of our time, it is just possible they will detect a change in how maximum pressure was applied—one which, finally, generated satisfactory outcomes to some of America’s most intractable international security issues, and where adversaries of the U.S. were compelled to end their most egregious behaviors.

Iain King CBE is the U.K. Visiting Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).  The views expressed are the author’s alone.

This article appeared originally at Strategy Bridge.