Arms control and rapprochement in interstate rivalries

This research represents the first comprehensive quantitative empirical study of the effect of arms control on militarized conflict between interstate rivals. Rivals are pairs of states that have a long history of repeated militarized disputes. I argue that arms control should lead to lower levels of militarized conflict between rival states, which may in turn lead to an end to the rivalry itself. I test this thesis by conducting a battery of statistical analyses using the Correlates of War (COW) Project's Militarized Interstate Dispute (MID) data. These statistical tests are designed to determine: (a) if the level of militarized conflict between rival states is significantly reduced after the signing of an arms agreement; (b) if this reduction in conflict takes place immediately after the signing of an arms agreement (versus at some other point during the course of the rivalry); (c) if a similar reduction is found in rivalries that do not sign arms agreements; (d) if the reduction in conflict is likely to have been caused by some factor other than arms control; and (e) if the duration of the post-arms control portion of a rivalry is significantly less than the duration of the pre-arms control portion. The findings of these statistical tests strongly support my thesis.