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Using a recent book by Jeffrey Record as a point of departure, this essay considers the role of historical analogies in decisions by U.S. leaders to use force during the Cold War. The analogies considered by Record those of Munich and Vietnam may have had a bearing on some decisions, but it is often difficult to assess their relative weight compared to other critical variables. Moreover, several analogies not considered by Record Pearl Harbor, for example may have been far more salient during certain crises than the analogies he examines. In any case, we need a more systematic analysis of historical analogies than Record provides if we are to gauge the real influence and impact of historical analogies on the Cold War.

A review essay on a book by Jeffrey Record, Making War, Thinking History: Munich, Vietnam, and Presidential Uses of Force from Korea to Kosovo (Annapolis, MD: Naval Instit Press, 2002). Using a recent book by Jeffrey Record as a point of departure, this essay considers the role of historical analogies in decisions by US leaders to use force during the Cold War. The analogies considered by Record -- those of Munich & Vietnam -- may have had a bearing on some decisions, but it is often difficult to assess their relative weight compared to other critical variables. Moreover, several analogies not considered by Record -- Pearl Harbor, for example -- may have been far more salient during certain crises than the analogies he examines. In any case, we need a more systematic analysis of historical analogies than Record provides if we are to gauge the real influence & impact of historical analogies on the Cold War.

This article offers a conceptual framework that broadens & enhances our understanding of the role of "history" in contemporary governance & the attempts by policy-makers to "manage" critical issues. Building upon the literature on historical analogies in policy-making, we distinguish three dimensions that clarify how the past may emerge in & affect the current deliberations, choices, & rhetoric of policy-makers. We apply this in a comparative examination of two cases of crisis management where historical analogies played an important part: the Swedish response to (alleged) submarine intrusions in 1982, & the European Union sanctions against Austria in 1999. We induce from the case comparison new concepts & hypotheses for understanding the role of historical analogies in public policy-making & crisis management. 1 Table, 61 References. Adapted from the source document.

Established models of the domestic policymaking process accord some role to the individual decision‐maker, but they usually fail to show how policy decisions are ultimately influenced by the character of the information available to the policymakers concerned. Drawing on one prominent model of decision‐making developed by analysts of foreign policy—the analogical reasoning approach—this article proposes that individual‐level approaches are most useful in domestic policy analysis where decision‐makers must confront a discrete policy "episode" in which perceived levels of cognitive uncertainty and ambiguity are high. An analysis of decision‐making by political leaders during the 1967 Detroit riots reveals that these leaders made widespread use of historical analogies at various stages of the policymaking process. Policymakers can probably be expected to rely on analogizing under circumstances and contexts that make cognitive demands similar to those observed in the Detroit case.

Students of political psychology have long shown an interest in exploring how analogical reasoning affects decision‐making. However, the existing literature on analogical reasoning has remained within the rationalist explanatory framework by assuming that an actor's interests can be deduced from that actor's position in a certain material structure, thus treating those interests as unaffected by the process of analogical reasoning. This assumption unduly restricts the role that analogies may play. Analogies can do more than simply allow decision‐makers to figure out what specific policies will advance their preexisting interests—they can also determine the interests themselves. To demonstrate the benefits of moving the analogical literature beyond rationalism, this article explores the Reagan administration's policy toward American hostages in Lebanon, which culminated in the Iran‐Contra scandal.