What Game Theory Can Tell Us About Iran’s Nuclear Intentions
According to Yale dean Edieal J. Pinker game theory can tell us a lot about the nuclear intentions of Iran. Iran has been a key issue in American foreign policy because of its influence in the Middle East and the potential threat to American allies such as Israel. In the summer of 2015 a landmark deal was negotiated between Iran and the US that puts limits on the growth of Iran’s nuclear capabilities in exchange for the lifting of international oil and financial sanctions.
Professor Edieal believes that these negotiations between Secretary of State John Kerry and the Iranians can be viewed as a leader/follower game similar to chess. For the Iranians the choice is between aggressively proceeding with the development of nuclear weapons, or slowly developing their capabilities. The West must choose a threshold for action. Do they set the bar low and risk being pulled into another war in the Middle East, or do they wait until Iran is close to completing a weapon and risk being too late to intervene? Edieal argues that for the West the threshold has likely already been set at a relatively high level. Iran is aware that there is a lack of support for war in the U.S. due to the recent drawn out wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Thus, the best choice for Iran is the slow gradual development of weapons. Iran’s best strategy is to enhance their nuclear enrichment capabilities under the pretense of peaceful applications such as energy and medicine. Once they reach a certain threshold of development a “mad dash” will be made to complete a weapon before the US and Israel can react.
While this interaction can be viewed as a simultaneous game, it is better visualized as a dynamic leader/follower game due to the impact of intelligence. This type of game is described in the book using the example of 2 firms, one of which is the industry leader. In this case the US is the foreign policy leader so they are forced to take a stand or risk appearing weak, Iran can then analyze their strategic options based off of the US decision. This is a classic example of how game theory can be used to analyze foreign policy negotiations.