CASE STUDIES

The survey experiments and wargames provide valuable insight into the effect of drones on conflict dynamics, but do so using scripted, hypothetical scenarios. While these approaches shed light on how and why drones can temper escalation dynamics, there are legitimate questions to the external validity and generalizability of findings based on hypothetical scenarios.¹⁹³ To complement the experimental approaches, I draw from two sets of nested case studies that explore drone use by the United States and Israel.¹⁹⁴ I draw data from archival materials, recently declassified military documents, interviews, and the works of historians to probe each of the mechanisms associated with technology-enabled escalation control in a real world context.

Case studies are an ideal complement to the experiments and wargames for several reasons.

Most importantly, case studies enable a detailed analysis of drone development and deployments.

192 Clifford Geertz, The Interpretation Of Cultures (New York: Basic Books, 1977); Robert M. Emerson, Rachel I.

Fretz, and Linda L. Shaw, Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes, Second Edition, 2d Edition (Chicago: University Of Chicago Press, 2011), 13.

193 Hyde, “Experiments in International Relations.”

194 For another study that employs a nested case study design see, Carson, Secret Wars.

Given the relative paucity of openly available data on drone operations, large-N approaches are not well suited to assessing the effect of drones on conflict onset and escalation.¹⁹⁵ Further, the context dependent nature of escalation demands close attention to case specific details.

Understanding why and how socio-technical artifacts like drones shape conflict dynamics requires careful examination of the decision-making process surrounding decisions on the use of force – a task that is best accomplished by studying archival materials such as minutes of National Security Council meetings. The richness of qualitative data from these sources sheds light on internal debates and uncovers evidence on causal mechanisms.¹⁹⁶

In addition, case studies allow researchers to examine political decisions both within and across states. Studying whether drones have similar effects in multiple operational and political contexts helps examine the limits and generalizability of technology-enabled escalation control theory. Finally, case studies help provide the “general conceptual models” needed to help inform policymaking.¹⁹⁷ Although the findings of the experiments and wargames provide useful insights with policy-relevant implications, policymakers can often more readily absorb evidence from actual historical contexts.¹⁹⁸

I select the United States and Israel as cases to study the effects of drones on conflict dynamics for several reasons. First, the United States and Israel are among the most active drone users. Since the advent of military drone use, these two states have employed drones in a variety

195 John Gerring, “What Is a Case Study and What Is It Good For?,” The American Political Science Review 98, no.

2 (May 2004): 341–54; Alexander L. George and Andrew Bennett, Case Studies and Theory Development in the Social Sciences (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2005).

196 Gerring, “What Is a Case Study and What Is It Good For?,” 348–49.

197 George and Bennett, Case Studies and Theory Development in the Social Sciences, 270.

198 Alexander L. George, Bridging the Gap: Theory and Practice in Foreign Policy (Washington, D.C.: United States Institute of Peace Press, 1993).

of operational contexts ranging from reconnaissance to armed strikes. This provides several cases with which to test technology-enabled escalation control. Second, both states have long histories of drone use. The United States launched its first military drones against an adversary during World War II, and the Israelis did so in the mid-1960s. This long period of use allows for variation along several dimensions including the strength and type of adversary threat over time, changing domestic political context, and the evolving relative capabilities of manned assets vis-à-vis drones.

This variation allows me to probe how drones affect decision-making and escalation in multiple environmental contexts. Third, although Israel and the United States are both democracies, they have vastly different domestic politics, national security bureaucracies, and exist in different threat environments. Examining two countries allows for cross-national comparison and probes the generalizability of technology-enabled escalation control in different operational contexts.

In both the United States and Israeli case studies, I explore both the development of drones and the effects their use has on conflict dynamics. Studying the origins of the drone programs in each state sheds light on the motivations for the development of weapon systems that remove friendly troops from the battlefield. Documentary evidence and interviews of military planners suggest that both Israel and the United States developed drone capabilities primarily to reduce risk to their own personnel.¹⁹⁹ I then examine a series of crises where the United States and Israel deployed or considered the deployment of drones. I map how deployment decisions were made, identify the factors that drove these decisions, and assess how states reacted to the losses of remotely piloted aircraft. I compare these crises to crises in which manned aircraft are deployed or

199 As I discuss in greater detail in the case studies, other factors that contributed to the development of remotely piloted aircraft capabilities included the need to conduct more politically sensitive operations in denied territory (i.e.

missions that violated the sovereignty of a rival) and, later, to develop systems capable of operating for longer durations than manned assets on “dull, dirty, or dangerous” missions.

lost, to help identify whether and how drones affect conflict dynamics and to probe the hypotheses laid out in chapter two. I focus particularly on crisis situations for both theoretical and practical reasons. For theory, interstate crises place decisionmakers in a position where they must choose how to employ instruments of power against a rival. As international relations scholars Glenn Snyder and Paul Diesing note, “a crisis distills many of the elements that make up the essence of politics in the international system.”²⁰⁰ From a practical standpoint, there is typically more documentary and historical evidence on crisis situations to draw from for analysis.

To conduct this analysis, I rely on process tracing within each crisis. Process tracing examines a chronological series of events for observable evidence of causal mechanisms, allowing researchers to make inferences about competing hypotheses or explanations.²⁰¹ A key characteristic of process tracing is that the timing and sequencing of events is critical to making inferences about causal relationships. Chronology alone, however, is insufficient for effective process tracing; researchers must look for evidence that confirms that temporally prior events actually shaped subsequent decisions.²⁰² Additionally, process tracing must take into account the normative and international context surrounding decision-making.²⁰³ For instance, statements or writings by policymakers should reveal the role that technological progression and the international environment played in driving their decisions.

200 Glenn H. Snyder and Paul Diesing, Conflict Among Nations: Bargaining, Decision Making, and System Structure in International Crises (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1978), 4.

201 Andrew Bennett and Jeffrey T. Checkel, eds., Process Tracing: From Metaphor to Analytic Tool (Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press, 2014), 6; Derek Beach and Rasmus Brun Pedersen, Process-Tracing Methods:

Foundations and Guidelines (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2013), 2–5.

202 Beach and Pedersen, Process-Tracing Methods, 120–43.

203 Bennett and Checkel, Process Tracing, 23.

Together, each of the three methodological approaches helps explore the preferences and decisions of different actors whose opinions or actions can shape whether a crisis escalates. This mixed method approach yields two important benefits. First, it allows me to compare the preferences and reactions of senior civilian decisionmakers, the American public, and military practitioners. This sheds light on how drones influence decisions among each of these groups.

Second, the approach allows me to triangulate findings from historical cases and hypothetical, experimental scenarios. This allows me to compensate for the inherent limitations of each methodological approach.

Chapter 4