Reciprocal Citizens Exchange: A Confidence-Building Alternative to Nuclear Deterrence

This paper articulates a new and very different approach to deterrence in the nuclear age, one focussed on the underlying causes rather than the more easily visible effects of superpower intransigence, one based on positive rather than negative incentives, and one with the unusual potential to remove barriers (whether perceived or real) between political adversaries rather than continuously to create them. I suggest a deterrent ``force,´´ or perhaps more appropriately a ``restraining presence,´´ that uniquely combines inhibition of war-like or destabilizing acts in the short term with the simultaneous enhancement of transnational understanding over the longer term, at all levels of the body politic. Specifically, I propose a highly visible, mutially endorsed and deliberately massive effort by both the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. in support of a confidence-building program involving the reciprocal exchange, from one nation to the other, of large numbers of citizen ``hostages´´ chosen from all walks of life. Over a period of a generation or more, these carefully-selected and well-prepared volunteers would have the opportunity to lay the psychological and political groundwork for a significant and powerful, yet non-violent and gradual, shift in the conceptualization of deterrence currently endorsed by both superpowers.