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Seo-Hyun Park, Friends in Need? The Causes and Consequences of Reliability in Military Alliances, International Studies Review, Volume 16, Issue 1, March 2014, Pages 164–168, https://doi.org/10.1111/misr.12112
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Throughout history, states have formed military alliances to offset power imbalances, to fend off threats, to manage potential foes, and to act on shared goals and values. Working within the well-established tradition of alliance theories, but also challenging some of their limitations, Jason Davidson's America's Allies and War and Gregory Miller's The Shadow of the Past raise new and important questions for the long-term politics of alliance relations. Specifically, they offer new insights that go beyond the initial formation of military partnerships by examining the dynamics of alliances during and after the use of force. Together, they expand on and add nuance to recent studies on not only the formation of alliances but also their management, cohesion, and durability. They effectively challenge conventional wisdom on the free-riding nature of US allies, and the exaggerated effects of reputation and credibility in the minds of leaders and policymakers.
At the most basic level, both books share a common purpose: to explore why allies cooperate in some crises but not in others. But, they each add a new twist to this long-standing question. Davidson is interested in examining the different mix of strategic and domestic political factors that produce varied support among different European allies for American military operations abroad. Miller asks why some states are chosen for cooperative agreements to begin with, and identifies the long-term benefits of demonstrating timely and sufficient support for an ally (and the costs of not doing so). Davidson and Miller also discuss different types and levels of military and political support and why they matter. Their more fine-grained dependent variables range from types of support during military operations in America's Allies and War, to variations in alliance terms due to perceptions of past behavior in The Shadow of the Past.
