Military escalation refers to the increasing intensity of violence during a conflict. It can be an essential tool for a state to achieve its objectives, but it also presents challenges for those who seek to defuse conflicts or to prevent their escalation into full-scale war.
From the earliest days of warfare, opponents have sought to achieve tactical escalation by adding fresh troops and resources to the fight, which increases both the physical and strategic burden of conflict. The Peloponnesian Wars provide an excellent illustration of this phenomenon, with both sides throwing ever more men into the struggle over a quarter of a century. Conscription, of course, shifted manpower escalation from being merely a tactical factor to a constant feature of war.
While academic writing on escalation has evolved from Clausewitz’s philosophical reflections to focus on controlling the mechanics of escalation towards a theoretical extreme, today national security professionals have to deal with the fact that escalation is often an essential tool for achieving desired outcomes. Military and civilian leaders must consider the benefits and costs of a particular escalation step in relation to its impact on both domestic and international security, as well as its effect on conflict termination and achieving desirable peace outcomes.
However, the way in which escalation is thought about by military planners and staff officers often ignores offramps to the conflict, which could make an adversary more willing to accept a less intense escalation option. This tendency to overlook offramps in escalation planning makes it difficult to manage the potential for unforeseen, catastrophic consequences.