Experimenting with the Arms Race

Abstract

The study involves a game that simulates certain basic features of an arms race-disarmament dilemma. The game is a modification of the widely studied two-person prisoner's dilemma. The more complex conditions involve options for requesting or refusing a request for an inspection of the other player's armament level prior to the payoff move, or for engaging in a “sudden death” surprise attack. The manner in which the inspection opportunity is used as a vehicle for communicating intentions and the conditions under which each of these options tends to be selected are described. In addition to the deceptive propensity in inspection conditions, we found an unhappy tendency to engage in preemptive surprise attacks out of fear of the adversary, even when there was virtually no chance of success in such an attack. While all of the more complex variations are played with real subjects, two conditions are repeated with a stooge opponent preprogrammed to follow strictly either a matching (tit for tat) or a conciliatory strategy. Both of these strategies are markedly effective in moving the real subject toward a cooperative or mutually disarmed state.