Abstract
One of the most challenging tasks for a deterrence planner is assessing a leader's intent, which requires having an in-depth level of subject-matter expertise. This article investigates this challenge and offers answers to the following question “how can we identify a leader’s intent” to aid deterrence planners, operators, and policymakers? To examine this question, we used a multi-method approach by performing several qualitative analyses on Kim Jong-Un’s New Year’s Eve speeches (2013–2018). We focused on techniques that assessed the underlying facets of intent (e.g. cognitive beliefs and goals). These speeches served as a viable secondary source that identified objective markers to which we applied a coding scheme to extract the adversary’s “intent” to perform a particular action. This article argues that identifying intent can help policy-makers and planners understand if an adversary has plans to perform specific operations.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 398-421 |
Number of pages | 24 |
Journal | Defense and Security Analysis |
Volume | 36 |
Issue number | 4 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - 2020 |
Keywords
- Defence
- Deterrence
- Kim Jong-Un
- North Korea
- leadership intent
- multi-method
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Geography, Planning and Development
- Political Science and International Relations