Introduction: Research and Methodology
geostrategic position that traditional theorists such as Morgen-
thau and Thompson (1985, 204 ff ) suggested, but these
alliances may not be the choice of the minor state. In other
words, the major state demands a military presence in a partic-
ular area and is willing to provide its brand of security to the
minor state alliance partner in exchange for access to the area.
These were the alliances of the Soviet Union and satellite states
following World War II as well as the nonideological alliances of
the United States during the cold war. Throughout history, the
search for spheres of influence has been manifested in this
alliance type.
Group C alliances, capability-aggregating alliances, represent
the alliances commonly thought of in balance of power theory.
These alliances are formed by states with similar interests and
similar capabilities and are likely to be used to either avert or
win a coming conflict. The benefit of security is spread
throughout the alliance, but it is often unclear, at least for
adversaries, whether the alliance is going to be defensive or
offensive. The targets or neighbors of these alliances have to
look for clues as to the intentions of the alliance members. In
the case of postwar defense pacts that are often meant to ensure
the peace that was signed, the international context sometimes
determines the use of these kinds of alliances.
Group D alliances, single issue alliances, are similar to Group
B alliances as they comprise states with little or no harmony of
interests; in this group, however, the alliances cannot be
imposed because capabilities are relatively dispersed through-
out the alliance. These alliances tend to be specific agreements
pertaining to only a few issues because overall issue agreement
does not exist. The pacts of restraint identified by Schroeder
(1976) and Moul (1988) are likely to be of this type. Major
states with disparate interests may agree only that a conflict
should be limited, and the alliance serves as permission for the
coming attack and a guarantee against the expansion of con-
flict. For example, Hitler and Stalin agreed on very little before
their 1939 non-aggression pact. The alliance itself then focused
on the limited issues of division of territory and neutrality in
the coming war. Group D alliances are asymmetric in the provi-
sion of benefits but symmetric in the distribution of capabilities
throughout the alliance.
Notice the advantages of combining both capabilities and
interests together in this model. Capabilities in isolation cannot
discern the differences between the pacts of restraint and the
capability-aggregating alliances—the Hitler-Stalin pact looks the
same as the Anglo-French alliance prior to World War II because
both are among relative equals. Similarly, capabilities cannot dif-
ferentiate among the imposed alliances creating spheres of influ-
ence and the alliances meant to provide deterrence for friendly
states. The distribution of interests in alliances adds a tremen-
dous amount of information to aid the understanding of specific
alliances, and it does so in a relatively simple way.
This framework allows readers to quickly evaluate the
alliances found in these volumes. The terms of an alliance
(defense pact, neutrality or non-aggression pacts, and ententes)
provide a great deal of information, but often these terms are
not enough to gauge how an alliance treaty was to be used by
the signatories. If the terms of the alliance are combined with
the interest-capability framework, however, readers of these
volumes can easily deduce that a major state is not expecting a
smaller state to come to its aid when they sign a defense pact.
Or, similarly, defense pacts between similarly capable states with
vastly different interests are usually meant to resolve particular
issues of contention.
The remainder of this chapter describes the collection of
alliance treaties included in these volumes. The following sec-
tion begins with an outline of the method used to identify
potential treaties and includes a discussion of how this process
complements the original data sets developed in the 1960s. The
final part of the section explains the criteria that determine
when a formal international treaty is an international alliance,
and, thus, it provides an important guide for all the treaties
included in these volumes.Identifying and Describing Alliances in These
Volumes
This section describes the alliances that are included in these
volumes. As noted, the 1648 to 1815 cases were identified in the
author’s research (Gibler 1999). The 1816 to 2000 data included
revisions of the original Correlates of War data that became ver-
sion 3.0 of that data set (Gibler and Sarkees 2004). Finally, the
alliances signed after 2000 that are included in the second vol-
ume represent the beginning of a revision (version 4.0) of the
Correlates of War data set.Defining Formal Alliances
For the purposes of this data set, written agreements are major
indicators used to determine the existence of an alliance. This is
perhaps the greatest change from the original alliance data sets.
Although Singer and Small relied primarily on the written
alliance agreement in defining alliance types, they also supple-
mented this research with interpretations by diplomatic histori-
ans, particularly if the treaty text contained any ambiguities
(Singer and Small 1966, 5; 1968, 261). However, historical opin-
ion is no longer as decisive for these data because historical
scholarship on particular cases has changed greatly over time,
and the alliances were often used in ways contrary to the actual
terms of the treaty. For example, ententes were sometimes more
likely to resemble defense pacts than agreements to consult dur-
ing crises. Therefore, instead of a reliance on the secondary his-
torical record, only formal, written treaties that meet Singer and
Small’s original definition of alliance are included in these vol-
umes, with two important exceptions.
First, written treaties that do not pass the ratification process
are not included. Several South American treaties during the
nineteenth and early twentieth centuries failed to win legislative
approval following negotiations, and at least one treaty wasliv