Ongoing Research

Works in progress

`Enemies with benefits': On the rationale of trading arms with an enemy, with J. Malizard, available upon request.

This paper explores the rationale of arms trade between two rival agents. We propose a guns-versus-butter framework in which two agents first decide to trade arms (or not); then simultaneously choose their level of guns expenditure; last the prize at stake is shared with respect to a Contest Success Function. Our findings challenge the commonplace notion according to which it would never be rational to trade arms with an enemy. Indeed, arms trade may be mutually beneficial even if the agents are (potential) enemies. In particular, we find that arms trade could constitute a subgame perfect equilibrium if the seller has an advantage both in terms of military and non-military technologies. This article proposes theoretical justifications for historical events such as the arms trade between Germany and Britain on the eve of the World War I, the (aborted) sale of Mistral between France or the arms trade between U.K. and Argentina before the Falklands War.

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