deterrencen.

1861 T. B. L. Baker in War with Crime (1889) 124 That punishment is to be preferred which combines the greatest deterrence with the least pain.

1875 E. Poste tr. Gaius Institutionum Iuris Civilis (ed. 2) i. Introd. 8 The deterrence of future wrongdoers by..punishment of a past offender.

1884 F. Peek in Contemp. Rev. July 77 The main objects of imprisonment should be..deterrence from crime and the reformation of offenders.

1955 Economist 5 Nov. 457 (heading) Graduated Deterrence?

1958 New Statesman 19 July 90/1 The argument about self-preservation and deterrence is trivial and thoughtless. At the moment the nuclear powers will probably not start war against each other except in the event of an accident.

1959 Times Lit. Suppl. 9 Jan. 17/3 The present state of passive deterrence (in which each side could retaliate devastatingly if attacked, so neither side can afford to attack) provides a framework of insurance.

1962 Observer 13 May 15/2 The ‘deterrence only’ school include most of the adherents of finite deterrence (or minimum deterrence)... If each side can be certain of inflicting terrible damage on the other with its strategic forces, then neither side will use them.

1966 U. Schwarz & L. Hadik Strategic Terminol. 59 Graduated deterrence, a strategy threatening a whole range of countermoves, each of which is designed not so much to punish the enemy and to destroy his war-making capacity or to change the local balance of power, as to demonstrate the will to inflict greater punitive damage, to escalate the conflict, in the hope of convincing the enemy to refrain from pursuing his objective.