Mariya Grinberg's "Trade in War"

Mariya Grinberg is an assistant professor of political science and member of the Security Studies Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She focuses on international relations theory and international security. Her research interests center on the question of how time and uncertainty shape the strategic decisions of states, examining economic statecraft, military planning, and nuclear strategy.

Grinberg applied the “Page 99 Test” to her new book, Trade in War: Economic Cooperation across Enemy Lines, and reported the following:

On page 99 of my book, the reader will find an assessment of the changing expectations of the length of war among British decision-makers in World War I. The page picks up the story in 1915, remarking on the sense of optimism around the launch of the Dardanelles campaign. However, by the middle of the year, given the failure of the Dardanelles campaign to restart a war of movement, expectations of a short war once again gave way to planning for a long war.

The Page 99 Test would rather grievously deceive the reader about the contents of the book. Judging purely from page 99, a reader might expect this book to be a military history of World War I. In fact, the book explains wartime trade – why states would allow their own firms to trade with the state’s military opponents during open hostilities. British decision-making in World War I is one of the cases used to test the argument; other cases include the Crimean War (1854-6), World War II, and the United States wartime trade in its post-Cold War conflicts.

The book argues that states develop nuanced wartime commercial policies, determining how each product will be treated during the war. Products that can be quickly converted into military capabilities by the enemy are prohibited from trade, while those that take a while to become useful on the battlefield are more likely to be traded. Products that are essential for the key domestic industries of the state are also traded in war. Furthermore, states tailor their commercial policies to the war they expect to fight. When states expect a a short war, more products can be traded with the enemy; while expectations of a prolonged war bring a more restrictive wartime commercial policy.

Page 99 captures British expectations of the length of war – which in 1915, in the moment of optimism allowed them to continue importing German dyes, which were integral for the British textile industry. However, the changing expectations towards a long war in 1915 ended such imports and brought prohibitions on the export to the enemy of food, cotton manufacture, rubber, and other raw materials. All of which were previously allowed to be traded with the enemy. Of course, for these details, the reader would have to reach page 109.

Visit Mariya Grinberg's website.

--Marshal Zeringue