Active vs. passive defense against a strategic attacker

Abstract

The article analyzes how a defender determines a balance between protecting an object (passive defense) and striking preventively against an attacker seeking to destroy the object (active defense). The attacker analogously determines a balance between attacking and protecting against the preventive strike. The defender makes its decision about striking preventively based on its estimate of the probability of being attacked. In both cases of preventive strike and no preventive strike, the defender anticipates the most harmful attacker’s strategy. The influence of the ratio between the player’s resources and the contest intensities on the solution of the game is analyzed.