Thucydides trap
noun
a situation in which a dominant power’s fear of a rising power leads inevitably to war
What does Thucydides trap mean?
Thucydides trap refers to a situation in which a dominant power’s fear of a rising power leads inevitably to war.
Examples of Thucydides trap
“The world has come to another crossroads,” Chinese President Xi Jinping told U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday, as the two leaders began their summit in Beijing. Then Xi asked: “Can China and the U.S. overcome the so-called ‘Thucydides Trap’ and create a new paradigm of major-country relations?”
—Chad de Guzman, Time, 15 May 2026
In fact, I don’t know how many of you study history, but Thucydides, the Greek historian, described what he called the “Thucydides Trap,” and it goes something like this—it was Athenian fear of a rising Sparta that made war inevitable. Well, I think that one of my jobs as the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and as an adviser to our senior leaders, is to help avoid a Thucydides trap. We don’t want the fear of an emerging China to make war inevitable.
—Chinese leaders have put forward a new model of “major-country relationship” between China and the United States, an intellectual framework for resolving one of the greatest puzzles in international history—how to avoid falling into the so-called Thucydides trap, the often-cited cycle of struggle between rising and established powers.
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Where does Thucydides trap come from?
The term Thucydides trap was popularized by political scientist Graham Allison starting in the early 2010s.
Both Mr. Hu and President Obama seemed desperate to avoid what Graham Allison of Harvard University has labeled “the Thucydides Trap”—that deadly combination of calculation and emotion that, over the years, can turn healthy rivalry into antagonism or worse.
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The “trap” referenced refers to a situation described by Greek historian Thucydides (~ 460-404 BC).
The growth of the power of Athens, and the alarm which this inspired in Lacedæmon [Sparta], made war inevitable.
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How is Thucydides trap used?
Thucydides trap has mostly been used in the context of relations between China and the United States. The plural Thucydides traps is also rare. However, non-US/China specific uses and plural uses both exist.
All the still-under-draft (at the time of this publication) 2022 U.S. national strategic documents—security, defense, and military—emphasize the importance of allies and partners to affect integrated deterrence through active campaigning. There can be no say-do gaps in this functional imperative; such gaps will manifest holes-in-government nonsolutions—the stuff of self-inflicted “Thucydides traps.” If the U.S. continues to diminish its support for and its valuation of alliances, what would SOF look like without such alliances?
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