The otherization of countries creates competing representations of ontological being that causes mutual securitization. The misperception of political entities leads to a downwards spiral that leads to war.

In more scholarly terms, a negative spiral in relations is intensified when the other is securitized, i.e., construed, through speech, as different and dangerous at every encounter, and when every policy move in any issue-area is represented as a tool in the hands of this threatening other. Such multifaceted securitization pushes the representation of the other upward on the scale of difference and danger and can create a situation where positive recognition is not granted in any sphere. In this situation, the collective actor experiences an exogenous rejection of its self-ascribed identity in every policy sphere where it seeks outside confirmation—making the experience acute. In turn, this experience of acute ontological dissonance may be met by a strategy of avoidance and externalization: a counter-securitization that mirrors and matches the near-total rejection to which the political entity itself has been subjected. In the course of the ensuing spat, with hostile representations flung back and forth on every arena of encounter, the other is finally left with no face but that of an enemy. That resolves the dilemma of knowing what the intentions of the other are, as each party is now quite certain that the other has offensive designs. From this understanding, logically flow policies of positioning and armament in the military sphere, and disengagement and non-communication in non-military issueareas. In contrast to endogenously generated avoidance noted by Lupovici (2012, 813), the problem is not that a collective actor undertakes contradictory measures to alleviate ontological dissonance, but rather that the same measures of disengagement and confrontation seem logical and legitimate in every sphere of interaction between two political entities. In this situation, the parties have few possibilities of extricating themselves from the spiral that leads to confrontation. If the other is securitized and denied recognition across issue-areas and arenas, that leaves no space for responding with friendship to overcome mistrust—which would be the opening through which to start pushing the spiral downward. A high level of mutual and multifaceted securitization can produce, in Jervis’ terminology (2001, 41), a “deep security dilemma” ... “a situation where mistrust cannot be overcome” and where there are “no missed opportunities for radically improving relations.” But in contrast to Jervis’ conception, the road toward this high level of mutual securitization, with the ensuing minimal trust, is gradual and contingent, and produced through a plethora of representations. Moreover, in this approach, the key “mover” in the security dilemma—the perception of each party that the other has offensive intentions—emerges from their discursive practices, their representations of each other. Mutual and multifaceted securitization answers Mitzen and Schweller’s (2011) call to understand how certainty about the other actor’s aggressive intentions can contribute to the onset of war.9 But this certainty, with the tragic outcome it can result in, should not be seen as conditioned by structural uncertainty at the 9 Mitzen and Schweller (2011, 5) indicate that “structural uncertainty, not alone, but coupled with individuals’ misplaced certainty, causes conflict.” Misplaced certainty is “thought of as a particularly stubborn misperception that leads to suboptimal choice.” Spiraling toward a New Cold War in the North? outset; nor is the misplaced certainty in the next phase built from “inside” an individual decision-maker with reference to cognitive and affective causes (Mitzen and Schweller’s (2011; Jervis 1976, 387–406). I submit that it is built through the multiple and spreading self/other representations that bring the “offensive intent” of the other into being as a social reality, making it reasonable and logical to undertake policy steps to counter this aggressive intent.