As President Joe Biden met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in mid-June about the spate of Russian-origin cyber-attacks on America, a growing number of security analysts joined in repeating the refrain: “Hit them back!”

But what if the threat of a cyber counterattack isn’t a realistic method of deterrence?

As the character Dr. Strangelove said in the eponymous movie, “Deterrence is the art of producing in the mind of the enemy the fear to attack.” For many, deterrence is like an old friend from the last Cold War, grudgingly admired for preventing nuclear war. Having a like-for-like response in a match between two powers means that each fighter knows he will be hit as hard as he punches or harder, and that victory will be pyrrhic or elusive, and because of that he will be less likely to start a fight. That is, he is deterred, and his deterrence means the safety of his sparring partner.

Extending this logic to cyberspace has adherents. Mr. Biden’s national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, warned that Moscow would face “seen and unseen” consequences to a recent cyber-attack, which many analysts took to mean digital retaliation in addition to sanctions.

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