The literature on international security for the last three decades has primarily focused on the twin problems of terrorism and insurgency as the principal threats to the global status quo, and in doing so has neglected the role of conquest as an instrument within great power competition. The emerging era of bare-knuckled territorial aggrandizement by revisionist great powers, therefore, has largely caught the academy underprepared. Given this, I offer a ten-year anniversary review of a book that could assist in shaping our understanding of the changing nature of the international system today.
Hungry Like the Wolf: Territorial Conquest and Great Power Competition in the New World
Russia and China could succeed in weakening American influence in its far abroad and security in its near abroad through reliance on tried-and-true hybrid war/grey zone tactics. These indirect maneuvers are cheaper and easier to orchestrate under the U.S.’s nose than direct military operations and have the asymmetric effect of maximizing the impact of a minimal investment, stretching the power and reach of weaker powers confronting more powerful rivals.
Putin’s Jedi Mind Trick in Ukraine: How Truth Decay Shapes the Operational Environment
Moscow’s falsehoods justifying imperial aggression and war crimes have penetrated cultural and geographic boundaries. It is only a matter of time before other authoritarian powers adopt similar tactics to excuse similar actions. To address this challenge, the United States and its allies should come to view truth decay as a multi-domain mechanism for shaping the operational environment to accommodate military aggression – a non-kinetic means to a kinetic end.
Competing Against Authoritarianism
The global rise of authoritarianism is a pressing strategic problem for the United States and its like-minded allies. Chinese and Russian authoritarianism threaten the liberal order from without. Simultaneously, democratic backsliding in the U.S. and Europe undermines liberalism from within. The nature of these twin aspects of authoritarianism requires a joint response able to support and strengthen the liberal order against disintegration. This response must include a more expansive approach to countering the authoritarian warfare occurring below the traditional threshold of armed conflict.
#Reviewing Three Dangerous Men
Three Dangerous Men is a fast read that is also full of details and insights into the lives of Russian Chief of Staff Valery Gerasimov, the late Iranian Quds Force Commander Major General Qassem Soleimani, and Vice Chair Zhang Youxia of China’s Central Military Commission. Jones presents the reader with formative experiences in the life and professional development of the three military leaders and how they each contributed to shaping the 21st century military and foreign policies of their respective countries.
Arctic Competition, Climate Migration, and Rare Earths: Strategic Implications for the United States Amidst Climate Change
Climate change is rapidly reshaping the world despite international efforts to curb the warming trend. At its current pace, climate change will dramatically reshape the landscape by 2050, causing more than a billion people to compete for resources in affected regions. Moreover, the melting of Arctic ice caps will open new maritime routes nearly year-round, shifting global shipping to less secure zones. As fragile regions become unstable and climate change exacerbates conflict drivers, the U.S. must not remain strategically flexible but should prepare for certain variables. Of these variables, three stand out as most concerning for U.S. security and require shifts in strategy: Arctic ice loss, human displacement, and rare earth supplies.
#Reviewing Russians Among Us
Corera posits a thesis midway through the book, that Russian hybrid warfare, in all its forms, does not constitute military hard power, but it also does not conform to the traditional definitions of soft power—deferring to Joseph Nye’s description of soft power as attractive instead of coercive. Instead, Corera defines the Russian influence effort as “dark power,” playing on “greed and ambition.” The combination of this dark power with the hybrid warfare model creates a stark picture Corera argues is virtually impossible to combat.
#Reviewing In the Trenches
Autonomous Systems in the Combat Environment: The Key or the Curse to the U.S.
The U.S. military has already begun to incorporate artificial intelligence into its operations. However, the use of autonomous machines in the U.S. could be said to be quite conservative in comparison to its adversaries. Although artificial intelligence assists in providing risk predictions and improving time available to react to events, some believe artificial intelligence and autonomous systems will drastically distance humans from a direct combat role. Observations regarding the complexity of warfare, regardless of the technology, force scientists and military leaders to question the potential consequences of implementing artificial intelligence and autonomous systems in the next military conflict.
With Russia, it is Time to Restart Speaking Softly and Putting Away the Big Stick
The United States should once again place greater emphasis on a concept known as soft power as a means to influence Russian perceptions towards a more pro-Western Democratic mindset. If the United States can successfully influence Russian perceptions through soft power, one might see a less corrupt and more democratic Russia, and perhaps a peaceful transition of power in the post-Putin future.
#Reviewing The Kremlinologist
Though he was a known quantity to all Kremlinologists and highly respected, however, Thompson has largely remained an obscure figure. The online U.S. State Department history of the career foreign service officer Llewellyn Thompson is terse, indicating his service in Austria (1952-1957), the Soviet Union (1957-1962, 1966-1969), and “at large” (1962-1966). Omitted from this thumbnail sketch is Thompson’s service prior to and during World War II. Moreover, the official outline mentions nothing of the Cold War narrative involving the postwar negotiations pertaining to Trieste, the Berlin Crisis, the Cuban Missile Crisis, Vietnam, or the negotiations paving the way for the first Strategic Arms Limitations Talks (SALT I). Seldom has a person been so in the thick of important events only to be so largely forgotten.
Putin’s Playbook: #Reviewing Dugin’s Foundations of Geopolitics
A single book, written in 1997, signalled every significant foreign policy move of the Russian Federation over the following two decades. The United States, Europe, and every nation intertwined with Russia failed to see the signs. From the annexation of Crimea to Britain’s exit from the European Union, the grand strategy laid out in Aleksandr Dugin’s Foundation of Geopolitics: The Geopolitical Future of Russia has unfolded beautifully in a disastrous manner for the western rules-based international order. Perhaps, his words also telegraph the belligerent Putin’s future intentions.
#Reviewing The Russian Understanding of War
Jonssan’s thesis is that the Russian government and armed forces believe there has been a change in the nature of war with the advent of the information revolution. Specifically, information warfare is now so potent that it can achieve political goals commensurate with war without recourse to military means. The resulting book offers an efficient overview of trends in Russian military thought since the collapse of the Soviet Union paired with detailed examinations of the two major subjects that have defined those trends: information warfare and color revolutions.
Choosing Interests While You Sleep? #Reviewing The Senkaku Paradox
If the U.S. should concede ground on partner territories or interests, the nation must articulate a new policy. The other option would be to compete against near-peer competitors in such a manner that maintains the present security environment with enough flexibility to deter conflict and, if needed, limit escalation. Either way, we must move forward into the reality of great power competition with our eyes wide open and with a determined gait, not dozing and stumbling forward.
What Is NATO Good For?
NATO is an instrument, one that has shown it can be adapted to different tasks and goals as the strategic setting changes. Those adaptations have not always been swift or graceful, yet the alliance’s endurance speaks to the fact that it eventually does meet its members’ needs. If NATO can reassert itself in the current environment as an engine of stability and not just a provider of military security it has a much stronger chance of persevering, even as its origins in the aftermath of World War II and the early years of the Cold War recede further into history.
The Positive Impact of NATO’s Enhanced Forward Presence
The Thucydides Fallacy: Misdiagnosing Today’s Challenge to the International System
The rise of China is not the only distinguishing structural factor for the strategic environment in which the United States finds itself. Many scholars will discuss the role of terrorism, increased globalization, and non-state actors in the current strategic environment. These are all important, but from a classical view of the structure of the international system, what the U.S. today is facing is not just a rising power, or even a bloc of powers: it is also facing a declining power—Russia.
The Nexus of Russian Foreign and Domestic politics through Diversionary Warfare against Ukraine
Russian annexation of Crimea and the conflict in eastern Ukraine that followed negatively affected Russia’s international prestige. However, in contrast to the external reaction, the domestic population demonstrated higher support for national policies. Not only did the Russian public perceive the return of Crimea as a glorious military victory, the government-controlled narrative also managed to spread the effects of such success to positively perceiving the domestic situation as well.
Why the Military is the Wrong Tool for Defending Western Society
Napoleon’s advantage was created by a change in the sociopolitical environment. It could be argued a similar change in the nature of society and politics has been occurring in the West in the period since World War I. The more recent sociopolitical change occurred among the Western industrial nations over the last century and involved a shift towards individualism. It allowed liberal democracy to become the standard form of Western government. It created a New World Order that allowed for organizations like the EU that would have been unheard of in nineteenth-century Europe.
The Venezuela Crisis Revisited
The political turmoil in Venezuela has captured the attention of the United States for several months, and the recent introduction of Russian troops into the country has solidified a place for the ailing petrostate on front pages nationwide. As American eyes are drawn to the ongoing unrest in the streets of Caracas, it is worth noting this is not the first time the United States has been concerned by European intervention in Venezuela.