Grappling with Great Power Competition

Following the end of the Cold War, Pentagon war planners shifted to regional conflicts. During Iraq and Afghanistan, strategic planning was replaced by operational and tactical planning even at the level of day-to-day combat. With the reemergence of Great Power Competition (GPC), it is necessary to revert to global planning to set the conditions necessary for peace with peer competitors.

As discussed in Archuleta and Gerson’s “Fight Tonight”[1], war plans depend on three inputs: perceived and capable threats, the desired policy end state, and resource constraints.

Since the "setting of global conditions" must work across the continuum of competition (cooperation, competition below threshold of armed conflict, and armed conflict), it makes sense to consider the desired end state for three types of competition separately.

For lack of better terms, the competitor nation or non-state actor will be called "friend with benefits," "frenemy," or "enemy" depending on their place on the continuum. Actions the US Military takes are designed prevent or address armed conflict, which means moving the relationship with the competitor away from enemy status to frenemy or even friend status.

For each of these three types of relations, interactions we have with them must not only be appropriate for the current relation type, but also relevant to the next step on the continuum of competition.

For example, joint training exercises provide an opportunity to appraise the friendly nation's military capabilities for several reasons: first, this information would be useful if the US and the friendly nation should need to cooperate in a multinational military operation; second, to handle the situation where relations with the friendly nation should decay (so the formerly friendly nation becomes a frenemy). Bonds created by the joint training can help mend any move away from cooperation, however.

This addresses friends and frenemies. For enemies, the goal is to deter or address armed conflict. This is a third purpose for joint training exercises: they are shows of force, and also let the enemy know that we have friends (cooperative nations).

To get a very rough initial draft of a war plan, we run the area of interest through this framework. For example, in the Indo-Pacific Area of Operations, the primary perceived threat is China, with North Korea playing a secondary role. The desired policy end state would be containment. Joint training exercises with partners in the region, like Japan and India, serve as a deterrent to expansion. The resource constraints are the available U. S. military capabilities[2] in the region (U.S. Pacific Fleet and its component parts, Diego Garcia and other bases, etc.) plus the capabilities of friendlies.

B1-B Lancer departing from Naval Support Facility Diego Garcia, 7 October 2021
Photo by Senior Airman Rebeca M. Luquin, U.S. Air Force

These are regional conditions for the Indo-Pacific AO. Extending this to global conditions (as recommended in Archuleta and Gerson[3]) involves doing the same sort of things in other parts of the world, especially for nations that are friendly or potentially friendly with China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea.

Does this accomplish GPC containment through deterrence?

China practices "unrestricted warfare" which involves military, economic, diplomatic, propagandistic, and other approaches to control other nations[4]. Meanwhile, Russia often practices “liminal warfare” which means they shape outcomes to their advantage using military and nonmilitary methods while staying below the threshold of armed conflict[5].

Maintaining bases or enacting treaties granting the right of entry into maritime ports raises the standard of living of friendly countries. This leads to trade agreements, mutual assistance, and diplomatic relations. This helps to counter the unusual types of warfare practiced by China and Russia but is perhaps not sufficient since China and Russia aren’t economically contained[6].

Footnotes

[1] Archuleta & Gerson, “Fight Tonight: Reenergizing the Pentagon for Great Power Competition.”
[2] Nicastro, L. “U.S. Defense Infrastructure in the IndoPacific.”
[3] Archuleta & Gerson, “Fight Tonight: Reenergizing the Pentagon for Great Power Competition.”
[4] Qiao & Liang. Unrestricted Warfare.
[5] Kilcullen, The Dragons and the Snakes.
[6] Spalding, R. War Without Rules.

Bibliography

Archuleta, B. & Gerson, J. “Fight Tonight: Reenergizing the Pentagon for Great Power Competition.” Joint Force Quarterly 100. 17 February 2021. Retrieved 29 August 2024 from https://ndupress.ndu.edu/Media/News/News-Article-View/Article/2498193/fight-tonight-reenergizing-the-pentagon-for-great-power-competition/

Kilcullen, D. The Dragons and the Snakes: How the Rest Learned to Fight the West. Oxford University Press, 2020.

Nicastro, L. “U.S. Defense Infrastructure in the IndoPacific: Background and Issues for Congress.” Congressional Research Service. 6 June 2023. Retrieved 29 August 2024 from https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R47589

Qiao & Liang. Unrestricted Warfare. Shadow Lawn Press, 1999.

Spalding, R. War Without Rules: China's Playbook for Global Domination. Sentinel Press, 2022.