The American people have been treated to many “new” defense strategies, military force postures, nuclear strategies, and other policy proposals – mostly from the anti-military Left – over the last few decades. Most of these “new” policy proposals were aimed at cutting and gutting the US military while lulling the American people into a false sense of security by claiming that the policy proposals were “new” and thus somehow better, while the previous (and contemporary) policies, strategies, and force structure are supposedly bad per se and obsolete. This is, of course, utter nonsense.
By contrast, what my new defense strategy aims to do is to provide a framework for preserving US military strength to the greatest extent possible, protect crucial US national interests and key allies, and keep the peace while steering America out of unwise military adventures and reshaping the US military for the threats and wars of the future.
My strategy is based on the following simple principles:
Based on those principles, I propose the following strategy.
The world’s center of gravity is in the Asia-Pacific region, and that’s where the US should concentrate its military and nonmilitary assets. The largest threat to America’s (and other countries’) security is an increasingly aggressive, militaristic, hegemony-minded China, which has a dangerous combination of the historical grudges of a Weimar Republic, the militant nationalism of an Arab state, and an expansionist binge like the Soviet Union. It promises a “hand-to-hand” fight with the US, claims the entire South China Sea as its internal lake, and has supplied ICBM launcher vehicles to North Korea.
The US must therefore counter China militarily, economically, and diplomatically, in the ways advised below.
In the Persian Gulf, the US should continue to keep its option to bomb Iran to stop its military program open, as it is highly unlikely that diplomacy and sanctions will stop that program – Iran is already the world’s pariah (along with North Korea) and one of the most isolated countries in the world, but its leaders don’t care about that one iota, and its nuclear program continues unabated. As in the Asia-Pacific, the US should provide a large, modern nuclear umbrella to its allies in the Gulf to discourage them from going nuclear.
In Europe, the US should close the vast majority of its bases and withdraw all 4 Army BCTs, along with the tanker wing, the 4 USN missile defense capable ships, and one of the fighter wings, currently based there. Those assets should all be dedicated to the Asia-Pacific region. The US should retain only one fighter wing, tactical nuclear weapons, and the most important (strategically important) bases there, such as Ramstein and Lakenheath.
The Europeans should be told, in no uncertain terms, that they’re essentially on their own now and must start providing for their own defense; that the US will continue to provide a nuclear and missile defense umbrella for them, but they must provide for their own conventional defense and pay part of the cost of deploying US BMD systems in Europe.
In Cuba, the US should resume working towards the overthrow of the regime of the Castro brothers, and also aim to overthrow Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela and Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua.
The US also needs to revitalize its alliance with the United Kingdom, which could be repaired e.g. by recognizing Britain’s claim to the Falklands if the UK allows the US to use the Diego Garcia base in the Indian Ocean in any contingency with China or Iran. Ties with France should also be improved.
As for reshaping the US military itself, the US should move the military away from weapons and capabilities design for counterinsurgency wars and theaters, and for other theaters where the only opponents are insurgents or primitive states unable to contest control of the air. The military should instead shift quickly towards weapons and capabilities useful in highly-contested environments – where the opponents are nation states equipped with e.g. advanced fighters and air defense systems and thus able to contest control of the air.
This means setting priorities within the defense budget. Any real strategy is about setting these, and not everything can be a priority – because when everything is a priority, nothing is. A failure to set priorities would essentially be the same thing as sequestration.
This means the military should divest itself of Predator and Reaper drones, other nonstealthy drones, Littoral Combat Ships, aircraft carriers, nonstealthy fighters and bombers, nonstealthy or short-range missiles, and other unsurvivable weapons as soon as possible.
Instead, it should quickly field, in large numbers, weapons such as stealthy bombers and carrier-capable drones, stealthy long-range cruise missiles, submarines (including guided missile submarines), conventional prompt global strike weapons (such as FALCON aircraft), missile defense equipment, anti-submarine weapons (aircraft, sonar, torpedoes, ships), demining ships and equipment (including demining drones), ASAT weapons, hardened satellites, base dispersal and hardening, and cyberweapons – both defensive and offensive. That is where the vast majority of defense R&D and procurement spending should be focused.
Of course, none of those investments, and indeed, maintaining US military power in general, won’t be possible unless Congress drops its knee-jerk opposition to authorizing long overdue reforms of the military’s pay, healthcare, retirement, and other personnel programs, as well as base closure and the retirement of excess Global Hawk and C-27J aircraft. That must include increasing, at least somewhat, TRICARE program premiums for military retirees (these premius are already almost 10 times less what the average American pays in premiums) and increasing the number of years required for a military pension from 20 to 25, so that people have an incentive to stay in the military for longer, when they’re still in their prime, in their 40s or early 50s, and still able to give the nation at least 5 years of service.
The DOD has repeatedly asked Congress, year after year, for authorization of such reforms, yet Congress has repeatedly refused to do so, or to acknowledge that these costs are unsustainable. The defense authorization bill recently produced by the House Armed Services Committee continues that dishonorable trend.
This must change. Without these crucial reforms – which virtually all think-tanks across the political spectrum, from the right to the left, support – the DOD will become, within a few decades, nothing more but a benefit-administering agency. To prevent that from happening, these and other, sometimes painful, personnel program reforms and base closures, must be enacted.
Annex: How US foreign policy and defense posture should be reshaped
In the diplomatic arena, the US should:
In terms of military deployments and America’s overseas military posture:
In terms of weapon inventories and programs, the US should:
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