A US Military View of Global Geopolitical Shifts

 April 24, 2012

A year ago, a group of superior US officers with Republican credentials were involved in a geopolitical brainstorming session at the National Defense University in Washington. The group was asked to provide answers regarding the US’ place in the world and to outline a ten-year national security plan. Edward Luce was invited to attend and he subsequently summarised the group’s findings in a book, Time to Start Thinking, America in the Age of Descent, published in 2012.

The sixteen officers arrived at the conclusion that the biggest threat to US national security was not represented by the country’s external enemies, but by America’s decaying economy, infrastructure, education and health systems, and by its ballooning public debt. In their assessment, it will be next to impossible to keep the US as a world hegemon after 2020 : eventually, America could continue to provide the public goods associated with international law and order only if it were to share domination of the world with equally powerful nations, like China or super-states such as the EU.

The brainstorming group advocated reducing by 100,000 soldiers the numbers of the military, as well as cutting US military spending by 20 percent. It also proposed to close down military bases from Germany, South Korea and elsewhere, and to allow China to rule over Taiwan in exchange for accepting the reunification of South and North Korea.

The amount of money thus saved from military spending should be used to improve America’s infrastructure and to greatly expand foreign aid programmes, which currently stand at only one percent of every $100 the US spends every year.

Their assessment of the dire situation of the US economy was reinforced by Admiral Mike Mullen, who said that, as a country

“we are borrowing money from China to build weapons to face down China, which is clearly a broken strategy”.

The conclusions of the brainstorming session are echoed in the article “A National Strategic Narrative”, by Captain Wayne Porter and Colonel Mark Mykleby writing under the pseudonym “Mr Y”, in Foreign Policy magazine. The two officers claim, quite rightly, that the US should – in order to practise “smart power” abroad – practise “smart growth” at home first.

As anyone would agree, the ranks of the US military do not seem to conform to the cliché of a military caste bent on world domination. If anything, the two examples above go to show that the enlisted men and women of the United States army are perhaps more patriotic in their approach to their country’s problems than many Washington politicians up to the highest level. This happens, unfortunately, because the latter all too often fall prey to well-written but deeply flawed articles and studies such as Robert Kagan’s “The Myth of America’s Decline”, that represent the views and ambitions of the neo-conservative political fringe.

Military Spending: Less Boots on the Ground for the EU

March 20, 2012

International military analysts have recently pointed out that military spending in Asia has increased to 262 billion euros in 2012. The amount could overtake the EU’s own military spending in the near future, possibly as early as next year. Smaller military budgets, however, are consistent with the EU’s new focus on soft power and diplomacy, as opposed to investment in new weapons systems and more ‘boots on the ground’. Moreover, European countries have had an insignificant military presence in the Middle East or Asia, its former role being filled over the past sixty years by the United States. Naturally, the financial crisis and subsequent austerity measures are also considered responsible for the anaemic military spending by EU members.

In 2012 the US will spend an estimated 739 billion dollars, which, combined with the EU’s own 270 billion euros in military spending, will secure NATO’s position as the world’s most powerful military alliance. The refocusing of the US’ military strategy on Asia, which includes a new base in Australia and more American warships in Singapore, has been recently decried by Middle Eastern kingdoms feeling somewhat abandoned to their fate. Accordingly, they have increased their own military purchases and are intensifying diplomatic pressure on the US to remain engaged in their region. For Arab leaders, these lobbying efforts could not have been undertaken at a worst time, as the Obama administration plans to further reduce military spending to an estimated 500 billion USD per year.

Russia has recently announced that it would spend 775 billion dollars until 2022 for a much-needed refurbishment of its armed forces’ equipment, and for making its troops more professional.

China’s military will receive an estimated 89 billion dollars in 2012. In recent times, the Chinese military expenditure has shown a tendency to double every five years or so. Worries about Chinese hegemony in Asia have prompted other Asian nations, including India, to increase their military spending this year, which is good news for European weapons manufacturers. Fortunately – according to most analysts – the danger of a confrontation between major powers is rather remote at this point in time, as the Chinese military’s might will match America’s only in 15 or 20 years from now. (sources: www.sipri.org, Le Monde, International Institute for Security Studies, Reuters)