Seizing the advantage: The next US National Defense Strategy

Though Chinese initiative has upset the status quo, their first move clarifies their vulnerabilities and exposes potential effective counterweights. By acting promptly to exploit these opportunities, the United States can take the second-mover advantage.

The next National Defense Strategy should recognize that the American people’s unwillingness to spend considerably more money on the military necessitates a serious reconsideration of what is needed to secure the nation’s truly vital interests

To seize the advantage, the next US National Defense Strategy needs a paradigm adjustment, not a shift. In the next NDS, the Biden defense team must take a broader definition of competition if the United States is to succeed in deterring, defending, and shaping the strategic environment in its favor.

As the Biden administration reshapes foreign policy and makes decisions about how to invest in US military capabilities for the future, it should acknowledge the value of a denial-based approach to deterrence.

US adversaries including China, Iran, and Russia are investing in additional technological capabilities to counterbalance the United States’ advantages in great-power competition—specifically its dominance in kinetic operations and weapons. The next NDS must differentiate among different technologies to create more nuanced strategies.

The Biden administration has begun work on a slew of strategies—including a new National Security Strategy, National Defense Strategy, and Nuclear Posture Review—that will form the framework for its approach to security challenges. There’s a lot that it can learn from the British experience of conducting strategic reviews.

Ongoing great-power competition, US efforts to strengthen alliances and partnerships, and the global dominance of the US defense industry will ensure that FMS remains a policy tool of first resort. This being the case, US policymakers need to ensure that it is the most efficient tool that it can be.

To better serve US interests, the Biden administration should recalculate the DoD’s GPC framework to address the threats that the country is most likely to confront, while improving the United States’ preparedness for the most dangerous threats. It should replace the single “2+3” concept with three multilayered and interactive frameworks nested upon one another.

Russian and Chinese threats all seek to exploit gaps in Western cyber defenses and digital and information governance. To close these gaps as a part of its defense strategy, the United States should develop a strong collaborative relationship with the European Union in the digital and information sphere.

National security is no longer measured by the size of a country’s military forces. It is measured by how efficiently and securely a country, as part of a network of allies and partners, exchanges information, resources, and ideas.