Chapter 5 Grand strategy (Week 5)

5.1 Discussion questions

  • Desch (2008). What is the ideological original of US foreign policy? Do you agree or disagree with the interpretation? Building on this, how should the US define its national interests?

  • Montgomery (2020). What is the main argument? Do you agree? Imagining you were the US national security adviser, how would you recommend the White House develop and implement its grand strategy.

  • Which domestic actors/institutions are particularly relevant in shaping the US foreign policy? (*)

How American Foreign Policy Inspires Resistance, Insurgency, and Terrorism | Stephen Walt

5.2 Grand strategy

Here is a definition borrowed from Rand:

“A grand strategy describes a nation’s most important and enduring interests and its theory for how it will defend or advance them, given domestic and international constraints.”

5.3 National interests

From the US National Security Strategy 2022

“Our strategy is rooted in our national interests: to protect the security of the American people; to expand economic prosperity and opportunity; and to realize and defend the democratic values at the heart of the American way of life.”

5.4 National interests

From Tellis Blackwill (2015):

  • prevent, deter, and reduce the threat of conventional and unconventional attacks on the continental United States and its extended territorial possessions;
  • maintain a balance of power in Europe and Asia that promotes peace and stability through a continuing U.S. leadership role and U.S. alliances;
  • prevent the use and slow the spread of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction, secure nuclear weapons and materials, and prevent proliferation of intermediate and long-range delivery systems for nuclear weapons;
  • promote the health of the international economy, energy markets, and the environment.

5.5 National interests

From Blackwill (2019):

  • Prevent the use and deter and reduce the threat of nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons and catastrophic conventional terrorist or cyberattacks against the United States or its military forces abroad;
  • Prevent the use and slow the global spread of nuclear weapons, secure nuclear weapons and materials, and reduce further proliferation of intermediate- and long-range delivery systems for nuclear weapons;
  • Maintain a global and regional balance of power that promotes peace and stability through domestic American robustness, U.S. international power and influence, and the strength of the U.S. alliance systems;
  • Prevent the emergence of hostile major powers or failed states on U.S. borders;
  • Ensure the viability and stability of major global systems (trade, financial markets, supplies of energy, and the environment).

5.6 Grand strategy

“[T]he deeper cause of America’s recurring foreign policy failures was the combination of overwhelming U.S. primacy, a misguided grand strategy, and an increasingly dysfunctional foreign policy community … [T]he strategy of liberal hegemony rested on an inaccurate and unrealistic understanding of world politics, paid insufficient attention to political conditions in other countries, overstated America’s ability to shape complex societies, and encouraged other states and non-state actors to resist or exploit U.S. efforts.”

— Walt (2018)

5.7 Readings

Desch (2008)

  • Liberalism \(\rightarrow\) illiberal policies

    • Scope conditions: Huntington \(\rightarrow\) threat; Packenham \(\rightarrow\) constraints
    • Desch: fewer constraints \(\rightarrow\) more acute problems

  • Four unique premises: (1) political and economic development is easy; (2) all good things go together; (3) radicalism and revolution are bad; and (4) democracy is more important than political order.

  • Kantian origin: categorical imperative \(\rightarrow\) moral obligation for all states to leave the interational state of nature

  • The Liberal end goal has not varied. What change over time are the means: exemplarism and vindicationism.

5.8 Readings

Montgomery (2020)

  • Primacy (denial) vs. restraint (retrenchment)

  • Primacy “difficult to sustain” and “dangerous to enforce”: unfavorable balance of conventional forces and interests; interdependent commitment problem (reputation and resources);

  • Yet, restraint is reticent. Solution \(\rightarrow\) punishment (blockade)

  • Four threats from Iran: territorial expansion, a coercive missile campaign, irregular operations, and economic warfare

5.9 Grand strategy

Here are the big-picture questions from Rand:

  • Which countries are America’s allies and adversaries?
  • How should Washington manage its relationships with these countries?
  • In what situations should the United States use force?
  • Which regions should Washington prioritize?
  • What should the U.S. forward presence look like?