Great Power Competition
Escalation Management in Ukraine: “Learning by Doing” in Response to the “Threat that Leaves Something to Chance”
The article analyses a process of escalation management over time between nuclear states under conditions of radical uncertainty. After Russia invaded Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin manipulated uncertainty to manage escalation and to deter NATO support of…
Paying the Defense Bill: Financing American and Chinese Geostrategic Competition
In the face of what could be a decades-long competition, the United States and China must consider how they will finance defense spending. Leaders in both states are constrained by an intertemporal dilemma: pay the high political cost of raising taxes today,…
China’s Brute Force Economics: Waking Up from the Dream of a Level Playing Field
Liza Tobin argues that the time has come for the United States and its allies to abandon the notion that competing on a level playing field with China’s state-led economy is possible and confront the reality of what she calls the country’s “brute force…
A Crisis of Diverging Perspectives: U.S.-Russian Relations and the Security Dilemma
Aspects of the relationship between Russia and the United States can be conceptualized as a security dilemma. Each side perceives a serious threat from the other and takes countermeasures that further provoke insecurity for the adversary. Bilateral ties have…
Wormhole Escalation in the New Nuclear Age
Increasingly capable and intrusive digital information technologies, advanced dual-use military capabilities, and diffused global power structures will reshape future crises and conflicts between nuclear-armed adversaries and challenge traditional ways of…
One War Is Not Enough: Strategy and Force Planning for Great-Power Competition
What are the implications of the Department of Defense's adoption of a one-war standard that is focused on defeating a great-power rival? Hal Brands and Evan Braden Montgomery discuss the gap between America's global commitments and the military challenges it…
After the Responsible Stakeholder, What? Debating America’s China Strategy
Now that the responsible stakeholder approach to China is essentially defunct, how should America respond? There are four options — accommodation, collective balancing, comprehensive pressure, and regime change.
Against the Great Powers: Reflections on Balancing Nuclear and Conventional Power
The toughest and most important challenge for U.S. defense strategy is how to defend vulnerable allies against a Chinese or Russian fait accompli strategy, particularly one backed by nuclear threats. Here's how the United States should think about how to…
Xi’s Vision for Transforming Global Governance: A Strategic Challenge for Washington and Its Allies
What does China's "community of common destiny," recently emphasized by Chinese President Xi Jinping, mean for the future of the international order? Liza Tobin unpacks what, precisely, this vision entails and what it might mean for the United States and its…
From Engagement to Rivalry: Tools to Compete with China
To arrive at a new consensus, the United States needs to address the weaknesses in Americans’ knowledge of China while rethinking the connections between the ways China is analyzed and how policy is made.