American Primacy and Offensive Posture: A Reply to Stephen Walt

By Anders Corr, Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Government, Harvard University

In order to ease international fear of American military primacy, Stephen Walt (2002) prescribes decreasing US military mobility (an offensive capability) in favor of localized defensive forces -- ground troops and tactical aircraft (primarily defensive capabilities). "United States ground troops and tactical aircraft could be deployed overseas to defend key allies, as they currently do in Japan, Germany, and South Korea," writes Walt. "By eschewing large offensive capabilities (such as long-range bombers), the United States would appear less threatening to others and would be less likely to provoke defensive reactions" (148-9).

While such a defensive position is entirely appropriate for a lesser power concerned primarily with providing security to itself, it is not effective for the provision of security to an international system. Such a decrease in mobility would damage the US ability to respond in a timely manner to surprise violations of the international order by rogue states such as Iraq or even large powers such as China. Decreasing the mobility of troops would decrease the deterrent of what limited stationary troops are located with close allies such as South Korea or Taiwan. Defending these allies requires that forces quickly move to the theater of conflict. The forces currently in place are too thin to defend those theaters without rapid reinforcements from distant locations.

Military intervention in humanitarian crises and civil wars must often be rapid to gain effect. A slow US response to civil war or genocide may be no response at all.

Most importantly, a defensive posture would deny the US the ability to fight wars of prevention against surprise weapons of mass destruction (WMD) proliferation. If intelligence is received that a state is quickly developing a WMD capability that can strike the West and its allies, the US military necessarily requires speed in eradicating the threat and upholding international treaties of non-proliferation. A defensive conventional posture would protect the US in the short-term, but it would not give the US the ability to deter WMD proliferation that threatens the international system and long-term US national security.

The author argues that missile defense will make the US undeterrable, thereby encouraging other states to start a new arms race that can penetrate US defenses. A similar argument was made against NATO enlargement as leading the Russians to re-arm, but the Russians have only drawn closer to the West since enlargement. Unless missile defense is deployed, nuclear retaliation is not credible against a nuclear-armed aggressor such as Russia, China, or a newly nuclearized state that mounts a conventional attack on a close US ally. Retaliation may not even be credible against an aggressor that mounts a conventional attack on US tripwire forces.

Mobile forces and missile defense will give the United States the ability to protect the international order through escalation dominance if need be, but more importantly through rapid deployment of forces to conflict areas. No other state has the power to do so, and neither will the US if we do not possess a credible nuclear threat and mobile conventional forces. While the author rightly warns that US allies cannot trust that the US will always use its military power for defensive purposes, a solution other than debilitating those forces should be investigated.

One solution, not necessarily politically viable in the US, would be to give the UN Security Council greater formal power over US use of force. This would allay international fears of an aggressive US of the future, but would likely hamstring those forces with four additional vetos.

Another solution that would not require US political agreement is the encouragement of a multipolar world of three democratic powers with roughly equal military strength. If any single power were to become autocratic or belligerent, the other two powers would defeat it in battle. If Japan and Europe were encouraged to shoulder a portion of the global security burden by developing their respective militaries, a democratic triumvirate would likely protect global democracy and security more effectively than a lone and fallible democratic superpower. An international system of checks and balances would thus be created, while preserving the ability to enforce international order on rogue or autocratic states.

Lacking a solution such as these, however, the closest realistic approximation to a robust democratic power capable of securing an international order is required. The duration of US benevolent history internationally and the stability of US democracy has allayed international fear sufficiently to allow US military primacy to develop. By voluntarily eschewing militarization themselves, the main international powers have de facto entrusted the US with primacy. Rather than debilitate that primacy, the US should use it to protect international order.

References:

Walt, Stephen. 2002. "Keeping the World 'Off-Balance': Self-Restraint and U.S. Foreign Policy", America Unrivaled: The Future of the Balance of Power, ed., G. John Ikenberry. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, pp. 121-154.