Abstract
The United States faces multiple national security challenges, but in the longer sweep of history it is our response to the rise of Chinese power that may have the greatest significance. Over the previous two centuries the Anglo-American-led neoliberal order faced three rising powers. Great Britain managed the rise of American power at the end of the nineteenth century, through a deft strategy of accommodation and co-option. However, the United States and Britain failed to prevent the rise of Japanese and German power from leading to a calamitous global conflict. In those cases both deterrence and accommodation failed. We thus face the prospect of rising Chinese power with a one-for-three record, and the one case of success was one in which the rising power shared the values of the preeminent power.
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Country or Region: United States
Cha, Victor D
Abstract
Conventional wisdom argues that President Obama inherited a U.S. reputation that was badly damaged around the world. While this may hold true in Europe, in Asia, where U.S. standing matters most, there was never such a precipitous decline. To Europeans, the Iraq War stirred moral outrage and rabid opposition. However, the situation in the Persian Gulf simply did not matter as much to Asians. There were pockets within Asia that were critical of U.S. actions, but this was overshadowed by an overwhelming support for values such as democracy and human rights. Evidence shows that even vis-à-vis China, U.S. standing has not faced a significant decline in the region. The result is that Asians continue to perceive the United States as the closest thing to an honest broker in the region, as evidenced by positive reactions to the leadership role that the United States took in response to the 2004 tsunami. Representing 60 percent of the world’s population, compared to Europe’s seven percent, Asian views are probably most important for the future of the United States. Thus, President Obama has a solid base in Asia from which to build leadership and goodwill, but he must do so amidst the challenges of the global financial crisis and heightened expectations.
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Cha, Victor D
Abstract
In East Asia the United States cultivated a “hub and spokes” system of discrete, exclusive alliances with the Republic of Korea, the Republic of China, and Japan, a system that was distinct from the multilateral security alliances it preferred in Europe. Bilateralism emerged in East Asia as the dominant security structure because of the “powerplay” rationale behind U.S. postwar planning in the region. “Powerplay” refers to the construction of an asymmetric alliance designed to exert maximum control over the smaller ally’s actions. The United States created a series of bilateral alliances in East Asia to contain the Soviet threat, but a congruent rationale was to constrain “rogue allies”—that is, rabidly anticommunist dictators who might start wars for reasons of domestic legitimacy and entrap the United States in an unwanted larger war. Underscoring the U.S. desire to avoid such an outcome was a belief in the domino theory, which held that the fall of one small country in Asia could trigger a chain of countries falling to communism. The administrations of Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower calculated that they could best restrain East Asia’s pro-West dictators through tight bilateral alliances rather than through a regionwide multilateral mechanism. East Asia’s security bilateralism today is therefore a historical artifact of this choice.
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Cha, Victor D
Abstract
The continued relevance of the U.S. bilateral alliance system in Asia appears most tested by questions of regional architecture. International relations and areas studies scholars have rushed to a judgment that the alliance system is failing both to think creatively about regional architecture and to integrate China’s rise in Asia. The future of security cooperation in the region, however, may not be as dim as people surmise. This article argues that a definite architecture is emerging and evolving in Asia that the U.S. and its allies support. This architecture is not dominated by China, nor is it characterized by U.S. diminution; rather, it is inclusive of the major powers in the region. Nonetheless, this regional architecture must overcome a clear security dilemma to realize its positive potential. The dilemma is that U.S. alliance–initiated regional efforts are seen as latent efforts to contain China, while regional- or China-initiated proposals are seen as attempts to exclude the U.S. By encouraging a fluid network of security architecture, however, this problem can be mitigated to avoid zero-sum solutions. The picture of the institutions that connect the U.S., its allies, and China in the region is much more complex than bilateral vs. multilateral. Instead, this architecture is a “complex patchwork” of bilaterals, trilaterals, and other plurilateral configurations. The complexity of this geometry is a useful tool for muting regional security dilemmas.
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Brooks, Stephen G., and William Curti Wohlforth
Summary
World Out of Balance is the most comprehensive analysis to date of the constraints on the United States’ use of power in pursuit of its security interests. Stephen Brooks and William Wohlforth overturn conventional wisdom by showing that in a unipolar system, where the United States is dominant in the scales of world power, the constraints featured in international relations theory are generally inapplicable. In fact, the authors argue that the U.S. will not soon lose its leadership position; rather, it stands before a twenty-year window of opportunity for reshaping the international system.
Although American primacy in the world is unprecedented, analysts routinely stress the limited utility of such preeminence. The authors examine arguments from each of the main international relations theories–realism, institutionalism, constructivism, and liberalism. They also cover the four established external constraints on U.S. security policy–international institutions, economic interdependence, legitimacy, and balancing. The prevailing view is that these external constraints conspire to undermine the value of U.S. primacy, greatly restricting the range of security policies the country can pursue. Brooks and Wohlforth show that, in actuality, the international environment does not tightly constrain U.S. security policy. World Out of Balance underscores the need for an entirely new research agenda to better understand the contours of international politics and the United States’ place in the world order.
CSIS Commission on Nuclear Energy Policy in the United States
Summary
The United States’ nuclear energy industry is in decline. Low natural gas prices, financing hurdles, failure to find a permanent repository for high-level nuclear waste, reactions to the Fukushima accident in Japan, and other factors are hastening the day when existing U.S. reactors become uneconomic. The decline of the U.S. nuclear energy industry could be much more rapid than policymakers and stakeholders anticipate. China, India, Russia, and others plan on adding nuclear technology to their mix, furthering the spread of nuclear materials around the globe. U.S. companies must meet a significant share of this demand for nuclear technology, but U.S. firms are currently at a competitive disadvantage due to restrictive and otherwise unsupportive export policies. Without a strong commercial presence in new markets, the United States’ ability to influence nonproliferation policies and nuclear safety behaviors worldwide is bound to diminish. The United States cannot afford to become irrelevant in a new nuclear age.
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Bradford, John F
Abstract
The maintenance of safe and secure sea lanes, particularly those that link the United States with its partners in the Indian and Pacific Oceans, is at the very core of US interests. Therefore, US maritime strategy seeks to sustain credible combat power in the Western Pacific and Arabian Gulf/Indian Ocean so as to preclude attempts at interrupting vital sea lines of communication (SLOCs) and commerce. Given these strategic imperatives and the capability of both state and non-state actors to disrupt the Indo-Pacific sea lanes critical to global prosperity, the United States has renewed its commitment to maritime security in Asia. In recent years, the United States has made significant adjustments to its defence posture in order to bring more maritime forces closer to Indo-Pacific sea lanes and defence officials have stated their intention to further enhance US posture in Southeast Asia and the Indian Ocean while maintaining US presence in Northeast Asia. Recognizing that the expansive nature of Indo-Pacific maritime territory and the complexity of the region’s maritime challenges prevent any one country from resourcing the operations necessary to provide sea lane security, the United States is also strengthening cooperation with its maritime partners by expanding relationships and trust-building efforts, contributing to the capacity of its partners and enhancing interoperability. At the same time, the United States is supporting the strengthening of maritime symposiums and regional organizations as the foundations for the security architectures necessary to ensure the security of Indo-Pacific sea lanes and sustain regional prosperity.
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Randall, Stephen J
Summary
Through market excesses and shortages, complicated by periodic anxiety over the exhaustion of fossil fuel sources, balancing the international quest for oil with reduction of dependence on foreign oil has been a persistent but elusive goal for U.S. governments. United States Foreign Oil Policy since World War I offers a comprehensive analysis of the evolution of American global oil policy from the administration of Woodrow Wilson to George W. Bushs current regime. Stephen Randall demonstrates that U.S. foreign oil policy since World War I has been consistently based on ensuring an adequate supply of oil and oil products at reasonable prices to meet the industrial and military needs of American society. The result has been an ongoing search for energy security that has taken the United States into regions of the world where its national security interests would not otherwise have been at stake, even at the height of the Cold War. Randall explains that the continued tensions with Iraq and Iran and the increasing instability of Saudi Arabia indicate that the future holds little hope of permanent stability. His analysis extends from the remote shores of the Caspian Sea in the post-Cold War era to the U.S.’s close neighbours such as Canada and Mexico. Exploring the relationship between the state and the private sector in the development of foreign oil policy, Randall concludes that policy has consistently involved the search for a delicate balance between the public and the private interest.
Mcdonald, Brandon E. and Bobby R. Webb
Summary
Energy plays a vital role in Americans’ lives and in the U.S. economy as a whole, particularly in the provision of electricity, transportation, heating and cooling, and industrial processing – the four main energy-consuming sectors of the economy. This book examines the various commodities used to generate energy in the United States, focusing on the two largest energy-consuming sectors of the U.S. economy; electricity and transportation, and the differences in how they expose U.S. households and businesses to disruptions, either domestic or international, in the supply of energy.
Cha, Victor D
Abstract
Negotiating with North Korea is all about contradictions. What can be important one day can become unimportant the next. A position they hold stubbornly for weeks and months can suddenly disappear. But these contradictions tell us a lot about core goals that may lie beneath Pyongyang’s rhetoric and the provocative actions which culminated in a second nuclear test on May 25, 2009. Understanding these core goals, moreover, offers insights into how spectacularly unsuccessful North Korean leader Kim Jong-il has been as he prepares to step down.
What do the North Koreans ultimately want with their recent spate of provocative behavior? What is often stated through the mouths of their foreign ministry officials is only a part of the Pyongyang leadership’s broader goals. The judgments that follow are also informed by the experiences and ‘‘gut instincts’’ of those who have negotiated with the regime over the past sixteen years.
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DiFilippo, Anthony
Summary
This book examines the major security and related issues between the United States, Japan and North Korea (officially, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea – DPRK).
Although focusing mainly on current issues, this book also provides sufficient historical background to enable readers to appreciate the many nuances that have been ignored by policymakers, analysts and the media. Where appropriate, the book examines the security interests of other nations in Northeast Asia, specifically South Korea, China and Russia.
The central purpose of the book is to objectively analyze the policymaking processes of Washington, Tokyo and Pyongyang with respect to the DPRK’s nuclear weapons and other important security issues, and ultimately to provide practical ways to improve the security environment in Northeast Asia. Ongoing security-related issues include nuclear missile testing by the DPRK; its removal from the U.S. list of states sponsoring terrorism, and the abduction of Japanese nationals by North Korean agents that occurred during the 1970s and 1980s. Unlike other books, which typically take the position that North Korea is a rogue state run by an irrational, belligerent and autocratic leader, this book reveals the fundamentals of Pyongyang’s security concerns in the region.
This book will be of great interest to students of North East Asian politics, Asian security studies, US foreign policy and Security Studies/IR in general.
Arbatov, Alexei and Vladimir Dvorkin
Abstract
The “Great Triangle” of the Asia-Pacific region formed by the United States, Russia, and China is particularly important in both geopolitical and militarystrategic terms. The strategic arsenals and military programs of the two traditional superpowers and the steady buildup of the nuclear and missile capabilities of China, the newly emergent superpower of the twenty-first century, give global significance to the Great Triangle they form.
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Blank, Stephen
Summary
Five Central Asian states emerged out of the Soviet Union’s Central Asian republics in 1991. Although U.S. policymakers presumed that Iran would inevitably sweep them into its sphere of influence, this has not happened. Nor is it likely to occur. Instead there has developed a multi-state competition for influence and even control of these new states. This competition involves Russia as the leading force in the area and Moscow’s main rivals are Turkey, Iran, Pakistan (and India), China, and the United States. This rivalry is particularly strong in the struggle among these states to gain positions of leverage over the energy economy, i.e. production, pipelines, and refining in Central Asia because this region is blessed with enormous energy deposits. These deposits are crucial to Central Asia’s integration with the world economy and economic progress. Indeed, energy exports may be the only way these governments can hope for any economic stability and progress in the future. Therefore, whoever controls the energy economy will determine the destiny of the region. This monograph offers a detailed look at how and why Russia is trying to control that economy and thus the destiny of these states, as well as the strategies of its rivals. Moscow is aiming to reintegrate Central Asia into an economic, political, and ultimately military union with Russia. It is trying to dominate their economies and subject them to Muscovite direction. Russia, therefore, resorts to blocking energy production, hindering foreign firms’ activities in Central Asia, obstructing exports, and conducting currency policies that export inflation. Russia also has devised policies that coerce Central Asian states into giving Russians residing there dual citizenship. All of these policies signify Russia’s efforts to fashion a new model of economic and, hence, military-political hegemony over the region and a new form of Central Asia’s colonial dependency upon Moscow. The monograph argues that though Moscow is conducting a strong policy, it is not ultimately able to achieve such control because Central Asian states have alternatives in other states and because of Russia’s own economic weakness.
Wright, Robin B. ed
Summary
Edited by Robin Wright, this compendium provides top-level briefings by 50 seasoned experts on Iran (both Iranian and Western authors) from some twenty foreign policy think tanks, eight universities, and six U.S. administrations. The authors present a wide range of views, offering factual information for ready reference, thoughtful analysis, and context. Since Iran’s 1979 revolution, the West has struggled to understand what drives the Islamic Republic and how to deal with it. The challenge now looms even larger in the face of Iran’s controversial nuclear program, the disputed 2009 election, growing human rights violations, and angry rhetoric.
For Americans, Iran is one of the most stereotyped and least understood countries in the world. Relations have been cut off since shortly after the 1979 takeover of the U.S. Embassy. Three decades later, the dispute over Iran’s nuclear program is sparking even deeper debates on policy, said Wright. Iran has always been an important geostrategic country, but today it represents a more complex challenge than other hotspots Afghanistan, Iraq and North Korea for several reasons: The Islamic Republic will be pivotal to global events in the early 21st century because of its resources, ideology, weaponry, allies and location. Featuring 50 aspects of this pivotal state, The Iran Primer:
– Lays out little-known facts on Iran and provides analysis of key events, trend lines; major leaders and political movements;
– Details Iran’s foreign relations with a dozen nearby countries or regions;
– Chronicles U.S.-Iran relations under six American presidents from the perspective of those who crafted the policy;
– Probes the West’s options in dealing with Iran in the future; and,
– Offers extensive appendices, including a who’s who of Iran’s political elite and four detailed timelines on key events since the 1979 revolution.
This briefing book is a practical and accessible go-to resource for practitioners, policymakers, academics, and students, as well as a fascinating wealth of information for anyone interested in understanding Iran’s pivotal role in world politics.
Parsi, Trita
Summary
Have the diplomatic efforts of the Obama administration toward Iran failed? Was the Bush administration’s emphasis on military intervention, refusal to negotiate, and pursuit of regime change a better approach? How can the United States best address the ongoing turmoil in Tehran? This book provides a definitive and comprehensive analysis of the Obama administration’s early diplomatic outreach to Iran and discusses the best way to move toward more positive relations between the two discordant states.
Trita Parsi, a Middle East foreign policy expert with extensive Capitol Hill and United Nations experience, interviewed 70 high-ranking officials from the U.S., Iran, Europe, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Brazil—including the top American and Iranian negotiators—for this book. Parsi uncovers the previously unknown story of American and Iranian negotiations during Obama’s early years as president, the calculations behind the two nations’ dealings, and the real reasons for their current stalemate. Contrary to prevailing opinion, Parsi contends that diplomacy has not been fully tried. For various reasons, Obama’s diplomacy ended up being a single roll of the dice. It had to work either immediately—or not at all. Persistence and perseverance are keys to any negotiation. Neither Iran nor the U.S. had them in 2009.
