Ukraine, Russia, and the new US National Security Strategy

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of STaff Gen. Mark Milley gave a press conference this week speaking about the Russia-Ukraine War, Defense Secretary Austin and Gen. Milley hold news briefing following Ukraine meeting PBS Newshour 10/12/2022:

The official transcript is available at the Defense Department website.

Austin refrained from talking about the goal in the this war he stated for the US in April of weakening Russia to the point that it would be unable to amount an attack like the one in Feburary - which did't turn out to be nearly so quickly effective as Russian planners apparently expected it to be.

He did use a couple of different frameworks in Wednesday's press conference:

I'm also very pleased that ministers and chiefs of defense from some 50 countries took part in today's discussion. That again underscores the resolve of the international community to support Ukraine's self-defense after Russia's cruel and unprovoked invasion. And that resolve has only been heightened by the deliberate cruelty of Russia's new barrage against Ukraine's cities. Those assaults on targets with no military purpose again reveal the malice of Putin's war of choice.

But Russia's atrocities have further united the nations of goodwill that stand with Ukraine. So we are here because rules matter, because rights matter and because sovereignty matters. And in the past few days, Putin has given us all another grim preview of a future in which the appetites of aggressive autocrats outweigh the rights of peaceful states. And we would all be less secure in a world where big powers can assault their peaceful neighbors and trample their borders by force. [my emphasis]

There we get a combination of standard war polemics, a reference to the rules-based-international-order concept ("rights matter and because sovereignty matters"), and the popular New Cold War term of Democracies vs. Autocracies.

Also this week, the Biden-Harris Administration published a new National Security Strategy (NSS) to replace the Trumpista one of 2018.

These things always have a lot of military and diplomatic jargon to wade through. My own concern about the Democracies vs. Autocracies is that it puts a fairly cynical face on geopolitical considerations that actually aren't determined by whether the nations involved are democratic or not. Sovereignty and other provisions of international law apply to dictatorships as well as to the most (theoretically) pristine liberal democracies.

The concept of a rules-based international order at least encompasses the practical relevance and necessity of international law. But international-law-based isn't necessarily synonymous with "rules-based." Geopolitical power also set rules in practice, which may not be identical to - or even compatible with - international law.

My favorite Über-Realist Stephen Walt had some thoughts on that topic last year (China Wants a ‘Rules-Based International Order,’ Too foreign Policy03/31/2021):

A ready ability to use the phrase “rules-based international order” seems to have become a job requirement for a top position in the U.S. foreign-policy apparatus. ...

But the distinction between the United States’ supposed commitment to a system of rules and China’s alleged lack thereof is misleading in at least three ways. First, it overlooks the United States’ own willingness to ignore, evade, or rewrite the rules whenever they seem inconvenient. ...

Second, as Harvard University’s Alastair Iain Johnston has shown, China accepts and even defends many principles of the existing order, although of course not all of them.

Third, statements [which] imply that abandoning today’s rules-based order would leave us in a lawless, rule-free world of naked power politics, unregulated by any norms or principles whatsoever. This is simply not the case: Scholars of widely varying views understand that all international orders — global, regional, liberal, realist, or whatever — require a set of rules to manage the various interactions that inevitably arise between different polities. [my emphasis in bold]

Advocates of the "realist" school are consistently annoying in this way, which is often one of their most valuable features.

Stephen Wertheim, who identifies with the "restrainer" school of US foreign policy thought, seems to be worried that the new NSS is a step away from a more practical, realist, fact-based approach:

The Biden who withdrew from Afghanistan is mostly absent from the new National Security Strategy. It is fair to say that "Biden the realist," as Josh Shifrinson and I interpreted him last year, has been superseded. https://t.co/Vopmdk6zZj

— Stephen Wertheim (@stephenwertheim) October 13, 2022

Christopher Chivves notes what he sees as The Three Important Shifts Tucked Within the New National Security Strategy Carniegie Endowment 10/13/2022. "The main thrust of the strategy is that America will focus on competing with China and containing Russia, and it will do so by investing at home, building a coalition of like-minded states, and modernizing its military," he writes.

Chivves writes that the Democracy-vs.-Authoritarian framework has its limits, and he sees the new NSS as a broadening out from that approach:

As a roadmap for American statecraft, this ideological framing created problems. For one, casting the world historical moment as a fight with democracy in one corner and autocracy in the other amounted to a big oversimplification of the nature and variety of the world’s many different political systems. It also echoed the unfortunate good-versus-evil tone of former president George W. Bush’s controversial 2002 national security strategy.

Internationally, this stark ideological framing heightened tensions with China and Russia for no gain, while alienating nondemocratic nations that otherwise might be inclined to support Washington in tackling the challenges Beijing and Moscow pose.

And he adds, "It risked placing the locus of America’s democratic problems overseas, rather than at home where it belonged."

Chivves also sees the NSS as shifting emphasis away from the neoliberal "globalization" gospel that has become so familiar over the last 30 years.

Individually, these initiatives are probably merited, but the sum of the parts amounts to a big vote in favor of a more active state role in American economic life. The shift is especially striking given the absence of a strong statement in favor of free trade and an enduring U.S. commitment to a free-market international economy (though the White House acknowledges its importance). The strategy’s emphasis on industrial policy, especially when coupled with growing restrictions on technology-sharing, represents a distinct shift away from America’s long-standing role as the world’s leading proponent of a global free-market economy—a role that nearly all previous national security strategies highlighted. [my emphasis]

Certainly, in conventional realist geopolitical terms, the biggest foreign policy priority - nuclear arms proliferation and climate change aside - is adjusting to the rise of China as the world's lead economic and potentially military power. The new focus on confrontation with Russia in Europe brought on by Russia's invasion of Ukraine this year has not only significantly diverted attention and resources from that goal. It also has pushed Russia into the position of being a very dependent junior partner to China in security affairs, making any kind of coalitions by the US or the EU to cooperate with Russia in a power-balancing strategy against China much more difficult for the foreseeable future.

It's concerning to see serious commentators on foreign policy seemingly falling back reflexively into Cold War terms in relation to Russia. Because climate change and the threat of nuclear war aren't going away without achieving a more cooperative relationships among the US, Europe, Russia, and China. That means also a willingness by policymakers to look with an actual critical eye at why the cycle of relations with Russia from 1989 to 2022 wound up in the state is has.

And, yes, there really is a military-industrial complex, in the US and other countries, Tension and wars and the threat of wars are profitable business for them. Profits are immediate and predictable. The benefits for constructing an international order not so concentrated and short-term.

It's a good sign if the Biden-Harris Administration really intend to insist on "a more active state role in American economic life." As the new NSS puts it, "markets alone cannot respond to the rapid pace of technological change, global supply disruptions, nonmarket abuses by the PRC [China] and other actors, or the deepening climate crisis." But if that turns out in practice to be mainly ever-bigger annual increases in the Pentagon budget without major nuclear arms control, it will likely do much more harm that good.

I mean, just how many overseas military bases does the US need, anyway?