Small Wars Journal

Strategic Reform

Sun, 12/15/2013 - 12:50pm

Strategic Reform by Jeremy Renken, Medium.

Three fundamentally flawed assumptions dominate the Pentagon’s current “strategy.” The first is that uncertainty in our security environment is growing, requiring us to spend ever more to secure general readiness for a dizzying array of contingencies. The second is that our only reliable guide star is a need to pace China with high-end forces optimized for an eventual force-on-force clash close to their coast. The third is that all other potential adversaries constitute “lesser included” cases, requiring merely diminished application of high-end U.S. strength. All are wrong, and all drive the Pentagon to demand an overage of unaffordable forces while neglecting long-term investments that could ensure that the 21st century will be an American century…

Read on.