Month: November 2025

Selective Engagement: The Optimal United States Grand Strategy | By Daniel McGuire

Abstract of Argument

This editorial evaluates competing United States grand strategies against established criteria for protecting state interests. It argues that a strategy of “selective engagement,” which focuses American resources on maintaining favorable regional balances through alliances, limited military force, and economic statecraft, is the only strategy that aligns with current structural and domestic constraints.

I. Introduction

The United States currently faces slowing economic growth, rising debt, and polarized politics. These circumstances have prompted a reevaluation of U.S. grand strategy to sustainably pursue critical interests within contemporary economic and political constraints. Competing proposals for a new grand strategy range from strict isolationism to a renewed version of primacy, but these ideas rest on assumptions misaligned with current political conditions and cost-benefit principles. This piece argues that, despite calls for a new doctrine, the United States should maintain the status quo of selective engagement.

II. Theoretical Groundwork

Grand strategy links political objectives to the military, economic, and diplomatic tools used to secure them. Objectives must be clearly defined and efficiently pursued. For example, Barry Posen characterizes grand strategy as a political–military means–ends chain through which a state achieves security.¹ The pursuit of “security” through military force must recognize that war is a means to political ends rather than an end in itself.²These ends must be realized through what theorist Nina Silove describes as plans, principles, and durable patterns of behavior.³

These formulations imply four evaluation criteria: a strategy must identify vital interests, specify the mechanisms required to defend them, align ends with available means, and avoid commitments that cannot be sustained over time. To satisfy these criteria, theorists and policymakers have proposed four competing grand strategies: Restraint, Liberal Internationalism, Primacy, and Selective Engagement.

Each of these grand strategies reflects assumptions derived from major paradigms in international relations theory. Restraint draws from “defensive realism,” arguing that the United States should protect its homeland through limited threats and avoid extensive foreign engagement.⁴ Liberal Internationalism reflects “institutional liberalism,” treating international rules and economic interdependence as stabilizing forces.⁵ Primacy incorporates elements of “offensive realism” and “hegemonic stability theory,” which assert that sustained military preponderance is necessary to suppress competition to U.S. power.⁶ Selective Engagement embodies “structural realism,” identifying where power shifts matter most and concentrating commitments accordingly while avoiding peripheral obligations.⁷ These paradigmatic assumptions generate different expectations about whether power, institutions, or norms generate stable security outcomes. The core test of any grand strategy is whether these expectations withstand theoretical and empirical scrutiny.

III. Evaluation of the Four Grand Strategies

A. Restraint

Restraint assumes that geography and nuclear deterrence sufficiently insulate the United States from major threats. It suggests that alliances and forward deployments introduce unnecessary liabilities.⁸ Its causal logic posits that reducing commitments lowers exposure to conflict without compromising homeland security. However, this reasoning misidentifies how regional balances shape global economic and security outcomes relevant to U.S. interests. Regional hegemons can reshape technological standards, production networks, and financial channels in ways that weaken U.S. leverage and limit economic autonomy.⁹ Rising powers also exploit institutional positions to gain advantages in trade, innovation, and coercive diplomacy.¹⁰Historical evidence indicates that withdrawal accelerates renationalized defense, sharpens nationalism, and intensifies security dilemmas.¹¹These conditions can lead to arms racing, coercive bargaining, and nuclear proliferation.¹²Because these mechanisms undermine essential U.S. interests and cannot be mitigated by geography alone, restraint fails to meet the grand strategic criteria of aligning available means with accurately identified national interests.

B. Liberal Internationalism

Liberal internationalism posits that supranational institutions and economic interdependence can stabilize international politics and reduce conflict.¹³ Its causal logic suggests that sustained U.S. engagement embeds states in predictable rules and encourages cooperative behavior. However, this mechanism relies on the acceptance of institutional constraints by rising powers and stable domestic support for broad commitments. Neither condition holds today. Major powers increasingly view institutions as tools rather than constraints, complying selectively when rules align with their interests.¹⁴ Domestic polarization and economic inequality further weaken support for ambitious international order-building.¹⁵Institutions function reliably only when backed by capable and consistent power, meaning that less domestic support undermines U.S. capacity to sustain institutional commitments.¹⁶Consequently, liberal internationalism fails the tests of feasibility and sustainability, as it depends on political and structural conditions that no longer exist.

C. Primacy

Primacy asserts that sustained U.S. preponderance is essential to deter adversaries and stabilize key regions.¹⁷ Its causal logic maintains that forward presence and active regional management prevent the emergence of peer competitors. This approach requires overwhelming material advantage and a stable domestic consensus. These two foundations have eroded as fiscal pressures rise and political support for intervention declines.¹⁸ Evidence from attempts at forced democracy promotion, covert regime change, and counterinsurgency indicates that large-scale interventions often fail to produce desired outcomes, instead generating spirals of overextension, coercive backlash, and threat inflation.¹⁹ Because primacy demands resources and political cohesion that the United States no longer possesses, it fails the sustainability criterion, even if its strategic aims were desirable.

D. Selective Engagement

Selective engagement posits that only a few regions materially affect the global balance of power.²⁰ Its causal logic holds that outcomes in Europe, East Asia, and the Middle East determine access to technology, industrial capacity, capital, and strategic geography, which underpin U.S. national power.²¹Europe and East Asia possess the industrial and technological weight to produce hostile hegemons, while the Middle East influences global markets and chokepoints that, if dominated, could raise costs and reduce maneuverability for the United States. Because dominance in these regions would reshape global economic and security structures, selective engagement concentrates commitments where stakes are highest.

Alliances distribute burdens, deter aggression, and reduce the need for unilateral intervention; many exist by “invitation,” reflecting partner incentives to internalize U.S. leadership.²² Military force is reserved for contingencies where hegemonic outcomes are plausible and justified by clear cost–benefit logic.²³ Economic engagement reinforces technological and industrial competitiveness rather than presuming unlimited primacy.²⁴ Avoiding discretionary interventions preserves domestic consensus and prevents strategic drift.²⁵ Selective engagement meets all four evaluation criteria: it accurately identifies vital interests, relies on mechanisms supported by empirical evidence, aligns tools with constraints, and limits commitments to what can be sustained.

IV. Counterarguments and Rebuttals

Common criticisms of selective engagement often misstate its scope or misunderstand its mechanisms. Claims that the strategy lacks clarity overlook the fact that defining vital interests through the risk of hostile regional dominance leads to a narrow and operational set of commitments. Warnings of entrapment in unnecessary affairs ignore the United States’ ability to impose explicit limits on allied commitments and partner behavior.²⁶ Concerns regarding cost-benefit principles fail to consider that stabilizing key regions is less expensive than the long-term consequences of adversarial control over technological standards, supply chains, or financial rules. Assertions that selective engagement weakens deterrence disregard the reality that concentrated commitments produce clearer signals and more credible resolve than diffuse global activism. Therefore, these criticisms do not undermine the strategy’s feasibility or logic.

V. Strategy and Policy Prescription

Selective engagement remains the only viable grand strategy for the United States because it clearly identifies critical interests, aligns available instruments with those interests, and limits commitments to what contemporary economic and political conditions can support. Maintaining this strategy requires four policy choices. The United States must sustain alliances in Europe and East Asia, where power shifts most significantly affect the global balance. It must invest in technological and industrial capacity to ensure long-term competitiveness. It must maintain a military posture focused on deterrence rather than indefinite forward operations, with clear thresholds for the use of force. Finally, it must avoid discretionary interventions that do not impact the global distribution of power. Restraint underestimates the consequences of regional power shifts, while liberal internationalism and primacy overestimate the resources and domestic support available for expansive commitments. Selective engagement alone aligns U.S. objectives with the structural and domestic constraints that define grand strategy today.

Barry R. Posen, The Sources of Military Doctrine (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1984).
Carl von Clausewitz, On War, trans. Michael Howard and Peter Paret (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984), 87–89.
Nina Silove, “Beyond the Buzzword: The Three Meanings of ‘Grand Strategy,’” Security Studies 27, no. 1 (2018): 27–57.
Kenneth Waltz, Theory of International Politics (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1979).
Robert Keohane, After Hegemony (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984).
John J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (New York: Norton, 2001).
Stephen Brooks and William Wohlforth, “American Primacy in Perspective,” Foreign Affairs 81, no. 4 (2002): 20–33.
Barry Posen, “The Case for a Less Activist Foreign Policy,” Foreign Affairs 92, no. 1 (2013): 116–28.
Robert Wade, “The Invisible Hand of the American Empire,” Ethics & International Affairs 17, no. 2 (2003): 77–88; Carla Norrlof, America’s Global Advantage (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010).
Thomas Christensen, The China Challenge (New York: Norton, 2015).
A.J.P. Taylor, The Struggle for Mastery in Europe (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977); James Joll, The Origins of the First World War, 2nd ed. (London: Longman, 1992); Sebastian Rosato, Europe United (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2012).
Vipin Narang, Nuclear Strategy in the Modern Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2014); Mark Bell, Nuclear Reactions (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2021).
G. John Ikenberry, Liberal Leviathan (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2011).
Christensen, China Challenge.
Martin Gilens and Benjamin Page, “Testing Theories of American Politics,” Perspectives on Politics 12, no. 3 (2014): 564–81; Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman, The Triumph of Injustice (New York: Norton, 2019).
John Mearsheimer, “The False Promise of International Institutions,” International Security 19, no. 3 (1994): 5–49; Norrlof, America’s Global Advantage.
Stephen Brooks, G. John Ikenberry, and William Wohlforth, “Lean Forward,” Foreign Affairs 92, no. 1 (2013): 130–42.
Benjamin Fordham, “Paying for Global Power,” in The Long War, ed. Andrew Bacevich (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), 371–404.
Lindsay O’Rourke, Covert Regime Change (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2018); Douglas Porch, Counterinsurgency (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014); Benjamin Valentino, “The True Costs of Humanitarian Intervention,” Foreign Affairs 90, no. 6 (2011): 60–73; Robert Jervis, American Foreign Policy in a New Era (New York: Routledge, 2005).
Posen, “Less Activist Foreign Policy.”
Michael Beckley, Unrivaled (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2018); Brooks and Wohlforth, “American Primacy.”
Geir Lundestad, “Empire by Invitation,” in The United States and Western Europe Since 1945 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003); Ikenberry, Liberal Leviathan.
Thomas Schelling, Arms and Influence (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1966); Russell Weigley, The American Way of War (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1973).
Diana Mutz, Winners and Losers (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2021); Angus Deaton, The Great Escape (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2013); Robert Gordon, The Rise and Fall of American Growth (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2016).
Valentino, “True Costs”; Porch, Counterinsurgency.
Daryl Press, Calculating Credibility (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005).

A Case for Community Gardens | By Rocco Giannotti

Conventionally defined as, “collaborative efforts on shared open spaces where participants share in the maintenance and products of the garden, including healthful and affordable fresh fruits and vegetables,” community gardens offer an integrated approach to building community, combating hunger, and fostering ecological protection in an urban environment. They solve complex problems and bond diverse peoples together. More localities ought to create and sustain beautiful community gardens to promote their residents’ flourishing.

Community gardens foster community.

Humans are fundamentally social beings with obligations to family, neighborhood, and nation. Alienation, boredom, and loneliness increasingly plague Americans of all backgrounds despite constant technological interconnectedness. Today, over half of Americans experience loneliness or consider themselves lonely. The American Time Use Survey underscores a drastic decline for in-person interactions as youths in 2025 meet with peers 35% less than their counterparts two decades ago. Thus, a need exists for spaces outside of work, school, and home to provide connection, belonging and purpose. Community gardens operate as such a “third place,” or a public place that hosts “the regular, voluntary, informal, and happily anticipated gatherings of individuals beyond the realms of home and work.” Gardeners of all stripes can help grow fresh produce and enjoy the fruits of their labor. Community gardens can fortify bonds of social trust and awaken obligations between the wealthy and common folk, allowing for class intermingling. Class mixing permits encounters with “superior persons,” who “encourage us to make something of ourselves, to impose difficult demands on ourselves, and to appreciate the satisfactions conferred by devoted service to an ideal.” Third places such as community gardens act as a kind of social leveler in that participation and enjoyment are accessible to the general public and not predicated upon socio-economic status. Reliant on the generosity of private donations from individuals and local businesses and corporations, community gardens motivate an embrace of noblesse oblige so that one may become “the mere trustee and agent for his poorer brethren.” Therefore, community gardens can bridge the growing social gap and renew reciprocal obligations between the elites and the masses by serving as a space for charity, connection, and community.

Community gardens cultivate civic friendship.

Nascent forms of technological distraction and the sanctification of individual autonomy have eroded concern for the prosperity of the extended American family, enabling self-interest to reign. But communal efforts can reverse romantic individualism and advance social communion. By the elementary reality of physical proximity, informal associations and communal gatherings unite American citizens as equals in a robust exchange of ideas and opinions that polish political habits and virtues. Informal rendezvous inspire practices of civility and compromise between diverse peoples, drawing together the community as equal parts of a whole working toward a common goal. Engagement in efforts to grow and sustain fresh produce takes patience, hard work, and consensus. The practices of mutual aid, problem-solving, and open conversation involved with communal gardening train participants for democratic governance and active citizenship, learning how to rule and be ruled. Political participation is imperative for a functioning democracy and citizens who engage in civic associations are more likely to be politically active. Thus, community gardens strengthen democracy by instilling volunteers with democratic skills and civic virtue, prompting them to partake in politics.

Community gardens improve health outcomes, especially for the poor.

Community gardens increase consumption of fruits and vegetables. Roughly 53.6 million Americans dwell in “food deserts,” areas in which access to affordable and nutritious foods is significantly limited due to economic or transportation barriers. Nutritional gaps persist for those struggling with food insecurity. A poor diet is a prominent contributor to chronic disease. Higher intakes of fruits and vegetables have been associated with a reduced risk for cardiovascular disease, cancer, and ischemic stroke, three leading causes of death in the United States. A study of urban adults in Flint, Michigan revealed that gardeners consumed roughly 1.5 times the amount of fruits and vegetables than non-gardeners and were 3.5 times more likely to meet the daily recommended intake amount. Community gardens offer an inexpensive solution to help close nutritional gaps among the poor and reduce the scale of food deserts as free produce within close proximity to one’s home eliminates limitations of cost and availability.

Community gardens promote environmental stewardship.

Americans suffer from what Richard Louv has coined, “nature deficit disorder,” an unnatural and accelerated disconnect from the physical world. A lack of access to green spaces in urban areas and the allure of a screen has left people disinterested and disenchanted with the environment. Scientific evidence illustrates that those who are withdrawn from nature experience higher levels of physical and emotional illness and exhibit a reduced use of the senses. Detachment from nature contradicts fundamental anthropology as the late Pope Francis remarked, “We are a part of nature, included in it and thus in constant interaction with it.” A lack of involvement in nature contributes to a failure to see the earth as our common home. A society that cherishes instant gratification and convenience will likely view nature as a utilitarian good to be exploited for maximal human satisfaction rather than a gift to be respected and taken care of for generations to come. We are called to be responsible stewards of the earth, to preserve it and make it fruitful. Community gardens offer a chance to establish an active connection to and respect for nature and promote a sense of awe and wonder of its complexity and beauty.

Unity Gardens in South Bend, Indiana, is a model for community gardens across the nation. Funded by donations from individuals, local businesses, and even large corporations such as Kohls and AEP, the organization operates over 40 satellite gardens in northern Indiana. In addition to offering free produce for locals, Unity Gardens hosts social events as well as gardening courses, gathering diverse members of the area together and teaching volunteers the value of working in and respecting nature.

Some critics of community gardens suggest that the responsibility of caretaking often falls on a few committed volunteers or that lots of precious land in urban areas could be better used in solving shortages of affordable housing units. While the housing crisis is a pressing matter, community gardens can and should be built alongside housing developments to beautify the area and provide a space for neighbors to meet. To avoid the labor falling on a few, gardens can partner with local schools to ensure a steady supply of volunteers and inspire the next generation to care for the environment.

Communities should follow the example of Unity Gardens and heed Frederick Douglass’ call “to make us the most perfect national illustration of the unity and dignity of the human family that the world has ever seen.” “Feverish consumerism and new forms of egotistic self-preservation” cause Americans to grapple with a growing wealth divide and isolation. A shared aim to construct local spaces of belonging and solidarity with the most vulnerable can combat grotesque economic and social inequalities that contradict a democratic conception of equality and dignity and thwart the ills of self-interest and materialism.. Sharing time, talents, and food within the space of a community garden establishes bonds of mutual trust and civic friendship that are essential for a thriving democratic republic. Efforts to ethically use the earth’s fruits to foster community and promote human flourishing therefore ought to become a priority of America’s future.

Disembodiment, Disillusionment, and Digital IDs: A Slippery Slope to Dystopia | By Ella Yates

René Descartes asserts that “je pense donc je suis,” and Plato claims that the “soul is a helpless prisoner [of the body].” These thoughts, while philosophically interesting, are characteristic of the metaphysical error plaguing modern society. The “real” you is your mind/soul and we are being led to reject the necessity and goodness of our physical bodies. Oftentimes, it isn’t that people are actively seeking out this ideology, but rather it’s that our culture, steeped in technology and digital entertainment, is driving a revival of the new-gnostic – disembodied – philosophical worldview that has been accepted by most without giving it a second thought.

This is most acutely seen in Gen Z and the sheer amount of time spent in the digital realm rather than physical reality. Kids have phones in their hands as young as ten or eleven. Adults in the United States spend an average of over six hours per day online, and their average attention span is no longer than fifty seconds. Whether it is through scrolling on Instagram for hours at a time or being absorbed by video games, people live in their minds more than in reality. This online, technological realm has even become the new “reality” for some.

This phenomenon is not without its negative ripple effect. Almost 30% of Generation Z self-reports having poor mental health. The percentage of the adult population who reports having zero close friends has risen to 12% in 2021 (up from 3% in 1990). Our youth can’t read. We have lost the ability to exist in silence and lack the vocabulary and aptitude to describe beautiful things. Living outside of the physical world has undermined humanity. Most distressing, however, is the reliance our society has on technology on every level from the individual all the way up to government.

How could we have possibly ended up in this conundrum? Technology, after all, was meant to improve our lives, increase our efficiency, and provide a convenient, easy-to-access source of information and entertainment. Our society’s current disillusioned state is far from this idealistic vision. We can attempt to pin all of society’s problems on technology, but we must also recognize that technology is merely a tool that we humans, as moral agents, can use in a virtuous manner, supportive of our flourishing, or in a disordered way, something that drives us into the social, cultural, and mental crisis characteristic of far too many of our modern youth in the West. But is it really just those “dang phones” corrupting the youth, or is there something deeper, even spiritually corrupted, that is contributing to our increasingly dismal outlook?

The disembodiment of modern man from the rest of creation is this fundamental error. And our metaphysical principles influence every other belief we hold, including our politics.

We need not look far to see this made manifest – even one of the most powerful men in the world, Tim Cook, builds towards a world where people are conquered by technology on their couches. The Apple Vision Pro ad shows just this – rather than living a life of adventure, community, and purpose, technology has found a way to be ever-present, blurring the line between digital reality and the physical world.

Life is not meant for this. Man is not meant for this. Rather, man is meant to be a steward of creation on his journey towards union with the Divine. Being lulled into complacency in a make-believe technical realm is one of the furthest things from the virtue we are called to. The acceptance, even if passive, of a disembodied framework for viewing the person and world is driving the belief that this is an acceptable way to live our one, precious life. The only way to escape this toxic ideology is to combat it with the truth that we are not solely our bodies nor our minds. We are a soul embodied, living in the physical world while being connected to a higher spiritual realm. While we are called to an end beyond this world, it remains that we have an obligation to live in the world and do it well. We are ultimately stewards of a gift freely given. In the words of Pope Benedict XVI, the world offers us comfort, but we “were not made for comfort, [we] were made for greatness.” Our lives and the world are destined for magis.

In accepting disembodiment and allowing ourselves to be conditioned to an over-reliance on technology, we leave society vulnerable to a plethora of problems. We have hijacked our society’s understanding of leisure and turned us into hedonistic dopamine seekers. We have opened the floodgates for globalizing forces to infiltrate our conception of democratic politics we hold in the West. We are allowing a worldview in which it is justifiable for people to care less for their own bodies and for the environment. Most importantly, it solidifies the destruction of civil society, which in turn fuels polarization and political violence.

Despite some members of our society beginning to rise to reject and change our current predicament, the modern world makes it increasingly more difficult to escape disembodiment. There is an obsession with making every aspect of our lives “less real.” We have eliminated TSA physical ID checks and passport stamps in favor of biometric data scans. Stores take your biometric data and film you shopping to link your bill to your accounts without ever having you check out at a counter. The world has shifted away from owning and towards a subscription and renting model for everything from music to movies to homes. The United Kingdom has gone so far as to announce the introduction of the mandatory “BritCard,” a digital ID based on biometric data, for all UK citizens by August 2029.

The BritCard is being promoted to the public as “a new streamlined digital system… [that] will simplify … process[es], drive up compliance, crack down on forged documents and create intelligence data on businesses that are conducting checks.” The brief goes on to detail the efficiency of the “state-of-the-art encryption and authentication technology… providing better security than traditional physical documents.” The mandatory ID would be used in every realm, from education and employment to healthcare and shopping.

While some may view this move as progress and a use of technology for the benefit of a society, those with a belief in civil rights, personal liberties, and/or a Divine Being beyond the limits of the temporal Earth ought to hesitate in giving their assent so quickly.

A future with the BritCard as a reality can easily devolve into a theoretical dystopia if the state forgets its obligation to the people it serves. If a government decides to violate the God given rights of a citizen, such as one who decides to criticize the government in speech or media, if every aspect of your life is connected to a digital ID which the government has the power to control, it is easy to conceive of a slippery slope towards a security state in which noncompliance would equal functional nonexistence. Without the power to access your bank account or obtain employment, opposition political movements fighting for the principles the modern West was built upon could be easily quashed. This is not to say this is the BritCards’ aim, but it is an exercise in what could occur if said government were internally hijacked and had this sort of power over its citizenry that is meant to be politically free in a democratic system.

Patrick Deneen, in his book Why Liberalism Failed, conceived of the skepticism we ought to maintain in order to preserve our rights aptly in writing that “the ‘limited government’ of liberalism today would provoke jealousy and amazement from tyrants of old.” George Orwell speaks even more poignantly when he reminds us in 1984 that “Big Brother is watching you.” The question we face now is, should we invite him in? For the sake of convenience, efficiency, and a feeling of contentment, we will accept the foundation of a security state. The security being promised to us is not synonymous with either privacy or liberty. Rather than resisting these efforts in the name of protecting freedom, comfort, not flourishing and a life steeped in transcendent meaning, will become the ultimate pacifier.

This is not a left versus right debate. Rather, it is a question of what kind of existence we want to maintain on a societal level. It is bipartisan to reject the rejection of reality that is growing in influence. Looking beyond our political and party predispositions, we ought to ask ourselves what the ultimate end of implementing these overreaching technocratic measures is. Perhaps it is merely for convenience. But we could rationally find belief that it is not. Is the prospect of increased convenience worth potentially conceding your civil liberties beyond recovery? The disembodiment that has dominated every other aspect of our lives is finally creeping into a direct political application – a unified government ID system. The way forward is to realize the disenchantment we have with “progress” and realize that progress is not always good.

Our current ways have not made us happier nor more confident in the meaning of our lives. Disembodiment has caused the ultimate disillusionment and evoked a sense of feckless existence in the populace. We can only begin to remedy this by recognizing our embedded reality. We are born to families and communities. We have a responsibility to take care of our own bodies and souls, connect with others, and leave the world a better place for the generations to follow us. Returning to our local communities is the first step in fighting disembodiment. Put away your phone, engage with friends in person and not online, join a club, coach a sport, walk your dog with friends and family. The moment we stop talking to our neighbors of both like and unalike opinions and experiences is the day our democracy begins to die.

We have a civilization worth protecting. Even if it is far from perfect, we are called to improve upon it and order it to its proper end. It is through conversations, despite political differences, that we remind each other of the common ground and principles that we share. We are all aiming at creating a just society – we want flourishing for ourselves, our families, and our society. While we may differ in how we achieve this and which issues are the most critical to be addressed in pursuit of this end, we have far more in common with each other than polarization leads us to believe. In order to enter into these conversations, we must remind ourselves of our embodiedness. This connection is the way out of disembodiment and towards bridging our partisan divide. The fate of Western civilization depends on you talking to and loving your neighbor. Embrace reality and go forth with charity and truth to converse!

American Cold War Fears Becoming a Reality | By Chase Ouellette

As inter-state rivalry with China continues to grow, it is important to remember that the US is no stranger to this type of conflict. Throughout the Cold War, US national security decision-makers navigated the United States through tense, complicated scenarios that tested American political and economic security.¹ While observers might view the collapse of the Soviet Union as an inevitable result of internal dysfunction, stagnation, and sloppy attempts at reform, there were various geopolitical scenarios American leaders feared could jeopardize US Cold War aims and tilt the global balance of power in the Soviets’ favor. Among the most prevalent of these fears was the formation of a unified Communist bloc capable of challenging the economic and military might of the West.²

A unified Communist bloc, particularly close alignment and collaboration between the USSR and China, was a serious concern plaguing American policymakers in the first decades of the Cold War. The probability of intimate collusion between the PRC and USSR was highest in the first years of the new Chinese government’s existence. In February of 1950, both nations signed The Treaty of Friendship, Alliance, and Mutual Assistance Between the People’s Republic of China and the Soviet Union – a charter obligating mutual defense in the event of an attack by Japan and its allies.³ The Sino-Soviet relationship remained strong for the next few years, with a 1954 US report stating: “In its most general features the Sino-Soviet Relationship may be compared to that between Great Britain and the US”.⁴

Thankfully, ideological tensions, longstanding border disputes, Chinese resentment over Russian colonial treaties with China, and side effects of the Cultural Revolution provided the spark necessary to kick off the deadly Sino-Soviet border clashes that would mark the beginning of the 1969 border crisis and the conclusive Sino-Soviet split.⁵ American paranoia and concern regarding the preservation of the Sino-Soviet relationship can be seen by Nixon’s eagerness to open diplomatic relations with the nation in 1972.⁶ Such a definite reversal on decades-long US foreign policy displays how vital to US interests was the isolation of the USSR from the PRC, a belief that held until the collapse of the USSR.

US fears regarding the formation of a unified Communist bloc are becoming a reality in today’s international arena. While the world left domino theory behind in 1991, if we substitute “Communist” for “Challenger”, we can see that there is an increasingly resolute axis of states in China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea (CRINK) who are striving to challenge the extent and depth of US influence across the world.⁷ China and Russia’s leading role in the foundation of BRICS demonstrate the desire of the ‘no limits’ partnership to construct international institutions that counter-balance traditionally western-dominated international institutions such as the G7, IMF, and WTO.⁸ China has also utilized its Belt and Road initiative to establish comprehensive infrastructure projects within both Iran and Russia, measures that further demonstrate China’s commitment to aiding its sanctions-stricken partners.⁹¹⁰

The largest uptick in collusion between the states within CRINK has been seen during Russia’s war with Ukraine. China has forged an intimate military-technical partnership with Russia that has aided its sustained invasion of eastern Ukraine.¹¹ China has accomplished this through the export of dual-use goods such as semiconductors, microchips, drones, lithium-ion batteries, and ATVs.¹² These goods, while supposedly intended for civilian purposes, are easily converted into components that are vital for the production of Russian weapons systems. China has also helped Russia improve its satellite and space-based capabilities immensely. The identification and targeting of locations hundreds of miles away, a task necessary for Russia’s mass long-range drone strikes against Ukraine, has been greatly improved with Chinese technological transfers.¹³ China’s role in enhancing Iran’s defense capabilities rivals that of their involvement with Russia. Iran’s domestic surveillance systems, air defense network, and the solid fuel used to power its rockets are all sourced from China.¹⁴

While recent years have seen China supplying weapons technologies to Russia, Putin’s regime has long been a vital supplier of advanced military technology to China. Russia has supplied China with a wide array of technologies ranging from fighter jets and an aircraft carrier to advanced missile technologies and cutting-edge command and control systems.¹⁵ These arms transfers have played a prominent role in China’s stunning rise through the global military power food chain and are rooted in Russia’s desire to help China continue challenging American presence in the South China Sea.¹⁶

Russia has provided extensive assistance to North Korea’s armed forces. Recent North Korean military breakthroughs – the deployment of its first nuclear submarine, the new Hwasong-20 ICBM system, and the new Choe Hyon-class destroyers – have all been made possible through technological transfers from Moscow to Pyongyang.¹⁷¹⁸ These transactions have not exclusively benefitted North Korea. North Korean contributions to Russia’s war in Ukraine have been extensive. The DPRK has supplied millions of artillery shells to Russia over the course of the war, contributions that are essential to Russia’s war effort. North Korea has also contributed its own men to the fight, notably sending around 11,000 soldiers to the front in a mission to solidify ties between Russia and the DPRK and to provide North Korean soldiers with critical experience on a modern battlefield.¹⁹

CRINK’s increasing levels of cooperation and collusion pose a potential challenge to the US-led international order that has defined the decades after the Cold War. While, short of war, it is impossible to plot and execute a grand strategy that breaks up this new axis of evil, there are a variety of measures the US could take to limit CRINK’s potential influence and power on the global stage. The first measure, which should be the most obvious to US leadership, is to hold on to the advantages we already have.

One of the most impressive feats in world history has been the forging and maintenance of the modern US alliance system. Spanning across Europe, the Middle East, and the Western Pacific, the US has established intimate diplomatic relations with states of varying size, regime type, geography, and economic power. Looking to southeast Asia, China, the world’s fastest growing power who continually challenges US technological, economic, and military dominance, is boxed in by Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, the Philippines – all close US partners.²⁰ Moving to Iran’s neighborhood, observers will find Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan, Bahrain, and Israel cooperating closely with the United States.²¹ Egypt, Oman, and Turkey – states with vested interests in the Middle East – have also cooperated extensively with US policymakers in recent years.²² Finally, when Putin looks West from his bedroom window in the Kremlin, he sees two institutions in the horizon that are married to the US: The most formidable military alliance in world history and the world’s second-largest economic unit.²³

This point of this detour in geography is the highlight that the US possesses innate advantages over the CRINK axis that its member states could only dream of. What would China give to be a signatory of mutual defense pacts among seven of the world’s ten largest economies?²⁴ What would Iran give to have intense diplomatic sway over the affairs of the Arabian Peninsula and the Levant? What would Russia give to trade its rotting CSTO for NATO, an organization containing 3.5 million military personnel across 32 member states?

With these advantages in place, I wonder why US leadership is behaving in ways to undercut and diminish them. President Trump’s tariffs, trade wars, hesitant commitment to the transatlantic partnership, and troubling negotiations with Russia all significantly strain our alliances and give our partners valid reasons to question the benefits of US alliance leadership. Our escalatory trade war with Canada and our vague threats pointing to its annexation only serve to foster disdain for the US amongst Canadian leadership. Straining a relationship with a neighboring country is generally a bad path to choose. However, straining a relationship with a country you share an integrated air defense command with and who controls vast swaths of territory bordering the Arctic Ocean is an error.²⁵

US apprehensiveness regarding China is often anchored in observations of the PRC’s rapid industrial and technological development. Chinese developments in AI, auto manufacturing, steel production, clean energy infrastructure, and shipbuilding far outpace current US trends.²⁶ With the US locked into an innovation race with China, protectionism is illogical. South Korea, Japan, and the EU are all home to advanced manufacturing industries, economic sectors US firms would benefit greatly from if there were minimal trade barriers between our market economies.

President Trump’s faltering commitment to our European partners only weakens our global influence and posture. While our European allies undoubtedly freeload off of US security guarantees and have underinvested in their militaries over the past twenty years, the benefits of further involvement in European security affairs outweigh the drawbacks of carrying Europe on our shoulders. European dependence on an American security blanket allows the US to have intense influence over the policy decisions of the European powers.²⁷ Furthermore, having access to fifty military bases across Europe allows the US to have an incredibly strong military presence across a distant continent, project force right on Russia’s doorstep, and support intricate combat operations in a post-US nation-building Middle East.²⁸

CRINK’s strategic coordination to undercut the US’s global standing presents a challenge the US has not seen for decades. China, Russia, and Iran specifically have made various maneuvers that have placed US policymakers in awkward positions and forced them to make tough decisions. Despite the behavior of these contenders, the US has what CRINK can only dream of: an intricate alliance network allowing privileged economic and military access across the world’s largest economies and most strategically important states. This network is something CRINK can never replicate. Having been developed over the past eighty years, the US has cemented its influence over the world’s leading states, boxing CRINK out of important partnerships and economies.

With this innate advantage over our rivals, the US, particularly the Trump Administration, needs to stop weakening our alliances and partnerships through its spastic protectionism and imflammatory rhetoric. Yes, European states have neutered their militaries due to assumptions of a permanent American interest in Europe. Yes, the US holds trade deficits in industrial sectors with other states. Yes, it is not at all in the US’ interest to confront Russia directly over Ukraine. However, these grievances are not worth blowing up our alliance system over. CRINK can continue to make their leaps and bounds in technology and interoperability. However, they cannot recruit other leading states to their axis as long as the US maintains its relationships with the world’s largest advanced economies and militaries.