Strategy and force structure in an interwar period

Joint Force Quarterly, Spring-Summer, 2001 by Frederick W. Kagan

The contemporary era does not represent a strategic pause, but rather an interwar period, and history suggests that the next significant conflict will not be as distant as many would believe. Since 1648 major powers have engaged in a full-scale war approximately every thirty years. And from 1783 onward the United States has sent sizable forces into harm's way every twenty years. To assume that this cycle has suddenly ended is wishful thinking. It is no more the case than the notion that the economic cycle of booms and busts has come to a halt. Accordingly, maintaining international stability and preparing to deter or defeat enemies in the future are urgent tasks. They cannot be put off, underresourced, or ignored except at grave peril. The primary security goal for the Nation in this interwar period must be prolonging the current epoch of peace and prosperity as long as possible and being ready to fight and win the conflict that will ultimately end it.

Labor of the Liberal State

The requirement to remain engaged and ready even in an era of relative peace is the most difficult challenge that can face a democracy. The track record of democratic nations is poor. After the Crimean War and the Wars of German Unification, Great Britain largely disengaged from the international scene and maintained a peacetime army so small that German leaders quipped that they would have it arrested if the British landed to support an ally. As a result, Britain conspicuously failed to prevent a series of wars in the 1860s and 1870s and proved utterly unable to deter the Germans in 1914. Britain's weakness, appeasement, and consequent failure to deter Hitler in the 1930s has been well rehearsed elsewhere. But the record of the United States is little better. The refusal by America to remain engaged in Europe after World War I greatly facilitated efforts by Hitler and Mussolini to shatter the peace. Failure to manage international affairs in the Pacific over the same period led directly to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

The only recent occasion when a liberal democracy maintained the necessary force to deter an enemy in peacetime and to win without a conflict was the Cold War. For almost half a century, with conspicuous ups and downs, the United States fielded combat formations capable enough to persuade the Soviet Union that victory would be unlikely. The willingness to engage in Korea and Vietnam, whatever the regional consequences of such conflicts, illustrated American resolve. This prolonged policy of engagement was made possible largely because the Soviets were so clearly and obviously an imminent threat. It was also relatively easier to persuade the public of the need for large peacetime defense expenditures. At the same time, leaders remembered Munich and were determined to avoid a repeat.

The lack of an obvious threat makes the task much harder today, recalling the 1920s when weakness and disengagement laid the groundwork for disasters in the 1930s. Only by recognizing that military preparedness is urgent in periods of apparent peace just like during periods of tension can the United States avoid falling into the same trap. Such readiness requires the accomplishment of three tasks: constantly shaping the international environment to maintain stability in regions of vital national interest and to deter aggression anywhere; maintaining the ability to defeat at least two major regional aggressors simultaneously; and preparing for a future large-scale conflict.

Shaping. The aim of military operations other than war like Somalia, Haiti, Bosnia, and Kosovo is two-fold. One is maintaining peace and stability in regions of vital national interest, such as Europe and the Western Hemisphere. Any failure to ensure stability in those regions will create power vacuums when traditional structures collapse. The likelihood that such vacuums will be filled by friendly nations is low, because most allies have disarmed even more thoroughly than the United States and abandoned their responsibility for maintaining peace, placing the burden on America's shoulders.

On the other hand, if the United States permits an actor to use force it signals that would-be aggressors will not be opposed. That message is likely to encourage the boldest to try to revise the international order by arms. In the best case, failing to engage in a lesser conflict against weaker enemies can draw the Nation into a far more serious conflict against greater threats. In the worst case, unchecked aggression may lay the groundwork for the extremely rapid destruction of a peaceful world order.

Maintaining. Though the military is most likely to be engaged in small-scale contingencies day-to-day, they must above all be ready to meet the challenges of a major regional aggressor with little notice. In fact, they must be ready to meet two such challenges at once. Yet it has become fashionable to claim that the two major regional contingency (MRC) force sizing paradigm simply preserves the status quo. Because this force requirement has been explicitly tied to specific threats, Iraq and North Korea, and as both now seem weak, many argue that this concept can be abandoned. Moreover, such a change would allow the United States to reduce forces and refocus resources on military transformation or domestic needs. Both assumptions are wrong.