ational defense works best when it is fused with national diplomacy—collectively aligned under a coherent grand strategy. As economist and strategist Thomas Schelling famously noted, “violence is most effective when it isn't used.” While recent events in Eastern Europe have served as a catalyst for a unifying connection in U.S. foreign policy, it remains a short-term (and shortsighted) gambit that fails to enable a sustained vision for ensuring U.S. interests abroad. Too convenient is the increasing financial and military aid being piped into Ukraine, while the periphery of the global arena continues to see increasing activity by autocratic actors.
Herein lies the vulnerability of American grand strategy: the lack of fusion between the Defense and State Departments—with the former not serving as a means of expanding the reach and influence of the latter. These two arms of American foreign policy have seldom been close bedfellows, with diplomatic and soft power typically giving way to military force during or immediately after crises. With tumultuous global and regional tensions mounting, U.S. diplomatic and military efforts need synergy more than ever.
To its credit, the Biden administration made clear its intent to rebuild fractured relationships from previous eras and, two years into its executive term, has largely made good on that promise through increased security cooperation with familiar partners. The key takeaway here though: familiar partners. The global arena is far more complex and consists of countless actors that warrant a unified defense-diplomacy engagement. So far, these efforts have been piecemeal without integrating the efforts of the Defense and State Departments or incorporating new locales that would benefit from the increased defense-diplomacy initiatives.
To be sure, the DoD is still recovering from last year's chaotic and messy Afghanistan withdrawal. I recently spoke with several members of the U.S. Special Operations Command—each a veteran of multiple Afghanistan deployments and on-site during the final days in Kabul—who told me that the next steps for the elite command remain unclear. They currently seem to be tweaking existing training cycles rather than seizing the opportunity for a new strategic vision. These sentiments have been echoed across other units and commands during inquiries on what is next for defense planners. Over a year ago, I opined on the utilitarian value of Special Operations Forces pivoting from a myopic counter-terror posture towards building international security through diversifying partnerships—extending the reach of American diplomacy while still projecting power abroad. This thesis remains intact today, but now I see the failure to merge American diplomatic and military efforts in states and locales beyond traditional partnerships as resulting in a gap in American grand strategy.
The U.S. Defense Department is, arguably, better at making war than any other group in human history. This is not to suggest that Defense should subsume diplomacy. Rather, the current regionalization of geopolitics calls for the American foreign policy apparatus to consider using the DoD and its capabilities—security force assistance, intelligence, and cultural aptitude—to augment State Department efforts to find, develop, and solidify new and enduring partners in locales that see increased attention from geo-competitors. For instance, Mongolia has modernized its infrastructure to support increased economic and diplomatic alignment for the benefit of Russian and Chinese energy concerns. This recent leap in export capabilities occurred following in-roads made through security cooperation with Beijing. This is quite a coup for all three states in terms of security through economic cooperation. This type of economic bridge building does not occur without diplomacy—which has no teeth if it is not backed by military capacity.
The military role in fostering and solidifying diplomatic efforts could mean the difference between preventing autocratic competitors from exploiting vulnerable states in regions of interest. While the Mongolia example would be a difficult hurdle for American military and diplomat efforts to clear, it serves as a demonstration of how the United States can emphasize cooperation between its military and diplomatic machines with states who lie in key competitors’ shadows of influence.
Potential partners are no strangers to the attentions of Moscow, Beijing, Tehran, and Pyongyang—seeing both overt security cooperation and paramilitary and influence operations used on them. Rather than a strategy that is reactionary to the activities of competitors, U.S. foreign policy should prioritize efforts that are incorporate security cooperation and integration in lockstep with diplomatic engagement. While the State and Defense Departments of the United States are highly competent individually, implementing policy that substantively fuses these two elements of foreign affairs is lacking and critical. The current National Defense Strategy (an interim, as the classified version has only recently been released to Congress) references the importance of diplomacy and strong military capacity, but scarcely links the two into actionable initiatives that would reinforce each other and unleash the American foreign policy machine to its fullest potential.
What the United States has failed to do is define a clear and concise grand strategy that synergizes complementary defense and diplomatic efforts. American efforts to delegitimize competitors through transparency and its own legitimacy remain the most important capability. But, in order to do this, the military should take on an increased role in partnership building. Such actions, if melded at the hip with the diplomatic efforts, offers the potential for improved power balancing against the autocracies who threaten the rules-based world order.
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The Military is an Underutilized Tool of Diplomacy
Photo via Pixabay.
June 15, 2022
While the Biden administration has been able to rebuild traditional partnerships, U.S. strategy in other regions remains lacking. Merging diplomatic and military efforts to support broader objectives would strengthen the United States, argues Ethan Brown.
N
ational defense works best when it is fused with national diplomacy—collectively aligned under a coherent grand strategy. As economist and strategist Thomas Schelling famously noted, “violence is most effective when it isn't used.” While recent events in Eastern Europe have served as a catalyst for a unifying connection in U.S. foreign policy, it remains a short-term (and shortsighted) gambit that fails to enable a sustained vision for ensuring U.S. interests abroad. Too convenient is the increasing financial and military aid being piped into Ukraine, while the periphery of the global arena continues to see increasing activity by autocratic actors.
Herein lies the vulnerability of American grand strategy: the lack of fusion between the Defense and State Departments—with the former not serving as a means of expanding the reach and influence of the latter. These two arms of American foreign policy have seldom been close bedfellows, with diplomatic and soft power typically giving way to military force during or immediately after crises. With tumultuous global and regional tensions mounting, U.S. diplomatic and military efforts need synergy more than ever.
To its credit, the Biden administration made clear its intent to rebuild fractured relationships from previous eras and, two years into its executive term, has largely made good on that promise through increased security cooperation with familiar partners. The key takeaway here though: familiar partners. The global arena is far more complex and consists of countless actors that warrant a unified defense-diplomacy engagement. So far, these efforts have been piecemeal without integrating the efforts of the Defense and State Departments or incorporating new locales that would benefit from the increased defense-diplomacy initiatives.
To be sure, the DoD is still recovering from last year's chaotic and messy Afghanistan withdrawal. I recently spoke with several members of the U.S. Special Operations Command—each a veteran of multiple Afghanistan deployments and on-site during the final days in Kabul—who told me that the next steps for the elite command remain unclear. They currently seem to be tweaking existing training cycles rather than seizing the opportunity for a new strategic vision. These sentiments have been echoed across other units and commands during inquiries on what is next for defense planners. Over a year ago, I opined on the utilitarian value of Special Operations Forces pivoting from a myopic counter-terror posture towards building international security through diversifying partnerships—extending the reach of American diplomacy while still projecting power abroad. This thesis remains intact today, but now I see the failure to merge American diplomatic and military efforts in states and locales beyond traditional partnerships as resulting in a gap in American grand strategy.
The U.S. Defense Department is, arguably, better at making war than any other group in human history. This is not to suggest that Defense should subsume diplomacy. Rather, the current regionalization of geopolitics calls for the American foreign policy apparatus to consider using the DoD and its capabilities—security force assistance, intelligence, and cultural aptitude—to augment State Department efforts to find, develop, and solidify new and enduring partners in locales that see increased attention from geo-competitors. For instance, Mongolia has modernized its infrastructure to support increased economic and diplomatic alignment for the benefit of Russian and Chinese energy concerns. This recent leap in export capabilities occurred following in-roads made through security cooperation with Beijing. This is quite a coup for all three states in terms of security through economic cooperation. This type of economic bridge building does not occur without diplomacy—which has no teeth if it is not backed by military capacity.
The military role in fostering and solidifying diplomatic efforts could mean the difference between preventing autocratic competitors from exploiting vulnerable states in regions of interest. While the Mongolia example would be a difficult hurdle for American military and diplomat efforts to clear, it serves as a demonstration of how the United States can emphasize cooperation between its military and diplomatic machines with states who lie in key competitors’ shadows of influence.
Potential partners are no strangers to the attentions of Moscow, Beijing, Tehran, and Pyongyang—seeing both overt security cooperation and paramilitary and influence operations used on them. Rather than a strategy that is reactionary to the activities of competitors, U.S. foreign policy should prioritize efforts that are incorporate security cooperation and integration in lockstep with diplomatic engagement. While the State and Defense Departments of the United States are highly competent individually, implementing policy that substantively fuses these two elements of foreign affairs is lacking and critical. The current National Defense Strategy (an interim, as the classified version has only recently been released to Congress) references the importance of diplomacy and strong military capacity, but scarcely links the two into actionable initiatives that would reinforce each other and unleash the American foreign policy machine to its fullest potential.
What the United States has failed to do is define a clear and concise grand strategy that synergizes complementary defense and diplomatic efforts. American efforts to delegitimize competitors through transparency and its own legitimacy remain the most important capability. But, in order to do this, the military should take on an increased role in partnership building. Such actions, if melded at the hip with the diplomatic efforts, offers the potential for improved power balancing against the autocracies who threaten the rules-based world order.
