WASHINGTON (AP) – The Biden administration faces an enigma as it rethinks the positioning of military forces around the world: how to focus more on China and Russia without withdrawing from long-term threats in the Middle East – and to makes this change with potentially weaker Pentagon budgets.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin ordered a “global stance” review from a few months to just a few days after taking office. It will assess how the United States can best arrange and support its remote network of troops, weapons, bases and alliances to strengthen President Joe Biden’s foreign policy.
The review is part of the administration’s effort to pave the way for an army still caught up in decades-old conflicts, facing flat or declining budgets and facing internal problems such as racism and extremism.
Its outcome could have a long-term impact on the army’s first priority: ensuring that it is ready for war in an era of uncertain arms control. Also at stake are relations with allies and partners, weakened in some cases by the Trump administration’s “American diplomacy” approach.
Austin’s review is closely linked to a pending administration decision on fulfilling the previous administration’s promise to withdraw completely from Afghanistan this spring. And it moves forward separately from questions related to the modernization of the strategic nuclear force.
Like the Trump administration, Biden’s national security team sees China, not militant extremists like al-Qaeda or the Islamic State group, as the first long-term security challenge. Unlike his predecessor, Biden sees great value in US commitments to European nations in the NATO alliance.
This could lead to significant changes in the US military “footprint” in the Middle East, Europe and Asia-Pacific, although such changes have been previously tried with limited success. The Trump administration, for example, felt compelled to send thousands of additional air and naval forces to the Persian Gulf area in 2019 in an effort to discourage what it called threats to regional stability. Biden has seen memories of the issue in recent days with violence in Iraq and Afghanistan.
It could also mean an embrace by Biden of the recent efforts of military commanders to seek innovative ways of deploying forces without permanent base links that bear political, financial and security costs. A recent example was a visit by an American aircraft carrier to a Vietnamese port. Commanders see value in deploying forces in smaller groups on less predictable cycles to keep China in balance.
There were signs of change before Biden took office.
In December, General Mark Milley, the chief of staff, spoke of his own view that technological and geopolitical changes support rethinking the old ways of organizing and positioning forces.
The survival of US forces will depend on adapting to China’s growth, the spread of technologies such as artificial and robotic intelligence, and the emergence of unconventional threats such as pandemics and climate change, Milley said.
“Smaller ones will be better in the future. A small, almost invisible and undetectable force, which is in a constant state of motion and is widely distributed – this would be a force that can survive, “he said at a conference in Washington. “You will not reach any goal if you are dead.”
Austin mentioned a similar and narrower point last month about the positioning of US forces in Asia and the Pacific.
“There is no doubt that we need a more resilient and distributed Indo-Pacific stance in response to China’s counter-intervention capabilities and approaches, backed by new operational concepts,” Austin wrote in response to Senate questions before confirmation to hear.
Austin also noted concerns about competition with Russia in the Arctic.
“This is fast becoming a region of geopolitical competition, and I have serious concerns about Russian military buildup and aggressive behavior in the Arctic – and around the world,” he wrote. “I am also deeply concerned about the Chinese intentions in the region.”
This does not argue for the abandonment of large US military hubs abroad. But it suggests more emphasis on deploying smaller groups of troops on shorter rotations to non-traditional destinations.
This change is already underway.
The military, for example, is developing what it calls an “arctic-capable brigade” of soldiers as part of its increased focus on the High North. This area is seen as a potential flash point, as high powers compete for natural resources that are more accessible as ice packs recede. Similarly, the Air Force is sending B-1 long-range bombers to Norway, a NATO ally and neighbor of Russia, for the first time.
China considers itself an Arctic nation, but the US’s main concern for Beijing is its growing assertiveness in Asia and the Pacific. In the US vision, China aims to build military force to discourage or block any US effort to intervene in Taiwan, the semi-autonomous democracy that Beijing sees as a renegade province that must eventually return to the communist net. .
A report by the Foreign Relations Council this month called Taiwan the most likely spark for a US-China war, a prospect with dire human consequences that it said “should concern the Biden team”.
“Millions of Americans could die in the first war in human history between two nuclear-weapon states,” the report said.
Washington also notes concern over China’s efforts to modernize and potentially expand its nuclear arsenal, while refusing to participate in any international nuclear arms control negotiations.
The emphasis on China began during the Obama administration. The Trump administration went on to officially declare that China and Russia, not global terrorism, were the main threats to US national security.
Some now wonder if this change has gone too far.
Christopher Miller, who has been interim secretary of defense for the past two months of Donald Trump’s presidency, said in an interview that he agrees that China is the main threat to national security. But he said US commanders in other parts of the world told him that focusing on China cost him the necessary resources.
“So I felt it was time to resume this and make sure we didn’t create unintended consequences,” Miller said.