The posture of the U.S. as the global hegemon is creating strategic vulnerabilities.[1] The growing misalignment between American capabilities and geopolitical realities is allowing China to unseat the world order; small, iterative advances in ship design will not solve China’s growing influence in the South China Sea nor the expansion of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Yet, the U.S. seems determined to continue its arms build-up, putting the nation on a brash warpath with China. Many declining empires fought their rising adversaries only to lose, and in doing so, signaled a global transfer of power. This is popularly known as the Thucydides Trap.[2] Perhaps the U.S. can avoid this trap by adopting the perspective of a small nation. If the U.S. proactively assumes the posture of a smaller, militarily disadvantaged nation, it may be able to outmaneuver the rising power of China without direct armed conflict.
"David and Goliath" by Michelangelo, on the Sistine Chapel ceiling. (Web Gallery of Art/Wikimedia)
The Thucydides Trap
China is emerging as a dominant world power as it continues its build-up of arms, leverages its manufacturing strength over supply chain disruptions, and expands its economic investments.[3] China’s multidomain strategies, which employ sub-kinetic means across a wide spectrum of conflict, have garnered a predominately kinetic strategic response from the U.S. The 2022 defense budget, for example, allocated $27.3 billion towards missile and radar systems in the Indo-Pacific region.[4] This continued investment in kinetic capabilities signals that the U.S. is primarily positioned to fight a traditional, kinetic war with China. But going to war with your number one trading partner immediately creates a myriad of disadvantages, such as the loss of over $541 billion annually in imported goods.[5] China’s aggression in the South China Sea, and particularly its increasing antagonism of Taiwan, seem designed to provoke U.S. intervention.[6] Chinese strategists have criticized Americans for being “slaves to technology in their thinking,” understanding that the U.S. is more likely to engage in an expensive arms build-up than an organizational pivot towards a new conception of warfare.[7] In this sense, China strategizes around the assumption that the U.S. will act as the geopolitical Goliath.
The current American defense mindset of buying down risk does not work if the U.S. loses ground across multiple domains. American grand strategy takes its supremacy axiomatically, ignoring the very real possibility that it may have already lost the geopolitical advantage. If, however, the U.S. proactively strategizes as a militarily disadvantaged nation, it may effectively reorient its capabilities towards domains outside direct armed conflict. Countering China in sub-kinetic domains, as a smaller nation might, allows the U.S. to avoid Thucydides Trap without losing its geopolitical position.
Thinking Small
We can conceptualize a “small nation” as a one that lacks the necessary capital to strategize around buying their security. Most notably, this economic disadvantage prevents plans for long term defense acquisitions. Adopting a small nation perspective, then, would first mean the consideration of budgetary constraints. It seems likely at least part of China’s economic strategy against the U.S. is to coerce it into an increasingly expensive arms race. A small nation cannot consider the prospect of expanding its defense budget to the tune of billions or trillions. Actively avoiding the Thucydides Trap would naturally deemphasize military spending on kinetic capabilities, allowing for strategic reallocations to sub-kinetic capabilities.
We can conceptualize a “small nation” as a one that lacks the necessary capital to strategize around buying their security.
Deprioritizing kinetic capabilities encourages military leaders to break with the fixation on bigger and better technology; there is no silver bullet technology that is going to counter China. Rather, there must be an organizational focus on leveraging existing capabilities into new domains of warfare. A small nation perspective particularly emphasizes how these domains affect the social dynamics and culture of the host nation, what we might call the sociocultural element of warfare. This is analogous to how economic warfare creates direct avenues to engage in other, more culturally grounded domains of warfare like psychological and political warfare. [8] When an adversary consolidates influence over industries in a target nation, they also appropriate the societal access those industries possess. This access manifests as government connections, control over labor, media influence, and more. In this sense, one domain of conflict becomes many. The U.S. globally achieved these ends in the post-WWII period, partially through the Marshall plan, as China now employs this strategy through the Belt and Road Initiative.[9]
Whether we consider the United Kingdom’s occupation of Malaysia, the various American campaigns of “winning hearts and minds,” or China’s most recent Belt and Road Initiative efforts in Africa, host nation culture has provided the strongest defense against hegemonic foreign influence.[10] A small nation perspective gives culture a new significance in multi-domain warfare. Directly countering the economic incentives of the Belt and Road Initiative with pro-American aid is a difficult venture; fighting an economic war with China is as appealing as fighting a kinetic one. But there are other domains available to counter China’s economic warfare—domains that intersect in sociocultural spaces that small nations have traditionally competed in by necessity. By deprioritizing kinetic capabilities, the American military can allocate its resources to more effectively engage across other domains. Cyber warfare is one such non-kinetic capability that allows smaller nations to maximize their impact across sociocultural domains of warfare.[11]
Force Multiplying Domains
Cyber warfare has gained global attention due its ability to penetrate directly into a target society. Cyber capabilities, like hacking, can reveal military secrets while also disabling defense systems or key infrastructure.[12] But cyber warfare can also serve as an example of how one domain can create opportunities into other domains: cyber operations can be leveraged into psychological operations. The proliferation of information technology has enabled disinformation to shape the collective consciousness in new ways. Similar to the information forging efforts of the past, publicly available information can be altered to affect a target society.[13] An adversary could publish press statements from official government websites in order to confuse a population, particularly during a moment of crisis. Russia used a version of this disinformation tactic in 2015 when they hacked U.S. Central Command’s twitter account. Notably, this was also a false flag cyber attack as they made it appear as though ISIS conducted the operation.[14] Many reports published the misinformation of the attack, which then impacted domestic and international perceptions on American cyber capabilities—despite a twitter password being the only vulnerability actually exposed.[15]
The small nation perspective highlights the cultural aspects of warfare and helps realign sub-kinetic capabilities. Even various forms of political warfare find a renewed clarity in the cultural context of multidomain warfare. Economic aid provides one such example. The U.S. has predominantly used aid to create political leverage in smaller nations. To an extent, this has translated into the use of aid to bribe foreign governments to acquiesce to policy or defense objectives. Small nations contribute aid, but they generally do not use it as an economic or political lure. There is an underlying symbolic impact of aid that small nations are more keen to combat or maximize.[16]
The U.S. can undermine certain aspects of China’s economic expansion by maximizing the cultural and symbolic impact of aid. Aid by itself would do little to undermine the economic partnerships China is fostering through the Belt and Road Initiative. But the Belt and Road Initiative is an effective strategy because it utilizes a long-term economic plan to open other domains of conflict. China often requires the use of Chinese labor for international projects which allows them to export their citizens, culture, and currency.[17] This cultural dimension of their economic strategy helps to spread China’s influence, but it also creates vulnerabilities. Sociocultural dynamics are especially important to a small nation perspective as these cultural spaces increasingly represent avenues of warfare.[18] For example, aid can be given to countries experiencing increased pollution due to Belt and Road Initiative partnerships.[19] An accompanying psychological operation would shape media coverage and political discourse to highlight the negative environmental consequences of participating in the BRI. In this scenario, an emerging geopolitical opportunity—Chinese pollution from the Belt and Road Initiative—becomes an avenue to employ multi-domain capabilities that maximize a cultural response to undermine China’s economic partnerships.
Rethinking Domestic Strategy
Countries like Taiwan have countered China by pursuing clear ideological delineations from China. For Taiwan, this has meant a public embrace of democracy to create an international juxtaposition with China’s totalitarianism. Aside from democratizing their formal institutions, Taiwan has taken the notable step of democratizing their approach to diplomacy. Taiwan’s “people’s diplomacy” initiative encouraged all Taiwanese citizens to identify as representatives of the nation.[20] The program served the dual purpose of fostering informal diplomacy from their population to the international community, but also served an exemplary domestic function. The Taiwanese government educated their citizens on foreign policy through workshops and educational resources.
Flag of Taiwan (Office of the President of the Republic of China)
Taiwan’s example focuses on the role of domestic operations on thinking like a smaller nation. Information warfare, to include disinformation campaigns, seek to directly affect target societies; disinformation can be used to sow disunity or confusion within a population, but it can also be used to create positive public opinion.[21] When formal institutions, like those of the Taiwanese government, create partnerships with informal institutions, like those targeted by their “people’s diplomacy” program, they open opportunities for defensive information operations. Strong public buy-in of alternative or counter-narratives remains the primary means of countering disinformation.[22] Greater communication between a government and its people inherently limits the effectiveness of foreign disinformation by bolstering domestic narratives. Improved societal cohesion works as a bulwark against foreign operations meant to chip away at civic unity. Despite having limited resources for countering disinformation campaigns, small nations may have cultural systems that are better equipped at limiting their effects. The U.S. could use domestic programs like Taiwan to foster similar cultural systems.
Improved societal cohesion works as a bulwark against foreign operations meant to chip away at civic unity. Despite having limited resources for countering disinformation campaigns, small nations may have cultural systems that are better equipped at limiting their effects.
Conclusion
The continued posturing of the United States as the main geopolitical power represents a grave strategic misstep against the rising power of China. This posture overcommits resources to a narrow conception of warfare that then limits the availability of options. If, however, the U.S. were to strategize as a smaller, less wealthy nation, it may develop the strategic flexibility required to counter China. This small nation perspective deemphasizes investment in long-term kinetic capabilities while prioritizing the sociocultural elements of multidomain warfare. The U.S. can no longer take its place in the world for granted. We must learn to embrace being a geopolitical David if we are to survive against the new Goliath.
Garrett Martin is a graduate student at UCLA, a Marine Corps veteran, and a research fellow at the Naval Postgraduate School in the department of Defense Analysis. His research primarily centers on grand strategy, institutions, culture, information warfare, and the role of group identity in contemporary warfare. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Navy, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.
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Header Image: David, 2020 (FMR Noor)
Notes:
[1] Christopher Layne, “The unipolar exit: beyond the Pax Americana,” Cambridge Review of International Affairs, Vol. 24, Iss. 2 (Jul 2011): 149–164; Fareed Zakaria, “The Self-Destruction of American Power: Washington Squandered the Unipolar Moment,” Foreign Affairs, July 2019; Bidisha Biswas and Anish Goel, “What Comes After US Hegemony? The Asia-Pacific region looks beyond the United States,” The Diplomat, December 19, 2018; Ron Huisken, “China, the US and the Waxing and Waning of Power,” The Strategist, May 21, 2020.
[2] Graham Allison, Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides’s Trap? (Mariner Books, 2017).
[3] David Brown, “Why China Could Win the New Global Arms Race,” BBC News, July 28, 2022; Anjani Trivedi and Shuli Ren, “Good Luck Taking Away China’s Manufacturing Mojo,” The Washington Post, August 24, 2022; “China Increases Investments in PNG, Sparking Security Fears for Australia,” News.com.au, July 4, 2022.
[4] Paul McLeary, “Indo-Pacific Commander Delivers $27 Billion Plan to Congress,” Breaking Defense, March 1, 2021.
[5] “United States Imports from China,” TradingEconomic.com
[6] Iain Marlow, “Taiwanese Independence is a Charging Rhino That Must Be Stopped, Chin Says,” Bloomberg, September 22, 2022; Alys Davies, “Taiwan Tensions: China Condemns ‘manic’ Visit as Pelosi Continues Tour,” August 4, 2022.
[7] Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui, Unrestricted Warfare (People’s Liberation Army Publishing House, 1999): 24.
[8] Lt Gen PC Katoch, “Economic Warfare – Nuances in 21st Century,” Journal of the Centre for Joint Warfare Studies (Dec 2014).
[9] Daniel Immerwahr, How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2019): 215 - 227; 298 - 336; Greg Castillo, “Domesticating the Cold War: Household COnsumption as Propaganda in Marshall Plan Germany,” Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 40 (2005): 261 - 288.
[10] Yangbin Chen, “From ‘Lamb Kebabs’ to ‘Shared Joy’: Cultural Appropriation, Ignorance and the Constrained COnnectivity within the ‘One Belt, One Road’ Initiative,” Journal of Contemporary China, Vol 29 (2020): 1 - 16; Andrei Miroiu, “Deportations and Counterinsurgency,” Studia Politica, Romain Political Science Review, Vol 2 (2015): 177 - 194.
[11] Daniel Hughes and Andrew Colarik, “Small State Acquisition of Offensive Cyberwarfare Capabilities: Towards Building an Analytical Framework,” Intelligence and Security Informatics (2016): 166 – 179.
[12] Simone Dossi, “On the asymmetric advantages of cyberwarfare: Western literature and the Chinese Journal Guofang Keji,” Journal of Strategic Studies, Vol 43, Iss 2, (2020): 281-308.
[13] Thomas Rid, Active Measures: The Secret History of Disinformation and Political Warfare (New York: Picador 2020): 61 -134.
[14] Thomas Rid, Active Measures: The Secret History of Disinformation and Political Warfare (New York: Picador 2020): 367.
[15] David C. Gompert and Martin C. Libicki, “Decoding the Breach: The Truth About the CENTCOM Hack,” The RAND Blog, February 3, 2015.
[16] Tomohisa Hattori, “Reconceptualizing Foreign Aid,” Review of International Political Economy, Vol 8 (2001): 633 - 660.
[17] Jennifer Hillman and Alex Tippett, “Who Built That? Labor and the Belt and Road Initiative,” Council on Foreign Relations, July 6, 2021.
[18] Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui, Unrestricted Warfare (People’s Liberation Army Publishing House, 1999): 206.
[19] Kang-Chun Cheng, “Chinese Businesses are at the Forefront of Environmental Change in Africa,” Quartz Africa, July 20, 2022.
[20] Hongying Wang & Yeh-Chung Lu, “The Conception of Soft Power and its Policy Implications: a comparative study of China and Taiwan,” Journal of Contemporary China, Vol. 47, Iss. 56, (2008): 425-447
[21] Kenneth Osgood, Total Cold War: Eisenhower’s Secret Propaganda Battle at Home and Abroad (University Press of Kansas 2006).
[22] Andrew Dowse and Sascha Dov Bachmann, “Information warfare: methods to counter disinformation,” Defense & Security Analysis (Sep 2022).