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291. France and European defence: Continuity in long-term objectives, change in strategy

Author:
Pernille Reiker
Publication Date:
12-2018
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Finnish Institute of International Affairs
Abstract:
While the overall ambition (grandeur and status-seeking) in French foreign policy has been surprisingly stable, different strategies and approaches have been adopted. The French approach over the past 15 to 20 years has been to focus on status-seeking through legitimacy, and we have seen a gradual shift towards a French foreign policy that is increasingly guided by international law and multilateralism. There are also elements of both continuity and change in French ambitions for European defence. While the long-term ambition is the same, the French approach towards European defence has changed from being concerned with developing the defence structures within the EU (“Europe de la defence”) to becoming more concerned with the need to strengthen the European capacity to act. Different types of French initiatives over the past decades – within or outside the European Union – must all be seen as ways of strengthening the European defence capacity: The French return to NATO’s International Military Staff in 2009, the French-British defence cooperation from 2010, the French-German initiative to set up the Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO), and the recent French initiative to launch a European Intervention Initiative (EI2).
Topic:
Defense Policy, Regional Cooperation, Military Strategy, and European Union
Political Geography:
Europe and France

292. Finland's defence cooperation: The ‘no a priori limits’ approach with Sweden should be a model for other cooperation efforts

Author:
Charly Salonius-Pasternak and Henri Vanahanen
Publication Date:
12-2018
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Finnish Institute of International Affairs
Abstract:
Finland’s efforts to weave a web of bi- and multilateral defence cooperation have developed faster than anticipated. Yet cooperation with Sweden is unique, partially because limits have not been set a priori on what cooperation could entail. Finland should formally adopt this ‘no a priori limits’ approach throughout its other defence cooperation relationships.
Topic:
Defense Policy, International Cooperation, Military Strategy, and Multilateralism
Political Geography:
Europe and Finland

293. European Defence: Give PESCO a Chance

Author:
Sven Biscop
Publication Date:
06-2018
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
EGMONT - The Royal Institute for International Relations
Abstract:
At their 1998 Saint-Malo Summit, the UK and France initiated the creation of a military arm for the European Union, now known as the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP). Ever since, EU member states have consistently claimed that more cooperation between their armed forces is the only way to significantly increase military capability. Successive projects have been proposed, yet none has ever really been implemented.Sceptics can therefore be forgiven for eyeing the EU’s latest initiative, known as Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO), with some suspicion – not least because the EU has already tried and failed to activate PESCO, in 2010 after the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty.
Topic:
Defense Policy, NATO, Regional Cooperation, Military Strategy, and European Union
Political Geography:
Europe, North Atlantic, and North America

294. Strategic deterrence redux: Nuclear weapons and European security

Author:
Leo Michel and Matti Pesu
Publication Date:
09-2018
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Finnish Institute of International Affairs
Abstract:
One of the most notable consequences of the end of the Cold War was the diminished role of nuclear weapons in international relations. The world’s primary nuclear weapon powers, the United States and the Russian Federation, made considerable reductions in their nuclear forces. The climax of the process was the New START Treaty signed in 2010. Now, the optimism that characterized the first decades of the post-Cold War era is rapidly evaporating. Geopolitical competition again dominates global and regional security dynamics. Nuclear powers are modernizing their forces and introducing novel systems that may affect strategic stability. At the same time, existing arms control regimes are crumbling. This report takes stock of recent developments in deterrence in general, and nuclear deterrence in particular. Its main ambition is to understand how deterrence has changed in light of certain post-Cold War trends. To this end, the report introduces the basic principles of deterrence. It also explores the nuclear-related policies and capabilities of the four nuclear weapon states most directly involved in European security affairs – Russia, the United States, France, and the United Kingdom. Importantly, the report also analyses the implications of the recent trends in strategic deterrence for Northern Europe. This report is part of a research project conducted by the FIIA entitled ‘New Challenges for Strategic Deterrence in the 21st Century’. The project is part of the implementation of the Government Plan for Analysis, Assessment and Research 2018.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, Arms Control and Proliferation, Diplomacy, Nuclear Weapons, Military Strategy, and Deterrence
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, United Kingdom, Europe, France, and North America

295. Breaking the Defense Barrier

Author:
Arthur Herman
Publication Date:
03-2018
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Hudson Institute
Abstract:
The key to strengthening and deepening the U.S.-Japan alliance in order to better meet regional threats is to increase defense trade and defense industrial cooperation between the two countries. A Defense Trade Cooperation Treaty (DTCT), a formal agreement between two countries which exempts their trade in certain specified defense and defense-related articles from the arms export regulations of both nations, would be an important way to achieve that goal.
Topic:
International Relations, Defense Policy, Treaties and Agreements, Bilateral Relations, and Trade
Political Geography:
East Asia, Asia, North America, and United States of America

296. The U.S.-Japan Alliance: Significance and Role

Author:
Seth Cropsey and Jun Isomura
Publication Date:
04-2018
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Hudson Institute
Abstract:
The alliance between the United States and Japan, born at the end of the Second World War, continues to play a vital role in the defense of the Japanese Islands and in U.S. regional Indo-Pacific strategy. The People’s Republic of China is challenging the U.S.-Japan alliance in the Indo-Pacific Region. China has greatly increased its defense budget, expanded and modernized its navy, and increased operations that challenge the region’s status quo—including in the East China Sea, where the PRC regularly violates Japan’s territorial waters, in the vicinity of the contested Senkaku Islands. China’s belligerent behavior poses a strategic threat to Japan’s domestic security and will continue to encroach on Japanese and U.S. interests in the region. The PRC’s threatening behavior and an aggressive nuclear-armed North Korea are testing the U.S.-Japan bilateral alliance as it has not been tested since the Cold War. The United States continues to serve as a guarantor of Japan’s national security. The U.S. military has stationed naval, air force, army, and amphibious forces in Japan as a strategic deterrent against would be aggressors. With U.S. forces in Japan as a deterrent, Japan has developed a pacifist strategy based on non-aggression and security limited to self-defense. The Japanese constitution’s Article 9 enshrined this principle into law. Japan’s regional strategy has paid dividends through political, diplomatic, and economic engagement with Indo-Pacific countries. This includes Japan’s increasing defensive security cooperation in the region. The Japanese Self-Defense Forces have participated alongside the United States and such neighboring states as South Korea in bilateral and multilateral exercises that build both capabilities and security relationships. Beyond diplomatic and soft power engagement, Japan has in recent years increased its defensive capabilities. To counter Chinese and North Korean missile threats, Japan has worked with the United States to build an advanced ballistic missile defense. In addition, the Japanese Self-Defense Forces have acquired medium-range cruise missiles for its air forces to deter potential adversaries from launching attacks. Tokyo has expanded its defense to counter challenges below the threshold of war against Japan’s outlying islands. Improved intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance and the establishment of amphibious forces contribute to this defense.
Topic:
International Relations, Defense Policy, National Security, Bilateral Relations, and Alliance
Political Geography:
Japan, China, Asia, North America, and United States of America

297. U.S.-Japan Cooperation on Strategic Island Defense

Author:
Seth Cropsey and Jun Isomura
Publication Date:
09-2018
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Hudson Institute
Abstract:
Japan’s southwest island chain, an archipelago of 1,200 kilometers (750 miles), is known as the Ryukyu Islands. Along with Taiwan and the Philippines, it comprises what the People’s Republic of China (PRC) perceives as the first of three strategic island chains. To China, these island chains represent geostrategic impediments to Pacific Ocean expansion and power projection, which its adversaries—including the United States and Japan—might use to counter Chinese aggression in a conflict. In particular, the first island chain represents the first geostrategic hurdle for the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) as it seeks access to sea lanes in the Pacific and Indian Oceans. Two of China’s three PLAN fleet bases are located on the East China Sea. To reach the South China Sea and the Pacific, ships or aircraft from these bases must transit through the choke points of the Taiwan or Miyako Straits, the latter passage through the Ryukyus. Japan’s southwest islands pose a significant strategic and operational challenge for China, and thus their defense is equally strategically and operationally important for Japan. China, to achieve its goal of global superpower status by the mid-twenty-first century, has sought to contest and change the status quo across the Indo-Pacific region by constructing and arming islands from the South China Sea to the East China Sea and beyond. As part of this effort, the PRC has expanded and modernized its armed forces. The immediate objective is to neutralize what Chinese rulers regard as the threat of the first island chain. This has included building a larger and more advanced surface fleet and air force, including the country’s first aircraft carrier, as well as advanced destroyers and more advanced aircraft. It also involves developing and expanding China’s amphibious assault capabilities by means of a larger and more capable PLAN Marine Corps, along with more amphibious warships, amphibious aircraft, and amphibious assault vehicles. In the PRC’s crosshairs is not only Taiwan, the keystone of the first island chain and a vigorous democracy, but also the Senkaku Islands of Japan, whose sovereignty the PRC contests, and the Ryukyu Islands. Any Chinese invasion of Taiwan or military attempt to assert sovereignty over the Senkaku Islands runs the risk of drawing the United States and Japan into a conflict with the PRC. The U.S.-Japan alliance obliges the United States to defend Japan and its sovereign islands. Both countries maintain a security presence in the Ryukyus, principally on the island of Okinawa, where the U.S. Marine Corps (USMC) maintains a nineteen-thousand-strong force, alongside U.S. Air Force, Army, and Navy units. The Japanese Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) and Coast Guard also maintain ground, maritime, and aviation elements on Okinawa and conduct regular air and sea patrols throughout Japan’s southwest islands. In keeping with constitutional restrictions that limit Japan’s security forces to self-defense, Japan’s Ministry of Defense has also recently sought to bolster the country’s amphibious capabilities to counter potential Chinese aggression. In the face of a rising PRC challenge, the United States and Japan have in recent years streamlined and strengthened their security cooperation. This has included participation in bilateral and multilateral exercises to improve interoperability at tactical and operational levels. In addition, the 2015 creation of an alliance coordination mechanism (ACM) provides guidelines for the U.S. and Japanese governments to coordinate defense cooperation, including the defense of Japan’s outlying islands, at a policy level. However, the two countries still lack an integrated means—at the bilateral or multilateral level—to coordinate operations in response to regional contingencies.
Topic:
Defense Policy, International Cooperation, Military Strategy, Bilateral Relations, and Alliance
Political Geography:
Japan, Asia-Pacific, and United States of America

298. Journal of Advanced Military Studies: Superpowers

Author:
Ed Erickson, Christian H. Heller, T. J. Linzy, Mallory Needleman, Michael Auten, Anthony N. Celso, Keith D. Dickson, Jamie Shea, Ivan Falasca, Steven A. Yeadon, Joshua Tallis, and Ian Klaus
Publication Date:
09-2018
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Advanced Military Studies
Institution:
Marine Corps University Press, National Defense University
Abstract:
There are a variety of reasons to study geopolitical rivalries, and analysts, officers, and politicians are rediscovering such reasons amid the tensions of the last several years. The best reason to study geopolitical rivalries is the simplest: our need to better understand how power works globally. Power not only recurs in human and state affairs but it is also at their very core. Today’s new lexicon—superpower, hyperpower, and great power—is only another reminder of the reality of the various ways that power manifests itself. Power protects and preserves, but a polity without it may be lost within mere decades. Keith D. Dickson’s article in this issue of MCU Journal, “The Challenge of the Sole Superpower in the Postmodern World Order,” illuminates how fuzzy some readers may be in their understanding of this problem; his article on postmodernism calls us to the labor of understanding and reasoning through the hard realities. Ed Erickson’s survey of modern power is replete with cases in which a grand state simply fell, as from a pedestal in a crash upon a stone floor. Modern Japan, always richly talented, rose suddenly as a world actor in the late nineteenth century, but the Japanese Empire fell much more quickly in the mid-twentieth century. A state’s power—or lack thereof—is an unforgiving reality. This issue of MCU Journal, with its focus on rivalries and competition between states, is refreshingly broad in its selection of factors—from competing for or generating power. Dr. Erickson recalls that Alfred Thayer Mahan settled on six conditions for sea power, all still vital. Other authors writing for this issue emphasize, by turns, sea power (Steven Yeadon, Joshua Tallis, and Ian Klaus); cyberpower (Jamie Shea); alliances (T. J. Linzy and Ivan Falasca); information (Dickson); and proxies (Michael Auten, Anthony N. Celso, and others).
Topic:
Security, Foreign Policy, Defense Policy, NATO, Islam, Terrorism, War, History, Power Politics, Military Affairs, European Union, Seapower, Cities, Ottoman Empire, Hybrid Warfare, Cyberspace, Soviet Union, and Safavid Empire
Political Geography:
Britain, Russia, Europe, Ukraine, Middle East, Lithuania, Georgia, North Africa, Syria, North America, and United States of America

299. The Global Exchange (Spring 2017)

Author:
David J. Bercuson, Randolph Mank, Sarah Goldfeder, Mike Day, David Perry, Peter Jones, David Carment, Milana V. Nikolko, Brett Boudreau, Rolf Holmboe, Darren Schemmer, Andrew Griffith, and Robert Vineberg
Publication Date:
03-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
The Global Exchange
Institution:
Canadian Global Affairs Institute (CGAI)
Abstract:
The Global Exchange is the Canadian Global Affairs Institute’s quarterly magazine featuring topical articles written by our fellows and other contributing experts. Each issue contains approximately a dozen articles exploring political and strategic challenges in international affairs and Canadian foreign and defence policy. This Spring 2017 issue includes articles on trade, defense policy, elections and more.
Topic:
Defense Policy, War, Bilateral Relations, Budget, Elections, Democracy, Negotiation, Peace, and Trade
Political Geography:
Russia, Ukraine, Canada, Syria, North America, United States of America, and Gambia

300. The Global Exchange (Summer 2017)

Author:
David J. Bercuson, Hugh Stephens, Robert Hage, Robert Huebert, Stefanie Von Hlatky, Lindsay Rodman, Stephen M. Saideman, Hugh Segal, and Vanja Petricevic
Publication Date:
06-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
The Global Exchange
Institution:
Canadian Global Affairs Institute (CGAI)
Abstract:
The Global Exchange is the Canadian Global Affairs Institute’s quarterly magazine featuring topical articles written by our fellows and other contributing experts. Each issue contains approximately a dozen articles exploring political and strategic challenges in international affairs and Canadian foreign and defence policy. This Summer 2017 issue covers trade deals, human rights, defense, cybersecurity and more.
Topic:
Defense Policy, NATO, Human Rights, Territorial Disputes, Cybersecurity, Trans-Pacific Partnership, Free Trade, Transparency, and Deterrence
Political Geography:
China, Europe, Canada, North America, and Arctic