Operational Change and American Grand Strategy in the Context of the China Challenge

Abstract

With fiscal pressures at home and China’s continued rise abroad, the United States shows no signs of wanting to reverse its costly grand strategy of deep engagement. In the context of America’s relative decline, we evaluate existing proposals to ease pressures on the United States. We argue that the key aspects of American decline are in fact often operational rather than strategic in nature, consequently the undifferentiated fashion in which rise and decline is often presented is neither useful in describing current changes nor in proposing how to address them. Problems at the operational level do not necessarily demand higher-level strategic level alterations. As such, while restructured forms of deep engagement will help alleviate resource constraints in the medium to long term, their utility in addressing the operational changes brought on by relative decline are less apparent. Given that resource constraints are therefore not necessarily the primary concern, the major strategic elements of American deep engagement are more durable than commonly supposed. America’s current strategic objectives are not constrained by changes brought on by its relative material decline with respect to China, but by changes in the operational environment.