Tag: Alliance

China’s ‘New Type of Security Partnership’ in Asia and Beyond: A challenge to the Alliance System and the ‘Indo-pacific’ Strategy

Image courtesy of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office/Flickr. (CC BY 2.0)

This analysis1  was originally published by the Elcano Royal Institute on 26 March 2019.

Since 2013 China has clearly called for the creation of a new security architecture in Asia. The May 2015 white paper on China’s military strategy explicitly advocates promoting ‘the establishment of a regional framework for security and cooperation’. This call was reaffirmed in October 2016 and detailed further in China’s white paper, published in January 2017, on security cooperation in Asia-Pacific. Since then, Chinese officials have repeatedly declared, one way or another, that the region needs to be restructured. On 16 February 2019, at the 55th Munich Security Conference, Politburo member Yang Jiechi declared that ‘China supports security dialogue among the Asia-Pacific countries and efforts to explore a regional security vision and architecture that fits the reality of this region’. 2

Continue reading “China’s ‘New Type of Security Partnership’ in Asia and Beyond: A challenge to the Alliance System and the ‘Indo-pacific’ Strategy”
Categories
CSS Blog

From Cooperation to Confrontation

EmailFacebookTwitter

This graphic tracks how American opinions of Russia and Russian opinions of the United States have developed over time. To find out more about how these developments influenced Europe’s post-Cold War security architecture, see Christian Nünlist’s chapter in Strategic Trends 2017 here. For more CSS charts, maps and graphics, click here.

The US Shouldn’t Go to War with China over Taiwan—and Nor Should Australia

Image courtesy of Kaila Peters/DVIDS.

This article was originally published in The Strategist by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute on 13 February 2019.

Paul Dibb, in his recent Strategist post, writes that America’s strategic position in Asia would be fatally undermined if it didn’t go to war with China if China attacked Taiwan, and that Australia’s alliance with America would be fatally undermined if we didn’t then go to war with China too. The conclusion he draws is that, in the event of an unprovoked Chinese attack on Taiwan, America should go to war with China, and so should Australia.

Continue reading “The US Shouldn’t Go to War with China over Taiwan—and Nor Should Australia”

Extended (Nuclear?) Deterrence: What’s in a Word?

Image courtesy of DVIDS/Ronald Gutridge

This article was originally published by the ASPI’s The Strategist on 22 January 2019.

Over recent years, a somewhat geeky debate has emerged among the exponents of deterrence and assurance. Although the discussion typically occurs between Americans and nationals of an allied country, it’s overly simplistic to describe it as one between the US and its allies—the divisions aren’t that clear-cut.

The debate is part philosophical and part phraseological. At its core sits a single adjective. Some Americans (including policymakers) say that what the US offers its allies is ‘extended deterrence’. But a number of allied nationals (again, including policymakers) find the phrase underwhelming; they’d prefer that it read ‘extended nuclear deterrence’. And so we come directly to the crux of the argument: the presence or absence of the word ‘nuclear’ in the assurance that the US provides to its allies.

Continue reading “Extended (Nuclear?) Deterrence: What’s in a Word?”
Categories
CSS Blog

Swiss Attitudes toward Security Alliances

Click image to enlarge

EmailFacebookTwitter

This graphic of the week tracks how the Swiss public’s attitude toward security alliances has developed over the past 30 years. To find out more about long-term trends and tendencies in Swiss public opinion on foreign, security, and defense policy issues, see here (in German). For more CSS charts, maps and graphics on defense policy, click here.