Consider Foreign Policy in This Election: Victory is Not Assured

In 2020, as a corporal in the U.S. Marine Corps (USMC), I attended the Weapons and Tactics Instructor (WTI) course in Yuma, Arizona. The Marine Aircraft and Weapons Training Squadron (MAWTS-1) describes the course as the most comprehensive graduate-level aviation course in the world today which serves “highly experienced and fully qualified officers from all [USMC] aviation communities.” This WTI course was unique as it was the first year a new course of instruction — designed specifically for a potential conflict with China — was implemented. 

For the next two months, I sat through 12-hour days of PowerPoints, helped plan complex mission simulations and performed dozens of day-and-night training flights preparing for conflict with a powerful adversary. This experience was my first exposure to the reality that the U.S. was entering into a new global relationship. No longer were we the undisputed power of air, sea and land. Now, I knew it was possible that, in the future, I could find myself somewhere in the South Pacific — one tiny piece of a losing war against China. 

These experiences and the rapidly destabilizing global situation we see today have led me to believe this: A strong military, defense industrial base and foreign policy are necessary if the U.S. is to avoid a future in which its battles are no longer domestic, but existential. 

The best way to prevent war is deterrence. I urge you: before you go to the polls this election, make sure you are informed on matters of foreign policy. 

For the past decade, domestic issues have been the primary political driver in the U.S.; questions around civil rights, economic inequality and immigration echo loudly in our national consciousness. As our country has grappled with these issues and sought to reconcile itself with a complicated and often destructive history, we have grown apathetic toward issues playing out on the global stage. 

In recent years, while the U.S. has drawn progressively inward, nationalistic aggression worldwide has reached a level unseen since the 1930s. For example, the WSJ reported in September that the death toll in the Russo-Ukraine conflict recently surpassed one million — and the war continues to grind on bitterly. The Israel-Palestine conflict, which has burned steadily since the early 20th century, exploded to an unprecedented level of aggression in October of 2023. One year later, it continues to threaten to escalate into a broader regional and potentially international conflict. In South America, Venezuela openly considers annexing Guyana, and the U.S. military looks anxiously on as a Chinese invasion of Taiwan appears ever more imminent. 

Following the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the subsequent fall of the Iron Curtain which separated East from West, the U.S. emerged as the world's economic, military and cultural superpower. In the same year, the U.S. invaded Iraq in response to Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait. In a conflict now known as the Gulf War, U.S. and coalition forces utterly destroyed the entire Iraqi military apparatus in only 100 hours. 

Besides cementing the U.S. as a hegemonic power in the Middle East, this war served as a chilling warning to China. Like Iraq, they’d equipped their military with Soviet armaments — which wholly failed a trial by combat against American forces, according to the U.S. Naval Institute. Meanwhile, in the West, the U.S. celebrated “the end of history” and the period of Pax Americana — American peace — brought on by the unquestionable superiority of the American military and economy. Additionally, after the national horror of Sept. 11, the U.S. used attack helicopters, laser-guided bombs, night vision and drones to conduct a protracted air and ground war against an insurgent force — armed primarily with Soviet-era weapons. 

While America spent hundreds of billions of dollars shaping its military to fight a war against a severely under-equipped foe, China raced to modernize its military, aggressively expanding industrial capacity and acquiring military technology. 

Since 2016, both the Trump and Biden presidencies have emphasized the importance of the competition that has emerged between the U.S. and China in the 21st century — Trump in his 2017 National Security Strategy (NSS) and Biden, more recently in his 2022 NSS. 

Indeed, the Department of Defense now considers China a near-peer adversary, meaning it can almost match U.S. military power in many respects — though whether China is a near-peer or peer adversary is up for debate. 

In response, the USMC has radically reshaped its fighting capabilities, beginning a long transition from a counter-insurgency force to a lean, mobile, amphibious force that can fight effectively against Chinese naval assets in the Indo-Pacific. Despite this push, the U.S.’s military and defense industrial base as a whole remains woefully unprepared for a hot war with China. 

This destabilizing and fragmenting global situation we are witnessing today demands that the U.S. places its attention outside its borders and onto the international stage. Before you cast your vote this election, make sure you are informed on foreign policy — because victory is not assured. 

To learn about campaign promises — including matters of foreign policy — made by the Trump and Harris campaigns, visit https://www.politifact.com/article/2024/sep/30/donald-trumps-2024-campaign-promises-heres-his-vis/ and https://www.politifact.com/article/2024/sep/30/kamala-harris-2024-campaign-promises-here-are-her/. 

To learn more about the strategies that either presidential candidate is likely to adopt against China, visit https://substack.com/home/post/p-150334575?source=queue.