Just Say No: The Pentagon Needs to Drop the Distractions and Move Great Power Competition Beyond Lip Service
Mackenzie Eaglen
October 28, 2019
We’ve all heard a lot about the pivot to great power competition during this administration, but is it all talk? It’s looking that way. The Department of Defense keeps adding new missions and functions only tangentially related to its purported core role.
The Pentagon can’t seem to shed missions and requirements to better focus on great powers — especially China. For example, the military is building back up in the Middle East to deter Iran (not a great power by any definition), negating the benefits of a modest troop withdrawal in Syria. If civilian and military leaders want to successfully implement the National Defense Strategy, as they say they do, then they ought to do a better job protecting the force from the piling on of new missions and broadening of old ones.
And it needs to start at the top with Secretary of Defense Mark Esper.
https://warontherocks.com/2019/10/just-say-no-the-pentagon-needs-to-drop-the-distractions-and-move-great-power-competition-beyond-lip-service/
