Dueling with Dragons and Sparring with Snakes: US Strategy in an Era of Varied Threats
Kelsey Worley | September 2, 2020
What do bicycles, Syrian refuges, synthetic opioid fentanyl, hotel acquisitions, Android phones, Djiboutian ports, fishing boats, and African coups have to do with each other? They are all elements of how opponents of the United States and its Western allies have learned and adapted since the Soviet Union collapsed and the era of American unipolarity began. This is the subject of David Kilcullen’s latest book, The Dragons and the Snakes: How the Rest Learned to Fight the West. The book’s title plays on former CIA Director James Woosley’s 1993 warning to Congress about the post–Cold War challenges ahead: “We have slain a large dragon. But we live now in a jungle filled with a bewildering variety of poisonous snakes.†Kilcullen describes today’s strategic environment as one in which America and its allies face the emergence of dragons, large (China and Russia) and small (North Korea and Iran), while at the same time must continue to deal with the threat of terrorism and Woosley’s other snakes.
For anyone who has read the US National Security Strategy or National Defense Strategy—or who has not been living under a rock for the past decade—Kilcullen’s cast of characters should not come as a surprise. But that is the sad part, really. Despite these strategic documents’ emphasis on both dragons and snakes, we continue to be “blindsided†Kilcullen writes, “with new subversive, hybrid, and clandestine techniques of war.†That is because “our existing military model [is] ineffective [and] maladaptive.â€
https://mwi.usma.edu/dueling-with-dragons-and-sparring-with-snakes-us-strategy-in-an-era-of-varied-threats/
