FORWARD PRESENCE, PARTNERSHIP, AND DETERRENCE: THE US ARMY IN THE INDO-PACIFIC
Ben Blane and Christopher Lee | 04.10.24
Forward Presence, Partnership, and Deterrence: The US Army in the Indo-Pacific
Almost immediately after Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, observers began exploring how it would affect regional stability halfway around the world. The People’s Republic of China (PRC), it was said, was watching the war unfold. And Beijing was learning lessons from it. Would Taiwan be the next state targeted by an aggressive neighbor? Or, as some analysis concluded, would Russia’s struggles in Ukraine serve as a cautionary tale, discouraging military action to forcefully seize Taiwan?
More than two years into the war in Ukraine, there is little evidence that the grinding, attritional character it has taken on has diminished Beijing’s determination to bring Taipei under its control. In fact, as Admiral John C. Aquilino, the senior US military commander in the Indo-Pacific, recently told the Senate Armed Services Committee, the PRC’s increased military buildup and modernization efforts indicate readiness for an invasion of Taiwan as early as 2027. Given that assessment, it is crucial that the United States is able to achieve integrated deterrence against the PRC. But what enables effective deterrence? As General Charles A. Flynn, commander of US Army Pacific, has described, deterrence has four components—capability, posture, signaling, and will. An examination of these four components, informed by an appreciation of the lessons on display in the war in Ukraine, reveals the keys to achieving integrated deterrence in the Indo-Pacific region—and how the US Army can best contribute to it.
Capabilities and Forward Posture: The Keys to All-Domain Advantage
The first two components of strong deterrence, capability and posture, are closely linked to one another and best explored in tandem. The US Army’s posture and positions of advantage in theater must be understood relative to the capabilities of the pacing threat. Strategic standoff, once a concept related purely to kinetic fires, has taken on a new definition with the PRC’s continued development and integration of enhanced intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, and nonkinetic (primarily space and cyber) capabilities. As the PRC expands the range and reach of its operational capabilities, it continues to increase its positions of advantage and the likelihood that it can “win without fighting.”
https://mwi.westpoint.edu/forward-presence-partnership-and-deterrence-the-us-army-in-the-indo-pacific/
