Assessing the Defense Capabilities of Key US Allies and Security Partners

394 Pages·2015·4.27 MB·English

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Strategic Studies Institute
and
U.S. Army War College Press
A HARD LOOK AT HARD POWER:
ASSESSING THE DEFENSE CAPABILITIES OF
KEY U.S. ALLIES AND SECURITY PARTNERS
Gary J. Schmitt
Editor
July 2015
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CONTENTS
Foreword ....................................................................vii
1. Introduction ………………………......................... 1
Gary J. Schmitt
2. Italian Hard Power: Ambitions
and Fiscal Realities.................................................. 5
Gary J. Schmitt
3. Australian Defense in the Era of Austerity:
Mind the Expectation Gap …...............................35
Andrew Shearer
4. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization
at Sea: Trends in Allied Naval Power .............…67
Bryan McGrath

5. German Hard Power:
Is There a There There? …………………….....…95
Patrick Keller
6. South Korea: Responding to the
North Korean Threat ...........................................119
Bruce E. Bechtol
7. Polish Hard Power: Investing in
the Military as Europe Cuts Back …………......149
Andrew A. Michta
8. French Hard Power: Living
on the Strategic Edge …………………………...173
Dorothée Fouchaux
v
9. Taiwanese Hard Power: Between a ROC
and a Hard Place ………………….....................201
Michael Mazza
10. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s
Land Forces: Losing Ground ………...............231
Guillaume Lasconjarias
11. United Kingdom Hard Power:
Strategic Ambivalence ……………………...…257
Paul Cornish
12. Pooling and Sharing: The Effort to
Enhance Allied Defense Capabilities ….........287
W. Bruce Weinrod
13. Japanese Hard Power: Rising
to the Challenge ……………………………….315
Toshi Yoshihara
14. North Atlantic Treaty Organization
Air Power: A Self-Reliant Europe? ..…...........351
Craig Franklin
About the Contributors ...........................................381
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FOREWORD
Since the end of World War II, the United States
has made maintaining a favorable balance of power
in Eurasia a core element of its national security strat-
egy. It did so in good measure by maintaining a large
conventional military force that was based not only
at home, but also in bases spread across Europe and
Asia. That strategy was buttressed by developing se-
curity ties and alliances with key powers and front-
line states. The implicit bargain was that the United
States would help keep the peace on their door front
if they would provide access from which American
forces could operate and, in turn, maintain credible
forces themselves to reinforce and support U.S. efforts
at keeping the great power peace.
The question raised by this collection of essays is:
Is that bargain unraveling? As the following chapters
note, since the end of the great power threat posed by
the Soviet Union, both the United States and its prin-
cipal allies have seen fit to cut the size of their forces
substantially and, in most cases, slowed efforts at re-
placing military systems and platforms. The quanda-
ry many of America’s allies have faced is, on the one
hand, reforming their militaries to make them more
expeditionary and useful for addressing various secu-
rity problems—such as piracy, terrorism, and the in-
stability brought about by collapsing regimes. On the
other hand, not having the political resources at home
to prioritize defense spending in the face of domestic
demands and, more recently, faltering economies are
also problems that need to be considered. The result is
smaller, half-modernized militaries with often signifi-
cant gaps in key capabilities.
The strategic problem is that, while its allies and
partners have shrunk their militaries, so too has the
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United States. It no longer retains a military sized to
handle multiple major contingencies at once as it once
did and is now facing the prospect of not only con-
tinuing to deal with large-scale disorder within the
Middle East but also the problematic behavior of two
major military powers, China and Russia. In short, at
a time when the United States needs the most help, the
prospects for receiving it, with the exception of a few
allies, look more worrisome than at any point since
perhaps the immediate aftermath of World War II.
A Hard Look at Hard Power provides in-depth analy-
sis of the state of key allied militaries. It could not be
more timely.

DOUGLAS C. LOVELACE, JR.
Director
Strategic Studies Institute and
U.S. Army War College Press
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