Stephen Roach rightly invokes Sun Tzu. History supports the warning: once force is required to settle outcomes, strategy has already failed.
Since 1945, American military power has been tactically formidable but strategically inconclusive. No major conflict has produced decisive victory followed by durable stability. Tactical dominance repeatedly failed to deliver strategic closure.
That record matters. A tactically successful extraction in Venezuela is not a strategic victory, nor evidence of capacity in a peer kinetic conflict. Precision against weak or isolated regimes does not translate into durable order at scale.
The constraint is structural, not moral. As Max Weber observed, the state rests on its monopoly of legitimate violence. Growing reliance on quasi-paramilitary enforcement in the land of the brave and the home of the free signals strain in that monopoly, weakening credibility abroad.
Against this backdrop, China does not need to invade Taiwan. A gradual tightening of critical supply chains would erode Taiwanese capability and American political will below the threshold of war, underscoring a defining reality of contemporary power: control over inputs now matters more than control over territory.
At what point does China realize they have married a very weak partner. Russian defensive weapons were useless and Putin didn’t do anything for Maduro. Zip. Nada. Nothing.
Fiona Hill reminds us of a Russian proposal to Trump 1.0 to give Trump a free hand In Venezuela in return for the same in Ukraine. Is this the deal in play now?
If China wants to be taken as a serious player globally they function as an independent player untethered from Putin’s anchor.
China has fought well in Korea and Vietnam which were short burst actions with little opposition. It would be quite the test to go up against the US, however, that assumes Trump 2.0 wants to even put up a fight.
China’s unlimited partnership with Russia is certainly problematic, to say the least. Trump’s pro-Putin stance is a far more serious problem. The “deal” on a Venezuela-Ukraine swap is a non-starter for many reasons.
Stephen Roach rightly invokes Sun Tzu. History supports the warning: once force is required to settle outcomes, strategy has already failed.
Since 1945, American military power has been tactically formidable but strategically inconclusive. No major conflict has produced decisive victory followed by durable stability. Tactical dominance repeatedly failed to deliver strategic closure.
That record matters. A tactically successful extraction in Venezuela is not a strategic victory, nor evidence of capacity in a peer kinetic conflict. Precision against weak or isolated regimes does not translate into durable order at scale.
The constraint is structural, not moral. As Max Weber observed, the state rests on its monopoly of legitimate violence. Growing reliance on quasi-paramilitary enforcement in the land of the brave and the home of the free signals strain in that monopoly, weakening credibility abroad.
Against this backdrop, China does not need to invade Taiwan. A gradual tightening of critical supply chains would erode Taiwanese capability and American political will below the threshold of war, underscoring a defining reality of contemporary power: control over inputs now matters more than control over territory.
Brilliant. Thank you for taking the time to clarify the critical distinction between tactics and strategy
At what point does China realize they have married a very weak partner. Russian defensive weapons were useless and Putin didn’t do anything for Maduro. Zip. Nada. Nothing.
Fiona Hill reminds us of a Russian proposal to Trump 1.0 to give Trump a free hand In Venezuela in return for the same in Ukraine. Is this the deal in play now?
If China wants to be taken as a serious player globally they function as an independent player untethered from Putin’s anchor.
China has fought well in Korea and Vietnam which were short burst actions with little opposition. It would be quite the test to go up against the US, however, that assumes Trump 2.0 wants to even put up a fight.
China’s unlimited partnership with Russia is certainly problematic, to say the least. Trump’s pro-Putin stance is a far more serious problem. The “deal” on a Venezuela-Ukraine swap is a non-starter for many reasons.