A new strategic mindset

Abstract

‘Without doubt, this is the right book at exactly the right time! Despite COVID's media predominance, the dangers to our freedom have not simply faded away; quite the opposite. With their novel analysis piercing through the layers of Germany's strategic wavering, Giegerich and Terhalle demonstrate precisely that. For anyone aiming at taking over executive responsibility for Berlin's foreign and security policy after the federal elections in September 2021, this is a must-read.’

Friedrich Merz, Member of the German Bundestag (1994-2009), Chief Whip and Minority Leader (2000-02) and member of the CDU/CSU Government Team for the 2021 federal elections

‘This is an in-depth study of a crucial topic. Well-argued and well-researched, this book offers an original take on a timely and important subject with broad implications for the future of European and transatlantic security.’

Dr Benedetta Berti, Head of Policy Planning, Office of the Secretary-General, NATO

The rise or resurgence of revisionist, repressive and authoritarian powers threatens the Western, US-led international order upon which Germany's post-war security and prosperity were founded. With Washington increasingly focused on China's rise in Asia, Europe must be able to defend itself against Russia, and will depend upon German military capabilities to do so. Years of neglect and structural underfunding, however, have hollowed out Germany's armed forces. Much of the political leadership in Berlin has not yet adjusted to new realities or appreciated the urgency with which it needs to do so.

In this Adelphi book, Bastian Giegerich and Maximilian Terhalle argue that Germany's current strategic culture is inadequate. It informs a security policy that fails to meet contemporary strategic challenges, thereby endangering Berlin's European allies, the Western order and Germany itself. They contend that Germany should embrace its historic responsibility to defend Western liberal values and the Western order that upholds them. Rather than dogmatically reject the use of military force, Germany should wed its commitment to liberal values to an understanding of the role of power - including military power - in international affairs. Giegerich and Terhalle show why Germany should seek to foster a strategic culture that would be compatible with those of other leading Western nations and allow Germans to perceive the world through a strategic lens. In doing so, they also outline possible elements of a new security policy.

Dr Bastian Giegerich is Director of Defence and Military Analysis at the IISS. He previously worked for the German Federal Ministry of Defence in research and policy roles and is the author and editor of several books on European security and defence matters.

Professor Maximilian Terhalle is affiliated with King's College London. Between 2019 and 2020, he served as Senior Adviser to the UK's Ministry of Defence. Previously, he taught at Columbia and Yale universities' security programmes and undertook field work in China and Egypt. His work focuses on hard security, strategy and world order; he has written or edited seven books and published widely in international newspapers and journals. He is a Lieutenant Colonel (res.) in the Bundeswehr.

Notes

1 Catherine Philp and Didi Tang, ‘We Must Confront Threat of China, Says Nato Chief Jens Stoltenberg’, The Times, 25 March 2021, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/we-must-confront-threat-of-china-says-nato-chief-jens-stoltenberg-fv36m2rr5.

2 For the debate concerning the number of deaths for which Mao Zedong may be responsible, see Ian Johnson, ‘Who Killed More: Hitler, Stalin, or Mao?’, New York Review of Books, 5 February 2018, https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2018/02/05/who-killed-morehitler-stalin-or-mao/. For more recent oppressions committed by the Chinese government, see Sasha Chavkin, ‘China Cables: Who Are the Uighurs and Why Mass Detention?’, International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, 24 November 2019, https://www.icij.org/investigations/china-cables/china-cables-who-are-the-uighurs-and-why-mass-detention/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIuNuRz5S47wIVy-7tCh31Cw31EAMYAiAAEgK9b_D_BwE; Lea Deuber and Reiko Pinkert, ‘Bericht des Auswärtigen Amts beklagt Verfolgung der Uiguren’ [Foreign Office Report Complains About Persecution of the Uighurs], Süddeutsche Zeitung, 31 January 2020, https://www.sued-deutsche.de/politik/auswaertiges-amtchina-uiguren-verfolgung-1.4779614; and James Landale, ‘Uighurs: “Credible case” China Carrying Out Genocide’, BBC, 8 February 2021, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-55973215.

3 Adrienne Klasa et al., ‘Russia’s Long Arm Reaches to the Right in Europe’, Financial Times, 23 May 2019, https://www.ft.com/content/48c4bfa6-7ca2-11e9-81d2-f785092ab560; Susi Dennison and Dina Pardijs, ‘The World According to Europe’s Insurgent Parties: Putin, Migration and People Power’, European Council on Foreign Relations, June 2016, https://ecfr.eu/wp-content/uploads/ecfr_181_-_the_world_according_to_europe_insurgent_parties_new.pdf; and Péter Krekó and Lóránt Győri, ‘From Russia With Hate: The Kremlin’s Support for Violent Extremism in Central Europe’, UkraineAlert, Atlantic Council, 17 May 2017, https://www.atlantic-council.org/blogs/ukrainealert/from-russia-with-hate-the-kremlin-s-support-for-violent-extremism-in-central-europe/.

4 James Kirchick, ‘Russia’s Plot Against the West’, Politico, 17 March 2017, https://www.politico.eu/article/russia-plot-against-the-west-vladimirputin-donald-trump-europe/; Lionel Barber, Henry Foy and Alex Barker, ‘Vladimir Putin Says Liberalism Has “Become Obsolete”’, Financial Times, 28 June 2019, https://www.ft.com/content/670039ec-98f3-11e9-9573-ee-5cbb98ed36; Ivo Daalder, ‘Die Unheilvolle Allianz Gegen die Freiheitliche Weltordnung’ [The Sinister Alliance Against the Liberal World Order], Handelsblatt, 2 August 2019, https://www.handelsblatt.com/politik/konjunktur/research-institute/geopolitische-analyse-die-unheilvolle-allianz-gegen-die-freiheitliche-weltordnung/24856924.html; and Shaun Walker, ‘Syria? Ukraine? Isis? Blame It All On the West’s Rampant “Egotism”, Putin Says’, Guardian, 28 September 2015, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/28/putin-un-general-assembly-speech.

5 Graf, ‘Wahrnehmungen der Bilateralen Beziehungen zu China, Russland und den USA’ [Perceptions of Bilateral Relations With China, Russia and the USA] in Steinbrecher et al., Sicherheits-und ver-teidigungspolitisches Meinungsbild in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland: Ergebnisse und Analysen der Bevölkerungsbefragung 2020 [Security and Defence Policy Opinions in the Federal Republic of Germany: Results and Analysis of the 2020 Population Survey], pp. 74–89, https://www.bundeswehr.de/resource/blob/5036360/dd413dbbd10610484755c6f4fbfbaa93/download-fober-128-data.pdf.

6 Meia Nouwens and Helena Legarda, ‘China’s Rise as a Global Security Actor: Implications for NATO’, China Security Project, IISS and Mercator Institute for China Studies, December 2020, p. 7, https://www.iiss.org/blogs/research-paper/2020/12/chinasrise-as-a-global-security-actor; and Jeffrey Mankoff, ‘Russian Influence Operations in Germany and Their Effect’, Center for Strategic and International Studies, 3 February 2020, https://www.csis.org/analysis/russian-influence-operations-germany-and-their-effect.

7 ‘Europe’s “Sinatra Doctrine” on China’, TheEconomist,11June2020,https://www.economist.com/europe/2020/06/11/europes-sinatra-doctrine-on-china.

8 Josep Borrell, ‘The Sinatra Doctrine: How the EU Should Deal With the US–China Competition’, IAI Papers, Istituto Affari Internazionali, 4 September 2020, p. 7, https://www.iai.it/sites/default/files/iaip2024.pdf.

9 In 2018, Germany exported US$110.5bn of goods to China and imported US$126.8bn. See ‘World Integrated Trade Solution’, World Bank, https://wits.worldbank.org/CountryProfile/en/Country/DEU/Year/LTST/TradeFlow/EXPIMP.

10 Johannes Leithäuser and Michaela Wiegel, ‘Was Sich Frankreich und Deutschland von Joe Biden Erhoffen’ [What France and Germany Hope for From Joe Biden], Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 26 January 2021, https://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/von-trump-zu-biden/was-sich-frankreich-und-deutschland-von-biden-erhoffen-17166015.html.

11 Jost Wübbeke et al., ‘Made in China 2025: The Making of a High-Tech Superpower and Consequences for Industrial Countries’, Mercator Institute for China Studies, 12 August 2016, https://merics.org/en/report/made-china-2025; Zhang Zhihao, ‘AI Development Plan Draws Map for Innovation’, China Daily, 5 August 2019, https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/201908/05/WS5d476b48a310cf3e35563d0d.html; and Hideaki Ryugen and Hiroyuki Akiyama, ‘China Leads the Way on Global Standards for 5G and Beyond’, Financial Times, 4 August 2020, https://www.ft.com/content/858d81bd-c42c-404d-b30d-0be32a097f1c.

12 Agatha Kratz et al., ‘Chinese FDI in Europe: 2019 Update’, Mercator Institute for China Studies, 8 April 2020, https://merics.org/en/report/chinese-fdi-europe-2019-update.

13 Stefan Nicola, ‘China’s Ping An Buys Stake in German Fintech Incubator Finleap’, Bloomberg, 19 November 2018, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-11-19/chinas-ping-an-buys-stake-in-german-fintech-incubator-finleap.

14 Kelly Earley, ‘N26 Valued at $3.5bn After $170m Series D Extension’, Silicon Republic, 18 July 2019, https://www.silicon-republic.com/start-ups/n26-value-2019.

15 Jon Russell, ‘Alibaba Acquires German Big Data Startup Data Artisans for $103M’, TechCrunch, 8 January 2019, https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/08/alibaba-data-artisans/.

16 Elsa B. Kania, ‘Chinese Military Innovation in Artificial Intelligence’, Center for a New American Security, 7 June 2019, https://s3.amazonaws.com/files.cnas.org/documents/June-7-Hearing_Panel-1_Elsa-Kania_Chinese-Military-Innovation-in-Artificial-Intelligence.pdf?mtime=20190617115242.

17 IISS Military Balance+ database, https://milbalplus.iiss.org/, accessed April 2021. The IISS estimates that the total defence expenditure of China is significantly higher than the official defence budget.

18 US Department of Defense, ‘Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China 2020: Annual Report to Congress’, September 2020, pp. 24–36, https://media.defense.gov/2020/Sep/01/2002488689/-1/-1/1/2020-dod-china-military-power-report-final.pdf.

19 Richard Haass and David Sacks, ‘American Support for Taiwan Must Be Unambiguous’, Foreign Affairs, 2 September 2020, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/american-support-taiwan-must-be-unambiguous.

20 Helen Davidson, ‘China Could Invade Taiwan in Next Six Years, Top USAdmiral Warns’, Guardian, 10 March 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/mar/10/china-could-invade-taiwan-in-next-six-years-top-us-admiral-warns.

21 Hal Brands, ‘What if the U.S. Could Fight Only One War at a Time?’, Japan Times, 17 June 2019, https://www.japan-times.co.jp/opinion/2019/06/17/commentary/world-commentary/u-s-fight-one-war-time/; Aaron Mehta, ‘The US May Not Be Able to Fight Two Big Wars at Once’, Defense News, 3 October 2018, https://www.defensenews.com/pentagon/2018/10/04/can-the-us-fight-two-big-wars-at-once-new-report-casts-doubts/; Kathy Gilsinan, ‘How the U.S. Could Lose a War With China’, Atlantic, 25 July 2019, https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/07/china-us-war/594793/; Elbridge Colby and David Ochmanek, ‘How the United States Could Lose a Great-Power War’, Foreign Policy, 29 October 2019, https://foreign-policy.com/2019/10/29/united-states-china-russia-great-power-war/#; and US Senate Committee on Armed Services, ‘Confirmation Hearing on the Expected Nomination of Mr. James N. Mattis to Be Secretary of Defense’, 12 January 2017, https://www.armed-services.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/17-03_01-12-17.pdf.

22 Nouwens and Legarda, ‘China’s Rise as a Global Security Actor: Implications for NATO’, p. 9. See also Shashank Joshi (@shashj), tweet, 25 February 2021, https://twitter.com/shashj/status/1364924859650875394.

23 See, for example, Barry R. Posen, ‘Europe Can Defend Itself’, Survival: Global Politics and Strategy, vol. 62, no. 6, December 2020–January 2021, pp. 7–34.

24 Pavel K. Baev, ‘Russia as Opportunist or Spoiler in the Middle East?’, International Spectator, vol. 50, no. 2, June 2015, pp. 8–21; Michael Kofman, ‘Raiding and International Brigandry: Russia’s Strategy for Great Power Competition’, War on the Rocks, 14 June 2018, https://warontherocks.com/2018/06/raiding-and-international-brigandryrussias-strategy-for-great-power-competition/; and Julia Gurganus and Eugene Rumer, ‘Russia’s Global Ambitions in Perspective’, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 20 February 2019, https://carnegieendowment.org/2019/02/20/russia-s-global-ambitions-in-perspective-pub-78067.

25 Michael Peel, ‘EU Envoy Urges Bloc to Engage More With Russia over 5G and Data’, Financial Times, 13 September 2019, https://www.ft.com/content/725aa5b6-d5f7-11e9-8367-807eb-d53ab77; ‘A Thaw in EU–Russia Relations Is Starting: Undeserved Détente’, The Economist, 12 October 2019, https://www.economist.com/europe/2019/10/12/a-thaw-in-eu-russia-relations-is-starting; Anne-Sylvaine Chassany, ‘Macron’s Rapprochement With Putin Is Not Worth It’, Financial Times, 30 September 2020, https://www.ft.com/content/168243c2-bac4-404c-843a-ca1f61196049; and Rym Momtaz, ‘Emmanuel Macron’s Russian Roulette’, Politico, 14 February 2020, https://www.politico.eu/article/emmanuel-macron-russian-roulettevladimir-putin-security-partner/.

26 See Martin Wight, Power Politics (New York: Continuum Books, 1995, reprint), chapter 16; Gordon A. Craig and Alexander L. George, Force and State-craft: Diplomatic Problems of Our Time (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 3rd edition, 1995), chapter 3; and Richard Little, The Balance of Power in International Relations: Metaphors, Myths and Models (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), chapters 1 and 8.

27 See IISS, Russia’s Military Modernisation: An Assessment (Abingdon: Routledge for the IISS, 2020).

28 Douglas Barrie et al., ‘Defending Europe: Scenario-Based Capability Requirements for NATO’s European Members’, IISS, April 2019, pp. 3, 26–9, 38–41, https://www.iiss.org/blogs/research-paper/2019/05/defending-europe.

29 Beyond the realm of conventional military capabilities, NATO would also likely have to consider a nuclear asymmetry as it seems plausible that Putin’s Russia would at the very least threaten the use of nuclear weapons to dissuade European NATO members from attempting to retake the occupied territory. It is less plausible that NATO would match such an escalation in the scenario discussed here.

30 Nadège Rolland, ‘A China–Russia Condominium Over Eurasia’, Survival: Global Politics and Strategy, vol. 61, no. 1, February–March 2019, pp. 7–22.

31 Nouwens and Legarda, ‘China’s Rise as a Global Security Actor: Implications for NATO’, pp. 8–9.

32 Turkey's status in the DCA arrangement is somewhat unclear. While it is likely that some of its aircraft retain the ability to operate in the nuclear role, US nuclear bombs that used to be designated for use by Turkey have likely been withdrawn from the country.

33 See, for example, Anthony H. Cordesman, Deterrence in the 1980s. Part I: American Strategic Forces and Extended Deterrence, Adelphi Papers, vol. 22, no. 175 (London: International Institute for Strategic Studies, 1982).

34 Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, ‘Speech by Federal Minister of Defense Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer on the Occasion of the Presentation of the Steuben Schurz Media Award on October 23, 2020 in Frankfurt/Main’, Bundesministerium der Verteidigung [Federal Ministry of Defence], 23 October 2020, p. 5, https://nato.diplo.de/blob/2409698/75266e6a100b6e35895f431c3ae66c6d/20201023-rede-akk-medienpreis-data.pdf.

35 Michael Howard, ‘Deterrence, Consensus and Reassurance in the Defence of Europe’, in Defence and Consensus: The Domestic Aspects of Western Security: Part III Papers from the IISS 24th Annual Conference, Adelphi Papers, vol. 23, no. 184 (London: IISS, 1983), p. 24.