The US withdrawal from Afghanistan ended a coalition of some forty nations, all with their own national goals and internal political dynamics but brought together by a shared interest in that war. In the aftermath of its chaotic collapse, it is easy to forget the prominent role that the United States played in building, leading, and sustaining this coalition—a task that required some determined diplomacy and a sophisticated understanding of what each country brought to the table. As the United States pivots to the Indo-Pacific region and the competition with China for legitimacy and influence below the level of armed conflict, the question becomes whether coalition building is the right approach.
Our guests today have served at the highest levels of government in the United States and Australia, both as soldiers and diplomats. They have considerable experience working with coalitions and understand the rare alchemy that enables them to work at every level, from the tactical to the strategic.
Lieutenant General Douglas Lute retired from the US Army in 2010 after thirty-five years of distinguished service. His military career concluded with six years in the White House, where he served under President George W. Bush as deputy national security advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan, and then as coordinator for South Asia during the first term of the Barack Obama administration. During Obama’s second term, Lute was US Ambassador to NATO, where he focused on the thirty-nation alliance’s responses to new security challenges in Europe and the Middle East.
Ambassador Duncan Lewis is a retired Australian military officer, diplomat, and intelligence chief. From 2014 to 2019, he was the director-general of security, leading the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation. Prior to that appointment, he held the post of Australian ambassador to the Kingdom of Belgium, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, the European Union, and NATO. He is a former national security advisor, secretary of the Department of Defence, and head of Australian Special Operations Command.
Ambassadors Lute and Lewis argue that coalitions have played an important role in the major irregular warfare fights of recent history. They discuss why nations join coalitions in the first place—an often complex combination of motivations that can perhaps be best summed up as “enlightened self-interest,” and they share some of their own lessons on how to lead a coalition to achieve its collective objectives while providing value to each member. They argue that to compete effectively in irregular warfare contexts, to include in the era of strategic competition, the United States and Australia cannot go it alone but will be dependent on building partnerships with like-minded nations as a bulwark against adversaries who have adopted political warfare as the means to further their global ambitions.
The Irregular Warfare Podcast is part of the broader Irregular Warfare Initiative. IWI generates written and audio content, coordinates events for the IW community, and hosts critical thinkers in the field of irregular warfare as fellows. You can follow and engage with the Irregular Warfare Initiative on Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn to make sure you don’t miss any new content.
Image credit: Breanna L. Weisenberger, US Marine Corps
Might we consider such things as "political warfare" and "coalition building" today more from a New/Reverse Cold War perspective?
Thus, from a perspective that acknowledges that — much as in the Old Cold War of yesterday likewise in the New/Reverse Cold War of today —
a. One party (the U.S./the West in the Old Cold War; such nations as China and Russia today) — feeling threatened by "modernity"/"progress"/"change" — appealed (both at home and abroad) to such things as "conservatism" and "traditional values;" this, while:
b. The other party (the Soviets/the communists in the Old Cold War; the U.S./the West today) pressed for worldwide political, economic, social and/or value "modernization"/"progress"/"change" (re: communism in the Old Cold War; re: liberalism today)?
In this regard, consider:
a. The following regarding China:
“Compelling as it may seem, this argument, too, has some empirical difficulties: Until the past few years, the dominant socioeconomic or political positions in the Chinese intellectual world were clearly liberal ones: most intellectuals argued for greater institutional restraints on state activity, free market reforms, and stronger protection of civil and political rights. Even today, Pan and Xu’s paper finds that highly educated individuals are generally more liberal than less educated ones. When cultural conservatism reemerged as a somewhat influential ideological position during the later 1990s, its proponents could arguably reap greater social benefits by developing a liberal affinity, rather than a leftist one. For the most part, this did not happen.
Why not? Reading the early work of prominent contemporary Neo-Confucian intellectuals such as Jiang Qing or Chen Ming, one feels that this was a carefully considered — even principled — decision: They saw themselves as defending Chinese traditions against a distinctly hostile Western liberal intellectual mainstream. The ‘other’ they defined themselves against was not some version of socialism or leftism, which at this time was clearly a minority position, but rather a supposedly intolerant liberalism that had dominated Chinese sociopolitical thought since the 1980s.”
(From the 2015 “Foreign Policy” article “What it Means to Be ‘Liberal’ or ‘Conservative’ in China: Putting the Country’s Most Significant Political Divide in Context” by Taisu Zhang.) And:
b. The following regarding Russia:
"During the Cold War, the USSR was perceived by American conservatives as an 'evil empire,' as a source of destructive cultural influences, while the United States was perceived as a force that was preventing the world from the triumph of godless communism and anarchy. The USSR, by contrast, positioned itself as a vanguard of emancipation, as a fighter for the progressive transformation of humanity (away from religion and toward atheism), and against the reactionary forces of the West. Today positions have changed dramatically; it is the United States or the ruling liberal establishment that in the conservative narrative has become the new or neo-USSR, spreading subversive ideas about family or the nature of authority around the world, while Russia has become almost a beacon of hope, 'the last bastion of Christian values' that helps keep the world from sliding into a liberal dystopia. Russia’s self-identity has changed accordingly; now it is Russia who actively resists destructive, revolutionary experiments with fundamental human institutions, experiments inspired by new revolutionary neo-communists from the United States. Hence the cautious hopes that the U.S. Christian right have for contemporary Russia: They are projecting on Russia their fantasies of another West that has not been infected by the virus of cultural liberalism."
(See the December 18, 2019, Georgetown University, Berkley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs article "Global Culture Wars from the Perspective of Russian and American Actors: Some Preliminary Conclusions," by Dmitry Uzlaner. Look to the paragraph beginning with "Russia and the United States as screens for each other’s projections.")
As I have tried to show above, in the Old Cold War of yesterday, one way that the U.S./the West pursued "containment" and "roll back" — versus the Soviets/the communists "expansionist" and "modernizing"/"progress" efforts back then — this was by "countering" with such "natural weapons" as "conservatism" and "traditional values."
In the New/Reverse Cold War of today — with Russia and China now feeling threatened by U.S./Western "liberalism"/"modernity" — Russia and China have decided to copy our such highly successful approach, and now use it against us.
Bottom Line Question — Based on the Above:
From the perspective I have offered above, the question seems to become:
In the New/Reverse Cold War of today, using such things as "pro-change" (in our case re: "liberalism") coalition building and political warfare; how can we prevail against those using "anti-change"/"conservatism" and "traditional values" coalition building and political warfare? (Did not work out so well for the Soviets/the communists in the Old Cold War.)
Now let me attempt to connect (a) the "conflict paradigm"(?) that I describe above (a New/Reverse Cold War; one in which we are pursuing "expansion" and "change" and they are pursing "containment" and "roll back"); this, with such things as:
a. Russia's irregular warfare efforts today; these
b. In pursuit of their (Russia's) such "containment" and "roll back" goals:
As to this such "connecting" effort/attempt, let me start with this quote from Russian GEN Valery Gerasimov, Chief of the Russian General Staff:
"Asymmetrical actions have come into widespread use, enabling the nullification of an enemy´s advantages in armed conflict. Among such actions are the use of special operations forces and internal opposition to create a permanently operating front through the entire territory of the enemy state, as well as informational actions, devices, and means that are constantly being perfected. …"
(See the "Military Review" (Sep-Oct 2020 edition) article "Russian New Generation Warfare: Deterring and Winning at the Tactical Level" by James Derleth.)
As we can see here, GEN Gerasimov wants to use his "special operations forces" — and "internal opposition" (for example, the more-conservative/the more-traditional elements within both the U.S./the West's own states and societies and those within our partners' and allies' states and societies also?); this, to create "a permanently operating front through the entire territory of the enemy (the U.S./the West and our partners and allies) states."
Here are some example of Russia's amazing success in this regard:
"Liberal democratic societies have, in the past few decades, undergone a series of revolutionary changes in their social and political life, which are not to the taste of all their citizens. For many of those, who might be called social conservatives, Russia has become a more agreeable society, at least in principle, than those they live in. Communist Westerners used to speak of the Soviet Union as the pioneer society of a brighter future for all. Now, the rightwing nationalists of Europe and North America admire Russia and its leader for cleaving to the past."
(See "The American Interest" article "The Reality of Russian Soft Power" by John Lloyd and Daria Litinova.)
“Compounding it all, Russia’s dictator has achieved all of this while creating sympathy in elements of the Right that mirrors the sympathy the Soviet Union achieved in elements of the Left. In other words, Putin is expanding Russian power and influence while mounting a cultural critique that resonates with some American audiences, casting himself as a defender of Christian civilization against Islam and the godless, decadent West.”
(See the “National Review” item entitled: “How Russia Wins” by David French.)
Bottom Line Question — Based on the Above:
Re: such things as "political warfare," "coalition building," "irregular warfare, etc., how exactly can the U.S./the West — and our old and new partners and allies —
a. Defeat the "containment" and "roll back" efforts of such nations as Russia and China above and, specifically,
b. Defeat their use of such things as "irregular warfare" in pursuit of their such "containment" and "roll back" goals?