WASHINGTON – When it began last March, the Syrian revolution appeared to be a textbook example for a peaceful uprising by a people united against state brutality. For weeks, videos documented the determination of the mostly youthful protesters, chanting their demands for freedom and political participation only to be faced with bullets, arrests, torture, and execution.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad reacted with a series of gestures whose insincerity was swiftly revealed. A few hundred prisoners were released while thousands more were arrested, with many dying in custody. The decades-old state of emergency was lifted but the regime, in the name of a “security solution,” went on ruthlessly crushing the protests.

Publicly, the Syrian government asserts that “foreign powers” are instigating an insurgency in Syria to punish it for its support of what it calls the anti-Israel “resistance.” In private meetings with non-Sunni regional leaders, the regime promotes the notion that this is also a conflict between a “hegemonic Sunnism” (about three-fourths of Syrians are Sunni) and historically persecuted minorities. But support for the revolution cuts across all socio-economic strata and ethnic or religious groups. Conversely, the Assad regime has resorted to the Alawi community (approximately one-eighth of the population) as a primary pool for support; still, it neither encompasses this community in its totality, nor is limited to it.

The Syrian revolutionaries’ commitment to nonviolence was premised on expectations that they would be able to divide the security apparatus through insubordination and defections and that the world community would act to stop the massacres. Neither expectation was realized.

The revolutionaries have underestimated the ability of the regime to leverage ethnic and religious community cleavages. Recruits from the Alawi community are playing a key role in the repression. Defections are happening, but remain at about 10 percent of the military. The defectors, with no unified leadership, are unable to defeat the regime, but are used by it as proof of being engaged in combating “armed gangs.”

Even more dramatically, the international community was unable to provide the revolutionaries the support they needed. Most observers remain wary as to the implications of regime change in Syria, and indeed the revolutionaries have yet to offer a convincing post-Assad scenario to alleviate these concerns (including those of the regime’s internal constituencies). The Arab League was able to overcome substantial differences between its members on ways to manage the Syrian crisis, but as a result provided a watered-down plan that failed to satisfy the revolutionaries, and was still rejected by the regime. Meanwhile, the transatlantic alliance, the sole plausible agency for decisive support, is hamstrung by the economic crisis and a sharp decline in public tolerance for military interventions. Many strategists compare the case for Western intervention in Syria unfavorably with Libya: the latter, they argue, was “low-risk and high-reward,” whereas the former is precisely the reverse. Finally, Assad continues to be of significant value for both Iran and Russia.

All this has emboldened the Syrian regime; it is asserting that it will regain its international standing once its “security solution” is complete. Yet, with all its lethal superiority, it has been unable to achieve military victory. It has, however, managed to seriously undermine the revolutionaries’ initial commitment to nonviolence and inclusiveness. Against the protestations of many militants, the Syrian revolution has in large part become an armed uprising. This in turn allows the regime to “expose” the revolution as a violent sectarian insurgency, in order to justify resorting to even harsher measures, including arguably engineering violent sectarianism. The Assad regime’s actions may not secure its survival, but they will ensure the unraveling of Syria as a nation-state, with deadly repercussions across the region.

Russia and China’s veto of the latest UN Security Council resolution amounts to a green light for the escalation of the Syrian regime’s homicidal campaign — or, in the words of Qatar’s foreign minister, “a license to kill.”

The only way to stop Syria from sliding into an abyss now is for the transatlantic alliance to assert moral and political leadership. The Arab League’s original plan — that Assad should delegate his authority to a deputy ­­— had succeeded in trimming the demands of the rebels to yet another token action, but still ran afoul of concerted opposition by Russia and China. The League should now be encouraged to propose a bolder, more principled plan to serve as a baseline.

Obviously, it would be preferable to see this conflict addressed at the highest levels of the United Nations, but given the entrenched positions of Moscow and Beijing, that is unlikely. However, the Arab League’s position would also provide a mandate on its own for the transatlantic alliance to investigate next steps. It would also be worth preserving silence as to which steps are would be categorically excluded since the Syrian regime’s killing machine has been reinvigorated by statements of restraint from Washington.

The Assad family’s decades-long stranglehold on power has been largely based on a fear-instilling aura of power. The Syrian revolutionaries have broken through the wall of fear. Their ultimate success depends on denying the regime the ability to re-erect it. They will not be able to succeed without Western help. 

Hassan Mneimneh is a Senior Transatlantic Fellow with the German Marshall Fund in Washington, DC.

Image by Syria Press. 

French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s recent announcement that French troops would hand over their security responsibilities to Afghan forces by the end of 2013 — a year earlier than the completion of the NATO combat mission — has caused some to declare that the entire Afghanistan operation is at risk. The French decision certainly reflects Sarkozy’s need to address pressing domestic pressure to bring forces home as his presidential reelection campaign begins. But Sarkozy will have to balance this with the need to maintain France’s reputation within NATO. There will be times when alliance interests will need to trump national interest. The decision must also be put into context. It poses little operational risk, and is by no means a repudiation of the validity of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) mission in Afghanistan. What the French decision does reflect is the politics that accompany any coalition mission, however undesirable.

From an operational standpoint, there is no doubt that the 4,000 French troops in Afghanistan, mainly in Kapisa province, have made a difference. French forces have shown acuity in counterinsurgency operations, and French trainers, especially gendarmes, have been critical to increasing the capacity of Afghan National Security Forces. But as with all ISAF nations, the French are now looking at what the expected 2014 transition will mean and how they can best support Afghanistan during this process and beyond. For many states, this will mean a shift away from combat to training operations. Thus, the more important question is what role will France choose to play beyond transition and will it reflect the balance between national and alliance interests? While France has signed a 20-year strategic partnership agreement with Afghanistan to cover security, economic, and political cooperation, it remains unclear what mix of forces France would contribute to a training mission through 2014 and beyond. A firm French commitment at the upcoming NATO summit to provide significant numbers of personnel to NATO and EU training missions would be especially welcome as the planning for a post-2014 Afghanistan continues. Likewise, specified commitments to development projects and expertise to assist the Afghan government in establishing more effective rule of law could have an even greater impact in addressing the strategic vulnerabilities of the Afghan state.

While it is certainly irksome that the French chose not to use the Joint Afghan-NATO Inteqal Board (JANIB) process to work through the timeline on transition in Kapisa, the decision was not a surprise to NATO or Afghan government officials. Indeed, Presidents Karzai and Sarkozy had already agreed to the 2013 timeline in pre-decisional meetings prior to the public announcement. Both NATO and the Afghan government have long expected Kapisa province to transition as part of the third “tranche,” likely to be announced in March 2012. This will give ISAF and Afghan forces plenty of time to fully handover security operations and prepare Kapisa for Afghan leadership. While the pace of the French drawdown has been increased there will still be about 3,000 French troops in Afghanistan at the end of 2012. In short, the French decision is simply a repackaging of the milestones that have been discussed for almost two years now.

Coalitions are, almost by definition, imperfect creatures. They are politically complex and require considerable investment and management to get them to work. Indeed, Napoleon is reported to have said that he’d rather fight against a coalition than as part of one. But it is equally important to recall that it was, in the end, a coalition that defeated Napoleon. The art of leading a successful coalition requires balancing national and alliance interests and an understanding of when to give one way or another. In an age of budget austerity, NATO members must continue to remember that alliances mean shared commitment, shared contributions, and shared sacrifice. In Afghanistan the transition process has also always had an unwritten purpose — to keep the NATO allies and ISAF partners together until the Afghans could lead on their own and it was formulated with an eye towards maintaining sufficient domestic political support in each nation so that force contributions could continue, even if they had to be adjusted over time. Building and maintaining a coalition is not always a pretty process, but it is a necessary one, and in Afghanistan it will be better to win messy than lose pretty.

Mark Jacobson, former Deputy NATO Senior Civilian Representative in Afghanistan, is a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States in Washington DC.

WASHINGTON – As he campaigned for the U.S. presidency in 1952, Republican candidate Dwight D. Eisenhower argued that he would seek to bring “security with solvency” to the American people.  Eisenhower realized that the challenges posed by the Soviet Union could too easily stress America’s finite resources and a strategy to face that threat consider the economic roots of America’s military power and influence in the world. For Eisenhower, economic power was the indispensable source of American global leadership.

In his State of the Union address Tuesday evening, U.S. President Barack Obama seemed to recognize Eisenhower’s insight.  Obama focused largely on the economic challenges still facing the United States — but framed those challenges in the context of recent national security victories and the achievements of the World War II generation.  While Obama did focus on domestic affairs, he both opened and closed his address by praising America’s men and women in uniform — one of the few points drawing bi-partisan applause – and took stock of a broad set of foreign policy and security challenges that face the United States today. He also made clear that the new U.S. defense strategy would also balance security with solvency — saving nearly half a trillion dollars but maintaining the type of first-rate military required to deal with current and emerging threats.

Obama’s address included a call to learn from the shared sacrifice, partnership, and teamwork that the U.S. military demonstrates day after day, to include that shown in the mission to kill Osama bin Laden in May of last year — clearly the most significant national security event of the past twelve months.

Obama was assertive in his description of his vision of America’s role in the world but realistic when considering the complexity of the challenges ahead. In stark contrast to much of the isolationist rhetoric of the Republican primary debates, he argued that America continues to be a strong, ascendant world leader with a “steadfast” commitment to allies around the globe.

Of course, Obama noted the end of the war in Iraq and the determination to transition to Afghan leadership.  He also acknowledged the “wave of change” brought about by the Arab Spring and issued a sharp rebuke to the Assad regime — noting that they would soon discover “that the forces of change can’t be reversed and that human dignity can’t be denied.”   He praised the power of partnerships that have enabled a unified approach to counter the Iranian quest for nuclear weapons but was realistic in his assessment of whether this in and of itself would provide the solution.  Coming a day after U.S., British, and French warships entered the Persian Gulf despite threats from Iran; Obama reiterated that while he hoped for a peaceful resolution, “no options” were off the table.

It is telling that while facing a tough re-election in a poor economy, Obama has chosen to frame domestic problems within the context of foreign policy successes.  It is a clear indication that even while Washington focuses on a Presidential election campaign, the administration will not abdicate the responsibilities the United States has as a global leader.

Mark R. Jacobson is a Senior Transatlantic Fellow at the German Marshall Fund. He has formerly served at the Department of Defense and on the staff of the Senate Armed Services Committee. The views expressed are his own.

Fewer than 30 days into the new year, the foreign policy agenda for Europe and North America has already become crowded.  North Korea, Iran, Syria, potential breakthroughs in Burma, and the still roiling revolutionary fervor in the Middle East are but a few of the issues facing transatlantic policymakers.  Iraq, facing renewed violence in the wake of Coalition troop withdrawals, and Afghanistan, where France just lost more soldiers and ambivalence reigns on negotiating with the Taliban, have not gone away.

Add to this volatile mix national elections in the United States, France, and elsewhere and it is easy to forget one of the landmark events of 2011:  the July 9^th independence of South Sudan.  Moreover, although remembrance of the new nation’s founding is appropriate, what is more critical is that Europe and North America sustain the generally positive and optimistic dynamics of South Sudan’s birth.

These dynamics came into focus for me when I attended the recent International Engagement Conference on South Sudan, organized by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) in Washington.  The two-day session, addressed by the first President of South Sudan, the Honorable Salva Kiir Mayardit, saw presentations by World Bank President Zoellick, United Nations Development Programme Administrator Clark, senior European Union officials, and numerous ministerial level representatives from Sudan, Europe and North America, including U.S. Secretary of State Clinton.  The conference list of co-sponsors boded well for continued world engagement with South Sudan:  The UN; the World Bank, including the International Finance Corporation; the African Union; the European Union; the governments of Norway, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the United States; the NGO coalition InterAction; and the Corporate Council for Africa.

And well should these international heavyweights be interested.  Not only does South Sudan possess very large – how large is yet to be fully determined – petroleum reserves, but the White Nile and other resources could be world-class sources of renewable energy.  Some of us are old enough to remember when the southern reaches of Sudan were heralded as Africa’s “breadbasket,” and the combination of vast, fertile, and well-watered lands has re-awakened interest in South Sudan’s food-producing potential.  Although its internal population is under ten million, South Sudan is at the center of a regional market containing 250 million.  And, politically, a stable South Sudan could be a bulwark against trans-national violence in a Great Lakes region that has hovered on the edge of chaos for decades.

Looked at through a slightly different lens, the risks of the transatlantic community not focusing on this fragile, newborn state are high.  South Sudan lies in a rough, violent neighborhood, bordering on regions of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo and northern Uganda notorious for fragile governance and violent atrocities.  South Sudan remains one of the most underdeveloped regions of the world (there exist fewer than 200 kilometers of paved roads in a nation-state the size of France), and underinvestment in the country’s optimistic, rapidly growing population runs the risk of spawning a crisis of rising, but unfulfilled, expectations.  Despite the generally cordial breakup of Sudan last July, the specter of continued instability haunts the Sudan-South Sudan border, with the risks of violence and human displacement ever present.  USAID reports that the U.S. government alone spent nearly $10 billion in primarily humanitarian aid in the six years prior to independence alone, a level of resources from donor nations that must now be shifted to the long-term development account, if the promise of independence is to be fulfilled.  Foreign investment, on which the new government in the capital of Juba is relying heavily, comes at this point primarily from Asia, with Chinese investment in petroleum exploration prominent.  Personally, I harbor no antipathy to Chinese investment in Africa, but – a little competition being a healthy thing – business people from the transatlantic nations should be on the ground, as well.

The International Engagement Conference on South Sudan provided a useful venue to focus on the new state’s potential.  The challenge for Europe and North America, going forward, will be to maintain, amid a daunting foreign policy agenda, the sustained focus required to fulfill the promise of a successful South Sudan, and avoid the substantial risks of under-investing in the world’s newest country.

James Kunder is a non-resident fellow at the German Marshall Fund in Washington, DC.

WASHINGTON–A year ago, during his State of the Union address, U.S. President Barack Obama set a goal for a national high-speed rail (HSR) network: 85 percent of the country’s population would have access to HSR within 25 years. One year later, that goal seems wildly optimistic.

Within a month of Obama’s speech, Florida Governor Rick Scott joined the governors of Ohio and Wisconsin (all Republicans) in rejecting HSR funds that had been targeted for his state. He, like many critics of HSR, argued that the project was too costly during a time of economic crisis and the risks would outweigh the benefits. Then, earlier this month, California’s HSR effort appeared to run out of steam. The California High-Speed Rail Peer Review Group, an independent body created by the California High-Speed Rail Authority to advise on the proposed system, released a report that detailed numerous concerns about the project’s overall funding plan and the lack of a fully vetted business plan. In the end, the report concludes that too many flaws and financial unknowns exist in the plans, representing “an immense financial risk” to the state of California. The report might well kill the prospects for a true HSR project in the United States for the foreseeable future.

So, why did Obama’s signature infrastructure project meet such a quick demise? While each project has its own reasons for failure, the Obama administration also made a critical tactical error in the way it awarded funds. Instead of identifying and investing in one promising project, the administration allocated $10 billion ($8 billion from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and $2 billion from appropriations) to 13 HSR projects in 31 states to foster the development of a national HSR network all at once. Additional federal funds for the network (approximately $43 billion according to Obama’s plan) were to be secured through the annual appropriations processes. The administration’s strategy appears to have been to hope the initial federal investments would spur even more substantial state and local investments in HSR, especially in a number of swing states, leading to the creation of a national network. At current estimates, a national HSR network could cost hundreds of billions of dollars — the California system alone is projected at $98 billion. With dramatic budget cuts looming, a slow economic recovery, and a toxic political environment, this strategy is not viable.

The lack of significant progress on HSR is unfortunate. A well-planned and smartly operated HSR system can be transformational for cities, helping them to maintain or improve quality of life and enhance economic competitiveness in the global economy. At one level, HSR facilitates intercity travel, fosters regionalism, and can enhance regional economic viability. At another level, as populations and densities are projected to rise in America’s large urban regions, new and better mobility alternatives will be imperative to meet a host of associated challenges. When integrated intelligently with other modes of transportation into the urban fabric, HSR can help stimulate the development of economically vibrant corridors and station stops.

A better approach to start up a national HSR network in the United States can be found in Spain. Over the past two decades, Spain has created the longest HSR network in Europe. However, AVE, the Spanish network, began with a single project, the Madrid-Seville line, which proved itself for more than 10 years before significant expansion occurred. The line, averaging 185 mph, cut the 300-mile trip time by more than half between the two cities, significantly decreasing the automobile and air travel between them but increasing the number of individual trips. Equally compelling, existing businesses near AVE stations have reported significant benefits from the investments in infrastructure. None of this is to say that Spanish HSR has been perfect — the Spanish government ultimately may have over-invested. But if the Obama administration chooses to revisit HSR, a more effective strategy would be to start small, be focused, invest smartly, and allow HSR to prove itself, which could put aspirations for a national HSR rail network back on track.

Brent Riddle is a Senior Program Officer in the German Marshall Fund’s Urban and Regional Program.

BRATISLAVA—“Freedom House got it wrong!” We can expect to hear this message from an angry official in Budapest after the release on Thursday of the Freedom in the World Report 2012. Hungary has the unfortunate distinction of being the only Western democracy in which governance and civic liberties declined over the last year. Just earlier this week, Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban was grilled in the European Parliament for his government’s recent policies, including some seemingly draconian legislative steps that have brought an unexpected number of protesters to the squares and streets of Budapest. Compared to other democratically-elected leaders in post-communist countries who departed from their countries’ democratic trajectories, Orban is younger, more talented, better educated, and has a superior understanding of Western politics. But following the constitutional and political reforms of the last year — which have given him wide-ranging and centralized authority over many areas of governance and society — Orban’s furious critics at home took to calling him “Viktator.”

Like many such leaders before him, Orban has used a tried and true formula to justify or defend his actions: a political mandate, appeals to nationalism, and a sense of crisis. Orban and his followers in the Fidesz party — which won a two-thirds or constitutional majority in the 2010 elections — like reminding their critics of their popular mandate. They argue that they are simply carrying out the wishes of the people, in line with Hungary’s democracy. Secondly, Orban’s followers make appeals to the greatness and historical exclusivity of a suffering nation, defending their actions as being in the spirit of the country’s founding fathers while redressing past mistakes. Finally, they imply that the country is embroiled in a serious economic and moral crisis and that Orban is the only person capable of saving it.

Following multiple demarches by Brussels and Washington, popular domestic criticism led by prominent Hungarian intellectuals and activists, and worrisome economic trends being highlighted by credit-ratings agencies, one might expect Orban to modify his course. But it does not appear that the politically skillful Orban is about to reset his policies any time soon. In fact, rather paradoxically, the ongoing economic and political crises in the European Union and the United States have allowed Orban to advance his own assertive political rhetoric. He can also, for the time being, capitalize upon the weaknesses of a fragmented domestic political opposition, a controlled media, a scared business community, and a civil society, academia, and church that have been silenced. He is also capable of deftly tackling criticism from European technocrats by pretending to fix things around the margins.

At the same time, Orban should be aware that his country, hit hard by the economic recession, cannot survive long in isolation. Nor can he continue bluffing the United States and European Union forever. His neighbors, many of whom have sizable ethnic Hungarian minorities, will not let him freely continue making grand and bizarre gestures and statements featuring obsolete Great Hungary tones. Most of all, Orban should be aware of his own people’s power and keep in mind the fates of other seemingly omnipotent leaders in his immediate neighborhood and beyond.

Over the last two decades, countries in post-communist Europe produced various forms of government, ranging from Western-style liberal democracies to authoritarian rule. After the collapse of the Berlin Wall, it was generally assumed that those countries that graduated from the pre-accession process and entered the European Union would become immune to authoritarian practices. Hungary single-handedly overturns this assumption. Orban’s willingness to ignore criticism of his country’s departure from shared European values amid the gradual destruction of checks and balances has created headaches in many EU capitals. In that sense, Hungary’s future is deeply intertwined with that of the European Union and what it stands for: cohesion, good governance, and respect for state sovereignty. 

Pavol Demes is Senior Fellow with the German Marshall Fund of the United States in Bratislava. 

WASHINGTON– Political realities facing the leaders of the United States and Iran mean that military confrontation between the two states is a distinct possibility. In late December, the Iranian armed forces conducted a number of war games — which included the live firing of missiles — in the Straits of Hormuz and adjacent waters of the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman. When the aircraft carrier USS John Stennis sailed for a routine repositioning from the Gulf to the North Arabian Sea, Iran told the United States not to return it to the Persian Gulf region. The commander of Iran’s army, General Ataollah Salehi, later reiterated that “The Islamic Republic will not repeat its warning.”

On January 6, three armed patrol boats of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps came within several hundred yards of a U.S. amphibious assault ship, the USS New Orleans. This is precisely the sort of cat-and-mouse games at sea that can lead to serious miscalculations and subsequent escalation. Many Americans will recall that in 1964 a military encounter between North Vietnamese torpedo boats and the USS Maddox resulted in a pitched sea battle, which was enough to persuade the U.S. Congress to pass the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution that gave President Lyndon Johnson authority to begin the massive escalation in Southeast Asia.

In addition to military brinksmanship, covert military action against Iran’s nuclear establishment appears to be increasing. On January 11, the Iranians announced that one of their nuclear scientists had been assassinated in Tehran. They blamed both the United States and Israel though they offered no explicit proof. Some Iranians have publicly called for retaliatory killings. Assassinations and reprisals have long been an important driver in the paths to war. Remember the attempted assassination in London of Israel’s ambassador to the United Kingdom, Shlomo Argov on June 3, 1982? This attack was attributed to the Palestinian Liberation Organization and provided the pretext for Israel’s invasion of Lebanon three days later.

Why might Iran be willing to risk confrontation with the United States at this time? It faces draconian new international sanctions, led by the United States, and if the EU agrees to ban imports of Iranian oil at the end of January, its financial situation will further deteriorate. Its currency is in freefall and the business community appears to be in a state of panic. Even Iran’s great friend China is cutting back on oil purchases. The regime in Tehran also faces the possibility that its closest Middle East ally, Syria, is edging towards civil war and there is a chance that the Bashar al-Assad regime could eventually be ousted. This would radically change the balance of power in the region and undermine other Iranian allies, especially Hezbollah. While Iran has signaled a willingness to return to Turkey for nuclear talks, it has simultaneously blamed the United States for attacks on its people and financial system.

The Obama administration, meanwhile, is being savaged by Republican opponents for appearing weak on Iran, despite warnings that any interference with international traffic through the Straits of Hormuz “will not be tolerated.” When U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton condemned the killing of the Iranian scientist and stated that Washington had played no role in his killing, former Senator and current presidential candidate Rick Santorum stated bluntly that the condemnation was a mistake. Santorum, along with fellow presidential candidates Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney, have all taken a much harder line on Iran than the White House and, along with Israel’s most right-wing supporters in the United States, are goading the administration to be tougher on Iran, even to the point of launching a military strike against its nuclear facilities.

Given the fragility of the U.S. economy, which seems just on the cusp of recovery, the Obama administration does not want a war with Iran. But the president cannot control or predict Iranian behavior. A truly provocative act by Iran — such as the sinking of a U.S. warship — would force Obama’s hand, especially in an election year, but he must nevertheless resist the temptation to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities. This could only be justified if Iran had provided unambiguous evidence that it was determined to develop a nuclear weapon. Under these circumstances, international support for war would likely be forthcoming.

Geoffrey Kemp is a Senior Fellow with the Transatlantic Academy at the German Marshall Fund of the United States in Washington DC.

Image by the United States Department of Defense.

BRUSSELS—Full details of the Obama administration’s new look in defense spending, force posture, and strategy are not yet out. But enough has been revealed  to venture some thoughts on the logic of the new approach and the longer-term implications for the United States and transatlantic partners.

The shift to a “one war, spoil and manage” strategy contrasts sharply with a decade of costly and inconclusive engagement in irregular warfare in Afghanistan and Iraq. Enormous efforts were undertaken to adapt the U.S. way of war and to focus it on counterterrorism and counterinsurgency, with the unfortunate effect of eroding the United States’ capacity to address more serious and potentially more demanding long-term challenges, above all in Asia. Today, much of the U.S. strategic community has come to believe that a disproportionate amount of effort has been devoted to meeting nonexistential threats to the national interest and international security. A strategy re-emphasizing core risks, and conventional rather than irregular warfare, simply makes sense against a backdrop of stark resource constraints.

The need to meet serious conventional contingencies with smaller ground forces could spell a renaissance in nuclear strategy. There are precedents for this in the Cold War experience, when the expense and difficulty of forward defense in Europe compelled a reliance on nuclear forces and nuclear deterrence to fill the gap at reasonable cost. Of course, we are unlikely to see a return to a doctrine of massive retaliation to meet security challenges in Asia, a more competitive relationship with Russia, or an aggressive Iran. But the mix of conventional and nuclear deterrence in U.S. strategy could well change as forces are realigned and forward-deployed forces, in particular, become more exposed to ballistic missile attack, perhaps nuclear-armed. Under these conditions, planners may be tempted to reinforce the nuclear dimension. Not quite a trip-wire strategy, but perhaps a bit closer than many U.S. allies would prefer.

Many will be tempted to interpret the Obama administration’s new strategy as a shift away from European defense—and perhaps more important, European defense partnerships—in the face of more pressing challenges in Asia. This interpretation is too dramatic. In reality, the shift away from European defense per se has been underway for two decades. This is not just a question of land forces. The U.S. Sixth Fleet has not kept an aircraft carrier battle group in the Mediterranean for many years. Residual U.S. forces in and around Europe are kept there to enable the United States to meet contingencies elsewhere, across the Mediterranean, the Black Sea, and the Middle East. Maintaining a capacity to reinforce Europe’s crisis response capabilities on the European periphery, as in Libya, will continue to depend, above all, on mainly bilateral base access and over-flight arrangements. If anything, transatlantic partners will now have an even greater stake in solidifying these strategic ties. The locus of strategic risk may be shifting; the logic of cooperation endures.

Dr. Ian O. Lesser is the Executive Director of the German Marshall Fund’s Transatlantic Center in Brussels.

BERLIN — When President Barack Obama unveiled a new national defense strategy last week, which confirmed the United States’ intent to play a sustained role in shaping a rising Asia, he noted that “the tide of war is receding.” This observation will have done little to reassure a skeptical Beijing that the strategy is aimed at managing, as opposed to containing, the rise of China. Beijing will note with ire its bracketing, in one part of the strategic review, with Iran: a country with whom the United States has had no diplomatic relations for three decades and with whom the risk of conflict (even if by proxy), remains all too real. Nor will it be pleased by the U.S. commitment to “invest in a long-term strategic partnership with India,” a country whose potential Beijing would prefer to see checked. Seen from Beijing, the administration’s repeated assurances that the United States does not view China as an adversary will be even harder to believe now.

Nevertheless, as Beijing waits to discover the full details of the U.S. realignment and to calibrate its reaction accordingly, a few ironies are already clear. Firstly, despite the fanfare with which the announcement was made, it should be no surprise that Washington plans to pay close attention to Asia. In fact, the realignment reinforces an underlying trend of increased U.S. engagement with the Asia-Pacific region, which has been quietly gathering momentum since the 1990s. The wars that followed the 9/11 attacks may have constrained some of this focus, but the ultimate direction of U.S. defense policy has been clear for a while. Likewise, the intention to cultivate India as a long-term strategic partner has roots stretching back across administrations long before Obama’s tenure.

Secondly, the perception of increasingly “assertive” behavior by China in recent years has played its part in crystallizing a stronger U.S. response. The danger is that this in turn bolsters the position of hard-liners in Beijing, including elements of the military, thereby further increasing their influence in foreign and security policymaking. Thirdly, China’s bracketing with Iran as nations pursuing asymmetric means to counter U.S. power projection capabilities is likely to encourage Beijing to mistakenly identify common cause with Tehran. Indeed, a Global Times editorial the day after Obama’s announcement argued, “The U.S. strategic adjustment highlights Iran’s importance to China. Iran’s existence and its stance form a strong check against the U.S.” And finally, as Washington complains about the pursuit of these asymmetric measures, its increased presence in the region is likely to make such activities even more attractive. China will continue to pour resources into access denial, focus on the development of longer-range capabilities, and continue their advances in electronic and cyber warfare.

Yet, for the United States to retain its primacy in Asia whilst ensuring the rise of China within a rules-based international environment, there is no alternative other than pouring more resources into Asia. Ultimately, anyone judging China’s strategic intentions purely by observing the nature of its military build-up would not likely be persuaded by Beijing’s commitment to rise peacefully. For the many U.S. allies and partners in Asia struggling to manage the security implications of their burgeoning trade relations with China, this demonstration of U.S. commitment to the region provides significant reassurance. At the same time, the strategy will also generate tensions with U.S. partners in Asia. More will be demanded of them, which will have financial implications and might require deft political handling domestically. Equally, as South Korea’s Chosun Ilbo has been quick to point out, the United States’ decreased appetite for boots on the ground does not sit easily with a military strategy that presently envisions the deployment of 690,000 American soldiers on the Korean Peninsula in the event of war.

In the struggle to manage the consequences of China’s rise, U.S. military might and strategy will be crucial, but these will not be the only tools required. While a more coherent diplomatic strategy for Asia appears to be emerging with, for example, U.S. participation in the East Asian Summit, U.S. trade policy in Asia remains woefully underdeveloped, the administration’s recent push on the Trans-Pacific Partnership notwithstanding. Ultimately, as intriguing as the consequences of this strategy may be for the broader region, for the moment at least, the Pentagon review remains just a paper. Even once key details are made clear, a lot can happen on the road between intent and reality.

Sarah Raine is a Non-Resident Transatlantic Fellow with the Asia Program of the German Marshall Fund of the United States in Berlin

PARIS—The Obama administration’s new defense strategy should come as no surprise to observers in France and across Europe. The question of rebalancing American military involvement between Europe and the Asia-Pacific has been a recurring theme of transatlantic relations and of U.S. policy debates since at least the 1950s. In large part, it reflects the historical evolution of U.S. perceptions of the transatlantic relationship, from what the United States should do for Europe to what it should do with Europe. In the context of economic austerity, this evolution assumes an even more urgent quality.

There are certainly legitimate reasons for concern. The stationing of U.S. troops in Europe is not only a key component of deterring potential aggression against U.S. allies, it also significantly enhances its power projection capabilities by locating U.S. forces closer to hotspots in the Middle East, North Africa, and Europe’s eastern periphery. A recessed U.S. posture in Europe will have direct implications for the military’s ability to respond to future conflicts or strategic surprises. In the lead-up to intervening in Libya, confusion related to the United States’ role illustrated the increasing and dangerous ambiguity that underscores U.S.-European strategic relations. Whereas the United States “transferred” the command and control of the Libya mission to its European allies, Europeans had been counting on U.S. leadership to conduct the military operations.

At the same time, closer strategic cooperation between the United States and Europe has become even more vital in an unpredictable environment being transformed by the emergence of new powers and threats. In Obama’s words, U.S. rebalancing should “create new opportunities for burden-sharing.” Indeed, the key questions induced by an increasingly Asia-oriented U.S. foreign policy do not concern the United States’ military posture in Europe itself, but rather whether Europe is ready to take responsibility for hard security matters in and around Europe, and across the world. France’s chief of the defense staff, Admiral Edouard Guillaud, recently noted that while “Europe is disarming, the world is rearming,” a trend that could impact Europe’s future in terms of its power projection and influence in world politics.

Burden sharing need not entail a geographical division of labor between Americans and Europeans, whereby the United States focuses on Asia and the Middle East, while Europeans concentrate on their near and Mediterranean neighborhoods. Under certain circumstances, the United States will need European support, as in Afghanistan or sub-Saharan Africa. In others, the EU will need U.S. support and unique capabilities, as in Libya. Defining clear modalities of transatlantic cooperation would help avoid future Libya-like scenarios.

It is as yet unclear whether Europe is ready for all this. While the United States would wish for Europe to develop a more coherent military capacity, Europe is actually evolving in the opposite direction. At the present juncture, virtually no European country has the will or the means to assume these responsibilities. European decision-makers may have welcomed Obama’s commitment to draw to a close the perceived over-militarization of the post-9/11 era, but the Libyan campaign showed that hard power still matters in the 21^st century. Ad hoc coalitions are a short-term solution, Franco-British defense cooperation suffers from ideological divergences, and Germany is occupied dealing with the Euro crisis. NATO can therefore be expected to continue to enhance interoperability and coalition building, rather than acting as the core transatlantic security alliance.

What may appear a pragmatic and natural shift in U.S. geostrategic priorities to Asia and the Middle East means fewer resources for the traditional transatlantic alliance. But this does not entail a post-American Europe or less U.S. interest in the transatlantic partnership. On the contrary, the Obama administration has, in a way, renewed its defense commitments to Europe and acknowledged the continuing strategic importance of Europe in terms of ongoing security challenges and unresolved conflicts.

Alexandra de Hoop Scheffer is Director of the German Marshall Fund’s Paris office.