America’s One-War Military Is No Match for Reality

Four consecutive bipartisan defense strategy commissions have looked “under the hood” of America’s armed forces and all issued dire warnings.

The Department of Defense is out-matched for the united threats it faces. This is reinforced by the report from the National Defense Strategy Commission, which opens with a sobering declaration: “The Commission finds that the U.S. military lacks both the capabilities and the capacity required to be confident it can deter and prevail in combat.”

The report paints a stark picture of the global security environment, noting the threats the United States faces are “…the most serious and challenging the nation has encountered since 1945 and include the potential for near-term major war.”

U.S. Air Force F-16 Fighting Falcons intercept two U.S. Air Force B-1B Lancers during exercise Amalgam Dart 21-2, March 23, 2021. The exercise will run from March 20-26 and range from the Beaufort Sea to Thule, Greenland and extend south down the Eastern Atlantic to the U.S. coast of Maine. Amalgam Dart 21-2 provides NORAD the opportunity to hone homeland defense skills as Canadian, U.S., and NATO forces operate together in the Arctic. A bi-national Canadian and American command, NORAD employs network space-based, aerial and ground based sensors, air-to-air refueling tankers, and fighter aircraft controlled by a sophisticated command and control network to deter, detect and defend against aerial threats that originate outside or within North American airspace. NATO E-3 Early Warning Aircraft, Royal Canadian Air Force CF-18 fighter aircraft, CP-140 long-range patrol aircraft, CC-130 search and rescue and tactical aircraft, and a CC-150T air refueler; as well as U.S. Air Force F-16 fighter aircraft, KC-10 Extender refueler, KC-46 Pegasus, KC-135 Stratotanker, as well as C-130 and C-17 transport aircraft will participate in the exercise. (U.S. Air National Guard courtesy photo)

While the lights are all flashing red for America’s armed forces, the commission also finds that China is “outpacing” the United States, and has “largely negated” the US military advantage in the Western Pacific through continued  military investment, while also noting that Russia is devoting a whopping 29 percent of its federal budget to its military as it wages its brutal invasion of Ukraine.

Compounding these risks, the report reads, is the increasing political and military alignment between China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran, which creates a “likelihood… that conflict anywhere could become a multi-theater or global war.”

In one of its landmark recommendations, the panel recommends dumping the Pentagon’s one-war force sizing construct, which is wholly inadequate in deterring this growing “coalition against democracy,” and proposes a “Multiple Theater Force Construct, “…sized to defend the homeland and tackle simultaneous threats in the Indo-Pacific, Europe, and the Middle East.”

This finding is derived from similar recommendations proposed in AEI’s To Rebuild America’s Military report, which called for a “Three-Theater Force” nearly 10 years ago:

“To remain a global power, the United States must preserve a favorable balance of military power in Europe, the Middle East, and East Asia. Deterring further Russian and Chinese aggression requires forces that are powerful and constantly present…America cannot lead the world by pivoting among these theaters nor by retreating to the continental United States.”

The key difference now being that the US military has lost a decade of valuable time to rebuild military capacity and bolster conventional and nuclear deterrents. The US Army active duty force is the smallest it has been since the end of World War II; the Navy has stagnated short of 300 battle force ships, half the size of the Cold War fleet; and the Air Force combat aircraft inventory continues to shrink as retirements outpace new purchases every single year.

Reality gets a vote. The military balance keeping peace across three theaters—two of which are engaged in wars of mass and attrition—is no longer possible with the smaller, older, less ready force on hand. Nowhere is this more apparent than the Indo-Pacific.

While the U.S. military can muster power when needed, it is divided across the world. Despite a “pivot to Asia”  and a “return to great power competition,”  little in terms of new combat power has shifted to the region, while Beijing continues to invest more into real, present, and capable combat power in its own neighborhood.

Absent a stronger and growing military, shifting combat power among theaters from a shrinking pool will inherently lessen deterrence across other regions.

A consensus is building in Washington that a three-theater force is necessary. The late Senator John McCain (R-AZ) championed the idea in Congress, endorsing the new force-sizing construct in his 2017 white paper and subsequent National Defense Authorization Act language.

Exercise Artemis Strike is a German-led tactical live fire exercise with live Patriot and Stinger missiles at the NATO Missile Firing Installation in Chania, Greece from Oct. 31-Nov. 09. Over 200 U.S. soldiers and approximately 650 German airmen will be participating in the realistic training within a combined construct, exercise the rigors associated with force projection and educate operators on their air missile defense systems. The 10th Army Air Missile Defense Command will deploy, operate and fire live missiles within a tactical scenario, under Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe operational readiness evaluation criteria.

Senator Roger Wicker (R-MS) also recently stressed the necessity “…to provide recurring deterrence and assurance signals in multiple theaters, including during a conflict,” in his recent 21st Century Peace Through Strength Plan, and pressed the defense strategy commissioners to expand on their multiple theater concept in a recent hearing on the report’s findings.

As Senator Wicker notes in his plan, to truly meet the needs of the National Defense Strategy, the active duty military must grow—and budgets alongside it—to meet the challenge at hand. As the Commission report indicates, real budgetary growth for the military “…has not been consistently achieved, and the world has grown more dangerous since that recommendation was made.”

The cost to strengthen our military should be considered an investment in deterrence. The cheapest war is the one we don’t fight.

Current wars have destroyed the myth of a short, exquisite war that Pentagon planners assume as the large scale conventional war in Ukraine grinds towards its third year and Israel battles its enemies across seven fronts simultaneously.

In addition, the US Navy in the Red Sea is experiencing some of the highest operational tempo in decades even as munitions stocks for both attack and defense are strained and unable to be sustained by our brittle defense industrial base.

Norfolk Naval Shipyard welcomed USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77) for a Planned Incremental Availability Jan. 11. In addition to equipment maintenance, this availability will improve ship safety along with communications and combat system upgrades.

The urgency to rebuild a three-theater force structure is paramount for the world as it is and not as Washington wishes it were.

Regional powers are prepared for just one war. The United States is supposed to be a global power that doesn’t have to pivot in a zero-sum fashion between problems across theaters.

About the Author: Mackenzie Eaglen

Mackenzie Eaglen, now a National Security Journal Contributing Editor,  is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where she works on defense strategy, defense budgets, and military readiness. She is also a regular guest lecturer at universities, a member of the board of advisers of the Alexander Hamilton Society, and a member of the steering committee of the Leadership Council for Women in National Security.

Ms. Eaglen is also one of the 12-member US Army War College Board of Visitors, which offers advice about academic program objectives and effectiveness, and serves on the US Army Science Board, an advisory body that provides guidance on scientific and other matters to the Army’s senior leadership. In 2023, she became a member of the Commission on the Future of the Navy, established by Congress to study the strategy, budget, and policy concerning the future strength of the US Navy fleet.

Image Credit: U.S. Government.