Sustainable Security: Developing a Security Strategy for the Long Haul

The inability of many states in the developing world to govern and police themselves effectively or to work collectively with their neigh­bors to secure their regions represents a global security capacity deficit that can threaten U.S. interests. Effectively addressing this security deficit will require a new approach, one that is more preventive and indirect in its nature, that seeks to husband American power, and that reconciles America’s values, interests, and commitments with its finite resources over the long haul. America’s current strategic predicament lends urgency to the formulation of a new strategy that focuses on how best to reconcile ends and means. More than six years on from the 9/11 attacks, America’s position in the world and the course that lies ahead are uncertain. The high costs of current wars in terms of blood and treasure contribute to a growing sense of strategic exhaustion. Given its global goals, responsibilities, and values, America’s current course is unlikely to be one that can be sustained for the long term—politically (both domestically and internationally), economically, or militarily. While the United States faces an array of security challenges, ranging from the rise of China and the resurgence of Russia, to the spread of nuclear and biological weapons, and the extension of conflict into the domains of space and cyberspace, chal­lenges to the nation-state system itself are the most complex and least understood. Many countries in the world expect the United States to lead efforts to counter proliferation or deter interstate conflict. However, the United States is less-suited to lead when it comes to confronting security challenges abroad that are more intrastate in character. It is in these cases that the United States should adopt a more behind-the-scenes, supporting role. This paper focuses on this strategic problem and proposes a conceptual approach for shoring up the nation-state system with the aim of setting condi­tions for an expansion of global civil society—and the commensurate gains in security and pros­perity that would come with it.