Issue No 198 2015

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26 David Kilcullen, The Accidental Guerrilla: fighting small wars in the midst of a big one, Oxford University Press: New York, 2009, pp. 22-6. 27 Sascha-Dominik Bachmann and Hakan Gunneriusson, ‘Hybrid Wars: 21 st century’s new threats to global peace and security’, Scientia Militaria: South African Journal of Military Studies, Vol. 43, No. 1, 2015, pp. 5-6, available at accessed 14 October 2015. 28 David Alberts and Richard Hayes, Understanding Command and Control, CCRP Publications: Washington DC, 2006, pp. 144-6. 29 Fred Wieners, ‘Operation Enduring Freedom Preliminary Lessons’, Air War College: Maxwell Air Force Base, 25 October 2002, cited in Richard Gomez, ‘Centralised Command-Decentralised Execution’, Air War College, Maxwell Air Force Base, 2003, available at accessed 14 October 2015. 30 Linda Sieg, ‘Japan, US differ on China in talks on ‘grey zone’ military threats’, Reuters, 9 March 2014; Ken Jimbo, ‘Maritime Security Challenges in Asia: implications for Japan and Australia’, Lowy Institute [website], 30 October 2014, available at accessed 14 October 2015. 31 Mark Galeotti, ‘NATO and the new war: dealing with asymmetric threats before they become kinetic’, In Moscow’s Shadows [website], 26 April 2014, available at accessed 14 October 2015. 32 UK Defence Committee, Towards the next Defence and Security Review. 33 Lynda Liddy, ‘The Strategic Corporal’, Australian Army Journal, Vol. 2, No. 2, Autumn 2004, pp. 139-48. 34 ‘Russia pulls in Sevastopol and Ukraine’s border troops – Tyagnibok’, NB News, 24 February 2014. 35 Neil Couch and Bill Robins, ‘Big Data for Defence and Security’, Occasional Paper, Royal United Services Institute: London, September 2013, abstract available at accessed 14 October 2015. 36 Such structures are already under consideration by US Army Special Operations Command, Counter- Unconventional Warfare, White Paper, September 2014, pp. 15-6, available at accessed 14 October 2015; Hoffman, ‘Hybrid Warfare and Challenges’, p. 38 37 Gary Luck, Joint Operations: Insights and Best Practices, 2 nd Edition, Joint Warfighter Center – US Joint Forces Command: Suffolk, July 2008, pp. 21-2. 22
Rebalancing What, Exactly? Analysing the United States’ Pacific Pivot 1 Colonel Tim Law, British Army Thus far, the US ‘rebalance’ to Asia is more like a slogan than a concrete strategic plan. 2 A near neighbour is better than a distant cousin. 3 Nearly six years into Obama’s presidency, America has failed to back up its rhetoric while tensions in Asia have become higher and higher. 4 Introduction Ever since the US announced a strategic rebalancing to the Asia-Pacific region, debate on its value has excited a substantial global following. In a conversation in which semantics matter, the bulk of academic literature measures rebalancing activity in absolute terms. 5 This article attempts a different strategy: judging the value of US efforts relative to those it has made elsewhere in the world and, perhaps more importantly, relative to those of China in the region. It will argue that regardless of the wealth of evidence that can be and has been used to demonstrate US intent, the Asia-Pacific region appears to be of limited real importance to the current Administration. Furthermore, it will argue that the gains which have been made through US strategic activity in the region are generally counter-balanced by those of the Chinese—arguably the US’ target in creating its strategy in the first place. Thus, while acknowledging that measurable activity is evident in all six aspects of the rebalancing strategy announced by then Secretary of State Clinton in 2011, 6 it will conclude that—when measured in terms relative to US efforts elsewhere and China’s counter-balancing efforts in the region—the strategy is a failing concept, ridden with strategic risk. In terms of methodology, the strategy will be analysed through the diplomatic, economic and military lenses of the ‘DIME’ construct. 7 US activity since 2011 in each of these areas will be compared with its efforts elsewhere in the world, and then with China’s own activity within the Asia-Pacific region. The rebalancing strategy Following Clinton’s call for the US to ‘pivot to new global realities through increased engagement in East Asia’, President Obama announced a turning of ‘attention to the vast potential of the Asia-Pacific region … to play a larger and longer-term role and to advance security, prosperity and human dignity’. 8 The pivot’s premise was apparently primarily economic, the region being the US’ principal destination for exports and a substantial home for US foreign direct investment. The contention was that ‘the lion’s share of the political and economic history of the 21 st century will be written in the Asia-Pacific region’. 9 The rebalancing contained six sub-strategies: the deepening of working relationships with emerging powers; engagement with regional multilateral institutions; expansion of trade and investment; advancing of democracy and human rights; strengthening of bilateral security alliances; and development of a broad-based military presence. 10 Described by proponents as a ‘low-cost, durable, fundamentally sound, and strategic policy based on the national interests of the US’, its most difficult aspect, however, has been the maintenance of cordial relations between the US and China. 11 At most risk is the balance of regional power. Indeed, the rebalancing is largely viewed, especially by China, as a means by which the US proposes to maintain its regional hegemony in the light of China’s rising influence and assertion in its immediate periphery. Suggestive of an inability to focus its attention on more than one region at once, Michael Mazza contends that the ‘pivot is beset by a problem of perception’. 12 Thus, the ‘pivot’ became a ‘rebalancing’, 23
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Page 3 and 4: Australian Defence Force JOURNAL IS
Page 5 and 6: FORTHCOMING SEMINARS AND CONFERENCE
Page 7 and 8: However, despite understanding the
Page 9 and 10: Australia failed our Vietnam vetera
Page 11 and 12: innovative rehabilitation and psych
Page 13 and 14: A Warning from the Crimea: hybrid w
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Page 31 and 32: 25 Zheng Wang, ‘China’s Alterna
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READING LISTS Professional military
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