Where's the strategic beef? That's what Andrew Krepinevich wants to know.
"When the administration came out with its strategic guidance [in] January, I thought the guidance made a lot of sense in terms of setting priorities," the head of the influential Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments said this morning at the headquarters of the Air Force Association. "Western Pacific No. 1, Persian Gulf region No. 2, that certainly made a lot of sense. But what I haven't seen since then is the strategy. If these are the objectives, how do we go about meeting those objectives?"
When we talk about a possible conflict with the Chinese, for example, "what do we want [Pacific Command chief] Adm. Locklear to do?" Krepinevich asked. "Do we want him to defend the first island chain [running from Japan through Taiwan and the Philippines to northern Indonesia], think about blockading any adversary, [or] do we want to practice nuclear brinksmanship, appeasement, accommodation?"
Krepinevich has been the leading non-government advocate of the Air Force-Navy "AirSea Battle" concept, seen largely as a war plan against Iran and China. But even that idea, he said, is still vague and underdeveloped compared to its inspiration, the Cold War "AirLand Battle" doctrine for defending Western Europe from the Soviets and South Korea from the North during the Cold War/.../