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Cognitive Competition, Conflict, and War: An Ontological Approach

May 2024

Hudson Institute

“The character of war has evolved from the precision strike and stealth regime developed in the late Cold War–era to operations and technologies that target an opponent’s decision-making. This shift has taken many forms, such as gray zone operations, hybrid warfare, little green men, and salami-slicing operations and tactics. Cognitive warfare represents the culmination of this evolution in how countries conduct military operations and calls into question whether traditional kinetic operations alone are necessary to achieve an aggressor’s objectives.”

SMA Speaker Series: Responses Against China’s Coercion in the Indo-Pacific: Developing a Toolkit from the Philippines and Taiwan

 

April 24, 2024

Strategic Multilayer Assessment (SME) General Speaker Session

“China has escalated its aggressive and coercive tactics against smaller and less powerful states as part of its objective to become a regional hegemony. Major targets of Chinese aggression since President Xi Jinping assumed power in 2012 include Taiwan and the Philippines. While both countries face similar forms of Chinese aggression, the tactics employed by China in each case exhibit unique characteristics. Mr. Shattuck delineated the forms of Chinese aggression and Taiwanese responses, while Mr. Garcia provided insights into the Philippines’ experiences.”

U.S. Collapse: A Chain-Writing Experiment

March 2024

It is 2053. The United States is no longer a superpower. What happened?

This is the question the Andrew W. Marshall Foundation posed to the public during the summer and fall of 2023. What might occur between 2024 and 2053 for the United States to experience a “rapid, severe, and significant loss” of power? We characterized this shift as a “collapse” – but left the particulars of its definition up to the public. 

The experiment was divided into three phases, each representing a 10-year increment leading to the future state of 2053, when the United States was no longer a superpower. We called for submissions exploring each 10-year increment, starting with 2024–2033. The winning submission of the first phase became the first link in the chain, the starting prompt for the second phase, 2034–2043. This continued to a third phase, thus creating a three-link chain. 

This paper presents the top submission from each period in “The Chain: U.S. Collapse, 2024–2053.” It then presents the runners-up in “Alternative Links in the Chain.” We encourage you to read this paper front to back—and then read it again as a “choose your own adventure.” What other links, and ultimately, chains, are possible? What would you have explored? 

The Incalculable Element: Ancient Innovations for Modern Security Problems

 

 

Narrated by Patrick Kirchner

Many unanticipated dangers—military, political, technological, foreign, and domestic—shadow the U.S. national security landscape, creating a need for adaptive and inventive leadership. But what exactly does this leadership look like? This paper explores insights from what might seem an unusual source: Thucydides’ discussion of how the Sicilians, inspired by the unconventional guidance of the general Hermocrates, facilitate Sparta’s defeat of Athens in the Peloponnesian War. As Thucydides shows, Hermocrates spurs his listeners to reflect on their limitations and biases at a time when imminent peril would seem to call for nothing but confidence. Yet this reflection, by allowing the Sicilians to reconsider their moral and cultural norms, reform their military structures, and join with unlikely allies to resist Athens’s imperialist threat, fosters an innovative outlook that makes that resistance succeed. This ancient case study remains salient for modern audiences because it exemplifies a nontraditional leadership suited to today’s unforeseen security problems.

Decoding Intentions: Artificial Intelligence and Costly Signals

October 2023

Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET)

How can policymakers credibly reveal and assess intentions in the field of artificial intelligence? Policymakers can send credible signals of their intent by making pledges or committing to undertaking certain actions for which they will pay a price—political, reputational, or monetary—if they back down or fail to make good on their initial promise or threat. Talk is cheap, but inadvertent escalation is costly to all sides.

America’s Reactive Foreign Policy: How U.S. Organizational Culture and Behavior Advantages China

 

Narrated by Patrick Kirchner

This paper critiques the U.S. foreign policy community’s approach to strategic competition with China and raises a crucial question: Is the U.S. government basing strategic competition with China on U.S. interests, or is it reacting in ways that advance the strategic goals of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)?

This paper argues that, because of its organizational culture, the U.S. foreign policy community approaches strategic competition in ways that disadvantage the United States. Through an analysis of the political, military, economic, and psychological condition of U.S. foreign policy, this paper posits that the United States has formed a reactive strategy toward China that leaves it vulnerable to China’s own competitive strategies. Through exploring historical examples and contemporary issues such as Taiwan and integrated deterrence, an underlying pattern emerges. Because it has ill-defined objectives and definitions of success, brought about largely by organizational factors, the United States is developing a reactionary foreign policy that is susceptible to CCP strategies, interests, and advantages. While this paper does not provide a definitive answer, it diagnoses American susceptibility to Chinese strategic manipulation and highlights the need for the United States to develop a more proactive and well-defined strategy to counter China’s competitive strategies effectively.

America’s Reactive Foreign Policy: How U.S. Organizational Culture and Behavior Advantages China

July 2023

The Andrew W. Marshall Foundation

This paper critiques the U.S. foreign policy community’s approach to strategic competition with China and raises a crucial question: Is the U.S. government basing strategic competition with China on U.S. interests, or is it reacting in ways that advance the strategic goals of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)?

This paper argues that, because of its organizational culture, the U.S. foreign policy community approaches strategic competition in ways that disadvantage the United States. Through an analysis of the political, military, economic, and psychological condition of U.S. foreign policy, this paper posits that the United States has formed a reactive strategy toward China that leaves it vulnerable to China’s own competitive strategies. Through exploring historical examples and contemporary issues such as Taiwan and integrated deterrence, an underlying pattern emerges. Because it has ill-defined objectives and definitions of success, brought about largely by organizational factors, the United States is developing a reactionary foreign policy that is susceptible to CCP strategies, interests, and advantages. While this paper does not provide a definitive answer, it diagnoses American susceptibility to Chinese strategic manipulation and highlights the need for the United States to develop a more proactive and well-defined strategy to counter China’s competitive strategies effectively.

The Ethics and Security Challenge of Gene Editing

June 26, 2023

Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

“The weaponization of the scientific and technological breakthroughs stemming from human genome research presents a serious global security challenge. Gene-editing pioneer and Nobel Laureate Jennifer Doudna often tells a story of a nightmare she once had. A colleague asked her to teach someone how her technology works. She went to meet the student and ‘was shocked to see Adolf Hitler, in the flesh.’

Doudna is not alone in being haunted by the power of science. Famously, having just returned home from Los Alamos in early 1945, John von Neumann awakened in panic. ‘What we are creating now is a monster whose influence is going to change history, provided there is any history left,’ he stammered while straining to speak to his wife. He surmised, however, that ‘it would be impossible not to see it through, not only for military reasons, but it would also be unethical from the point of view of the scientists not to do what they knew is feasible, no matter what terrible consequences it may have.'”