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Normative Contestation in the International Order: Is China Remaking Global Governance?
Full text linkThis essay explores China’s approach to global order. China’s remarkable rise has coincided with increasing engagement with the institutions of global governance. These institutions—in particular the United Nations—make up the core of what U.S. leaders have often referred to as the liberal world order or the rules-based order. Many U.S. officials see China as a deep threat intent on challenging, and perhaps even seeking to replace, this rules-based order. This essay, however, makes the case that China’s near-term goals for global governance appear more modest. Much of China’s behavior within institutions such as the UN suggests that what it seeks today is less a recasting of the existing order than a rebalancing and reinforcing of certain longstanding principles and features. China’s primary focus over the last decade has been to revitalize and reinforce long-standing principles of international law such as sovereignty, territorial integrity, and multilateralism while attacking the American concept of a rules-based order. Traditional concepts of sovereignty and international law provide an attractive frame to China. However, there are aspects of the international order China resists or even tries to undermine, such as the law of the sea and international human rights law. This essay explores how China’s approach to global governance has developed over the twentieth century and the first decades of the twenty-first and examines what conclusions about the near future we may draw from this evolution
AI-Enabled Autonomous Weapons and Human Control: Part I: Human Control and Machine Learning Design and Development
Full text linkAt the center of the emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) and autonomous weapon systems (AWS) is the challenge of human control. AI has the potential to reshape the boundaries of military capabilities. In particular, the increasing sophistication of AWS necessitates a deep examination of the balance between machine autonomy and the role and requirements of human decision-makers. In pursuit of this balance, the concept of meaningful human control emerged. It is a concept born of necessity and offers a platform to reexamine and redefine the scope of human involvement in critical and time-sensitive decision-making. MHC has become a defining feature in AWS regulation, but as a concept and a term it presents significant hurdles for its vagueness, lack of practice, and absence of global consensus. To move the needle on the practical realization of human control in AWS, we need to take a considered look at who the decision-makers are and what decisions they make throughout a weapon system life cycle. This article is the first of a three-part series that deconstructs the stages of the weapon system life cycle to explore critical decisions made at three stages: design and development, operational deployment, and tactical engagement. Examining each phase helps understand who is making these decisions, what those decisions are, when those decisions are made, and what the overall implications of those decisions are on the performance of a weapon system. This first article explores the design/development phase
Episode 6: Dilemmas of Strategic Imagination: The Ottoman Empire\u27s Role in World War I
No full textIn Episode 6, Dr. Burak Kadercan and Dr. Jesse Tumblin explore the current case study in Strategy and War Course, World War I, from a different angle: the strategic challenges the Ottoman Empire faced. At its height, the Ottoman Empire ruled on three continents: Europe, Asia, and Africa. However, in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, it lost much of its European domains and struggled to modernize. The possession of one of its former provinces, Bosnia and Herzegovina, led to the clash between Serbia and Austria-Hungary, which snowballed into World War I. Throughout the war the Allies targeted the Ottoman Empire with a series of peripheral campaigns in the Balkans and the Middle East. Dr. Vanya Eftimova Bellinger and her guests explore valuable strategic lessons these campaigns offer. At the end of the war, Great Britain and France divided the Ottoman domains in the Middle East among themselves, leading to many of the issues continuing to plague the region through the current era. Also, the guests discuss how the modern Turkish Republic emerged from the ashes of World War I largely due to the vision and leadership of one of the heroes from the Dardanelles/Gallipoli Campaign, Mustafa Kemal, later known as Atatürk.
The opinions expressed on this podcast represent the views of the presenters and do not reflect the official position of the Department of Defense, The US Navy, or US Naval War College.
Guests:
Burak Kadercan is an Associate Professor who holds a PhD and MA in political science from the University of Chicago and a BA in politics and international relations from Bogazici University in Istanbul, Turkey. Dr. Kadercan specializes in the intersection of international relations theory, international security, military-diplomatic history, and political geography. Prior to joining the Naval War College, he was Lecturer in International Relations at the University of Reading (United Kingdom) and Assistant Professor in International Relations and Programme Coordinator for the MA in international security at Institut Barcelona d\u27Estudis Internacionals (IBEI). Dr. Kadercan’s scholarly contributions have appeared in International Security, Review of International Studies, International Studies Review, International Theory, and Middle East Policy. Dr. Kadercan is the author of Shifting Grounds: The Social Origins of Territorial Conflict (Oxford University Press, 2023).
Jesse Tumblin is an assistant professor of strategy and policy specializing in political and military history, ideas of security, and the current and former British world. He earned a Ph.D. and M.A. from Boston College and a B.A. from the University of Tennessee. He is a past fellow in international security studies at Yale University. He is the author of “The Quest for Security: Sovereignty, Race, and the Defense of the British Empire, 1898-1931” (Cambridge University Press, 2020) and an article on Britain’s attempts to secure its Indo-Pacific empire, which won the Saki Ruth Dockrill Memorial Prize for international history from the Institute for Historical Research, University of London.https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/strategy-matters/1005/thumbnail.jp
CIWAG Policy Papers #1: Seabed Warfare is Here: A U.S. - Led Global Strategy to Secure the Ocean Floor
Full text linkDr. Jahara Matisek, James Langan, Andrew Rolander, and CIWAG Director David A. Brown, COL (Ret.) build on discussions from CIWAG\u27s 2025 Maritime Symposium, co-sponsored with the Naval War College Foundation, and expanding on key insights shared in The Trident podcast episode on maritime sabotage, this paper demonstrates why protecting critical undersea infrastructure is no longer optional—it’s urgent. Growing numbers of incidents and the destruction of pipelines and cables in the waters around Europe and Taiwan signal a global shift: the seabed has become a contested battlespace. The combination of difficulty of detection and attribution, plus the severe consequences to economic security, requires a unified transatlantic/transpacific strategy.
Authors:
Host David A. Brown, COL USA (Retired) is the director of the Center on Irregular Warfare & Armed Groups (CIWAG) and Executive Director of the Advanced Strategist Program at the U.S. Naval War College. COL Brown is a former military strategist with a 30-year career in combat units and military operations.
Co-host Jahara Matisek Ph.D. is a command pilot with over 3,700 hours in the C-17, E-11 BACN, T-6 and T-53 and is a Project Mercury innovation coach. He was recently a military professor in the National Security Affairs Department at the U.S. Naval War College and also served at the U.S. Air Force Academy as an associate professor in the Military and Strategic Studies Department. He has published over 120 articles on warfare, strategy, and national security and been a Fellow at AFWERX, Payne Institute for Public Policy, European Resilience Initiative Center, Modern War Institute, and Irregular Warfare Initiative. He has been a Co-PI on three DOD research projects on security assistance and Russian influence operations.
James Langan is a military policy advisor for the Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF) at the UK Ministry of Defence, where he focuses on hybrid threats such as the Russian Shadow Fleet and sabotage to Critical Undersea Infrastructure. Prior to this he was awarded a Chief of Airstaff Fellowship to complete a MPhil in European Security at the University of Cambridge. He was also the UK militaries’ chief Information Operations and StratCom instructor, and deployed as Commanding Officer of the British militaries’ Combat Camera Team during the 2021 Kabul and 2023 Sudan evacuations. James has also worked as a European energy commodities trader, and currently participates in the RUSI Maritime Sanctions Task Force. His research interests include Russian political economy, and the history of international sanctions policy.
Andrew M. Rolander is a senior IW analyst for Joint Staff J7 in the Office of Irregular Warfare and Strategic Competition (OIWC), responsible for formulating strategy and doctrine for the Joint Force. Andrew has expertise in special forces, intelligence, and para-military operations. He served as an intelligence analyst for the FBI and the CIA, and conducted fellowships on IW with USMC University, Grand Strategy as a George C. Marshall fellow, and History and Statecraft for the Clements Center, University Texas. He is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in maritime strategy and warfighting with the War Studies Department at King’s College London, and a Doctorate in National Security at the Institute of World Politics.
Articles/References: Podcast: Maritime Sabotage: The Hidden War Underseas on Digital Commons: https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/the-trident/19/https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/ciwag-policy-papers/1000/thumbnail.jp
CMSI Note 13: PLA Navy Enhances Realistic Combat Training: Observations of PLA Navy Operations Around Taiwan
Full text linkKey Takeaways Chinese activities around Taiwan in the first two months of 2025 indicate that the PLA is strengthening realistic combat training around the island. This trend aligns closely with the PLA’s emphasis in recent years on using peacetime interactions with foreign forces to achieve training outcomes, a practice it calls “using the enemy to train the troops.” The PLA has exhibited a noticeable increase in the daily number of naval vessels operating around Taiwan, as well as increased frequency and scale of joint combat readiness patrols and maritime-aerial training exercises, when comparing January and February of this year to the same period in previous years. Noteworthy among these PLA Navy activities was an exercise conducted by a Type 075 (LHD) task force in the vicinity of Taiwan in February 2025. This episode was remarkable for the size of the task force (the largest publicly disclosed LHD task force ever to have operated near Taiwan), the location of the exercise (southwest of Jia Lu Tang Beach), and its occurrence very early in the annual training cycle. This acceleration of realistic combat training near Taiwan likely reflects efforts by the PLA to develop the capabilities needed to achieve “national unification” before its centenary in 2027.https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/cmsi-notes/1012/thumbnail.jp
Sabotage of Submarine Cables and Pipelines as a Use of Force and Armed Attack
Full text linkCombating sabotage of submarine cables and pipelines is a matter of law enforcement, subject to the international law of the sea. However, such acts may also constitute the use of force and an armed attack under Articles 2(4) and 51 of the UN Charter. The application of these concepts requires clarification of the “international relations” in which the use of force takes place and identification of the State against which the armed attack occurs. This article argues that, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, the sabotage may be presumed to be directed against the States connected to the targeted cable or pipeline. Whether they may resort to self-defense raises further questions. From the perspective of U.S. doctrine, the right of self-defense is available against any illegal use of force. If, however, it is accepted that only the most grave forms” of the use of force constitute an armed attack triggering self-defense, it may be argued that the longer-term non-physical consequences that can reasonably be expected to result from the sabotage must also be taken into account. It is possible that, in the face of increasing threats, States will adopt such an interpretation. This would allow them to act more robustly even in maritime areas where the law of the sea, as traditionally understood, does not provide sufficient enforcement powers
CMSI Translations #17: Analysis of Problems with Warship Damage Control Plans and Methods for Preparing Damage Control Plans
Full text link“Damage control” (sunhai kongzhi, or just sunguan) refers to measures and actions taken by a warship for the prevention, control, and elimination of damage in order to maintain or recover its vitality (shengmingli). If a warship suffers an accident, this could result in major casualties among the crew and cause damage to the ship’s equipment; it might also impact the ship’s vitality. The crew’s normal level of damage control training determines the success or failure of damage control. In order to fully leverage the active role of crew members in damage control and fully leverage the effectiveness of damage control, a scientific and rational damage control plan must be prepared. The damage control plan resolves questions related to the deployment and responsibilities of personnel during the damage control process, according to certain principals and requirements.https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/cmsi-translations/1016/thumbnail.jp
Intervention, Force & Coercion: A Historical Inquiry on the Evolution of the Prohibition on Intervention
Full text linkIn the Nicaragua Case, the International Court of Justice described coercion as the “very essence of prohibited intervention.” The characterization of coercion as an essential element of non-intervention has become unquestioningly accepted by States and scholars and has dominated debates on how the prohibition on intervention applies in various contexts, including in relation to economic sanctions and cyberoperations. This article challenges the ICJ’s assertion. It does so by retracing the history of the evolution of the prohibition on intervention. It begins by surveying the travaux préparatoires of three Inter-American treaties in which non-intervention was first codified, and then explores the negotiations on the two most influential declarations adopted by the U.N. on non-intervention. This historical inquiry will reveal, first, that States never understood coercion as a defining element of non-intervention, and second, that there is no support for the definitions of coercion that some States and scholars have adopted in recent years, especially in the context of applying non-intervention to cyberoperations. This article concludes by offering an alternative understanding of coercion. It proposes a “unified threshold of coercion” that applies to forcible and non-forcible intervention. According to this approach, an act would be considered coercive if it entails the exertion of a degree of pressure that is comparable to the scale and effects of a violation of the prohibition on the threat or use of force
Sea Dragons: Special Operations and Chinese Military Strategy
Full text linkAs China continues to rise as a global sea power, its maritime strategy continues to evolve. Among these critical evolutions is one of the People’s Liberation Army’s naval special operations forces’ most elite units: the Sea Dragons. A small yet highly specialized unit, the Sea Dragons entered the global spotlight and international consciousness with the 2018 film Operation Red Sea, raising several questions for Chinese naval experts. What does Chinese military strategy and doctrine require of special forces, and specifically naval SOF, to be able to accomplish the mission, particularly along the Taiwan Strait and in the South China Sea? What are their capabilities and limitations? What real-world experience do they have and how might they be employed in the future? This volume attempts to answer those questions and many more regarding one of China’s more enigmatic units and its role in future peacetime and low-intensity conflicts.https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/cmsi-red-books/1017/thumbnail.jp