Azernews.Az

Akbar Novruz

Read more

The US Department of Defense has released a new national defense strategy, describing Russia as a “persistent but manageable threat” to NATO’s eastern members, Azernews reports.

The Pentagon noted that despite Moscow’s demographic and economic challenges, its ongoing war in Ukraine demonstrates that Russia still retains significant military and industrial capabilities. However, the strategy asserts that Russia can no longer claim hegemony in Europe.

The document also highlights China as “the second most powerful country in the world,” emphasizing that Washington aims to counter China’s influence in the Indo-Pacific with strength, not direct confrontation. The Pentagon noted that China, despite internal economic and social challenges, continues to expand its military capabilities and demonstrates an ability to spend effectively on defense.

The strategy reflects a dual focus for US defense planning: maintaining NATO’s deterrence in Europe while preparing for strategic competition in the Indo-Pacific.

What does the NDS say?

"As US forces focus on homeland defense and the Indo-Pacific, our allies and partners elsewhere will take primary responsibility for their own defense with critical but more limited support from American forces," the strategy says.

In the Indo-Pacific region, the document says, the Pentagon is intent on preventing Chinese dominance over the US or its allies, but the strategy urges "respectful relations" with Beijing.

It says combating Chinese territorial ambitions "does not require regime change or some other existential struggle. Rather, ‍a decent peace, on terms favorable to Americans but that China can also accept and live under, is possible."

Notably, the document does not mention Taiwan, a US ally that China claims as its territory.

The document describes Russia as "a persistent but manageable threat to NATO's eastern members for the foreseeable future" and calls on the US's NATO allies to "take the lead" in defending Ukraine against Moscow's invasion "with critical but more limited US support."

Other points in the strategy include the statement that "border security is national security," with the Pentagon set to "prioritize efforts to seal our borders, repel forms of invasion, and deport illegal aliens."

The paper also says that the Pentagon will provide Trump with options to "guarantee US military and commercial access to key terrain" in different parts of the world, including in Greenland, which Trump has vowed to take over.

The contrast between the 2026 NDS and its immediate predecessor is made strikingly obvious from the outset, with the current document peppered with pictures of Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, both together and alone.

The previous NDS, released under President Donald Trump's predecessor Joe Biden, did not feature a single picture either of the then president or the defense secretary at the time, Lloyd Austin.

The current strategy document is also full of praise for Trump and his alleged achievements in "[rebuilding] the American military to be the world’s absolute best—its most formidable fighting force," while denigrating previous administrations for "eroding our military’s readiness and delaying modernization."

Very notably, the 2026 NDS makes no mention of climate change as an existential threat, while the one released under Biden contains a whole section on the issue.

Among other things, the 2022 document states: "Climate change is creating new corridors of strategic interaction, particularly in the Arctic region. It will increase demands, including on the Joint Force, for disaster response and defense support of civil authorities, and affect security relationship with some Allies and partners."

The 2022 NDS also accords a much higher priority to the threat posed by China, calling its actions in the Indo-Pacific and beyond the most "comprehensive and serious challenge" to US security.

It also emphasized what it called the "acute threat" of Russia, accusing Moscow of seeking to "reimpose an imperial sphere of influence."