FRIENDS IN GREAT POWER COMPETITION: REFINING PARTNERSHIP EFFORTS TO COMPETE WITH CHINA

Abstract

Partnerships with foreign security forces is one significant military activity that contributes to attaining strategic objectives in great power competition. Military planners and practitioners may refine their understanding of how to create and sustain effective partnerships through this study’s three-component partnership framework consisting of willingness, capability, and effects. The partnership framework draws from principal-agent theory to illuminate how to influence a potential partner’s interests, business partnership literature to improve a partner’s capability, and deterrence theory to understand effects on the rival. This study develops and then illustrates the framework through three historical cases that focus on China as a near-peer rival in East Asia; however, the possible applications are broad. The partnership framework provides insights on what traits in a partner are important, what actions the United States should take to develop a partnership, and unique aspects of China’s responses to U.S. partnerships. This topic is essential because it is a critical component of the military effort in great power competition and one that could use improvement. U.S. partnerships can also significantly impact local political environments; military planners and practitioners owe it to those partner nations and to the United States to make calculated and deliberate decisions on partnerships.