Last week, Jim sat down with Stephen Wertheim, senior fellow in the American Statecraft Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, to discuss the case for U.S. restraint in global affairs. The episode is the first in a new series on The President’s Inbox that between now and the November election will periodically examine contending perspectives on U.S. grand strategy.

Here are four highlights from Jim and Stephen’s discussion:

1.) The United States adopted a strategy of military primacy after World War II. Before Pearl Harbor, the United States avoided “entanglements” in Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. That changed with World War II and continued throughout the subsequent Cold War as the United States sought to counter totalitarianism. Stephen believes that the United States was right to step up when European nations were unable to defend themselves. “I find it unimaginable for the United States not to have entered World War II and stopped the very worst powers,” Stephen noted. “And I think the United States did play an important role again in the Cold War on much the same logic, the Soviet Union… [was] a totalitarian power that had the capability of overrunning Europe.”

2.) The decision to continue to pursue primacy after the Cold War ended was a pivotal choice. The collapse of the Soviet Union created a “unipolar moment,” meaning the United States did not have another major power threatening its global dominance. That geopolitical reality meant there was a low cost to expanding alliances like the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. But it also created the temptation to demonstrate global dominance, as happened with the 2003 decision to invade Iraq. The result of that war, along with other developments, changed the geopolitical environment. This new era, in Stephen’s view, is one in which “the costs and risks to the United States of maintaining primacy are considerably higher today than they were in the unipolar moment.”

3.) The United States’ quest for global primacy may not have produced the results it promised. Stephen argued that the pursuit of primacy has created a “forever project” for U.S. foreign policy where primacy becomes “an end unto itself.” At the same time, Stephen pointed to how a focus on primacy failed to prevent China’s rise or stop Russia’s aggression. Instead, the quest for primacy, as Jim put it, has helped spur the rise of “the axis of the aggrieved—states that want to challenge U.S. primacy.”

4.) Proponents of retrenchment want the United States to abandon the goal of primacy, do less overseas, and ask allies to do more. Stephen argued that the United States is overcommitted with its involvement in Asia, Europe, and the Middle East: “Even if we don't initially get into a major conflict, you could have a deterrence failure because one of the U.S. adversaries believes that the United States is overstretched.” Stephen personally favors doing less in Europe and the Middle East and more in Asia because “40 percent of the world's economic activity is produced in Asia.” 

If you’re looking to read more of Stephen’s analysis, check out his piece for Foreign Affairs, “Why America Can’t Have It All.” It argues in favor of prioritization over primacy.