THE STRATEGIC CONTEXT
THE ELEMENTS OF THE NEW STRATEGY 3.1 A PARADIGM SHIFT: EMBRACING THE COMPETITION CONTINUUM
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HIS STRATEGY IS PREMISED on an emerging paradigm that embraces the concept of a “competition continuum” as introduced by the US Joint Chiefs (JCS) in 2019. As the JCS described, “Rather than a world either at peace or at war, the competition continuum describes a world of enduring competition conducted through a mixture of cooperation, competition below armed conflict, and armed conflict.”22 Seizing the Advantage embraces the continuum and outlines the need for a departmental paradigm shift, “The gray zone,” “hybrid warfare,” and “below-threshold geared toward competing activities” are often used interchangeably. Seizing the and deterring today across Advantage will define and standardize the use of these terms: the continuum, and prepar• The Gray Zone: a portion of the competition continuum ing for a potential future fight. where covert, illegal, malign, or destabilizing actions fall Today, the DoD is comfortabove the level of cooperation and below the typical able deterring and preparthreshold of armed conflict ing for conventional conflict, • Below-Threshold Activities: covert, illegal, malign, but much less experienced or destabilizing actions in the gray zone that are and comfortable competing intended to deliver effects that achieve a national in the gray zone; this needs objective without eliciting a response (or specifically a military response) to change. The DoD should embrace the competition • Hybrid Warfare: statecraft using multiple levers continuum, which requires of national power (including political, diplomatic, not relying solely on coninternational, economic, and other nonmilitary means, often in conjunction with the use or threat of military ventional action or capabilforce) across the entire competition continuum ities. China and Russia have (including cooperation, competition, and conflict) for been engaged in competition the purposes of achieving national security objectives below the threshold of armed Using these definitions, this strategy argues the United conflict, also known as the States should conduct hybrid warfare (the action) in the “gray zone,” with the United gray zone (the environment). States and its allies and partners for years, albeit in different ways. China’s fait accompli military buildup in the South China Sea; its sustained cyberattacks, including the theft of trillions of dollars of US intellectual property; Russia’s hybrid warfare, including its “annexation” of Crimea and the use of masked “little green men” in Ukraine; its interference in Western elections; its promotion of mis- and disinformation to sow discord in the United States; and interference in democratic elections are just a few examples of these states’ aggressive activities in the gray zone.23 These activities have chipped away at the established international rules-based order and incrementally eroded the United States’ domestic stability and relative security position.
Terms of Reference
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