NEWS AND ANALYSIS:
The Pentagon is in the final stages of producing a new “America First” defense strategy. Early indications suggest the game plan will include a shift away from viewing the threat posed by communist China as a priority.
A draft of the strategy, now Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s desk and awaiting final approval, is said to alter the first Trump administration’s major focus on deterring adversaries, including an increasingly belligerent and expansionist China.
Instead, the defense strategy will call for prioritizing defense of the U.S. homeland, specifically, and the Western Hemisphere, in general, according to reports.
Asked if the forthcoming strategy will shift away from the China threat toward homeland defense, Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell declined to specify.
“Secretary Hegseth has tasked the development of a National Defense Strategy that is laser focused on advancing President Trump’s commonsense America First, Peace Through Strength agenda,” Mr. Parnell told Inside the Ring. “This process is still ongoing. We do not comment on alleged leaked classified documents to the press.”
Politico obtained a draft of the forthcoming strategy and reported earlier this month on the proposed changes in priorities.
One sign of a new regional aggressiveness has been the willingness of U.S. warships in recent weeks to sink suspected drug boats off the coast of Venezuela, a South American country the Trump administration has deemed a “narco-state.”
In addition to the new strategy, the Pentagon is also in the late stages of drafting a review of American forces deployed globally and a review of theater air and missile defense.
The new strategy is being directed by Elbridge Colby, undersecretary of defense for policy, who also took part in the first Trump administration’s defense strategy in 2018.
That earlier strategy stated that the Pentagon must prepare to defend the U.S. homeland and remain the world’s most powerful military power. It also said China and Russia were “principal priorities” for defense requiring increased investment and resources.
Similar language may be included in the forthcoming strategy that, according to the leaked draft, states: “It is increasingly clear that China and Russia want to shape a world consistent with their authoritarian model.”
Mr. Colby in writings and social media posts has advocated a more accommodationist approach toward China.
Unlike other China hawks, Mr. Colby also has said he does not favor ending the communist regime in Beijing.
Like the president, Mr. Colby favors demanding greater defense and security support by regional allies.
The new strategy is expected to reflect the neo-isolationist policies of many hard-line MAGA advocates in the administration, including Vice President J.D. Vance.
China experts voiced some concerns about the reported shift, but said other indications from within the government have given them some assurances China will remain a defense priority.
Retired Navy Capt. Jim Fanell said suggestions of a shift away from China may not be accurate.
Capt. Fanell said he would be concerned if the administration pulls ground forces from South Korea or Japan to bolster the southern border.
However, the recent announcement of a new buildup of naval shipbuilding and ammunition production at Subic Bay in the Philippines augers well for a continued focus on security in the Indo-Pacific, he said.
“I get the sense that we’re seeing a reordering of priorities, and if it’s a reordering that focuses on maritime dominance to be able to deter and defeat the [People’s Republic of China] in any kind of naval invasion of Taiwan, or the Philippines, or Japan, to me that a prioritization that’s long overdue,” Capt. Fanell said.
Capt. Fanell said care is needed by the Pentagon in any force reductions that could increase the danger from China and should follow carpenters’ rules: measure twice, cut once.
Grant Newsham, a retired Marine Corps colonel and China expert with decades of experience in Asia, said if the new strategy is based on an expectation that U.S. allies and friends in the Asia-Pacific will fill in for a reduced American presence or commitment in the region, Washington will be sorely disappointed.
America’s allies in the region are not ready to step in and lack the political will needed to take a larger security role, he said.
“China would love to see themselves declared a ’secondary’ threat or an adversary that just isn’t quite the trouble it was thought to be,” Col. Newsham said.
“If the National Defense Strategy does this, there will be big trouble — and it doesn’t matter if the administration insists our commitment to freedom and our friends in the region is ’rock solid.’”
A Pentagon reorientation away from attention on the Asia-Pacific to the homeland and Western Hemisphere would enable Beijing to dominate the entire region in a matter of 5 to 10 years at most, he said.
“The U.S. will be irrelevant with all that entails,” Mr. Newsham said. “Sometimes one thinks there’s a crowd in D.C. policy circles that aims to accomplish this.”
Trump order on NASA seeks to block China
President Trump last month designated the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and several other agencies as requiring national security protection based on their primary function of serving national security, including intelligence, counterintelligence and investigative work.
For NASA, the order is directly aimed at countering the Chinese Communist Party’s involvement and exploitation of the agency’s space work, said L.J. Eads, a China expert.
“Beijing has long sought to exploit U.S. universities’ partnerships with NASA in violation of the Wolf Amendment, often obfuscating affiliations and funding ties to conceal People’s Republic of China and PLA-linked participation,” said Mr. Eads, founder of DataAbyss, a data-driven defense and security firm focused on China.
The policy shift makes clear that NASA research is no longer just scientific or exploratory but requires protection under national security controls.
The 2011 Wolf Amendment to a defense appropriations law is named after former Rep. Frank Wolf, Virginia Republican. It blocked NASA and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy from any cooperation with China or Chinese-owned companies on space matters.
The measure became law as a result of cases involving technology theft by China, including Chinese theft of advanced U.S. nuclear warhead designs.
Mr. Eads said despite the law Beijing repeatedly tried to exploit loopholes through U.S. university collaboration and third-party fronts.
President Trump’s executive on Aug. 13 order is part of a broader policy to close gaps in research security.
The House Select Committee on the CCP last year uncovered multiple Wolf Amendment violations, including more than a thousand NASA-backed publications co-authored by Chinese institutions, many involving the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Chinese defense contractors.
Among the compromises were work that provided China with remote sensing technology that helped a military program known as the 863 Program.
A NASA marine fog study involved a Chinese university that has a formal agreement with the PLA Naval Submarine Academy and boosted PLA submarine stealth and navigation.
“In short, NASA-funded research has repeatedly been co-opted by PRC military-linked institutions, showing how Beijing exploits loopholes and weak enforcement around the Wolf Amendment,” Mr. Eads said.
U.S. sanctions Chinese spy balloon maker
The Commerce Department Bureau of Industry and Security this week placed 32 foreign companies, including 23 in China, on its blacklist of sanctioned firms for activities that threaten America’s security.
Included among the Chinese entities was the Aerospace Information Research Institute that BIS said in announcing the sanctions is supporting China’s high-altitude spy balloon program.
In 2023, a Chinese surveillance balloon flew undetected over sensitive military and missile bases in the U.S., setting off a U.S. backlash over Chinese spying and violations of sovereignty.
The balloon was eventually shot down over the Atlantic near South Carolina by an F-22 jet but not until passing thousands of miles over the country
China claimed the balloon was a harmless weather monitoring craft and denounced the shootdown.
However, an extensive amount of electronic spying gear was recovered from the downed balloon and the Biden administration kept secret details of the equipment to avoid upsetting Beijing.
A report by the Indo-Pacific Command’s legal office stated that Chinese high-altitude balloon spying operations have violated international law and the sovereignty of more than 40 countries across five continents.
U.S. officials disclosed that the balloon was equipped to collect signals intelligence for a People’s Liberation Army-run surveillance program that targeted more than 40 nations, the report said.
The report said Chinese claims that the balloon did not violate sovereignty were false and had no basis in international law since the balloon had a propulsion and steering system and thus was covered by foreign aircraft rules.
China “sought to justify violation of U.S. sovereignty by characterizing its [high-altitude balloon] as a ‘civilian airship’ used for ‘meteorological’ purposes while blaming ‘force majeure’ for ‘unintended entry’ — not only are these claims false, they do not provide a legal justification even if true,” the report said.
The spy balloons are said to be a Chinese tactic for collecting intelligence from “near space” instead of using more expensive satellites.
“By propagating the term ‘near space’ in various publications, the PRC likely aims to foment a gray zone in which to execute unlawful surveillance under a false veneer of legitimacy,” the report said.
“There is no ‘near space’ in international law — only airspace and outer space, and [high-altitude balloons] fly in airspace.”
• Contact Bill Gertz on X @BillGertz.
