BOOK OF THE DAY

State strategies for survival

Objective 1 – Regional hegemony

In addition to their principal goal, which is survival, great powers seek to achieve three main objectives. Their highest aim is to achieve regional hegemony. Mearsheimer argues although achieving global hegemony would provide maximum security to a state, it is not feasible because the world has too many oceans which inhibit the projection of military power. Thus, the difficulty of projecting military power across large bodies of water makes it impossible for great powers to dominate the world. Regional hegemons try strongly to prevent other states from achieving regional hegemony.

Instead, they try to maintain an even balance of power in regions and act to ensure the existence of multiple powers so as to keep those multiple powers occupied among themselves rather than being able to challenge the regional hegemon's interests, which they would be free to do if they were not occupied by their neighboring competitors. Mearsheimer uses the example of the United States, which achieved regional hegemony in the late 1800s and then sought to intervene wherever it looked as though another state might achieve hegemony in a region:

Imperial Germany during World War I

Nazi Germany during World War II

Imperial Japan during World War II

Soviet Union during the Cold War

Objective 2 – Maximum wealth

Great powers seek to maximize their share of the world's wealth because economic strength is the foundation of military strength. Great powers seek to prevent rival powers from dominating wealth-producing regions of the world. The United States, for example, sought to prevent the Soviet Union from dominating Western Europe and the Middle East. Had the Soviets gained control of these areas, the balance of power would have been altered significantly against the United States.

Objective 3 – Nuclear superiority

Mearsheimer asserts that great powers seek nuclear superiority over their rivals. Great powers exist in a world of multiple nuclear powers with the assured capacity to destroy their enemies called mutually assured destruction (MAD). Mearsheimer disagrees with the assertions that states are content to live in a MAD world and that they would avoid developing defenses against nuclear weapons. Instead, he argues that great powers would not be content to live in a MAD world and would try to search for ways to gain superiority over their nuclear rivals.

Rise of American power; 1800–1900

The United States was a strongly expansionist power in the Americas. Mearsheimer points to the comment made by Henry Cabot Lodge that the United States had a "record of conquest, colonization and territorial expansion unequaled by any people in the 19th century." In the 1840s, Europeans began speaking about the need to preserve a balance of power in America and contain further American expansion.

By 1900, however, the United States had achieved regional hegemony and in 1895 its Secretary of State Richard Olney told Britain's Lord Salisbury that "today the U.S. is practically sovereign on this continent and its fiat is law upon the subjects within its interposition...its infinite resources and isolated position render it master of the situation and practically invulnerable against all other powers."

Future of American power

On the penultimate page of Tragedy, Mearsheimer warns:

Neither Wilhelmine Germany, nor imperial Japan, nor Nazi Germany, nor the Soviet Union had nearly as much latent power as the United States had during their confrontations ... But if China were to become a giant Hong Kong, it would probably have somewhere on the order of four times as much latent power as the United States does, allowing China to gain a decisive military advantage over the United States.

Excerpt from WIKIPEDIA

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