David Kilcullen is from Australia and served in the Australian Army. He has also served the U.S. Government in civilian roles. He has strong opinions but he is not dominated by American political partisanship, so this book is not in the “Democrats Good, Republicans Bad” or “Republicans Bad, Democrats Good” genre. He criticizes American policies where he thinks they need to be criticized but he seems to be very objective and even-handed.
The book takes its name from a speech by CIA Director James Woolsey in 1993, where he called America’s state adversaries dragons and he called our non-state adversaries snakes. So the dragons are, mainly, Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea, and the snakes include the Taliban, Al Qaida, Hezbollah, and ISIS. Kilcullen does an amazing job of describing the military, economic, and political efforts by these dragons and snakes, mainly from the break up of the Soviet Union until 2019.
Kilcullen compares the evolution of dragons and snakes with biological evolution of species. Leaders and soldiers who use the worst tactics get killed. The best leaders and soldiers survive and are successful. When a state or non-state organization is being pressured by military confrontation, it changes and adapts to optimize its effectiveness with respect to its enemies. During more peaceful times, it evaluates itself and watches the technology advances of its enemies and changes and a slower, deliberate pace. Sometimes a snake like Al Qaeda achieves “catastrophic success.” This is a success that is so spectacular that it causes its enemies to launch a campaign to destroy it.
Russia sees itself as the rightful dominant power in Eastern Europe, and they only feel safe with a good buffer of allies between it and the West (NATO). When East Germany and West Germany were united, Russia felt they had a promise that NATO would not expand farther to the east, so they felt double-crossed when some of the former Warsaw Pact countries were allowed to join NATO.
Russia has been engaging in “liminal” confrontation. This reminds me of the “brinksmanship” that we talked about in the 60’s and 70’s. They take actions which are difficult to detect and when detected, difficult to assign responsibility. When responsibility can be assigned, the action perhaps did not reach the threshold that would cause the West to retaliate. They send troops into Crimea, they mass their troops at the border of Ukraine and Norway. They send Islamic migrants into Norway. They poison or imprison Russian dissidents.
In the early decades of the People’s Republic of China, they were a land power with minimal naval and air assets. A large role of the army was to keep domestic order. As they have expanded their trade and economic power, they have developed their navy and gone to a more lean army.
China sees itself as the “middle kingdom” and sees the United States as a danger. The U.S. bombed the Chinese embassy in Kosovo, and sent aircraft carrier groups through the Taiwan Straight. The first, the U.S. called a mistake. The second, the U.S. calls maintaining freedom of navigation. China sees them both as aggressive and sinister. China was also surprised by the way the U.S. crushed the Iraqi army in the first Gulf War. China uses its economic power to coerce many nations into doing their will in many areas. They have been rapidly modernizing their army, navy, and air force.
Another reviewer gave the book one star because it is not as good as Clausewitz or Sun Tzu and deals with the same ideas. Well it might be not as good, and it might deal with the same ideas, but Clausewitz and Sun Tzu did not write about how these ideas apply to our confrontations with Russia, China, North Korea, Iran, and the Islamist terrorists.
Kilcullen thinks that the U.S. and its allies have been dominant from the break-up of the Soviet Union until 2003, and since then their dominance has faded. He thinks the U.S. could be overtaken the way other great powers in history have been overtaken. He suggests several ways that the U.S. could proceed. His favorite is to follow the pattern of the Byzantine Empire. The idea is to use allies, keep enemies off balance, and avoid major wars.
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Top reviews from other countries
NRM
An excellent book about the modern strategic environment facing Western governments
Reviewed in Canada on January 19, 2021
Michele
Ottimo strumento sulla politica internazionale
Reviewed in Italy on February 17, 2022
G.C.
If this doesn't scare the living daylights out of you, I don't know what will
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 25, 2022Rekha Vasan
Excelsior Book with less voluminous content
Reviewed in India on September 1, 2021
Rekha Vasan
Reviewed in India on September 1, 2021
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