Decent Peace or Strategic Delay?
Dr. Hüseyin KORKMAZ
According to the U.S. National Defense Strategy released recently, the United States possesses “the most powerful military the world has ever seen.“
Yet, despite such power, the United States has grown weary of endless wars and efforts that extend into nation building. The document underscores this point explicitly, while also stressing that such a posture should not be interpreted as either “retrenchment“ or “isolationism.“
The strategy document places particular emphasis on the concept of “flexible realism.“ This same emphasis also appeared in the previously released National Security Strategy. The aim is to ensure that pure interest-driven pragmatism dominates American foreign policy.
The rhetoric shaping Washington’s new strategic texts differs markedly from the weary interventionism of the past, which was polished with the language of value. Earlier American discourse often cloaked power politics in a fog of value-laden rhetoric. The fog has now dissipated.
The United States is attempting to establish a balance in its favor. It is precisely in this context that the concept of “Decent Peace“ emerges:
The document does not define China as “an enemy to be defeated,“ but rather as a strategic rival with whom coexistence under reasonable conditions is possible. This is, in fact, a noteworthy conceptual shift. Nevertheless, I maintain the view that it is little more than an attempt by a deeply confused American state elite to buy time.
Judging from the document, Washington’s objective is not to dominate, suffocate, or humiliate China. Rather, it seeks a balance in which no one can dominate the other. It would not be an exaggeration to describe this as a twenty-first-century version of the Westphalia Treaty.
This new normal rests on a vision of balance-of-power politics that refuses to share hegemony, yet does not regard total regime destruction as a strategic necessity.
The 2026 National Defense Strategy prioritizes homeland defense, fortification of the Western Hemisphere, deterrence of China by force in the Indo-Pacific, shifting greater burdens onto allies, and reconstituting the defense industrial base.
Although Washington claims on paper that it wants to avoid long, grinding, and distracting wars, the storm unleashed by the Iran strike suggests otherwise.
An America that seeks to concentrate its power to deter China in the Indo-Pacific inevitably consumes munitions, focus, diplomatic energy, and political legitimacy as the war with Iran escalates.
Another instructive dimension of the Iranian front lies in the posture adopted by Russia and China. Moscow and Beijing are approaching Iran not through direct military engagement but with diplomatic distance and caution.
China’s position is consistent with its strategic outlook.
However, reports alleging that Moscow has provided Iran with intelligence to target U.S. forces stand out as tangible signs that the degree of involvement and realities on the ground may yet change.
For Russia, rising energy prices and the diversion of Western attention from Ukraine to the Middle East serve clear interests in the region.
For China, the fact that the United States is being tied down on a front outside East Asia, along with the opportunity to observe American operational capacity, is of considerable strategic significance to China.
The United States is now aware that it can no longer bear the full burden of global leadership. However, it is equally unwilling to allow a world order to be built against its will.
Therefore, it is difficult to conclude from the document that interventionism has ended. What has changed is merely the form of intervention. In place of liberal sermons, we now see a more calculating management of violence.
Yesterday, power politics was constructed through the language of “values.“ Today, it is being reproduced through concepts such as “concrete interests,“ “burden-sharing,“ “homeland defense,“ “balance,“ and “decent peace.“
The Iran war is a concrete example of this new era. America is not retreating; it is simply calculating where, to what extent, and under what justification it will wage a war.
In other words, Washington’s primary objective is to find hegemonic subcontractors and reduce the costs of its military operations. However, it has not yet succeeded in doing so in Iran. Indeed, its European allies appear increasingly reluctant.
A Europe already bending under pressure over Ukraine could be driven into full strategic bankruptcy if Iran is added to the equation.
Returning to the concept of “Decent Peace“ invoked in the document, it is possible to argue that the American strategic doctrine has evolved into a form of selective hegemony.
When the American strategic mindset speaks of “peace through strength,“ it really means withdrawing from wars that are not profitable while retaining a monopoly over violence wherever its geopolitical interests are implicated, as in the case of Iran.
In brief, the United States seeks a realist modus vivendi that would prevent hot conflict along fault lines such as the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea. It views this period as an interim phase in which it can consolidate its power and weaken other states aligned with China’s influence.
Simultaneously, the condition of controlled alertness continues.
As the document itself states: “It is only prudent for the United States and its allies to be prepared for the possibility that one or more potential opponents might act together in a coordinated or opportunistic fashion across multiple theaters.“
X @drhkorkmaz
According to the U.S. National Defense Strategy released recently, the United States possesses “the most powerful military the world has ever seen.“
Yet, despite such power, the United States has grown weary of endless wars and efforts that extend into nation building. The document underscores this point explicitly, while also stressing that such a posture should not be interpreted as either “retrenchment“ or “isolationism.“
The strategy document places particular emphasis on the concept of “flexible realism.“ This same emphasis also appeared in the previously released National Security Strategy. The aim is to ensure that pure interest-driven pragmatism dominates American foreign policy.
The rhetoric shaping Washington’s new strategic texts differs markedly from the weary interventionism of the past, which was polished with the language of value. Earlier American discourse often cloaked power politics in a fog of value-laden rhetoric. The fog has now dissipated.
The United States is attempting to establish a balance in its favor. It is precisely in this context that the concept of “Decent Peace“ emerges:
The document does not define China as “an enemy to be defeated,“ but rather as a strategic rival with whom coexistence under reasonable conditions is possible. This is, in fact, a noteworthy conceptual shift. Nevertheless, I maintain the view that it is little more than an attempt by a deeply confused American state elite to buy time.
Judging from the document, Washington’s objective is not to dominate, suffocate, or humiliate China. Rather, it seeks a balance in which no one can dominate the other. It would not be an exaggeration to describe this as a twenty-first-century version of the Westphalia Treaty.
This new normal rests on a vision of balance-of-power politics that refuses to share hegemony, yet does not regard total regime destruction as a strategic necessity.
The 2026 National Defense Strategy prioritizes homeland defense, fortification of the Western Hemisphere, deterrence of China by force in the Indo-Pacific, shifting greater burdens onto allies, and reconstituting the defense industrial base.
Although Washington claims on paper that it wants to avoid long, grinding, and distracting wars, the storm unleashed by the Iran strike suggests otherwise.
An America that seeks to concentrate its power to deter China in the Indo-Pacific inevitably consumes munitions, focus, diplomatic energy, and political legitimacy as the war with Iran escalates.
Another instructive dimension of the Iranian front lies in the posture adopted by Russia and China. Moscow and Beijing are approaching Iran not through direct military engagement but with diplomatic distance and caution.
China’s position is consistent with its strategic outlook.
However, reports alleging that Moscow has provided Iran with intelligence to target U.S. forces stand out as tangible signs that the degree of involvement and realities on the ground may yet change.
For Russia, rising energy prices and the diversion of Western attention from Ukraine to the Middle East serve clear interests in the region.
For China, the fact that the United States is being tied down on a front outside East Asia, along with the opportunity to observe American operational capacity, is of considerable strategic significance to China.
The United States is now aware that it can no longer bear the full burden of global leadership. However, it is equally unwilling to allow a world order to be built against its will.
Therefore, it is difficult to conclude from the document that interventionism has ended. What has changed is merely the form of intervention. In place of liberal sermons, we now see a more calculating management of violence.
Yesterday, power politics was constructed through the language of “values.“ Today, it is being reproduced through concepts such as “concrete interests,“ “burden-sharing,“ “homeland defense,“ “balance,“ and “decent peace.“
The Iran war is a concrete example of this new era. America is not retreating; it is simply calculating where, to what extent, and under what justification it will wage a war.
In other words, Washington’s primary objective is to find hegemonic subcontractors and reduce the costs of its military operations. However, it has not yet succeeded in doing so in Iran. Indeed, its European allies appear increasingly reluctant.
A Europe already bending under pressure over Ukraine could be driven into full strategic bankruptcy if Iran is added to the equation.
Returning to the concept of “Decent Peace“ invoked in the document, it is possible to argue that the American strategic doctrine has evolved into a form of selective hegemony.
When the American strategic mindset speaks of “peace through strength,“ it really means withdrawing from wars that are not profitable while retaining a monopoly over violence wherever its geopolitical interests are implicated, as in the case of Iran.
In brief, the United States seeks a realist modus vivendi that would prevent hot conflict along fault lines such as the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea. It views this period as an interim phase in which it can consolidate its power and weaken other states aligned with China’s influence.
Simultaneously, the condition of controlled alertness continues.
As the document itself states: “It is only prudent for the United States and its allies to be prepared for the possibility that one or more potential opponents might act together in a coordinated or opportunistic fashion across multiple theaters.“
X @drhkorkmaz
_jpeg_2025_22_12_b3702079-4965-4132-8c28-6f30c62c1513.jpeg "Defense, Security, and Intelligence Revolution: Technopolitics and Demopolitics")
