Laura Ru

"Sustaining America’s position of power requires major changes in the funding and planning of our military. This includes major changes in trade, production capacity and supply chains to make our military as resilient and capable as possible. Some specifics will suffice:

We don’t have multi-year plans for critical military expenditures and often rely on short-term continuing resolutions to fund our military. This costs the military billions of dollars a year and creates instability and uncertainty for the defense industry. Switching to multi-year plans could potentially provide $40 billion in savings a year (out of a 2024 Defense Department budget of almost $850 billion) and greater stability for the military.
We need to allow greater flexibility on the reallocation of money; i.e., to continuously innovate (buy the newest drones and other items).
Our stockpiles of vital munitions are seriously inadequate – if there was a war in the South China Sea, we would run out of missiles in seven days. If it were up to me, I would be stockpiling ammunition, air and missile defense, rare earths and other critical components, importantly to preserve peace.
We don’t maintain sufficient excess production capacity in our defense industrial base to ramp up the production of weapons, if necessary. We don’t even have the proper capacity to build battleships anymore. It would be rather easy for the government to work with the private sector to help maintain factories capable of producing military materials that would be required at a wartime pace.
We also lack sufficient labor necessary to do everything outlined above. It can take up to six years to train workers on the complex skills that are needed to manufacture this equipment – and we don’t have six years.
We need to immediately restructure some of our trade and supply chains. Surprisingly, many of the essential items we would need in case of war would come from potential adversaries. These products range from rare earths to penicillin and other pharmaceutical ingredients to certain types of steel, semiconductors and even some manufactured components. We need to use all of the tools at our disposal to do this as expeditiously as possible.
Taking the proper unilateral actions on very targeted investment and export restrictions (chip making equipment, advanced chips and other hard-to-duplicate technology used for military purposes) is essential. However, we should only expect these kinds of actions to slow down our competition, not necessarily stop it.
Finally, the extraordinary science that comes out of our national labs and our exceptional universities has been critical to creating and maintaining our scientific discoveries and advances, which have not only fueled America’s economy but have also maintained our military superiority. There are lots of complaints – some legitimate – about America’s elite universities, but this cannot and should not be one of them.
Protecting our country goes way beyond just the military and includes, among other items, grid security, data centers, communications and cybersecurity in general.

Foreign policy is realpolitik.
America’s alliance system is the foundation of our geopolitical advantage and is the special sauce of American leadership. Foreign policy must be grounded in realpolitik – a pragmatic approach that prioritizes national interest over ideological considerations. Realpolitik means that many decisions are properly subordinated to national security. For example, while addressing global challenges, like climate change, is important, such efforts should not overshadow the strategic imperatives of our foreign relations."