by Nathan Catching
There was once a kingdom that became a dominant land power and eventually a great power. It set international norms and shaped the world order through diplomacy and sometimes war. One day, a localized war escalated, drawing neighboring states into a worldwide conflict that unexpectedly raged for years. When the exhausted belligerents finally compromised at the peace table, this leading power had lost not only prestige and territory, but also its place as the ruling hegemon; a rising state from the West had suddenly usurped it. This angered the older great power, who vowed revenge, initiating a modernization strategy as it continually sought opportunities to reshape the international order. This is not a fairy tale or hypothetical, and the great power in question is not Russia or China.
Great power competition predates the contemporary era by three hundred years. France, at the dawn of the 18th Century, had become the world’s leading land power, and it strove against the rising British maritime kingdom to the West in a series of hot and cold wars for over a century. During this turbulent period, these adversaries sought to balance power through ever-shifting alliances.[1] By mid-century, Britain and France became embroiled in a regional conflict known in America as the French and Indian War, but this confrontation soon widened into a global phenomenon called the Seven Years’ War (1756–63). Late British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill referred to it as The First World War, ostensibly because it spanned Europe, the Mediterranean, North America, the West Indies (Caribbean), India, and parts of Africa and the southeast Pacific. At its conclusion, Britain had unquestionably become an Empire, seizing Canada and India from France.[2] The bitter part for France, however, was the loss of prestige; they would spend the next two decades seeking to regain it while challenging Britain’s world order.[3] Times have drastically changed, but great power competition is still very much alive.
This is not a proposition to consider the Seven Years’ War in lieu of more recent conflicts, like the 20th Century World Wars or the Cold War, but in addition to these examples. A 2024 North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) report predicts the “alignment of state adversaries and the empowerment of non-state actors [will require] adaptive and strategic responses,” and one way NATO is preparing is through “scenario planning” (i.e. wargaming contingencies).[4] Scenarios, by their very nature, must draw some sense of realism from history. A detailed case study of the Seven Years’ War would add depth to scenario planning for great power struggles because it involved managing risk of unwanted escalation, highly dynamic alliances, and global strategy. Considering these three facets in the shadow of current global tensions is crucial, but it is important to first understand the context of the Seven Years’ War.
This conflict began as a regional contest over the Ohio River valley (western Pennsylvania). Anglo-American colonists expanded westward, into this region, threatening the link between French Canada and Louisiana (which extended through the Midwestern U.S. at the time). The French tried to evict them and started building forts with the intent of encircling the thirteen Anglo-American colonies, checking British expansion east at the Appalachian Mountains.[5] In 1754, a young colonial officer named George Washington responded by leading a skirmish against a French position, and though he succeeded, a larger French contingent counterattacked and forced his surrender, unofficially starting the French and Indian War.[6]
Escalation continued despite attempts by both sides to contain hostilities. In 1756, Austria and Russia allied with France while Prussia sided with Britain. France seized British Minorca in the Mediterranean, leading Britain to declare war.[7] The Prussians subsequently lit the powder keg in Europe by conducting a preemptive attack into Saxony (Germany), which was loyal to Austria, thus officially starting the Seven Years’ War. It soon spread across the globe, with the major theaters consisting of Europe, North America, the West Indies, and India. It also drew in other European belligerents, including Portugal (allied to Britain) and Spain (supporting France).[8] Although the Treaty of Paris in 1763 ended hostilities, it was more of a temporary truce because the embittered French set to work rebuilding their navy while seeking opportunities to reshape the international order. This later involved providing materiel to the American colonial rebels in 1776 and eventually declaring another hot war against the British in 1778–83, near the end of the American Revolution.[9] Understanding how this war escalated lends important lessons for 21st Century policymakers.
Tensions in competition can cause both vertical and horizontal escalation (i.e., increasing intensity and widening the conflict). While many historians prefer to stay away from counterfactuals, educated guesses about what might have otherwise happened are useful when considering the origins of this war. What could have happened had the contest remained between Britain and France in North America? Would Americans today be speaking French? The British were losing in that theater from 1754 to 1758, and perhaps the outcome would have differed greatly if France had not divided their focus by supporting Austria against Prussia in Europe.[10] This counterfactual enables modern armchair historians to ask what decisions the French might have made differently to prevent escalation and thus retain their strategic advantage? In a similar vein, Britain and France returned to postwar competition after 1763. When the American Revolution started in 1775, one of Britain’s major concerns was ending it quickly, before contentious European powers (e.g. France or Spain) could get involved.[11] Competition is laden with tension, but historic examples like the Seven Years’ War allow modern strategists to understand how these tensions turned into conflict, and to potentially avoid similar pitfalls. Escalation also links closely with alliances.
The Seven Years’ War offers two lessons regarding diplomacy. The first is that a multipolar world breeds more fluid alliances because of changing domestic politics and emergent opportunism. Britain, for example, fought the French twice and were allied to them once in the half century leading up to the Seven Years’ War.[12] In 1755–56, Europe underwent a Diplomatic Revolution, meaning that Austria – formerly a British ally – now sided with France in a bid to regain lost territory from Prussia. The Prussians, on the other hand, had been an enemy of Britain but now allied with them out of necessity; France, Austria, and Russia – all adversaries – surrounded them. It was a symbiotic relationship, as Britain subsidized Prussia to defend its territory in Hanover (northern Germany) while also raising a Hanoverian mercenary army.[13] Diplomacy, however, did not remain static.
Alliances shifted in the final years of the conflict. Portugal and Spain joined the British and French, respectively, in 1761. The following year, Russia fell out of the war because of internal regime change, and Britain lost its alliance with Prussia after cutting the purse strings on subsidies because Frederick the Great – the Prussian king – refused to explain how he intended to use the money (which perhaps resonates with current U.S. concerns over supporting Ukraine). Britain then spent the next two decades through the American Revolution in diplomatic isolation.[14] All these alliances are enough to make one’s head spin, yet diplomacy in a multipolar world was clearly an art form that 18th Century practitioners had mastered. The last century of the modern era has seen relative stability through the advent of NATO, but in 2016, the U.S. military joint staff postulated “an increasingly multipolar world” of “flux” in the future security environment. They predicted that “state competitors will try to weaken traditional U.S. alliances or take advantage of perceived fractures to expand their regional power.”[15] While policymakers may never face the precarious diplomacy of the 18th Century, they could certainly afford to take lessons from the masters of this period, who were seasoned in great power competition. The Seven Years’ War also, conversely, provides a lesson in diplomatic caution.
A second diplomatic insight is that states must weigh alliance commitments within their grand strategies. France had originally intended to focus on defeating Britain’s navy in the Seven Years’ War, but after Prussia conducted the preemptive strike into Saxony, the French chose to make good on their alliance commitment to Austria. This meant reprioritizing the European theater to the chagrin of their own strategy.[16] There are similar costs in modern alliances. Consider Article 5 of the NATO treaty, for example, where an attack on one NATO member is an attack on all. This commitment may become more problematic in the years ahead, especially if NATO continues to expand its membership or extends its reach beyond Europe.[17] The alternative – isolation – is no doubt worse, as 18th century Britain learned when European powers led by France formed a coalition against them during the American Revolution, but the point is that states should choose their diplomatic commitments carefully.[18] This is especially true when operating globally.
Churchill’s 18th Century First World War paradigm lends two, interrelated lessons about global strategy. First, strategy must be coherent across theaters of war. Britain’s mercenary army in Europe and its subsidies to Prussia not only protected Hanover, but also allowed the British to concentrate their army and navy abroad. They could send more redcoats to North America, where they responded to initial defeats by launching a three-pronged counterattack into French Canada, culminating in the seizure of Quebec and Montreal. In India, the British navy supported the civilian East India Company (which had its own privatized army) in defeating the French.[19] Similarly, the modern U.S. military has multiple geographic combatant commands focused on various regions across the world. Policymakers may glean insights from a simpler age about using straightforward strategic guidance to integrate operations and resources globally.[20] This ties closely into a second application – tradeoffs.
To borrow an economic term, there are always opportunity costs (tradeoffs) in grand strategy.[21] The French committed to the European theater, attempting to seize Hanover as a bargaining chip against Britain for postwar negotiations, but this gambit failed. They had divided their commitments between Europe and the naval-colonial war, and could not accomplish both, at least not well. By 1759, they tried to shift prioritization to the colonies, but it was too late; the British were already in the process of defeating them in both North America and India.[22] Business theorist Greg McKeown asserts that the word “priority” was originally singular when it came into the English language, meaning there cannot truly be more than one, otherwise “we don’t purposefully and deliberately choose where to focus our energies.”[23] This logic applies to strategy as well, where every French unit committed to Europe could not be committed to North America. A potential pitfall of the 2022 U.S. National Security Strategy is that it lumps China and Russia together, striving for “an enduring competitive edge over [China] while constraining a still profoundly dangerous Russia.”[24] While these are excellent objectives, which adversary is the priority? In a hot war, there are only so many strategic assets available (carrier strike groups, nuclear submarines, 5th generation aircraft, long range missile launchers, etc.), thus the need for what historian Jeremy Black terms “adroit prioritisation.”[25] Alternatively, consider how Russia was either unable or unwilling to back the Assad regime against the recent 2024 rebel attacks, ostensibly because of their prioritization of Ukraine and the enduring costs of that war.[26] In sum, a deeper study of the Seven Years’ War and its immediate postwar period offers many relevant insights for modern strategists.
In returning to the original tale, it took the older great power (France) two decades to achieve its revenge and challenge the British world order. Today’s adversaries may be willing to wait even longer to attain their objectives in the “flux” of this multipolar world. Alternatively, there is also the risk of unforeseen escalation as tensions rise; this was the case between 1754 and 1756, when a French and Indian War transformed into a global conflict. Today’s policymakers could learn much about multipolar diplomacy and grand strategy from a deeper study of this period. The U.S. and NATO should use historical case studies as far back as the 18th Century to provide realistic context for scenario contingency planning. Today’s policymakers and strategists would do well to glean insights from predecessors seasoned in great power competition.
[1] Daniel A. Baugh, “Withdrawing from Europe: Anglo-French Maritime Geopolitics, 1750–1800,” The International History Review 20, no. 1 (March 1998): 1, 5–7, 9, 11, https://www.jstor.org/stable/40107934. Baugh and Szabo (listed below) discuss the rise of France to great power status, the threat to Great Britain, and the Seven Years’ War as a global conflict. Baugh also discusses the “Second Hundred Years War” between Britain and France, from 1689 to 1815 (p. 1), how France’s alliances drew it into a war in Europe (p. 5) and why alliances in the 18th Century were so dynamic (pp. 6–7), Britain’s maritime prowess (p. 9), and notes that France was a land power (p. 11); Edmond Dziembowski, “European Geopolitics, 1756–1783” in The Oxford Handbook of the Seven Years’ War, ed. Trevor Burnard, Emma Hart, and Marie Houllemare, (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2024), 215–16, 220, 223, 224, https://academic-oup-com.ezp.lib.cam.ac.uk/edited-volume/57923?login=true&token=eyJhbGciOiJub25lIn0.eyJleHAiOjE3MzczMTk3NDIsImp0aSI6IjkwOGM2N2MwLTc4OWUtNDM2Yy04N2ZmLTc2ZTY2NzNhZmE4MCJ9. Dziembowski discusses how France was no longer head over the great powers after the Seven Years’ War because the British had taken that mantle (pp. 215–16, 223), and how France prepared for revenge after the war (p. 220), which included rebuilding the navy (p. 224); Daniel Marston, Essential Histories: The Seven Years’ War (Oxford, UK: Osprey Publishing, 2001), 10–11, 15, 83–87, 90. Marston discusses the alliances and escalation on each side (p. 15), high economic costs for the participants (pp. 83-87), and how France as “a shell of her former self” underwent military reform (p. 90). Marston (pp. 10–11) and the United States Military Academy map (listed below but not depicted in this short blog) show how New France and Louisiana held the British thirteen colonies back from westward expansion; D. J. Peters, A Short History of France (Oxford, UK: Pergamon Press, 1966), 6. Peters provides an overarching history of France, starting as a kingdom; Franz A. J. Szabo, The Seven Years War in Europe 1756–63, ed. H. M. Scott and B. W. Collins (Abingdon, UK: Routledge, 2013), 2–3, 7, 11–12, 22, 31, 36, 378–79, 424. Szabo describes the escalation (pp. 11–12), Prussia’s intentions for a short war (pp. 22, 36, 424), France’s reputation as “the most formidable military power on the continent” (p. 31; this presumably paints France as a land power), and how financially exhausted some of the belligerents were by the end of the war (pp. 378–79); Robert Tombs and Isabelle Tombs, That Sweet Enemy: The French and the British from the Sun King to the Present (London, UK: William Heinemann, 2006), 112. These authors note Britain’s “maritime strength” and that “Britain eventually emerged as the greatest imperial state, largely at France’s expense”; United States Military Academy (USMA): Digital History Center – Atlases [Map of American Colonies, 1754], Depicts Principal Campaigns of the American Colonial Wars, 1754–63], accessed 14 December 2024, https://s3.amazonaws.com/usma-media/inline-images/academics/academic_departments/history/Colonial%20Wars/01ColonialWarsPrincipalCampaigns-01.jpg. This map (though not displayed in my paper), is a good reference for the general areas of contention in North American, including Washington’s movement into the Ohio River valley in 1754.
[2] Daniel Marston, Essential Histories: The French and Indian War, 1754-1760 (Oxford, UK: Osprey Publishing, 2002), 7-8, 90; Marston provides an overview of the French and Indian War (pp. 7-8) and its territorial concessions (p. 90); Fred Anderson, Crucible of War: The Seven Years’ War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754-1766 (New York, NY: Vintage Books, 2001), 505-506. Anderson briefly summarizes the Treaty of Paris, which ended the Seven Years’ War in 1763; Winston S. Churchill, The Age of Revolution, vol. 3., A History of the English-Speaking Peoples New York, NY: Bantam Books, 1963), 123, 133–34, https://archive.org/details/A-History-Of-The-English-Speaking-Peoples-4-volumes/A-History-of-the-English-Speaking-Peoples-03-The-Age-of-Revolution_-_Winston-Churchill/page/n137/mode/2up. Churchill titled his chapter on the Seven Years’ War: “The First World War” (p. 123) and discusses Britain’s territorial gains and its establishment as an Imperial power (pp. 133-134), arguing that it ended up becoming detrimental to Britain in the long run; Niall Ferguson, Empire: How Britain Made the Modern World (United Kingdom: Penguin Books, 2004), 32. Ferguson adds to the discussion on global conflict by describing the various belligerents and noting that the “Seven Years War was the nearest thing the eighteenth century had to a world war…the fighting raged from Coromandel to Canada, from Guinea to Guadeloupe, from Madras to Manila”; Daniel Baugh, The Global Seven Years War, 1754–1763: Britain and France in a Great Power Contest, 2nd ed. (Abingdon, UK: Routledge, 2021), 6. Baugh briefly notes the global nature of the war; Don Higginbotham, The War of American Independence: Military Attitudes, Policies, and Practice, 1763–1789 (Boston, MA: Northeastern University Press, 1983), 21. He notes the great territorial gains of the war and compares the British Empire to ancient Rome.
[3] Dziembowski, 215-216, 220, 223, 224; Higginbotham, 230. Dziembowski discusses how France was no longer head over the Great Powers after the Seven Years’ War as the British had taken that mantle (pp. 215-216, 223), and how France prepared for revenge after the war, which included rebuilding the navy (p. 220). Higginbotham describes how France saw the American Revolution as an opportunity to attack British commerce, which was pivotal to their Empire, and thus restore the balance of power and regain primacy in Europe.
[4] North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Allied Command Transformation, First Allied Foresight Conference, Helsinki, Finland, 10-12 June [Report Summary] (Norfolk, VA: NATO Allied Command Transformation, 2024), 8, https://www.act.nato.int/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/AFC_HelsinkiSummaryReport_FINAL.pdf. The quotations and description of scenario planning come from this source; Timothy R. Heath, “Wargames Can’t Tell Us How to Deter a Chinese Attack on Taiwan—But Different Games Might,” Lawfare: Foreign Relations & International Law, 5 January 2023, accessed 14 December 2024, https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/wargames-cant-tell-us-how-deter-chinese-attack-taiwan-different-games-might. Heath describes the utility of contingency focused wargames and proposes improvements; Gian Gentile et al., Research Report: Revisiting RAND’s Russia Wargames After the Invasion of Ukraine, Summary and Implications (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2023), 1–5, https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA2031-1.html. This report gives an idea of the type of wargaming that RAND has done in support of NATO.
[5] Brendan Simms, Three Victories and a Defeat: The Rise and Fall of the British Empire, 1714-1783 (New York, NY: Basic Books, 2009), 388; Marston, The French and Indian War, 11; Marston, The Seven Years’ War, 10; Anderson, 36–41; Baugh, The Global Seven Years War, 40-42; Churchill, 126.
[6] Anderson, 44–45, 50-59, 62–65; Marston, The French and Indian War, 11-13; USMA: Digital History Center – Atlases [Map of American Colonies, 1754].
[7] Dziembowski, 217; Baugh, The Global Seven Years War, 146, 152-153; Szabo, 11, 14–16; Anderson, 68–73. Note that Dziembowski and Szabo (p. 11) briefly discuss how the British and French attempted to “confine the hostilities to North America” (Dziembowski). Also, chronologically, Prussia sided with Britain at the end of 1755 (Baugh), then the French conquered Minorca in April 1756 (fleet landed in April but the operation continued until June before it fell to the French, per Szabo, p. 16), then the French established the Austrian alliance on 1 May 1756 (Szabo, p. 15), then the British declared war on France on 17 May 1756 because news of Minorca had finally reached them in May (Szabo, p. 16), and lastly, France declared war on Britain on 9 June 1756 (Szabo, p. 16). Anderson describes the escalation from a North American stance, where he notes that by 1755, “war between Britain and France [was] all but inevitable” (p. 72).
[8] Szabo, xv and xviii (maps), 36; Marston, The Seven Years’ War, 12–15, 26–29, 34–35; Ferguson, 32; Baugh, The Global Seven Years War,6, 192-194, 484 (War with Spain), 511–12 (Support to Portugal); Simms, 419, 481, 487.
[9] Dziembowski, 220, 224–25; Simms, 479–80, 504, 508–9, 598, 683; Anderson, 505–6; Marston, The Seven Years’ War, 91; Baugh, The Global Seven Years War, 557, 567; Baugh, “Withdrawing from Europe,” 21; Tombs, 148, 154, 155, 157, 163; Higginbotham, 116–17, 229–30, 379–83, 427, 431–32. According to Tombs (p. 163) and Higginbotham (pp. 116–17, 229–30), the French started providing weapons to the American Patriot rebels in 1776 during the American Revolution. Higginbotham also describes French later intervention, beginning in 1778 (pp. 379–83, 431–32) and the subsequent 1783 Treaty of Paris (p. 427). Tombs describes French opposition via proxy and in India after the Seven Years’ War (p. 163). Simms briefly mentions the Treaty of Paris (1783) as well (p. 683).
[10] Ferguson, 30; Marston, The French and Indian War, 31–33, 37, 40–41; Marston, The Seven Years’ War, 47; Churchill, 126–27. Ferguson describes the counterfactual of a French victory in greater depth.
[11] Baugh, “Withdrawing from Europe,” 26; Baugh, The Global Seven Years War, 567; Simms, 598; Nathan Catching, “Back to the Drawing Board: Redesigning Leaders for Joint Task Force (JTF) Command in 2035” (monograph, U.S. Army School of Advanced Military Studies, 2021), 23–24, 29, accessed 12 December 2024 at https://cgsc.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p4013coll3/id/4140/rec/1. The monograph briefly outlines the continuum for competition and conflict.
[12] Peter Jupp, The Governing of Britain, 1688–1848: The Executive, Parliament and the People (Abingdon, UK: Routledge, 2006), 4; Baugh, “Withdrawing from Europe,” 7; Simms, 115, 221, 409. Jupp describes how the British and French were enemies in the War of Spanish Succession (1701–13), then briefly allies in a short war in 1718–1720, and then enemies once again in the War of Austrian Succession (1739–48). Baugh describes why “leagues and alliances” were “commonplace” in this era. Simms describes the brief alliance with France after the death of King Louis XIV of France (1716–31).
[13] Szabo, 9, 14–17; Simms, 419–20, 425–26; Baugh, The Global Seven Years War, 146, 152–53; Marston, The Seven Years’ War, 15, 26–28.
[14] Szabo, 376, 380-384, 388, 426; Baugh, The Global Seven Years War, 484, 511–12; Simms, 488, 492, 680; Marston, The Seven Years’ War, 91; Jonathan Masters and Will Merrow, “How Much U.S. Aid Is Going to Ukraine?” Council on Foreign Relations, 27 September 2024, accessed 21 January 2025, https://www.cfr.org/article/how-much-us-aid-going-ukraine; “White House announces nearly $1 billion more in military assistance to Ukraine,” CBS News, 7 December 2024, accessed 21 January 2025, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/white-house-nearly-1-billion-dollars-military-assistance-ukraine/.
[15] U.S. Department of Defense, Joint Staff, Joint Operating Environment (JOE) 2035: The Joint Force in a Contested and Disordered World (Washington, DC: Government Publishing Office, 2016), accessed 12 December 2024 at https://www.jcs.mil/Portals/36/Documents/Doctrine/concepts/joe_2035_july16.pdf, 1, 6, 28. The quotations are from Joint Operating Environment (JOE) 2035. The portion about “flux” is on p. 1, the one about “multipolar” is on p. 6, and the one about “state competitors” is on p. 28; Catching, “Back to the Drawing Board” (monograph), 28; Ivo Daalder and James Goldgeier, “Global NATO,” Foreign Affairs 85, no. 5 (September-October 2006): 105–8, 113, available at https://www-jstor-org.ezp.lib.cam.ac.uk/stable/20032073?searchText=global+nato&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Dglobal%2Bnato%26so%3Drel&ab_segments=0%2Fbasic_search_gsv2%2Fcontrol&refreqid=fastly-default%3Aebaf7252eee2c1a9dff6b37fa0dad640.
[16] Baugh, The Global Seven Years War, 190–94; Baugh, “Withdrawing from Europe,” 5; Dziembowski, 220; Marston, The Seven Years’ War, 28.
[17] North Atlantic Treaty Organization, North Atlantic Treaty (Washington, D.C.: 1949), 3, https://www.nato.int/nato_static_fl2014/assets/pdf/history_pdf/20161122_E1-founding-treaty-original-treaty_NN-en.pdf; Daalder and Goldgeier, 105-108, 113. I began pagination for the NATO Treaty on p. 3 of the digital PDF since that looked to be p. 1 of the original document, thus Article 5 is on p. 3 of the Treaty but p. 5 of the online PDF.
[18] Higginbotham, 379, 420–21, 423, 426–27, 431–32; Simms, 680.
[19] Simms, 419–20, 426; Marston, The French and Indian War, 37, 40–41, 56–72; Marston, The Seven Years’ War, 22, 45–46, 55–56, 66–69; Churchill, 127. Marston mentions that there were British army units in India, but the “officers and men were seconded to the various East India Company forces” (p. 22). In the later Battle of Wandiwash in early 1760, he mentions “regular units of both armies” (the British and French, p. 68), connoting units made up of British and French soldiers in addition to “Sepoy” (Indian) units with European officers.
[20] “Combatant Commands,” U.S. Department of Defense, accessed 20 December 2024, https://www.defense.gov/About/combatant-commands/; Jim Garamone, “Global Integration Deserves More Attention, Selva Says,” U.S. Department of Defense, 19 June 2019, accessed 20 January 2025, https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/1881159/global-integration-deserves-more-attention-selva-says/; Jeffrey M. Reilly, “Strategic Design: Compiled,” Over The Horizon Journal, 12 April 2018, accessed 20 January 2025, https://othjournal.com/2018/04/12/strategic-design-compiled/.
[21] Lewis H. Haney, “Opportunity Cost,” The American Economic Review 2, no. 3 (September 1912): 591, https://www-jstor-org.ezp.lib.cam.ac.uk/stable/1804594?searchText=opportunity+cost&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Dopportunity%2Bcost%26so%3Drel&ab_segments=0%2Fbasic_search_gsv2%2Fcontrol&refreqid=fastly-default%3A2dfab4801f9cd4017761a9dbe21a5d7f. Haney couches “opportunity cost” in economic terms, but also notes that these costs consist of “relative sacrifices.” Thus, I apply it to strategic decisions.
[22] Baugh, “Withdrawing from Europe,” 18–19; Dziembowski, 220; Marston, The Seven Years’ War, 55–60, 66–69; Churchill, 124–25.
[23] Greg McKeown, Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less (London, UK: Virgin Books, 2021), 16. I removed his italicization of “priority.” He applies this logic to individuals and businesses, but I posit that the tradeoffs are applicable to states and grand strategy as well.
[24] U.S. White House, National Security Strategy (Washington, DC: Government Publishing Office, 2022), 23, https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/Biden-Harris-Administrations-National-Security-Strategy-10.2022.pdf.
[25] Jeremy Black, Military Strategy: A Global History (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2020), 13, 31, 32, 85–86. The quotation is from p. 13 (where Black provides an example from ancient Rome), though the concept is a major theme in this book. The additional pages provide other examples and discussion.
[26] Anna Borshchevskaya, “Russia’s Overstretched Military Faces Challenges from Syria to Ukraine,” The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 6 December 2024, accessed 20 January 2025, https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/russias-overstretched-military-faces-challenges-syria-ukraine; Brian Whitmore et al., “The toll on Russia from its war in Ukraine, by the numbers,” New Atlanticist (blog), Atlantic Council, 23 February 2024, accessed 20 January 2025, https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/the-toll-on-russia-from-its-war-in-ukraine-by-the-numbers/. Borshchevskaya describes the strategic prioritization mismanagement by Russia and its consequences for Syria, arguing that it is creating opportunities for the West. The Atlantic Council article describes economic and military costs numerically, as of last year.
Acknowledgements: I want to thank my wife, Keri, for her support through my continuing study of post-Seven Years’ War strategy and her initial feedback as I wrestled with the concepts here. I would also like to thank professors Andrew Thompson at Cambridge University, UK and Ken Weisbrode at Bilkent University, Türkiye for their feedback, critiques, and mentorship, as well as my friend and fellow academic student Mike Payne for providing pointed feedback. The opinions herein are solely the author’s and do not reflect the official policy or position of the U.S. military or government.
