The United States is “sleepwalking” into a global war with its greatest enemies banded together in an “unholy alliance,” and experts are warning that American troops and citizens are unprepared for World War III.
In late July, a group of nongovernmental national security experts tasked for the first time by Congress under the National Defense Strategy Commission in 2022 released an assessment of the U.S. comprehensive national security strategy put forward by the Biden administration two years ago.
The commission concluded that decades of defense cuts and security disinvestment after the Cold War left Washington “unprepared” to confront Beijing in an open conflict, let alone a multi-front war with China, Iran, North Korea and Russia.
On December 27, 2022, Chinese and Russian warships took part in a joint naval exercise in the East China Sea. (Xu Wei/Xinhua News Agency via The Associated Press, File)
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The commission, which includes four Republicans and four Democrats who served under the Clinton, George W. Bush and Obama administrations, sought to make clear that the lack of preparedness was the fault of no single administration but the failure of a generation of leaders to recognize and counter the growing danger posed by authoritarian states and adequately explain that threat to the American people.
Experts explained that Europe is witnessing the continent’s largest ground war since 1945, and that in a war in which Russia is receiving aid from China, Iran and North Korea, the United States and its allies face a threat not seen from a global power since World War II.
The threat of large-scale war between nations, not just lawless militants and terrorist groups, looms in the Middle East, and the possibility of open conflict in the Indo-Pacific region remains a serious concern.
“There has been a failure by politicians across the board to educate the American public about the seriousness of these threats and the dangers they pose,” Ambassador Eric Edelman, vice chair of the 2024 committee and co-chair or vice-chair on previous committee reports, said at a press conference hosted by JINSA this week.


Chinese President Xi Jinping, right, and Russian President Vladimir Putin look at each other and shake hands before their meeting in Beijing, Thursday, May 16, 2024. (Sergey Bobylev, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via Associated Press, File)
“Unfortunately, historically, when we’ve faced these challenges, we’ve usually responded after a catastrophe has occurred,” he said, referring to events such as Pearl Harbor and 9/11, adding that “perhaps we can draw a different lesson from history.”
Experts pointed to a decline in defense spending — from about 17% of GDP in 1952 to just 3% today — and warned that these investments in security are not enough to adequately counter an adversary like China.
The committee, reviewing unclassified military exercises, concluded that despite U.S. efforts to bolster its weapons stockpiles in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the U.S. would likely deplete its weapons stockpiles within three to four weeks if it were to enter an all-out war with Beijing.
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U.S. Army Soldiers with 3rd Battalion, 321st Field Artillery Regiment, 18th Field Artillery Brigade, Fort Bragg, North Carolina, conduct a live-fire test of an early version of the Army Tactical Missile System at White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico, December 14, 2021. (John Hamilton/U.S. Army via The Associated Press, File)
Some weapons, such as anti-ship missiles, are estimated to last only a few days, and once depleted, it would take years to replace them.
Edelman noted that this is no justification for cutting off military aid to Ukraine, stressing that a direct war with a hostile power like China or Russia would be far more costly, let alone a global conflict not seen since the 20th century.


With the war between Russia and Ukraine continuing for two years, the 120th Territorial Defense Battalion took part in a training exercise near the Belarusian border in Chernobyl, Ukraine, on March 16, 2024. (Photo by Gian Marco Benedetto/Anadolu via Getty Images)
“Preparing for defense is essentially an effort to deter conflict,” Edelman said. “Whatever the costs of defense, they are tiny compared to the costs of war.”
Near the end of World War II, the United States allocated more than 40 percent of its GDP to defense in 1943 and 1944, and the commission warned that modern wars are drawn out, as seen in Afghanistan, Iraq and now Ukraine.
“The United States therefore needs to prepare its military and industrial base for the possibility of a protracted conflict,” the commission’s report said.
But experts warned that preparing the US for a global power struggle requires more than just pouring money into the defence budget – it also requires a “cultural shift”.
Mara Rudman, who served as national security adviser under the Clinton and Obama administrations, pointed to steps China has taken over the past few decades to gain an advantage over the United States in technology and in building relationships in Latin America, Africa and more recently the Middle East.


A view of facilities under construction at the Konchoch deposit in western Tajikistan on Nov. 3, 2021. TALCO Gold, jointly owned by Tajikistan’s state metals company TALCO and China’s Tibet Huayu Mining, plans to begin commercial production of antimony, a metal used in batteries and flame retardants, at the Konchoch deposit by October 2022. (REUTERS/Nazarali Pirnazarov)
“They’ve spent the last 20 years building up their Belt and Road Initiative and have controlled the processing and mining of most of the critical minerals that we need for the various weapons systems that we have, but also for the mobile phones that we have to make, the cars that we have to make, and the batteries that we need in general,” she told reporters this week. “This is something that we have to overcome.”
Pressure is growing within the Republican Party to distance itself from international involvement, leading to a rise in isolationism that echoes U.S. sentiment before World War II — a situation that experts warn needs to change if Americans don’t want to be drawn into a new global war.
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“We need leadership, and we need to educate the American people,” said Edelman, who served in the Bush administration.
Experts on the bipartisan commission agreed that Americans not only need to be better educated by their leaders, but also need to be trusted to make informed decisions about what is best for the country.


North Korean leader Kim Jong Un (right) met with a delegation led by Russian Security Council Secretary-General Sergei Shoigu on September 14, 2024, a few days before Shoigu’s visit to Iran. (KCNA via Reuters)
Both the Biden-Harris administration and the Trump campaign were briefed by experts on the commission’s findings.
The White House and Harris’ campaign have not publicly commented on the investigation’s findings, but former President Donald Trump’s response to the report, which he called “stupid” at a rally in late August, appeared to run counter to the committee’s requests, leading experts to question whether Trump was properly briefed by the campaign.
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“I think it’s really impossible to read the report that they’ve submitted and not believe that our country is on the brink of a potentially historic catastrophe,” said event organizer John Hanna, Charles and Randy Wax senior fellow at JINSA. “We’re not just on the brink of a national crisis. In many ways, we’re already in deep crisis.”
“And there’s no Churchill here at this point,” added Hanna, who also served in the Bush administration. “The National Defense Strategy Board has done its job. Now everyone else in the power structures across the country and in Washington has to do their part.”