PROMPT: Examine how relevant NSC-68 (1950) is for guiding the United States in its current strategic competition with the People’s Republic of China. Then, use the ends-ways-means-risk (Lykke) model to develop a contemporary US national security strategy focused on China.
Your essay must integrate the lessons from NSC-68 to develop a national security strategy towards the People’s Republic of China. In this section of your essay, you must employ theoretical perspectives, particularly the ends-ways-means-risk (Lykke) model of strategy.
You may restrict your strategy to the South China Sea, but this is not required. Your essay may use any examples drawn from the range of issues that condition the strategic relationship between the United States and China, including:
- Chinese relations with other strategic competitors (Russia, North Korea);
- Chinese global influence through the Belt and Road Initiative;
- human rights violations (persecution of Uighurs);
- anti-democratic policies in Hong Kong;
- intellectual property theft and business relations;
- currency manipulation and trade; climate change and environmental degradation;
- the security threat to Taiwan; or
- the Sino-Japanese sovereignty dispute over the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands.
The examples that you select may be determined by the IR perspectives that seem most significant to you and their congruence with your strategy.
Essay structure and recommended word counts: Introduction (150 words); NSC-68 and strategic similarities (250 words); NSC-68 and strategic differences (250 words); ends (200 words); ways (200 words); means (200 words); risks (200 words); conclusion (150 words).
- Your introduction must answer the question with a clear thesis statement and provide a “road map” so that your instructor understands how the essay is going to unfold.
- Your conclusion should provide an explicit judgment about the utility of NSC-68 and highlight what is most significant about your strategy.
- You must use and cite a range of sources from the readings about NSC-68, theoretical perspectives, and US-PRC relations from both peer-review discussions. Essays that do not comply with this requirement will not be accepted for grading.