The United States must launch a national effort to revitalize its industrial and military power, echoing the World War II-era “Arsenal of Democracy” call, to deter the growing authoritarian threat posed by China in the Western Pacific.
In 1940, as Nazi Germany consolidated power in Europe, President Franklin D. Roosevelt warned that America could no longer pretend it was safe, demanding the nation become the “great arsenal of democracy.” Today, a new storm gathers in the Western Pacific. China, a new authoritarian power, is conducting the largest military buildup since World War II, seeking hegemonic control over the world’s most dynamic region and aiming to reset the global order at the expense of the United States.
While a Taiwan crisis represents the most dangerous and likely trigger for a U.S.–China conflict, the stakes involve far more than the island itself. To maintain an honorable peace and preserve its strategic position in Asia, America must deter a devastating war. Deterrence is a system requiring industrial capacity, technology, allied coordination, and strong leadership.
China may pursue various strategies, ranging from a formal naval blockade or a coast guard “quarantine,” to attacking Taiwan’s outlying islands, or a full-scale invasion. The United States must prepare for all contingencies. In blockade and quarantine scenarios, lawfare and economic coercion might matter as much as air-naval power. However, if Chinese President Xi Jinping tests U.S. and Taiwanese resolve, clever diplomatic strategies will not be effective substitutes for robust military deterrence.
Beijing would obviously prefer to take Taiwan and seize global supremacy without fighting the U.S., but Xi is openly preparing for such a war. In May 2023, Xi told the National Security Commission: “We must adhere to bottom-line thinking and worst case scenario thinking.” He added that China’s ship of state must be ready to withstand “high winds, choppy waters, and even dangerous storms.” According to former CIA Director William Burns, Xi has ordered the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to be ready to forcibly seize Taiwan by 2027. More broadly, China is preparing for a prolonged general war by stockpiling necessary raw materials and components.
Deterring a conflict with China is the safest, cheapest, and most sustainable way to ensure security and stability in the Western Hemisphere, making it the United States’ top strategic priority. Taiwan is a key link in the First Island Chain—an archipelago stretching from Japan to Southeast Asia—which General Douglas MacArthur famously called an “unsinkable aircraft carrier.”
If Taiwan falls under China’s control, the PLA would find it far easier to project military power around Japan, the Philippines, and into the broader Western Pacific. From this favorable position, it would eventually project air and naval power across the Pacific to threaten the American homeland, just as Japan did in 1941.
The loss of Taiwan would severely compromise the U.S.’s ability to defend regional allies such as Japan and the Philippines, degrading the credibility of U.S. security assurances. Smaller countries, especially in Southeast Asia, would have to submit to Beijing’s dictates. Decision makers in Seoul and Tokyo would fear abandonment by the United States and might move towards developing nuclear weapons programs, setting off a chain reaction disastrous for U.S. interests globally.
Moreover, economic globalization has made Taiwan important for reasons MacArthur could not have imagined. A conflict could lead to the destruction of Taiwan’s semiconductor industry, crashing the stock market and costing millions of American jobs. If China seized Taiwan’s chipmaking facilities intact, it might starve the United States and its allies of computation power and seize the commanding heights of AI technology.
To persuade Xi Jinping that the costs and risks of provoking war with the United States would exceed any possible benefit, America must demonstrate the ability to destroy China’s air and naval forces. While Taiwan, Japan, Korea, and other allies must strengthen their own defenses and resilience, the United States must also organize and equip itself to defeat the PLA directly. Should Taiwan fall under the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) control in the future, it will be even more important for the U.S. and its allies to possess a dominant conventional force that can deter further Chinese aggression.
It is important not to focus solely on capabilities—the systems, technologies, and operational techniques for achieving objectives. The United States also needs industrial capacity—the scale and endurance to sustain large-scale operations over time, deploy sufficient forces across multiple theaters, and maintain readiness for multiple simultaneous conflicts. As Democrats and Republicans alike recognize the importance of revitalizing American industrial dynamism, policies must be aligned with America’s most urgent national security needs.
Washington needs to break from the status quo. Over the past two decades, China has conducted the largest military buildup since World War II, systematically developing a force capable of disrupting U.S. operations in the region and even striking targets in the Western Hemisphere, backed by a vast defense industrial base. While the newly-renamed Department of War has made progress in responding, it is moving too slowly. Over the next decade, the Pentagon will need to improve coordination with industry in the U.S. and allied countries and enact necessary reforms to spend every dollar effectively.
Preserving deterrence will require more money, but fundamentally, it is a matter of political will. The world’s major democracies must work more closely together and share the burden of deterring war with China. This collaboration will require American leadership; it will not happen organically.
In short, a clear mandate from the President and Congress for a crash effort to preserve deterrence through industrial revitalization is needed. Establishing this political mandate requires building consensus around the specific capabilities we need to produce and engaging the public in an honest conversation about the trade-offs involved.
As Franklin Roosevelt told the public in his famous “Arsenal of Democracy” fireside chat on December 29, 1940:
“Our national policy is not directed toward war. Its sole purpose is to keep war away from our country and away from our people.” To that end, “We must have more ships, more guns, more planes—more of everything. And this can be accomplished only if we discard the notion of ‘business as usual.’”
