During the signing event, President Trump remarked, “On trade, I have decided, for purposes of fairness, that I will charge a reciprocal tariff, meaning whatever countries charge the United States of America, we will charge them no more, no less. In other words, they charge the US a tax or tariff, and we will charge them the exact same tax or tariff, very simple.”

A strong economy is vital to national security. In addition to reliable access to energy, minerals, and capital, any great power fundamentally requires a resilient, production-oriented, economic infrastructure that ensures a comprehensive and adequate industrial base capable of producing most of the nation’s necessities.

Furthermore, America’s national debt exceeds $36 trillion, with a debt-to-GDP ratio surpassing 133 percent. In fiscal year 2024, the cost of servicing the debt’s interest surpassed America’s defense budget.

Americans place great importance on fairness and balance. The Declaration of Independence famously states that “all men are created equal” and advocates for equal treatment for all individuals, regardless of status or position. The Constitution establishes a framework that balances power among various branches of government, as outlined in James Madison’s Federalist 51.

Socrates once remarked, “If measure and symmetry are absent from any composition in any degree, ruin awaits both the ingredients and the composition…. Measure and symmetry are beauty and virtue the world over.” He was right.

President Trump seeks to implement tariff reciprocity towards America’s competitors in a fair, just, and balanced manner. Can this same principle be applied to his peace through strength deterrence approach? Yes, it can.

Dynamic parity is a nuclear deterrence strategy that deliberately achieves and maintains a contextually symmetrical balance of nuclear force capabilities, capacities, and composition in relation to the combined nuclear strength of China, North Korea, Russia, and possibly Iran. This strategy seeks to balance America’s nuclear deterrent force against the potentially collaborative arsenals of these adversaries, thereby enhancing deterrence, reassuring allies, and preserving strategic stability in a world lacking binding arms control agreements.

America is about 15 years into a 30-year effort to recapitalize its nuclear arsenal, which has a program of record that offers a one-for-one intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) swap, two fewer ballistic missile submarines, and a reduced bomb load capacity. The current program of record was designed for a world that no longer exists.

Even the Biden administration’s acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space Policy acknowledged the need to explore “options for increasing future launcher capacity or adding more deployed warheads in land, sea, and air capabilities” to address the significant growth and variety of China’s nuclear arsenal. The 2023 Congressional Commission report on U.S. Strategic Posture stated that the current nuclear modernization program is “necessary, but not sufficient” for facing two nuclear peers: China and Russia.

Americans often assess the fairness of financial rewards and the distribution of costs, commonly reacting to perceived unfairness with feelings of hostility and responding with protest. Regarding economic, political, or national security issues, we are “wired to resist unfair treatment.” This sense of fairness and balance also extends to America’s defensive posture. A recent Reagan National Defense Forum Survey noted that 77 percent of voters were concerned that the national debt might force defense cuts, with 79 percent supporting increased defense spending, and 70 percent of those surveyed were concerned about “Russia launching a thermonuclear attack against the US.”

In this context, geopolitical fairness refers to the perceived evenhandedness among nations in a manner that mutually impacts interests. Meanwhile, geopolitical balance pertains to the distribution of perceived power between states in the international system. The 2024 Annual Threat Assessment noted that Russia possesses the largest, most diverse, and most modern nuclear weapons stockpile in the world. This infers that America remains inferior in aggregate nuclear weapon numbers and is trailing in modernization, which creates an imbalance.

Correcting long-standing imbalances in trade policy and military shortfalls is vital to the American conscience. Allowing trade deficits with economic competitors to persist without challenge is akin to unilateral disarmament. The US trade deficit for goods reached a record $1.2 trillion in 2024, while the treasury borrowed $2 trillion that same year. Ongoing deficits of this magnitude threaten domestic companies and jobs, putting negative pressure on GDP and the prosperity of individual Americans. Ensuring that America’s nuclear deterrent can counter the threats posed by its adversaries will safeguard citizens’ security and sovereignty, enabling prosperity.

President Trump’s new Trade and Tariff Reciprocity Policy, like the nuclear deterrence strategy of Dynamic Parity, places the burden of acceptable behavior on America’s competitors. They both empower America to act in the interest of fairness, aiming to achieve balance in both process and product. Geopolitical stability is not born of an America exploited economically or constrained militarily. This kind of weakness is not only provocative but also insulting.

Col. Curtis McGiffin (US Air Force, Ret.) is Vice President for Education of the National Institute for Deterrence Studies and a visiting professor at Missouri State University’s School of Defense and Strategic Studies. He has over 30 years of total USAF service. The views expressed are his own.

Trump’s Trade and Tariff Policy Benefits America’s Nuclear Deterrent was originally published on Global Security Review.

This infers the US should ignore the plight of Taiwan’s sovereignty as well as accept the seizing of the South China Sea. The People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) willful disruption of global peace and stability to further its imperial expansionism directly violates the sovereignty of its neighbors. Readers should not forget that it was only after the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was victorious in the Chinese Civil War in 1949 that the communists invaded and occupied Tibet, Inner Mongolia, Manchuria, East Turkistan, and areas in the southeast that were not historically part of China.

Neither is the history of Taiwan a history of control by Imperial China. The simple fact is that China is an expansionist power that is still hungry for more territory. The United States, however, is not attempting to annex land or sea. The simple fact is that China can ensure the first guardrail by ending its imperial expansion.

Second, the article then suggests, “There should be agreement on No First Use (NFU) of nuclear weapons. Some argue that a NFU policy is not credible. But if that is the case, it is hard to explain why both the Obama and Biden administrations tried but failed to adopt a NFU or sole purpose policy. Every person of integrity should acknowledge that NFU is relevant and meaningful.”

This argument is laughable. China’s NFU policy is a ploy to deceive American policymakers and dupe nuclear disarmament advocates. During the Cold War, China’s NFU pledge was judged credible because it had a small and unsophisticated nuclear arsenal incapable of engaging in first use. The recent Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China, 2023 Annual Report to Congress describes an increasingly lethal capability that threatens more and more American cities, contrary to American counterforce targeting strategies.

As noted in a recent analysis of the annual report, the PRC sanctioned a video that threatens to employ nuclear weapons against a non-nuclear Japan. In that video, the narrator states, “We will use nuclear bombs first. We will use nuclear bombs continuously. We will do this until Japan declares unconditional surrender for the second time.” China’s NFU policy is deliberately ambiguous to deter conventional attacks on its nuclear forces. Moreover, the PRC’s four exceptions to its NFU policy are meant to “dissuade the continuation of the strong enemy’s conventional attacks against our major strategic targets.” China has deliberately entangled its nuclear and conventional command and control to intentionally increase the risk of nuclear escalation in the early stages of conflict. Finally, the article proclaims the virtues of no first use because an American NFU policy would leave the United States’ Indo-Pacific allies uncovered from America’s nuclear umbrella and more susceptible to Chinese nuclear coercion. 

Third, the article declares, “There should be no cross-domain deterrence.” The US should manage the interplay between non-nuclear capabilities and nuclear deterrence. The article argues that a deterrence policy “stating that nuclear weapons will not be only used to deter nuclear strikes, but also used to deter non-nuclear strategic strikes…significantly lowers the nuclear threshold and drastically increases the risks of nuclear escalation.” Thus, the article argues that the United States and China should prohibit cross-domain deterrence.

With the article also suggesting the United States should adopt a “sole purpose” nuclear policy, the American arsenal would serve one purpose—deterring nuclear attack. Considering that the article suggests the PRC maintains an advantage in strategic cyberattacks, advocacy for a sole purpose policy is little more than an attempt to encourage self-deterrence on the part of the United States. In reality, cross-domain deterrence is key to American security.

The US cannot threaten an in-kind response to a biological attack any more than it can an in-kind cyberattack. Dr. Strangelove suggested that “deterrence is the art of producing, in the mind of the enemy, the fear to attack.” Asymmetric deterrence ensures the United States can deter any attack with the most destructive weapons available. The article advocates for a PRC advantage by removing that fearful threat and thus increasing PRC freedom of action.

Fourth, the article argues that “[t]here should be no unlimited development of missile defense systems. It is undeniable that missile defense has negative impacts upon strategic stability. The bilateral quarrel over missile defense is one of the root causes of US-Russia tensions in the past two decades. An agreement should be reached to limit the development and deployment of missile defense systems in order to assure other nuclear weapon states that their nuclear retaliation capabilities will not be compromised.”

Designed to defend against North Korean attack, American missile defense systems are part of integrated deterrence and are purposed to limit damage and “expand decision-making space for senior leaders.” With the PRC’s breathtaking growth and modernization of its nuclear forces exhibited in the recent construction of over 300 new intercontinental ballistic missile silos and at least 1,500 nuclear warheads by 2035, China may well be seeking to overwhelm any current or future missile defenses by orders of magnitude.

China is also leading the hypersonic missile arms race, including the coupling of hypersonic weapons with the fractional orbital bombardment system (FOBS) that are potentially nuclear-armed and a destabilizing first-strike capability. Finally, America’s nuclear recapitalization program is already into its second decade and has yet to produce the first new system.

Promulgating PRC propaganda as unbiased perspective may feel good, but it is a red herring. China long ago left the blocks in an arms race that the United States still does not understand it is losing. Not only is China modernizing and expanding its nuclear first-strike capability, but it is also doing so under the guise of deterrence and fear, while the PRC is developing a coercive force meant to ransom American cities in exchange for a Sino-centric Indo-Pacific.

If the United States wants to retain its geopolitical influence and continue to assure regional allies, it must avoid any compromise with the Chinese, like that offered in the article discussed. Instead, it is time for the United States to embark on a comprehensive nuclear arms build-up that accounts for the risks posed by an aggressive and hostile China. To do anything less is a concession to Chinese imperialism and an admission that the United States is no longer a “shining city upon a hill,” the beacon of liberty President Reagan once suggested this country is to the rest of the world.

Col. Curtis McGiffin (US Air Force, Ret.) is Vice President of Education at the National Institute for Deterrence Studies and visiting professor at Missouri State University’s School of Defense and Strategic Studies. Dr. Adam Lowther is Vice President for Research at the National Institute for Deterrence Studies and host of Nuclecast. Together, they have more than five decades of experience in uniform and DoD civil service. Both authors co-host the weekly podcast The Nuclear View. The views expressed in this article are the authors’ own.

Red China’s Concerns About Nuclear Escalation Are a Red Herring was originally published on Global Security Review.