This pattern has direct relevance for the Indo-Pacific region. Deterrence depends not only on forward-deployed forces and advanced capabilities, but also on the sustained ability of allied military institutions to function under pressure. Long-duration crises test personnel systems, logistics governance, and civil–military coordination in ways short conflicts do not. Joint operations across multiple states rely on interoperability, shared intelligence, and coordinated command structures that may degrade under stress. Failure of these institutional mechanisms can be as decisive as battlefield defeat. The Indo-Pacific presents additional challenges, including vast maritime distances, diverse political systems among allies, and critical chokepoints such as the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea, which amplify the consequences of institutional stress.

Logistics is often the first system to degrade in prolonged conflict. Early wartime adaptation can mask structural weaknesses, but logistics networks become brittle over time. Sustained disruption, infrastructure damage, and competing civilian demands reduce flexibility. Recent high intensity conflicts demonstrate that logistics effectiveness often declines due to cumulative friction across transportation, maintenance, and energy supply chains. These vulnerabilities are particularly pronounced in maritime and air domains, where long supply lines and port dependencies create operational risks. For Indo-Pacific states, heavy reliance on maritime transport and civilian infrastructure further intensifies these challenges. Deterrence credibility therefore depends not only on stockpiles, but on whether logistics governance can function after months of sustained pressure.

Energy infrastructure resilience is intricately linked to logistics sustainability. Sustained strikes on energy systems rarely halt operations immediately, but they gradually erode institutional capacity. Power instability affects command systems, maintenance cycles, training pipelines, and civilian support networks. Over time, these disruptions degrade operational tempo and decision-making quality. Many Indo-Pacific states rely on centralized power generation, imported fuel, and dual-use infrastructure, increasing their vulnerability to prolonged disruption. Such stress would not only affect military units, but also civilian resilience, intensifying friction between defense requirements and societal tolerance. Extended deterrence relies heavily on political cohesion, making energy resilience a strategic factor. States with diversified energy networks, redundant supply routes, and hardened civilian-military interfaces are better positioned to sustain military effectiveness.

Personnel systems represent another critical late-phase vulnerability. High-intensity conflict places sustained demands on trained personnel that are difficult to replace. Initial mobilization often creates an illusion of depth, but over time training quality declines, leadership fatigue accumulates, and institutional knowledge erodes. These effects are gradual and frequently overlooked until they become operationally decisive. Demographic constraints further complicate personnel sustainability across Indo-Pacific allies, many of which face aging populations and limited mobilization pools. Prolonged conflict would force trade-offs between force quality and quantity. Effective deterrence planning requires realistic long-duration personnel strategies, including force rotation, cross-training, and preplanned personnel pipelines that preserve institutional knowledge under operational stress.

Civil–military coordination also deteriorates during prolonged crises. Early conflict phases typically produce strong political consensus and public support. Over time, however, economic strain, infrastructure damage, and social fatigue create competing priorities. Decision-making processes slow, risk tolerances shift, and coordination mechanisms weaken. These dynamics have direct deterrence implications because adversaries observe not only military deployments, but also institutional coherence. Prolonged stress that reveals political fragmentation or administrative paralysis can undermine deterrence credibility. In the Indo-Pacific, where extended deterrence relies on alliance unity and sustained commitment, maintaining institutional cohesion is strategically essential. Regular joint exercises, wargaming, and civil–military education can strengthen resilience before conflict emerges.

Technological developments and emerging threats intensify these challenges. Hypersonic weapons, autonomous systems, cyber operations, and space-based surveillance increase operational tempo and reliance on interconnected networks. Disruption in one domain can cascade across others, magnifying institutional stress. Attacks targeting space-based command-and-control or satellite navigation systems would degrade precision strike capabilities, logistics coordination, maritime awareness, and joint operational planning. Although technological superiority remains important, it cannot compensate for institutional degradation during prolonged conflict. Resilience in digital infrastructure, cybersecurity frameworks, and redundancy planning therefore represents a decisive late-phase determinant of military effectiveness.

Space and cyber capabilities are especially significant for extended deterrence. American space-based sensors, missile warning networks, and communications satellites provide critical detection and coordination advantages. However, these systems rely on both technical redundancy and organizational resilience. Sustained disruption would test alliance coordination and operational cohesion as much as physical hardware. Prolonged conflict would reveal whether allied institutions can maintain effectiveness under persistent technological and informational pressure. Cyber operations are particularly concerning because they can gradually degrade institutional functionality without provoking overt confrontation, underscoring the importance of integrated defensive architectures and rapid recovery mechanisms.

Nuclear deterrence is similarly shaped by institutional endurance. Adversaries observing strain in logistics, personnel systems, or civil–military coordination may question the credibility of extended deterrence commitments. Modernization programs that enhance survivable nuclear forces and resilient command-and-control systems remain essential, but their effectiveness depends on institutional capacity to operate under sustained stress. Endurance therefore emerges as a strategic variable equal in importance to platforms and weapons systems. Deterrence credibility is continuously tested by the ability of institutions to project capability during protracted crises.

For deterrence planners, the central lesson is clear: prolonged conflict transforms military effectiveness from a function of platforms into a function of institutions. States that plan for short, decisive engagements risk strategic failure if conflicts extend beyond expectations. The United States and its Indo-Pacific allies must rebalance deterrence planning by emphasizing late-phase resilience. Priorities should include logistics governance under disruption, energy system adaptability, personnel sustainability, durable civil–military coordination, and protection against emerging technological threats. These factors determine whether deterrence remains credible over time rather than only at crisis onset.

Prolonged conflict is not an anomaly but a plausible future condition. Strategies that overlook institutional endurance risk failure not at the outset of war, but after sustained operational pressure erodes recovery capacity and strategic credibility. Integrating late-phase considerations into readiness assessments, modernization programs, and alliance coordination is therefore essential. Ultimately, the credibility of extended deterrence rests less on platforms alone and more on the ability of military and political institutions to withstand the cumulative stress of prolonged conflict.

Andrey Koval is a defense planner working on issues of military effectiveness and long-duration conflict. The views expressed in this article are the author’s own.

Late-Phase Failure and the Erosion of Military Effectiveness in Prolonged Conflict was originally published on Global Security Review.

As great powers become entangled in trade disputes, the spillover effects threaten to undermine the cooperative spirit essential for effective arms control. These economic conflicts erode bilateral relationships, making it even more challenging to negotiate future agreements on critical and emerging domains such as artificial intelligence, cyber warfare, and the militarization of outer space.

Tariffs can disrupt trade, increase prices, stifle innovation, and agitate the supply chain. Moreover, it can weaken American global leadership as long-term allies face an American president unwilling to accept high tariffs on American exports while guaranteeing low tariffs on imports. American efforts to counter China are disrupted by tariff disputes as well, as allies and foes coordinate their strategies for countering President Trump’s effort to reduce tariffs on American exports. The president’s actions erode the confidence of allies in extended nuclear deterrence because allies begin to question whether the United States will continue to subsidize security, if they are demanding an end to protective tariffs.

The tariff dispute between China and the US, two large trading partners, severely affects arms control and strategic stability. It exacerbates crisis, heightens mistrust, undermines confidence-building measures, and curtails the possibility of a constructive arms control framework. It is, however, not unexpected. The United States long tolerated protective tariffs and poor intellectual property protections by the Chinese. Thus, rebalancing should not come as any surprise, even if it is disconcerting.

American technological superiority, innovation, cutting-edge military and civilian technology, and significant soft-power influence are the key components of its hegemonic status. Central to this dominance is access to rare earth minerals, which are critical for producing advanced weaponry, including missiles, drones, artificial intelligence (AI)–driven systems, and cutting-edge civilian technologies. However, the US faces a growing vulnerability in this domain, as China currently controls approximately 70 percent of the global supply of rare earth elements. This strategic dependency seriously challenges American innovation and military effectiveness.

However, the American military is already in decline according to a report from the US Army Science Board, which reveals the limitations of the American industrial base. The report warned that the US may be “incapable of meeting the munitions demand created by a potential future fight against a peer adversary.”

The conflict in Ukraine underscores this concern, as the US struggles to maintain adequate production levels of artillery shells, drones, rockets, and missiles primarily due to insufficient stockpiles of critical components. Furthermore, structural deficiencies are increasingly evident within the US Navy. As of 2023, less than 68 percent of surface fleet ships were rated “mission-capable,” with only 63 percent of attack submarines meeting the same standard. Compounding these challenges, American shipyards are currently unable to produce more than three destroyers annually. By contrast, China possesses 13 shipyards capable of constructing large and deep-draft vessels one of which reportedly surpasses the entire US shipbuilding capacity.

The ongoing US-China tariff dispute reflects a zero-sum strategic mindset, intensifying hostilities and reducing incentives for restraint or cooperation. This economic confrontation has already narrowed the space for meaningful arms control dialogue. The imposition of sanctions on each other’s officials and entities alongside increasingly provocative rhetoric from senior officials risks further erosions of the fragile trust necessary for future diplomatic engagement, particularly in arms control and emerging domains such as AI, cyber warfare, and outer space.

Traditionally, China rejects arms control as the US had far more weapons than China. Tarriff disputes reinforce the narrative that the US is using economic means to contain China’s rise, making China less likely to engage in future arms control discussions. Moreover, diplomatic relations and multilateralism will weaken and increase mistrust—leaving no room for constructive future arms control talks.

Arms control forums are increasingly fragile as mutual trust and respect for arms control and disarmament among the great powers declines. Tariff disputes create mistrust, which complicates the verification process, and the supply chain supporting the global cooperative arms control verification limits the ability to enforce or verify compliance with arms control agreements.

Trade disputes deepen mistrust and normalize confrontation over cooperation, secrecy over transparency, and arms racing over arms control. This leads to proliferation while making accountability less relative and paves the way for a fragmented world order with little or no hope for future arms control.

Moreover, it increases the chances future administrations face a backlash for rolling back policies that demand equitable treatment of American trade goods, fearing internal backlash for being soft on China. This will permanently lock both states into an adversarial stance, reducing any flexibility in arms control. Moreover, if the US wants to reconsider any future arms control discussion, political costs may prove too high, leaving fewer options to prevent an arms race.

In 2019, President Donald Trump withdrew the United States from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, after Russian cheating became too hard to ignore.  Meanwhile, the future of New START remains uncertain and fragile.

At such a critical juncture, President Trump’s demand that American exports sent to foreign markets receive equal treatment to those foreign imports entering the United States, penalizing both allies and adversaries who enact punitive tariffs, may be unsettling for recipients of increased tariffs, but it should come as no surprise that an American president elected to stop the outflow of American wealth would seek equal treatment for American exports.

Many Americans are willing to see the subsidies to foreign nations—that are brought about by high tariffs on American exports and American extended deterrence—come to an end. This may lead to an erosion of confidence in American benevolence by some states.

South Korea, for example, was shocked that the United States took offense to the very protectionist policies that allowed South Korea to become the third largest auto producer in the United States, all while effectively preventing American automobile sales in South Korea. Thus, South Korea is reconsidering their non-nuclear status and exploring an independent nuclear deterrent. As President Trump seeks to level the playing field by forcing down the tariffs of trade partners, under the threat of higher tariffs on imported goods, allies should come to understand that the United States is increasingly unwilling to subsidize others. While this may be a jarring fact, it is not a purposeful effort to destabilize arms control.

Thus, trade disputes may cause allies and adversaries to reconsider American willingness to accept unequal trade and disproportionate burden sharing. In the long run, equilibrium will return. It is just a matter of what that equilibrium may look like.

Muhammad Shahzad Akram is a Research Officer at the Center for International Strategic Studies, Azad Jammu Kashmir. He holds an MPhil in International Relations from Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad. He is an alumnus of the Near East South Asia (NESA) Center for Strategic Studies, National Defense University (NDU), Washington, DC. His expertise includes cyber warfare and strategy, arms control, and disarmament.

How Trade Disputes Threaten the Future of Arms Control was originally published on Global Security Review.