From the Middle East to the Pacific: The Military’s Shifting Focus

Moving beyond Iraq and Afghanistan, the Pacific Rim with emerging Asian powers presents vexing diplomatic and strategic challenges to U.S. influence. In his new book, Robert D. Kaplan examines how the U. S. military is gradually shifting from an operational focus on the Middle East to one on China and the Pacific.

On September 5, the Brookings Institution hosted Kaplan for a discussion of his book Hog Pilots, Blue Water Grunts: The American Military in the Air, at Sea, and on the Ground (Random House 2007). Peter W. Singer, Brookings senior fellow and director of the 21st Century Defense Initiative, provided introductory remarks and moderate the discussion. A question and answer session followed Kaplan’s remarks.

Kaplan, a correspondent for the Atlantic Monthly and best-selling author of nine books on international affairs, provides a ground-level portrait of the global war on terrorism on several continents, and a firsthand account of how U.S. soldiers, sailors, marines, and airmen are protecting sea-lanes, providing disaster relief, contending with the military rise of China, fighting the war in Iraq, and crafting contingency plans for wars with North Korea and Iran.