The 2025 National Security Strategy is not just another routine filing from a US administration. It is a deliberate attempt to rewrite the grammar of American statecraft after the post–Cold War period. Earlier strategies, even when they criticized specific wars or policy excesses, still operated inside a loose consensus: that the United States should steward a liberal order, defend and enlarge a community of democracies, deepen globalization, and rely on alliances and institutions as core instruments of influence. This document does something different. It narrows the concept of national interest, reorders geography, fuses domestic and foreign policy into a single project, and openly abandons democracy promotion as a central pillar. It presents these changes as a correction rather than a rupture, but read carefully, it points toward a qualitatively new doctrine.
Any serious analysis has to start from the way the strategy defines the problem it is trying to solve. The authors lay blame on what they call elite misjudgment after 1991. They argue that, once the Soviet Union collapsed, successive administrations pursued an unrealistic goal: permanent American domination of the entire world. They link that goal to a package of policies that included global military presence, wars of choice, deep trade and financial integration, and a growing dependence on international institutions. In their telling, these moves eroded the industrial base, overextended the armed forces, and detached foreign policy from the concrete interests of ordinary Americans. The NSS is therefore built on a moral and political indictment of the recent past. It presents itself as the moment when the United States lowers its sights from managing the whole system to securing a more tightly drawn set of priorities.
That change in altitude leads directly to a striking redefinition of what counts as national interest. The document still affirms classic aims such as territorial security, economic prosperity, and military strength. Yet it adds categories that earlier strategies rarely treated as primary. Control over borders is elevated from an issue of law and order to the first line of national defense. Mass migration is depicted not just as a humanitarian or social management problem but as a structural challenge that can reshape the cultural and political fabric of the republic. The integrity of the information space, the resilience of infrastructure against disruption, and the stability of critical supply chains are also folded into the core of national security. There is a clear belief that vulnerabilities in these domains can be exploited by rivals, and that the line between foreign aggression and domestic fragility has blurred.
At the same time, some elements that once defined American strategic identity are noticeably absent or downgraded. The promotion of democracy abroad appears only as an optional and secondary activity. Human rights are not framed as an independent driver of policy but as something that may or may not align with concrete interests. The NSS does not celebrate a free international order as a good in itself. Instead, it treats liberal economic and political structures as instruments that can be used when they work for the United States and discarded when they do not. This represents a significant departure from the rhetoric and, at times, the practice of the 1990s and 2000s, when the United States spoke of enlarging a zone of democratic peace and rule-based cooperation.
The way the strategy talks about means is no less important than its definition of ends. The United States is described as still possessing extraordinary advantages: a large innovative economy, an unrivaled financial system, favorable geography, alliances, military strength, and cultural influence. What is new is the insistence that these advantages must be reconstituted and consciously directed, rather than taken for granted. The document argues that the country’s economic and industrial base has been allowed to atrophy under the assumption that global markets would provide security of supply. It calls for a systematic effort to reindustrialize, to reshore production in crucial sectors, and to rebuild the defense industrial base. This is accompanied by a vision of energy dominance that rejects transitional climate agendas and places hydrocarbons and nuclear power back at the center of a strategy for growth, export leverage, and technological leadership.
What emerges is a form of geoeconomic statecraft in which tariffs, export controls, regulatory standards, subsidies, and development finance become strategic tools, not merely economic policy instruments. The NSS sees the country’s technological sector as the backbone of both economic and military power, so it calls for protections against intellectual property theft, the securing of hardware and software supply chains, and heavy investment in emerging fields such as artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and advanced manufacturing. It is explicit that the United States must shape global standards in these areas or else risk seeing rivals embed their own norms and architectures into critical systems. This view is not entirely new, but the integration is much tighter than in earlier strategies, which tended to treat industrial and tech policy as separate from the core of national security.
One of the document’s more distinctive features is its treatment of sovereignty. On one level, it insists that the United States will protect its own sovereign decision-making against interference by foreign powers, by unelected international institutions, and by transnational advocacy networks. This is directed not only at classic adversaries such as China and Russia, but also at multilateral bodies and non state actors that Washington believes have constrained its freedom of action. On another level, it states that every nation has the right to order its internal affairs according to its own traditions. Officially, this is meant to signal a reduced appetite for interventions that aim to transform foreign societies. Practically, it allows the United States to work with authoritarian regimes if doing so advances specific interests, without the burden of maintaining a democracy agenda.
There is an obvious tension between this sovereignist philosophy and the strategy’s hemispheric doctrine. In the Western Hemisphere, the NSS signals that the United States will seek to restrict the strategic presence of external powers, especially China and to a lesser degree Russia and Iran. It wants to ensure that no rival can own or control ports, energy hubs, telecommunications infrastructure, or resource concessions in ways that threaten US security. In other words, the United States seeks to assert a kind of privileged position in the hemisphere, even as it argues elsewhere that each state should enjoy independent agency. From a realist perspective, this contradiction is not surprising; great powers historically reserve special zones of interest. For analysts, the more important question is how this assertion will be perceived by Latin American states that have grown accustomed to greater diversification of partnerships. The NSS tries to address this by framing the hemispheric effort as mutually beneficial, highlighting opportunities for nearshoring, investment, and shared security, but the underlying asymmetry remains.
The Western Hemisphere chapter also illustrates the strategy’s method of linking migration, security, economics, and influence. The document lays out a twin concept of enlistment and expansion. Enlistment refers to relying on regional partners to stabilize their neighborhoods, suppress organized crime and trafficking networks, and manage migration flows. Expansion refers to deepening American commercial and security partnerships with additional states that might otherwise turn toward rival powers. The instruments range from targeted military deployments against cartels, to increased naval and coast guard operations, to the aggressive use of US financing tools to facilitate American corporate entry into key sectors such as ports, telecommunications, and energy. The intention is to create a dense web of interdependence that makes turning to Beijing less attractive and reinforces the image of the United States as the hemisphere’s indispensable partner.
If the Western Hemisphere is the inner ring of the NSS, the Indo-Pacific is its decisive external arena. The strategy treats the region as the central theater for economic competition, technological rivalry, and military deterrence. It explicitly criticizes earlier US assumptions that integrating China into global markets would moderate its behavior, and it accuses Chinese policy of taking advantage of open Western markets while preserving a state-directed, mercantilist system at home. In response, the NSS proposes a multi-layered response. It seeks closer coordination among advanced economies in North America, Europe, and Asia to counter subsidies, dumping, intellectual property theft, and unfair trade practices. It prioritizes securing access to critical minerals and components that currently run through Chinese-controlled segments of global supply chains. It calls for using US financial and technological advantages to offer alternative partnerships to countries in the so-called Global South, which have become the focus of Chinese infrastructure and lending efforts.
This economic strategy is coupled with a robust but calibrated security posture. The NSS identifies the First Island Chain and the South China Sea as central to US interests, not only because of Taiwan’s semiconductor industry, but also because of the shipping volumes that transit those waters. It envisions a US military capable of denying aggression in the region while insisting that allies such as Japan, South Korea, Australia, and potentially others increase their own contributions to deterrence. The approach to Taiwan is cautious on paper: the United States reaffirms its opposition to unilateral changes of status by any side while preparing to support the island’s defense. The goal is to maintain a balance of power that makes coercion prohibitively costly, thereby preserving a tense but stable status quo.
At the same time, the NSS refrains from framing China as an ideological enemy. It does not denounce the nature of the Chinese regime or call for its transformation. It describes the rivalry as one of interests and capabilities. For Beijing, this will be an ambivalent document. The emphasis on noninterference will be reassuring, but the resolve to limit Chinese economic and strategic penetration into the Western Hemisphere and key Indo-Pacific domains will be seen as a direct challenge to its ambitions. For US allies and partners, the strategy offers both clarity and uncertainty. It clarifies that the United States is prepared to confront predatory aspects of Chinese behavior. It is less clear on how Washington will reconcile its desire for balanced trade, its imposition of broad tariffs, and the need to keep partner countries economically aligned when they depend on Chinese markets and capital.
The European section of the strategy is perhaps the most politically sensitive. It combines a familiar demand for increased defense spending with a harsher cultural critique of Europe’s internal trajectory. The NSS suggests that European societies are experiencing demographic decline, identity erosion, and political fragmentation, and it implies that these trends compromise Europe’s capacity to remain a robust partner. Russia is acknowledged as a problem mainly in relation to European perceptions; the strategy argues that many Europeans see Moscow as an existential threat, but it does not spell out in detail how Russia threatens the United States itself, beyond the implications for the European theater. It calls for an expeditious end to the war in Ukraine that leaves Ukraine viable, which signals a desire for stabilization but not necessarily a maximalist resistance to Russian aims.
The treatment of Europe is internally conflicted. On one hand, the NSS insists that Europe must assume primary responsibility for its defense and develop an autonomous capability to deter Russia, which is consistent with a long tradition of burden sharing rhetoric from Washington. On the other hand, its rhetoric about civilizational decline and its deviation from mainstream European narratives on migration and integration risk undermining the very political actors who support stronger defense commitments and closer ties with the United States. There is a danger that European audiences will interpret the strategy less as tough love and more as a sign that Washington no longer sees them as central. For Moscow, this language is exploitable. It allows Russia to present itself as the inevitable permanent neighbor of Europe, in contrast to an America that appears alienated from European developments.
The strategy’s handling of the Middle East reflects a clear fatigue with a region that has dominated American foreign policy bandwidth for over twenty years. The NSS recognizes that some of the original drivers of deep engagement have diminished. Energy markets have diversified, with the United States now a net exporter, and the old superpower confrontation has given way to more diffuse great power competition. The document credits recent diplomatic efforts, including normalization initiatives and hard strikes on Iranian assets, with having reduced the immediate danger from Tehran’s nuclear program and from some regional conflicts. Yet it does not treat the region as settled. It acknowledges that choke points like Hormuz and the Red Sea remain vital and that Israel’s security is still a non negotiable interest. Its main argument is that the United States can now manage these concerns with a lighter footprint, relying more on regional partners, intelligence, and targeted uses of force, and less on large troop deployments or attempts to reshape political orders.
Africa is approached through the lens of economic opportunity and selective security engagement. The NSS criticizes past efforts to export a liberal ideological model as the centerpiece of US policy. It proposes instead to prioritize trade, investment, and access to critical resources, especially in the energy and mineral sectors. It does not rule out military action, particularly against jihadist movements that could grow into transnational threats, but it clearly intends to avoid new long term commitments akin to earlier counterinsurgency missions. The strategy shows awareness that Russia and China have used security cooperation, media, and infrastructure projects to build influence across the continent. However, it does not construct a fully fleshed out counterstrategy; rather, it assumes that a more focused, interest driven American economic engagement can compete effectively if properly funded and coordinated.
Underlying all these regional moves is a conceptual shift toward what might be called bounded ambition. The strategy accepts that the United States remains the most powerful state, but rejects the notion that it can or should try to shape every region equally. Instead, it sets up a hierarchy. The Western Hemisphere is foundational. The Indo-Pacific is the critical arena for long term competition. Europe is important but expected to carry more of its own weight. The Middle East is still relevant but no longer the gravitational center of policy. Africa is emergent in economic terms and potentially dangerous in security terms, but not yet a primary focus. This tiering of regions corresponds to a recognition that resources, both fiscal and political, are finite.
The same instinct to bound ambition appears in the strategy’s treatment of global problems. Climate change is mentioned mainly to criticize policies that have constrained fossil fuel production. Pandemics and health security are not highlighted as headline drivers, even though recent experience might have justified such emphasis. Cyber security and information operations appear as threats, but the solutions proposed are largely national, framed in terms of hardening domestic infrastructure and monitoring the role of foreign actors. The NSS presents a world where cross border challenges exist but do not override the primacy of state sovereignty and national capability. Cooperation is welcome when it serves US interests; universal regimes with binding authority are not.
From a think tank perspective, it is important to identify not only the internal logic but also the unresolved tensions embedded in this vision. One tension lies between the desire to avoid overextension and the need to sustain alliances and balances of power in multiple theaters. The strategy calls for allies to do more and for the United States to step back from some roles, yet it also insists that no hostile power should be allowed to dominate any region of strategic importance. In practice, that will require careful calibration; if allies lag in stepping up, Washington will face repeated choices between tolerating temporary vacuums, which adversaries could exploit, or reentering burdens it had hoped to shed.
Another tension arises in the economic realm. The NSS rightly identifies the vulnerabilities created by long, fragile supply chains and by concentrated production of critical inputs in rival states. It proposes reindustrialization, greater use of tariffs, and tighter screening of investment and trade. At the same time, the United States relies on cooperation with major economies to reinforce these measures and to prevent a fragmentation of the global economy into hostile blocs that impose high costs on all participants. Yet some of Washington’s own trade decisions, including across the Atlantic and in Asian relationships, have already created disquiet. Partners who face tariffs and extraterritorial sanctions may be less willing to align fully with US approaches to China or others. A geoeconomic strategy that is internally coherent but externally alienating could undercut the very coalitions the NSS imagines.
There is also a question of implementation on the technological front. The strategy paints an ambitious picture of American leadership in fields such as artificial intelligence, quantum science, and advanced manufacturing. It recognizes the link between basic research, defense applications, and economic competitiveness. However, achieving this vision requires sustained public investment, predictable regulatory environments, and openness to talent. If budgetary pressures, political cycles, or restrictive immigration policies undermine the research base, the aspiration of technological preeminence may become harder to realize. There is a risk that rhetoric about innovation outpaces the institutional and financial commitment actually made to sustain it.
The most far reaching tension, however, concerns the long term shape of the international system. By deliberately stepping back from the normative leadership that once characterized American policy, the NSS accepts a more plural world. In this world, democracies coexist with authoritarian regimes without an overarching narrative of convergence. Rules are more contingent, institutions more contested, and alignments more transactional. This could produce a more stable equilibrium if major powers accept mutual limits and focus on practical coordination where necessary. It could just as easily generate a more volatile environment in which norms weaken, coercion becomes more common, and smaller states find themselves caught between competing patrons with fewer institutional buffers.
The 2025 National Security Strategy therefore represents both an intellectual departure and an experiment. It is a departure because it breaks with the language of universal liberal order and embeds national security in domestic economic and cultural revival. It is an experiment because it is not yet clear whether a strategy so deeply anchored in sovereignty, economic nationalism, and selective engagement can sustain the coalitions and patterns of cooperation that have underpinned relative stability in key regions since the end of the Second World War. Much will depend on how flexible the doctrine proves in practice. If it is interpreted rigidly, it may leave the United States with fewer tools when crises spill across borders or when allies require reassurance. If it is applied with pragmatism, it could create space for recalibration without abandoning the responsibilities that come with preeminent power.
Whatever the outcome, the strategy is important for what it reveals about the current mood in Washington. It reflects a profound skepticism about the benefits of past globalizing policies, a renewed fear of industrial vulnerability and social fragmentation, and a belief that the country’s external posture must be rooted in a more cohesive and self confident society. It tells allies and adversaries alike that the United States intends to be less of an architect of a shared order and more of a very powerful state defending its own perimeter, shaping its key environments, and engaging in global competition in ways that it believes are sustainable for its own society. For analysts and practitioners, understanding this shift is essential. Even if future administrations later soften or modify this doctrine, the underlying concerns it identifies will remain part of the strategic debate for years to come.
