The Pentagon’s first new national defence strategy in four years will adopt a more aggressive military stance against China and Russia as its top priority, according to people familiar with the document.
The focus restores Washington’s rivalry with other leading powers to the forefront of US defence planning, in line with last month’s White House national security strategy that named Russia and China as America’s chief adversaries.
A defence official who has read the classified document, a small part of which is due to be released in unclassified form on Friday by defence secretary Jim Mattis, told the Financial Times the US is concerned that America’s chief adversaries are eroding its traditional military advantage.