Strategic Shock Therapy: Why Defense XXIV Is the Essential Guide to a Multi Polar Authoritarian World
We are publishing a series of articles highlighting the books we published in 2025. This is the first of sixteen posts highlighting each book published in 2025.
Defense XXIV: Reworking U.S. and Allied Defenses to Deal with the Multi-Polar Authoritarian Challenge is a timely, hard-edged guide to the world liberal democracies now actually inhabit rather than the one many still wish existed. It is both a warning order and a field manual for policymakers, commanders, and serious citizens trying to navigate an era defined by multi-polar authoritarianism, contested deterrence, and stretched Western resources.
What This Book Is About
Defense XXIV brings together a year’s worth of tightly argued essays and interviews that show how the liberal democracies are struggling and sometimes succeeding in adapting to a world shaped by Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, and other authoritarian actors. Edited by Robbin Laird and drawing on a first-rate team of international contributors, the book connects global geopolitics directly to concrete force development, industrial capacity, and operational innovation across the alliance.
Across nearly 300 pages, the volume moves from nuclear strategy and the Ukraine war to Indo-Pacific deterrence, from Polish border security to Australian Army reform, from fifth-generation airpower and the kill web at sea to deeply human interviews that tie today’s crises back to Vietnam and Afghanistan. What emerges is not an abstract think-tank product, but a practitioner’s view of how democracies actually fight, build, and adapt under pressure.
Structure and Major Themes
The book is organized into eight major sections that mirror the way serious defense professionals think about the problem set from global context, to American strategy, to commanders’ perspectives, to force design, and finally to historical depth.
Global developments
This opening section frames 2024 as a hinge year, with the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East and Chinese gray-zone operations exposing the illusions of frictionless globalization. Essays here unpack the rise of multi-polar authoritarianism, the grinding Russia‑Ukraine campaign, European defense responses, and nuclear risk in a crowded strategic environment.
America and its place in the world
These chapters dissect the U.S. domestic and strategic debate, from the “911 generation” entering politics to the impact of Trump 2.0 on Ukraine, NATO, and allied perceptions. Readers get candid assessments of how U.S. political dysfunction, fiscal limits, and strategic overreach collide with real-world threats in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia.
Commanders’ perspectives
A signature strength of Defense XXIV is its reliance on active and recently serving commanders from the U.S. Marine Corps, U.S. Navy, Italian and French air forces, and the Australian Army who explain how they are actually transforming their forces. The result is a granular look at service-level innovation: training pipelines, readiness, command-and-control, and integration with allies.
Building 21st century combat forces
This core section examines how the fifth-generation combat paradigm, kill-web thinking, and contested logistics are driving new force structures across air, land, and maritime domains. It covers everything from MBDA’s role in an allied “arsenal of democracy” to Eurosatory and Euronaval 2024, from CH‑53K heavy lift and CMV‑22B logistics to integrated combat systems like CMS 330 and the U.S. Navy’s new Navigation Plan.
Interviews with historical insight
Here the book links past and present through interviews conducted by Edward Timperlake with figures such as Vietnam Marine-turned-journalist David Evans and Sister Deirdre Byrne, a former Army surgeon in Afghanistan. Their stories underscore a recurring theme: tactical excellence repeatedly undermined by Beltway narratives and strategic confusion.
The editor and contributors
Biographical sketches of contributors including John Blaxland, Robert Czulda, Murielle Delaporte, George Galdorisi, Debalina Ghoshal, Harald Malmgren, Pierre Tran, Richard Weitz, and others reveal an impressive network of scholars, practitioners, and journalists embedded in key theaters and institutions. This bench of expertise is one reason the book ranges so comfortably from Polish defense budgeting to Indian SSBN programs to South Korean missile exports to Iraq.
Defense developments 2020–2024
The volume closes by situating Defense XXIV within a series that began with 2020 A Pivotal Year? and continued through Defense XXI, Defense XXII, and Defense XXIII. Together, these books track how COVID‑19, the erosion of the rules-based order, and successive shocks in Europe and Asia have accelerated the shift to a fragmented, contested strategic environment.
Why Defense XXIV Matters Now
Defense XXIV argues that the central feature of our time is not generic “great-power competition,” but the consolidation of a multi-polar authoritarian world in which regimes cooperate opportunistically to undermine the liberal order. These actors use tools that range from nuclear breakout and gray-zone coercion to cyber, migration, and economic penetration of Western societies, exploiting internal fractures in democracies.
Rather than dwelling on decline, Defense XXIV showcases the practical ways allies are adapting, Poland pushing defense spending above 3 percent of GDP and rebuilding counter-intelligence, Nordic states fortifying borders and industrial bases, India commissioning new SSBNs, South Korea exporting missile defenses, and Australia restructuring its army under AUKUS-era demands.
Inside the Key Sections
Global developments
The “Global Developments” section opens with a bracing discussion of nuclear weapons in a multi-polar authoritarian world, built around Paul Bracken’s notion of a “second nuclear age.” Here, nuclear weapons are not placed in a political “box” separate from warfighting; they are woven into deliberate escalation ladders in crises spanning Europe and Asia.
Readers are then taken through a set of deeply reported essays on:
- The evolution of the Russia‑Ukraine war from blitzkrieg to attritional campaign, and Putin’s outreach to North Korea and Iran.
- Poland’s posture on the Russian threat, from border violations by cruise missiles to dismantling Russian and Belarusian espionage networks, and aggressive defense spending and modernization.
- The fraying of Polish‑Ukrainian relations over grain, exhumations, and political rhetoric, despite Warsaw’s enormous tank, artillery, air defense, and refugee support.
- Indo-Pacific nuclear and conventional dynamics, including India’s SSBN fleet and SLBM force development and South Korea’s missile defense exports to Iraq.
- European perceptions of China, drawn from Pierre Tran’s review of The Idea of China and analysis of Chinese military exercises, nuclear buildup, and economic leverage over Europe.
This section alone is worth the price of admission for anyone wanting a connected picture of European and Indo-Pacific security in 2024.
America and its place in the world
The second section turns the lens inward, examining U.S. politics, strategy, and credibility in the context of Trump 2.0. Essays here explore:
How a “911 generation” of younger Americans is reshaping U.S. politics and its relationship to war, trust, and institutions.
The intersection of the Ukraine war, the Trump election, and European anxieties about American staying power, including a blunt Polish view of U.S. political turbulence.
The contrast between Trump 1.0 and Trump 2.0, and what this means for NATO burden-sharing and European hedging.
For Australian readers, John Blaxland’s piece on Trump’s win and its implications for Australia stands out. He argues that while much commentary focuses on rhetoric, the underlying fabric of U.S., Australian defense, intelligence, and industrial ties, Pine Gap, AUKUS, integrated logistics and training—is deep, mutually beneficial, and structurally resilient.
Commanders’ perspectives
Where many books stop at policy, Defense XXIV goes into cockpits, ready rooms, and headquarters. Interviews and essays capture:
- A decade of U.S. Marine Corps transformation, including Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations, distributed aviation, and the integration of the F‑35 and CH‑53K into new concepts of operations.
- U.S. Navy training and innovation through the eyes of the Commander of Carrier Strike Group 4 and Atlantic naval aviation leaders bringing the CMV‑22B into service.
- Updates from MAWTS‑1 and 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing on training for distributed, fifth-generation warfare.
- Briefings from the chiefs of the French Air Force and Italian Air Force, detailing how European air forces are building multi-national fifth-generation enterprises, with hubs such as Cameri and the International Flight Training School.
These pages give readers a sense of the living force: the change agents, experiments, and doctrinal shifts that will define allied capability a decade from now.
Building 21st century combat forces
For industry and capability planners, the fourth section is a goldmine. It ties high-level geopolitics directly to platforms, systems, and industrial choices:
- Fifth-generation air combat and the re-norming of air warfare, including how the F‑35, advanced munitions, and networked sensing are changing both deterrence and day‑one strike.
- The role of firms like MBDA and the broader European munitions sector in recreating an “arsenal of democracy” for a protracted conflict era.
- Lessons from Eurosatory 2024 and Euronaval 2024 on land warfare in the age of Ukraine and Gaza, autonomous systems, and naval kill-web integration.
- Detailed looks at enabling platforms and systems: CH‑53K heavy lift, CMV‑22B long-range logistics, MWCS‑28’s distributed C2, CMS 330 for naval combat management, and Lockheed Martin’s integrated warfare systems and sensors.
- A clear, accessible explanation of the U.S. Navy’s new Navigation Plan and the emerging hybrid fleet of crewed and uncrewed surface vessels.
- Rather than treat uncrewed systems as buzzwords, the book follows their path from experimentation (Task Force 59 and 59.1) to serious integration into numbered fleets and special operations.
Interviews with historical insight
The “Interviews with Historical Insight” section is where Defense XXIV moves from analytic to deeply personal. Timperlake’s interviews remind readers that debates about strategy and policy are always grounded in lived experience and sacrifice.
- David Evans, a Marine artillery officer who fought at Con Thien and Khe Sanh before becoming a Chicago Tribune defense correspondent, describes the lethal reality of Vietnam and the persistent gulf between battlefield truth and Washington narratives.
- Sister Deirdre Byrne, a Catholic nun and former Army surgeon in Afghanistan, offers an unusual perspective on service, war, and moral responsibility in an era of endless conflict and abrupt withdrawal.
These pieces underscore a core argument of the book: tactical success means little if strategic leadership refuses to learn, recalibrate, and tell the truth about costs, limits, and interests.
Who Should Read Defense XXIV
Defense XXIV is written for readers who are serious about strategy, but it is accessible enough for any engaged citizen who wants to understand the world emerging from 2020–2024. The book will be especially valuable for:
- Military officers and NCOs trying to connect their daily work to the larger strategic picture and allied context.
- Policymakers and staffers wrestling with budgets, force design, and alliance politics under fiscal constraints and political polarization.
- Defense industry leaders and engineers seeking to align products, innovation, and industrial capacity with real operational demand signals.
- Scholars, journalists, and students looking for grounded case studies rather than abstract theory, spanning nuclear strategy, gray-zone conflict, and allied military reform.
Because it folds in contributors from Poland, France, India, South Korea, Australia, and the U.S., the book offers a genuinely allied not Washington-centric view of the strategic landscape.
How Defense XXIV Fits in the Series
Defense XXIV is part of an evolving series that has tracked the turbulence of the last half-decade.
- 2020 A Pivotal Year? explored COVID‑19’s shock to Western societies and early signs of strategic realignment.
- Defense XXI examined how U.S. and allied forces were beginning to reshape themselves for authoritarian challenges, with heavy emphasis on field visits and commander interviews.
- Defense XXII: A World in Transition chronicled the eruption of open conflict in Ukraine and the reawakening of defense debates across Europe and the Indo-Pacific.
- Defense XXIII: America Faces a Very Different World analyzed a year marked by growing conflict, disintegration of the rules-based order, and the consolidation of multi-polar authoritarianism.
Defense XXIV builds on this foundation but focuses sharply on practical adaptation—what militaries, industries, and governments actually did in 2024 to cope with a more dangerous environment, and where they are still falling short.
For readers who want not just commentary but a longitudinal record of how the democracies have responded since 2020, owning Defense XXIV alongside its predecessors provides a unique narrative of this turbulent period.
Defense XXIV is available in both ebook and paperback formats through Amazon and other online booksellers, and it stands as the definitive 2024 snapshot of how the United States and its allies are reworking defense to survive and prevail in a multi-polar authoritarian age.
Defense XXIV: A Podcast on Military Innovation in a Multi-Polar World