Beijing’s Innovation Strategy: Threat-Informed Acquisition for an Era of Great Power Competition

Abstract

The 2018 National Defense Strategy defined a new great power contest. Both the United States and China treat an upper hand in science and technology (S&T) as the determinative variable in today’s contest. But they disagree over what the upper hand entails. Discourse in the United States revolves around pioneering basic research. By contrast, China prioritizes applications. Beijing’s strategic discourse and resource allocations focus on deploying rather than developing cutting-edge capabilities. They focus on doing so at pace, with scope and scale, under State control. This is innovation of application. Beijing’s innovative orientation rests on the ease of acquiring basic research and development (R&D) from the open global system. It is also premised on a new, paradigm for power. Tailored to a world of network-defined interaction, this paradigm is measured by scale and influence, not force and lethality. It de-emphasizes traditional tools and battlefields in favor of controlling networks, standards, and platforms. It plays to China’s enduring strengths of scale, scope, and centralization. Beijing’s approach to innovation will shape how it prioritizes, allocates resources, and measures standing in the unfolding great power contest. Those decisions will in turn shape the U.S.–China strategic dynamic as well as the U.S. military’s operating environment.