Jennifer Kavanagh, who directs military analysis at Defense Priorities and is a senior fellow there, proposes cutting U.S. forces in Asia and shifting the remaining posture toward the Second Island Chain, recasting regional security commitments.
Her proposal would remove most Army and Marine Corps deployments from Asia, reduce air and naval power, and consolidate remaining forces at bases farther from China’s coast. It names Guam, Palau, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia and Australia as locations for the revised posture. Kavanagh argues that a smaller footprint would reduce military requirements and the risk of war while preserving access to markets and trade routes.
The proposal’s summary recommends ending mutual defense alliances with South Korea, Australia, the Philippines and Japan, with narrower partnerships taking their place. Its Japan section calls for a slower drawdown and allows some rotational U.S. forces to remain. It also recommends nonintervention in a conflict over Taiwan. The report suggests completing most changes by 2030 and the rest by 2035; those dates are proposed milestones, not a government schedule.
James Park, a research associate in the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft’s East Asia Program, and Brandon Carr, a studies associate at the institute, argued in a Responsible Statecraft commentary that withdrawing guarantees could leave allies more exposed to Chinese coercion. They also said a more distant U.S. posture could make it harder for forces to regain access to the western Pacific during a conflict. These are assessments of possible outcomes.
South Korean polling offers context on nuclear views, but neither survey asked about Kavanagh’s proposal. The Asan Institute for Policy Studies found that 76.2% of 1,000 South Koreans surveyed in March 2025 supported acquiring an indigenous nuclear-weapons capability.
The Center for Strategic and International Studies received 175 responses from South Korean strategic elites in its 2024 poll, a 16% response rate from a sample of 1,094. Among respondents, 34% initially supported nuclearization, 53% opposed it and 13% were unsure. In a hypothetical involving fears that the United States might abandon its security commitment, 51% of those initially opposed said they would become supportive. The two surveys covered different groups and questions; neither establishes that South Korea would pursue nuclear weapons.
