Offensive Realism In War

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The counterpart of the core states defined by Huntington in the context of John Mearsheimer are the great powers. These great powers are states that are globally high ranking in terms of military prowess, being economically powerful, has a global spheres of interest, and has a foreign policy that would have an impact on world affairs (Heywood, 2011). As an advocate of offensive realism, John Mearsheimer assumes that because international system is anarchic and there is no central authority to safeguard states from hostilities among themselves, the primary goal of the great powers then is survival (Mearsheimer, 2001). But in the question of how much power does a great power wants, offensive realists believe that it is their goal to be a regional…show more content…
In acquiring relative power or the material capability of a state, war is the main strategy. ‘Blackmail’ is an alternative, this does not rely on the actual use of force but only on its threat. Another is ‘bait and bleed’, it is a strategy where states provoke a long and costly war between another states to weaken the opponent. A variety of this strategy is called ‘bloodletting’, whereby state make sure that its opponent state is involved in a deadly war (Mearsheimer, 2001). The major strategies of great powers to prevent another state from shifting the balance of power are ‘balancing’ and ‘buck-passing’. In the former, threatened states shoulder the burden of containing the aggressive state while in the latter threatened state try to avoid direct contact with the aggressive state, so they try to get another great power to check on it, while staying in the sidelines. Another strategies are ‘band-wagoning’ and ‘appeasement’. In the former, threatened state loses hope of preventing its adversary state to gain power, so it will just join its opponent to still have at least small gains from war. In the latter, threatened state eliminates its motive to gain power in order to alter the behavior of its adversary state. These two strategies are short-term because these are used to concede power against the…show more content…
Zakaria discussed the post-American world focusing on the rise of everyone else not only the countries but also international organizations, and Non-Governmental Organizations. The US is now being challenged by other states in terms of economy and military. The international system have gone through different eras. A century ago, there was a multipolar system wherein the Europeans and empires were the great powers of the world, down to Cold War wherein two great powers emerged, and since then, the international system became unipolar world lead by the United States. Now that it have come to a modern world, and all states have undeniably experienced economic growth, which can be evidently seen in countries such as China, India, Russia, United Arab Emirates, and Malaysia, the unipolarity of the system has been challenged by other emerging powers (Zakaria,
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