US Defense Strategy Downplays Threat of Confrontation With China

The Trump administration’s annual defense strategy report takes a softer tone toward China than in years past, calling for deterrence “through strength, not confrontation,” while focusing on threats posed by migration and narcotics in the Western Hemisphere.

The department’s long-awaited National Defense Strategy, released Friday evening, directs the Defense Department to “maintain a favorable balance of military power in the Indo-Pacific.” It offered a much anticipated look at the way the Pentagon would translate President Donald Trump’s “America First” approach to the military in his second term.

“Not for purposes of dominating, humiliating, or strangling China,” the 25-page document ...