Issue Brief
June 18, 2026 • 6:32 pm ET
Christopher Lee, Ben Blane, and Markus Garlauskas
Bottom lines up front
The current US military command-and-control construct in the Indo-Pacific is built on a hub-and-spoke model not well suited to the critical subregion of Northeast Asia. The United States should establish a new Northeast Asia Command with responsibility over US military operations and military coordination with allies in this subregion.This new command could help bypass political resistance to military coordination between Japan and South Korea, help build a “kill web” in the first island chain, and support deterrence.
