Why, for all its advantages in wealth and capability, does the West find itself outmanoeuvred by adversaries on so many fronts? Despite profound internal problems, Beijing, Moscow and Tehran seem to get the better of their adversaries too often; they are adept at spreading their influence and exacting heavy costs from their opponents – while we in the West scratch our heads. And now that Donald Trump’s United States has turned predatory and coercive, is it even clear who ‘we’ and ‘they’ are any more?

These questions are not new. Defence analyst Jack Watling’s Statecraft offers a fresh take on the familiar ground of great power competition. His work is a rich survey of contemporary conflicts and power struggles from Ukraine to Mali to Afghanistan, and it pairs well with A Wess Mitchell’s Great Power Diplomacy (2025), a book of comparable quality though dealing with history across a wider arc of time and space.

Watling’s account draws on his own experience of conflict on multiple fronts. He writes as both itinerant strategic mind and military observer. He has been close to the danger and the gunfire, and evokes what he saw, smelled and touched in economical and controlled prose. 

Statecraft is a welcome intervention