In an increasingly multipolar world, nations like South Korea, Canada, Indonesia, the Philippines, Brazil, Nigeria and others are key partners for the United States.
These countries and other influential nations like them are known in policy circles as “middle powers.” While definitions vary, most experts identify them as countries with regional political, security, and economic clout. While they may not rival superpowers, these counties often play vital roles in regional relations and in international forums.
These middle powers can provide stability and offer avenues for advancing global security and economic opportunities. Each brings unique interests, domestic political constraints, and regional leadership to the relationship, but reliable partnerships with middle power nations advance our own national security interests. Sustaining U.S. influence with these increasingly important countries requires predictable policy, credible partnership, and consistent respect, and not the transactional exchanges which can dominate these bilateral connections.
The United States must refocus on these middle powers, which have been and can be critical partners to advance our priorities. We must avoid the policy volatility that increases risk and incentivizes these nations to seek alternatives to alignment with the United States.
Within multilateral organizations such as NATO or minilateral groupings, where nations come together in smaller forums around shared interests, these powerful players shape outcomes on security, energy, governance, and sanctions enforcement. These are core U.S. interests, and U.S. objectives benefit from sustained, individualized, bilateral engagement with these partners.
In an environment marked by geopolitical competition, economic fragmentation, and domestic political pressure, middle power nations are faced with conflicting demands. Especially among the developing countries known as the Global South, young populations are demanding economic opportunity. Multiple middle powers also face regional conflict, even if not in their own country or at their own borders.
Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran continue to aggressively seek influence among middle powers through strategic investment, soft power ploys, multilateral gambits and personal leader-to-leader relationships, especially amid recent U.S. economic decisions that have roiled global trade.
But transactional or extractive arrangements are fragile building blocks for long-term gain, while sustained and sincere diplomacy strengthens bonds. Strong bilateral partnerships between the United States and these key regional players will strengthen deterrence against nonstate instability and safeguard regional security for both the United States and partners – and provide durable relationships for the United States globally.
The United States should treat stability as a strategic advantage by anchoring engagement in long-term frameworks and consistent policy. In addition to seeking transactional arrangements, the United States should move toward jointly defined objectives and multiyear cooperation, including multiyear defense cooperation roadmaps where practical. The United States can leverage multinational and minilateral forums as avenues of opportunity.
Our continued focus on economic partnerships should prioritize reliable, strategic investment and reduced friction. Washington should streamline reliable market access and co-investment in infrastructure and integration of supply chains, particularly in areas of national security including critical minerals and key technology such as semiconductors.
“Friendshoring” sensitive industries – locating critical production in trusted partner countries rather than in unreliable markets – would reduce U.S. vulnerability to coercion or disruption while maintaining U.S.-level standards and supply-chain resilience. Development finance, export credit, and multilateral development banks should be used strategically and in a spirit of coordination and partnership, not as ad hoc incentives or with conditionality. The United States’ best trade and business partners are fellow democracies who adhere to rule of law
Finally, the United States should prioritize the appointment and confirmation of U.S. diplomatic leadership in key nations as well as in regional leadership positions at the State Department as signals of respect and engagement. Confirmed senior executive branch leaders, both in American embassies abroad and in Washington, facilitate disciplined, private diplomacy and communicate clear expectations.
By treating middle powers as capable partners, not junior allies or just transactional clients, the United States can strengthen our own resilience, reduce coerced dependencies and the growing influence of adversaries, and reinforce an economic order that benefits the American people.
