Editing Geostrategy (section)

{{Short description|Type of foreign policy guided principally by geographical factors}}
{{original research|date=September 2016}}
'''Geostrategy''', a subfield of [[geopolitics]], is a type of [[foreign policy]] guided principally by [[geography|geographical]] factors<ref name="strategy1">{{cite book|author=Dr. Cabral Abel Couto|year=1988|title=Elementos de Estratégia. Vol I.|publisher=Instituto Altos Estudos Militares, Lisboa}}</ref> as they inform, constrain, or affect political and military planning. As with all [[strategy|strategies]], geostrategy is concerned with matching means to ends.<ref name="strategy1a">{{cite journal|author=Dr. John Garafano|date=5–9 July 2004|url=http://www.afes-press.de/pdf/Garafano_Alternate_Secutity.pdf|title=Alternate Security Strategies: The Strategic Feasibility of Various Notions of Security|publisher=International Peace Research Foundation|access-date=2006-05-19}}</ref><ref name="strategy2">{{cite journal|author=Report of the [[United Nations Secretary General|Secretary General]]|date=20 April 2001|url=http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/peacekpg/reform/2001/0420sgreport.pdf|title=No exit without strategy: Security Council decision-making and the closure or transition of United Nations peacekeeping operations|publisher=[[United Nations Security Council]]|version=S/2001/394|access-date=2006-05-19|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040113095006/http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/peacekpg/reform/2001/0420sgreport.pdf |archive-date=2004-01-13}}</ref><ref name="strategy3">{{cite journal|author=Col. David J. Andre|date=Autumn 1995|title=The Art of War—Part, Present, Future|journal=Joint Force Quarterly|page=129|url=http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/jfq_pubs/2909.pdf|access-date=2005-05-19|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20041114122740/http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/jfq_pubs/2909.pdf|archive-date=2004-11-14|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref name="strategy4">{{cite book|editor=Philip Babcock Gove|title=Webster's Third New International Dictionary|date=September 1961|publisher=Riverside Press|location=Cambridge, MA|quote=strategy: the science and art of employing the political, economic, psychological, and military forces of a nation or group of nations to afford the maximum support to adopted policies in peace and war}}</ref><ref name="strategy5">{{cite book|last=Gaddis|first=John Lewis|author-link=John Lewis Gaddis|title=Strategies of Containment: A Critical Appraisal of Postwar American National Security policy|year=1982|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=New York, NY|isbn=978-0-19-503097-6|quote=The process by which ends are related to means, intentions to capabilities, objectives to resources.|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/strategiesofcon000gadd}}</ref> [[Strategy]] is as intertwined with [[geography]] as geography is with [[nation]]hood, or as [[Colin S. Gray]] and Geoffrey Sloan state it, "[geography is] the mother of strategy."<ref name="mother">{{cite book|last=Gray|first=Colin S.|author-link=Colin S. Gray|author2=Geoffrey Sloan|date=November 30, 1999|title=Geopolitics, Geography and Strategy|publisher=Frank Cass|location=London and Portland, Oregon|isbn=978-0-7146-8053-8|page=3}}</ref>

Geostrategists, as distinct from geopoliticians, approach geopolitics from a [[nationalist]] point of view. Geostrategies are relevant principally to the context in which they were devised: the strategist's nation, the historically rooted national impulses,<ref name="csis_Brzezinski_Institute">{{Cite web |title=Brzezinski Institute on Geostrategy |publisher=[[Center for Strategic and International Studies]] |date= |access-date=31 March 2021 |url= https://www.csis.org/programs/brzezinski-institute-geostrategy }}</ref> the strength of the country's resources, the scope of the country's goals, the political geography of the time period, and the technological factors that affect military, political, economic, and cultural engagement. Geostrategy can function prescriptively, advocating foreign policy based on geographic and historical factors, analytically, describing how foreign policy is shaped by geography and history, or predictively, projecting a country's future foreign policy decisions and outcomes.

Many geostrategists are also geographers, specializing in subfields of [[geography]], such as [[human geography]], [[political geography]], [[economic geography]], [[cultural geography]], [[military geography]], and [[strategic geography]]. Geostrategy is most closely related to strategic geography.

Especially following [[World War II]], some scholars divide geostrategy into two [[school of thought|schools]]: the uniquely German [[Organic theory of the state|organic state theory]]; and, the broader [[Anglo-American relations|Anglo-American]] geostrategies.<ref name="parameters">{{cite journal|last=Hillen|first=John|author2=Michael P. Noonan|date=Autumn 1998|title=The Geopolitics of NATO Enlargement|journal=Parameters|volume=XXVIII|issue=3|pages=21–34|url=http://carlisle-ww.army.mil/usawc/Parameters/98autumn/hillen.htm|access-date=2006-12-22|url-access=subscription }}{{dead link|date=April 2025|bot=medic}}{{cbignore|bot=medic}}</ref><ref name="Tyner">{{cite journal|quote=... is often divided into two main schools: the organic state branch and the geostrategy branch ...|last=Tyner|first=JA|year=1998|title=The Geopolitics of Eugenics and the Incarceration of Japanese Americans|journal=Antipode|volume=30|issue=3|pages=251–269|doi=10.1111/1467-8330.00077|bibcode=1998Antip..30..251T }}</ref><ref name="Russell">{{cite journal|quote=Geopolitics, broadly defined, may actually be seen as two distinct schools that comprise the organic state theory and geostrategy.|last=Russell|first=Greg|year=2006|title=Theodore Roosevelt, geopolitics, and cosmopolitan ideals|journal=Review of International Studies|volume=32|issue=3|pages=541–559|doi=10.1017/S0260210506007157|s2cid=145259554 }}</ref>