In a recent class discussion in ECON 201 Introduction to Economics, the instructor asked cadets about the economic ramifications of blockades in the Strait of Hormuz, on the southwest edge of Iran. 

Cadets talked about supply and demand of oil, oil prices, and reasons why the prices may or may not change. 

The daily news is full of economic warfare examples: tariffs, blockades, currency, sanctions. Motoyuki Yoshihara, the inaugural Dick and Rosalie Bush Fellow of Economic Warfare, says current events such as the war in Iran are the perfect classroom introduction to the concept of economic warfare. 

While he’s discussing the topic in the Introduction to Economics class, he also is creating an entire course focused on economic warfare for the spring semester. 

As an infantry officer in the U.S. Army, Yoshihara deployed to Iraq in 2019 during Operation Inherent Resolve. He was involved in what became the last battle with ISIS, the Battle of Baghuz Fawqani. He has also served with the United Nations Command in Korea, and he continues to serve as an Army Reserve officer. 

His experiences around the world have illustrated for him how adversarial relationships can lead to tactics aimed at affecting the strength of a rival’s economy. This is one of many lessons Yoshihara hopes to convey in his fellowship with the Air Force Academy’s Institute for Future Conflict.

Yoshihara discovered the Bush Fellowship through a friend, who told him, “Look, Yoshi, they made a job just for you!” The job description blended economics — his academic discipline — and the career he has followed since he enlisted in the Army at the age of 18: warfare. 

Economics is listed as one of the four instruments of national power, known as DIME: diplomacy, information, military and economics. In recent years, the United States has at times leveraged its economic strengths and advantages while in other instances played economic defense. 

“Economic warfare is using all elements of statecraft within economics to proceed with national objectives,” Yoshihara says. “The broader definition is using these tools both offensively and defensively, just like we use aircraft or how we use any tool that we have at our disposal.”

Dick Bush earned his bachelor’s degree in economics at the Air Force Academy in 1971. He had a special interest in the economics of the Soviet Union at the time. He also earned a master’s degree in economics from UCLA and flew the F-106 interceptor during his nine years of active duty. 

In 1979, about 18 months before he separated from the Air Force, he came face-to-face with a serious global calamity through his father’s experiences. 

“My father was in the oil business in Iran until his boss was assassinated. He came back the next day, and the Shah was overthrown two weeks later,” Bush recalls. “My parents were over there during the whole buildup of the Iranian overthrow of the Shah, and I was aware of the change in the environment. I paid quite a bit of attention to those kinds of things.” 

These topics helped shape his understanding of how the world operates. As he and his wife, Rosalie, contemplated a gift to support his alma mater through the U.S. Air Force Academy Association & Foundation, he asked himself what he thought was missing from an otherwise excellent system for developing cadets into officers. He ultimately concluded that cadets could benefit from a deeper understanding of, as he says, “geopolitical, military and economic functions and interactions.” 

Motivated to make a difference, the Bushes funded the Dick and Rosalie Bush Fellowship of Economic Warfare, which is designed to help cadets understand the importance and use of “economic levers” in the geopolitical space. 

“These levers, intelligently executed, can make a big difference,” Bush says. “I don’t know what they all are, and that’s the reason to have somebody lead this effort.”

“The first part of the course is talking about all of these tools that we have at our disposal. What can we do with them?” Yoshihara says. “The second part is bringing all of that together in case studies. What have we employed? What effects have we reached? How the elements of national power actually work together and sometimes how they don’t. Because there’s essentially a lot of competing interests of what people want.” 

These ideas and concepts will result in a couple of academic exercises that will put the cadets in the role of a government staffer tasked with creating a policy memo based on an economic warfare situation. Yoshihara will then outline a response from an adversary. The final assignment will be the cadet’s response to that. 

“So, they’ll work on two policy memos to make it as realistic as possible, because that’s where the Department of War is going,” Yoshihara says. “I want to imitate what the Department of War is going through right now because cadets are going to be the future, and that part is really exciting.”

Yoshihara is one of many fellows and others within the Institute for Future Conflict who are supported by generous donors. 

The spring economic warfare course will be open to all economics majors, and those pursuing IFC minors can take it as an elective to fulfill the minor requirements. 

Maj. Gen. (Ret.) David Scott ’78, senior adviser to the Institute for Future Conflict, says about 90 cadets are taking IFC courses, and about half of those are enrolled in the minor. 

“The minor supports the new provost’s concept of warfighting, and it supports the interdisciplinary nature of bringing cadets from every department into the minor to understand the strategic level of war fighting for not only future conflict but also current conflicts, such as Iran,” Gen. Scott says. 

In an August announcement about a realignment of the Academy’s academic enterprise, Brig. Gen. James Valpiani ’04, Academic Wing commander and provost, said, “The demands of modern warfare are inherently multidisciplinary. Our graduates must be able to connect what they know across fields, to judge well under pressure, and to understand what they are fighting for. An education delivered in disconnected pieces will not form the judgment they need to deter conflict or, if necessary, prevail in combat.” 

Gen. Scott says the goal is to make the economic warfare course a permanent offering. To that end, the IFC asks Intermediate Development Education fellows and Intermediate Level Education fellows to take this course along with all of the future conflict minor courses so they will be able teach them during their second year in the program. 

“What we don’t want is a course to be built and then just dissipate,” Gen. Scott says. “We would like these courses to be longenduring and part of the host department’s offerings.”

In this current age of great power competition, Yoshihara sees the beginning of a new Cold War, which started in the early 2010s. Actions in this new reality are focused on non-kinetic means, such as degrading economic power of other countries. Countries can focus on economic policies, specific industries or currencies of adversaries, and the United States must be ready to defend against and leverage similar tactics. 

For economic warfare to work, it needs collaboration across governmental agencies: Department of War, Federal Trade Commission, Department of Commerce and the State Department. Yoshihara says the U.S. government is developing how this approach will be implemented. 

“Teaching this comes with a lot of work, but it’s work I enjoy, so it’s very hard to complain about it,” Yoshihara says. “This is stuff I’m literally thinking about every morning. I open up the Wall Street Journal or the BBC to see what the main press is thinking about. There’s never a day that something relevant doesn’t appear.”