The United States is not alone in any of this, of course. For more than 67 years, NATO has been the quintessential example of nations coming together to respond to collective security challenges. And as it did during the Cold War, NATO will be critical to preserving collective defense in the face of new and renewed threats.

To ensure it does so, NATO, too, is adapting to use a new playbook—one that prepares to counter cyber threats and hybrid warfare, to better integrate our conventional and nuclear deterrence, and much, much more.

That’s why NATO created a Very-High-Readiness Joint Task Force that can deploy allied forces on 48 [hours’] notices to any crisis on allied territory. That’s why NATO is also deploying four battalions to its eastern flank—one each in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland—the latter, by the way, is where the United States will lead a battalion starting in April this year. And it’s why NATO is providing support to partner countries like Ukraine and Georgia to help strengthen and reform their national defense institutions and to improve their ability to work with NATO.

Everything the United States is doing, both on its own and with NATO, will ensure that we continue to stand up to Russian aggression, and that we’re ready for longer-term competition. But it’s also necessary to keep the door open to working with Russia, when and where our interests align, or can be made to align. And as I said, there was a time, in the years after the Cold War, when Russia cooperated with the United States and other nations, contributing to the principled international order rather than undermining it. I remember that personally—and so do many of you. And perhaps someday, we’ll see that spirit rekindled.

Catalyzing a Principled & Inclusive Security Network in the Asia-Pacific

Next, I want to discuss what the defense department has to do to carry out the security aspect of President Obama’s rebalance to the Asia-Pacific. The rebalance has ensured that DoD will continue to help provide the security necessary for that consequential region—home to nearly half the global population and nearly half the global economy—and allow it to remain a place where everyone can rise and prosper.

That’s been American policy and practice since the end of World War II. Regardless of what else was going on at home or in other parts of the world—during Democratic and Republican administrations, in times of surplus and deficit, war and peace—the United States has remained economically, politically, and militarily engaged in the Asia-Pacific.

Now, unlike elsewhere in the world, peace and stability there has never been managed by a region-wide, formal structure like NATO in Europe. That’s made sense because of the Asia-Pacific’s unique history, geography, and politics.

Instead, the United States has long taken a principled and inclusive approach, and collaborated with a network of regional allies and partners to enable security and uphold important principles like resolving disputes peacefully; ensuring countries can make choices free from external coercion and intimidation; and preserving the freedom of overflight and navigation guaranteed by international law.

Because we did so, out of the rubble of World War II, economic miracle after miracle occurred. Think about it . . . first Japan, then Taiwan, South Korea, and Southeast Asia, and now, today, China, India, and others rose and prospered.

That progress has produced incredible changes in the region: populations are growing, education has improved, freedom and self-determination have spread, economies have grown more interconnected, and military spending and cooperation are both increasing.

Amid all this remarkable change and progress, America’s interests and objectives in the Asia-Pacific have endured: we still want peace, stability, and progress there for all, including ourselves. But as the region has changed, our approach to how we advance our interests and uphold those enduring principles has had to change along with it.

Today, as the Defense Department has been operationalizing one phase after another of the military part of the rebalance, we’re not only ensuring we remain the strongest military and primary provider of regional security; we’re also connecting—and further networking—our allies and partners in a burgeoning Principled and Inclusive Security Network that will allow all of us to see more, share more, and do more to maintain security in the region.

In the rebalance’s first phase, DoD sent tens of thousands of additional American personnel to the region, committed to homeporting 60 percent of our naval and overseas air assets to the Asia-Pacific, and began to modernize our regional posture around Guam as a strategic hub.

In the second phase, which we launched almost two years ago, we committed to sending some of our best people and our most advanced capabilities to the region—our newest submarines, aircraft, and surface warfare vessels, for example—even as we developed new and innovative strategies and operational concepts for the principal contingencies that could occur there.

We also significantly strengthened our bilateral alliances and partnerships. Nurtured over decades, tested in crisis, and built on shared interests, values, and sacrifice, we’ve now strengthened these relationships so they better reflect twenty-first-century security needs. There are many examples to point to in the region—whether it’s our long-time alliances with Japan, the Republic of Korea and Australia, or our newer growing partnerships with India, Singapore, Vietnam and others.

Now, in the third phase, it will be necessary to cement the progress we’ve made in the first and second, and more importantly, build upon it.

It will be necessary for the United States to continue to sharpen our military edge so we remain the most powerful military in the region, and the security partner of choice, by increasing and targeting investments in capabilities suited to the region to ensure we stay the best there.

We’ll also continue to make “leap-ahead” technological investments—including some surprising ones—that will help us keep the lead in the Asia-Pacific, and elsewhere.

And we’ll further catalyze the Asia-Pacific’s growing Principled and Inclusive Security Network. Although it’s not a formal alliance like NATO, this burgeoning network—built on trilateral and multilateral as well as bilateral relationships—is grounded in those principles I mentioned earlier. It’s inclusive, since any nation and any military can contribute—that’s the American approach.

That’s all to the good for the region and the United States, but it’s important to remember, the rebalance and this Asia-Pacific security network are not aimed at any particular country. The network’s not closed and excludes no one. Although we have disagreements with China, including over its destabilizing behavior in the South China Sea—and its behavior is in fact driving many more to work more closely with us—we’re committed to working with China where possible, to introducing measures to reduce risk, and to encouraging China to avoid self-isolation.

The Strategic Transition & Innovation

All this is happening today. But even as we confront the challenges of this time of strategic transition, it will also be necessary for DoD to lead and compete well into the future.

Today ours is the finest fighting force the world has ever known. There’s no military that’s stronger, more capable, more experienced, or more innovative. But that’s not a birthright, it’s not guaranteed. We can’t take it for granted. We need to earn it again and again.

To do so, we have to invest and innovate for the uncertain future we face, as well as deal with the problems of today. And that’s why I’ve been consistently pushing the Pentagon to think, as I put it, outside of our five-sided box to ensure that our technology, our plans, our organization, and above all, our people stay the best for decades to come. We’ve made the decisions and investments to ensure DoD maintains our dominance in every domain, not just sea and air and land, but also in space, and cyberspace.

We’re pushing the envelope with research and development despite the budget woes to stay ahead of our competitors and at technology’s frontier, by putting for example nearly $72 billion dollars into R&D alone this next year. To give you a little context, that’s more than double what Apple, Intel, and Google spent on R&D combined in 2015.

Beyond that, we’ve been building and rebuilding bridges between the Pentagon and America’s technology community.

One way we’re doing that is through our Defense Innovation Unit-Experimental, or DIUx—which I created to help connect with startups and other commercial tech firms in Silicon Valley, Boston, Austin, and everywhere in between. Those outposts are already producing results: DIUx has interacted with companies in over 30 states to help us adopt technologies more quickly that can help our warfighters accomplish their missions. We always will continue to need our excellent existing and traditional defense partners that help us build our amazing defense systems, but DIUx will also help better connect the Pentagon as a whole to the entire world of American innovation. That’s an investment worth making. Because when I started my life in science and technology and national security most technology of consequence came from the United States, and most of that from government sponsorship. We’re still an influential force, but it’s not just the Defense Department anymore. To stay the best, we need to interact with the rest of the technological ecosystem.