Several fashionable fallacies affect current assessments of the character of conflict. It is always difficult to discern what changes will affect the strategic level, especially when attention is focused on particular wars and technological novelties. In this article, Rob Johnson argues that an honest appraisal of what is unchanging offers one route to that evaluation. Strategically, revisionist geopolitics, an electronic arms race between encryption and access, and a greater focus on protecting populations and national wealth are anticipated. After a period when the West could intervene across the globe at will, it appears that escalatory, existential threats are back, demanding a strategic solution.