PNSR op-eds on World Politics Review

Last week, PNSR was afforded a great opportunity by World Politics Review, a forum we hold in high regard for its writers’ insight and depth of analysis of important issues. WPR hosted three op-eds authored by PNSR President and CEO, James R. Locher III, adapted from PNSR’s recently released report, Turning Ideas Into Action. Each piece focused on a significant initiative discussed or recommendation made in TIIA, and explained their objective.

The first in the series focused on PNSR’s call for a Next Generation State Department, one that “possesses [and] exercises sufficient authority to manage the full range of international civilian programs effectively:”

http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/Article.aspx?id=4648

The second explains the need for empowered interagency teams. In an era of “czars,” the president still runs high-risk with this unchecked, informal set up, and institutionalization of stand-up issue teams would be beneficial to the way national security is managed:

http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/Article.aspx?id=4663

The third op-ed deals with the need of improvement to high-level, national security strategic planning. “With the National Security Staff consumed with day-to-day priorities, and without comprehensive strategies for the medium- and long-term timeframe in place, planning and budgeting inevitably lack coordination and coherence,” Locher said.

http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/article.aspx?id=4673

Please follow the links to read each op-ed at World Politics Review, and download the whole Turning Ideas Into Action report here. Also, please share your thoughts in the comments section of our blog, or by emailing info@pnsr.org.

 

-Michael Drohan

Gary Hart is correct: America needs “A national security act for the 21st Century”

Last week, Gary Hart, former United States Senator of the state of Colorado, had a very interesting and important piece published on The Huffington Post. Titled “A National Security Act for the 21st Century,” Sen. Hart laid out his vision for “a new statutory basis for [America's] national security strategy in this new century.”

You can read the whole piece here for context, but as far as PNSR and its CEO James R. Locher III see it:

Senator Hart is correct.  “The only issue that matters is whether Cold War strategies and structures adequately address present and future realities or whether the realities of a new century demand a fresh look at the institutions and policies, military and non-military, that will make the nation secure.”

Understanding these challenges and the imperative for timely reform, PNSR is engaging with stakeholders and external experts to further discover and develop potential solutions, inviting those who want to advance reform to contribute.  More information can be found at www.pnsr.org.

Senator Hart should take comfort, this issue has already been answered.  “After our examination of the new strategic environment of the next quarter century and of a strategy to address it, this Commission concludes that significant changes must be made in the structures and processes of the US national security apparatus.”  The above quotation is the very first sentence of a commission’s report that was delivered to the Congress on March 15, 2001 – long before the attacks of 9/11 that further clarified the problems of our Cold War legacy thinking and institutions.

Senator Hart should also take heart – literally.  He along with former Senator Warren Rudman led a team of distinguished Americans that wrote that sentence.  In fact, the two-and-a-half year effort addressed the nature of the 21^st Century threat, questioned weapon procurements, took on the intelligence community, and raised the implications of challenges for which the military is either not suited or needs to be collaborative with other skills from across government and others.

The Project on National Security Reform’s (PNSR) first report, Forging a New Shield, delivered to the President and Congress in November 2008 and consisting of some 800 pages, identified and analyzed specific problems of our current national security system and described the root causes.  It then presented a vision for 21^st Century national security and the path to reach it.  PNSR’s newly released report, Turning Ideas Into Action, focuses on specific implementation steps and tools that will make the vision a reality.

PNSR believes that we must organize for success.  We need a collaborative, agile and innovative national security system that can work together across agencies, departments, jurisdictions, and sectors.  This system must horizontally and vertically integrate all elements of national power to make timely, informed decisions and take decisive action.

Reaching this vision will require significant changes to the way people think and operate today.  The national security apparatus must:

- Focus at the strategic level

- Concentrate on national missions and outcomes

- Match resources to missions

- Take a whole-of-government approach

- Establish a national security workforce

- Leverage and extend the collective knowledge of the entire national security community

Getting there will not be easy.  Many obstacles must be overcome.  First, the mental model that persists is clearly that of the Cold War system and is dominated by defense and intelligence, and to a lesser extent, diplomacy – each in its own separate domain.  Second, political sensitivities, concerned about power, jurisdiction and resources, resist change.  Third, the sheer size of national security reform is huge and can be daunting unless broken into manageable pieces.  The fourth obstacle is bandwidth – that is, the time and attention needed to focus on the reform challenge is overwhelmed by the requirements of managing the daily “in-box.”

Leaders like Senator Hart must continue to demand reform.  Momentum is building, but in the face of the great challenges the nation faces, we need more action.  The movement for true national security reform needs more push, more support, more drive and more commitment from those at all levels who know that things must change.  Hard work lies ahead, but the time to act is now.

Sen. Hart has responded to this in the comments on his blog, hosted by Matters of Principle. Sen. Hart’s own words:

Jim Locher is better equipped by background and experience than anyone I know to comment on defense structures and reforms, as his comments here prove. He has given extensive thought to the need for our Cold War structures and institutions to adapt to the new realities, opportunities as well as threats, of the 21st century. I encourage all those concerned with the urgent need for this adaptation and the reasons for it to follow the work of the Project on National Security Reform. As Jim says, the key is to change the way people think and operate today.

We appreciate Hart’s leadership, vision, and voice to the important issue of national security reform, and are thankful for the conversation. Hopefully now the mission led by PNSR and others like Hart will transfer to Washington’s halls of power, ending the talk and beginning the action.

-Michael Drohan

How can national security sttrategy documents work best? A response to Stephen Walt

Although his blog entry seems overly negative, Professor Stephen Walt makes a good point that the National Security Strategy documents mandated by Goldwater-Nichols haven’t resulted in something terribly useful to the presidency, Congress, or the public in general.

Consider timeliness. An administration is supposed to issue the strategy within 150 days of coming into office, and annually thereafter. Most never make the deadline and are lucky to get a security strategy published in the first term. A better system would be for an administration to issue a strategy once every four years and only after it has had a chance to put together its national security team. Issuance within 365 days makes more sense and would be more in line with actual practice. A national security review that names threats, proposes assumptions, and identifies opportunities is something that can be done on an annual basis and should feed the national strategy.

Now let’s look at content. Most strategies have been rhetorical documents with lists of goals lacking priority order, identification of advantages over adversaries, or practical considerations such as resources available. So, in their present form, they aren’t really strategies at all. A real national security strategy with unclassified and classified portions that provide selected assumptions, weigh resources, identify opportunities, and establish priorities would help most administration decision-makers stay on track. Officials below the principal-level who have rare encounters with the president or their own leadership would find such guidance helpful. Congress would find it more useful too, because it would provide better justification for legislation.

Professor Walt also suggests that strategies ought not be made public at all. A bit extreme, but there is good reason to have, at least, classified and unclassified versions. There are some actions our government may not want to broadcast. But that doesn’t mean that there should be no political guidance, or that subordinate officials should be kept in the dark. Going that far would exacerbate an existing vulnerability, that (outside of DoD) we don’t strategize or plan well. Doing away with a requirement for a national security strategy would enshrine that weakness.

Instead, the national security strategy needs to be less a square-filler and more of a document that provides analysis and guidance. Not long and ponderous, but sufficient to direct the national security bureaucracy to implement presidential policies according to resources we have, opportunities before us, and against dangers that we think may threaten. Since the primary purpose of our government is to protect its citizens and their way of life, blowing off writing a strategy—just because it hasn’t been done well in the past—would be a serious mistake.”

-Steve Johnson

Steve Johnson is a Distinguished Fellow with PNSR, leading the organization’s development of Strategy and Resource research and recommendations. Prior to Joining PNSR, Johnson was Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Western Hemisphere Affairs. His views are not necessarily representative of PNSR’s.

The Project on National Security Reform Commemorates 9/11 With a Renewed call for Systemic Reform

Today the Project on National Security Reform (PNSR) commemorates the eighth anniversary of the most devastating attack on the United States since Pearl Harbor.  We remember the victims and their families, and honor the heroism of the fire fighters, police officers, emergency workers and everyday Americans who rushed to help those in need after the unprecedented attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

Over the past eight years, the United States has reacted to the tragedy by making progress towards strengthening our nation’s security.  In 2007, with bipartisan support, Congress enacted legislation to implement the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, in both its domestic and foreign-policy dimensions.  By so doing, Congress addressed major vulnerabilities in the system and improved our homeland security across the board.  But there is much more work to be done.

It is widely understood that the security environment of the 21^st century differs significantly from that which the national security system was created to address following World War II.  Regrettably, the system is still organized to combat the last challenge, not those that lie before it.  Despite the shock of 9/11, we have failed to keep pace with the rapidity and scope of change in the world.  While the U.S. government has made incremental modifications, it has failed to produce an integrated, agile, and anticipatory system that can adequately meet today’s challenges.

One of the basic problems that led to 9/11 and plagues us still is that the system does not know what it knows. Information is not shared between agencies, knowledge is neither captured nor leveraged, and collaboration across the interagency is close to impossible.  For example, according to the 9/11 Commission report, “NSA information that would have helped identify Nawaf Al Hamzi [one of the hijackers of the plane flown into the Pentagon] in January 2000” was not properly shared with relevant agencies.  Although the information was accessible, someone would have had to ask for it first before it could have been widely disseminated.  Quoting the report again, “Agencies uphold a ‘need-to-know’ culture of information protection rather than promoting a ‘need-to-share’ culture of integration.”  Eight years after the attacks and five since the landmark report was published, this still remains the case.

These problems are more a reflection of prevailing mindsets and outdated processes than technological challenges.  The technology exists in the private-sector; government needs to adapt that technology to its needs, and shift to the information-sharing culture that current generation technology enables.  PNSR is currently involved in creating an on-line, real-time, national security collaboration environment that will be the foundation for making information-sharing a reality.

Improved information sharing is part of the bold, carefully crafted plan of comprehensive reform the United States needs in order to institute a national security system that can manage and overcome the challenges of our time.  In its 2008 report, Forging a New Shield, PNSR laid out recommendations that begin to resolve the problems affecting the current system.  If implemented, PNSR’s recommendations would constitute the most far-reaching governmental design innovation in national security since the passage of the National Security Act in 1947.  PNSR has a singular focus:  to be a valuable resource for holistic reform of the national security system so that the nation can successfully address 21^st-century challenges and opportunities.

Perhaps the victims of that horrific day in 2001 can best be honored by transforming the system to ensure such an event never occurs again.  PNSR stands ready to help.

Watch PNSR associate (and our former blogger) Roger Carstens on NBC!

L to R: Carstens, Adam Ciralsky, and Scott Tyler, stars of "The Wanted"

Well this is exciting. Roger Carstens– Green Beret, Counter-Terrorism and Insurgency expert, fellow at the Center for a New American Security, and on top of all of that, former official PNSR blogger– is one of the stars in the new NBC show “The Wanted.”

“The Wanted” is an incredibly enticing program, hailed by Washington Post TV critic Tom Shales as a show whose ” substance is strong and the overall effect is a highly charged knockout.” The program follows Carstens and two colleagues as they track down war criminals, terrorism suspects, and other sketchy real-life characters and bring them to justice. The show premiered this week on NBC, and you can watch the first episode now on Hulu (See below).

In the coming weeks, check back with the PNSR blog as we will be posting some of Carstens’ best entries from the Fall of 2008.

The Wanted- Episode 1

Does General Jones Have a Future in National Security Reform?

National Security Advisor General James Jones, left, and United States Secret Service Special Agent in Charge Joe Clancy, right, are seen aboard Air Force One flying to Iraq April 7, 2009, as they coordinate arrival details by telephone for President Barack Obama's visit to Baghdad. Joined also by White House Senior Advisor David Axelrod; Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel; Presidential Scheduler Alyssa Mastromonaco; Jim Messina, Deputy Chief of Staff; White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, and National Security Council Chief of Staff Mark Lippert, background-right. Photo courtesy of the White House/ Wikimedia Commons

By Christopher Jon Lamb, National Defense University; and James Douglas Orton, Project on National Security Reform

National security advisor General James L. Jones is under an attack that has serious implications for the likelihood of national security reform in the Obama administration.  For those who have not yet heard, General Jones is already a victim of the bane of Washington, D.C. political life—the dreaded whispering campaign from anonymous sources.  The early spring 2009 chatter about dumping General Jones picked up enough momentum that Secretary of Defense Robert Gates recently went public to counter the rumors in an interview with reporter David Ignatius (The Washington Post, 6/7/09).  A recent Newsweek article (Newsweek, 6/27/09) suggests the issue is not going away.

Several explanations have been offered for why Jones is being criticized.  Some cast the development as a policy fight (see Steve Clemons article in The Washington Note, 6/12/09). Others question his leadership style (see Secretary Gates interview in The Washington Post, 6/5/09). We think Jones is sniped at because he envisions a role for the national security advisor that emphasizes the need to manage the entire national security system to a higher level of performance rather than just dominating the outcome of a small number of presidential priorities.

Consider the complaints offered up anonymously about General Jones.  They tend to fall into three categories that reflect conventional wisdom about what it takes to be an effective national security advisor:

• A close relationship with the president (Scowcroft, Rice);
• Bureaucratic and intellectual dominance on all issues (Kissinger, Brzezinski);
• And always work to exhaustion in crisis management mode (all of Jones’ predecessors).

To indulge in a little hyperbole, conventional wisdom suggests that good national security advisors should be omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent.  These expectations are unrealistic, but not surprising given the way the national security system currently works.  Let’s consider each in turn.

Unrealistic Expectation #1: Jones should be Omnipotent

Jones’ greatest shortcoming, according to his critics, is insufficient proximity to the president and by extension, his ability to project the president’s unquestioned constitutional authorities as commander-in-chief and chief executive.  Joe Klein (Time, 4/23/09) cites an anonymous national security executive who insists: “He has to be first among equals—the fact that Condi [Rice] couldn’t control Cheney and [Donald] Rumsfeld in Bush’s first term was disastrous.  A lot depends on what sort of relationship develops between Jones and Obama.”  David Rothkopf, an expert on the National Security Council, agrees.  He told Helene Cooper: “The national security advisor needs to be behind the president,” both literally and figuratively, but General Jones is not “seen as the guy in the room.”  Who is?  Well, Robert Dreufuss (Rolling Stone, 5/14/09) explains Jones has to compete with Mark Lippert, Denis McDonough and Greg Craig—all of whom advised President Obama on national security during his grueling two-year race for the presidency.  Lippert and McDonough now ostensibly work for Jones, and Craig is White House Counsel.  Jones, who is known for his candor, acknowledged to Karen DeYoung (Washington Post, 5/7/09) that “it is ‘absolutely’ fair to say” it has taken some time for him to get used to the special access to President Obama others enjoy, but that it fits with his collaborative approach to decision making:

“When I first went into the Oval Office, I didn’t expect six other people from the NSC to go with me,” he said.  Now, he said, “I think the president and I are very comfortable with the fact that I don’t have to be the shadow.  I don’t have to be there all the time.  I really have great people.  I want them to be trusted.”

Unrealistic Expectation #2: Jones should be Omniscient

Jones’ penchant for managing collaboration rather than dominating debate is no virtue according to his critics, however.  Mark Landler (The New York Times, 5/4/09) reports that anonymous sources complain Jones “has struggled with his transition from Marine commander to senior staff person, speaking up less in debates than Mrs. Clinton and not pushing as hard for decisions.”  He is not seen within or outside the administration as a dominant national security figure who commands attention on every important national security issue.  On the contrary, as Joe Klein (Time, 4/23/09) reports, Jones is self-effacing, collaborative, and generous in meetings.  He doesn’t lead meetings, he attends them; or even sends others who are substantively competent and he trusts will represent his views.  As Klein notes, Jones reliance on collaboration is worrisome even to his supporters:

“Obama has appointed all these high-powered envoys like [Richard] Holbrooke and [George] Mitchell, but we don’t know who’s going to really be in charge of setting the foreign policy priorities,” says a prominent foreign policy realist who admires Jones. “That should be Jim’s job.  But he’s throwing off a sense of uncertainty.”  Several sources say Jones seems to attend meetings rather than lead them.  “He needs to drive the agenda,” the foreign policy expert adds.

David Ignatius (The Washington Post, 4/30/09) also worries Jones is too self-effacing: “This kind of NSC collaboration always sounds good in principle.  The question is what to do when sharp disagreements arise about policy.  Then the low-key style may not work, and the self-effacing retired general may have to summon his inner Henry Kissinger.”

Unrealistic Expectation #3: Jones should be Omnipresent

Third, and perhaps most offensive to young White House staffers who can easily get hooked on the adrenaline rush of constant crisis management, Jones maintains a steady pace and demeanor.  He is not working a frenetic pace and encouraging a collective camaraderie forged under the miserably crushing weight of the NSC staff’s collective inboxes.  Karen DeYoung (The Washington Post, 5/7/09) reports the tension between the young NSC staff members and the older national security adviser politely:  “In recent weeks, Jones has been portrayed in foreign policy articles and blogs as too measured and low-key to keep pace with the hard chargers working late hours in the West Wing.”  Steve Clemons (The Washington Note, 6/12/09) put it more bluntly:  “His critics think that he’s just too unable to animate nimble, high flex policy decision making products for a White House on a manic dash to get a lot of top tier issues dealt with.”  Helene Cooper (The New York Times, 5/8/09) discussed these complaints directly with General Jones:

He maintained his cool even when asked about sniping from staff members that he went biking at lunchtime and left work early, although he did, at one point, seem about to crush his coffee cup. “I’m here by 7 o’clock in the morning, and I go home at 7, 7:30 at night.  That’s a fairly reasonable day if you’re properly organized,” he said.  What about officials who pride themselves on being at the White House deep into the night?  “Congratulations,” he said. “To me that means you’re not organized.”

To others, working a mere 12 hours a day means you can’t do the national security adviser’s job of managing the president’s national security agenda.  Jonathan Martin and Ben Smith (Politico, 5/8/09) report:

For weeks, Democratic insiders had been buzzing that Jones was strangely absent from key meetings, leaving to deputies the ‘staffing’ of Obama – the delicate task of sitting with the president and shepherding national security meetings, large and small.  “That’s very unusual,” said a Clinton administration veteran. “The way that staff has always run is the deputy runs the council day to day, and the [national security] adviser is in with the president all day (emphasis added).”

What the Criticism of Jones Really Means

Critics look for a powerful, indefatigable genius to run the national security system because that is just about what it takes to do the job in the system’s current configuration.  As noted in the Project on National Security Reform’s analysis of the U.S. national security system (Forging a New Shield, www.pnsr.org), the system has severe limitations.  It is grossly imbalanced, supporting strong departmental capabilities at the expense of integrating mechanisms like the national security adviser and his staff.  Only the President has the authority to compel collaboration among the powerful cabinet officials who run major national security organizations and who have their authorities codified in law.  Thus it is not surprising that critics want Jones to be a close extension of the President and his power, because Jones’ ability to lead the president’s team to unified purpose and effort on any given issue is largely a function of the perception that he is acting with the president’s complete approval and authority.

Similarly, it is not surprising that critics want Jones to be knowledgeable enough to control the agenda and debate on all national security topics for the president.  Since only the president or a national security advisor acting with the president’s complete support can compensate for the system’s inability to adequately integrate and resource national security missions, these missions gravitate toward the White House for effective management.  Unfortunately, both the president and his national security advisor, no matter how well they work together, have a limited span of control.  Centralizing issue management in the White House helps secure a well integrated effort for some issues but also ensures that many other issues will be neglected.  Practically speaking, the nation’s ability to manage national security issues effectively cannot exceed the grasp of the national security advisor’s effective span of control.  Along with his or her relatively small staff, the national security advisor becomes a bottleneck constricting policy development and oversight of policy implementation, which explains why some issues are well managed in any administration but many are poorly managed in all administrations.  The tendency to overburden the White House with centralized issue management also explains the criticism that Jones is not working hard enough; if he is not working around the clock on every major issue (and in the process exhausting his intellectual capital rather than building it), then by definition important issues are receiving insufficient attention.

Jones no doubt understands the rationale of his critics, but believes he has a mandate from the President to improve the performance of the national security system as a whole.  In his speech on February 8, 2009 in Munich, General Jones noted that President Obama has charged him with strategic reforms:

In our country, one of the institutions that is changing is the National Security Council, which like so much of our national and international security architecture was formed in the wake of World War II and during the Cold War. So let me say a few words about what the National Security Council does and how President Obama has asked that I approach my job as National Security Adviser. The President has made clear that to succeed against 21st century challenges, the United States must use, balance, and integrate all elements of national influence….Given this role, the NSC is by definition at the nexus of that effort….The NSC’s mission is relatively simple. It should perform the functions that it alone can perform and serve as a strategic center – and the word strategic is operative here – for the President’s priorities.

General Jones is pursuing the President’s guidance by emphasizing the need to manage the entire national security system to a higher level of performance through collaborative effort rather than clinging to the president and attempting to personally dominate debate on every issue set.

With this background, it is easier to understand the bifurcated view of Jones captured in Steve Clemons’ commentary (The Washington Note, 6/12/09) on Jones’ “fragile” tenure as national security adviser:

James Jones is considered by his admirers to be a genius when thinking about management structures and decision-making processes.  On the other hand, his critics see him as a plodding, slow-moving, out of touch retired general who was better prepared to think about the last era rather than the one we are moving into.

Which view of General Jones takes hold—the organizational genius or the out of touch retired general—may depend on whether Jones can implement meaningful national security reform.  Currently Jones is finding both formal and informal reform of the system quite difficult.  As Laura Rozen (The Cable, 4/23/09) reports, Jones was unable to force a common map on the national security system to improve cross-organizational collaboration.  Since Rozen also reports anonymous sources claiming Jones was “having a problematic tenure at the NSC,” it is possible that this reform effort contributed to the “off with his head” atmospherics.  Jones also was unable to merge the national and homeland security councils but did succeed in merging the staff for the two presidential advisory bodies.

Next Steps for National Security Reform in the Obama Administration

In the interest of full disclosure, we note that General Jones formerly was a Guiding Coalition member in PNSR.  Our purpose here is not to defend General Jones, however, but instead to promote needed national security reform.  We hope General Jones can bring his organizational acumen to bear in favor of national security reform because the nation needs it.

PNSR has made recommendations that support collaborative decision making, less centralized issue management, and strategic system management.  However, PNSR did so in the context of a new national security act and statutory changes to the authority of the national security advisor.  While a great deal can be accomplished under existing authorities, meaningful systemic reform cannot be achieved without new authorities.  In fact, the campaign against Jones suggests his relatively low-key, incremental approach to reform may be unsustainable.  Jones is trying to play the role of system manager without a statutory basis for doing so and without even a clearly understood informal mandate from the president for such a role.

It may be a good time for the national security advisor to ask the President if he is serious about national security reform.  If so, it is an opportune time to make systemic changes so that collaboration is regularly rewarded and system capacity for effective decision making grows.  The President and his party control both the executive and legislative branches of government, and national security reform is a bipartisan subject that the President could use to reach out to Republicans.  The best option would be for President Obama and General Jones to work with Congress on a new national security act that would provide a bipartisan basis for reform.  PNSR would readily support such an agenda, as would many others.

But if system reform is not on the president’s agenda, and especially if the anonymous attacks continue, Jones may have to meld his leadership style to the demands of the current system.  In that case he needs to burnish those divine attributes that served his predecessors so well: omnipotence, omniscience, and omnipresence.  On that score, we can only wish him good luck.

Christopher Lamb is a senior research fellow at the Institute for National Strategic Studies at the National Defense University, and PNSR’s former director, research and analysis.  James Douglas Orton is PNSR’s senior organization and management theorist. The opinions expressed here are those of the authors and not necessarily the Department of Defense or any other federal department or agency.

Jim Locher at USAID

PNSR Executive Director Jim Locher addresses the USAID Administrator's Forum June 1, 2009

PNSR Executive Director Jim Locher spoke recently to the staff of the U.S. Agency for International Development. The photos and text are courtesy of  USAID.

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) hosted PNSR executive director James R. Locher III as part of the Administrator’s Forum, a speaker’s series designed to inform the development dialogue within the Agency. Locher was invited to speak on national security reform and the role of development in a “Smart Power” approach.

Locher is introduced by Acting USAID Administrator Alonzo L. Fulgham

“Smart Power,” defined by Secretary of State Clinton, means using the full range of tools at the U.S. Government’s disposal – diplomatic, economic, military, political, legal, and cultural – and applying the right tool or combination of tools to each situation.

Locher took questions from USAID staff on what national security reform and smart power means to them

“As Executive Director of the Project on National Security Reform, Jim Locher is at the forefront of defining how smart power can and should be applied across the spectrum of our government’s development, diplomacy and defense capabilities,” said Acting Administrator Alonzo L. Fulgham.

Locher with (L-R) Lisa Chiles, Counselor of USAID, and Margot Ellis, Deputy Assistant Administrator for USAID's Asia Bureau.

Recap of PNSR’s “National Security Reform: a Global Roundtable” Event

PNSR Executive Director James R. Locher III addresses the Roundtable participants

On 12 May, the Project on National Security Reform held a lively, intellectual conference entitled National Security Reform: a Global Roundtable, which brought together experts from the United States, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Australia, and Singapore. These representatives from the worlds of government, academia, and the private sector met to discuss issues and approaches taken by their respective nations in addressing the challenges of national security in the 21st century.

PNSR Executive Director James R. Locher III opened the event by speaking to the shared need for national security reform among the represented nations, noting that “There is no country around the world that has been able to transfer (national security) to a 21st century structure,”

Close to 50 participants attended the conference

The conference presentations were divided into four areas:  a new scope of national security; identification of underlying policy problems; predicates, goals and implementation ; and the transition to a non-linear world. Presentations were followed by discussion amongst participants seated at tables in the room.

Dr. Dorle Hellmuth, DAAD Fellow, American Institute for Contemporary German Studies, Johns Hopkins University; Jack LeCuyer, PNSR Theme Team Lead and Rex Patterson, U.S. State Department, in mid-discussion at PNSR's Global Roundtable event

Leon Fuerth, PNSR guiding coalition member and former National Security Adviser to Vice President Al Gore, gave two particularly stimulating and discussion-inspiring presentations. Fuerth first discussed the idea of what he calls, “anticipatory governance”, which he described as “the name of the beast we are after.” Fuerth defines anticipatory governance as “a system of systems in which foresight means that a government can sense and execute policy, provide feedback, and have an open-minded institutional culture.”

Dr. Patrick Cronin, Director of the Institute for National Security Studies, National Defense University addresses conference participants alongside Leon Fuerth, PNSR Guiding Coalition member, George Washington University, former National Security Adviser to VP Al Gore and Dr. Greg Austin, Director of Worldwide Security Initiative, EastWest Institute

In the closing presentations, Fuerth presented the idea of non-linearity. Linearity, or the orientation towards one actor (in this case the state) was frequently discussed at the event, especially regarding the role of the state in national security policy, and how it relates to policy implementation and the inclusion of all relevant actors.

PNSR guiding coalition member Tom Pickering also participated in the event. The former ambassador to the UN focused on PNSR’s recommendations of predicates and goals needed for effective national security reform as well as other tools to achieve that goal. Pickering also spoke to the urgency for congressional leadership of the effort, which is -so far- developing slowly.

Ambassador Tom Pickering discusses issues during table discussion. (L to R: Bob Kravinsky, PNSR Director of Executive Branch Affairs; Dr. James Douglas Orton, Senior Organization and Management Strategist, PNSR; Bill Navas,Executive Director NSPD Integration Office (DOD); Amb.Tom Pickering, PNSR Guiding Coalition member, Former Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, Former Ambassador to the United Nations)

“Overall, I think the event was a great success,” said PNSR Chief Performance Officer and event organizer, Leland Russell. “A lot of great ideas and discussion were compiled today, and I think today really provides a great base for going forward in each of our nations’ reform efforts.”

Dr. Nora Bensahel, Senior Political Scientist, RAND Corporation, shares her table's consensus with participants

The Global Roundtable is the first in what PNSR plans to be a series of similar events. If you would like to keep abreast of future PNSR plans, please email info@pnsr.org.

For a larger collection of photos from the event, please see PNSR’s Facebook photo album

Contra Rothkopf

Reprinted from The National Interest. PNSR’s former Director of Research and Analysis, Dr. Christopher Lamb, and PNSR Senior Organization and Management Theorist Dr. James Douglas Orton respond to David Rothkopf’s analysis of PNSR (Note: Dr. Lamb and Dr. Orton’s views do not necessarily represent any official viewpoints of PNSR, but of course are appreciated):

David Rothkopf pays some backhanded compliments to the Project on National Security Reform (PNSR) in his intriguing article in The National Interest, “A Thousand Envoys Bloom.” His critique of PNSR merits a response because it illuminates a fault line in the current debate over national security reform. Rothkopf says PNSR’s 2008 report, Forging a New Shield, “covered the landscape thoughtfully and comprehensively” and he even agrees with many of the PNSR recommendations. Ultimately, however, he considers the report less than relevant for the real challenges facing the country:

In short, this was undoubtedly a worthy exercise by worthy people, but in some important respects, it really amounted to puttering around in the garden while a tank division was rolling down your cul de sac. It doesn’t address deeply imbedded flaws in our system like the toxic role money plays in corrupting the American political process or the role that politics plays in ensuring that very often the wrong people will be given important jobs to satisfy one constituency or another.

Rothkopf is either confused about the difference between America’s national security and political systems or PNSR’s mandate. PNSR analyzed the national-security system, not the American political system. PNSR would only be interested in the role resources play in political campaigns and the motives for presidential appointments to the extent they affect the performance of the national-security system. This is why PNSR did not take on campaign-finance reform, but did address the question of political appointments in general and ambassadorial appointments in particular, which Rothkopf must have missed.

On the subject of the national-security system per se, Rothkopf does not argue PNSR missed its fundamental problems; instead he argues there are no fundamental problems to begin with. Rothkopf dismisses then-Senator Joseph Biden’s call for a new National Security Act, which PNSR supports, with the argument that the system we currently have is fundamentally strong:

But it is worth noting that one of the great strengths of the system as it was conceived in 1947 is that it is highly flexible. Each president can easily adapt it to his or her needs….Sometimes it leads to a more decentralized system in which power is at least ostensibly farmed out to the agencies (as in the Reagan years), sometimes it leads to much more concentrated power in the White House (as it seems to be doing today). So the system we already have has advantages of flexibility and responsiveness to needs and management styles that would be the envy of many organizations.

Rothkopf, like many who have studied the drama surrounding the NSC, national-security advisors and their staffs, argues the current system is flexible. PNSR fundamentally disagrees. One of the core findings of the PNSR research was that the system is superficially flexible but fundamentally rigid:

Many popular accounts of the national security system observe how flexible it is and conclude major organizational reform is not necessary. They note that the president often changes structures and processes to match his decision-making style and should do so. This is true, but the changes presidents typically make are superficial and have little impact on the actual performance of the system. As many presidents later lament, the system is fundamentally rigid—hierarchical and dominated by a set of powerful, functional bureaucracies that can stymie or veto collaboration that runs counter to their organizational interests. (Forging a New Shield, p. 493)

The NSC staff is flexible and responsive to presidential decision styles, as it should be, but it is a tiny, ephemeral and weak integrating mechanism that routinely fails to control the large, well-resourced and powerful functional organizations of the national-security system. The test of a management system is not how flexible it is, but whether it produces effective results. PNSR makes a strong case that the NSC staff is consistently unable to manage the system well for the president, who is too busy to do it for himself. For this and other reasons, PNSR concluded that the current national-security system unduly restricts presidential control and management of national security—and, in fact, is increasingly ineffective irrespective of leadership.

Rothkopf’s critique of PNSR takes us to the epicenter of the current debate over national security reform: the fault line between those who argue the system is fundamentally flawed in ways that hamstring even the best leaders, and those who believe it is fundamentally sound and just requires good leadership—in particular, an effective president. Rothkopf begins his article with the assertion that the previous president led the nation into a deep abyss, and concludes with the observation that the possibility of a bright new future depends entirely on the abilities of the current one. For Rothkopf, “our ability to do what we must begins and ends with the president of the United States.”

Other scholars also believe PNSR missed the importance of the president in the national-security system. For example, after noting “there is much that is good in this sophisticated report,” University of Maryland professor Mac Destler dismissed PNSR recommendations in his March 19 testimony before the House Committee on Armed Services by arguing PNSR did not sufficiently appreciate the central importance of the president:

For in the end, it is “the president, stupid.” It is he (she one day) who drives the system. His operating preferences and decision style are what any senior White House aide must accommodate.

Contrary to both Rothkopf and Destler, PNSR fully understands the importance of the president. PNSR argues the president is the central figure in the system not because his style preferences must be accommodated, but because only the president has the authority to integrate the work of powerful cabinet officials. PNSR even argues the current system is not just president centric, but also president dependent:

The national security system is a president-centric system by virtue of the Constitution; it is a president dependent system by force of current system limitations. It is always good to have a president who is knowledgeable about national security and heavily involved in it, for example, a Roosevelt or Eisenhower. But it is not realistic to expect all presidents to have extensive national security experience. Even those who do deserve a system that effectively supports their strategic direction. (Forging a New Shield, p. 536–537)

Thus PNSR and NSC experts like Rothkopf and Destler do not differ over the central role the president plays in the system, but rather over the question of whether the system can be reformed to better support the president. PNSR believes the performance of the national-security system depends on much more than presidential decision-making style, and that system performance can be improved without sacrificing the ability of the NSC staff to accommodate presidential styles. Put differently, organization matters as much as leadership style. To quote the 9/11 Commission Report, “Good people can overcome bad structures. They should not have to.” It is particularly the case that busy presidents ought not to have to do so. When policy issues must be managed by the president to compensate for structural deficiencies in the system, the White House becomes a bottleneck that constricts the scope, intensity and duration of issues that the system can manage well.

Rothkopf completed his backhanded set of compliments to PNSR by asserting “the PNSR study, which is far better than most of its ilk, is a great illustration of the fact that the road to policy hell is often paved with good intentions regarding improving process.” It would be easy to flip Rothkopf’s argument and point out all the instances in which the road to national-security failure has been paved by great leaders paying insufficient attention to how the system generates and implements policy. It also would be easy to lampoon Rothkopf’s suggestion for improving policy advice to the president, which was to “set aside distractions and launch an internal review” with “thoughtful analysis and a new paradigm,” since unproductive internal reviews easily outnumber the blue-ribbon panels Rothkopf disparages. But there is no reason to do so. Like the 9/11 Commission, PNSR does not believe the American people or the president should be asked to choose between good leadership, good organizations or good policy and strategy advice (whether internally or externally generated). All are required.

In this regard, Rothkopf’s “tanks in the garden” analogy is useful. It is much more exciting to focus on personalities and policy arguments in the crisis du jour than the hard work of making organizations perform better, but both are necessary. Tank divisions rumbling down your cul-de-sac do indeed require immediate attention. But it is also true we have to tend the garden that produces the basic means we employ when fighting the daily crises. Current crises should not be allowed to crowd out the need for good organizational performance that will, over the long term, largely determine the extent to which presidents can effectively secure our health, wealth and liberty.

Which brings us to one more error that demands correction in Rothkopf’s otherwise excellent article. PNSR is not one of “Washington’s endless supply of blue-ribbon commissions and think-tank gabfests.” It is an independent reform movement that preceded and lives on past the publication of its first major report, dedicated to fixing what an astounding number of senior leaders now agree is a broken system that will produce poor outcomes regardless of how good our leaders are. PNSR believes President Obama understands the limitations of the current system and wants change. As noted by David Ignatius in the Washington Post, he has charged his capable national-security advisor, Jim Jones, with creating a collaborative “twenty-first-century” national-security system that can effectively employ “all the elements of national power” and cover all “the diverse threats to American interests.” PNSR is ready to support President Obama and his National Security Advisor in that endeavor through preparation of draft presidential directives, changes to Senate and House rules, and a new National Security Act.

Christopher Lamb is a senior research fellow at the Institute for National Strategic Studies at the National Defense University, and PNSR’s former director, research and analysis. James Douglas Orton is an adjunct associate professor of human and organizational learning at George Washington University, and PNSR’s senior organization and management theorist. The opinions expressed here are those of the authors and not necessarily the Department of Defense or any other federal department or agency.

A new strategy but the same old resources?

Photo Courtesy of the Department of Defense

The Obama administration announced a new strategy last month promising a dramatic increase in the civilian effort in Afghanistan. However, just a few weeks later, the administration says it will actually have to turn to the military to fill hundreds of these new posts.

While described as a ‘stop-gap’ measure, this same refrain was heard throughout the last administration. Without an immediate concerted effort to build civilian capacity, this ‘stop-gap’ measure risks becoming a permanent feature of this administration’s policy toward Afghanistan—at great cost to the US government. These costs include the substantially higher costs of deploying military personnel versus civilian personnel, the costs to readiness incurred by using military personnel for non-military purposes, and the costs of missed opportunities as the United States seeks to ‘demilitarize’ its public face.

It is time to correct the imbalance between soft and hard power in the US government tool kit. The ability to send economists, lawyers, agricultural experts and health professionals abroad is a vital part of dealing with global affairs in the 21^st century. It is unfortunate that this systemic problem is unresolved especially because civilian and military officials (including Secretary Gates) have called for increased civilian capacity.

Some modest progress has been made to rectify the situation, but it is only a start. Last year Congress provided $75 million for State’s Civilian Response Corps (S/CRS) and USAID stabilization and reconstruction activities. So far however, the Active branch of the Civilian Response Corps (ARC)—comprised of individuals from S/CRS, and seven other executive agencies—only includes eleven members. These numbers must increase exponentially if they are to reach the goal set by President Obama’s announcement last month. Whether or not there will be more Iraqs and Afghanistans in the future, a civilian capacity is necessary to accomplish the non-military aspects of our foreign policy.

Money alone, however, will be insufficient. Increased funding must happen together with organizational reform. The State Department is not designed to support the deployment of large number of civilians. Furthermore, without such organizational reform, it is also unlikely that Congress will have the confidence to give the State Department the magnitude of funding required. The President’s 2011 budget should include substantial increases in civilian capacity and it should do so together with a commitment and plan to build a ‘Next Generation’ State Department with the vision, institutional culture, and managerial talent and processes necessary to support the effective employment of those resources. In 1947, President Truman recognized the vital role the military would play in the strategic competition with the Soviet Union. He passed the National Security Act of 1947, which consolidated the Army, Navy, and newly created Air Force into a new entity that became the Department of Defense. Similarly, President Obama recognizes the central role civilian foreign policy bureaucracies must play in managing global affairs today and should move to strengthen these bureaucracies and equip them to play this role.

-Job C. Henning

PNSR, Senior Adviser