Leon Panetta is an old Chicago pol. He came of political age as a cog in the oldest, longest running, smoothest operating machine in the US--the Cook County Democratic Party. As such, he knows well the primary duty of a machine man--loyalty to the Boss. By definition the Boss is the Nice Young Man From Chicago, Barack Obama.
Only the overarching requirement of loyalty could have impelled the new Secretary of Defense as he moved from his old job of DCIA to announce that the defeat of al-Qaeda was "within reach." Only days later Mr Panetta demonstrated the requisite degree of doublethink when he thundered against the possibility of doubling the 400 billion dollar cut in the next decade's defense budget under the debt ceiling increase deal.
Given that the American participation in the Great Adventure in Regime Change in Iraq is in its death throws and the rush to the exit has started in Afghanistan, the new SecDef is perfectly well aware that the costs of war will go down as well which will allow for significant decreases in the Pentagon expenditures without a single real cut in procurement or force size. And, if his statement regarding the impending end of al-Qaeda is taken at face value, the need for the large security establishment created in the immediate wake of 9/11 and the consequent decisions of George W. Bush evaporates as well. If al-Qaeda does well and truly turn its collective toes to the sky, the need for mountains of money marked "For the Pentagon" goes away.
Presumably, the end of al-Qaeda would allow the US to return to the (relatively) lower levels of defense appropriations which characterized the days prior to 9/11. In that case, Panetta should quit his bitchin' and find a few additional programs to cut so as to please his Boss properly.
Of course, the Panetta Dictum regarding the morbidity of al-Qaeda like the rumors of Mark Twain's death is greatly exaggerated. Al-Qaeda is not dead. It is not on some sort of Islamic life support. It is not even gravely ill.
The real deal of which Leon the Loyal must be completely aware considering his previous job as well as his daily access to the Senior Executive Intelligence Brief (as well as the Presidential Intelligence Brief) is that al-Qaeda has morphed. It has changed profoundly from its original form. Most critically, it is far more of a threat in its current incarnation than it was in the Bad Old Days.
In the far distant Eocene of 2001, al-Qaeda was a small, hierarchical organization with a tight command and control system. It was dependent upon Osama bin Laden as inspiration, decision maker, leader, and chief fund raiser. None of this obtains today. Nor has it obtained for some time. Long before bin Laden went to Paradise, the "Base" had fissioned, decentralized, become far more of an idea than an institution.
Just as American doctrine and tactics changed under the stresses of real wars in Iraq and Afghanistan so also have the operational concepts and organizational methods of the al-Qaeda predicated practitioners of violent political Islam. Arguably, the Mighty Men of the Koran have changed more radically and more effectively than have the armed forces of the US.
The most obvious feature of the new, improved "al-Qaeda" is the spawning of franchises. Both al-Qaeda in the Arab Peninsula (AQAP) and al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) are obvious spin-offs or imitators of the famed original. "Allied" groups such as al-Shabaab in Somalia may not use the old brand name but exist as self-conscious copies of Osama's group. It is a brute fact that AQAP has become a larger threat to the civilized states than the ragged band of drone pressed fugitives headed by al-Zawihiri lurking in either the stone huts of the FATA or living in relative comfort in anonymous houses in some sprawling Pakistani city.
The far more important change in the universe of violent political Islam is the transformation of the old al-Qaeda brand into a metaphysical idea. This coupled with the elevation of bin Laden from a jihadi ideal to the Perfect Martyred Warrior of the Prophet has provided the intellectual substrate for the emergence of powerfully motivated "lone wolf" terrorists.
In this context it is important to recall that war, all war, exists first as an idea. It matters not in the least what type of war or what level of intensity, war is first and foremost an intellectual construct. The now dead or captured theorists of Islamist martyrdom operations along with bin Laden have provided a basic set of ideas which define asymmetrical warfare from the point of view of the advocate of violent political Islam. These ideas have been enlarged, filled out, and spread by the assorted jihadist websites as well as videotaped sermons (and hectoring) by Muslim clerics. Many of these Men of the Islamic Cloth are quite unknown in the West. Others, most notably Anwar al-Awlacki, are nearly household names throughout the civilized states.
Self-radicalization facilitated by the web and the arguments of clerics great and small, well known and unknown alike has become the major feature of the current version of al-Qaeda. Individuals or very small groups of self-radicalized adherents of violent political Islam represent a very real threat to the civilized states as well as a quite meaningful challenge to security and law enforcement agencies. The several high profile arrests of wannabe "martyrs," the spectacular failures of the Underwear Bomber and the Times Square Bomber, or the quick police follow-up on the alert gun shop clerk in Kileen, Texas do not militate against the reality of the jihadist threat or the thinness of the margin between tragedy and tragedy narrowly averted.
Of course, crowd sourced terror does not exist alone. In addition to the ideological support provided by the memes originating with al-Qaeda 1.0 and the effective tools of self-radicalization and not completely irrelevant instruction in the practical considerations of waging one man wars on the West, there exist potent and growing al-Qaeda facsimiles. AQAP has been acknowledged properly as the single largest threat. AQIM is growing. Rapidly.
The senior French investigative judge holding the counterterrorism brief has issued a reassuring nostrum to the effect that AQIM does not represent a threat to Europe. This pronouncement is rather like patting the hoi polloi gently and telling them not to worry their pretty little (empty) heads about terrorism, that the adults in the government know better. In this way M.Marc Trevidic echoed Panetta's declaration of al-Qaeda's impending death. Feel good words which belie the substance of reality.
AQIM has extended its reach to Nigeria. Kidnapping Europeans. This is an expansion of their reach with the view to forcing changes in European policy. In short, it is terror of the violent political Islamic sort. Operations in Nigeria taken in conjunction with the local Islamist group would have been unthinkable a year ago. Now, the action shows a growing potential to strike Europeans if not Europe. There is every reason to believe that by this time next year AQIM will rival AQAP as a threat to the West generally.
Al-Shabaab may have evacuated Mogadishu, but that is not a sign of its defeat regardless of what the imitation government of Somalia may say. Rather, the real potential of al-Shabaab was demonstrated by its set of highly lethal attacks in Uganda last year. Al-Shabaab has tight links with AQAP as well as a ready source of English speaking recruits in Somali refugee communities in the US. It is one more rapidly growing threat.
Of his two contradictory statements, Panetta was much closer to the truth when he warned against overly dramatic cuts in the Pentagon budge. He must know that ten years from now the US will be engaged heavily even if not with conventional forces on the ground. He must be aware perfectly that the war against the advocates of violent political Islam will be ongoing in 2022 as it is today. Probably on a larger scale geographically.
Panetta may be a good machine politician, but he is also an American. Doublethink like loyalty to a misguided Boss has its limits. When push comes to shove as it must in the next few months, it is likely that the Secretary of Defense will fight with all the political skills he possesses to assure the the US has the means necessary to continue the fight against the forces of violent political Islam until the civilized states finally win.
Leon Panetta came a very long way during his years as DCI. That was a surprise to any and all who have personal acquaintanceship with the mindset of typical Chicago pols. It has been obvious that Panetta has learned that there is a wide and dark world out there, that the limits of Cook County are not the limits of the US, that the interests of the machine are transcended by the interests of the US. If a bit of experience can manufacture that level of miraculous transformation, it is not impossible that a few months running the Pentagon and talking more and more often with commanders responsible for the lives of those under them will carry the transformation to the next step--a Leon Panetta who is willing and ready to drop his Boss's water bucket in the higher cause of the country as a whole.
Showing posts with label Defense Budget. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Defense Budget. Show all posts
Saturday, August 6, 2011
Thursday, August 4, 2011
Butchering A Sacred Cow
The Pentagon is already scheduled to take a big hit in the money department. In addition, the landmine laden wording of the debt ceiling increase bill assures that should the "super committee" not come up with the requisite 1.2 trillion bucks in additional cuts over the next decade, the "national security" portion of federal expenditures will take another, larger whack. Potentially, the "national security" community could lose over a trillion bucks during the next ten years.
The term "national security" is not defined in the recent legislation, but it is not unfair to posit that most of the money will be extracted from the pockets of the uniformed services simply because they consume the largest share by far of all dollars spent under the rubric national security. There is little doubt but those on the political left are gratified by the prospect of the Pentagon hemorrhaging dead presidents by the tanker load as, they assume, the result will be a military incapable of doing its (repugnant) thing. On the Right there is an equal but opposite emotion--fear. Those on the right fear that the US will lose its capacity not only to advance and defend its national interests but to protect the physical security of the country itself.
As recent experience has shown in the UK, there is real, clear, and present danger in basing national security planning on the need to reduce expenditures to the practical exclusion of all other considerations. As you no doubt recall, the Conservative/Liberal Democratic Coalition released its Strategic Defense and Security Review (SDSR) late last year. The SDSR was predicated upon the imperative of reducing the budgetary "black hole" created by the previous Labor government.
As a result of this overarching consideration, the budget of the Services was slashed with a vigor not seen since the opening days of the Great Depression some eighty years earlier. The Royal Navy lost its only aircraft carrier along with the recently upgraded Harrier jump jets on board. (There will be a new carrier coming in the rather distant future but without any aircraft allotted--unless the French embark their planes or the US loans the Brits a few of its redundant F/A-18s.) The air force was cut to the lowest number of aircraft on inventory since just before the Great War. And, the ground forces were chopped by some thirty thousand slots.
By the time all the slicing and dicing was complete, it became clear that the UK did not have a military capable of "broad spectrum" operations regardless of assurances to the contrary by Prime Minister Cameron. Indeed, it appeared that when the SDSR was fully implemented, the British would not be capable of replicating their success in the Falklands War of thirty years ago. It was debatable whether or not the UK would be able to do a replay of its intervention in Sierra Leone a few years back or be a competent partner in interventionary operations such as those in Afghanistan, Iraq, or the Gulf War.
As if to underscore the idiocy of the SDSR, the Cameron/Clegg ministry undertook the Libyan adventure in conjunction with France only weeks after the Review had been released. Considering the ongoing mission in Afghanistan, the decommissioning of the aircraft carrier, the retirement of the Harriers, the destruction of the new Nimrod reconnaissance aircraft, the addition of the Libyan campaign to the British plate was a perfect example of ignoring self-inflicted constraints in pursuit of political opportunities. The British reach far exceeded its military grasp.
A parliamentary select committee dominated by Tories issued a scathing report a couple of days back in which the prime minister was roasted. The select committee in effect denounced the SDSR as having been short-sighted, counterproductive, and as sacrificing the long term interests and influence of the UK on the alter of short-term budgetary exigencies.
The select committee was bang on in its arguments and conclusions. The only component of the very bad policy contained in both the SDSR and the Libyan adventure was the tacit assurance predicated on decades of experience that the US would be there to pick up any and all military slack. The British (in common with NATO members generally) was guided by the sincere belief that the US would always be both able and willing to do all the really heavy lifting.
The reality was far different. As the Libyan campaign has shown, the US was unwilling to do much after the first few days beyond offer verbal support. The Obama Doctrine of "leading from behind" was invoked so the US could walk away from the Europeans First effort in the benighted but oil filled desert of Libya.
Now that the Americans have openly admitted that the flush days are far in the past, the belief that the US will always be both willing and able to pick up the military burdens of the civilized states generally demands reexamination both abroad and here at home. In the future the US may be willing but quite unable to employ military force in support of either its diplomacy or its physical security.
Will is one thing. Ability is quite another. Political will is perishable. It can flourish. Or, it can be exhausted, progressively reduced by a long war without a clear goal or end point in sight. Political will can be developed almost instantly as in the wake of Pearl Harbor or 9/11. But, it can be frittered away by inept decision making or bad policy choices. And, political will can be destroyed intentionally by an administration or a political elite following a given agenda.
Ability, the human and material capacity to wage war, is harder to develop, easier to lose, and expensive to maintain in readiness. The budget deficit demands that not simply senior military personnel and elected officials consider the real military needs of the US. Rather, this is a subject all of We the People need to consider, to debate, to answer. After all, it is our security, the physical integrity of our country, the interests of our economy, society, and polity around the world which are in play whenever the subject of "national security" is raised. It is our collective future which is at stake should we have too little military capacity to support our diplomacy or to deter potential enemies. Similarly, it is our collective economic future which is placed in peril should we have too much "defense," too great an expenditure on "national security" (whatever that might mean).
This implies that the proper starting point is not simply the budget chasm. The British made that major error; there is no need for us to repeat it. Dollars must be considered. Dollars and what they purchase must be near the center of things. But the mounds of dead presidents as well as the hardware they buy or the people they hire cannot and should not be the primary consideration.
The foundations of any national security budget must be a rational, conservative consideration of what does the US need to protect and to what extent does American diplomatic influence rely upon the big stick. In this connection we have to keep in mind that the US will be a target due to its size and geographic location as well as its social, political, and economic norms and values. We also must remember that nbe o country has ever been allowed to resign its status as a Great Power. It would be wise to note as well that international organizations such as the UN are no more effective than their most powerful members allow them to be.
The realities of the world demand that the US, quite unlike the UK or Germany or even the European Union as a totality, must be ready and able (even if not willing) to have a genuine "broad spectrum" capacity. We have to able to deter or to fight and win every type of war from the nuclear to the asymmetrical. As a Great Power, the US must have a comprehensive diplomatic portfolio which includes the capacity for the credible use of military force in every sort of mission from an exercise in coercion to humanitarian relief.
The realities of the world also demand that the US acknowledge that it has active enemies. Some are multidimensional in capability such as China or Russia. Others may have limited capabilities but are no less a threat for that reason such as advocates of violent political Islam. The US must not lack the basic capacities to deter, fight and defeat both ends of the spectrum. This means that no matter which battlefield the enemy chooses from the vacuum of space to the deepest oceans, from the most remote and barren mountains to the virtual worlds of cyberspace the US must be ready and able to fight and win should deterrence and the diplomacy of talk or sanction fail.
None of this means nor implies that the American "national security" budget cannot or should not be cut--even significantly chopped. But it does mean that the cuts, the reposturing, the redeployments must not be made without careful consideration and full debate not only inside the Pentagon or within Congress but among We the People, the people who both pay the bills and stand at risk if our "national security" components are not up to the challenge.
Implicit in the process is a consideration of what constitutes an "ally," a "partner." There needs to be a reconsideration of old alliances, of old relationships in light of the post-Cold War realities. It will be necessary, for example, to disabuse European "allies" of the belief that the US will provide for their defense, will support their diplomatic gambits with our military or step in when the political or diplomatic aspirations of a partner is not supported effectively by their own organic hard power instruments.
Whether he realizes it or not, David Cameron has provided a fine object lesson for the US. His SDSR has shown us the dangers of allowing deficits to define national security capabilities. And, his desire for a spot of glory in Libya has illustrated the pervasive nature of the don't-worry-the-Yanks-will-do-it fantasy.
Every time in the past when the US has wound down a war it has cut the defense budget. In the past, after World War II, Korea, Vietnam all come to mind, the US has cut too much, too fast. By so doing we made the world a more dangerous place. We also made the process of reconstituting our military capacities much more expensive and time consuming. Perhaps, just perhaps, this time will be different.
Not that the Geek is going to bet his ranch on it.
The term "national security" is not defined in the recent legislation, but it is not unfair to posit that most of the money will be extracted from the pockets of the uniformed services simply because they consume the largest share by far of all dollars spent under the rubric national security. There is little doubt but those on the political left are gratified by the prospect of the Pentagon hemorrhaging dead presidents by the tanker load as, they assume, the result will be a military incapable of doing its (repugnant) thing. On the Right there is an equal but opposite emotion--fear. Those on the right fear that the US will lose its capacity not only to advance and defend its national interests but to protect the physical security of the country itself.
As recent experience has shown in the UK, there is real, clear, and present danger in basing national security planning on the need to reduce expenditures to the practical exclusion of all other considerations. As you no doubt recall, the Conservative/Liberal Democratic Coalition released its Strategic Defense and Security Review (SDSR) late last year. The SDSR was predicated upon the imperative of reducing the budgetary "black hole" created by the previous Labor government.
As a result of this overarching consideration, the budget of the Services was slashed with a vigor not seen since the opening days of the Great Depression some eighty years earlier. The Royal Navy lost its only aircraft carrier along with the recently upgraded Harrier jump jets on board. (There will be a new carrier coming in the rather distant future but without any aircraft allotted--unless the French embark their planes or the US loans the Brits a few of its redundant F/A-18s.) The air force was cut to the lowest number of aircraft on inventory since just before the Great War. And, the ground forces were chopped by some thirty thousand slots.
By the time all the slicing and dicing was complete, it became clear that the UK did not have a military capable of "broad spectrum" operations regardless of assurances to the contrary by Prime Minister Cameron. Indeed, it appeared that when the SDSR was fully implemented, the British would not be capable of replicating their success in the Falklands War of thirty years ago. It was debatable whether or not the UK would be able to do a replay of its intervention in Sierra Leone a few years back or be a competent partner in interventionary operations such as those in Afghanistan, Iraq, or the Gulf War.
As if to underscore the idiocy of the SDSR, the Cameron/Clegg ministry undertook the Libyan adventure in conjunction with France only weeks after the Review had been released. Considering the ongoing mission in Afghanistan, the decommissioning of the aircraft carrier, the retirement of the Harriers, the destruction of the new Nimrod reconnaissance aircraft, the addition of the Libyan campaign to the British plate was a perfect example of ignoring self-inflicted constraints in pursuit of political opportunities. The British reach far exceeded its military grasp.
A parliamentary select committee dominated by Tories issued a scathing report a couple of days back in which the prime minister was roasted. The select committee in effect denounced the SDSR as having been short-sighted, counterproductive, and as sacrificing the long term interests and influence of the UK on the alter of short-term budgetary exigencies.
The select committee was bang on in its arguments and conclusions. The only component of the very bad policy contained in both the SDSR and the Libyan adventure was the tacit assurance predicated on decades of experience that the US would be there to pick up any and all military slack. The British (in common with NATO members generally) was guided by the sincere belief that the US would always be both able and willing to do all the really heavy lifting.
The reality was far different. As the Libyan campaign has shown, the US was unwilling to do much after the first few days beyond offer verbal support. The Obama Doctrine of "leading from behind" was invoked so the US could walk away from the Europeans First effort in the benighted but oil filled desert of Libya.
Now that the Americans have openly admitted that the flush days are far in the past, the belief that the US will always be both willing and able to pick up the military burdens of the civilized states generally demands reexamination both abroad and here at home. In the future the US may be willing but quite unable to employ military force in support of either its diplomacy or its physical security.
Will is one thing. Ability is quite another. Political will is perishable. It can flourish. Or, it can be exhausted, progressively reduced by a long war without a clear goal or end point in sight. Political will can be developed almost instantly as in the wake of Pearl Harbor or 9/11. But, it can be frittered away by inept decision making or bad policy choices. And, political will can be destroyed intentionally by an administration or a political elite following a given agenda.
Ability, the human and material capacity to wage war, is harder to develop, easier to lose, and expensive to maintain in readiness. The budget deficit demands that not simply senior military personnel and elected officials consider the real military needs of the US. Rather, this is a subject all of We the People need to consider, to debate, to answer. After all, it is our security, the physical integrity of our country, the interests of our economy, society, and polity around the world which are in play whenever the subject of "national security" is raised. It is our collective future which is at stake should we have too little military capacity to support our diplomacy or to deter potential enemies. Similarly, it is our collective economic future which is placed in peril should we have too much "defense," too great an expenditure on "national security" (whatever that might mean).
This implies that the proper starting point is not simply the budget chasm. The British made that major error; there is no need for us to repeat it. Dollars must be considered. Dollars and what they purchase must be near the center of things. But the mounds of dead presidents as well as the hardware they buy or the people they hire cannot and should not be the primary consideration.
The foundations of any national security budget must be a rational, conservative consideration of what does the US need to protect and to what extent does American diplomatic influence rely upon the big stick. In this connection we have to keep in mind that the US will be a target due to its size and geographic location as well as its social, political, and economic norms and values. We also must remember that nbe o country has ever been allowed to resign its status as a Great Power. It would be wise to note as well that international organizations such as the UN are no more effective than their most powerful members allow them to be.
The realities of the world demand that the US, quite unlike the UK or Germany or even the European Union as a totality, must be ready and able (even if not willing) to have a genuine "broad spectrum" capacity. We have to able to deter or to fight and win every type of war from the nuclear to the asymmetrical. As a Great Power, the US must have a comprehensive diplomatic portfolio which includes the capacity for the credible use of military force in every sort of mission from an exercise in coercion to humanitarian relief.
The realities of the world also demand that the US acknowledge that it has active enemies. Some are multidimensional in capability such as China or Russia. Others may have limited capabilities but are no less a threat for that reason such as advocates of violent political Islam. The US must not lack the basic capacities to deter, fight and defeat both ends of the spectrum. This means that no matter which battlefield the enemy chooses from the vacuum of space to the deepest oceans, from the most remote and barren mountains to the virtual worlds of cyberspace the US must be ready and able to fight and win should deterrence and the diplomacy of talk or sanction fail.
None of this means nor implies that the American "national security" budget cannot or should not be cut--even significantly chopped. But it does mean that the cuts, the reposturing, the redeployments must not be made without careful consideration and full debate not only inside the Pentagon or within Congress but among We the People, the people who both pay the bills and stand at risk if our "national security" components are not up to the challenge.
Implicit in the process is a consideration of what constitutes an "ally," a "partner." There needs to be a reconsideration of old alliances, of old relationships in light of the post-Cold War realities. It will be necessary, for example, to disabuse European "allies" of the belief that the US will provide for their defense, will support their diplomatic gambits with our military or step in when the political or diplomatic aspirations of a partner is not supported effectively by their own organic hard power instruments.
Whether he realizes it or not, David Cameron has provided a fine object lesson for the US. His SDSR has shown us the dangers of allowing deficits to define national security capabilities. And, his desire for a spot of glory in Libya has illustrated the pervasive nature of the don't-worry-the-Yanks-will-do-it fantasy.
Every time in the past when the US has wound down a war it has cut the defense budget. In the past, after World War II, Korea, Vietnam all come to mind, the US has cut too much, too fast. By so doing we made the world a more dangerous place. We also made the process of reconstituting our military capacities much more expensive and time consuming. Perhaps, just perhaps, this time will be different.
Not that the Geek is going to bet his ranch on it.
Sunday, May 22, 2011
We Will Not See The Likes Of Him Soon
Robert Gates gave a splendid example of why he will be missed sorely when he steps down as Secretary of Defense next month. His remarks at Notre Dame University's commencement provided an excellent epitome of his intellectual honesty as well as his breadth of thought and imagination.
The subject of Gate's address was the future of American national security forces--and, thus, the role to be played by the US in the world. Pointedly, he noted that the US cannot resign its role as a Great Power. As he commented, his travels around the world as Secretary of Defense have impressed him with the number of countries which want the US to play a larger role in global politics and not a smaller one.
In short, Dr Gates saw first hand, up close and personal, proof of the historical maxim holding no country can resign its status as a great power--although that status may be taken away by the actions of others. In this context, the Secretary commented upon the salient--but to many on the political Left, unpleasant--reality that the final shield of American core values has been the strength and reach of our military power.
As an add-on of key importance, the Secretary warned that there existed other Great Powers whose interests and goals were not completely compatible with our national and strategic interests. This means that only the continued capacity of the American military exists as a check on these ambitions. It was a very clear warning to and about the Trolls of Beijing.
In his reading of history, Gates drew a lesson regarding the ability of the American people to "avert their eyes" from events occurring in distant, remote places. It has been difficult to the point of impossibility for We the People in the past (and the present, he might have added) to see how some affair in a small and far distant country may rebound to the immediate disadvantage of the US and its citizens. It is this willful blindness conditioned by our history on a continent protected on both east and west by broad oceans which has given rise not only to our periods of isolationism but also this diminuendo form of being unable or unwilling to connect the dots linking us with some far off place filled with people having unpronounceable names.
The implication of these twin phenomena of large scale isolationism and small scale who-cares-ism for the Secretary is that of gutting the American military. Gates has lived through several periods during which We the People allowed--even demanded--the hollowing out of our military, air, and naval forces. In each case, a war had just been ended. In each case, there were strong economic imperatives in play. In each case, We the People were sick and tired of the sacrifices required of us. And in each case--after World War II, after the Vietnam War and after the collapse of the Warsaw Pact and Soviet Union--the ultimate impact on our capacity to conduct diplomacy as a Great Power was lessened along with our ability to wage effective war if and when required.
We are in a similar situation with these earlier periods today. More so given the potential enervating impact of the federal deficit. There is both a need and a set of political imperatives to engage the national debt and current deficit with effect and dispatch. As the Secretary well knows and has publicly stated on numerous occasions, the defense appropriations cannot be held harmless during the process. They will not be. That is a for sure.
But, as Dr Gates argues in his Notre Dame speech, the process of reducing military expenditures cannot be done at the expense of our real world combat capacities. Administration, overhead, some categories of personnel expenses, some force components can and should be reduced or removed all together. Core combat and force/power projection capabilities as well as the research and development of next gen systems must be taken off the table.
As a Great Power, as the Great Power most trusted by countries around the world to act quickly and decisively in the face of threats, the US has the unique responsibility to maintain a significant full-spectrum capability which can do all missions. The US military, air, and naval forces must be able to do it all--deter or, if necessary, defeat peer opponents, execute low or no lethality interventions, provide humanitarian relief, train and equip friendly forces--the entire ambit of war and warlike utilities.
Dr Gates made reference to a statement purportedly made by Winston Churchill after World War II, ""With greatness comes great responsibility." It is obvious that Gates agrees with Churchill that the US cannot avoid either its greatness nor the responsibilities which come with it. It is evident in Gates' remarks that he believes that continued American greatness depends upon getting our financial affairs in order--and by doing so without gutting our military capabilities.
Gates projects optimism regarding our will and ability to address the parlous financial condition of the country and maintain the basis of global diplomacy--our military potency. He correctly notes all the times in our collective history when we have successfully overcome challenges as large or larger than those confronting us today. His optimism is tempered by a clear headed understanding that the US--its military and civilian decision makers but not excluding We the People--must undertake a penetrating review of our strategic needs and national interests so as to separate properly those which are truly central from those which may be nice, desirable, optimal but remain on the periphery of core interests.
It is easy to infer from his speech that the Secretary does not think this necessary review will be accomplished either easily or quickly. The debate will be both noisy and often uncouth, couched not in the national interest but in far more parochial concerns. Nor will the debate end with all sides walking away with broad smiles.
The review and its consequences will be both long and not pretty. It will be marked by missteps perhaps too many to be counted with ease. But, when night falls Gates remains hopeful. He demonstrated his hope by resort to another, perhaps apocryphal quote from Churchill. "The United States will always do the right thing--after they have tried everything else."
The subject of Gate's address was the future of American national security forces--and, thus, the role to be played by the US in the world. Pointedly, he noted that the US cannot resign its role as a Great Power. As he commented, his travels around the world as Secretary of Defense have impressed him with the number of countries which want the US to play a larger role in global politics and not a smaller one.
In short, Dr Gates saw first hand, up close and personal, proof of the historical maxim holding no country can resign its status as a great power--although that status may be taken away by the actions of others. In this context, the Secretary commented upon the salient--but to many on the political Left, unpleasant--reality that the final shield of American core values has been the strength and reach of our military power.
As an add-on of key importance, the Secretary warned that there existed other Great Powers whose interests and goals were not completely compatible with our national and strategic interests. This means that only the continued capacity of the American military exists as a check on these ambitions. It was a very clear warning to and about the Trolls of Beijing.
In his reading of history, Gates drew a lesson regarding the ability of the American people to "avert their eyes" from events occurring in distant, remote places. It has been difficult to the point of impossibility for We the People in the past (and the present, he might have added) to see how some affair in a small and far distant country may rebound to the immediate disadvantage of the US and its citizens. It is this willful blindness conditioned by our history on a continent protected on both east and west by broad oceans which has given rise not only to our periods of isolationism but also this diminuendo form of being unable or unwilling to connect the dots linking us with some far off place filled with people having unpronounceable names.
The implication of these twin phenomena of large scale isolationism and small scale who-cares-ism for the Secretary is that of gutting the American military. Gates has lived through several periods during which We the People allowed--even demanded--the hollowing out of our military, air, and naval forces. In each case, a war had just been ended. In each case, there were strong economic imperatives in play. In each case, We the People were sick and tired of the sacrifices required of us. And in each case--after World War II, after the Vietnam War and after the collapse of the Warsaw Pact and Soviet Union--the ultimate impact on our capacity to conduct diplomacy as a Great Power was lessened along with our ability to wage effective war if and when required.
We are in a similar situation with these earlier periods today. More so given the potential enervating impact of the federal deficit. There is both a need and a set of political imperatives to engage the national debt and current deficit with effect and dispatch. As the Secretary well knows and has publicly stated on numerous occasions, the defense appropriations cannot be held harmless during the process. They will not be. That is a for sure.
But, as Dr Gates argues in his Notre Dame speech, the process of reducing military expenditures cannot be done at the expense of our real world combat capacities. Administration, overhead, some categories of personnel expenses, some force components can and should be reduced or removed all together. Core combat and force/power projection capabilities as well as the research and development of next gen systems must be taken off the table.
As a Great Power, as the Great Power most trusted by countries around the world to act quickly and decisively in the face of threats, the US has the unique responsibility to maintain a significant full-spectrum capability which can do all missions. The US military, air, and naval forces must be able to do it all--deter or, if necessary, defeat peer opponents, execute low or no lethality interventions, provide humanitarian relief, train and equip friendly forces--the entire ambit of war and warlike utilities.
Dr Gates made reference to a statement purportedly made by Winston Churchill after World War II, ""With greatness comes great responsibility." It is obvious that Gates agrees with Churchill that the US cannot avoid either its greatness nor the responsibilities which come with it. It is evident in Gates' remarks that he believes that continued American greatness depends upon getting our financial affairs in order--and by doing so without gutting our military capabilities.
Gates projects optimism regarding our will and ability to address the parlous financial condition of the country and maintain the basis of global diplomacy--our military potency. He correctly notes all the times in our collective history when we have successfully overcome challenges as large or larger than those confronting us today. His optimism is tempered by a clear headed understanding that the US--its military and civilian decision makers but not excluding We the People--must undertake a penetrating review of our strategic needs and national interests so as to separate properly those which are truly central from those which may be nice, desirable, optimal but remain on the periphery of core interests.
It is easy to infer from his speech that the Secretary does not think this necessary review will be accomplished either easily or quickly. The debate will be both noisy and often uncouth, couched not in the national interest but in far more parochial concerns. Nor will the debate end with all sides walking away with broad smiles.
The review and its consequences will be both long and not pretty. It will be marked by missteps perhaps too many to be counted with ease. But, when night falls Gates remains hopeful. He demonstrated his hope by resort to another, perhaps apocryphal quote from Churchill. "The United States will always do the right thing--after they have tried everything else."
Saturday, May 21, 2011
Defense, Diplomacy, And Development
Those three words constitute a sort of mantra which issues from the mouth of Secretary of State Hilary Clinton at every opportunity. They also define much of the debate soon to be entered into by the congress as the US makes another of its fitful attempts to come to grips with the deficit and the government's chronic inability to live within its means.
When congress in its collective excuse for wisdom makes the attempt to limit American expenditures, it will be traveling a road already passed over by the British Parliament. The Coalition government of Cameron and Clegg inherited a financial debacle from the Labor predecessor which has necessitated deep and painful cuts in all areas of the British budget. High on the list of those cut was the Ministry of Defense.
The British military, naval, and air services were not simply cut, they were mangled. The Royal Air Force now possesses the fewest aircraft since before the first shots of World War I. The Royal Navy in its entirety would not be adequate to provide anti-air and anti-submarine screening for a single US aircraft carrier. The Royal Army has shrunk to a level which would preclude a successful replay of either the Falklands War or even the intervention in Sierra Leone.
Bad is this seems, there are more cuts in the pipeline. Dr Liam Fox, the Minister of Defense, has promised more whacks will be taken as soon as the British wrap up their ground presence in Afghanistan. While Dr Fox specifically mentioned "redundant" vehicles, it is generally understood that the draw down in forces will go beyond vehicles and to the troops who ride them, drive them, and fire their guns. At least another brigade equivalent in the general purpose forces will permanently case its colors.
Given that Prime Minister Cameron is chomping at his bit to hit the Afghan exit, the next ramp down of British military capacity will come sooner rather than later. Even though the prime minister and his defense colleague assure the British public (and the US government) that the UK will remain capable of "broad spectrum" operations and will retain its "superb" special operations forces and will acquire more of the new generation of submarines, doubt as to British capacities to join with allied forces in combined and joint operations must linger.
It is clear that the British expect the US to retain its military capacities unscathed by the same budgetary and financial forces which have buffeted the UK. The same thinking seems to apply generally across Western Europe.
How this wishful thinking can be maintained in the face of accelerating American force withdrawal from Europe boggles the imagination. There are currently 42, 000 US personnel in Europe. By 2015 the figure will drop to 37,000. In comparison there were 213,000 stationed in Europe as the Berlin Wall fell. And, that number was down from the high point in 1962 of nearly 277,000.
The American justification for the continued retreat from Europe is purely financial. The aggregate GDP of the European Union is ten percent greater than that of the US. At the same time the combined defense budgets of the EU states is a mere fraction of that imposed on the US.
It is worth noting that the logic of withdrawal has a momentum of its own. Force strengths like rocks tend to roll down hill. And, the imperatives of finance can far outstrip the power of gravity.
The US will lose some significant tactical flexibility and rapidity of response by pulling out of Europe. It will take measurably longer to move force across an ocean. More importantly, the interposition of an ocean between the US and the likely conflict areas of the Mideast and Africa provide an important political distance between any future flareup and the decision makers inside the Beltway. Political and psychological distance is far more critical in slowing or preventing a response than the mere add-on of a few thousand miles.
It may be that this consideration will be moot by the time 2015 rolls around. There is no way that the American defense department is going to be spared the budget trimming meat ax. President Obama has made that clear. Outgoing SecDef Gates has concurred, wholeheartedly. At least four hundred billion dollars will go over the next decade. Probably more. Perhaps even a lot more depending upon the electoral fortunes of the defense conservatives of the Republican Party.
Implicit in the mantra of Secretary Clinton is the hope that insofar as the "defense" leg of the triad is shortened, the legs of "diplomacy" and "development" will be elongated in compensation. This hope is both false and misplaced. There is no powerful base of support for either diplomacy or development.
For many of We the People, even among those who are most aware of global politics and the Game of Nations, "diplomacy" is seen as a quasi-mysterious process involving gobs of talk, rounds of dinners, and photo ops. Whatever it is that diplomats do and with whatever results, there is no belief that it should cost much money. "Diplomacy" is something like a wand which is waved at vexing problems rather than a useful tool of state in the estimate of many outside of that dismal profession. So, why does it need money?
"Development" is in even worse shape in the mind of many of us. Foreign aid is tantamount to an obscenity in the estimate of many conservatives both in and out of congress. At best it is seen as a form of bribery, a form of rent-a-friend which all too often does not pay off. At worst it is conceived of as a way of furthering corruption in the recipient country while fostering tumor-like growth in the bureaucracy which doles it out.
Again the recent experience in the UK points at the limits of both debate and understanding when it comes to diplomacy and development. Critics of the Coalition have pointed with disdain to the Cameron proposal to increase the development budget of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office by more than a third at the same time that the British military is undergoing enforced, unilateral disarmament.
Advocates of the British move argue that by fostering education, good governance, and economic development in unstable or collapsing states, the need for military intervention or active defense against terror attacks originating in such places will be obviated. The same points have been advanced here not only by Secretary Clinton and others in Foggy Bottom but also by Secretary Gates. If anything Mr Gates has been a more robust proponent of foreign aid as a means of precluding later military action than have the denizens of State and USAID.
In principle it is hard to dissent from the perspective that prevention through foreign development assistance is far preferable to sending in the Marines at some future date. In principle a strong case can be made for the effective use of foreign aid as a means of helping to create political and social tranquility within a recipient country such as to preclude it becoming a failing state. In practice, though, it is far easier to identify the examples where foreign aid has not brought about either internal political and social harmony and progress or bribed the recipient government into accepting American policy leadership.
The Cold War landscape is carpeted with the corpses of failed foreign aid programs. Africa is littered with the results of foreign aid driven corruption, inefficiencies, and betrayed expectations of a better life. The same is true in large swaths of Asia and Latin America. The aid has not been simply from the US. Americans are not the only people to have failed in the development through aid game. All who have played it have experienced more failures than successes.
Nor did the situation change with the end of the Cold War. One need look no further than Pakistan than to see that truism at work. But, if more convincing is necessary, all that is needed is to take a peek at the totality of those receiving development assistance at the government-to-government level to see that lack of success trumps success by a huge margin.
The palpable lack of success in the government-to-government development efforts will go a very long way to assure that budget cutters will find the funding for these programs a politically attractive target even though very few real dollars will be saved even if the totality of US foreign aid in all categories were to be zeroed out. Slashing here is one of those look-good, feel-good votes that are so attractive to politicians unwilling and unable to make tough decisions.
While diplomacy is no magic wand to be waved at international problems and development no anodyne for internal debacles, both are necessary, even valuable, complements to defense. The "vanilla" diplomacy of building upon coinciding national interests as well as carefully targeted development aid focusing on projects which are modest in scale, immediate in visible effects, and sustainable over time by local resources alone can go along way to limiting the need for more robust measures--and cost a lot less.
At the same time it must be recognized that "vanilla" diplomacy and targeted development have very real limits. There are states which require a coercive approach. There are states which will collapse and fail or have governments come to power which are not only adverse to the interests of the US and its allies but are willing to use asymmetrical means to demonstrate this.
In these contexts it must be remembered that all forms of coercive diplomacy rest finally upon the material ability and political will of the US to employ force in support of its policies. Likewise the hostile state must be defanged. The collapsed or collapsing state might well require outsiders come and impose peace. In all these eventualities, eventualities which will become more rather than less likely over the next decade or two, credible and relevant military force is necessary if a positive outcome from the perspective of the US is desired.
Schoolrooms in Pakistan will not necessarily prevent violent political Islam from taking firm and continuing root there. Nor will clinics in Yemen assure the place does not collapse into a welter of internal warfare. Sudan will not become a thriving multi-ethnic, multi-religious, democratic state simply because some donor or another pumps in buckets of cash. The same caveats may be made with respect to many other psuedo-states.
These unpleasant ground truths imply strongly that planners, both those dealing with budgets and those whose game is international strategy, must put defense first. This does not mean the US is condemned to be an impoverished bunker, but it does mean that the existence of a full-spectrum and flexible military capacity cannot be sacrificed on the alters of diplomacy and development.
Nor does it mean the cost of budgetary sanity is surrender to hostile forces.
It does mean, however, that the congress and administration must be intelligent and realistic in their world view. That, unfortunately, is probably too much to expect.
When congress in its collective excuse for wisdom makes the attempt to limit American expenditures, it will be traveling a road already passed over by the British Parliament. The Coalition government of Cameron and Clegg inherited a financial debacle from the Labor predecessor which has necessitated deep and painful cuts in all areas of the British budget. High on the list of those cut was the Ministry of Defense.
The British military, naval, and air services were not simply cut, they were mangled. The Royal Air Force now possesses the fewest aircraft since before the first shots of World War I. The Royal Navy in its entirety would not be adequate to provide anti-air and anti-submarine screening for a single US aircraft carrier. The Royal Army has shrunk to a level which would preclude a successful replay of either the Falklands War or even the intervention in Sierra Leone.
Bad is this seems, there are more cuts in the pipeline. Dr Liam Fox, the Minister of Defense, has promised more whacks will be taken as soon as the British wrap up their ground presence in Afghanistan. While Dr Fox specifically mentioned "redundant" vehicles, it is generally understood that the draw down in forces will go beyond vehicles and to the troops who ride them, drive them, and fire their guns. At least another brigade equivalent in the general purpose forces will permanently case its colors.
Given that Prime Minister Cameron is chomping at his bit to hit the Afghan exit, the next ramp down of British military capacity will come sooner rather than later. Even though the prime minister and his defense colleague assure the British public (and the US government) that the UK will remain capable of "broad spectrum" operations and will retain its "superb" special operations forces and will acquire more of the new generation of submarines, doubt as to British capacities to join with allied forces in combined and joint operations must linger.
It is clear that the British expect the US to retain its military capacities unscathed by the same budgetary and financial forces which have buffeted the UK. The same thinking seems to apply generally across Western Europe.
How this wishful thinking can be maintained in the face of accelerating American force withdrawal from Europe boggles the imagination. There are currently 42, 000 US personnel in Europe. By 2015 the figure will drop to 37,000. In comparison there were 213,000 stationed in Europe as the Berlin Wall fell. And, that number was down from the high point in 1962 of nearly 277,000.
The American justification for the continued retreat from Europe is purely financial. The aggregate GDP of the European Union is ten percent greater than that of the US. At the same time the combined defense budgets of the EU states is a mere fraction of that imposed on the US.
It is worth noting that the logic of withdrawal has a momentum of its own. Force strengths like rocks tend to roll down hill. And, the imperatives of finance can far outstrip the power of gravity.
The US will lose some significant tactical flexibility and rapidity of response by pulling out of Europe. It will take measurably longer to move force across an ocean. More importantly, the interposition of an ocean between the US and the likely conflict areas of the Mideast and Africa provide an important political distance between any future flareup and the decision makers inside the Beltway. Political and psychological distance is far more critical in slowing or preventing a response than the mere add-on of a few thousand miles.
It may be that this consideration will be moot by the time 2015 rolls around. There is no way that the American defense department is going to be spared the budget trimming meat ax. President Obama has made that clear. Outgoing SecDef Gates has concurred, wholeheartedly. At least four hundred billion dollars will go over the next decade. Probably more. Perhaps even a lot more depending upon the electoral fortunes of the defense conservatives of the Republican Party.
Implicit in the mantra of Secretary Clinton is the hope that insofar as the "defense" leg of the triad is shortened, the legs of "diplomacy" and "development" will be elongated in compensation. This hope is both false and misplaced. There is no powerful base of support for either diplomacy or development.
For many of We the People, even among those who are most aware of global politics and the Game of Nations, "diplomacy" is seen as a quasi-mysterious process involving gobs of talk, rounds of dinners, and photo ops. Whatever it is that diplomats do and with whatever results, there is no belief that it should cost much money. "Diplomacy" is something like a wand which is waved at vexing problems rather than a useful tool of state in the estimate of many outside of that dismal profession. So, why does it need money?
"Development" is in even worse shape in the mind of many of us. Foreign aid is tantamount to an obscenity in the estimate of many conservatives both in and out of congress. At best it is seen as a form of bribery, a form of rent-a-friend which all too often does not pay off. At worst it is conceived of as a way of furthering corruption in the recipient country while fostering tumor-like growth in the bureaucracy which doles it out.
Again the recent experience in the UK points at the limits of both debate and understanding when it comes to diplomacy and development. Critics of the Coalition have pointed with disdain to the Cameron proposal to increase the development budget of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office by more than a third at the same time that the British military is undergoing enforced, unilateral disarmament.
Advocates of the British move argue that by fostering education, good governance, and economic development in unstable or collapsing states, the need for military intervention or active defense against terror attacks originating in such places will be obviated. The same points have been advanced here not only by Secretary Clinton and others in Foggy Bottom but also by Secretary Gates. If anything Mr Gates has been a more robust proponent of foreign aid as a means of precluding later military action than have the denizens of State and USAID.
In principle it is hard to dissent from the perspective that prevention through foreign development assistance is far preferable to sending in the Marines at some future date. In principle a strong case can be made for the effective use of foreign aid as a means of helping to create political and social tranquility within a recipient country such as to preclude it becoming a failing state. In practice, though, it is far easier to identify the examples where foreign aid has not brought about either internal political and social harmony and progress or bribed the recipient government into accepting American policy leadership.
The Cold War landscape is carpeted with the corpses of failed foreign aid programs. Africa is littered with the results of foreign aid driven corruption, inefficiencies, and betrayed expectations of a better life. The same is true in large swaths of Asia and Latin America. The aid has not been simply from the US. Americans are not the only people to have failed in the development through aid game. All who have played it have experienced more failures than successes.
Nor did the situation change with the end of the Cold War. One need look no further than Pakistan than to see that truism at work. But, if more convincing is necessary, all that is needed is to take a peek at the totality of those receiving development assistance at the government-to-government level to see that lack of success trumps success by a huge margin.
The palpable lack of success in the government-to-government development efforts will go a very long way to assure that budget cutters will find the funding for these programs a politically attractive target even though very few real dollars will be saved even if the totality of US foreign aid in all categories were to be zeroed out. Slashing here is one of those look-good, feel-good votes that are so attractive to politicians unwilling and unable to make tough decisions.
While diplomacy is no magic wand to be waved at international problems and development no anodyne for internal debacles, both are necessary, even valuable, complements to defense. The "vanilla" diplomacy of building upon coinciding national interests as well as carefully targeted development aid focusing on projects which are modest in scale, immediate in visible effects, and sustainable over time by local resources alone can go along way to limiting the need for more robust measures--and cost a lot less.
At the same time it must be recognized that "vanilla" diplomacy and targeted development have very real limits. There are states which require a coercive approach. There are states which will collapse and fail or have governments come to power which are not only adverse to the interests of the US and its allies but are willing to use asymmetrical means to demonstrate this.
In these contexts it must be remembered that all forms of coercive diplomacy rest finally upon the material ability and political will of the US to employ force in support of its policies. Likewise the hostile state must be defanged. The collapsed or collapsing state might well require outsiders come and impose peace. In all these eventualities, eventualities which will become more rather than less likely over the next decade or two, credible and relevant military force is necessary if a positive outcome from the perspective of the US is desired.
Schoolrooms in Pakistan will not necessarily prevent violent political Islam from taking firm and continuing root there. Nor will clinics in Yemen assure the place does not collapse into a welter of internal warfare. Sudan will not become a thriving multi-ethnic, multi-religious, democratic state simply because some donor or another pumps in buckets of cash. The same caveats may be made with respect to many other psuedo-states.
These unpleasant ground truths imply strongly that planners, both those dealing with budgets and those whose game is international strategy, must put defense first. This does not mean the US is condemned to be an impoverished bunker, but it does mean that the existence of a full-spectrum and flexible military capacity cannot be sacrificed on the alters of diplomacy and development.
Nor does it mean the cost of budgetary sanity is surrender to hostile forces.
It does mean, however, that the congress and administration must be intelligent and realistic in their world view. That, unfortunately, is probably too much to expect.
Friday, April 29, 2011
A Couple Of Good Personnel Choices
President Obama--or, to err on the side of accuracy--Secretary of Defense Robert Gates deserve a strong thumbs-up for two specific decisions on personnel. One is the move of Leon Panetta from CIA to SecDef. The other is tabbing Marine LtGen John Allen to take over the supreme command in Afghanistan.
Panetta, like Gates, has a long and distinguished record in Washington. More to the point, Panetta has spent the last two years immersed in the realities of the threats confronting the US now or in the near to mid-term. It is this latter consideration which makes Panetta the only real contender to follow Gates to the Pentagon. With his knowledge of the dark sides of the world, Panetta is best equipped to argue budget cuts which will leave the US in the best possible position to honor commitments and defend its national and strategic interests. Panetta is prepared in all essential respects to hold an open debate on American priorities and absolute requirements as the budgetary considerations demand a shrinkage of the Pentagon's budget by at least four hundred billion dollars over the next decade.
The great fear of Gates and all other reasonably knowledgeable observers has been an across the board cut which would result in all defense capacities being hollowed out equally. This would leave the US without sufficient capabilities in any area either to honor obligations to treaty partners or to deter and defeat threats to national interests. It would leave the US without the muscle necessary to support diplomacy in all its myriad forms.
Gates has been in favor of an open debate, a far reaching one by necessity over the stance of American military forces. Such a debate will be messy, unpleasant, ideological in all too many ways, and, unless undertaken with a leadership both well informed and willing to lead, inconclusive. Panetta should be able to perform the function of debate facilitator quite well. Given that he can combine the expertise of having run a large, complex, and sensitive agency with knowledge of the world and previous experience with both the Office of Management and Budget and the Appropriations Committee, it is hard to see any other person so well equipped to handle the delicate and highly important matter of guiding the Pentagon budget to a soft landing.
While unknown outside the Marine Corps and the small number of mavens of small wars, LtGen Allen is an excellent choice to run operations in Afghanistan during what will prove to be the make or break end stage of the war. When the Geek encountered Allen in the context of an advanced service school many years before the man got his first star let alone his third, the Geek was quite impressed by the officer's quick and probing mind. That the mind was far more than merely quick or probing was demonstrated by Allen's success in recruiting critical tribal leaders so as to shift Sunni tribes from leaning to the insurgents in Iraq to siding with the US. This act was central to the development of the Awakening Councils and the Sons of Iraq, both of which proved to be very important components of the victory over the various insurgent combines.
While the tribal politics of Afghanistan are not so regimented or predictable as was the case in Iraq, there is very good reason to believe that LtGen Allen's skills in this area will serve the cause of defeating the insurgents with high efficiency. It is also probable that General Allen will be able to establish a relationship with Hamid Karzai which more closely resembles that which existed between Stanley McChrystal than the current troubled one with David Petraeus.
It rather appears that LtGen Allen combines much of the warfighting nature of McChrystal with many of the political skills possessed by General Petraeus. This will do much to assure the US and its allies including Afghanistan are more rather than less likely to come out on top in the war. Potentiating this is the fact that the war in Afghanistan is now an all Marine operation at the highest levels with a Marine as CENTCOMCINC and another running the shop in Afghanistan. This will do much to smooth any of the frictions which normally exist between major commands and theater commands.
Robert Gates has performed many outstanding services to We the People over his long career. However, few equal let alone surpass this last day effort--choosing two perfect candidates for two very tough jobs. The outgoing Secretary of Defense deserves more than the usual gratitude for the care with which he has prepared for his leaving office with wars in progress and a budget which must be cut without damage to the core interests of the US.
Panetta, like Gates, has a long and distinguished record in Washington. More to the point, Panetta has spent the last two years immersed in the realities of the threats confronting the US now or in the near to mid-term. It is this latter consideration which makes Panetta the only real contender to follow Gates to the Pentagon. With his knowledge of the dark sides of the world, Panetta is best equipped to argue budget cuts which will leave the US in the best possible position to honor commitments and defend its national and strategic interests. Panetta is prepared in all essential respects to hold an open debate on American priorities and absolute requirements as the budgetary considerations demand a shrinkage of the Pentagon's budget by at least four hundred billion dollars over the next decade.
The great fear of Gates and all other reasonably knowledgeable observers has been an across the board cut which would result in all defense capacities being hollowed out equally. This would leave the US without sufficient capabilities in any area either to honor obligations to treaty partners or to deter and defeat threats to national interests. It would leave the US without the muscle necessary to support diplomacy in all its myriad forms.
Gates has been in favor of an open debate, a far reaching one by necessity over the stance of American military forces. Such a debate will be messy, unpleasant, ideological in all too many ways, and, unless undertaken with a leadership both well informed and willing to lead, inconclusive. Panetta should be able to perform the function of debate facilitator quite well. Given that he can combine the expertise of having run a large, complex, and sensitive agency with knowledge of the world and previous experience with both the Office of Management and Budget and the Appropriations Committee, it is hard to see any other person so well equipped to handle the delicate and highly important matter of guiding the Pentagon budget to a soft landing.
While unknown outside the Marine Corps and the small number of mavens of small wars, LtGen Allen is an excellent choice to run operations in Afghanistan during what will prove to be the make or break end stage of the war. When the Geek encountered Allen in the context of an advanced service school many years before the man got his first star let alone his third, the Geek was quite impressed by the officer's quick and probing mind. That the mind was far more than merely quick or probing was demonstrated by Allen's success in recruiting critical tribal leaders so as to shift Sunni tribes from leaning to the insurgents in Iraq to siding with the US. This act was central to the development of the Awakening Councils and the Sons of Iraq, both of which proved to be very important components of the victory over the various insurgent combines.
While the tribal politics of Afghanistan are not so regimented or predictable as was the case in Iraq, there is very good reason to believe that LtGen Allen's skills in this area will serve the cause of defeating the insurgents with high efficiency. It is also probable that General Allen will be able to establish a relationship with Hamid Karzai which more closely resembles that which existed between Stanley McChrystal than the current troubled one with David Petraeus.
It rather appears that LtGen Allen combines much of the warfighting nature of McChrystal with many of the political skills possessed by General Petraeus. This will do much to assure the US and its allies including Afghanistan are more rather than less likely to come out on top in the war. Potentiating this is the fact that the war in Afghanistan is now an all Marine operation at the highest levels with a Marine as CENTCOMCINC and another running the shop in Afghanistan. This will do much to smooth any of the frictions which normally exist between major commands and theater commands.
Robert Gates has performed many outstanding services to We the People over his long career. However, few equal let alone surpass this last day effort--choosing two perfect candidates for two very tough jobs. The outgoing Secretary of Defense deserves more than the usual gratitude for the care with which he has prepared for his leaving office with wars in progress and a budget which must be cut without damage to the core interests of the US.
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