Arms for the World: How The US Military Shapes Foreign Policy Posted by Michael Cohen

Yesterday, I attended a conference in Washington DC hosted by the US Global Leadership Coalition that was the first public review of the State Department's Diplomacy and Development Review (QDDR). All the usual suspects where there - Deputy Secretary of State Jacob Lew, the Director of Policy Planning, Anne Marie Slaughter, and Acting AID Administrator, Alonzo Fulghum and I recommend checking out their discussion on the USGLC website. All the participants said the right things about restoring the civil/military balance and ensuring that State and AID plays a more central role on foreign policy planning, but the whole time I found myself wondering about the elephant in the room - the Pentagon and its growing footprint in driving US diplomacy and development policy.

In fact over at the USGLC website they reference this quote from Jacob Lew, "“We’re going to give civilians the tools to do what they do best, and let the military get back to doing what it does best.”  While I love this idea in concept, I'm less convinced about it in practice. In fact, I'm downright skeptical. Good intentions are one thing, but the harsh reality of our ever growing military bureaucracy and its burgeoning role in nearly every element of American foreign policy speaks to a different reality.

While I think the QDDR process is a smart one; and I like the fact that a lot of folks at State, the Pentagon and on Capitol Hill are talking about increasing resources for State and AID until we start talking about moving authorities away from DoD and giving them back to the civilian agencies the slow but inexorable militarization of American foreign policy will continue unabated. In some ways, I think this is the most important foreign policy challenge Barack Obama will face during his presidency.

With that in mind . . . I have a new piece out this month in Dissent Magazine on precisely this issue. The PDF is available below, but I invite folks to consider a subscription to Dissent and check out their web site for some great online content including a smart piece by Todd Gitlin on counter-insurgency in Afghanistan.

Download Arms for the World

A brief excerpt below:

The defining characteristic of U.S. foreign policy and national security policy in the post–cold- war era is the extent to which America’s foreign policy agenda is being crafted and implemented by the military. Almost fifty years ago, President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned of the “total influence—economic, political, even spiritual” of an “immense military establishment and large arms industry being “felt in every city, every Statehouse, every office of the Federal government.” Today, these concerns seem quaint. Whether it’s waging the war on terror or the war on drugs; nation-building in post-conflict environments; development, democracy promotion, or diplomacy; fighting cyber-criminals or training foreign armies, the global face of the United States today is generally that of a soldier.

. . . The traditional elements of statecraft can hardly compete with the juggernaut that is the modern U.S. armed forces. And the growing predisposition to view all security challenges through the prism of the military portends even more reliance on America’s fighting men and women. For progressives, the ever-expanding military-industrial complex presents grave dangers to the hopes of a renewed period of activist government. The United States can maintain a huge army with the most up-to-date weapons system or it can better provide for the needs of its citizens. It can’t do both. Although it is essential that the country begin to rebuild its civilian agencies and rein in the defense budget, it can’t do so without larger structural changes. What is needed is a fundamental reconceptualization of U.S. security interests—a recognition that discussions about military tactics and the structure of forces should be closely aligned with strategic considerations as well as a dispassionate view of the country’s national interests. The growing U.S. military footprint around the world risks undermining not only America’s foreign policy agenda but its democratic ethos.

 . . . During his historic presidential campaign, Barack Obama said the key to changing U.S.
foreign policy for the better was moving away from the “mindset” that led to the invasion of
Iraq and its subsequent occupation. If he is serious about changing the current shape of U.S. foreign policy, de-emphasizing the role of the military is not only the logical place to start: it’s the only place.
 

The Washington Post's Bizarre Editorial on the Taliban Posted by Michael Cohen

I'm really starting to wonder about the folks who write foreign policy editorials for the Washington Post. Consider this passage today about why the US can't quit the fight in Afghanistan:

For years the United States has been trying to persuade Pakistan to fully confront the threat of the Taliban, even as its government and army dithered and wavered. Now that the army at last appears prepared to strike at the heart of the movement in Waziristan, the Obama administration is wavering -- and considering a strategy that would give up the U.S. attempt to defeat the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Adopting such a strategy would condemn American soldiers to fighting and dying without the chance of winning. But it would also cripple Pakistan's fight against the jihadists. With the pressure off in Afghanistan, Taliban forces would have a refuge from offensives by Pakistani forces. And those in the Pakistani army and intelligence services who favor striking deals or even alliances with the extremists could once again gain ascendancy. After all, if the United States gives up trying to defeat the Taliban, can it really expect that Pakistan will go on fighting?

Is the Washington Post editorial board so blinded by its hawkishness that the folks who write there simply don't understand that there is a pretty crucial difference between the Pakistan Taliban and the Afghan Taliban? Do they not understand that while the Pakistani military has waged war on Pakistan Taliban forces they have basically given the Afghan Taliban a free pass and left their safe havens unmolested? Indeed, from every appearance elements of the Pakistani military view the Afghan Taliban as a strategic check against Indian influence in Afghanistan.

Further, does the Post not understand that America's ability to defeat the Taliban in Afghanistan is severely undermined by the very presence of these very Afghan Taliban safe havens across the border in Pakistan? The Post seems to be arguing that the Taliban is a monolithic and centralized fighting force. This isn't even true of Afghan Taliban, no less the Pakistan AND Afghan Taliban.

Then consider this sentence, "If the United States gives up trying to defeat the Taliban, can it really expect that Pakistan will go on fighting?" Why if the Pakistan military has declared war on the Pakistan Taliban would it matter to them if the US lessens up in its fight against the Afghan Taliban? By the Post's tortured logic wouldn't that actually make them more inclined to militarily defeat the Pakistani Taliban for fear that a US retreat - and Taliban victory - would embolden these forces?

But the Post doubles down on incoherent arguments:

The Taliban no longer aims merely at controlling the ethnic Pashtun areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan but at gaining control over a nuclear-armed state . .  the Taliban has gone from struggling for survival to aiming for control over both Afghanistan and Pakistan.

And I want to play shortstop for the Boston Red Sox. Guess what, neither event is likely to happen. The scare tactic of a Pakistan Taliban takeover of Pakistan is just that: a scare tactic and one absolutely divorced from reality.

Reading this piece one gets the impression that the Washington Post editorial board simply has no idea that the various groups, which fall under the Taliban umbrella, have different agendas and different grievances - and that the Pakistani government is opposed to some and tolerant of others.

No One is Talking About Withdrawal Posted by Michael Cohen

Of the many frustrating elements of the debate on US-Afghan strategy few others are as pernicious as the canard that there are two options in Afghanistan - full-on counter-insurgency or complete and immediate withdrawal. As near I can tell, no one in the Administration and no one in serious policy circles is arguing for a such step. Indeed, there are a myriad of options that lie between these two extremes. Over at FP's Af/Pak channel, Austin Long does a nice job of laying out one possible scenario and offers a pretty compelling idea of what a smaller, more focused counter-insurgency terrorism strategy might look like:

To use a military term of art, the bottom line up front is that the United States could successfully transition to an effective small footprint counterterrorism mission over the course of the next three years, ending up with a force of about 13,000 military personnel (or less) in Afghanistan.

Long goes on to recommend that the US maintain a presence at three major bases at Bagram, Jalalabad and Kandahar; rely more heavily on Tier 1 special operations forces; utilize three Army Special Forces' battalions that "would partner with local forces to collect intelligence and secure specific areas;" and  increase the military's reliance on unmanned aircraft as well as robust human and signal intelligence.  I recommend reading the entire article, because it really does put some flesh on the bone of what at CT strategy would look like.

Over at the New Republic, Alex Rossmiller takes the argument a step further by pushing for a political compromise with Taliban forces:

Rather than trying to evict the Taliban from the territory of the largely supportive Pashtun population, the United States and the Afghanistan central government should acknowledge that renegade Pashtuns--not groups of international terrorists, but nationalist insurgents--have earned the right to participate in government in some capacity . . . In some areas, the Taliban has acted as a local government--keeping order, providing services, mediating disputes, etc.--and, in others, it is confined to anti-government propaganda and violence. But, through participation in government, its actions can be evaluated by the people and observed by the global community.

I'm not sure yet if we're at the point that such a strategy would work. With the Taliban on the ascendancy I'm perhaps a bit less sanguine that the opportunity exists for near-term political compromise - all the more reason, I would argue to put greater military pressure on the Taliban. But Rossmiller's overall point is spot on; we're not going to militarily defeat the Taliban (even if McChrystal gets 40,000 more troops). The only viable long-term solution is a political compromise that for better or worse imagines a Taliban role in Afghanistan's political future. The sooner we acknowledge that point, the better.

But even more important, the sooner we acknowledge that the options for Afghanistan's future are broader than just leave or double down the more robust the debate on US-Afghan policy will be.

Who Loves America More? Posted by Michael Cohen

As is so often the case, I'm not crazy about this Politico headline, but the content works! Below is my latest op-ed, arguing that out of partisan fury Republicans are risking losing the debate on national security:

Twenty-five years ago, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Jeane Kirkpatrick famously lambasted Democrats as “blame America firsters” and a party plagued by “self-criticism and self-denigration” of America. It was a speech at pace with an emerging political stereotype that suggested Democrats weren’t quite patriotic enough and didn’t love their country as much as Republicans did. This image of Democratic weakness and self-doubt became one of the most effective attack lines for Republicans — and Democrats’ greatest political liability.

But today the tables are turning. Democrats have narrowed the Republican advantage on national security. They are seen as more effective when it comes to improving global respect for America and working closely with the country’s allies. And in a poll result that would have raised eyebrows only a few years ago, President Barack Obama is more trusted on foreign policy than he is on the economy and health care. Today, more than seven in 10 Americans consider him a strong leader.

A look across the aisle tells a more sobering tale for Republicans. Conservative leaders have been lambasted for cheering America’s defeat for losing the 2016 Olympics and disparaging an American president’s receiving the Nobel Peace Prize. Others can decide whether charges of unpatriotic and un-American behavior launched by the Democratic National Committee against Republicans are appropriate, but the very fact that the DNC felt it had the ammunition to launch such an attack speaks volumes about the changing political dynamics of national security.

Read the whole thing here

 

The McChrystal Debate, Round 3 Posted by Michael Cohen

Bill Galston has responded to my post on the civil-military implications of General Stanley McChrystal’s recent public announcements on Afghan policy – and I will say that we have some genuine areas of agreement. For example, Bill is absolutely right that entering expanding a war is perhaps the gravest decision a policymaker can make and it merits a robust and open public debate.

And unlike many on the left – and seemingly all Democrats in Congress – Bill and I share the view that General McChrystal should testify on Capitol Hill. Members of Congress, as a co-equal branch of government, have as much right to hear from our commanding general in Afghanistan as the President does.  Indeed, there is a pressing need to debate the dubious conclusions drawn in McChrystal’s review – a process that could have happened if he had been asked to testify before Congress. (One would certainly imagine that would have been better to have that debate before McChrystal’s hand was so clearly shown).

But I suppose our contrasting viewpoints can be summed up as a disagreement about the proper role of the military in advising civilian leaders.

In Galston’s initial blog post he made the comparison between General McChrystal's actions and that of General Shinseki in the run-up to the Iraq war. But Shinseki’s performance was decidedly anodyne when compared to the recent behavior of McChrystal. Like many in the military Shinseki believed that a larger post-occupation force would be needed in Iraq and when asked in a congressional hearing by Senator Carl Levin he dispassionately indicated as such.  In fact, as Tom Ricks recounts in his book “Fiasco” Shinseki went to great lengths to be properly prepared to answer such a question. I am not aware that Shinseki at any point spoke publicly outside the confines of Congress or went on 60 Minutes to plead the case for a larger post-invasion force.

Compare his behavior with that of General McChrystal who has gone from military advisor to advocate.  It’s not simply that McChrystal went to London to publicly call for the full resourcing of a counter-insurgency it’s that he then proceeded in the Q&A to publicly dismiss the strategic approach being debated in the White House and promoted by Vice President Biden. To be blunt, General McChrystal really shouldn't be weighing in publicly on strategic decision-making in this manner. As Bruce Ackerman noted recently in the Washington Post:

Under law, he (McChrystal) doesn't have the right to attend the National Security Council as it decides our strategy. To the contrary, the Goldwater-Nichols Act of 1986 explicitly names the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff as the National Security Council's principal military adviser.

Galston argues that military leaders should not be “barred from publicly expressing their best judgment as to the strategy and tactics best suited to the problem at hand.”  Well judgment about tactics is one thing; advocacy for a specific strategy is something else altogether.

It’s one thing, for example, to say that a counter-insurgency operation in Afghanistan needs to be more fully resourced – that’s akin to what Shinseki testified before Congress – it’s quite another for the General to weigh in on matters of strategy and to do so in such a way that puts him at odds with his civilian overseers. What happens, for example, if Obama goes in a different direction than that advocated by McChrystal? How can he faithfully implement a plan that he has derided in public as unrealistic? Galston’s solution; the general can take the extreme step and resign if he disagrees. But a difference in strategic approach should hardly be routine grounds for resignation – and I just think Galston is underplaying the damage that such actions would have on civil-military relations. Do we really want four-star generals going around resigning because they disagree with the President’s judgment calls on national security strategy? To echo what I said before if this isn’t a recipe of civil-military disaster I don’t know what is.

Not only would such a course put the military increasingly at odds with its civilian superiors, but it would almost certainly further politicize national security decision-making.  I take Bill’s point that his “views on what is constitutionally appropriate are not governed by the short-term interests of either party” but that’s not really the point.

I’ll go back to an argument made by Peter Feaver, who is definitely more of an expert on civil-military relations than I am – and who is, as far as I’m aware not a Democrat:

Whether you favor ramping up or ramping down or ramping laterally, as a process matter, the Commander-in-Chief ought to be able to conduct internal deliberations on sensitive matters without it appearing concurrently on the front pages of the Post. I assume the Obama team is very angry about this, and I think they have every right to be.

As Feaver argues, and as I said at the time, this leak was a clear and unambiguous effort to force Obama’s hand on troop increases.  Instead of weighing the pros and cons of sending more forces to Afghanistan and fighting a counter-insurgency the President (a Democrat who never served in the most respected institution in American society, namely the military) now has to wrestle with the appearance that he is breaking with his own military leadership and the almost guaranteed political fallout from such a move.  This isn’t about short-term partisan interests; its about constricting the choices facing the Commander-in-Chief. 

Bill's argument almost suggest that these choices are made in a political vacuum but as he correctly notes the hyper-partisanship of Washington (and I would argue the inclination of Republicans to so brazenly politicize national security) makes that an impossibility. All the more reason for the military to avoid the appearance of taking sides and instead faithfully adhering to its role as counsel to civilian policy-makers and not advocate. I share Bill’s view that we need to have robust public debates about matters of war and peace, but they should be informed by military counsel, but ultimately debated and decided by the branches of government tasked with that responsibility in the Constitution.

Where is NATO? Posted by Michael Cohen

Over at World Politics Review the "ever astute Judah Grunstein" makes a really important point about an unremarked upon element of the current debate on Afghanistan:

The Obama administration was asking for: more troops from our NATO allies; a crackdown on FATA safe havens from the Pakistani government; less corruption and better governance from the Afghan government; and a willingness to find a political accomodation from "moderate" Taliban.

See a pattern? Straight down the line, from all of the necessary partners on which this effort depends, Obama got nothing . . .

A lot of people, myself included, have been explaining the Obama administration's recent hesitation by pointing to what's changed under the initial strategy's feet: the Afghan presidential election, and an assessment on the ground by Gen. Stanley McChrystal that was even worse than expected.

But it's worth pointing out what hasn't changed as well. The American effort has gotten no additional support from any of our partners. That's not to say we're going it alone, because there are roughly 40K non-U.S. NATO troops in Afghanistan. But if the situation truly demands the kind of force increase being talked about, it would be a much easier political sell if the cost were distributed. And it hasn't been.

So for all the criticism Obama has taken for hesitating in public view like this, there's an audience for this spectacle that has so far gone unremarked. The U.S. is far from the only nation with interests at stake in Afghanistan. And the prospect of America limiting its goals there puts those interests in jeopardy. That seems to me to be a way of saying, Ask not what your global superpower can do for you, but what you can do for your global superpower.

If the answer still comes back, Nothing, that's even more reason to return to basic assumptions. Because even with help, there are no guarantees for success in Afghanistan. But we definitely can't do what the McChrystal report proposes all alone.

This is such a smart point I wish I had made it.  This isn't to say that the US strategy in Afghanistan is wrong (although clearly I think it is) but if you can't get the key allies to get on board - and not just in London, Paris and Berlin, but also Kabul and Islamabad -- then it tends to suggest that there are some divergent interests at play. I mean if you can't even get Karzai to play nice and say, not steal an election; or get the Pakistanis to crack down on Afghan Taliban safe havens, then a reassessment of the strategy is almost certainly in order.

For example, the simple fact that the Bush Administration had a very hard time getting key allies to support the Iraq War should have been a big red flag that the US was going to have to go it alone in Iraq. Now for some Bushies that was a net positive, but I don't the Obama folks share that view - and we now know what a disaster it was to go to war without allied support.

If support from key allies is not forthcoming now it's perhaps the best evidence possible that the US may have to - down the road -- shoulder the mission in Afghanistan alone. And something tells me that's a road the President may not want to go down.

"For What He Has Done in the Previous Year" Posted by Heather Hurlburt

The history of the Nobel is filled with mid-stream attempts to encourage and reward initiatives -- many of which didn't pan out, frankly.  Sadat-Begin was very much a work in progress at the time.  Woodrow Wilson got his in office, before it was clear that the US would never join the League of Nations.  There was some commentary about Tutu's prize at the time for the same reason.  Willy Brandt's came while people felt very uncertain what the ultimate fate of his efforts would be.
 

As a French journalist said to a friend this morning:  "they're betting on hope."

Remember:  you can't get a Nobel after you're dead and it's clear what your achievements are. The Committee clearly sees the prize as a tool to encourage approaches to the world that it thinks will promote piece.  The Chairman said:

We are not awarding the prize for what may happen in the future but for what he has done in the previous year. We would hope this will enhance what he is trying to do.

America's Nobel Prize Posted by Michael Cohen

So a couple of years ago I was traveling in Helsinki, Finland on vacation and my friend and I struck up a conversation with some folks at a bar. It turned into a wide-ranging discussion about both Finnish and American politics. At some point the conversation veered to Iraq, Gitmo etc and one of my interlocutors - a young Finnish woman who worked in Parliament - began talking passionately about how disappointed she was in the United States; how she always admired America and what it stood for, but that now she didn't recognize this country that she had loved from afar.

And then she began to cry.

I sort of think that's why Barack Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace prize today. Today's completely unexpected honor is as clear a sign as you could ever receive that for all of our faults (and we have many) there are millions of people around the world who admire and love what America represents. They yearn for an America that not only adheres to its most basic values, but provides genuine leadership toward their realization - both at home and abroad. I think the Nobel Committee summed it up nicely:

"Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world’s attention and given its people hope for a better future,” the committee said in its citation. “His diplomacy is founded in the concept that those who are to lead the world must do so on the basis of values and attitudes that are shared by the majority of the world’s population.”

A year ago this nation was run by a man who eschewed international cooperation, who thumbed his nose at international conventions, who was complicit in the use of torture and who seemed to believe that bullying was a form of global leadership.** Now we have a President with the potential to not only reverse those disastrous positions, but to turn a new corner in global cooperation. And clearly, the world has noticed that potential - and they want America to lead. But above all they believe that America can be, perhaps the most important force for good in the world.

Yes I know that we are often not - and I know there is a lot of deserved cynicism about America's role in the world - but lest we ever forget there are millions of people around who admire what we stand for as a country. And they want us to live up to it.

This should be a humbling day for every America and an object lesson not only in the potential of American leadership, but in the inspirational power of the "idea" that is America. It's a great day for the USA.

**  A belated hat tip to Brian Beutler for putting this idea in my head in an e-mail conversation

108,000 is a lot closer to 68,000 than 600,000 Posted by Patrick Barry

There's something odd about Rajiv Chandrasekaran's sensational account of the Obama administration's troubles setting the strategy for Afghanistan.  The piece shows that the civilian leadership's understanding of the resources required by a COIN diverged pretty dramatically from the military's understanding. This has the effect of making the civilian strategy-makers look pretty silly and naive for not getting what it takes to do COIN properly. (The piece lightly plays down the fact that General McKiernan had "said he had shifted his troops toward counterinsurgency operations," and the Administration had already OK'd his troop request) On the military side, you have the newly appointed COIN guru General McChrystal, who goes through an agonizing review process, which results in a politically explosive request for 40,000 additional troops. All of a sudden we're left with a choice between 68,000 from the White House back in March, compared with 108,000 by the Pentagon today. That's a big difference.

But how big? Certainly the two numbers diverge quite a bit when compared with one another.  But when you compare both of them to the 600,000 or so troops that the COIN manual force ratios actually dictate, they're actually much closer! Now I know all the counterarguments. Violence isn't as bad in the North and West! Don't forget about our NATO allies! Focusing on population centers would allow the U.S. to do more with less!  Training the Afghan security forces boosts our numbers!  That's a lot of assumptions strung together.  

The truth is that if you're assessing faithfulness to COIN, both the White House AND the Pentagon fall far short of the standard laid out in 3-24 in significant ways.  That doesn't absolve the disconnect hit upon in the Washington Post piece, but it puts a question Michael has raised several times - whether we have the capacity and political will for a fully resourced, prolonged counterinsurgency - in stark relief.   

Jennifer Rubin Has An Awfully Short Memory Posted by Michael Cohen

Look I could spend all day snarking off the material produced by the Commentary "Contentions" blog, but generally I resist the urge. Today is different. I had to read these two sentences a few times to make sure it says what I think it says:

America’s enemies certainly aren’t impressed by a confession of bureaucratic incompetence. And the public may once again be horrified to learn that the Obama national-security team is the most inept in history.

Can you imagine any person who has been conscious over the past 8 years making a statement like this? I don't want to say this is the most astoundingly ridiculous and historically illiterate thing I've read about American foreign policy in quite some time . . . but it's definitely in the top ten.

You know I'll make you a deal Jennifer; when Barack Obama plunges this nation into a 6 year war of choice that kills more than 4000 soldiers and costs more than a trillion dollars in direct and indirect costs versus an enemy that doesn't even threaten the United States and puts virtually no thought into the post-war occupation of said country; then perhaps we can have a conversation about the most inept national security team in American history. Until then, you may want to take some time to re-think this blog post.