{"id":3903,"date":"2011-04-25T04:22:12","date_gmt":"2011-04-25T04:22:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=3903"},"modified":"2011-04-26T01:13:10","modified_gmt":"2011-04-26T01:13:10","slug":"time-for-a-grand-strategy-board","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=3903","title":{"rendered":"Time for a Grand Strategy Board?"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

The Gerousia<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

“I have not lived so long, Spartans, without having had the experience of many wars, and I see among you of the same age as myself, who will not fall into the common misfortune of longing for war from inexperience or from a belief in it’s advantage and safety”<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Archidamus, King of Sparta<\/a><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

One thing on which most commentators, academics and former officials seem to agree is that the United States government has a difficult time planning and executing strategy. Furthermore, that\u00a0since 1991 we have been without a consensus as to America’s<\/a> grand<\/strong><\/a> strategy<\/strong><\/a>,<\/strong> which would guide our crafting of policy and strategy. This failing bridges partisan divisions and departmental\u00a0bureaucracies; there are many career officials, political appointees and even a few politicians, who can explain the nuances of the Afghan War, or the Libyan intervention, the depreciatory tailspin of the US Dollar or\u00a0America’s Russia policy – but none who would venture to say how these relate to one another, still less to\u00a0a common vision.<\/p>\n

Sadly, they do not, in fact, relate to one another – at least not, as far as I can discern, intentionally.<\/p>\n

Few American policies or even military operations (!) in one country can be said to have been conceived even within a coherent and logically consistent\u00a0regional<\/em><\/strong> strategy and it is not just common, but normal, to have DIME<\/strong> agencies working at completely contradictory purposes in the same area of operations. The interagency process, to the extent that it exists, is fundamentally broken and incapable of interagency operational jointness<\/a>; and the institutional coordinating mechanism for any “whole of government” effort, the National Security Council<\/a><\/strong>, has become too\u00a0consumed with crisis management<\/a>. A mismatched prioritization of\u00a0resources\u00a0which leaves little time for the kind of\u00a0long range\u00a0planning\u00a0and strategic thinking that allows nations to seize the initiative instead of reacting to\u00a0 events.<\/p>\n

It would be a useful corrective for the better\u00a0conception and execution of US policy,\u00a0for the President and the Congress to create a special board for grand strategy that could give presidents and key officials\u00a0frank assessments and confidential\u00a0guidance to help weave their policy ideas into a durable and\u00a0overarching national strategy. One that might last beyond a few days’ headlines in The New York Times<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The President of the United States, of course has a number of bodies that could, should but do not always provide strategic advice. There’s the Defense Policy Advisory Board<\/a><\/strong>, an Intelligence Advisory Board<\/a><\/strong>,\u00a0 the National Intelligence Council<\/a><\/strong>, the State Department’s<\/strong> Policy Planning Staff<\/a><\/strong>, the Office of Net Assessment<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0and not least, the NSC itself and the Joint Chiefs of Staff<\/a><\/strong>, whose Chairman<\/strong>, by act of Congress, is the military advisor to the President and Secretary of Defense<\/strong>. While strategic thinking does percolate from these entities, many have very specific mandates\u00a0or, conversely, wide ranging briefs on matters other than strategy. Some operate many levels below the Oval Office,\u00a0are filled with superannuated politicians or have\u00a0personnel who, while intellectually brilliant, are excessively political and untrained in matters of strategy. The Joint Chiefs, the professionals of strategy,\u00a0are highly cognizant of the\u00a0Constitutional deference they are\u00a0required to give to\u00a0civilian officials and are very\u00a0leery of overstepping their bounds into the more political realms of policy and\u00a0grand strategy.<\/p>\n

What\u00a0 the President could use is a high level group just focused on getting strategy right – or making sure we have one at all.<\/p>\n

I’m envisioning a relatively small group composed of a core of pure strategists leavened with the most strategically oriented of our elder statesmen, flag officers, spooks and thinkers from cognate fields. A grand strategy board would be most active at the start of an administration and help in the crafting of the national strategy documents and return periodically when requested to give advice. Like the Spartan Gerousia<\/strong>, most of the members ( but not all) would be older and freer of the restraint of institutional imperatives and career ambitions. Like the Anglo-American joint chiefs and international conferences of WWII and the immediate postwar era, they would keep their eye on the panoramic view.<\/p>\n

\"combined-chiefs.jpg\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The Octagon Conference – FDR, Churchill and the Combined Chiefs of Staff<\/strong><\/p>\n

Here’s\u00a0my grand strategy board in a hypothetical perfect world, unlike the one that prevails inside the beltway. I’m sure people will quibble with particular names or will suggest others. I freely admit, for example, that I do not have the best grasp of who our leading intellectual powerhouses are in the Navy, Air Force or the closed world of intelligence analysis and this impairs my ability to put together the list. Nevertheless, I’m trying anyway:<\/p>\n

Let’s start with a group of acclaimed and eminent strategic thinkers\u00a0who have demonstrated over a long tenure, their ability to consider matters of\u00a0war, peace and statecraft as well as the nuances of strategic theory:<\/p>\n

Thomas Schelling -Chairman
\nAndrew Marshall
\nEdward Luttwak
\nColin Gray
\nJoseph Nye<\/strong>
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Next, some senior statesmen:<\/p>\n

Henry Kissinger
\nGeorge Schultz
\nZbigniew Brzezinski<\/strong>
\nMadeleine Albright
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

General officers and one colonel with a demonstrated talent for challenging conventional assumptions:<\/p>\n

Lieutenant General Paul van Riper
\nGeneral James Mattis\u00a0
\nGeneral Jack Keane
\nColonel John Warden<\/strong><\/p>\n

Two economists:<\/p>\n

Alan Greenspan
\nNouriel Roubini<\/strong><\/p>\n

Two scientists:<\/p>\n

Freeman Dyson<\/strong>
\nE.O. Wilson
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Mixed group of strategists, historians, practitioners and theorists:<\/p>\n

David Kilcullen
\nJohn Robb
\nJohn Negroponte<\/strong>
\nBarry Posen
\nAntulio Echevarria<\/strong>
\nChet Richards
\nMicheal Vlahos
\nThomas P.M. Barnett
\nStephen Biddle
\nRobert Conquest
\nDuane Clairridge
\nJack Matlock
\nMartin van Creveld<\/strong><\/p>\n

Visionaries and Contrarians:<\/p>\n

Nicholas Nassim Taleb
\n<\/strong>William Gibson
\nRay Kurzweill
\nAndrew Bacevich
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

What are the problems with my grand strategy board (aside from having zero chance of coming into being)?\u00a0<\/p>\n

For one, it is probably way too large. In my efforts to balance expertise in strategy with varied thinking it grew\u00a0bigger than what is manageable in real life, if the group is to be productive.<\/p>\n

Secondly, it is an\u00a0exceedingly white, male and conservative leaning list\u00a0– though to some extent that reflects the\u00a0criteria of experience, the field of strategy itself and the nature of American politics. \u00a0Barbara Ehrenreich<\/strong>, for example,\u00a0is definitely bright but her politics are fundamentally\u00a0opposed to effectively\u00a0maximizing American power in the world\u00a0or the use of military force – thus making her of little use except as a voice of dissent.<\/p>\n

Another limitation of this exercise\u00a0is the idiosyncratic\u00a0eclecticism of my approach – this was a blog post written over a few days in my spare time and not a methodical inquiry into who in American life would\u00a0verifiably be the “best qualified” to help construct a grand strategy. There are “insiders” who command great respect within the national security, defense\u00a0and intelligence communities who are unknown to the general public, or even this corner of the blogosphere, who would be enormously helpful to such a board. Finally, a grand strategy board would not\u00a0be a panacea; it would be\u00a0subject to all the inertial pressures that over time would reduce it’s ability to effect change, just as the Policy Planning Staff and the NSC have been “neutered” over decades by the forces of the status quo.<\/p>\n

That said, the above group or one reasonably comparable to it could, for a time,\u00a0markedly improve the construction of strategy , assuming American leaders are willing to enlist such advice,\u00a0put aside short term political considerations\u00a0and pursue long term strategic goals.<\/p>\n

Whom would you nominate to a grand strategy board?<\/p>\n

Grand Strategic Viewing<\/strong>:<\/p>\n