Toward a Future National Strategy

Marines from Mike Battery, 4th Battalion, 14th Marines, operate 155mm M198 howitzer in support of Operation Phantom Fury, November 2004 (U.S. Marine Corps/Samantha L. Jones) certain trumpet for friends and allies to heed. In our messy democracy, domes- Toward a Future tic politics and bureaucratic politics will often frustrate strategy, but, in the end, national strategy retains its importance. National Strategy For the entire Cold War, we had one overarching national strategy: the containment of our principal enemy, the A Review Essay Soviet Union. Strategic debates on how to contain the Soviet Union were severe By Joseph J. Collins and constant, but the aims and framework of the strategy were widely accepted. Containment activities ranged from hat could be more important national policy, but, in turn, strategy military operations to subtle diplomacy or than a nation’s strategy? A guides subordinate plans and policies. foreign aid to the more than occasional W strategy brings together ends, It provides a framework that can help covert operation. When the Cold War ways, and means. It assesses costs and us comprehend contextual develop- ended, some claimed that history (and risks and establishes priorities. It takes ments, which, in turn, can reshape the strategy!) had ended, but others argued basic guidance and direction from strategy. A consistent strategy is also a that the United States had to exploit its “unipolar moment” or otherwise behave, in Madeleine Albright’s phrase, as the world’s “indispensable nation.” Dr. Joseph J. Collins is the Director of the Center for Complex Operations, Institute for National Strategic Studies, at the National Defense University. A retired Army colonel, he was formerly Deputy The predominant national strategy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Stability Operations. that emerged has been called primacy or JFQ 84, 1st Quarter 2017 Collins 93 liberal hegemony. During the years of the Trump should choose one of three strate- of overlapping commitments, interests, Bill Clinton administration, this strategy gies: Independent America, Moneyball and rivalries demands the kind of long- featured engagement and enlargement America, or Indispensable America. After term strategic thinking that a Moneyball of the number of democracies, especially quizzing the readers about their views, approach, with its focus on limited in Europe. After failures in Somalia Bremmer artfully takes a chapter to investment in limited goals for near-term and Rwanda, the domestically focused advocate for each of the strategies, later results, can never produce. How many Clinton team fought low-casualty air wars matching the readers’ views to their pref- American (and global) problems are the in Bosnia and Kosovo, followed by peace erences on his quiz. result of short-term thinking” (137)? enforcement operations, which were Independent America, what some Advocates of Indispensable America are followed by what came to be known as would call neo-isolationist America, ar- globally focused, activist, and oriented on nation-building. The George W. Bush gues that America is overextended abroad both standing up to and engaging China administration initially rejected nation- and underfunded at home. In the future, and Russia. American values loom large building and tried to focus on great it should forget about being the leader of in this strategy, and expanding the num- power relations, but fate had another the free world, lead by example at home, ber and vitality of democracies around path in mind. After the 9/11 attacks, be far less active abroad, and concentrate the world is also part of the approach. President Bush conducted a retaliatory on improving its infrastructure and Bremmer’s advocacy for this option war against al Qaeda and the Taliban economy. This strategy option, as written, concludes: government in Afghanistan, and less than even rejects regional and global trading 2 years later, a preventive war against arrangements. For Independent America, Seven U.S. presidents, Democrats and Iraq, presumed to be both a supporter of “national security begins at home,” and Republicans, followed their [Truman international terrorism and the holder of to protect the homeland, we have to and Eisenhower’s] lead. When Soviet weapons of mass destruction stockpiles invest in public infrastructure, border communism finally collapsed, democracy, and research programs. That misestimate protection, and homeland defense. freedom of speech, and free-market capital- led to a still-compounding tragedy in the Moneyball America—despite the ism began the next phase of their global Middle East. catchy title—is actually a strategy guided advance. Imagine the cost to the world if The Barack Obama administration by finite, prudent realism, “a cold- America decides that the job is now fin- made it quite clear that its priorities were blooded, interest-driven approach that ished—that Americans will no longer fight ending the war in Iraq and first surging redefines America’s role in the world in a for these values (158). and then drawing down in Afghanistan. way designed to maximize the return on The new President was all about exit the taxpayer’s investment” (89). Aiming Bremmer, an internationalist, sur- strategies, with the accent mark on exit directly at both security and prosper- prises the reader in his last chapter when and less so on strategy. U.S. strategy en- ity simultaneously, Moneyball America he—almost reluctantly—opts for the neo- countered a host of new problems. Allied demands more prudent intervention- isolationist, Independent America, with dissatisfaction with the Obama adminis- ary choices, a focus on vital interests, the addition of an added plank on more tration appeared to rise as overseas policy prudent negotiations, the use of sanc- international trade. In the conclusion, problems increased and compounded one tions, and, occasionally, leading from however, he puts aside his own prefer- another. Today, the United States finds behind. It takes its direction on using ences and insists that the key thing for the itself war-weary and deficit-ridden, with force from the Colin Powell and Casper Trump administration is to choose a sin- much of the world dissatisfied with our Weinberger doctrines. In Bremmer’s gle strategy and to follow it consistently: leadership. We are at a strategic inflec- formulation, this strategy emphasizes “The worst choice of all is to refuse to tion point. What we have been doing trade, especially in the Asia-Pacific region. choose, because I don’t believe we can no longer works, and the need for a new Overall, Moneyballers argue for humility: continue to improvise our foreign policy. strategic course is overwhelming. “America is not an exceptional nation. We’re confusing our allies, our rivals, and Three books have performed seri- America is the most powerful, but that the American people with an incoherent ous strategic critiques that range from doesn’t mean that it’s always right. We approach to an increasingly dangerous the theoretical to the micro-analytical. are not all-knowing, and the universal world” (191). Together, they have produced a set of benefit is never our concern” (119). Bremmer’s short book is earnest, books that should be read by the incom- Indispensable America, which takes clever, and appeals to a wide audience. ing national security team. its names from Madeleine Albright’s Its laser-like focus on the elements of The first book is Ian Bremmer’s oft-used phrase, is a strategy that is ori- each of the three strategies is terrific, but Superpower: Three Choices for America’s ented on global leadership, engagement, the student of international affairs and Role in the World.1 Bremmer, the founder and, where necessary, intervention. This the policy wonk need more detail to add of the Eurasia Group and a prolific strategy is frequently referred to as liberal meat to the strategic frameworks that he author, argues that we have become in- hegemony or primacy. It is long-term in so artfully builds. creasingly directionless and that Donald its perspective: “Today’s globalized world 94 Commentary / Toward a Future National Strategy JFQ 84, 1st Quarter 2017 Barry Posen’s Restraint: A New entail a reduction in “political commit- Posen’s recommendations, however, Foundation for U.S. Grand Strategy ments and military deployments” and made sense for his restraint strategy when adds theoretical and practical detail to transitioning many regional burdens to it was written, but may need to be modi- the debate over future strategy.2 It also our allies over a decade. Posen treats fied to take into consideration aggressive goes one step further than Bremmer: every region of the globe in some de- changes in Chinese and Russian behav- Posen includes a military strategy, a force tail, but in all, U.S. allies receive tough iors, as well as operations against ISIL. structure, and a useful risk analysis. Posen love under the strategy of restraint. For Similarly, writing in 2012–2013, Posen is a senior professor at the Massachusetts example, over time, Israel would lose its might want to reconsider his argument Institute of Technology and a prolific multibillion-dollar U.S. defense subsi- that U.S. troops should be withdrawn on academic writer on national security is- dies. Posen also concedes that some of schedule from Afghanistan, “no matter sues. His book, published in 2014, is a our major allies might have to become what develops” (127). Posen is wary of cousin to Bremmer’s Moneyball strategy. nuclear powers in the process of reestab- China, but does not support suggestion Motivated by perceived failures such as lishing regional balances. His proposals by “offensive realists” to contain it or fos- the enlargement of the North Atlantic for fighting violent terrorist movements ter a “preventive cold war” (171). Treaty Organization (NATO), the war are balanced, even if less detailed than his The strategy of restraint is a potential in Kosovo, and the Iraq War, Posen thoughts about major powers.

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