What should the next president do first? Winter 2008 –09 www.belfercenter.org For the Next President— Center Scholars Suggest Priority Actions on Security and Climate/Energy R E ith a new president of the United –No loose nukes; T N E States soon to be elected, Belfer Cen - –No new nascent nukes; C W R ter scholars offer their advice on issues of –No new nuclear weapons states; E F L E national security and climate/energy policy. –No role for nuclear weapons in B The Belfer Center’s Graham Allison , Ashton international affairs. B. Carter , and Joseph S. Nye summarize what • Appoint a Deputy National Secu - they think the president’s top priorities should rity Advisor whose sole responsibil - be to increase security and decrease the threat ity is to integrate, shape, and define of terrorism in the United States. The Center’s the strategic, technical, and political John P. Holdren , Kelly Sims Gallagher , and dimensions of your strategy, to set Henry Lee join together to suggest steps they targets for all departments and agen - believe the next president should take to cies, and to lead U.S. participation in The Belfer Center’s John P. Holdren (left) with Kelly Sims Gallagher (center) and Henry Lee increase energy security and decrease poten - the Global Alliance. tially catastrophic effects of climate disruption. For additional information on these recom - investments in national security are out of mendations, see: www.belfercenter.org/advice . America’s reputation matters balance, with spending on “soft power,” diplomacy, and foreign aid still tiny in com - Improving National Security as much as its power. parison with defense spending. The new —Ashton B. Carter president is required to conduct a Qua - by Graham Allison drennial Defense Review, but he should • A Nuclear 9/11 is the only clear and present broaden it to a National Security Review existential threat to America. Preventing a by Ashton B. Carter encompassing every tool of peace and justice nuclear 9/11 must be a central organizing • The U.S. is spending almost twice as the U.S. can wield. principle of your administration. much on defense as before 9/11. But our continued on page 3 • A successful strategy must confront the dual challenge: (1) in the short run, a deter - mined adversary who demonstrated on 9/11 Acting on Climate and Energy a capacity to kill thousands of Americans and (2) over the longer run, trend-lines that by John P. Holdren, Kelly Sims Gallagher, • Immediately begin bilateral negotiations threaten to take us to a world of nuclear and Henry Lee with the Chinese government on an inter - anarchy. This will require you to: national framework for cooperation on global climate change. The United States and China • “Find, fix, finish” nuclear-capable global together emit nearly half of the global green - terrorists , focusing on the main enemy: Impose a significant price house-gas emissions. Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda central. on carbon . • Mobilize a global undertaking in a new Impose a variable tax 21st century equivalent of NATO: a • Send a climate protection bill to Congress Global Alliance Against Nuclear Terrorism. that (1) imposes a significant price on car - on foreign oil . The Alliance should organize to realize four bon, which escalates over the course of the common objectives: next two decades, (2) includes a provision to • To address both energy security and climate use the revenue from the carbon tax or change, impose a variable tax on foreign oil R E auctioned cap-and-trade permits to imports that would be triggered when crude T N E reduce income taxes and ease the tran - oil prices reach a certain threshold. This would C R E sition for those who would be dispro - entail establishing a floor price. If the price of F L E portionately harmed by the subsequent oil decreases below that floor, the government B increase in prices—primarily low would impose a tax equal to the difference income people, and (3) contains a between the price of oil and the floor. Such a long-term target for climate stabiliza - program would give a clear signal to investors tion. The prices and long-term targets and consumers and would significantly reduce should be re-evaluated in light of new the financial uncertainties caused by the scientific, economic, and technical volatility in oil prices. This program would Belfer Center Director Graham Allison (left) with information every five to ten years. continued on page 3 Center board members Ashton B. Carter (center) and Joseph S. Nye See Global Financial 9/11 – What Now? page 16 FROM THE DIRECTOR R E T N E C R E F L E This issue offers a few tidbits of the work B being done at the Center and offers links to the website for further exploration. As director, I am especially pleased to wel - come new faculty members, fellows, and stu - dents here this fall. Nicholas Burns , the highest-ranking career diplomat at the State Department, has become a professor of the Welcoming Wisdom: Belfer Center founder s our colleague Lawrence Summers (a practice of diplomacy and international poli - Paul Doty greets new fellows at orientation. Amember of the Center’s Board of Direc - tics and a new member of the Center’s Board. Associate Professor Monica Toft (left) looks on. tors) noted recently: in each of the last ten (See the Q&A with Nick on pg. 8.) presidential elections it has been argued that A senior fellow and former director of the Kennedy School are fortunate to have Meghan “this was a uniquely important presidential Managing the Atom project here at the Center, as my co-instructor in the course on “Central election—that the country was at a turning Matthew Bunn has been appointed an associ - Challenges of American Foreign Policy.” point, that the decisions that were going to be ate professor of public policy at the School. The Center is also pleased to provide the made would shape the future irrevocably. This appointment not only acknowledges the intellectual infrastructure for the Kennedy Sometimes clichés turn out to be true.” quality of Matt’s research and its impact on School’s new concentration in International For a Center that attempts to advance pol - global nuclear policy, but is also a vote of con - and Global Affairs (IGA). Ash Carter , faculty icy-relevant knowledge about the most impor - fidence in the future of the Belfer Center. chair of this effort, has taken the lead in creat - tant international challenges, the combination Another senior fellow at the Center, ing this concentration. The Belfer Center has of the economic 9/11, an overcrowded Meghan O’Sullivan , who served until Sep - established and funded twelve Belfer student national security agenda, and growing con - tember 2007 as President Bush’s deputy fellowships for a dozen of the most outstand - sciousness about challenges of energy and cli - national security advisor for Iraq and ing public policy students who have chosen mate change, assure that both our hearts and Afghanistan, has been appointed a lecturer in this concentration. minds are pounding. public policy at the School. Students at the [R]esearch at the Center is Managing the Atom’s Matthew Bunn Named providing policy analysis as input to both campaigns and Associate Professor of Public Policy recommendations relevant to T R he Belfer Center’s the new government . A W E Matthew Bunn , co- [Matt] is the best generator T T S A principal investigator for As Americans go to the polls to elect a new H anywhere of practical ideas T the Belfer Center’s Project R president, members of the Belfer Center are A for reducing the dangers M on Managing the Atom engaged as citizens on both sides of this cam - (MTA), was appointed we continue to face from paign. In addition, research at the Center is associate professor of public nuclear weapons. providing policy analysis as input to both cam - policy at the Harvard —John Holdren paigns and recommendations relevant to the Matthew Bunn Kennedy School in July. new government that will be organized in the HKS Dean David Ell - months immediately ahead. Advice to the next wood announced Bunn’s appointment. president on national security and cli - Bunn also is lead author of the Managing Bunn’s research at the Belfer Center has mate/energy is noted on page 1. A brief sum - the Atom’s annual report “Securing the focused on nuclear theft and terrorism, nuclear mary of proposed “to do’s” for the economy Bomb,” a comprehensive yardstick of global proliferation and measures to control it, and (from Feldstein , Frankel , Summers , and Vol - progress toward locking down nuclear materi - the future of nuclear energy and its fuel cycle. cker ) is featured on page 16. Links to elabora - als and weapons worldwide. Commissioned by Before joining the Kennedy School in 1997, tions of these points—in opeds and the Nuclear Threat Initiative, the report has Bunn served for three years as an advisor to the testimony—can be found on the Center’s web - been credited for suggesting a number of Clinton administration in the Office of Sci - site at www.belfercenter.org/advice . nuclear security measures later implemented ence and Technology Policy, where he played a R E by the government. T major role in U.S. policies related to the for - N E “Matt is enormously knowledgeable, cre - C mer Soviet Union. He also worked at the R E ative, productive, and effective,” said John F National Academies of Sciences and is an L E elected fellow of the American Association for Holdren , director of the Center’s Science, B the Advancement of Science.