Morton H. Halperin and Priscilla A. Clapp with Arnold Kanter Bureaucratic Politics and Foreign Policy Second Edition 3409-3 ch0 9/15/06 4:25 PM Page i Bureaucratic Politics and Foreign Policy 3409-3 ch0 9/15/06 4:25 PM Page ii 3409-3 ch0 9/15/06 4:25 PM Page iii second edition Bureaucratic Politics and Foreign Policy Morton H. Halperin Priscilla A. Clapp with Arnold Kanter brookings institution press Washington, D.C. 3409-3 ch0 9/15/06 4:25 PM Page iv about brookings The Brookings Institution is a private nonprofit organization devoted to research, education, and publication on important issues of domestic and foreign policy. Its principal purpose is to bring the highest quality independent research and analysis to bear on current and emerging policy problems. Interpretations or conclusions in Brookings publications should be understood to be solely those of the authors. Copyright © 2006 the brookings institution 1775 Massachusetts Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036 www.brookings.edu All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without permission in writing from the Brookings Institution Press. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data Halperin, Morton H. Bureaucratic politics and foreign policy / Morton H. Halperin, Priscilla A. Clapp. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN-13: 978-0-8157-3409-3 (pbk.: alk. paper) ISBN-10: 0-8157-3409-3 (pbk.: alk. paper) 1. United States—Foreign relations administration. I. Clapp, Priscilla. II. Title. JZ1480.H35 2006 327.73—dc22 2006026348 2 4 6 8 9 7 5 3 1 The paper used in this publication meets minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials: ANSI Z39.48-1992. Typeset in Minion Composition by OSP, Inc. Arlington, Virginia Printed by R. R. Donnelley Harrisonburg, Virginia 3409-3 ch0 9/15/06 4:25 PM Page v Contents Preface vii 1 The ABM Puzzle: An Introduction to 1 Politics inside Government part i: interests and participants 2 National Security Interests 9 3 Organizational Interests 25 4 Domestic Politics and Presidential Interests 62 5 Interests, Faces, and Stands 84 part ii: decisions 6 Initiative and Rules 99 7 Planning a Decision Strategy 119 8 Information and Arguments 139 9 Maneuvers to Affect Information 164 10 Uses of the Press 181 11 Involving the President 204 12 Influence and Decisions 226 part iii: actions 13 Decisions and Implementation 243 14 Actions in the Field 273 15 Presidential Control 292 v 3409-3 ch0 9/15/06 4:25 PM Page vi vi /contents part iv: congress 16 Congress and Bureaucratic Politics 313 part v: conclusions 17 Back to ABM: Some Tentative Answers 347 18 A Complicated Reality 361 References and Bibliography 365 Index 379 3409-3 ch0 9/15/06 4:25 PM Page vii Preface The purpose of this book is to help readers understand the process by which decisions are made and actions are taken by the U.S. govern- ment in the field of national security and foreign policy. The views of its authors have been inspired and influenced by a variety of experiences in the executive branch—in the Defense Department, in the State Department, and on the National Security Council—over a period of nearly forty years. Mor- ton Halperin also has spent many years working with Congress. However, the book is decidedly not autobiographical. Rather, it is based predominantly on the published works of other participants in and observers of the national security bureaucracy. An extensive bibliography of these books and manu- scripts is included at the end of the book. The reader will find a number of long quotations. They are meant to be read. In many cases they are illuminating descriptions of events by a partici- pant; in a few cases they are analyses of key issues, stated clearly and suc- cinctly. They are essential to the book’s central themes. Read them. When this book was first published by the Brookings Institution more than thirty years ago, it was set firmly in the context of the cold war. The world has changed dramatically since then, not only through the realignment of power, alliances, and ideology, but also in how technological advances have transformed the way we communicate and conduct business, both nationally and internationally. It is not surprising that those evolutions have affected some of the structures of national security and foreign policy decisionmak- ing in the U.S. government and therefore some of the propositions advanced vii 3409-3 ch0 9/15/06 4:25 PM Page viii viii /preface in the original book. Amazingly, however, the original book’s thesis remains essentially valid today as a tool for explaining how bureaucracy affects policy decisions and their implementation. This version of Bureaucratic Politics and Foreign Policy is thus largely a reaffirmation of its predecessor, incorporating new materials drawn from the events of the intervening thirty years. We have revised the sections of the book dealing with those government structures and processes that have evolved, and we discuss other significant players that have emerged with the changing policy environment. Most important, a new section has been added to reflect the expanding role of Congress in the decision process and the com- plex nature of bureaucratic structures and rules on Capitol Hill. In addition to the expanding role of Congress, several historical develop- ments warrant special mention here. First is the degree to which humanitar- ian values have assumed greater prominence and weight in the foreign policy process, affecting policy structures, players, and arguments. Second is the impact of the Goldwater-Nichols Act of 1986 (the Defense Reorganization Act) on the role of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in national security decisions. Third is the expansion of the size and role of the White House executive offices—the National Security Council, the new Office of Homeland Security, and the Office of the Vice President—and the impact of that expansion on the president’s role in the policy process. Fourth is the number of additional sig- nificant actors in the foreign policy process, including essentially domestic agencies and departments that have developed international concerns, new agencies like Homeland Security, and new bureaus in the State Department and Defense Department and nongovernmental organizations. And finally, we must acknowledge the degree to which new technology has transformed com- munications within the bureaucracy; communications between Washington and overseas missions; communications between governments; the influence, nature, and role of the press; and the sheer volume of real-time information available to the U.S. government and general public. We remain grateful to those who provided assistance to us in preparing the first edition, as explained by Morton H. Halperin in the original preface: More of this book than I care to acknowledge was taught to me by two of my professors: Warner Schilling (under whom I studied at Columbia College in 1956–57) and H. Bradford Westerfield (Yale University, 1958–59). My interest in the subject was rekindled by the formation at Harvard in 1966 of the “May Group,”which met from time to time to discuss the role of bureaucracy in the making of national security policy. 3409-3 ch0 9/15/06 4:25 PM Page ix preface / ix I learned much from the members of that group, which included Gra- ham T. Allison, Joseph L. Bower, Fred C. Ikle, William W. Kaufman, Andrew W. Marshall, Ernest R. May, Richard E. Neustadt, Don K. Price, and Henry S. Rowen. In July 1966 I went to work in the government, intending to stay for one year as a “participant-observer”; I stayed for nearly three, but quickly lost my status as “observer.”I did, however, learn much about how the bureaucracy functions and about the obligations and responsibilities of a middle-level in-and-outer. My greatest debt is to the late John T. McNaughton, in memory of whom this book is dedicated. McNaughton was killed tragically in an airplane disaster in August 1967 just as he was preparing to move from his post as Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs to become Secretary of the Navy. From McNaughton I learned much about how to operate effectively while maintaining one’s integrity and concentrating on important issues. I learned also from the two men who served as Secretary of Defense while I was in the Pentagon—Robert S. McNamara and Clark Clifford— from my two other bosses, Paul C. Warnke and Henry A. Kissinger, and from numerous colleagues in the federal government, among them Philip Farley, Leslie C. Gelb, Haakon Lindjord, Winston Lord, Richard C. Steadman, Frederick C. Wyle, and Adam Yarmolinsky. In the years since we collaborated at Brookings on the book’s first edition, we have both accumulated much more experience inside government. While the intellectual structure of the book is still essentially academic, its proposi- tions are now even more informed by firsthand experience. We are grateful to the many dedicated public officials with whom we practiced the art of poli- cymaking in the bureaucracy. We also would like to thank Denis McDonough and Scott Lilly for their help reviewing the chapter on Congress. Finally, we offer special thanks to Michael Fuchs for research assistance on this edition and to Arnold Kanter for his important contributions to the first edition and for carefully reviewing portions of the revised text. 3409-3 ch0 9/15/06 4:25 PM Page x 3409-3 ch0 9/15/06 4:25 PM Page xi on the notes in our book The footnotes pinpoint for the reader where the passages that we quote are located and the episodes that we cite are described.