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Organizing for National Security
Douglas Stuart Dr.
Over the last decade the United States has been confronted with not just the collapse of the Soviet empire but also with revolutionary scientific breakthroughs, the transformation of the global economy, and the erosion of many of the basic premises of the Westphalian system of international order. The U.S. policy community has attempted to make sense of these and other changes by recourse to bodies such as the National Defense Panel and the U.S. Commission on National Security/21st Century (USNCS/21). The USNCS/21 is currently in the third phase of its mandated activities. At the end of phase three, the members of the Commission will recommend changes in the institutions of the U.S. national security policymaking system. Its conclusions are likely to stimulate a lively, and much needed debate.
In order for institutional reform to succeed, it will have to be guided by a coherent and compelling national strategy which must, in turn, be anchored in widely-accepted national interests. It will also have to be in accord with such constitutional principles as civilian control of the armed forces and the inviolability of the civil liberties of all Americans. Hopefully, the chapters in this volume will offer some useful insights and some encouragement. -
Transnational Threats: Blending Law Enforcement and Military Strategies
Carolyn Pumphrey Dr.
On February 2-3, 2000, the U.S. Army War College, the Triangle Institute for Security Studies, and the Duke University Center for Law, Ethics, and National Security co-sponsored a conference in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. The conference examined transnational threats, including terrorism involving weapons of mass destruction, cyber threats to the national infrastructure, and international organized crime. The goal was to evaluate the seriousness of such threats and discuss strategies for dealing with them. In particular, the conference sought to address the question of how military and law enforcement could blend their strategies to better counter transnational threats. A secondary purpose was to clarify the role of the military in meeting challenges that transcend national borders and threaten our national interests. This book highlights some of the main issues and themes that ran through the conference. After looking at the various threats and undertaking a risk assessment, the report considers the unique aspects of transnational threats, and then identifies the key challenges facing the United States, paying particular attention to the role of the military. The book concludes with discussions of some of the steps that should be taken to secure ourselves against transnational threats
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Generations Apart: Xers and Boomers in the Officer Corps
Leonard Wong Dr.
The author addresses the junior officer attrition problem by identifying and discussing the disparity between senior and junior officers in terms of generational differences. Officers from the Baby Boom Generation think and perceive things differently than officers from Generation X. Using empirical evidence to support the generational differences literature, the author points out that Generation X officers are more confident in their abilities, perceive loyalty differently, want more balance between work and family, and are not intimidated by rank. Additionally, while pay is important to Generation X officers, it alone will not keep junior officers from leaving. The solutions presented in the monograph range from strategic policies changing the Army as an organization to operational leadership actions affecting the face-to-face interaction between senior and junior officers.
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American Strategy: Issues and Alternatives for the Quadrennial Defense Review
Steven Metz Dr.
The combination of a congressionally-mandated Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR), a change of presidents, and shifts in the global security environment will force or allow American strategists to rethink some of the basic elements of U.S. strategy and decide if any changes need to be made. It is vital that the defense transformation process be strategy driven rather than dictated by budgets or technology alone. In other words, the first step in assessing the status and the future of American strategy is to examine the concepts and broad alternatives on which it is built.
In this monograph, the author begins with a survey of the evolution of American defense strategy since the end of the Cold War. He then describes some the key issues which will shape the upcoming QDR and assesses a range of strategic alternatives ranging from the existing strategy to some new and innovative ones. For each alternative, he describes the key assumptions and the risks involved. He ends with a slate of recommendations including a controlled shift away from the focus on large-scale regional war with rogue states. -
Peacekeeping and the Just War Tradition
C. Anthony Pfaff Dr.
Major Tony Pfaff, a former Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the United States Military Academy, addresses an important source of much of the confusion that currently surrounds many of the Operations Other Than War (OOTW) that the military finds itself participating in with increasing frequency. The author points out that, though the source of this confusion is primarily ethical, it has important operational implications as well. In the Just War Tradition, as well as the Law of War, there has always been a tension between winning and fighting well, and the peacekeeping environment does not change this. Commonly, the resolution of this tension is expressed in the maxim: always use the least amount of force necessary to achieve the military objective. This maxim applies, regardless of what environment one is in. The author's contention is, however, that the understanding of necessary is radically different in the peacekeeping environment than it is in more conventional operations. Failure to understand this results in a great deal of confusion as soldiers try to apply an ethic designed for dealing with enemies in environments where there are none.
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Theater Missile Defense in Japan: Implications for the U.S.-China-Japan Strategic Relationship
Patrick M. O'Donogue Colonel
Colonel Patrick M. O'Donogue (U.S. Army War College class of 2000) considers a topic of key importance to U.S. national security. Perhaps no security matter (with the exception of National Missile Defense) is as contentious globally as Theater Missile Defense (TMD). The question of U.S. assistance to Japan to develop and deploy a TMD is particularly complex and controversial.
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People's Liberation Army After Next
Susan M. Puska Colonel
The 1999 PLA Conference, which was hosted jointly by the American Enterprise Institute and the U.S. Army War College's Strategic Studies Institute, convened September 10-12, 1999, at Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania. The goal of this conference was to comprehensively examine Chinese military modernization efforts. The meeting drew together leading experts on the PLA army, navy, air force, missile forces, and national defense industries and included PLA experts with opposing views on the pace and likely success of Chinese military modernization. Lively debate continually probed analytical differences and prejudices, as well as the sources of information upon which conclusions were based. The conference also included a preliminary yet timely examination of the PLA s potential application of information warfare. An initial discussion of the post-Kosovo implications for China s Taiwan strategy and China s foreign military relations also took place.
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The Information Revolution and National Security
Thomas E. Copeland Mr.
The effects of the information revolution are particularly profound in the realm of national security strategy. They are creating new opportunities for those who master them. The U.S. military, for instance, is exploring ways to seize information superiority during conflicts and thus gain decisive advantages over its opponents. But the information revolution also creates new security threats and vulnerabilities. No nation has made more effective use of the information revolution than the United States, but none is more dependent on information technology. To protect American security, then, military leaders and defense policymakers must understand the information revolution.
The essays in this volume are intended to contribute to such an understanding. They grew from a December 1999 conference co-sponsored by the U.S. Army War College Strategic Studies Institute and the University of Pittsburgh Matthew B. Ridgway Center for International Security Studies. The conference brought together some of the foremost members of the academic strategic studies community with representatives of the U.S. Government and U.S. military. As could be expected when examining a topic as complex as the relationship between the information revolution and national security, the presentations and discussions were far-ranging, covering such issues as the global implications of the information revolution, the need for a national information security strategy, and the role of information in U.S. military operations. While many more questions emerged than answers, the conference did suggest some vital tasks that military leaders and defense policymakers must undertake. -
Chinese Arms Exports: Policy, Players and Process
Bates Gill Dr. and Evan S. Medeiros Mr.
Global arms proliferation continues to be a key concern for the United States, particularly the export role of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Although China experienced a significant decline in its arms exports in the 1990s (down from the boom times of the 1980s), the PRC provides a significant array of lethal weapons and sensitive defense technologies to states around the world. These exports provide an invaluable means by which to assess the progress and performance of China's military-industrial complex. Moreover, these products may present the very systems and technological know-how that the United States and allied forces will encounter in a future conflict.
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Chinese Army Building in the Era of Jiang Zemin
Andrew Scobell Dr.
To many in the United States, China looms large and threatening. This monograph attempts to answer, through an analysis of China's defense establishment under the leadership of Jiang Zemin, questions such as: What are the national security and national military goals of China's leaders? What strategies are Chinese leaders considering in pursuit of these goals? What is the likelihood that these goals will be attained? It assesses the political and economic determinants of China s effort to modernize its armed forces. Four possible strategies are outlined: (1) playing the superpower game," (2) playing to its strengths," (3) changing the rules of the game," or (4) don t play that game." The factors that will determine the selection of a strategy are examined. The most likely strategy is identified and its outcome of evaluated. Lastly, the implications of the study for the U.S. defense community are addressed.
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Threats to Russian Security: The View from Moscow
Stephen J. Blank Dr.
The documented threat assessments addressed here are clearly the culmination to date of a long-standing process by which the Russian military and government have forsaken the optimistic Westernizing postures and visions of the initial post-Soviet years and returned in many respects to assessments and demands for specific policies that evoke the Soviet mentality and period. The armed forces and the government have adopted a viewpoint that magnifies both the internal and external threats to Russia that they perceive and regard those threats as growing in number and saliency. This viewpoint is fundamentally at odds with both the post-1985 Soviet and Russian perspective and with Western perspectives on international security. The future course of Russian security policy is one of the most important and difficult questions in contemporary international affairs. This monograph addresses basic issues pertaining to Russia s future options for policymakers' consideration and reflection as the global debate over Russia s future direction under Vladimir Putin takes shape.
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Multinational Land Forces and the NATO Force Structure Review
Thomas-Durell Young Dr.
Since 1991, standing and mobilization forces made available by nations to NATO have been steadily reduced, particularly in the case of land forces. Equally important have been the structures NATO has created into which national contributions would fall on deployment. Military Committee (MC) 317, accepted by nations in 1991, provides the framework by which NATO organizes its forces. However, the author argues that, while there are arguably sufficient reaction forces to support NATO Ministerial Guidance, there are numerous weaknesses that would, and have, inhibited the efficient and effective deployment of land forces in crises. More specifically, there are insufficient deployable reaction headquarters, both at the corps and component command level, that would support a commander of a NATO Combined Joint Task Force. The continued existence of what has become atavistic practices of nations impede and inhibit the employment of multinational land forces by an Allied commander. The author observes that the NATO Force Structure Review offers nations an opportunity to review these dated structures, organizations, and practices.
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U.S. Military Engagement with Transcaucasia and Central Asia
Stephen J. Blank Dr.
The Clinton administration has proclaimed a strategy to engage and enlarge the democratic community of states. By virtue of their strategic location adjacent to Russia, the Middle East, and Europe s periphery, and their large-scale oil and natural gas deposits, Transcaucasia and Central Asia have become important testing grounds of this strategy. The U.S. goal of irrevocably integrating these states into the Western state system economically, politically, and militarily has made them an intensifying focus of international rivalry with Russia. Moscow still perceives these areas as part of its sphere of interest and deeply resents U.S. engagement there. Furthermore, Moscow's current war with the breakaway province of Chechnya demonstrates its willingness to contest expanding U.S. interests forcefully. Moreover, in this region many factors exist that could cause other conflicts. Accordingly, it is a sensitive place to test the strategic rationale of the engagement strategy and its military corollary, a strategy whose goal is to shape the emerging environment in directions that we wish to see. This monograph contributes to the debate that has just begun and which undoubtedly will last for a long time over what our strategy for the new states should be and how it should be carried out.
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The PLA and the Kosovo Conflict
June Teufel-Dreyer Dr.
The U.S. armed forces are not the only military that has sought to discern the lessons of the Kosovo campaign in the spring of 1999. The Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) has also analyzed the conflict and drawn its own conclusions. In fact, as Dr. June Teufel Dreyer, Professor of Political Science at the University of Miami in Florida, observes, rather than reach a single set of conclusions, different groups within the Chinese military drew different judgments. Dr. Dreyer argues that these differences of opinion reflect the considerable diversity of thinking about defense modernization and future war that exists within the PLA today. The analysis that follows provides an opportunity for readers to learn about the different strands in Chinese strategic thinking as that country enters the 21st century. The different views that Dr. Dreyer identifies reminds us of the dangers of treating the PLA as a single monolithic entity. Only through careful study and analysis can we anticipate trends in the future direction of the PLA.
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Shaping the World through Engagement: Assessing the Department of Defense's Theater Engagement Planning Process
Thomas Jordan COL, Douglas C. Lovelace Professor, and Thomas-Durell Young Dr.
The Department of Defense (DoD) has launched an ambitious planning initiative that could have a major impact upon how resources are allocated among the military departments and the combatant commands. The National Command Authorities have directed the geographic combatant commanders-in- chief (CINCs) to implement the administration's strategy of shaping within their areas of responsibility (AORs). In the past, no single, unified planning mechanism within the Joint Strategic Planning System (JSPS) addressed the issue of shaping. DoD seeks to ensure that all shaping activities conducted by the U.S. armed forces are executed within the parameters of existing law and stated policy. In this particular aspect of implementing the President's strategy, DoD faces difficult challenges and opportunities. This monograph addresses how well Theater Engagement Planning methodology has been designed and implemented and offers recommendations to improve the existing process.
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The Future of the American Military Presence in Europe
Lloyd J. Matthews Colonel
Ten years have elapsed since the fall of the Berlin Wall, which served as a fitting symbol for the end of the Cold War. That historic juncture brought into question the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which has served Alliance members so well since its founding in 1949. It also brought into question the rationale for America's continued deep involvement in European security affairs. With the gradual realization that the Russian menace is essentially dead, at least for the next 10 to 15 years and perhaps longer, and with NATO's missions having evolved well beyond the original purpose of territorial defense, debate on both sides of the Atlantic has begun to intensify concerning the vital issue of where NATO should be headed and America's relation to the Alliance.
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Armed Conflict in the 21st Century: The Information Revolution and Post-Modern Warfare
Steven Metz Dr.
Within the past decade, the U.S. military has implemented a number of programs to assess the changes underway in the global security environment and in the nature of warfare. Defense leaders and thinkers have concluded that revolutionary change is taking place and, if the United States develops appropriate technology, warfighting concepts, and military organizations, it can master or control this change, thus augmenting American security. Dr. Steven Metz suggests that official thinking within the U.S. military may be too narrow. The information revolution, he contends, will have far-reaching strategic effects. The transformation it brings will not only be technological, but political, social, ethical and strategic as well. As he explores the impact that the information revolution may have on the conduct of armed conflict, Dr. Metz introduces a number of ideas which need further analysis, including the potential for the emergence of nontraditional, networked enemies; multidimensional asymmetry; the privatization of security; and the potential impact of technologies like robotics, nonlethality, and nanotechnology. He concludes with an assessment of the features likely to characterize successful militaries in the 21st century.
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European Security: Washington's Shaping Strategy in Action
Stephen J. Blank Dr., Thomas-Durell Young Dr., and William T. Johnsen Dr.
Notwithstanding the claims of some in the United States, European affairs continue to dominate U.S. foreign policy and strategic thinking. The end of the Cold War has not seen any blurring of the focus of U.S. officials on European affairs. Managing the implications of the break-up of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact, the seemingly never-ending conflicts in the Balkans, increasing Western norms and institutions in Central and Eastern Europe, and expanding and reforming the North Atlantic Alliance are just some of the issues that require firm and consistent U.S. leadership.
How the United States has, and should continue, to deal with these issues is the subject of this collective effort. In addition to assessing past and present challenges to U.S. and Western security interests and objectives in Europe, the authors also analyze the strategies and policies of the Department of Defense in this crucial region of the world. Recommendations for consideration by officials include the need for a lighter leadership touch in some areas and for stronger encouragement in others. However, let there be no doubt that a U.S. policy toward Europe of stasis or benign neglect should be rejected. The United States is a European power by virtue of its history, current commitments, and strategic and political exigencies. Finding the most efficacious means of achieving these national objectives, while working to effect a Europe whole and free, is the daunting long-term task to be faced. -
Future Leadership, Old Issues, New Methods
Douglas V. Johnson Dr.
Each year, the Army After Next Seminar students are asked to orient their Strategy Research Papers on topics appropriate to the programs 30-years in the future focus. Thirty years ago, the United States Army was deeply involved in Vietnam and in the Cold War. Officers could reasonably expect to serve repetitive tours in Southeast Asia interspersed with tours along either the Korean Demilitarized Zone or the Inter-German Border. The tension between sometimes guerrilla, sometimes major warfare in the Pacific and the prospects of nuclear war in Europe made any prognostications of a future like that which we currently enjoy an exercise in silliness. Yet we are now asking officers to make such prognostications with the end in view that they might be less surprised by whatever does come into being.
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Prevailing in a Well-Armed World: Devising Competitive Strategies Against Weapons Proliferation
Henry D. Sokolski Mr.
This book provides insights into the competitive strategies methodology. Andrew Marshall notes that policymakers and analysts can benefit by using an analytical tool that stimulates their thinking about strategy in terms of long-term competition between nations with conflicting values, policies, and objectives. The book also demonstrates the strengths of the competitive strategies approach as an instrument for examining U.S. policy. The method focuses on policies regarding the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. In shaping the international environment in the next millennium, no other national security issue seems as complex or important. The imperative here is to look to competitive strategies to assist in asking critical questions and thinking both broadly, as well as more precisely, about alternatives for pitting U.S. strengths against opponents weaknesses in global, regional or interstate competitions. Part I suggests that the competitive strategies approach has value for both the practitioner and the scholar. Part II uses the framework to examine and evaluate U.S. nonproliferation and counterproliferation policies formed in the final years of the 20th century. In Part III, the competitive strategies method is used to analyze a regional case, that of Iran.
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The United States and Colombia: Untying the Gordian Knot
David Passage Ambassador
Twenty-five years after the end of the Vietnam War, the ghost of that war still haunts the corridors of the decision makers when it comes to making long-term commitments to situations that remotely resemble anything like our Indochina experience. That is the case in with Colombia, which is embroiled in an internecine struggle with two guerrilla movements bent on overthrowing the government as well as from narcotraffickers. The author details the complicated but increasingly clear nexus between the political and social insurgencies and the drug traffickers. This, he maintains, has obliged a highly reluctant United States to reexamine whether its counternarcotics strategy can succeed if it is not accompanied by a willingness to assist the Colombian government improve its ability to defeat guerrillas and regain control of its national territory. If the United States is to become even more involved in the internal struggles in Colombia, it is a good bet the U.S. Army will play an important role.
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The United States and Latin America: Shaping an Elusive Future
Donald E. Schulz Dr.
The demise of the Cold War has produced not an "End of History" but a "New World Disorder," which may well become more tumultuous in the decades ahead. Thus, it is crucial at this turn of the millennium to reconsider the prospects for regional security, the challenges that both new and old dangers may pose to U.S. interests, and the kind of strategy and policies that might enable the United States to both better cope with current problems and head off those that are just over the horizon.
The author first analyzes U.S. security interests in Latin America, then goes on to survey the primary challenges to those interests, and how well U.S. strategy and policy are equipped to cope with them. He suggests how the security environment is likely to change over the next quarter century, both in terms of the new dangers that may arise and the evolution of problems that already exist. His conclusion that we are not strategically equipped to face the future is a disturbing one, for Latin America's importance to the United States is growing fast even as our attention is flagging. Will we have the insight to recognize our own interests, the will to commit sufficient resources to attain them, and the intellectual wherewithal to relate our means to our ends? -
Refining American Strategy in Africa
Steven Metz Dr.
The author provides a broad overview of the African security environment as a basis for recommendations on the refinement of American strategy in that region. He assesses both the opportunities for positive change which exist today, and the obstacles. While only Africans themselves can determine the future of their region, an American strategy which discourages proxy aggression, encourages private initiatives in the economic and political spheres, and uses the U.S. military, particularly the Army, to engage its African counterparts could pay great dividends. American defense strategy calls for using the military to help shape the global security environment, preempting and deterring conflict and building regional mechanisms for security. This is a particularly wise approach to Sub-Saharan Africa.
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Asia-Pacific Security: China's Conditional Multilateralism and Great Power Entente
Jing-dong Yuan Dr.
According to Dr. Jing-dong Yuan, China now recognizes that multilateral engagement is unavoidable and indeed can be useful in advancing China's interests. China's embrace of multilateralism, however, varies depending upon the particular forum and specific issue. Furthermore, Dr. Yuan contends China remains leery of entering into arrangements that might constrain its independence and flexibility. This change in China's attitude toward multilateralism is a significant one that has important implications for U.S. national security strategy and for U.S. interests in the Asia-Pacific.
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Army Professionalism, the Military Ethic, and Officership in the 21st Century
John A. Nagl Major, C. Anthony Pfaff Dr., and Don M. Snider Dr.
The authors address what they—and many others—perceived to be a decline in military professionalism in the Army officer corps. The authors first describe the ethical, technical, and political components of military professionalism and then address the causes for the decline. They conclude by proposing a set of principles which, if adhered to, will reinvigorate the vision of the officer corps and motivate the corps to selfless service.
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