Military

DATE=10/10/2002

TYPE=ON THE LINE

NUMBER=1-01206

TITLE=NATIONAL SECURITY STRATEGY

INTERNET=Yes

EDITOR=OFFICE OF POLICY 619-0037

CONTENT=

THEME: UP, HOLD UNDER AND FADE

Host: The United States' new strategy for national security. Next, On the Line.

[music]

Host: The United States has a new official statement of its goals in international affairs. The national security strategy was issued by the White House in September. Its unifying principle is the defense and promotion of freedom. In military terms, that means confronting what President George W. Bush calls "the evil designs of tyrants." In social and economic terms, that means the United States will, in the words of President Bush, use this moment of opportunity to extend the benefits of freedom across the globe, bringing the hope of democracy, development, free markets, and free trade to every corner of the world. The new national security strategy also sets out the president's policy of eliminating the threat posed by rogue states before those states or their terrorist allies are able to mount attacks with weapons of mass destruction. According to the new strategy statement, to "prevent such hostile acts by our adversaries, the United States will, if necessary, act preemptively." Joining me to discuss the new national security strategy are Tom Donnelly, resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute; Marcus Corbin, senior analyst at the Center for Defense Information; and Frank Gaffney, president of the Center for Security Policy. Welcome and thank you for joining us today.

Tom Donnelly, let me start by asking you, what is this national security statement?

Donnelly: As a document, it is as you said in your introduction, a formal expression of American purpose in the world. And it serves both the purpose of setting the tone for the administration, [and] it also gives marching orders to the other federal agencies, particularly the Defense Department, which will then design their programs and their policies and build their budgets to align themselves with this capstone document, so to speak.

Host: Marcus Corbin, how was this document put together? Who was in the planning of it?

Corbin: Probably the key person is the national security advisor, Condoleezza Rice, who is responsible for a variety of the elements of national security, is also responsible for bringing the different components together in a national security strategy.

Host: Frank Gaffney, how significant is this document? What kind of role does it play in American policy?

Gaffney: I think it really depends on how much it reflects the views of the president. And my sense is that this document does. We've seen in the past similar documents. In fact, I think Sandy Berger, the national security advisor to President [Bill] Clinton, or maybe it was Leon Furth, the national security advisor to Al Gore, in recent days saying, "This is more or less the same kind of document that we put out." Not in every particular, that's for sure, but the difference was I think that President Clinton didn't actually subscribe to what was laid out in his national security strategy and I think President Bush does. And if so, it is to be hoped that it will indeed guide the direction of his administration and set the priorities as the budgets and programs get put together.

Host: Tom Donnelly, one of the things that's set out in the preamble of this National Security Statement is that the aim of this strategy is to help make the world not just safer, but better. How so? How is that organized?

Donnelly: Well, from an American perspective those are two sides of the same coin. Our belief is that liberty is the best guarantee of our security, so when the world is free, America is safe. And I think that is certainly one of the unique aspects of the Bush document, compared to, perhaps, past national security strategies is to fuse those two elements back together in a very coherent way.

Host: Marcus Corbin, is that trying though to bite off too much with the security strategy to make the world not just safer but better?

Corbin: Well, it's certainly an ambitious program to improve the world and expand democracy around the world and develop economically all the various regions of the world. It's a lot to chew off. The question is how much they really want to do specifically with programs and resources as opposed to calling for a better world.

Gaffney: Can I add something?

Host: Frank Gaffney.

Gaffney: This is a broad vision and goal, I think, for the United States and how much of it actually gets translated within the space of this presidency, whether it's a four-year term or an eight-year term, I think remains to be seen and will depend in no small measure on events elsewhere encroaching upon the President's policy. But having said that, I think what the president deserves credit for saying is, we really do think this vision will, as Tom says, translate into a better world for not just Americans and their interests and security but for people all over the planet. You know, I think where we see this reduced to a microcosm and a practical test case, if you will, is in Iraq. In Cincinnati recently, the president said we're in this -- that is to say, effecting regime change -- not just to get rid of the weapons of mass destruction but to liberate the Iraqi people. And I think that's a very important measure of commitment.

Host: Tom Donnelly?

Donnelly: I would say that it's important to see this as part of a series of speeches and documents and events that the administration has put out, and the pattern is really quite striking and quite consistent since September 11th. The president has now made a handful, almost half a dozen major speeches about the particulars, such as Iraq. We've had a campaign in Afghanistan, so there's now, not only statements, but a building track record of policy changes that comprise a Bush Doctrine, if you will. And there's clearly more to come, but already there's a pretty substantial body of work, so to speak, that represents a departure from the past.

Host: Marcus Corbin, is this document a justification for action in Iraq or is it broader than that and Iraq just fits into the general overall strategy?

Corbin: I think most immediately it does make the case broadly, in general terms for action in Iraq. It also serves more broadly. The president has outlined broad themes and his strategic intentions and approach to the world. So it really does cover both, I'd say.

Host: Frank Gaffney, let's start talking about some of the specific items in this strategy. The strategy document does not start out with a statement of military principles, but rather starts with the principle that the United States will champion aspirations for human dignity. In that section it says, "No people on earth yearn to be oppressed, aspire to servitude, or eagerly await the midnight knock of the secret police." What is the practical application of this principle in U-S policy?

Gaffney: If implemented, I think it really does commit the United States to an effort, again broadly speaking, to try to transform the many places -- in fact I'm sure it's the vast majority of the population of the planet that remain under the thrall [control] of one kind or another of oppressive or at least authoritarian regime. That's an interesting point of departure because some of those authoritarian regimes are supposed to be our friends; some of them are clearly quite hostile to us. What I think the president is about is trying to demonstrate, now at the rhetorical level, hopefully shortly in a practical way in Iraq, that he does indeed mean to help liberate these people and empower them in a way that Americans with our traditions and our values and the freedoms that many of us frankly take for granted would identify with and appreciate and I think would like to see extended to others around the world.

Host: Tom Donnelly, there's been a lot of talk in the last year about what the root causes for terrorism are and often the issue of, is poverty a root cause? Is there an effort in this strategy document to identify the root cause of terrorism not as poverty but rather as lack of freedom?

Donnelly: Yes. I would say that's very much true. During the past decade, we've been forgetting how important security is and how important our political ideals are. We've been telling ourselves that we live in an age of geoeconomics and not geopolitics. I think this represents -- and certainly you can overstate these things -- but it does kind of represent a recentering, not only of our purpose and our political principles, but also our willingness to employ our national power to try to achieve these goals.

Host: Marcus Corbin, the second main principle set out in the national security strategy is to strengthen alliances, to defeat global terrorism, to work to prevent attacks against us and our friends. How does that work in practice?

Corbin: I think it means lining up people who are on your side. I think there's been a lot of debate about whether the administration is really serious about how much it wants to work with allies and how much it is just going through the motions. But certainly in this document it has outlined the principle that if you work with allies you can marshal forces globally against terrorism.

Host: Frank Gaffney, do you think the administration's just been going through the motions in terms of building coalitions?

Gaffney: No. I don't think so. I think it's taking a different approach to the building of coalitions than we've seen in the past. I would suggest that this document is an expression of American sovereignty. That we have a vision of the world that we would like to see because it benefits us, but also as we have talked about because we think it will benefit others. We are prepared to take action where we can, where it is in our national interest, where our power enables us to do so, to bring about this world at least in its component parts. And we believe, or we are so disposed [to believe], we will by our leadership bring others with us. This is the idea of these coalitions of the willing. [It's] very different from the idea that you have to go to the United Nations and you have to accept whatever is sort of the lowest common denominator of its fulminations, which more or less means doing nothing, or in some cases doing things that are really antithetical to our interests. That's what I would suggest is a main point of departure here.

Donnelly: Yes. I would say that's an important point. And Secretary [of Defense Donald] Rumsfeld actually put it in his usual pithy way and that is that it's the purpose that determines the coalition, not the coalition that determines the purpose. I'm misquoting, but that's the thrust of the idea. And in addition to being an expression of sovereignty, it is an expression of the universality of American political principles. President Bush says repeatedly, and I think quite articulately, that we don't recognize that there's any corner of the world that's exempt from our political principles of individual liberty and democratic governance. Again, how we will actually employ our power in the world will always be subject to practical questions of what is possible and what is difficult. But as an expression of what we intend to achieve, I think this is a clear and very consistent view. Nobody can misunderstand where the president and where the American government is coming from at this point.

Host: Tom Donnelly, let me ask you then about the next item on the security strategy, which again is one that has more of a multilateral tack to it, which is the principle of working with others to defuse regional conflicts. How does that differ from the previous item and where is that going?

Donnelly: Well, again, it's the purpose: "to defuse regional conflicts." We will work with those who are willing [and] those who are able, to protect ourselves and to advance the cause of liberty. And we will welcome anyone that's genuinely dedicated to achieving that goal. In fact we will encourage those. We will help those. As the document says, we will encourage those and help those who need the help. But again, it is a correct ordering of the sequence of events to try to figure out what it is you want to do and then find a mode of achieving that. And too often we've put the process in front of the purpose and now we're getting things back in order.

Host: Let's move to the item that has stirred the most controversy and that is the item that says, "We will prevent our enemies from threatening us, our allies, and our friends with weapons of mass destruction." And the first item under that sets out that there will be what this security strategy sets out as "proactive counter-proliferation efforts." Marcus Corbin, what does that mean?

Corbin: Well, that might mean preemptive action. That's the normal phrase that is when we feel that a nation is preparing to attack us or preparing to help terrorists attack us, that we will take action unilaterally if necessary to strike them first. I think there's a debate as to whether this is more a strategy of preemptive action, which means a more immediate, response to immediate threats -- for example [if] our intelligence detects that somebody is about to launch a missile at us, something like that, versus the broader concept of preventive war, which is more that you think a nation might have the capability in the future to attack us. And it appears at this point, at least given the intelligence that's been released to the public by the president, that Iraq really is more a case of preventive war. I don't believe the president has information that Saddam Hussein has the capability to attack us in the next week or so, but he certainly believes, President Bush certainly believes that there is a capability in the coming months or years for Saddam Hussein to either attack us directly or to give terrorists the means to do so.

Host: Frank Gaffney, let's talk about that distinction.

Gaffney: Yes. This is clearly an element of the strategy, I think, that was sharpened subsequent to September 11th. I think there's no doubt that this was probably a sensible policy beforehand but I think this became an important component of American strategy after we discovered to our horror that the smoking gun was likely to come without any forewarning at all. So this notion of distinguishing between prevention and preemption -- you know, I'm reminded of one of the formative periods, I think for most of our thinking about world events and that was the 1930s. Early in the 1930s, it would have been easy to stop Adolf Hitler from becoming the malevolent force that he ultimately was, which plunged the world into global conflagration. Now some would say, well, you shouldn't do anything until the eve of the Blitzkrieg and I think what the president is saying is that that doesn't really make sense. We ought to try to stop these things. He certainly said this in Cincinnati about Saddam Hussein -- we certainly ought to try to stop these kinds of malevolent forces from fully metastasizing before we deal with them if possible. And that's where I think this preemptive notion as he's defining it comes into play.

Donnelly: If I could quickly just add.

Host: Tom Donnelly.

Donnelly: This distinction between preventive and preemptive really collapses in the face of weapons of mass destruction. Frank's analogy to the Blitzkrieg is good, but again imagine that situation when we're talking about nuclear or biological or chemical weapons. And waiting until the eleventh hour in the fifty-ninth minute for that sort of attack with that kind of a consequence is really difficult.

Gaffney: Not to mention dangerous.

Host: Let's talk a little bit about how the security strategy has been received in opinion around the world. Let's just look at a couple of different opinion pages from different newspapers. Let's start with the Jordan Times, which said, "The security policy of the Bush administration is based on preemptive military strikes against any perceived enemy. Today it's Iraq. Who is next?"

Japan's Asahi Shimbaum said, "The only superpower wants to make all the rules. Without international cooperation and a stance of humility toward the weaker members of the global community, the Bush doctrine will be little more than a self-serving show of brute strength by a misguided superpower." Canada's Nation Post editorialized that, "While many will focus on the document's endorsement of a robust military response to America's enemies, the document is not a mandate for U-S unilateralism. Indeed, Mr. Bush sings the U-N's praises. Yet the document also sets out America's relationship with the rest of the world in candid, hard-headed terms." Marcus Corbin, is this a representation of the different responses that there've been to the national security strategy?

Corbin: Yes. I was surprised by Canada's take on it. [Laughter] But I get the impression that the international reaction has been pretty concerned about the elements of U-S unilateralism in this. I think even though there are many good words in the strategy about alliances and working with others, I think it's fairly clear from the administration's actions that it is ready whenever it feels necessary to move away from the need to work with allies and take immediate action itself whenever it feels necessary.

Host: Frank Gaffney.

Gaffney: I think that you're going to find this kind of cacophonous response to an articulation of policy by a powerful nation like the United States. The thing that I think tends to undercut most of those criticisms is what we're about is genuinely trying to improve the life of people around the world. This is not a formula for enslaving them for imperialist exploitation. This about trying to give people around the world the opportunity for the quality of life that people in the United States have enjoyed for several hundred years. And I think that really ought to be something we keep in perspective here.

Donnelly: We're not out to make all the rules for the Japanese. If we were, we might impose a different set of rules on Japan.

Gaffney: Fifty years ago. [laughter]

Donnelly: Although, on the other hand, there are certain things that we will not tolerate and the threats and dangers of dictatorial regimes with really really dangerous weapons is not something that we can tolerate. And it is incumbent upon us -- our very power makes us responsible for international order in some sense. And we would be shirking our duty and would be the worst sort of ally if we were not the ones to stand up and to lead the coalition and other coalitions against those things that threaten our way of life.

Gaffney: Particularly when you throw into the mix the terrorist connection and the terrorist-sponsoring nations. That just adds a "y" factor.

Host: You've got the last word, we're out of time. I'd like to thank my guests for joining me today. Tom Donnelly of the American Enterprise Institute, Marcus Corbin of the Center for Defense Information, and Frank Gaffney for the Center for Security Policy. For On the Line, I'm Eric Felten.