A year ago, as mandated by the Goldwater-Nichols Act of 1986, the Biden administration published its National Security Strategy (NSS), which theoretically serves as the grand strategy document for the United States, linking the ends of policy with the means available to achieve them in light of limited resources. As events continue to unfold at home and abroad, what can we say about the Biden NSS?
In theory, the NSS shapes the National Defense Strategy (NDS) and the Defense Strategic Guidance (DSG), documents developed and released by the Secretary of Defense to guide defense planning; and the National Military Strategy (prepared by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff) outlining of how the U.S. military will implement its portion of the NSS. In practice, an effective process for developing a unified strategy that coordinates all aspects of government is hard to implement. The sequencing is rarely linear. The budget cycle intervenes, forcing DoD and the independent services to make critical decisions without an agreed-upon strategy. And real-world events can disrupt the process, requiring a modification of the discourse.
Strategy is ultimately best understood as the interaction of three factors, all within the context of risk assessment: Ends (the goals or objectives set by national policy that the strategic actor seeks to achieve); Means (the resources available to the strategic actor); and Ways (the strategic actor’s plan of action for utilizing the means available). In essence, a good strategy articulates a clear set of achievable goals; identifies concrete threats to those goals; and then, given available resources, recommends the employment of the necessary instruments to meet and overcome those threats while minimizing risk.
Although strategy can be described as the conceptual link between ends and means, it cannot be reduced to a mere mechanical exercise. Instead, it is “a process, a constant adaptation to shifting conditions and circumstances in a world where chance, uncertainty, and ambiguity dominate.”
Strategy, properly understood, is a complex phenomenon comprising a number of elements. Among the most important of these are geography; history; the nature of the political regime, including such elements as religion, ideology, culture, and political and military institutions; and economic and technological factors. Accordingly, strategy can be said to constitute a continual dialogue between policy on the one hand and these various factors on the other, in the context of the overall international security environment.
Real strategy must also take account of such factors as technology, the availability of resources, and geopolitical realities. The strategy of a state is not self-correcting. If conditions change, policymakers must be able to discern these changes and modify the nation’s strategy and strategic goals accordingly. The United States has faced substantial geopolitical changes of great magnitude since the end of the Cold War: the decline and then reassertion of Russian power, the expansion of terrorist organizations, the rise of China, disorder in the Greater Middle East, and the new geopolitics of energy. US grand strategy must adapt to these geopolitical changes.
Although Biden’s NSS hits the mark on some issues, e.g. recognizing the threat to the United States posed by China, and to a lesser extent, Russia, it nonetheless suffers from the deficiencies of the worst previous iterations, especially those issued by Obama: 1) it is a mishmash, a wish list from all governmental departments and the “national security community,” which favors an approach to foreign policy based on “liberal internationalism;” 2) it is aspirational and contradictory; and 3) most importantly, it tends to dismiss the importance of geopolitics and the role of power in the international arena.
The Biden NSS identifies two principal strategic challenges: 1) competition between democracies and autocracies (i.e., China and Russia) on the one hand; and 2) cooperation to address “shared challenges”—climate change, arms control, food insecurity, global health threats, environmental problems, inequality among nations, and energy transition—on the other. But it prioritizes climate change and the “threat” of domestic terrorists over geopolitics. The result has been strategic incoherence from Ukraine to the Pacific.
The contrast with Trump’s NSS is instructive. To begin with, it reflected a foreign policy perspective based on “realism” as opposed to “liberal internationalism.” Trump’s NSS was featured four “pillars:” 1) protect the American people, the homeland, and the American way of life; 2) promote American prosperity; 3) preserve peace through strength; and 4) advance American influence.
These pillars are absent from the Biden NSS, which would subordinate US national security to international organizations and a mythical “international community.” The document continues the unfortunate practice by too many U.S. policymakers of making a fetish of international organizations. Such organizations are means, not ends. In fact, the end or purpose of American power should be to secure the republic, protect its liberty, and facilitate the prosperity of its people. The U.S. is not “entitled” to wield its power for some “global good,” independent of national interests. Indeed, Trump’s election in 2016 was due in part to the perception that U.S. power was not being used to advance the interests of citizens but in the service of others, i.e., the “international community,” international institutions, and the like.
A sound U.S. grand strategy should seek to assure the freedom, security, and prosperity of the U.S. A sound grand strategy should aim to enhance American power, influence, and credibility as the means for achieving those ends. A sound grand strategy should seek to cooperate when possible, but compete and dominate when necessary. Biden’s National Security Strategy has proven to be a failure on all counts.
Source : Golocal Prov
