WHAT THE PRESIDENT’S INTERIM NATIONAL SECURITY STRATEGIC GUIDANCE MEANS FOR THE U.S. MILITARY
BY TODD SCHMIDT
On March 3, 2021, President Joseph Biden released his “Interim National Security Strategic Guidance” (INSSG). According to the White House, the interim guidance was issued “to convey President Biden’s vision for how America will engage with the world,” and ensure the actions of federal departments and agencies were in alignment with the president’s forthcoming National Security Strategy. The president’s foreword and guidance signal key policy changes and priorities that will have potentially profound impacts on the U.S. military.
The president highlights in his guidance that the challenges the United States faces are global in nature, require “common cause with our closest allies and partners,” and can only be met through the balanced application of all sources of our national power. Reclaiming America’s position of strength requires building back economic foundations, regaining technological advantages, emphasizing diplomacy, working through international institutions, continuing the modernization of our military, and going so far as to say that we must commit to renewing faith in the apolitical nature of the military.
For the military, Biden’s guidance signals fundamental changes in current national security, foreign policy, and federal spending priorities. These changes in national priorities will challenge the military to adapt its modernization investments, create more agile policy and decision-making processes, anticipate non-traditional missions and hybrid threats, and scrutinize its own profession as it relates to civil-military relations. Failure to address these presidential priorities appropriately could put the military crosswise with the administration and negatively impact the service’s relevance in the years to come.
Impacts to Modernization
Over the course of the last four years, the military renewed investment in critical modernization initiatives. Indeed, “modernization” and “disciplined investments” continue to be a top priority for the current president and Department of Defense. However, as with all things defense-related, politics plays a huge role in the budgetary process. The days of the military being unable to confidently plan defense investments because of budget cuts and “continuing resolutions” are, hopefully, over. However, with midterm elections easily capable of changing current power dynamics in Congress, the extreme partisanship, polarization, and gridlock in the Legislative Branch could cause defense spending to become politically leveraged once again. Regardless, the military must adjust its modernization strategy to conform with the new administration’s spending priorities while maintaining close relations with Congress on both sides of the aisle.
Electoral politics will still influence how defense spending unfolds over the course of the next four years. Campaign promises that commit to demilitarizing decades-old conflict and leading with diplomacy are an obvious signal to anticipate defense-spending cuts, reinvestments, and cost-saving measures. If past is prologue, the military should (and does) expect significant resource constraints over the next two to three years. However, as the 2024 election nears, expect military spending to potentially increase, as incumbents anticipate that increased military spending close to an election will garner increased electoral advantage and support in their congressional districts, states, and nationally.
Archaic Policy and Decision-making Processes
Closely associated with the military’s modernization initiatives, is a term that has become a new buzzword in the defense industry, and halls and upper echelons of the Pentagon: “convergence.” The idea or concept of convergence is ill-defined, but generally describes how advancing technology is creating a revolution in military affairs. Quantum and “edge” computing technologies, nanotechnology, neurotechnology, biotechnology, artificial intelligence, robotics, augmented reality, unmanned weapons, hypersonic vehicles, and space- and cyber-based capabilities are all individual fields of technological advancement that are driving this military revolution. However, when these technologies “converge” to create new, unanticipated capabilities, the speed and velocity of the revolution increases exponentially.
This has profound impacts to archaic policy and decision-making processes, particularly as it relates to national security, foreign policy, and national defense. The military, along with the National Command Authority and National Security Council, are laboring, with difficulty, to maintain pace with current technological developments. Our Combatant Commanders allude to it in their congressional testimonies. Having an agile policy and decision-making process that can respond, in a timely, preventive manner with dynamic and dangerous challenges to U.S. national security interests, is imperative. To cope with and respond to the speed and velocity of international events and national security challenges, decision-makers will be tempted to increase and expand delegation of decision-making authorities down the chain of command from the president to senior military leaders.
While increased delegation may not necessarily be a negative development, there are national, strategic, and political implications for delegating increased authorities to senior military leaders. There must be accountability and oversight. Civilian political leaders are accountable to the American electorate, whereas the military is not. Striking a healthy balance between delegation of authority, civilian oversight, and political accountability will require continuous consideration and review in the decades ahead. Regardless, the United States must retain the ability to act proactively and rapidly respond to the challenges that the current technological revolution will bring to national security and military arenas.
Anticipating Non-traditional Missions and Hybrid Threats
When the president states that the United States will “lead with diplomacy,” revitalize alliances, and work through international institutions to take collective action against global threats, the military should anticipate an increased supporting role in non-traditional missions. The president’s guidance states that “many of the biggest threats we face respect no borders or walls, and must be met with collective action.” The military implications of this approach require the military to be ready to respond to and support whole-of-government stabilization missions.
According to Joint Doctrine (3-07), stabilization efforts directed by a president typically require a joint, interagency, inter-organizational, and multinational approach to addressing conflict, fostering host-nation resiliencies, and creating “conditions that enable sustainable peace and security.” Stability operations are meant to support economic and political instability by providing assistance to a range of “stability sectors,” such as “security, justice and reconciliation, humanitarian assistance and social well-being, governance and participation, and economic stabilization and infrastructure.”
To this end, multiple sources of national power are brought to bear against complex challenges short of war that can require protracted commitment. Stabilization missions can be frustrating to military leaders, because although they are typically led by a host nation or other governmental agency, “when there is no competent lead organization,” the military tends to take ownership of the mission in an attempt to achieve unity of effort.
In addition to the challenges inherent in stability operations, the military faces hybrid threats and challenges that are not necessarily contained to a defined area of operations. Hybrid threats are often trans-regional and global in nature and often challenge the distinctions between homeland defense and homeland security. Information operations, disinformation campaigns and fake news, cyberattacks, and other actions taken below the threshold of war create dilemmas and seams, and exploit gaps in the military’s ability to coherently respond and act. As Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General John Hyten has stated, the military, in overcoming hybrid threats, has “learned that we actually don’t know how to do that very well.”
Professional Scrutiny and Civil-Military Relations
The politicization of the military has weighed heavy on the minds of the military’s senior leaders, particularly over the course of 2020 presidential election. Concerns centered on countering perceptions that the military was acting in a partisan manner that favored Republican Party politics. More recently, we have, somewhat ironically, witnessed flare-ups of social media banter between senior military leadership and conservative entertainment show hosts, such as Tucker Carlson, baiting and drawing the military into a cultural-political fray. Despite opinions regarding Carlson’s offensive, clownish commentary, active-duty military leaders must resist being drawn into un-substantive repartee with trivial entertainment media personalities.
As the military anticipates and plans for the external challenges that lay ahead, it also needs to consider and address internal challenges that can quickly gain traction, distract from core missions, and have strategic societal and political impacts. The military knows that it continues to face workplace challenges related to sexual harassment and sexual assault. In the shadow of the past several years, the military has had to face the reality that a very small population of white supremacists in its ranks are having a strategic impact on the enterprise, as well. Finally, from an over-arching civil-military relations perspective, the military needs to heed the president’s call to become less partisan and political.
The military profession and ethos require constant reflection and review. While elected leaders have a responsibility to provide oversight of the military, as a community of professionals, scrutiny is often most constructive when it comes from within. How the military indoctrinates new members into its sacred profession must reinforce the values that set it apart from other vocations. When the president of the United States—the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces—feels compelled to issue guidance that we must recommit to renewing faith in the apolitical nature of the military, we need to take that admonishment personally. For while the military has never been apolitical in its history, it must strive to be non-partisan and reinforce its commitment to the principle of civilian control.
Learning from History
Nearly 70 years ago, only a few months into his first term, President Dwight D. “Ike” Eisenhower warned Americans of “humanity hanging from a cross of iron.” Eisenhower faced an era of great power competition, ballooning defense spending, an unprecedented budget deficit, an economy at risk, and global challenges that required coordinated response from a strong alliance. Eisenhower perceived the challenges he faced as existential to America’s democratic principles and values. Ike understood that national security must be achieved through balanced application of America’s sources of national power.
Senior military leaders, particularly in the U.S. Army, disagreed vehemently with Eisenhower’s “New Look” agenda and dependence on a theory of “Massive Retaliation.” General Matthew Ridgway, General Maxwell Taylor, and General James Gavin worked tirelessly in opposition to Eisenhower’s national security agenda. They lobbied Congress, gave media interviews, became involved in domestic political issues, and, in Taylor’s case, wrote a book outlining their case and disapproval of Eisenhower’s national security policies.
These generals, heroes to many, challenged the principle of civilian control, believing their personal policy positions were superior to Eisenhower’s and in the best interest to the nation. Indeed, President Eisenhower’s relationship with the military makes for an insightful civil-military relations case study. Ironically, President Eisenhower had graduated from the ranks of the military’s most elite. And he was a Republican.
In a recent engagement with students and the Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Army Chief of Staff General James McConville warned his audience of up-and-coming officers that the military “finds it increasingly hard to stay out of domestic politics.” However, he continued, “We can’t let there be a perception that we choose sides—we can’t have a side!” In previous engagements, he has echoed similar sentiments, warning of politicians attempting to politicize the military and using the military as a political pawn for electoral advantage. In every case, the military must resist these attempts and strive to avoid being put in compromising political positions.
There is an opportunity, as President Biden exhorts, to renew America’s faith in the non-partisan nature of the military and its undying allegiance to the Constitution, not political party, platform, or presidential personality.
Some may read this article and wonder who in the military has the time to worry about all these seemingly ethereal or ephemeral issues. A warrior mentality may strongly assert that at the tactical and operational level, military leaders should be more concerned with ensuring they have enough resources to plan and provide for their next weapons qualification range, collective exercise, or major operational training event. Yet, it matters. Professionals must take the time to reflect on the state of their profession.
For the first time in decades, surveys of the American public regarding trust and confidence in the military have demonstrated a pattern of decline. Gallup Polls have shown that confidence in the military remained relatively steady over the past four years. However, a new study by the Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute find that public trust and confidence in the military has declined by 14 percent between 2018 and 2020.
Military leaders must remain cognizant of prevailing political winds. When political winds shift, the military must ensure that it is firmly planted. The cornerstone that grounds the military is its oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. The pendulum of public favor swings both ways and it is important that we understand that the recent history of the military being regarded as “secular saints” will only last for a season.
The president’s “Interim National Security Strategic Guidance” provides the military with an azimuth for where the current administration is going with national security and foreign policy. The guidance document signals change for which the military must be prepared to respond. There is no doubt that there will be friction as the military adapts to the leadership of President Biden and his administration. However, there is an opportunity, as President Biden exhorts, to renew America’s faith in the non-partisan nature of the military and its undying allegiance to the Constitution, not political party, platform, or presidential personality.
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Colonel Todd A. Schmidt, Ph.D., currently serves as the Director (J5) for Plans, Policy, and Allied Integration in the U.S. Army’s Joint Functional Component Command for Integrated Missile Defense.
The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Pacific Council or the U.S. Army.
