Customer Reviews

Hard Power: The New Politics of National Security

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I know Michael O'Hanlon, whom I consider to be one of the most insightful and honest policy analysts in America--his one line in "A Half Penny on the Federal Dollar" pointing out that the single best investment in foreign assistance is in the education of women, is a benchmark for all that ails US foreign policy--we simply do not know how to wage peace. He's the best. I do not know Kurt Campbell, but I respect the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). I give this book five stars instead of four because of the caliber of the authors and the terribly difficult task they took on. The book is, however, *very* incomplete.

The authors are strongest on the politics of national security--there is nothing wrong with the substance where they address it, but I will end with my observation on how incomplete the book it.

The book can be summed up--and questioned--on the basis of its eight chapter headings--the book's focus is in capital letters, my alternative focus in lower case:

NATIONAL SECURITY AS PRIMARY ELECTORAL ISSUE--not so, electoral reform and the integrity and legitimacy of government is the primary issue

MYTH OF REPUBLICAN SUPERIORITY--quite so, but what about Peter Peterson's view in "Running on Empty," to wit, BOTH political parties are inept and two sides of the same coin--they represent corporations, not the people.

MANAGING THE MILITARY--is not enough. Must manage ways and means, must manage the inter-agency matrix (Cheney ignores the policy bureaucracy, and the only agency actually fighting in Iraq is the military--everyone else is going through the motions).

HOMELAND SECURITY--TAKING IT TO THE NEXT LEVEL--physical security is not enough, even if private sector is willing to cooperate. The next level is about immigration control, tracking non-citizens, revoking citizenship as appropriate for those who do not adopt our values, tracking sermons by hostile imans, and rejecting visitors who are not bonded by their home government.

WINNING THE LONG WAR--strong on understanding next generation, weak on how to actually stabilize and reconstruct the world. The authors are too focused on terrorism, which is a tactic, not an enemy, and while they boldly propose approaches to stabilizing the Islamic nations, with a positive emphasis on education, they do not address the fundamentals of virtual colonialism, unilateral militarism, and predatory immoral "bandit" capitalism--our greatest enemy is within, not without.

THE REAL TRIPLE THREAT; ENERGY & SECURITY, GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE, AND TERRORIST FINANCING. Simplistic, conventional wisdom. Sure, we have to have energy independence, start doing real-time science and climate stabilization (changes that used to take 10,000 years now take three), and focus on terrorism financing, but these are a *fraction* of the national security challenge, and out of context, they are not realistically achievable.

COPING WITH CHINA--all well and good, but what about Brazil, India, Indonesia, Iran, Russia, Venezuela, and Wild Cards such as Turkey and South Africa?

PROLIFERATION--fine on the bio-chem and nuclear weapons, what about small arms, the real weapons of mass destruction that make the 17 genocides real (I am sick and tired of hearing about Darfur in isolation--it is ONE of 17 genocides now on-going).

Most useful to me was the authors' knowledgeable identification of four competing Democratic constituencies focused on national security: the "hard power" elite; the "soft power" globalists; the "modest power" Democrats seeking a partial pull back; and the labor-environmental Democrats profoundly troubled by global capitalism (which I and William Greider and Clyde Prestowitz among others have found to be pathologically predatory and our own worst enemy in terms of long-term global stability).

In short, this is a book that is excellent in its narrow focus--getting the Democrats some traction in the national security arena, growing beyond Iraq, and setting the stage for an expanded dialog.

Now here is what is NOT in this book:

1) The ten high-level threats identified by the United Nations High-Level Threat Panel, Dr. LtGen Brent Scowcroft participating, and taken *together*: poverty, infectious disease, environmental degradation, inter-state conflict, civil war, genocide, other atrocities (kidnapping starlets for Saudi debauchery, kidnapping others for body parts), proliferation, terrorism, and transnational crime.

2) The twelve policies that must be balanced in a transpartisan fashion: Agriculture, Diplomacy, Economy, Education, Energy, Family, Health,Immigration, Justice, Security, Social Security, and Water--using scarce water to produce subsidized agriculture or to flush heavy tar oil is nuts--but no one is managing the country across the board; and finally

3) The eight challengers or challenges that *must* be enlightened and assisted in avoiding our mistakes while we also learn from them: Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Iran, Russia, Venezuela, and Wild Cards.

One final note: Jock Gill, who served President Clinton as a communications specialist, taught me this: we have to abandon the war metaphor--war on drugs, war on poverty, war on terrorism. IT DOES NOT WORK! I would add that we have to abandon the secrecy practice as well. In my view, the next government must be a Coalition Government because neither the Republicans nor the Democrats can govern competently without the common sense of the Libertarians, Greens, Reforms, Independents, and others; and the next government must redirect half the secret intelligence budget toward national and global education free in all languages, and half the heavy-metal military budget toward waging peace in all possible forms, to include using residual capabilities in abandoned DoD communications satellites to provide free Internet connectivity to Africa and Latin America.

O'Hanlon and Campbell are as good as it gets inside the beltway. I praise them as being the first step in a long march back to sanity, but only the first step. We cannot proceed nor succeed without them, but they need a dirty dozen iconoclastic outsiders to actually get us to an AFFORDABLE implementable Grand Srategy for a sustainable prosperous peaceful future going out seven generations.

Kurt M. Campbell and Michael E. O'Hanlon's book is written as a handbook for Democrats, as well as other soft power proponents, to discuss the importance and elements of national security. As the authors argue, Democrats need to stop fearing participation in national security debates and step up to form a dialogue and become a viable political party. National security is a wedge issue that is "often dominated by extremist ideology on one side and muted protest on the other" and Democrats and soft power advocates are ill-equipped to participate in the discussion is how Campbell and O'Hanlon frame it.

Examples of furthering the myth and not encouraging "original" thinking includes blind acceptance of L. Paul Bremer's version of events in Iraq (p116) and Tom Ridge's rosy image of port security, vaccines, etc (p125). A bare discussion of casualty sensitivity (p89), or did they really mean insensitivity, while assuming a role for it (without establishing if the "in-" belongs or not). A fanciful discussion on global projection requirements and suggesting the US Navy simply wait for UAVs instead of new fighters (p100). Ignorance of wear and tear on the Army's vehicle fleet (p102), conflicting views on counterinsurgency (p104).

Perhaps more importantly, the authors completely ignore institutional differences between DoS and DoD, which is odd considering the nature of the handbook and its efforts to instruct on the issues of national security. While arguing for Department of State Response Force / SysAdmin / Department of Peace / CRC / or whatever it is, they accept and promote 12 year old arguments that "combat units are best at [peace operations] as they inspire respect and fear in those who would challenge them" (p110).

As an introduction to the importance of hard power in national debates, this book is useful. The book creates an awareness of the complexity of some of the issues, but unfortunately they adopt the same language and lack "fact-based reality" in some of their arguments and citations. It should, however, help create the debate where it is absent in the coalitions of Democrats who fear issues of national security, Republicans who see things as black or white, and Independents and moderates who don't know any of the issues.

Democrats have been losing elections for the past five years and if you want to understand just why, HARD POWER is the place to go. It shows how the Democrats have no viable strategy on the major issue of national security, and shows not only how foreign policy will decide elections of the future, but how Democrats have lost such credibility and how to get it back. With its chapters covering Middle East peace issues and processes, military management, and future problems with China's ascent, HARD POWER outlines all the major issues facing us in the future.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

Hard power - The new politics of national security
Authors: Kurt M. Campbell, Michael E. O' Hanlon
Published by Basic books 2006

National security is an essential electoral issue, and this book is supposed to provide hard-headed ideas and intellectual ammunition for both Democrats and Republicans prepared for a new approach to foreign affairs and national security. The book was written in 2006, before the election of Obama, the credit crunch, and the Arab spring; and it is worth remembering it again what was said at that time about the Iraq war, war on terrorism, rise of China, energy policy, and nuclear proliferation. Other topics are left out, but it does not matter as the scope is clearly defined.

International stability is needed for Americans to live in security and prosperity (how many people would dispute this simple truth!), and the authors argue that Democrats have quite a few achievements in the use of hard power. In fact, they were comfortable with the use of military up until the Vietnam War. In 1992 elections, 92% voters concerned about national security issues voted for Republicans. U.S. military became a highly politicized and overwhelmingly Republican institution, what many do not consider a healthy sign. The anti-war image of Democrats date back to 1960's, and Clinton did not make this relationship any better. Military votes count only some 2.5 million active service and reservist personnel, but 25 mil veterans and 4 mil DOD contractors, families, and communities around bases add to the final count. The authors concluded that the lack of interest of Democrats in national security and defense issues is self-inflicted and therefore remediable.

The Bush administration oversimplified and overstated the link between Al Qaeda and Iraq, and entered a war without a plan for phase IV, what caused lost momentum and unnecessary improvisation especially when it comes to policies how to deal with former Baath party members in Saddam's security apparatus. The cost inflicted on U.S. military was first of all human, in tripled divorce rates, severe psychological stress and PTSD, and polytrauma which would not be survivable in previous conflicts. Realistic voices stated that to achieve sense of stability would take at least a decade. In 2006, the war was seen as a botched operation, where U.S. presence breeds insurgency but at the same time I needed to prepare handover of power to the Iraqis.

There are some interesting issues raised here about the possibility of reintroduction of draft, the participation of Europe on worldwide deployments and their own defense, and new defense structures such as State Department Response Force and a National Guard for domestic response to natural disasters (the topic of Diplomatic Special Forces is remembered again by Stavridis: Partnership for the Americas; NDU).

In 2003, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld stated that we cannot be sure if we kill the Al Qaeda militants fast enough, before the next generation is being created. Patriot Act allowed sharing data between agencies, integration of terrorist watch lists; and also made passports and new driving licenses much more secure through using biometric features. The possibility of introduction of an independent authority which would decide the fate of terror suspects is discussed; as methods of intelligence work cannot be discussed in civilian courts, and current legal limbo is not acceptable. Another important topic is protection of potential targets and the fact that private enterprise is not always doing what it should because it does not have enough incentives to do so.

The most interesting part of this book concerns energy security, available future options, and the cost of defense of sources of oil. Dependence on foreign oil creates a significant vulnerability, especially in situation of growing demand in rapidly growing India and China, and distribution of oil reserves in authoritarian states. Transition towards greater efficiency and introduction of biofuels and hybrid cars can take roughly $15 to 25 billion a year, what is still less than $100.000 billion a year currently spent on defense of oil reserves (as of 2006).
The two major threats as perceived in 2006 were two very different types of players - globally operating stateless terrorists and a giant state actor. China is perceived by some as a strategic competitor, and strategic partner by others. China's effort to upgrade and modernize its army raises some serious concerns about its intentions. For many authoritarian governments, China is still a very attractive ideological partner, and its stakes in Latin America should be taken seriously. Its economic policies are not considered by the authors as primarily predatory, and more effort is required on the U.S. side to improve trade balance in its favor. The fact that Chinese middle class is unhappy with the state of property rights and quality of life can eventually lead to reforms. Trouble is that democratic China does not necessarily mean that such a transformed state would pursue a peaceful foreign policy.

Last chapter deals with the issue of nuclear proliferation and means available to tackle this threat. Loose nukes originating mainly from former Soviet Union are still perceived a major problem, namely when it comes to security standards at nuclear sites. Most troubling (at that time still only potentially) nuclear state is North Korea, followed by Iran. Iran, as a major sponsor of terrorism, is almost nonresponsive to international pressure. Coercion methods are discussed. Pakistan is considered a major nonproliferation failure, due to the spread of nuclear technology by the A.Q. Khan network to Libya and Syria. In short, the international pressure was not sufficient to stop nuclear proliferation by several very dangerous regimes.

President George W. Bush and his administration have worked hard to build the illusion that only conservative and neo-conservative Republicans can be trusted with security of the United States. This book is designed to offer Democrats and moderate Republicans alternative approaches to the issues of national security that have been monopolized by the Bush administration for the last six years. Campbell and O'Hanlon have succeeded in at least providing a series of relevant talking points that could be used by opponents of the present administration's national security policies.

Yet the book provides somewhat uneven advice to potential policy makers. In the area of defense policies it is quite good and it was especially gratifying that the authors recognized the courage and professionalism of the U.S. armed forces on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan. Their suggestions on controlling Department of Defense spending and building force structures for the future appear to have a good deal of merit. In the same manner their ideas for establishing regional National Guard planning centers and a bureau of the State Department devoted to the activities related to nation building appear to be will worth examining. On the other hand, their treatments of Homeland Security and the so-called Global War on Terrorism (GWOT or the Long War) are both cursory and ill-informed. Their implication that the U.S. Intelligence System has reformed itself and is no longer what it was prior to the tragedy of 9/11 is complete nonsense. Their chapter on coping with China has the virtue of recognizing that the evolving relationship between the U.S. and China involves a convergence of military, economic, and regional geo-political issues that are dynamic, complex, and nuanced. It is unfortunate that they did not balance the chapter on China with a similar one on Russia. Their treatment of U.S. energy security and the non-proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) are sufficient of be the basis for an informed dialogue on both subjects. So all in all it is a good book.