The Adults are Heard From: National Defense Panel 2014

Last week brought with it the release of the National Defense Panel's Assessment of the 2014 Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) entitled "Ensuring a Strong U.S. Defense for the Future".  It is well-written, straightforward, and quite readable.  Most importantly though, it represents the CONSENSUS view of a bi-partisan group of defense and national security experts that we are moving toward a "high risk" military force as the result of dangerous cuts in defense spending.

First, a story.  Back in the olden days when I was part of a team writing strategy for the Navy, we were exposed to a quiet study done by an outside organization on how the Navy was viewed by policy elites on both sides of the political spectrum.  Interviews with a few dozen former Deputy, Under, and Assistant Secretaries from State, Defense, and Treasury revealed a high level of convergence on America's role in the world and the view of the Navy's importance to it.  I remember reading the study and making the comment to colleagues that "the adults are in charge" when it comes to these matters, irrespective of political party.  Such were the quality of those who served on this year's NDP.

What the study in part reflected was what many view as the "Post WWII security consensus" that has guided this nation's national security policy.  The NDP Panel describes it thusly:

"Consistently now for nearly seventy years, no matter which party controlled the White House or
Congress, the United States has followed a policy of deep global engagement and leadership
undergirded by a military capable of forward defense and effective global power projection.
Americans judged that such a policy was the best way to preserve and protect this favorable
international order that served their interests. We believe this logic still applies in an enduringly
uncertain and increasingly hazardous world. This is because an international order favoring
American interests and values – and those of our allies and partners and indeed all nations who
wish to join – is not simply self-generating and self-sustaining. It cannot be left to the mercies of
states and non-state groups that have different agendas. Rather, it requires leadership, global
engagement, and military strength – and the only country with the power, credibility, and
dynamism to play that role is the United States." (p.10)

Increasingly, that consensus is fraying. On the right, some treat the defense budget as if it were simply another domestic spending program worthy of cutting--rather than the organizational product of a sworn Constitutional duty.  On the left, some view the defense budget as a bloated anachronism in our modern, global, networked, world, worthy of raiding to fund ever-increasing social outlays.  In the past, these were fringe views, and the above consensus dominated.  Not so much today.

What the NDP Assessment does is bring into sharp relief the sizable mismatch between that seven decade consensus and the resources programmed to achieve it.  More specifically, the study states simply that the strategic aims of the Quadrennial Defense Review it was impaneled to assess are unattainable within current budget levels. Apportioning responsibility in equal measure to Capitol Hill and the White House, the Panel advocates AS A START a return to the Gates 2012 budget baseline while repealing the 2011 BCA and its pernicious offspring, the Sequester.

Our nation's fiscal crisis was not caused by defense spending and it will not be solved by raiding it.  Worse yet, doing so will only exacerbate the crises underway.  The NDP puts it so:  "Attempting to address America’s budget woes through defense spending cuts is dangerous and ultimately self-defeating. In this economically interdependent but poorly integrated and unstable world, an America less capable of global leadership will soon become a poorer America less capable of meeting its other federal priorities."

In a nation that seems to want bi-partisan approaches to policy making and problem solving, the NDP report reaches common sense conclusions and reminds us of the symbiotic relationships among security, military power, and economic prosperity.  This report should serve as the entering argument for the next administration's national security team, no matter who is in charge.

Bryan McGrath