Michele Flournoy on strategy

[Rank amateur]

We are now in what U.S. counterinsurgency doctrine calls the "build" phase — certainly the hardest phase in which the primary objective is enhancing the legitimacy of the host-nation government in the eyes of the population. The problem is that, to date, improved security has increased our legitimacy, not that of the Iraqi government.

This observation was very interesting. How do you create "breathing space" without creating dependency? (The Bible talks about giving a man fish and teaching him to fish. Nowhere does it say that if you fish for him he'll eventually insist on doing all the work himself.)

[JJackson]

thinking through withdrawal

Ties in well with Marc Lynch's thoughts about Green Zone politics and politicians.

[Ken White]

This observation was very interesting. How do you create "breathing space" without creating dependency? (The Bible talks about giving a man fish and teaching him to fish. Nowhere does it say that if you fish for him he'll eventually insist on doing all the work himself.)

dependency, which is happening. Takes time. Some people wean more easily than others; in the ME, it'll be pretty slow. All we could ever do was open the window, crawling through it is up to the Iraqis -- who are as politically diverse and fractious as a bunch of Americans. Herding cats come to mind...

Still, that's a minor problem. The flaw in her argument is the paragraph in the article following the one you cited:

"And herein lies the cause for concern. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki government appears largely unwilling or unable to take advantage of the space created by improved security to move toward political accommodation, provide for the basic needs of the Iraqi people and lay the foundation for stability — and its own legitimacy. And the Bush administration appears to lack a strategy for getting it to do so."

Perhaps I missed it but I didn't see her prescription for such a strategy in convincing a sovereign government to do ones bidding. Much less an address of the issues of doing so.

As has been often said, any idiot can surface a problem; the genius provides a solution.

[Rank amateur]

for such a strategy in convincing a sovereign government to do ones bidding.

I'm glad you said that. Is there a way to make it happen or are we in a "no win" situation?

[Ken White]

on the part of those either pro or con. We were not going to destroy the Army, a fourth or so of the civilian population and half the infrastructure so there was never going to be a military victory or 'win.'.

All we could hope for was and is a satisfactory outcome. I put the odds at 60:40 going in and they're, I think, in the 65:35 to 70:30 range now. Still up to the Iraqis and my guess is it'll work out okay. Certainly not to everyone's satisfaction and certainly not as soon as anyone would like. We'll just have to give it time and see.

Not sure it's really in anyone's interest to "make that happen" as rushing things in the ME tends to push them into telling you what they think you want hear -- or what they want you to hear. Neither may accord with reality. That aside from the fact I'm unsure it's our job to make that happen in any event. It's their country, we just gave them a chance to rearrange it -- with, to my mind, anyway -- no real idea what the final product would resemble. Nor did we or do we need to know.

The alternative of a precipitous withdrawal would be, I think a major error (90:10 on that ) -- however, I doubt, regardless of campaign rhetoric that we'll do that. We're gonna be there a while...

[John T. Fishel]

Michele Flournoy will be one of those who will be responsible for a strategy - a POLITICAL military strategy to help the Iraqis do what is in their own interest...

My point was that until the new president takes office this adminsitration will be responsible and afterwards the new one. In any case, I don't see President Bush, McCain, Clinton, or Obama pointing his/her finger at someone and saying you're my guy and everybody else works for you. Hope I'm wrong but as GEN Gordon Sullivan said, "hope is not a method."

Cheers

JohnT

[Ken White]

Wolfotwits...

As for:

...a POLITICAL military strategy to help the Iraqis do what is in their own interest...

Uh, which subset of Iraqis? Not a snark, a serious question. And is that what they think is in their own best interest or what we think?

My point was that until the new president takes office this adminsitration will be responsible and afterwards the new one. In any case, I don't see President Bush, McCain, Clinton, or Obama pointing his/her finger at someone and saying you're my guy and everybody else works for you.

'fraid not. Not the American way.

...Hope I'm wrong but as GEN Gordon Sullivan said, "hope is not a method."

Gordy was right but that, regrettably, does not change the fact that IS the American way. Again, no snark, serious point. As you said above in your starting post:

"...My only caveat is that while strategy is conceptually easy, doing it well is hard. And executing it is harder still. Today, everybody and his dog is a strategist. But, in government, only the military does it well - and not all the time."

All too true -- and while we do it more and better if not perfectly, we end up doing a lot that is outside our purview. Which, if it falls apart, lets the hammer fall on not necessarily the right person.

Be that as it may, the point is that strategy IS hard -- and it becomes devilishly hard when you have to do it in conjunction with another government whose goals differ radically from yours (or with people in your own government to whom that comment also applies). Even harder when you have few folks who really understand the host country culture and those that do tend to fall into various and differing ideologically based schools of thought on what needs to happen.

Really superior strategists have floundered on those rocks for a great many years. Regardless of who was in charge...

[John T. Fishel]

with you on all this.

Consider this one: John Abizaid knows the culture of the region as well or better than any military or foreign service officer. Yet, his regional strategy as applied to both Iraq and Afghanistan was seriously flawed.

Charles Lindblom, an economist who was also President of the American Political Science Association, wrote a classic article called "The Science of Muddling Through" which states American (Western) policy reality as well as it has ever been stated. Just when we think we really know how to do something we often find that muddling through is the best we can do. It's just that some folk do it better than others...

Cheers

JohnT

[Rob Thornton]

Hi John,
Michele Flournoy was one of the panelists here for the SFA Symposium. I was not here (I was TDY), but I recently watched all the videos from it as part of a review of a forthcoming product from the symposium. Mrs. Flournoy's thoughts were articulate and complete on the topic, and you could tell she'd served as a DAS-D, I believe Mrs. Celeste Ward has the same job currently, she was also here (incidentally her recorded remarks are also articulate and concise). While Mrs. Flournoy could move into a direct position to affect U.S. Grand Strategy if a Democrat enters office, I think its fair to say that she and many others are already having an indirect effect of a substantive nature, and I see many similarities between how OSD under Secretary Gates and the various "think tanks" are looking at things. I don't think that's bad, in my opinion it gives the direction more validity as people with differing opinions on domestic policy reach similar perspectives on foreign policy. It also creates more synergy and dampens friction some.

SWC Member Old Eagle showed me a piece yesterday from CNAS I'm reading now by Shawn Brimley and Vikram Singh. "Stumbling Into the Future? The Indirect Approach and American Strategy", and of course there is also the current piece at the top of the SWJ Blog by Brimley, "A grand Strategy of Sustainment". They all interest me because of my interest in SFA and how it fits within our broader strategy.

I think we've talked about it before here, but to me this is part of an evolution in better understanding things and how they relate. Most of the ideas (SFA, RoL, BPC, Direct and Indirect) may not be new from the vast historical perspective that in the West goes at least back to the Greeks (they've had different names and been described in manners that fit the times), but the relationship between the context of the ideas as they relate to political ends, the way we think about the use of various means, and how we implement ways would seem to be new for Americans.

I think there is a challenge in reconciling how we see the world from the inside looking out, how the world sees us from the outside looking in, and the interactions that take place from the variance in perspectives and interests. These interactions I think are political by nature, but their impetus may be idealogical, economical, social etc. and the consequences of those actions are increasingly intertwined with other areas, and touch a broad international audience in ways that are often undervalued.

Over time I think this is a discussion that has to be pitched to the U.S. public in a manner that illustrates why its in their interest that the United States remains engaged over an indefinite period on a scale that appears at odds with who we'd prefer to be. If that sounds a bit counter-intuitive, I think its may be because the vast majority of Americans only see the products of globalization that effect them as an individual, be it the products that wind up on the shelf at the Wal-Mart, the outsourcing or off-shoring of jobs and activities, or the new faces and places that move into their cities, but as a whole we don't consider the causes and inter-actions that generate those effects and why those should interest them until something dire and unavoidable enters the discussion. Such an effort has to go beyond a State of the Union, or an occasional speech, it must be part of a cultural shift and the mechanism for implementing such a narrative must be enduring and woven throughout the "whole of government" because such is the growing degree of "inter-connectedness".

The second tier of education I think needs to occur is the education of our children toward understanding the world as it is, and what it may become, and what that means for them in terms differentiating the lives their parents led, and better prepares them for the future. Our children are going to communicate, cooperate, inter-act, collaborate on a scale I think that is hard for most of us to imagine (its hard for me anyway). Part of what a "grand strategy" should do for us is look out over the horizon some and help put us in a better position by shaping what can be shaped in a manner that when something occurs it is not a complete surprise, and we are better prepared to meet the challenges posed then if we had done no planning. A grand strategy must accommodate some vision and imagination to frame it broadly enough to account for change over time (since resources have their own cycle), but it should also be firm enough to stand on enduring principles and interests which sustain and conserve what is best about us for our posterity while dealing with immediate and identified challenges.

Best, Rob