“DOD Panel: Next President to ‘Likely’ to Face Crisis in First 270 Days”

[nerdgirl 0]

Does the content of this sound a lot like the content of Sen Biden’s comment that were discussed here last week?

Excerpt from insidedefense.com, a “news report for defense professionals.”

“The next president is likely to face a major international crisis within his first nine months in office, according to a senior group of business advisers to the defense secretary.

“Michael Bayer, chairman of the Defense Business Board and veteran Pentagon consultant, this week called for the next administration to move quickly to avoid encountering civilian leadership vacuums that often accompany political transitions.

“'Prepare for a likely first 270 days crisis',” Bayer warns in an Oct. 23 briefing. 'Too many presidents were ill prepared for this.'

“Joe Biden, the Democratic ticket's vice presidential nominee, drew criticism earlier this week for suggesting that should he and Barack Obama prevail in the Nov. 4 election, U.S. adversaries will mount an attack of some kind to test the new president.

“Bayer's briefing, presented yesterday to a public meeting of the Defense Business Board, recommends the future president elect and his advisers 'set aside time in transition to identify the planning, gravitas and interagency process necessary to respond to a likely first-270-day crisis.'



“His briefing also notes challenges that nearly every president since Dwight Eisenhower has faced in the early days. In 1953, Eisenhower agreed to work with the British to depose Iran's prime minister and install the Shah; John Kennedy ordered the ill-fated Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in April 1961; Lyndon Johnson in Aug. 1964 had to deal with the Gulf of Tonkin Incident, which became a pretext for escalating U.S. military involvement in Vietnam.

“Richard Nixon, in the third month of this presidency in 1969, escalated U.S. military operations in Southeast Asia by ordering aerial attacks against Cambodia and Laos. Jimmy Carter, during his first month in office in 1977, directed unilateral removed of nuclear weapons from South Korea and announced plans to reduce the number of U.S. troops from the peninsula, a step that drew public criticism from then Army Maj. Gen. John Singlaub, a senior U.S. commander in South Korea, whom Carter relieved of duty. In his fifth month as president, George H.W. Bush, in the summer of 1989, sent the first wave of U.S. military personnel to Panama to set the stage for the launch of “Operation Just Cause” that December.

“Finally, Bayer’s briefing notes, Bill Clinton, in Feb. 1993, his second month in office, had to manage the World Trade Center bombing; while George W. Bush, in April of his first year in office, dealt with the downing of a Navy spy plane near China. Months later, Bush was faced with the terrorist attacks in September in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania.”

In some ways the last 3 quoted paragraphs (history of early-term conflicts encountered by 20th Century presidents) is one of those announcements from what I flippantly call the “US Dept of ‘Duh.’”

One might argue that Sen Biden’s first ‘mistake’ was being too open and honest, i.e., the ‘foot-in-mouth’ disease for which he is known. Whether it comes from Sen Biden or the Defense Business Board is open, forthright discussion of the likelihood of conflict (outright or otherwise) unwanted? Not in my opinion. I’d actually like to see more thoughtful discussion of potential threats, their potential/probable origin, and discussion of strategies for addressing them across the spectrum of all possible responses. That is, discussion of options beyond sending the uniformed services OCONUS. (Sen Biden's 2nd mistake was the non-uncommon biblical and literary references, perhaps.)

There is another aspect that may reflect my thinking and may not be intentional: many times simply putting forth information with the caveat that we’re prepared, expecting, and able to responds sends a message to adversaries to think twice, i.e., it’s a deterrent and form of strategic communications. It is a different type of deterrence than is often discussed here (e.g., nuclear deterrence). It’s the same kind of deterrence that drives US investment in anthrax vaccines and therapeutics: if a state has countermeasures, it reduces vulnerabilty.

VR/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

[nerdgirl 0]

p.s. the members of the Defense Business Board appointed by the Secretary of Defense and serve a 2 year renewable term. A majority of the current members were appointed during SecDef Rumsfeld's tenure.

VR/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

[downwardspiral 0]

Doesn't this seem kind of odd to you? It seems the panel is reaching in an effort to produce something and this is the best they came up with. I don't exactly think of Operation Just Cause as a crisis since it was our own manufacturing. Carter being criticised by an Army General is a crisis? It appears the 270 day mark was decided on so they could include September 11th, 2001. Why not just say ,"within the first year?" Probably because 270 days seems more 'scientific.' Not a very good prediction in my opinion.

Where's Billy Mitchell when we need him?

www.FourWheelerHB.com

[lawrocket 3]

I agree. Many of these crises were manufactured. The issue of Bay of Pigs? Ike got it started and Kennedy just went through with it - and manufactured the crisis level.

Johnson with Gulf of Tonkin? Yeah, manufactured.

Nixon? Ordering attacks in Cambodia and Laos. Affirmative crisis.

Carter ordering the removal of SoKo nukes? An affirmative crisis.

GHW Bush? Operation Just Cause didn't happen until December 1989. Training began earlier, but again, it was a continuation of the policies of the prior administration - and Congress.

The latter two? Yeah. Thoses were crises.

This leads to the question: will the next President respond to a crisis? Or create one?

My wife is hotter than your wife.

[kelpdiver 2]

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Doesn't this seem kind of odd to you? It seems the panel is reaching in an effort to produce something and this is the best they came up with.

They're saying, don't dick around with the transition, and don't focus solely on the domestic front, as an Obama presidency is likely to do (just as Clinton's did coming into that recession).

It's somewhat less of a concern if McCain were to pull out a win, as he can use many/all of the existing people.

[nerdgirl 0]

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It appears the 270 day mark was decided on so they could include September 11th, 2001. Why not just say ,"within the first year?" Probably because 270 days seems more 'scientific.' Not a very good prediction in my opinion.

I would speculate that the “270 days” the DBB used correlates to average amount of time to get a majority of the civilian leadership Class “A” political appointees confirmed by the Senate.

Typically Exec Level II’s (USDs) are not through Senate confirmation process until end of June and most of the Exec Level III’s (DUSD/ASD/ATSD/DDR&E) don’t come up until October or later. E.g., the DDR&E in President Bush's first admin was not confirmed until August 2001 and the ATSD(NCB) was not confirmed until November 2001. It’s a combined artifact of the process (generally SecDef wants to have some voice on DepSecDef and USDs; the USDs want to have some input into their DUSDs/ASDs/ATSD/DDRE, etc), tradition, & the Senate calendar.

Vacancies are an increasing chronic problem, altho' much worse at DHS than DoD.

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Where's Billy Mitchell when we need him?

Why do we need a BG Mitchell?

VR/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

[nerdgirl 0]

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This leads to the question: will the next President respond to a crisis? Or create one?

Your last comment suggests a speculation and lines of questioning that I had not considered.

First, why would the Defense Business Board want a crisis? It seems pretty reasonable to assume the DBB is operating independently of a Presidential campaign. Defense contracting, acquisition, and contractor services are going to continue regardless of party. Would you suggest a scenario reminiscent of President Eisenhower’s (in)famous farewell address?

Otoh, the DBB was charged to “assess elements of transition efforts and identify factors that will drive the next Administration’s governance focus and minimize risk associated with the transfer of power” (p. 1 of the brief). They identified the single issue of most concern to be “The Administration must be ready to govern immediately upon taking office and respond to any national crisis” (p. 2). That was the single “issue” they identified.

Second, rather than setting aside some of the cited events as solely “manufactured” (as a means to explain the historical record), I would suggest that they are indicative of the need to not be over-ambitious or reactionary in responding to foreign events or overly driven by ideology without having the civilian leadership in place who lack the “necessary gravitas” (p. 5).

Or perhaps the causal vector is in the wrong direction? For which administrations is the “manufacturing” of crisis in the first 270 days more likely?

Perhaps the prevalence/some of international crises … or perhaps more precisely, international incidents … in the first 270 days is not evidence of intentional manufacture, but they are an (inadvertent) consequence of administration? One really would need to examine the foreign policy intentions and inclinations of each President and make-up of Congress at the time. For example, partisans, pundits, and others have criticized President Clinton’s focus on domestic issues – as you wrote, the 1993 attack on the WTC was “a crisis.” Without that outside factor/force, would that administration be inclined to focus on domestic issues? Because President Clinton was not inclined to pursue actively foreign affairs, the presence of a Democratically-controlled Congress in the first 2 years was not a factor for this. By the same token, there is evidence to suggest that “challenging hostile governments” & invading/liberating Iraq was a goal of the neoconservative elite of early Pres GW Bush administration; i.e., the foreign policy intentions pre-date Bush’s election. Was there inclination to expeditionary, assertive, reactionary, or pro-active foreign policy in the early policies and early administrations of the Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Carter, or GHW Bush administrations?
Are administrations that are inclined to impetuous, risky or well-intentioned but ill-advised in hindsight foreign-directed behavior restrained over time by becoming enmeshed in the bureaucracy? I.e., after the first 180-270 days. One of the fundamental functions of bureaucracy is to keep bad ideas from being implemented, e.g., “death by coordination.” This is not a bad thing.

Is the history of international incidents in the first year of a Presidential term the dependent variable and the foreign policy inclination (however well-intentioned or misguided) of an administration the independent variable?

And perhaps, more timely, what does that say about the current Presidential choices? Which one is more likely to "create" (your word) an international crisis or respond more impulsively to one?

VR/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

[downwardspiral 0]

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Why do we need a BG Mitchell?

Not BG Mitchell. This guy.

www.FourWheelerHB.com

[nerdgirl 0]

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Why do we need a BG Mitchell?

Not BG Mitchell. This guy.

I was thinking of the same guy. I just included his rank.

Why him?

/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

[downwardspiral 0]

lol ah ok....Being a lowly enlisted guy I don't usually abbreviate Colonel or above.

But if we're looking for predictions we need another Brigadier General Mitchell who is a bit more specific.

www.FourWheelerHB.com

[lawrocket 3]

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Your last comment suggests a speculation and lines of questioning that I had not considered.

That's the sort of asshole cynical crap I do on a regular basis.

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Would you suggest a scenario reminiscent of President Eisenhower’s (in)famous farewell address?

Isn't it amazing how relevant that speech is today? It could be given by a candidate today and sound fresh.

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First, why would the Defense Business Board want a crisis?

They wouldn't. Much like I don't want a non-libertarian POTUS. But I can fairly predict it will happen. But the DBB would certainly like to have a role in things. Nobody gets work by saying "We won't be needed."

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They identified the single issue of most concern to be “The Administration must be ready to govern immediately upon taking office and respond to any national crisis” (p. 2). That was the single “issue” they identified.

Absolutely. It's not like Obama (yes, I'm predicting he takes it with at least 300 electoral votes) will get any mulligans. There should be a smooth transition and planning for the unexpected. The Bush Administration will brief Obama officials on what's going on.

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I would suggest that they are indicative of the need to not be over-ambitious or reactionary in responding to foreign events or overly driven by ideology without having the civilian leadership in place who lack the “necessary gravitas” (p. 5).

I don't find "gravitas" and "over-ambitious" to be mutually exclusive things. JFK challenged the nation to land a man on the moon and return him safely to the earth within 8 1/2 years. The speech was given three weeks after our first suborbital flight. We wouldn't even orbit Glenn for another 9 months. Many in the scientific community thought it was nuts. It was as ambitious as anything ever done by a POTUS, and yet was done with appropriate dignity.

Overly ambitious, with gravitas, and it worked.

Reagan was great at it. So was JFK. And Clinton was pretty damned good at it, too.

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Or perhaps the causal vector is in the wrong direction? For which administrations is the “manufacturing” of crisis in the first 270 days more likely?

All. One would think that Reagan would do it. He didn't. He's an exception. He was ambitious and ideological, and yet he seemed pretty immune from that first-year crisis. Of course, one may say that there was a crisis two months into his presidency when John Hinckley, Jr. attempted to cap him. A shot president would be a crisis (but Haig was in control).

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Perhaps the prevalence/some of international crises … or perhaps more precisely, international incidents … in the first 270 days is not evidence of intentional manufacture, but they are an (inadvertent) consequence of administration?

Perhaps. And in continuations of the prior admin's policies. The Bay of Pigs is an excellent example. It was something that was planned during Ike's presidency. Then JFK came in an gave the final go-ahead. How much could the new admin know about the program? I think that this can, in and of itself, cause problems. Bringing in new leadership with other ideas can shake plans up. It is difficult to get continuity when there's a change in the middle of it.

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there is evidence to suggest that “challenging hostile governments” & invading/liberating Iraq was a goal of the neoconservative elite of early Pres GW Bush administration; i.e., the foreign policy intentions pre-date Bush’s election.

Absolutely. It was confirmed by a Congressman I chatted with that this was gonna be the effort to clean up the block in the middle east. "Broken windows" he called it. 9/11 and WMD's merely gave a great excuse. JFK's Bay of Pigs "yellowcake" was Societ fighters and rockets to justify it.

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Was there inclination to expeditionary, assertive, reactionary, or pro-active foreign policy in the early policies and early administrations of the Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Carter, or GHW Bush administrations?

JFK? Yep. He focused highly on threats in Latin America, as the Bay of Pigs showed (and with high-level friends who lost business interest in Havana, it's understandable). Then it was Kennedy who realized that Southeast Asia was big, and he sent Special Forces in there to disrupt Soviet expansion. Kennedy authorized the overthrow of Diem, who was executed three weeks before JFK would die.

Johnson? Yeah. He wanted to control Communists. But McNamara (a continuation of JFK) helped get the American forces involved after the Gulf of Tonkin incident. LBJ was more interested in the Great Society at first. But he was soon drawn in.

Nixon? Foreign policy was his strong point.

Carter? It wasn't his.

Reagan? HIGHLY pro-active. And this man of legendary military build-up signed the IMF treaty - perhaps the greatest step forward for peace in the last 50 years.

GHW Bush? I can't help but wonder whether being called a "wimp" was a large factor in Panama. I also can't help but think that all it would have taken to prevent the issues in Serbia was for Bush to hop on the phone to Milosovic and say, "Hey. Slobbo? This is George Bush. My kids? They're fine except for one. Hey. Look out your window. No. Just do it. You're lying. Okay. There you are. Nice tie. See, we've got surveillance right on you and I've got a real time feed. And you're making trouble. As you saw from the Gulf War, we've got missiles that are so accurate they can fly right up your asshole and tickle your left eyeball. That fart will be devastating. My point? Back off."

Clinton? "It's the economy, stupid." No wars. Then things picked up in Bosnia, enforcement of no-fly zones. Etc. And his biggest foreign policy prize - hoping to broker peace in the Middle East with Israel. It didn't work.

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Are administrations that are inclined to impetuous, risky or well-intentioned but ill-advised in hindsight foreign-directed behavior restrained over time by becoming enmeshed in the bureaucracy?

I think that depends. If an administration is impetuous at the beginning, they likely tend to hold back that behavior somewhat. Like Reagan. Then there is the Clinton Model - someone who was generally uninterested in international politics and became a world figure because he couldn't avoid being enmeshed in it.

It depends on the personalities involved. Clinton was the MASTER at adaptation. The Master.

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Which one is more likely to "create" (your word) an international crisis or respond more impulsively to one?

I think that "crisis" is in the eye of the beholder. I've had girlfriends who consider things to be crises that I consider to be nuisance. I am profoundly phobic of insects. To me a "crisis" is a cockroach in my room. To others, it's a nuisance.

So what may be a "crisis" to some is not a "crisis" to others. For many, the situation with the earthquake in Pakistan is an international crisis. For others, the economy is a crisis.

Response will be dictated by what that person thinks. Is the Pakistan issue a crisis? Perhaps not when he thinks he can deal with the economy.

Another thing - if the issue is successfully managed, expect the White House to laud the POTUS's action in managing the "crisis." If unsuccessful, expect the White House to mention that the POTUS is doing what he can and that things are being managed. It won't be a crisis if that happens.

My wife is hotter than your wife.