by Dick Cheney
China is matching its technological advances, military buildup, and cyberespionage programs with policies aimed at countering American influence globally. They have proliferated missile technology to rogue states like Iran, Libya, and Syria. They are expanding trade ties, weapons sales, and military cooperation with Russia, building a relationship based on challenging America’s preeminence. “They see [America’s] grip on the rest of the world rapidly loosening,” writes Dmitri Trenin, director of the Carnegie Moscow Center:
Both Moscow and Beijing see the world going through an epochal change away from U.S. domination and toward a freer global order that would give China more prominence and Russia more freedom of action.
Neither China nor Russia, it is safe to say, plans to use these anticipated gains in prominence to further the cause of global freedom, security, or peace. Nor do they seem to agree with President Obama’s assertion that the days when global power “was a zero-sum game” are over.
IN THE SEVENTY YEARS since World War II, no American president has done more damage to our nation’s defenses than Barack Obama. His determination to cut defense spending and reduce the size of the U.S. military has served two of his fundamental objectives. He came to office determined to increase domestic spending, and cutting defense spending was a way of getting the resources to do it.
He also came into office determined to reduce America’s role in the world. Bret Stephens of the Wall Street Journal described Obama’s philosophy this way:
Above all, progressivism believes that the United States is a country that, in nearly every respect, treads too heavily on the Earth: environmentally, ideologically, militarily, and geopolitically. The goal, therefore, is to reduce America’s footprint; to “retrench,” as the administration would like to think of it, or to retreat, as it might more accurately be called.
Slashing the size, readiness, and equipment of our forces is a way of guaranteeing America will be unable to play a larger role in the world.
In what may turn out to be one of the tragedies of American history, President Obama has been aided in his misguided efforts by partisan gridlock in the U.S. Congress. Unable to reach agreement on cuts in the federal budget, Congress has allowed sequestration to further devastate our defense capabilities.
The misguided cuts being made now will have long-lasting negative effects on the nation. Weapons systems take years—and dedicated assembly lines—to produce. Cuts of the magnitude we are seeing now gut our industrial capacity as well as our current war-fighting capability. A strong military force requires a consistent and long-term investment. Officers must be developed over multiyear careers. Adequate training requires time and money. Cutting the size of the force, reducing training budgets, and denying our men and women the equipment they need guarantee we will have a less capable, less ready force years down the line. We are also likely to be reminded that it is far costlier to rebuild a military than it is to maintain it.
If not reversed in the very near term, current defense budget cuts will significantly limit the ability of future presidents to defend the nation. Even today, twenty-seven years after Ronald Reagan left office, we are still benefiting from his defense buildup. Many of the most important weapons systems on which we rely were designed, procured, and built during the Reagan era. As former undersecretary of defense for policy Eric Edelman has said, we have been “eating the seed corn” that was laid down then. President Obama’s legacy will be far different. It is hard to imagine anyone who succeeds him in the Oval Office looking back in gratitude for what he has done to our capacity to defend ourselves.
One can’t help but wonder what some of President Obama’s Democratic predecessors would have thought of his neglect of the nation’s military power. In June 1941, when London was standing virtually alone against the Nazis, President Roosevelt sent a letter to a special convocation of Oxford University. He told the story of America’s ambassador to England visiting the House of Commons and Westminster Abbey after they’d been bombed, and seeing the statue of Abraham Lincoln, our Great Emancipator, still standing as a symbol and sentinel “in this great battle for freedom.” Roosevelt knew this was America’s cause:
We, too, born to freedom, and believing in freedom, are willing to fight to maintain freedom. We, and all others who believe as deeply as we do, would rather die on our feet than live on our knees.
President John F. Kennedy knew this, too. For our own sake, and for the sake of global peace and freedom, he believed America must always maintain “a national security position which is first, not ‘first, but’; not ‘first, if’; not ‘first, when’; but first.” America must, he warned, maintain a military power that is “second to none.” Everything else—everything—depends on this.
PART THREE
What Must Be Done
SEVEN
Restoring American Power
The free peoples of the world look to us for support in maintaining their freedoms. If we falter in our leadership, we may endanger the peace of the world. And we shall surely endanger the welfare of this nation.
—HARRY S. TRUMAN, MARCH 12, 1947
Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans—born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage—and unwilling to witness or permit the slow undoing of those human rights to which this nation has always been committed, and to which we are committed today at home and around the world. Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and success of liberty.
—JOHN F. KENNEDY, INAUGURAL ADDRESS, JANUARY 20, 1961
Presidents Truman and Kennedy knew that neither America’s freedom nor its security was self-sustaining. Each was guaranteed by American power. Both men were shaped by World War II: President Kennedy by his heroic Navy service and President Truman by the duty he inherited and the leadership he provided in securing victory for the Allies. Neither man was naïve enough to think that America could be safe if we retreated behind our oceans. They had seen too much of the evil of our enemies and the powerful reach of their weapons to have been lulled by the false comfort of isolationism or appeasement.
Nor would either man have suggested that American unilateral disarmament would inspire the Soviets to follow suit. When Truman had to decide whether America should develop the hydrogen bomb, he asked one question: “Can the Soviets do it?” Told that they could, he ordered America’s program to proceed. When Soviet premier Khrushchev built the Berlin Wall and threatened to cut off America’s access to the western side of the city, Kennedy didn’t offer American concessions. He instructed his deputy secretary of defense to announce publicly how far the American nuclear arsenal exceeded the Soviets’ arsenal in size and capabilities. He wanted to be certain the Soviets were under no illusions about America’s nuclear supremacy and the deadly costs of escalation. Both men had a clear understanding of the nature of America’s adversaries, the magnitude of the threats we faced, the importance of our military power, and the indispensable role we played in the world.
Although they were Democrats, it is unlikely they would find much that is prudent—or even explicable—in the national security policies of the Democrat who inhabits the Oval Office today. It will be up to America’s next president to look to the examples of men like Truman and Kennedy, Eisenhower and Reagan as he or she works to undo the significant damage that’s been done.
The next president’s top priority must be rebuilding America’s military to ensure it has the personnel, resources, and equipment necessary to defend the nation in an environment of escalating and multiplying dangers. Not since before World War II have we faced a situation of such disparity between the threats we face and our capability to defend against them. There will be no more important or urgent task for our next commander in chief than repairing th
e damage done by the Obama-era defense budget cuts.
Even before our next president is inaugurated:
• Congress should move immediately to repeal the Budget Control Act and end the sequestration cuts. If Congress fails to act, two more rounds of sequestration cuts will go into effect before January 20, 2017, when the next president is inaugurated. Former general Jim Mattis described the damage these cuts are doing to our nation’s defenses: “No foe in the field can wreak such havoc on our security [as] mindless sequestration is achieving today.” They should be repealed immediately.
In addition, the next commander in chief should:
• Use the Gates fiscal 2012 budget as a minimum baseline on which to build in setting funding levels for the Department of Defense. The Gates FY 2012 budget was the last defense budget prepared using the normal defense planning process, assessing the threats to the nation and the resources necessary to meet those threats. That budget requested $661 billion for national defense for FY 2016. This FY 2012 budget was developed prior to the rise of ISIS, the collapse of the government in Iraq, the civil war in Syria, the fall of Libya to militant Islamists, the fall of Yemen to Iranian-backed rebels, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, China’s most recent aggressive actions in the South China Sea, and the cyberattack on the U.S. government personnel systems for which the Chinese were apparently responsible. The FY 2012 budget should be supplemented to ensure sufficient resources in light of this increased threat environment.
• Direct the Department of Defense to prepare a list of immediate readiness requirements to remedy shortfalls. The president should work with Congress to seek an emergency supplemental providing the funding necessary to restore these shortfalls. Allowing readiness to continue to decline will, as noted in the National Defense Panel QDR Review for 2014, lead to the possibility of a hollow force “that loses its best people, underfunds procurement, and shortchanges innovation.”
• Instruct the Department of Defense to adopt an updated force-sizing construct. In 2012, President Obama abandoned the “two-war” strategy, which provided for a force sized to defeat two enemies in two geographically separate theaters simultaneously. By abandoning this requirement, the president was able to abandon the need for a force sized to accomplish it. In light of the growing complexity of the international situation and the rising threats we face, even a return to a force sized to meet the “two-war” construct is likely insufficient. The United States must have a force today that is structured to defeat adversaries in multiple geographically separate theaters simultaneously, while maintaining the ability to defend the homeland and engage in other critical missions.
• Reverse cuts to the size of the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps. The current Obama budgets, combined with sequestration, have put us on a path to having a Navy smaller than at any time since 1915, an Army smaller than it has been since 1940, and an Air Force operating the smallest and oldest force of combat aircraft in its history. Those levels would be inadequate in a time of peace and stability. They are inexcusable in the face of today’s threats. The recommendations of the bipartisan 2014 National Defense Panel are a responsible place to start in reversing these cuts. In particular, the panel recommends that Congress should task the Defense Department with conducting a thorough review, “without undue emphasis on budgetary constraints,” to determine how it would construct a force to meet the current threat environment.
• Ensure the Pentagon budget includes a robust program to invest in the technologies necessary to maintain our military superiority. Important areas identified for particular focus in the NDP include: armed intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance systems, space capabilities, cyberspace, joint and coalition command and control, air superiority, long-range and precision strike capability, undersea and surface naval warfare, and electric and directed-energy weapons.
• Upgrade America’s offensive and defensive cyber-capabilities. The successful cyberattack on the U.S. government’s personnel and security clearance databases makes clear that we do not have adequate cyberdefenses. Former NSA and CIA director General Michael Hayden has said that the United States must bear much of the blame for this attack because we have left ourselves vulnerable. He also noted that many of the same members of Congress who voted to limit the authorities of the NSA, “America’s most powerful cyberforce,” were demanding, forty-eight hours later, “to know how the personal records of millions of Americans could have been violated by a foreign power.” Our next president must lead the nation in recognizing that limiting our own intelligence abilities aids our adversaries.
• Develop and build a robust, modern, and effective missile defense system. Cuts made to missile defense programs must be restored, and we should invest in upgraded programs that enable us to defend against new capabilities, such as China’s hypersonic weapons. In a world in which America’s adversaries have nuclear weapons and the missiles to deliver them, we cannot leave ourselves unprotected.
• Harden American targets that are most vulnerable to EMP attack. One of our greatest vulnerabilities is the threat posed by electromagnetic pulse attacks to our military and civilian infrastructure. Congress established the Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse Attack. The next president should sign the executive order prepared by the EMP commission and ignored by President Obama, to protect essential infrastructure targets. He or she should also ensure America’s missile defense system is structured to provide protection against an EMP attack. Congress should take immediate action to pass legislation proposed by the commission to enable the hardening of targets, including the nation’s electric grid. The next president should use the commission’s recommendations as a basis to build on to ensure we are taking all necessary steps to defend against this threat.
• Modernize and upgrade our aging nuclear arsenal. We must recognize the continued importance of maintaining nuclear superiority with a strategic arsenal that is “second to none.” Our nuclear arsenal should not be viewed as a relic of a long-ago time. It is a crucial element in the security of the nation, particularly in a world in which the spread of nuclear weapons has become reality. Failing to upgrade, modernize, and maintain our nuclear force, in a world in which our adversaries are improving and modernizing their arsenals, puts our security at risk. The Defense Department should help restore the loss of human capital in all areas related to nuclear capabilities, including investing in programs that will help fund the education of the next generation of nuclear specialists.
• Reverse Obama-era environmental policies that may harm our national security. Environmental Protection Agency policies, such as those aimed at reducing emissions from coal-fired power plants, can lead to reductions in the reliability of our power grid and interfere with efforts we should be undertaking to decrease Europe’s dependence on Russian energy by exporting some of our growing surplus of natural gas to European markets. The current EPA “Clean Power Plan” requires taking one-third of coal-fired power plants off the grid by 2020. This is inconsistent with ensuring the reliability of our grid and will have no demonstrable positive impact on our environment, particularly so long as countries such as China and India continue to produce far greater quantities of pollutants.
In the difficult budget environment in which we find ourselves, it has been tempting for some to think we can cut funds from our nation’s defenses as a way to fund domestic programs or to reduce the overall size of the deficit. In reality, cutting defense only harms our capacity to secure the nation and does not solve our fiscal problems. The defense budget is not driving our deficits—entitlement spending is. We must reform entitlements as part of a larger effort to guarantee the long-term health of the U.S. economy, which will also be beneficial to our national security.
Maintaining America’s global supremacy is necessary for our freedom and security. As author Mark Helprin recently noted, “Upon our will to provide for defense, all else rests.”
AS WE REBUILD AMERICA�
�S armed forces, we must also take steps to win the war against militant Islam. Our adversaries in this war include ISIS, al Qaeda and its affiliates, and Iran and the terror groups it sponsors.
The urgent task facing us today is the defeat of ISIS and the denial of the territory on which it has established its caliphate. We must:
• Recognize that America’s current strategy, to the extent there is one, is failing. The limited military operations authorized by President Obama are insufficient to defeat ISIS. The $500 million program to train Syrian rebels is a national embarassment, having produced, according to Secretary of Defense Ash Carter, sixty vetted candidates. America and its allies are not winning.
• Dedicate the American forces necessary to prevail. Former vice chief of staff of the Army General Jack Keane has detailed these near-term requirements: We should deploy U.S. and coalition military advisors to accompany indigenous frontline forces fighting ISIS. Thousands of advisors, not hundreds, are required, and they need the ability to call in air strikes. We also need direct-action special operations forces, both ground and air, targeting ISIS leaders. American and coalition combat brigades should be designated for deployment and moved to Kuwait to be ready if needed.
• Reverse President Obama’s policy of retreat and rebuild our alliances with key Arab states, including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, and Jordan. Provide them the support they need to win against ISIS, al Qaeda, and other insurgent groups, especially those backed by Iran. Recognize that alliances must be based on trust and on reliability. Countries in the Middle East must know that America will not abandon them and that our word means something. We must never issue empty threats.