Volume 1, Issue 4 May 1997

National Security Report

Background and Perspective on Important National Security and Defense Policy Issues,

Written and Produced by

From the Chairman...

Chairman, House National Security Committee

A Look Ahead at the

Quadrennial Defense Review

U.S. Army forces like these in Bosnia, appear to be the likely

billpayer for budgetary and force cuts contemplated under

the Quadrennial Defense Review.

On May 15, the Defense Department

is scheduled to submit to

Congress the results of the

Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR), the

blueprint that is intended to shape

American military strategy and determine

the structure of U.S. forces in the future.

Though the final version of the QDR has

yet to be released, extensive press

accounts and other sources reveal the

scope of the review and the course it is

taking.

From the outset, the review’s one fixed

variable has been the size of the defense

budget. Despite vows by senior

Department of Defense civilian and military

officials that “everything is on the table,”

the underlying premise of the QDR is the

assumption that the defense budget

cannot be increased. For several months,

Secretary of Defense William Cohen has

maintained that “the QDR is not, in essence,

a budget-driven exercise....What we’re

doing in this QDR is trying to find the right

mix of strategy, programs, and resources.”

But Cohen also has said, “Just as we have

to be realistic about the many threats that

we face in the world today, we have to be

realistic about the kind of environment that

we’re operating in as far as fiscal restraint.

So I am operating,

and the entire

building is operating, on the

assumption

that...the defense

budget is likely to

be no more than

roughly $250 billion

in real terms for the

foreseeable future.”

As a result, The New

York Times reported

April 29, “The

budget-cutting tone

[of the QDR] has

angered several

members of Congress...who say

they believe that an honest strategic

review would result in a dramatic increase

in military spending. The military budget

has been cut by about a third in real terms

over the last decade.”

Despite the projection of a flat defense

budget, which will actually reflect a decline

in spending when the effects of inflation

are considered, the QDR apparently will

codify an expansive U.S. military strategy,

an increased pace of equipment

modernization, and a deepened

commitment to innovation in military

technology, organization and doctrine.

According to press accounts, the price

for trying to increase spending on long

overdue equipment modernization is

certain to be significant cuts in the size

and structure of current U.S. military

forces - forces that have already been cut

by one third just since the end of the Gulf

War. The Washington Post reported on

May 7 that Secretary Cohen has approved

a cut of up to 60,000 active-duty

personnel, 70,000 reservists and 80,000

civilian defense workers across all the

services. The strategy appears

increasingly ambitious while military

personnel levels, force structure, and

budgets shrink.

The Quadrennial

Defense Review

increasingly

looks like a modest update of the

current BottomUp Review, which

will open a wider

gap between increasing strategic commitments and

declining defense resources. When

Secretary Cohen states that the QDR

was conducted based on the premise

that defense budgets can never increase,

it becomes impossible not to view the

QDR as a budget-first, strategy-second

exercise.

Make no mistake – the current

mismatches between strategy, forces

and resources have had real

consequences: If the QDR once again

compels a smaller, under-resourced

force to execute an expanding strategy,

then the readiness, quality of life and

modernization problems we see today

will quickly worsen.

The emerging QDR is likely to call for

a continuation of the current tworegional war strategy, and a recognition

of the current reality of numerous

peacekeeping and humanitarian

operations, while simultaneously

calling for reducing forces and

resources to meet a predetermined

budget number.

The widening gap between strategy

and resources must spark a muchneeded public debate about the risks

associated with an underfunded

national military strategy. Weighing the

risks of war, of casualties, of defeat, and

the implications of retreat after this

century’s great victories over fascism

and communism must play a central role

in any honest evaluation of the QDR’s

recommendations.

QDR:

Budget or Strategy Driven?
2 National Security Report

American citizens walk through a heavily guarded

perimeter to board a U.S. Marine Corps CH-53 inside

the U.S. Embassy housing compound in Tirana,

Albania, on March 15, 1997.

Issues of National Military Strategy

The current national military strategy,

developed during the Adminstration’s

1993 Bottom-Up Review (BUR), has as

its force-planning guidance the military’s

ability to conduct two nearly

simultaneous major regional wars. This

two-war scenario was based upon the

assumption that regional powers such as

North Korea and Iraq posed the most

likely threats to U.S. national security

interests. Both these nations remain

hostile to U.S. interests. For example,

since 1993, North Korea’s nuclear and

ballistic missile programs have matured

and, according to former CIA director John

Deutch, Saddam Hussein is in a stronger

position than he was at the conclusion of

the Gulf War in 1991.

However, the BUR failed to account for

the frequency with which the Clinton

Administration would commit U.S. forces

to manpower-intensive and expensive

peacekeeping and humanitarian relief

operations. Yet, since the BUR was

conducted, U.S. troops have been

deployed to Somalia, Rwanda, Haiti, and

Bosnia. The no-fly zones over northern

and southern Iraq, originally conceived

as temporary missions, continue today

and, in fact, these missions are growing.

In contrast to the BUR, which considered

peacekeeping and humanitarian missions

to be of secondary importance, the QDR

states that these “smaller-scale

contingencies” are the most likely mission

for U.S. troops for the next decade and

should be considered in U.S. force

planning.

Three Strategic Tasks

The QDR apparently foresees a 10-to15-year period of “strategic pause,”

during which there will be few large-scale

threats to U.S. national security interests.

During this pause, the prime goal of U.S.

military strategy is to “shape the

international security environment in

ways favorable to U.S. interests, to

respond to the full spectrum of crises

when it is in our interests to do so, and to

prepare now to meet the challenges of an

uncertain future,” according to one draft

of the QDR strategy that has been widely

circulated. These three broad tasks –

shaping the international environment,

responding to crises great and small, and

preparing for an uncertain future –

cumulatively amount to a more expansive

defense strategy and ambitious set of

military missions than reflected in the

current strategy’s focus on regional

threats.

The QDR strategy outlines three ways

of shaping the international security

environment. The first is to promote

regional stability, including the need to

“adopt and strengthen core alliances,”

such as the plan to expand NATO. A

second is to employ U.S. forces to prevent

threats and conflicts, such as in the

enduring peacekeeping mission in

Macedonia. The third is traditional

deterrence, both with conventional and

nuclear forces. According to one press

account, the QDR concludes that “in

order to shape the international

environment in favorable ways, U.S.

armed forces must maintain substantial

levels of peacetime engagement overseas,

utilizing the full range of shaping

instruments at their disposal to achieve

key U.S. objectives in each region of the

world.” [emphasis added.]

The second broad task of the QDR’s

defense strategy is military response to

the full spectrum of crises where “national

interests [are] at stake, be they vital,

important, or humanitarian in nature,”

according to one account of the QDR.

The current two-war requirement appears

to have been modified to reflect the fact

that key and substantial forces needed

for warfighting are likely to be

encumbered by peacekeeping missions

should a crisis occur. The

draft QDR strategy now

states that U.S. forces “must

be able to transition from a

posture of global engagement

to fight and win, in concert

with allies, two major theater

wars in overlapping time

frames. In this context, they

must also be able to defeat the

initial enemy advance in two

distant theaters in close

succession and achieve U.S.

war aims even in the face of

an adversary’s use of

chemical and biological

weapons, information

operations and terrorism.”

The third element in the new

defense strategy is to prepare

now to meet the security

challenges of an

unpredictable future.

According to news reports, the QDR

strategy calls for the United States to

maintain its military superiority “in the

face of evolving, as well as discontinuous,

threats and challenges.” To maintain this

needed superiority, the QDR recommends

that the Pentagon take a four-part

approach to fostering innovation:

• Increase modernization to replace

aging systems and incorporate “cutting -

edge” technologies;

• Employ more innovative technologies,

operational concepts and military

organizations to improve the services’

ability to perform current missions and

meet future challenges;

• Exploit similar innovative business

practices to improve efficiency and free

up resources for other investment needs;

• Prepare to deal with significant future

threats while remaining within projected

defense budgets.

Budgetary and Force Structure Issues

While the QDR’s strategy, which

recognizes the necessity of retaining the

two-regional war capability, the current

pace of peacekeeping and humanitarian

operations and the need also to prepare

for an uncertain future, is more realistic

than that of the 1993 Bottom-Up Review,

it is also more ambitious. The gap

between strategic requirements and actual

defense resources would appear to be

growing rather than diminishing. The

mismatch between the current, more
National Security Report 3

The QDR and NDP

Process

U.S. aircraft prepare to deliver troops, equipment and supplies

for many contingency operations worldwide.

narrow, Bottom-Up Review strategy and

defense resources has been estimated

by the Congressional Budget Office at

more than $100 billion over the course of

the five-year defense program. The

nonpartisan Center for Strategic and

International Studies characterized the

mismatch as a “coming trainwreck.” The

QDR’s more expansive strategy, to be

executed by reduced forces all in the

context of defense budgets unable to

keep pace even with inflation, can only

exacerbate the mismatch.

Since the end of the Cold War, total

active-duty manpower has dropped from

approximately 2.1 million to 1.4 million.

The QDR is likely to continue this trend.

According to The Washington Post, of

the planned 60,000 cuts in active-duty

personnel, approximately 15,000 soldiers

will be cut from the Army, 2,000 from the

Marine Corps, 25,000 from the Air Force,

and 18,000 from the Navy. The QDR

also reportedly calls for a reduction in

reserve component

forces of 70,000,

primarily from the

Army National

Guard.

These manpower cuts are

intended to generate

approximately $15 -

$20 billion in savings

to pay for increased

spending on long

needed equipment modernization. Yet

the cuts in personnel, as serious as they

are, are certain to fall well short of

generating the kind of savings necessary

to pay for the full range of equipment

modernizations now programmed by the

Department of Defense.

In an effort to generate additional

savings, the QDR reportedly will recommend two add-itional rounds of base

closings. The QDR is expected to

recommend the closure or realignment

of dozens of military installations. Four

previous rounds of the Base

Realignment and Closure (BRAC)

process have resulted in the closing of

97 defense installations in the United

States and many more overseas.

Unfortunately, the base closure process

became unnecessarily political and

controversial in 1995 when, in the eyes

of Congress, the Administration

circumvented the law to prevent the

closure of installations in Texas and

California. As a result, the Clinton

Administration’s credibility on the issue

of base closures has been damaged

severely. In addition, any savings

generated from further rounds of base

closures will not be realized for many

years to come, as the previous rounds

of base closures indicates.

Conclusion

The likelihood of worsening

mismatches between military strategy

and resources under the QDR has

caused many, including a number of

senior military officers, to conclude that

the prime goal of the review has been

rationalizing smaller defense budgets

rather than actually tailoring U.S. military

forces and budgets to the strategic

needs of the post-Cold War world. The

artificial constraint of limited defense

budgets led one senior general to

conclude that “we still have dollars

driving [the QDR] instead of strategy.”

Similarly, the report of the National

Defense Panel, the independent board

of outside experts mandated by

Congress to assess the QDR, is expected

to emphasize the strategy-resources

mismatch in its report accompanying the

QDR, which is to be submitted to the

Secretary of Defense December 1, 1997.

“The QDR ‘talks the talk’ when it comes

to strategy,” said one panel member,

“but doesn’t seem to ‘walk the walk’

when it comes to budgets.”

The requirement for the Department ofDefense to undertake a Quadrennial

Defense Review (QDR) was established by

section 923 of the FY 1997 National Defense

Authorization Act, public law 104-201. First and foremost,

the QDR was to provide a “comprehensive discussion of the

defense strategy of the United States and the force structure

best suited to implement that strategy.” The QDR is to be

transmitted to the House National Security and Senate Armed

Services committees by May 15, 1997.

The legislation also mandated the creation of a National

Defense Panel (NDP) to provide an assessment of the QDR

strategy and propose alternative force structures. The panel

consists of nine members, including a chairman, appointed

by the Secretary of Defense in consultation with the chairmen

of the House National Security and Senate Armed Services

committees. It was to have been named by December 1, 1996,

and is to issue its report to the Secretary of Defense by

December 1, 1997, who shall submit it to the House National

Security and Senate Armed Services committees not later

than December 15, 1997. Defense Secretary William Cohen’s

choice to chair the NDP is Philip Odeen,

president of BDM International, a

defense consulting and research firm.

Other NDP members are: Richard

Armitage, former Assistant Secretary of Defense for

International Security Affairs; Richard Hearney, former

Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps; David Jeremiah,

former Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Robert M.

Kimmitt, managing director of Lehman Brothers, an

investment banking firm; Andrew Krepinevich, director of

the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments; James

P. McCarthy, former deputy commander-in-chief, U.S.

European Command; Janne Nolan, senior fellow, Brookings

Institution Foreign Policy Studies program; and Robert R.

RisCassi, former commander- in -chief, U.S. forces in Korea.

The NDP has received extensive briefings on the QDR and

is expected to transmit its initial assessment of the review to

Secretary Cohen in time to be included in the May 15 report

to Congress. The NDP is also conducting a number of open

hearings during which it is receiving testimony from outside

experts on a variety of defense issues.
4 National Security Report

Update

 In Bosnia...

The National Security Report is archived on the world wide web site of the House National Security Committee at: http://www.house.gov/nsc/.

Additional background information may be obtained from Tom Donnelly (x65372), David Trachtenberg (x60532), or Will Marsh (x56045) on the

committee staff.

 In the Pacific...

Ten checkpoints are dismantled bySFOR soldiers in northern Bosnia,

leaving only two checkpoints – at Brcko

and Doboj — remaining in the area. The

checkpoints are removed to facilitate

freedom of movement and to allow for

more mobile patrols.

•

Bosnian Serbs sign a trade agreementwith the Republic of Yugoslavia,

paving the way for a joint customs

system this summer. The agreement is a

violation of the Dayton accord, which

delegates to the Bosnian central

government responsibility for foreign

trade.

•

Former Bosnia peace negotiatorRichard Holbrooke criticizes the U.S.

military role in Bosnia, arguing that the

Pentagon’s “reluctance to go beyond a

rather narrow definition of its role and

mandate” and arrest indicted war

criminals has “given strength to the

[Serb] separatist cause.”

•

Nearly 200 additional police monitorsare authorized by the United

Nations Security Council to be deployed

in disputed area of Brcko, in northern

Bosnia.

•

An agreement is reached amongmembers of Bosnia rotating threeman presidency regarding a single

currency for the country.

•

Pope John Paul II, during a visit toBosnia, appeals for reconciliation

among the various ethnic factions and

an end to religious hatred.

 In the United States...

The House AppropriationsCommittee approves $1.3 billion in

fiscal year 1997 supplemental funding to

pay for ongoing U.S. peacekeeping

operations in Bosnia.

•

The General Accounting Office(GAO), in a draft report cited in the

press, concludes that most of the

political and economic provisions of the

Dayton peace agreement remain

unfulfilled. The report cites a State

Department view that a multinational

military presence will be required to keep

the peace in Bosnia “for many years.”

•

House National Security ChairmanFloyd Spence and Ranking

Minority Member Ronald Dellums send

a letter to the President regarding NATO

expansion. The letter requests detailed

information on the costs, rationale and

implications for U.S. security of the

Administration’s expansion plan.

•

Russian Defense Minister IgorRodionov denies reports that the

command and control of Russian

strategic nuclear forces is weakening. He

says Russia “will do everything possible

to ensure that the safety and protection

of our nuclear arsenals would never

decrease.” Rodionov says there is

“some shortages in funding” for the

Russian military, but notes that “the

strategic nuclear forces have the same

level of funding as they used to have for

many years.”

 In Russia...

I

sraeli Defense Minister Yitzhak

Mordecai claims in an April 29

interview that Syria is developing VX, a

chemical weapon deadlier than sarin

nerve gas, with cooperation from

Russia. Syria is not a signatory to the

chemical weapons ban that entered into

force this week. Russia has delayed

ratifying the ban.

•

According to the Russian press,China has contracted to have its

Kilo-class diesel-powered submarines

repaired by Russia at Vladivostok.

China purchased Kilo submarines from

Russia several years ago.

•

On April 25, Russia, China,Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and

Kyrgyzstan signed a treaty reducing the

number of troops on the sides along

the former Soviet-Chinese border. A

day earlier, on April 24, Moscow and

Beijing had criticized NATO

enlargement in a joint statement from

Moscow condemning the “building up

of troops and expanding of military

blocks.”

The head of Japan’s Defense Agencysays Tokyo is reviewing various

domestic laws and considering revising

them to deal with emergencies under new

guidelines for Japan-U.S. defense

cooperation.

•

U.S. and Japanese media report thatNorth Korea has deployed the

intermediate-range No-Dong missile. If

operational, the No-dong missile

imminently threatens over 77,000 U.S.

forces forward-deployed in South Korea

and in Japan.