Posted by Andrew Bacevich
at 7:50am, April 10, 2018.
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Here's how Colonel Robert
Heinl, Jr., began a June 1971 article in Armed Forces Journal bluntly
headlined “The Collapse of the Armed Forces”:
“The morale, discipline, and
battleworthiness of the U.S. Armed Forces are, with a few salient exceptions,
lower and worse than at anytime in this century and possibly in the history of
the United States. By every conceivable indicator, our army that now remains in
Vietnam is in a state approaching collapse, with individual units avoiding or
having refused combat, murdering their officers and noncommissioned officers,
drug-ridden, and dispirited where not near mutinous. Elsewhere than Vietnam,
the situation is nearly as serious.”
Consider that grim list and
the churning antiwar activism in the Vietnam-era military that Heinl went on to
describe as a reminder of why President Richard Nixon, Secretary of
Defense Melvin Laird, and the U.S. military high command opted
on January 27, 1973, to end the draft. They launched instead
the “all-volunteer” force we know 45 years later, the one that, with nary a
peep of protest, criticism, or complaint, continues to fight a set of still
spreading wars across the Greater Middle East and Africa almost 17 years after
the 9/11 attacks.
What Nixon, in particular,
took away from the endless disaster of Vietnam (before the disaster of
Watergate felled his presidency) was that a draft army -- that is, a literal
people’s army -- taken from a reasonable cross section of a still-democratic
society increasingly opposed to a quagmire war, was a disaster in its own
right. In his urge to ditch the draft and so dampen the still-churning antiwar
movement at home, Nixon created a new kind of American force. For all the adulation it now gets here, it's perhaps closer to a foreign legion (as
retired Air Force Lieutenant Colonel William Astore long ago suggested at TomDispatch) geared to fighting
never-ending wars thousands of miles from what, post-9/11, came to be known as
“the homeland.”
As for those draft-less armed
forces and the draft-less society that went with them, Nixon couldn’t have been
cannier or more on target. The resulting military and its commanders, who could
be thought of as Nixon’s children, are now impermeable to criticism, even
though they ensure, as TomDispatch regular Andrew Bacevich, author
of America’s War for the Greater Middle East: A Military History,
makes clear in striking fashion today, that wars without end and a military
system incapable of ending anything it begins are facts of our present
lives. Tom
What Happens When a Few
Volunteer and the Rest Just Watch
The American Military System
Dissected
The purpose of all wars, is
peace. So observed St.
Augustine early in the first millennium A.D. Far be it from me to disagree with
the esteemed Bishop of Hippo, but his crisply formulated aphorism just might
require a bit of updating.
I’m not a saint or even a
bishop, merely an interested observer of this nation’s ongoing military
misadventures early in the third millennium A.D. From my vantage point, I might
suggest the following amendment to Augustine’s dictum: Any war failing to
yield peace is purposeless and, if purposeless, both wrong and stupid.
War is evil. Large-scale,
state-sanctioned violence is justified only when all other means of achieving
genuinely essential objectives have been exhausted or are otherwise
unavailable. A nation should go to war only when it has to -- and even then,
ending the conflict as expeditiously as possible should be an imperative.
Some might take issue with
these propositions, President Trump’s latestnational security adviser doubtless among them. Yet
most observers -- even, I’m guessing, most high-ranking U.S. military officers
-- would endorse them. How is it then that peace has essentially
vanished as a U.S. policy objective? Why has war joined death and taxes in that
select category of things that Americans have come to accept as unavoidable?
The United States has taken
Thucydides's famed Melian Dialogue and turned it inside out. Centuries before
Augustine, the great Athenian historian wrote, “The strong do what they will, while the weak suffer
what they must.”Strength confers choice; weakness restricts it. That’s the way
the world works, so at least Thucydides believed. Yet the inverted Melian
Dialogue that prevails in present-day Washington seemingly goes like
this: strength imposes obligations and limits choice. In other words,
we gotta keep doing what we’ve been doing, no matter what.
Making such a situation all
the more puzzling is the might and majesty of America’s armed forces. By common
consent, the United States today has the world’s best military. By some
estimates, it may be the best in recorded history. It’s certainly the most
expensive and hardest working on the planet.
Yet in the post-Cold War era
when the relative strength of U.S. forces reached its zenith, our well-endowed,
well-trained, well-equipped, and highly disciplined troops have proven unable
to accomplish any of the core tasks to which they’ve been assigned. This has
been especially true since 9/11.
We send the troops off to war,
but they don’t achieve peace. Instead, America’s wars and skirmishes simply
drag on, seemingly without end. We just keep doing what we’ve been doing,
a circumstance that both Augustine and Thucydides would undoubtedly have found
baffling.
Prosecuting War, Averting
Peace
How to explain this paradox of
a superb military that never gets the job done? Let me suggest that the problem
lies with the present-day American military system, the principles to which the
nation adheres in raising, organizing, supporting, and employing its armed
forces. By its very existence, a military system expresses an implicit contract
between the state, the people, and the military itself.
Here, as I see it, are the
principles -- seven in all -- that define the prevailing military system of the
United States.
First, we define military
service as entirely voluntary. In the U.S., there is no link between
citizenship and military service. It’s up to you as an individual to
decide if you want to take up arms in the service of your country.
If you choose to do so, that’s
okay. If you choose otherwise, that’s okay, too. Either way, your decision is
of no more significance than whether you root for the Yankees or the Mets.
Second, while non-serving
citizens are encouraged to “support the troops,” we avoid stipulating how this
civic function is to be performed.
In practice, there are many
ways of doing so, some substantive, others merely symbolic. Most citizens opt
for the latter. This means that they cheer when invited to do so. Cheering is
easy and painless. It can even make you feel good about yourself.
Third, when it comes to
providing the troops with actual support, we expect Congress to do the heavy
lifting. Our elected representatives fulfill that role by routinely ponying up
vast sums of money for what is misleadingly called a defense budget. In
some instances, Congress appropriates even more money than the Pentagon asks
for, as was the case this year.
Meanwhile, under the terms of
our military system, attention to how this money actually gets spent by
our yet-to-be-audited Pentagon tends to be -- to put the
matter politely -- spotty. Only rarely does the Congress insert itself
forcefully into matters relating to what U.S. forces scattered around the world
are actually doing.
Yes, there are periodic
hearings, with questions posed and testimony offered. But unless there is some
partisan advantage to be gained, oversight tends to be, at best, pro forma.
As a result, those charged with implementing national security policy --
another Orwellian phrase -- enjoy very considerable latitude.
Fourth, under the terms of our
military system, this latitude applies in spades to the chief executive. The
commander-in-chief occupies the apex of our military system. The president may
bring to office very little expertise pertinent to war or the art of
statecraft, yet his authority regarding such matters is essentially unlimited.
Consider, if you will, the
sobering fact that our military system empowers the president to order a
nuclear attack, should he see the need -- or feel the impulse -- to do so. He need not obtain
congressional consent. He certainly doesn’t need to check with the American
people.
Since Harry Truman ordered the
destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, presidents have not exercised
this option, for which we should all be grateful. Yet on more occasions than
you can count, they have ordered military actions, large and small, on their own
authority or after only the most perfunctory consultation with Congress.
When Donald Trump, for instance, threatened North Korea’s Kim Jong-un with “fire and
fury the likes of which the world has never seen,” he gave no hint that he
would even consider asking for prior congressional authorization to do so.
Trump’s words were certainly inflammatory. Yet were he to act on those words,
he would merely be exercising a prerogative enjoyed by his predecessors going
back to Truman himself.
The Constitution invests in Congress the authority to declare war. The
relevant language is unambiguous. In practice, as countless
commentatorshave noted, that provision has long been a dead letter. This,
too, forms an essential part of our present military system.
Fifth, under the terms of that
system, there’s no need to defray the costs of military actions undertaken in
our name. Supporting the troops does not require citizens to pay anything extra
for what the U.S. military is doing out there wherever it may be. The troops
are asked to sacrifice; for the rest of us, sacrifice is anathema.
Indeed, in recent years,
presidents who take the nation to war or perpetuate wars they inherit never
even consider pressing Congress to increase our taxes accordingly. On the
contrary, they advocate tax cuts, especially for the wealthiest among us, which
lead directly to massive deficits.
Sixth, pursuant to the terms
of our military system, the armed services have been designed not to defend the
country but to project military power on a global basis. For the Department of
Defense actually defending the United States qualifies as an afterthought,
trailing well behind other priorities such as trying to pacify Afghanistan’s Kandahar Province or jousting with militant groups in Somalia. The
United States Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps are all designed to fight
elsewhere, relying on a constellation of perhaps 800 bases around the world to facilitate the
conduct of military campaigns “out there,” wherever “there” may happen to be.
They are, in other words, expeditionary forces.
Reflect for a moment on the
way the Pentagon divvies the world up into gigantic swathes of territory and
then assigns a military command to exercise jurisdiction over each of them:
European Command, Africa Command, Central Command, Southern Command, Northern
Command, and Pacific Command. With the polar icecap continuing to melt, a U.S.
Arctic Command is almost surely next on the docket. Nor is the Pentagon’s mania
for creating new headquarters confined to terra firma. We already have U.S. Cyber Command. Can U.S. Galactic Command be far
behind?
No other nation adheres to
this practice. Nor would the United States permit any nation to do so. Imagine
the outcry in Washington if President Xi Jinping had the temerity to create a
“PRC Latin America Command,” headed by a four-star Chinese general charged
with maintaining order and stability from Mexico to Argentina.
Seventh (and last), our military system invests great
confidence in something called the military profession.
The legal profession exists to
implement the rule of law. We hope that the result is some approximation of
justice. The medical profession exists to repair our bodily ailments. We hope
that health and longevity will result. The military profession exists to master
war. With military professionals in charge, it’s our hope that America’s wars
will conclude quickly and successfully with peace the result.
To put it another way, we look
to the military profession to avert the danger of long, costly, and
inconclusive wars. History suggests that these sap the collective strength of a
nation and can bring about its premature decline. We count on military professionals
to forestall that prospect.
Our military system assigns
the immediate direction of war to our most senior professionals, individuals
who have ascended step by step to the very top of the military hierarchy. We
expect three- and four-star generals and admirals to possess the skills needed
to make war politically purposeful. This expectation provides the rationale for
the status they enjoy and the many entitlementsthey are accorded.
America, the (Formerly)
Indispensable
Now, the nation that has created
this military system is not some “shithole country,” to use a phrase made famous by President Trump. We are, or at least
claim to be, a democratic republic in which all power ultimately derives from
the people. We believe in -- indeed, are certain that we exemplify -- freedom,
even as we continually modify the meaning of that term.
In the aggregate, we are very
rich. Since the latter part of the nineteenth century we have taken it for
granted that the United States ought to be the richest country on the planet,
notwithstanding the fact that large numbers of ordinary Americans are themselves
anything but rich. Indeed, as a corollary to our military system, we count on
these less affluent Americans to volunteer for military service in disproportionate numbers. Offered sufficient incentives, they do so.
Finally, since 1945 the United
States has occupied the preeminent place in the global order, a
position affirmed with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold
War in 1991. Indeed, we have come to believe that American primacy
reflects the will of God or of some cosmic authority.
From the early years of the
Cold War, we have come to believe that the freedom, material abundance, and
primacy we cherish all depend upon the exercise of “global leadership.” In
practice, that seemingly benign term has been a euphemism for unquestioned
military superiority and the self-assigned right to put our military to work as
we please wherever we please. Back in the 1990s, Secretary of State
Madeleine Albright said it best: “If we have to use force, it is because we
are America. We are the indispensable nation. We stand tall. We see further
into the future.”
Other countries might design
their military establishments to protect certain vital interests. As Albright’s
remark suggests, American designs have been far more ambitious.
Here, then, is a question: How
do the principles and attitudes that undergird our military system actually
suit twenty-first-century America? And if they don’t, what are the implications
of clinging to such a system? Finally, what alternative principles might form a
more reasonable basis for raising, organizing, supporting, and employing our
armed forces?
Spoiler alert: Let me
acknowledge right now that I consider our present-day military system
irredeemably flawed and deeply harmful. For proof we need look no further than the conduct of our post-9/11 wars,
especially in Iraq and Afghanistan, but also in Libya, Pakistan, Somalia,
Syria, Yemen, and parts of sub-Saharan Africa.
These myriad undertakings of
the last nearly 17 years have subjected our military system to a comprehensive
real-world examination. Collectively, they have rendered a judgment on that
system. And the judgment is negative. Put to the test, the American military
system has failed.
And the cost so far? Trillions
of dollars expended (with trillions more to come), thousands of
American lives lost, tens of thousands of Americans grievously damaged, and
even greater
numbers of non-Americans killed, injured, and displaced.
One thing is certain: our wars
have not brought about peace by even the loosest definition of the word.
A Military Report Card
There are many possible
explanations for why our recent military record has been so dismal. One
crucial explanation -- perhaps the most important of all -- relates to those
seven principles that undergird our military system.
Let me review them in reverse
order.
Principle 7, the military
profession: Tally up the number of three- and four-star generals who have
commanded the Afghan War since 2001. It’s roughly a dozen. None of them has
succeeded in bringing it to a successful conclusion. Nor does any such happy
ending seem likely to be in the offinganytime soon. The senior officers we expect to
master war have demonstrated no such mastery.
The generals who followed one
another in presiding over that war are undoubtedly estimable, well-intentioned
men, but they have not accomplished the job for which they were hired. Imagine
if you contracted with a dozen different plumbers -- each highly regarded -- to
fix a leaking sink in your kitchen and you ended up with a flooded basement.
You might begin to think that there’s something amiss in the way that plumbers
are trained and licensed. Similarly, perhaps it’s time to reexamine our
approach to identifying and developing very senior military officers.
Or alternatively, consider
this possibility: Perhaps our theory of war as an enterprise where superior
generalship determines the outcome is flawed. Perhaps war cannot be fully
mastered, by generals or anyone else.
It might just be that war is
inherently unmanageable. Take it from Winston Churchill, America’s favorite
confronter of evil. “The statesman who yields to war fever,” Churchill wrote, “must realize that once the signal is given, he is
no longer the master of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and
uncontrollable events.”
If Churchill is right, perhaps
our expectations that senior military professionals will tame war -- control
the uncontrollable -- are misplaced. Perhaps our military system should
put greater emphasis on avoiding war altogether or at least classifying it as
an option to be exercised with great trepidation, rather than as the political
equivalent of a handy-dandy, multi-functional Swiss Army knife.
Principle 6, organizing our
forces to emphasize global power projection: Reflect for a moment on the
emerging security issues of our time. The rise of China is one example. A
petulant and over-armed Russia offers a second. Throw in climate change and
mushrooming cyber-threats and you have a daunting set of problems. It’s by no
means impertinent to wonder about the relevance of the current military
establishment to these challenges.
Every year the United States
spends hundreds of billions of dollars to maintain and enhance the lethality of
a force configured for conventional power projection and to sustain the global
network of bases that goes with it. For almost two decades, that force has been
engaged in a futile war of attrition with radical Islamists that has now spread across much of the Greater Middle East and
parts of Africa.
I don’t know about you, but I
worry more about the implications of China’s rise and Russian misbehavior than
I do about Islamic terrorism. And I worry more about changing weather patterns here in New England or
somebody shutting down the electrical grid in my home town than I do about what
Beijing and Moscow may be cooking up. Bluntly put, our existing military system
finds us focused on the wrong problem set.
We need a military system that
accurately prioritizes actual and emerging threats. The existing system does
not. This suggests the need for radically reconfigured armed services, with the
hallowed traditions of George Patton, John Paul Jones, Billy Mitchell, and
Chesty Puller honorably but permanently retired.
Principle 5, paying -- or not
paying -- for America’s wars: If you want it, you should be willing to pay for
it. That hoary axiom ought to guide our military system as much as it should
our personal lives. Saddling Millennials or members of Generation Z with
the cost of paying for wars mostly conceived and mismanaged by my fellow Baby
Boomers strikes me as downright unseemly.
One might expect the young to
raise quite a ruckus over such an obvious injustice. In recent weeks, we’ve
witnessed their righteous anger over the absence of effective gun controls in
this country. That they aren’t comparably incensed about the misuse of guns by
their own contemporaries deployed to distant lands represents a real puzzle,
especially since they’re the ones who will ultimately be stuck with the bill.
Principles 4 and 3, the role
of Congress and the authority of the commander-in-chief: Whatever rationale may
once have existed for allowing the commander-in-chief to circumvent the
Constitution’s plainly specified allocation of war powers to Congress should
long since have lapsed. Well before Donald Trump became president, a
responsible Congress would have reasserted its authority to declare war. That
Trump sits in the Oval Office and now takes advice from the likes of John Bolton invests this matter with great urgency.
Surely President Trump’s
bellicose volatility drives home the point that it’s past time for Congress to
assert itself in providing responsible oversight regarding all aspects of U.S.
military policy. Were it to do so, the chances of fixing the defects permeating
our present military system would improve appreciably.
Of course, the likelihood of
that happening is nil until the money changers are expelled from the temple. And
that won’t occur until Americans who are not beholden to the military-industrial
complex and its various subsidiaries rise up, purge the Congress of its own set
of complexes, and install in office people willing to do their duty. And that
brings us back to…
Principles 2 and 1, the
existing relationship between the American people and their military and our
reliance on a so-called all-volunteer force: Here we come to the heart of the
matter.
I submit that the relationship
between the American people and their military is shot through with hypocrisy.
It is, in fact, nothing short of fraudulent. Worse still, most of us know it,
even if we are loath to fess up. In practice, the informal mandate to “support
the troops” has produced an elaborate charade. It’s theater, as phony as Donald
Trump’s professed love for DACA recipients.
If Americans were genuinely
committed to supporting the troops, they would pay a great deal more attention
to what President Trump and his twenty-first-century predecessors have tasked
those troops to accomplish -- with what results and at what cost. Of course,
that would imply doing more than cheering and waving the flag on cue.
Ultimately, the existence of the all-volunteer force obviates any need for such
an effort. It provides Americans with an ample excuse for ignoring our endless
wars and allowing our flawed military system to escape serious scrutiny.
Having outsourced
responsibility for defending the country to people few of us actually know,
we’ve ended up with a military system that is unfair, undemocratic, hugely
expensive, and largely ineffective, not to mention increasingly irrelevant to
the threats coming our way. The perpetuation of that system finds us mired in
precisely the sort of long, costly, inconclusive wars that sap the collective
strength of a nation and may bring about its premature decline.
The root cause of our
predicament is the all-volunteer force. Only when we ordinary citizens conclude
that we have an obligation to contribute to the country’s defense
will it become possible to devise a set of principles for raising, organizing,
supporting, and employing U.S. forces that align with our professed values and
our actual security requirements.
If Stormy Daniels can figure
out when an existing contract has outlived its purpose, so can the rest of us.
In between his contributions to TomDispatch, Andrew J.
Bacevich is trying to write a book about how we got Trump. He is the author,
most recently, of America’s War for the Greater Middle East: A Military History.
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