nKorea: Morality in Negotiations

Moral Surrender To Pyongyang, (Washington Post)…Michael Gerson, Dec 19, 2008

…The negotiations with North Korea were worth a try. But diplomatic engagement does not require moral surrender. And when diplomats such as Christopher Hill are deployed, it does not signify that the adults have arrived. It means that hope is fading.

The argument was simple: In an impossible situation — facing an infantile and possibly ill dictator with a nuclear weapon — Hill’s approach was worth a try. China was skillfully enlisted in an effort to pressure and isolate North Korea. Concessions were made in exchange for the resumption of negotiations, incremental progress and vague promises of future cooperation. Fuel was shipped. North Korea was removed from the sponsors-of-terrorism list.

Some have called this appeasement. It is more like bribery — with a special emphasis on getting North Korea to part with at least 30 kilos (66 pounds) of plutonium. Hill has summarized his approach this way: “If you give up 30 kilos, we will sign a bilateral assistance program.”

The negotiations with North Korea were worth a try. But diplomatic engagement does not require moral surrender.

Bush Doctrine: Preventing Further Terrorism

Bush Says His Post-9/11 Actions Prevented Further Terrorism, (Washington Post), Dan Eggen, Dec 18, 2008.

President Bush took credit yesterday for “keeping America safe” from terrorists since Sept. 11, 2001, arguing that his administration had prevented more bloodshed at home through aggressive policies and that such a result should outweigh any second-guessing of his methods. Bush told a friendly audience at the Army War College that he took “a deliberate and comprehensive approach” to preventing terrorism that combined military action overseas with strong defensive measures at home.

New National Security Advisor: Gen (Ret) Jones

Straight-Shooting Jones, (Washington Times)…Georgie Anne Geyer

Our new national security adviser to the president-elect is perhaps best known as the supreme allied commander of NATO from 2003 to 2007, but to me he should be heralded as the supreme survivor of the last eight years. Here’s why: …

We pressed him on Iraq, and we particularly pressed him on the responsibility of the military man to speak out. He was very careful in his answers. He finally said there is a law in America that military men have “the obligation to speak their own minds … when they testify before Congress.” There is such a law, although few invoke it.

I always think of that moment as the moment when a man, long put-upon to fight and lead in wars he did not believe in, deftly pointed out to us, by inversion if you will, the military man or woman’s real responsibility.

Banning Nuclear Weapons: "Transforming the image we see in the mirror"

A laudable goal. To paraphrase the argument against banning handguns, “nuclear weapons don’t kill people, people making the decision to use nuclear weapons is what kills people.” Desire for nulcear weapons motivated by power, fear, insecurity, mistrust, and survival.

“In the final analysis, any contemplation of war must return to the nature of humanity, which yet stands as the root cause of war and the wellspring of History’s inestimable tragedy. Throughout time, governments, like wars, have both flowed from and reflected human nature in both positive and negative manifestation. If we are to overcome the massive violence that has typified modern civilization for five centuries, our ultimate challenge is nothing more or less than transforming the image we see in the mirror. That, however, is a task that lends itself to no purely political solution.” — Bruce Porter, War and the Rise of The State.

Leaders Seek Ban On Nuclear Weapons, (Philadelphia Inquirer)…Barry Schweid, Associated Press

A new international group committed to eliminating nuclear weapons over the next 25 years has enlisted scores of world leaders as its campaign gets under way at a conference in Paris on Tuesday.

Leadership and Ethics

Additional opinion on the conflict of interest issue.

POST: Compromised general? by Thomas P.M. Barnett on December 5, 2008

ARTICLE: One Man’s Military-Industrial-Media Complex, By DAVID BARSTOW, New York Times, November 29, 2008

I was stunned by the level of reporting on this piece on McCaffrey. The jump section extended across virtually two full pages, which is a huge investigative effort on the NYT’s part.

Clearly, this is a follow-up to the piece months back on the generals being paid, secret spokesmen for the administration (“message multipliers”) whereby Barstow found enough out about McCaffrey to justify what must have been a huge reporting effort on his part.

It will be interesting to see if this hurts McCaffrey at all. He is sort of a King Kong figure. You read his reports and they always reference his West Point status, but I was really surprised to see how many commercial entities he works for.

The phenomenon of retired generals doing this is well known. Some refuse the temptation of such synergy, and others go whole hog. McCaffrey, on all levels, seems to be in a class by himself.

What constitutes wrong here? Not easy to say. But clearly, McCaffrey loses the perception-of-conflict-of-interest battle here.

National Security 101

Team Of Heavyweights, (Washington Post)…Henry A. Kissinger

President-elect Barack Obama has appointed an extraordinary team for national security policy.

…Process is no substitute for substance, of course. But even with this caveat, the new national security team encourages the hope that America is moving beyond its divisions to its opportunities.

The writer was national security adviser to President Richard M. Nixon and secretary of state under Presidents Nixon and Gerald R. Ford.

Natl Defense Strategy: Balance

Note that Secretary of Defense Gates is referencing “Defense” strategy – a balanced concept is also needed for the National Security Strategy that would more effectively integrate the “whole-of-government” approach.

ESSAY: A Balanced Strategy, Reprogramming the Pentagon for a New Age, Robert M. Gates From Foreign Affairs, January/February 2009

The defining principle of the Pentagon’s new National Defense Strategy is balance. The United States cannot expect to eliminate national security risks through higher defense budgets, to do everything and buy everything. The Department of Defense must set priorities and consider inescapable tradeoffs and opportunity costs.

The strategy strives for balance in three areas:

— between trying to prevail in current conflicts and preparing for other contingencies,

— between institutionalizing capabilities such as counterinsurgency and foreign military assistance and maintaining the United States’ existing conventional and strategic technological edge against other military forces, and

— between retaining those cultural traits that have made the U.S. armed forces successful and shedding those that hamper their ability to do what needs to

What is dubbed the war on terror is, in grim reality, a prolonged, worldwide irregular campaign — a struggle between the forces of violent extremism and those of moderation.

Foundation Principles for Leaders: Application of "Smart" Power

The Armed Services provide one of the better examples of a learning organization which is demonstrated by the current debate in Parameters, on the concept of Effect-based Operations (EBO) to include my response via a letter to the editor.

Many of the modern day quality improvement methods were pioneered by the War Department during WWII and evolved into programs/initiatives that have included zero-defects/six sigma, just-in-time/lean, quality circles, Total Quality Management, Capability Maturity Model Integration, Business Process Reengineering and now Continuous Process Improvement.

Smart Power would include the application of the foundation principles for leaders to optimize all the elements and instruments of national power (also referred to as the “whole-of-government” approach) to help prevent/deter conflict and if deterrence fails, to resolve the conflict quickly and decisively with a minimum amount of resources.

The application of this technology is supported throughout the world by the American Society for Quality.

Acronyms: EBO – Effect based Operations; ONA – Operational Net Assessment; SoSA – System of System Analysis, CPI – Continuous Process Improvement.

ARTICLES: Parameters, US Army War College Quarterly, Autumn 2008

Effects-based Operations: More Important Than Ever, by Tomislav Z. Ruby

USJFCOM Commander’s Guidance for Effects-based Operations” by James N. Mattis.

To the Editor,

The Autumn 2008 issue of Parameters included two excellent articles on the Future of Effects-based Operations that illustrate a “clash of paradigms.” I agree with both authors on the points that “EBO is more important than ever” and that “underlying principles associated with EBO, ONA and SoSA are fundamentally flawed.”

In May 2008, the scope of DoD’s guidance on Continuous Process Improvement (CPI) was appropriately expanded to include combat organizations and will inevitably be applied to combat operations. The CPI concept also provides proven and complementary approaches to improve effectiveness as well as efficiency.

The way ahead is neither to abandon the EBO concept, nor to consider CPI as irrelevant nor to rely solely on traditional approaches, but rather to recognize and build upon foundational principles that effective leaders have intuitively applied when developing optimal strategies that synchronize a systems-of-systems approach with the more traditional and “time-honored principles and terminology.” Stakeholders, systems, variability, knowledge, planned change and people (1) are the key components that provide the underlying principles for both traditional methods as well as emerging methods such as CPI, EBO, ONA, and SoSA. In a non-military application, the framework is applied to improve capabilities and in a military context, they are applied to reduce an adversary’s capabilities. Of the six principles, the concept of variability is the “what’s new?“ and most critical.

Variation is a law of nature that states that no two people or things will ever be exactly alike. Everyone and everything varies. In the 1920’s, Walter Shewhart developed the new but still relatively unknown paradigm for managing variation that has typically been defined using a scientific or statistical frame of reference.

In March of 2006, the American Society for Quality embraced a broader description of the concept to support more universal awareness and application. To summarize, variation represents the difference between the ideal situation and actual. An ideal represents a standard of perfection uniquely defined by the stakeholders that one can strive for but never achieve; a fact that makes continual improvement possible. Improving efficiency and/or effectiveness has always been achieved by reducing variation.

Ideal or perfect outcomes are defined as those benefiting everyone (win/win). Non ideal outcomes are those that result in zero-sum, somebody wins/somebody loses. Preventing war requires the most optimal (win/win) of approaches; war-fighting is all about optimizing the suboptimal.

Shewhart concluded that although everything varies and individual things are unpredictable, groups of things from a constant system of causes tends to be predictable within a range In other words, if you always do what you always did, on average, you will usually get what you always got. The variation principle is at the heart of military art and science that must address both chaos and order; chaos defined as order without predictability.

The application context for the foundation principles includes the strategic, operational and tactical levels. The distinctions between levels include scope, position of the primary stakeholders, required leadership competencies, degree of influence-direct vs. indirect, and time expected for achieving expected results—long-term, mid-term, short-term.

1. Stakeholders include individuals and groups that are affected by the respective situation in the short, mid and long term. Stakeholders, to include allies, adversaries or competitors, have needs, desires/wants and expectations that are met, or not met, by products/services that in military terms include the full spectrum of military operations. Stakeholder categories would include Political, Military, Economic, Social, Infrastructure, and Information (PMESII).

2. Systems transform inputs into outputs (products/services) to achieve the outcomes expected by stakeholders. Outputs and Outcomes are results that are produced through action. Actions or tasks (collective and individual) are accomplished through processes. A process is a series of actions taken to achieve a result. A system is a collection of processes with a common aim or purpose.

The term process and system are often and correctly used interchangeability depending upon the context. Systems determine 85-98% of the result. Consequently, a “systems-of-systems approach” to build or reduce capability has always been the required strategy for achieving the best results.

3. Variation is inherent in every system and an assessment of variation is how stakeholders keep score, e.g., determine if things got better or worse. Shewart identified two causes of variation (common and special) and two types of systems/processes (stable and unstable).

Common cause is variation that can be expected and predicted within a range. Special cause is unusual or unexpected. Systems/processes consisting of all common causes are considered stable or more predictable; systems/processes containing both common and special are more unstable or unpredictable.

Given the variation principle, a problem is never solved because variation is never eliminated (and gets worse if improvement is not continual). A solved problem represents an acceptable degree of variation; a problem is an unacceptable degree of variation. Stakeholders take action based on their assessments as to the “acceptability” of the variation.

4. Knowledge of variability leads to better results. Feedback to include the qualitative, quantitative, statistical, notional and intuitive leads to information, information to potential knowledge and knowledge to potential wisdom. Knowledge and wisdom are gained through action and assessment to include after action reviews, lessons learned and captured in doctrine, and identification of the right way (s) forward.

5. Planned Change requires the application of problem solving and decision processes that are applied simultaneously at the three levels of warfare (strategic, operational, tactical) and tailored to three general categories: Maintain/sustain the situation, incremental improvement and/or radical improvement. The appropriate level strategic plan provides the context needed to balance and align ends, ways, and means.

6. The People principle includes learning and applying a basic knowledge of the behavior of individuals and groups to include their respective cultures and capabilities.

The foundation principles for leaders provide underlying principles that effective leaders have always intuitively applied to improve upon traditional methods as well as assessing the quality of what may perceived as new methods. New methods in this case being CPI applied to combat operations, the EBO concept, ONA, and SoSA. A more conscious awareness and understanding of the variation principle may help resolve the “clash of paradigms” with the effect being obtaining better results with fewer resources.

(1) Principles derived from Foundation for Leaders, PQ Systems, Dayton, OH. The term Stakeholder substituted for the term Customer.

Global Trends 2025: Leadership

Gloom, But Not Doom, (New York Times)…Editorial

There’s been a fair amount of hand-wringing since the nation’s intelligence community surveyed the world of 2025. But the headlines from “Global Trends 2025: A Transformed World,” published by the National Intelligence Council, are not the whole story.

A relative decline in power also does not mean that the United States will not remain powerful. This country can and must continue to lead. There will be a particular premium on quick, nimble and farsighted decision-making and cooperation.

Their report on the concept states that “leadership is not an entitlement; it has to be earned and sustained. Leadership that serves common goals is the best way to inspire the many different peoples of the world to make shared commitments.” That is a good place to start.

Soft Power? What we need is "Smart" Power

The elements of national power within the U.S. are categorized into four areas: Diplomatic, Informational, Military and Economic (DIME). Soft power is Diplomatic, Informational and Economic. Hard power is Military.

Soft power is best used to prevent conflict and Hard power (military) provides the credibility that Soft power needs to be effective. The United Nations for example, is limited to employing Soft power.

The optimum application of “Smart Power” requires Quality Leadership.

The Focus Is On ‘Soft Power’, (Philadelphia Inquirer)…Trudy Rubin

At first glance, President-elect Barack Obama’s new national-security team of experienced heavyweights may not look like a change-oriented bunch. Look again. Robert Gates, the current and future defense secretary, and former NATO commander Gen. James L. Jones, Obama’s pick for national security adviser, advocate sweeping change in the way America pursues its security interests.

For example, the United States has more members of military marching bands than Foreign Service officers. Gates also noted that the number of Foreign Service officers was frozen as the number of embassies grew after the Soviet Union breakup. Meantime, “the United States Agency for International Development saw deep staff cuts … and the U.S. Information Agency was abolished.”

These were steps taken by the Clinton administration under pressure from Jesse Helms, the late Republican senator who chaired the Foreign Relations Committee.

The extent of the problem was described graphically in a report on the crisis in diplomatic readiness recently released by the American Academy of Diplomacy and the Stimson Center (available at www.academyofdiplomacy.org). The report details the shortage of Foreign Service officers, and particularly of those with training in critical languages such as Arabic, Chinese, Hindi and Urdu.

Chertoff, Shifting Views On Security, Pushes Use Of ‘Soft Power’, (Wall Street Journal)…Cam Simpson

The Bush administration’s point man in protecting America against terrorism says U.S. investments in safety should not be restricted to airport screening machines or border fences. Michael Chertoff says the U.S. also should spend more on foreign-aid programs, scholarships for foreign students and other tools of so-called soft power.