US National Security Reform

US National Security Reform
Author: Heidi Brockmann Demarest
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 212
Release: 2018-07-04
Genre: History
ISBN: 9781351171564

This collection of essays considers the evolution of American institutions and processes for forming and implementing US national security policy, and offers diverse policy prescriptions for reform to confront an evolving and uncertain security environment. Twelve renowned scholars and practitioners of US national security policy take up the question of whether the national security institutions we have are the ones we need to confront an uncertain future. Topics include a characterization of future threats to national security, organizational structure and leadership of national security bureaucracies, the role of the US Congress in national security policy making and oversight, and the importance of strategic planning within the national security enterprise. The book concludes with concrete recommendations for policy makers, most of which can be accomplished under the existing and enduring National Security Act. This book will be of much interest to students of US national security, US foreign policy, Cold War studies, public policy and Internationl Relations in general.

Creating the National Security State

Creating the National Security State
Author: Douglas Stuart
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 359
Release: 2012-06-24
Genre: History
ISBN: 069115547X

For the last sixty years, American foreign and defense policymaking has been dominated by a network of institutions created by one piece of legislation--the 1947 National Security Act. This is the definitive study of the intense political and bureaucratic struggles that surrounded the passage and initial implementation of the law. Focusing on the critical years from 1937 to 1960, Douglas Stuart shows how disputes over the lessons of Pearl Harbor and World War II informed the debates that culminated in the legislation, and how the new national security agencies were subsequently transformed by battles over missions, budgets, and influence during the early cold war. Stuart provides an in-depth account of the fight over Truman's plan for unification of the armed services, demonstrating how this dispute colored debates about institutional reform. He traces the rise of the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the transformation of the CIA, and the institutionalization of the National Security Council. He also illustrates how the development of this network of national security institutions resulted in the progressive marginalization of the State Department. Stuart concludes with some insights that will be of value to anyone interested in the current debate over institutional reform.

Flawed by Design

Flawed by Design
Author: Amy B. Zegart
Publisher: Stanford University Press
Total Pages: 336
Release: 1999
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 080474131X

Challenging the belief that national security agencies work well, this book asks what forces shaped the initial design of the Central Intelligence Agency, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the National Security Council in ways that meant they were handicapped from birth.

White House Warriors: How the National Security Council Transformed the American Way of War

White House Warriors: How the National Security Council Transformed the American Way of War
Author: John Gans
Publisher: Liveright Publishing
Total Pages: 367
Release: 2019-05-14
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1631494570

“The NSC, part star chamber, part gladiator arena, and part Game of Thrones drama is expertly revealed to us in the pages of Gans’ primer on Washington power.” — Kurt Campbell, Chairman of the Asia Group, LLC Since its founding more than seventy years ago, the National Security Council has exerted more influence on the president’s foreign policy decisions—and on the nation’s conflicts abroad—than any other institution or individual. And yet, until the explosive Trump presidency, few Americans could even name a member. “A must-read for anyone interested in how Washington really works” (Ivo H. Daalder), White House Warriors finally reveals how the NSC evolved from a handful of administrative clerks to, as one recent commander-in-chief called them, the president’s “personal band of warriors.” When Congress originally created the National Security Council in 1947, it was intended to better coordinate foreign policy after World War II. Nearly an afterthought, a small administrative staff was established to help keep its papers moving. President Kennedy was, as John Gans documents, the first to make what became known as the NSC staff his own, selectively hiring bright young aides to do his bidding during the disastrous Bay of Pigs operation, the fraught Cuban Missile Crisis, and the deepening Vietnam War. Despite Kennedy’s death and the tragic outcome of some of his decision, the NSC staff endured. President Richard Nixon handed the staff’s reigns solely to Henry Kissinger, who, given his controlling instincts, micromanaged its work on Vietnam. In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan’s NSC was cast into turmoil by overreaching staff members who, led by Oliver North, nearly brought down a presidency in the Iran-Contra scandal. Later, when President George W. Bush’s administration was bitterly divided by the Iraq War, his NSC staff stepped forward to write a plan for the Surge in Iraq. Juxtaposing extensive archival research with new interviews, Gans demonstrates that knowing the NSC staff’s history and its war stories is the only way to truly understand American foreign policy. As this essential account builds to the swift removals of advisors General Michael Flynn and Steve Bannon in 2017, we see the staff’s influence in President Donald Trump’s still chaotic administration and come to understand the role it might play in its aftermath. A revelatory history written with riveting DC insider detail, White House Warriors traces the path that has led us to an era of American aggression abroad, debilitating fights within the government, and whispers about a deep state conspiring against the public.

Orchestrating the Instruments of Power

Orchestrating the Instruments of Power
Author: D. Robert Worley
Publisher: U of Nebraska Press
Total Pages: 449
Release: 2015-07-15
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1612347541

National security, a topic routinely discussed behind closed doors by Washington’s political scientists and policy makers, is believed to be an insider’s game. All too often this highly specialized knowledge is assumed to place issues beyond the grasp—and interest—of the American public. Author D. Robert Worley disagrees. The U.S. national security system, designed after World War II and institutionalized through a decades-long power conflict with the Soviet Union, is inadequate for the needs of the twenty-first century, and while a general consensus has emerged that the system must be transformed, a clear and direct route for a new national security strategy proves elusive. Furnishing the tools to assist in future national security reforms, Orchestrating the Instruments of Power articulates and synthesizes the concepts of America’s economic, political, and military instruments of power.

National Security Council

National Security Council
Author: Richard A. Best
Publisher: DIANE Publishing
Total Pages: 39
Release: 2010-11
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1437920594

The Nat. Security Council (NSC) was established in 1947 to create an inter-departmental body to advise the President with respect to the integration of domestic, foreign, and military policies relating to the national security. This report traces the evolution of the NSC from its creation to the present. The organization and influence of the NSC have varied significantly from one Administration to another, from a highly structured and formal system to loose-knit teams of experts. The NSC staff should be organized to meet the particular goals and work habits of an incumbent President. The history of the NSC provides ample evidence of the advantages and disadvantages of different types of policymaking structures.

Emergence of the Intelligence Establishment

Emergence of the Intelligence Establishment
Author: United States. Department of State
Publisher: Bureau of Public Affairs, Office of the Historian
Total Pages: 1184
Release: 1996
Genre: History
ISBN:

State Department Publication 10316. Edited by C. Thomas Thorne, et al. General Editor: Glenn W. LaFantasie. One of a series of volumes on the foreign policy of the Truman administration. Also advertised with the subtitle: Intelligence and Foreign Policy. Includes high-level governmental plans, discussions, administrative decisions, and managerial actions that established institutions and procedures for the central coordination of intelligence collection and analysis and covert action. Documentsthe advice, actions, and initiatives of principals and groups in other departments and agencies, who helped to lay the foundations for the centralized intelligence bureaucracy.