WASHINGTON, Dec. 23 (UPI) -- A largely unnoticed, recently released report drafted by an important and mostly invisible Pentagon advisory group -- the Defense Science Board, or DSB -- contained surprisingly strong criticism of the Bush administration's approach to the global war on terror.
The report was titled "strategic communication." In plain English, that means waging and winning the war of ideas between the United States and Islamic extremism. The blunt conclusion of this group of outside experts was that "U.S. strategic communication must be transformed" because it "is in crisis." In plainer English, in the global war on terror, the United States is simply not communicating its message at home or abroad and is losing this contest of ideas.
The report also challenged key administration foreign policy assertions. Americans have been repeatedly told by the Bush administration that terrorists are out to kill us because they hate America and its democracy. But the report observed that "Muslims do not 'hate our freedom;' they hate our policies" and in particular, "what they see as one-sided support in favor of Israel and against Palestin(e)." And the optimistic assessments offered by the administration of post-war nation building in Afghanistan and Iraq, were countered by: "in the eyes of Muslims, American occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq have not led to democracy there but only more chaos and suffering."
The DSB report further observed that the United States "is engaged in a generational and global struggle about ideas, not a war between the West and Islam" and the fight is "more than a war against the tactic of terrorism." Hence, DSB Chairman William Schneider advised: "To win ... (this) ... global battle of ideas, a global strategy for communicating those ideas is essential," a requirement senior government officials clearly understand.
So why then are we losing this battle? The answer rests in three profound weaknesses of American government.
First is a failure to understand reality as it is, not as we might like it to be. This flaw was central to the 9/11 Commission's critical finding that "group think" produced intelligence misjudgments over Iraq's possession of weapons of mass destruction. Second is the difficulty in holding senior officials accountable for policy choices that go wrong. No one was fired or reprimanded either for the intelligence or strategic communication failures - or, for that matter, the handling of postwar reconstruction of Iraq.
Third is the "dysfunctional" character of the U.S. government's national security organization that often prevents rational decision-making and certainly confuses it. The word "dysfunctional" was first raised in the 2001 Hart-Rudman Commission on National Security Strategy for the 21st Century conducted by a bipartisan group of distinguished Americans, a report that apparently never reached the newly inaugurated president. That condition still exists.
Seven recommendations followed in the DSB report. The first called for the president to issue a directive for strengthening the nation's capacity for conducting strategic communication. The second proposed a strategic communication structure within the National Security Council headed by a Deputy National Security Adviser for strategic communications supported by an independent, non-partisan Center for Strategic Communication "think tank-like" organization. The remaining five recommendations specified changes within the State and Defense Departments regarding public diplomacy and planning for strategic communication including a tripling of resources (personnel and funding) for strategic communication in the Pentagon.
In many ways, this report paralleled the work of the 9/11 Commission, whose recommendations were just enacted into law after heated debate in Congress. Intelligence suffers from similar dysfunctional effects of government. The reality is that our security structure is still stuck in a time warp. Even with the new Homeland Security Department, the National Security Act of 1947 and the vestiges of the Cold War largely define our strategic instincts and national security organization. And "group think" has not been eliminated.
The DSB report ended by predicting that we will lose this war of ideas "if we tinker at the margins." And we are tinkering. The fact is that the administration does not have a comprehensive plan yet for dealing with these challenges.
The government and the public need better understanding of the dangers and the realities that confront the nation. This is the best reason for enhancing strategic communication and for correcting the larger problems that cut across national security and how we think about it. Then, elected leaders must have the courage not just to tinker at the margins but also to reform the overall national security structure, including both the Executive Branch and Congress. Otherwise, as long as we focus only on parts and not the heart of the issues that test us, we will never be successful in making the nation safer and more secure and we will never reduce to a manageable level the current dysfunctional nature of government.
Real change is needed now. But who will take that lead and deal with what really matters most rather than play at the margins?
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Harlan Ullman is senior adviser at the Center for Strategic Studies in Washington, D.C., and author of the just released "Finishing Business: Ten Steps to Defeat Global Terror," Naval Institute, Annapolis, Md., that contains many recommendations and proposals to deal with the dangers that threaten the nation.
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(United Press International's "Outside View" commentaries are written by outside contributors who specialize in a variety of important issues. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of United Press International. In the interests of creating an open forum, original submissions are invited.)
