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Page 39
2 IMPLICATIONS FOR DETERRENCE POLICY:
TASKS FOR POLICY MAKERS
GEN Andrew J. Goodpaster, USA (retired), The Atlantic
Council
Several important implications for policy makers may be drawn
from the foregoing regarding deterrence measures as essential tools
of security in the new era. They bear first of all on decisions
that are needed in peacetime in determining military posture,
including appropriate peacetime preparations for crisis
contingencies. But they also highlight issues that will require
decisions specific to situations at the time military operations
actually have to be undertaken. In both types of situations, the
environment is far more diverse and complex than the one we faced
during the Cold War. Moreover, the experts do not agree on several
important issues, including the role of nuclear weapons, the value
of declaratory policies, and the need for more advanced types of
missile defenses—particularly, defenses against ballistic
missiles.
THE NEW DETERRENCE ENVIRONMENT
For the foreseeable future, the more difficult challenges for
deterrence will probably not arise from other major powers, but
rather from numerous and diverse contingencies created by lesser
powers and also from a broader need to shape a stable and secure
world order as free from violence as can reasonably be
achieved.
• Since the prospect of war among the major powers is at an
all-time low, the chief requirements for deterrence are to maintain
appropriate nuclear weapons holdings among them and to sustain
effective and reliable command and control over the weapons to
ensure that they cannot be misused. Tight control of nuclear
weapons materials must also be ensured. These deterrence
requirements will constitute a primary task for policy makers for
as long as nuclear weapons arsenals exist.
• A much more dynamic ingredient in deterrence policy,
posture, and action for the United States and its allies will be
the risks and threats, some active, some latent, that derive from
nations less powerful but more likely to become the sources and the
sites of disorder, armed conflict, and international instability.
Many U.S. and allied interests may be put in jeopardy. They range
from safety in the face of direct
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Page 39
2 IMPLICATIONS FOR DETERRENCE POLICY:
TASKS FOR POLICY MAKERS
GEN Andrew J. Goodpaster, USA (retired), The Atlantic
Council
Several important implications for policy makers may be drawn
from the foregoing regarding deterrence measures as essential tools
of security in the new era. They bear first of all on decisions
that are needed in peacetime in determining military posture,
including appropriate peacetime preparations for crisis
contingencies. But they also highlight issues that will require
decisions specific to situations at the time military operations
actually have to be undertaken. In both types of situations, the
environment is far more diverse and complex than the one we faced
during the Cold War. Moreover, the experts do not agree on several
important issues, including the role of nuclear weapons, the value
of declaratory policies, and the need for more advanced types of
missile defenses—particularly, defenses against ballistic
missiles.
THE NEW DETERRENCE ENVIRONMENT
For the foreseeable future, the more difficult challenges for
deterrence will probably not arise from other major powers, but
rather from numerous and diverse contingencies created by lesser
powers and also from a broader need to shape a stable and secure
world order as free from violence as can reasonably be
achieved.
• Since the prospect of war among the major powers is at an
all-time low, the chief requirements for deterrence are to maintain
appropriate nuclear weapons holdings among them and to sustain
effective and reliable command and control over the weapons to
ensure that they cannot be misused. Tight control of nuclear
weapons materials must also be ensured. These deterrence
requirements will constitute a primary task for policy makers for
as long as nuclear weapons arsenals exist.
• A much more dynamic ingredient in deterrence policy,
posture, and action for the United States and its allies will be
the risks and threats, some active, some latent, that derive from
nations less powerful but more likely to become the sources and the
sites of disorder, armed conflict, and international instability.
Many U.S. and allied interests may be put in jeopardy. They range
from safety in the face of direct
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Page 40
• military or terrorist attack to unimpeded access to
critical raw materials, free use of the seas, and provision of
humanitarian aid and protection for the displaced populations that
the warlike actions of these smaller states may generate. The main
challenge will be to deal with such problems as far upstream as
possible. This will require mobilizing international involvement
and domestic support when the dangers appear neither clear nor
direct.
• A third set of problems involves major powers such as
China or Russia who may try to intimidate neighbors in territory
that they once controlled or currently claim. These are
particularly difficult cases as we try to engage Moscow and Beijing
in Western political, economic, and security systems.
CREATING A FABRIC OF DETERRENCE
Given such a diverse array of problems, the main task for policy
makers is to build a fabric of deterrence that embodies a sustained
commitment to providing an increasing level of security, stability,
and order among the peoples of the world. Accomplishing this task
requires unprecedented cooperation between both international and
domestic political leaders. Most importantly, the American public
must be convinced that the United States should remain engaged
abroad.
In weaving this fabric of deterrence, policy makers must focus
on the following:
• Developing appropriate deterrence capabilities.
Policy makers must carefully determine just what combination of
deterrence capabilities--the visible and demonstrable power to
punish serious violations of the norms of international behavior,
deny success to aggression, impose heavy costs and losses on the
aggressor--should be created and sustained to provide a high
likelihood of deterrence against a wide variety of potential
threats and risks.
• Defining unacceptable behavior. We must specify as
clearly as possible, in both abstract terms and in specific
situations as they develop, what behavior we want to deter. At one
end of the spectrum, a nuclear attack on the United States or our
allies is clearly unacceptable. The task becomes more difficult as
we seek to deter lower levels of violence and less direct threats.
In some cases we will need a clear message of which behavior will
result in certain punishment. In others, we might decide to express
displeasure about certain outcomes but to be ambiguous about the
U.S. response, in order to avoid stimulating a reaction and to
avoid providing implied openings, by omission, for the party we
would deter.
• Communicating U.S. will and intentions with
credibility. Some regimes are likely to challenge the United
States because they believe we will be unable to build or sustain
public or congressional support in the face of mounting or expected
casualties, as demonstrated in Vietnam, Somalia, and the arguments
about Bosnia. To meet these challenges, the United States must be
perceived as willing to pay the costs in lives and resources, and
to stay the course with the needed military skill and political
stamina. However, leaders cannot determine in advance the threshold
that will result in swift and certain U.S. response because each
case involves a unique set of circumstances, and any previously
announced set of criteria could tacitly permit lower-level
violations of human rights and other important international norms.
Therefore, effective deterrence must involve a dynamic process in
which policies are frequently reviewed to determine whether
underlying assumptions remain valid, and the case for U.S. action
must continually be made to the American public and Congress. It
will be important to have established credibility through previous
actions in order to disabuse the potential aggressor of a belief
that we would be self-deterred by internal divisions, past
expressions of a lack of interest in events that may have appeared
similar to the ones in question, logistic limitations, other force
commitments, international pressures, and the like.
• Building coalitions. Adding to deterrent effect
will be a demonstrated ability to build coalitions, an evident
availability of alliance command-and-control organizations, a
history of multinational peacekeeping exercises, and a record of
gaining mulitilateral participation. Such should be a goal of
policy makers.
• Building the foundation for information and
understanding. An important task for our national leaders is to
prepare in advance the information base needed to deal with crisis
situations when they arise, and when deterrence must act.
Preparatory steps include:
— Understanding the values of potential adversaries.
Ultimately, our ability to deter is a function of what inducements
or pressure we can bring to bear on specific leaders. Therefore,
understanding who has what kinds of influence within a target
regime, as well as what they hold dear within their own value
systems, is important. Simple categorizations of "moderates" and
"hardliners" are not useful and often are misleading. We need to
know how best to influence specific persons, and the list of who
they are needs to be continuously updated. A task for diplomats,
military leaders, and the intelligence community is to become as
well
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IMPLICATIONS FOR DETERRENCE POLICY: TASKS FOR POLICY MAKERS
...........................................................................................................................................................................
.
.
.
Communicating U.S. will and intentions with credibility. Some
regimes are likely to challenge the United States because they believe
we will be unable to build or sustain public or congressional support in
the face of mounting or expected casualties, as demonstrated in
Vietnam, Somalia, and the arguments about Bosnia. To meet these
challenges, the United States must be perceived as willing to pay the
costs in lives and resources, and to stay the course with the needed
military skill and political stamina. However, leaders cannot determine
in advance the threshold that will result in swift and certain U.S.
response because each case involves a unique set of circumstances, and
any previously announced set of criteria could tacitly permit lower-
level violations of human rights and other important international
norms. Therefore, effective deterrence must involve a dynamic process
in which policies are frequently reviewed to determine whether
underlying assumptions remain valid, and the case for U.S. action must
continually be made to the American public and Congress. It will be
important to have established credibility through previous actions in
order to disabuse the potential aggressor of a belief that we would be
self-deterred by internal divisions, past expressions of a lack of interest
in events that may have appeared similar to the ones in question,
logistic limitations, other force commitments, international pressures
and the like.
Building coalitions. Adding to deterrent effect will be a demonstrated
ability to build coalitions, an evident availability of alliance command-
and-control organizations, a history of multinational peacekeeping
exercises, and a record of gaining multilateral participation. Such
should be a goal of policy makers.
Building the foundation for information and understanding. An
important task for our national leaders is to prepare in advance the
information base needed to deal with crisis situations when they arise,
and when deterrence must act. Preparatory steps include:
Understanding the values of potential adversaries.
Ultimately, our ability to deter is a function of what
inducements or pressure we can bring to bear on specific
leaders. Therefore, understanding who has what kinds of
influence within a target regime, as well as what they hold
dear within their own value systems, is important. Simple
categorizations of "moderates" and "hardliners" are not useful
and often are misleading. We need to know how best to
influence specific persons, and the list of who they are needs
to be continuously updated. A task for diplomats, military
leaders, and the intelligence community is to become as well
41
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Page 42
acquainted as possible with current and future foreign leaders,
their value systems, nd the power structures within which they must
decide on accepting costs and risks. This requirement places a high
premium on encouraging a broad set of exchanges at many levels, and
avoiding automatic curtailing of such exchanges when relations
become strained.
— Intelligence. Our intelligence capabilities must,
to the greatest extent feasible, be shaped and sized to foresee and
assess accurately and in a timely way the circumstances that may be
encountered. The need is greater now than ever before.
— Assessment. Policy makers will have to establish
mechanisms to achieve a continuing flow of background analyses and
to participate regularly in simulations, games, and exercises that
anticipate the full range of deterrence problems. This will help
leaders to better understand complex issues they may face and to
make better-informed decisions. Asking the right questions has been
a key ingredient in the more effective cases of national security
decision making.
SOME DIFFICULT CHOICES
Some deterrence policy matters remain unresolved in the present
environment; indeed, the environment creates uncertainty about how
they should be resolved. In many cases, full resolution will be
possible only under the circumstances of specific situations. In
the meantime, policy makers may have to resolve them sufficiently
to make policy and program choices, or to make partial or hedging
program decisions pending further resolution of the issues. Chief
among these policy matters are the following:
• Reliance on existential deterrence. The extent to
which "existential deterrence"—simply the existence of
powerful forces capable of inflicting punishment, denying success,
imposing costs—can by itself achieve the deterrence that is
being sought must be decided as each situation develops. Action
beyond mere existence, such as moving forces or calculated
applications of force, may be needed to demonstrate the power of
such forces, to position them for swift employment, and to show
readiness and resolve to commit them fully if necessary. The timing
and force levels of such moves will be critical.
• The role and use of nuclear weapons. Nuclear
weapons, at whatever numbers our treaty commitments allow, will
remain the ultimate guarantee of U.S. national security. Our
national security policy includes steps to preclude the
proliferation of nuclear weapons and also of chemical and
biological weapons. But the precise role of nuclear
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Page 43
weapons in the post-Cold War environment is a matter of
controversy. Most agree that the threat of nuclear weapons use is
appropriate to deter the threat or use of nuclear weapons by
adversaries against us and also against our close allies, most of
whom do not have nuclear holdings. There is an issue about the
extent to which nuclear weapons can be supplanted in deterrence by
the threat of using advanced, precision-guided conventional weapons
against the bases of political, economic, and military power of an
aggressor. Experts also disagree on whether it would be appropriate
to invoke a nuclear response to the use of chemical and/or
biological weapons. They disagree, too, on whether nuclear weapons
should be used to deter conventional attacks on vital U.S.
interests or on our close allies; the prospect of such a need has
nearly vanished with the disappearance of the NATO-Warsaw Pact
confrontation, but it might arise in another context in the future.
All these issues await resolution as international relationships in
the post-Cold War world evolve.
• Declaratory policies. The relative merits of
declaratory policies, such as "no first use" of nuclear weapons,
also are widely contested by experts and require periodic review.
Some argue that such assurances in the abstract are simply not
credible for real situations and therefore are not useful for the
purposes of deterrence. Others argue that declaratory policies are
useful in gaining reductions in nuclear inventories by the major
powers and increasing the chances of cooperation by non-nuclear
weapons states. In the last resort, the president will decide what
kind and level of military force a situation merits. However, such
policies can have important implications for our force posture and
plans. In the specific case of "no first use" of nuclear weapons,
whether to enunciate the policy and, if so, whether the policy
would forego such use in all circumstances, or be limited to no
first use against those who are without nuclear weapons, or without
any of the other weapons of mass destruction, are matters to be
considered.
• Missile defenses. The extent to which the United
States should develop and deploy active missile defenses remains
highly controversial. Proponents argue that some level of national
missile defense is needed even if it requires invalidating the
Antiballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty. Others argue that any missile
defense can be defeated far more cheaply than the costs of
developing and deploying such a system—including technical
countermeasures against the missile defenses or attack modes that
bypass them altogether. Another concern is the belief of many that
the ABM treaty is essential to maintaining a stable nuclear balance
with Russia. Leaders in France, the United Kingdom, and elsewhere
are worried that their ability to deter Russia would be undermined
if Moscow were no longer held to
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Page 44
the ABM treaty. Theater missile defenses, currently permitted
under the ABM treaty, could be forced by the evolution of the
theater-level threat to grow in capability to the point that their
technical characteristics also challenge some of the ABM treaty
constraints. This issue will require continual review in terms of
threats, costs, and effectiveness; impact on the security of the
United States, our allies, and others; and other important
factors.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
The agenda laid out above is a substantial one for policy
makers, with tasks falling into two main categories. First are
preparatory actions and capabilities that should be brought into
existence in peacetime, including, in particular, the size,
composition, deployment, and states of readiness of our military
forces, together with their command, control, communications, and
intelligence (C3I), logistics
(especially including mobility and prepositioning), and many other
elements of military strength. Second, for actions that can be
taken only when a contingency actually occurs, or is thought to be
about to occur, there should be plans well thought out in advance,
reflected in training, exercises, and well-tested capabilities of
our forces for the kinds of operations that may be required. The
policy alternatives should be reviewed continually, so that the
availability and viability of alternatives can be assessed on the
basis of forethought in regard to each situation as it arises.
And finally, from these deterrent capabilities and preparations
will derive the support for the condition of security, stability,
and world order that should be our broader goal. It will be the
task of policy makers to assess the adequacy of this support and
augment it if required.
Representative terms from entire chapter:
declaratory policies
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