Discussion Topic: Assessments of Past, Present and Future Threats to our National Security—Implications at Home and Abroad

Background
In hindsight, the post-World War II half-century appears to have been an enviable period of stability and security for America. From the end of the war until the fall of the Soviet Union, national security considerations were often viewed through a fairly simple lens: the contest between two antagonistic world-views represented principally by two nation-states. Communism versus free-market democracy, the U.S.S.R versus the United States inhered in every question and every answer. And although ancillary players and issues such as China, the Middle East, and Viet Nam periodically came to the forefront of foreign policy, rarely was sight lost of the defining struggle.

To be sure, this contest—the Cold War—was deadly serious. It consumed much of our energy and dominated much of our thought. In fact, almost the entire governmental national security structure is a vestige of the latter half of the twentieth century. The Department of Defense, the National Security Council, the Central Intelligence Agency, and the National Security Division of the FBI all owe their formation and evolution to the Cold War mind-set. Similarly, the salient features of our current domestic legal regime and treaty alliances related to national security were formed during the Cold War. The National Security Act, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, and NATO were all formed during these years.

Moreover, because so much policy and politics was created and debated during the Cold War era, it is difficult if not impossible to address twenty-first century national security separate from or uninfluenced by that history. Bi-polarism still frames much of the national security discussion, although today the opposing pole is terrorism. Once again, we are spending billions of dollars to defend against a nuclear missile attack by our enemy. This time, however, we are preparing for a launch by a rogue nation or terrorist organization, rather than the U.S.S.R. Once again, those who question the direction this nation takes or the goals pursued by the administration in power are denounced as “soft.” This time, these individuals are soft on terrorism rather than soft on communism. Loyal opposition is once again characterized as “giving aid and comfort to the enemy.”

None of the foregoing is intended to be critical of the past, but is intended to provide some context for the present and perspective for the future. The collapse of the Soviet Union compelled government officials, political theorists, and academic writers to begin thinking in a different geo-political dimension. Acknowledging that the world had changed, however, turned out to be a lot easier than designing a new strategy and a modern national security structure to deal with the future. The catastrophic terrorist attacks of 2001 provided a clearly articulable threat that the national security community could build and implement a strategy to counter.

Now international terrorism is the enemy of freedom and democracy. But America’s strategy for preserving freedom and democracy sounds reminiscent of the Cold War. We are relying on our military’s superior training and technology to deliver a victory.

Admittedly, some of the tactics and terminology have changed. The emphasis of our efforts is on special operations forces instead of heavy armored divisions. In addition, we have realigned, in some respects, our international relations, both testing old friendships and fostering new alliances. We have reorganized our national intelligence apparatus and we have institutionalized and bureaucratized homeland security. To gain security, new laws have been enacted, such as the USAPATRIOT Act, empowering the government at a cost to individual liberty. Our daily lives are increasingly affected by sacrifices of convenience or privacy in the name of security.

Perhaps this is precisely what needs to be done. It is reasonable for our government to assume that international terrorism will be the persistent and predominant national security problem for the immediate and foreseeable future. Furthermore, it is quite possible that the measures we have taken to cope with this problem are appropriate, even if imperfect. Regardless, any judgments on where we stand and where we are headed with regards to security must be divorced from political ideology. Instead, they should be based on historical analysis, an accurate understanding of the facts, and the application of sound theories.