Fletcher Schoen and Christopher J. Lamb
In this era of persistent conflict, U.S. national security depends on the diplomatic, informational, military, and economic instruments of national power being balanced and operationally integrated. A single instrument of power—that is, one of the country’s security departments and agencies acting alone—cannot efficiently and effectively deal with the Nation’s most important security challenges. None can be resolved without the well-integrated use of multiple instruments of power—a team bringing to bear the capacity and skills of multiple departments and agencies. The requirement for better interagency integration is not, as some have argued, a passing issue temporarily in vogue or one tied only to counterterrorism or foreign interventions in failed states. Interagency collaboration has become a persistent and pervasive trend in the national security system at all levels, from the strategic to the tactical, and will remain so in an ever more complex security environment.
Because of its resources, expertise, and pool of highly developed leaders, the Department of Defense (DOD) will have an outsized role in the future integration of elements of American power. This makes it vitally important that military leaders gain an understanding of interagency best practices. This study on the Active Measures Working Group provides a window into one little known but highly influential interagency group and its methods. Although the study examines just one case, it makes some intriguing arguments about how and why this interagency process managed to work well. Its historical and organizational insights are immediately relevant to many interagency efforts that the military finds itself involved in today. Along with pointing to best practices, this study disproves some conventional notions about the interagency process. Most notable of these is that small interagency groups need to be far away from Washington to work well.
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