Across the Aisle » Bipartisanship

KORUS Free Trade Agreement: An Agent of Stability

PSA Staff — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 19:34:11 +0000

This article was written by two Fall 2011 Fellows in PSA’s Congressional Fellowship Program. All CFP articles are produced by bipartisan groups of Democrat and Republican Fellows who were challenged to develop opinion pieces that reach consensus on critical national security and foreign affairs issues.

KORUS Free Trade Agreement: An Agent of Stability

Almost sixty years ago at the end of the Korean War, the relationship between the United States and South Korea took on a new meaning. The relationship was built on a cooperative framework between allied forces in order to promote stability on the peninsula through a strengthened commitment to the mutual goals of protecting democratic values, peace and economic security.

Within the past few months the United States Congress and the Korean Parliament took large steps in solidifying their commitment to these basic tenants of the U.S.-Korea relationship when they passed the Korea-U.S. Free Trade Agreement (KORUS FTA). Their support of this agreement is evidence that shared economic prosperity is a strong part of the U.S.-Korean relationship. As the political dynamics on the Asian continent continue to change, it is critical that the U.S. maintain and build its relationship with Korea as a means to enhance America’s position to promote political and economic stability in the region.

Most of those who have been following the debate and progress of the long-stalled KORUS FTA have heard most about how the reduction or removal of several tariff and non-tariff barriers will lead to greater economic opportunity through increased market access for American goods and services. Korean duties on major agricultural products like meat and dairy products and cotton and soybeans will be eliminated and many U.S. businesses will experience simplified and expedited customs procedures that will allow them to reach customers in South Korea with less red tape. Overall, the U.S. International Trade Commission estimated that tariff cuts alone to a variety of U.S. goods could amount to an increase of $10 billion to $11 billion of U.S. goods exports alone. KORUS is mutually beneficial to the South Korean economy and its competitiveness. Reducing tariffs and increasing exports will increase the country’s gross domestic product by an estimated five percent.

The KORUS FTA was negotiated and signed by the United States and South Korea on June 30, 2007; however, the George W. Bush Administration did not submit legislation to the then Democratically-controlled Congress due primarily to partisan differences over autos and beef. The often referenced case is the American automobile industry, which originally opposed the agreement, but after the Obama Administration achieved key concessions that soothed the concerns of the industry, not only did the auto industry itself welcome the opportunity to compete on a level playing field, the United Autoworkers also joined to support. Their support came as a result of Korean commitments to immediately reduce their eight percent tariff on U.S.-built passenger cars, including electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids, to four percent and to immediately reduce their ten percent tariff on trucks to zero. After five years, tariffs on U.S.-made motor vehicles, including electric cars and plug-in hybrids, will be reduced to zero.

Though these tariff reductions and concessions are important and positive elements, they should not overshadow the FTA’s equally positive effects on strengthening the U.S.-Korea relationship and how U.S. trade policy can function as a key diplomatic tool. As North Korea pursues a misguided nuclear weapons strategy, it threatens the tenants of the U.S-Korean relationship. The tensions on the Korean Peninsula are heightened by the growth of China’s influence in the region while other nations have grown increasingly wary of the foreign and military policy goals of the communist-led countries of Asia. The KORUS FTA provides opportunities for greater economic security and emboldens the democratic institutions of a key partner in the region since the end of the Korean War. Our growing economic relationship will empower both the United States and Korea to be active agents for stability.

Growing trade relations with our allies is rarely easy to achieve; however, with the mutual goal of fairness to our businesses, workers and consumers, the KORUS FTA will not only benefit our economic well-being but also support our longstanding relationship with Korea that has sought to maintain peace and prosperity on the Korean Peninsula.

Rethink our Russian Relationship

PSA Staff — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 15:58:52 +0000

Gary Hart is a member of the PSA Advisory Board, president of Hart International, Ltd. and chairman of the American Security Project. He served in the U.S. Senate from 1975 until 1987. This article originally appeared in The Hill on January 18th, 2012 and can be found here.

As an American with more than average interest and experience in Russia, it is a mystery to me why, unlike virtually every other country on earth, U.S. policy has tended to be so dependent on the personal relationship between the respective leaders.

This was especially true of Presidents Clinton, with the late Boris Yeltsin, and George W. Bush, with then-President Vladimir Putin (“I looked the man in the eye.”). This mystery of Russian relations is not totally confined to U.S. leaders: Remember Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s famous report to President George H.W. Bush on Mikhail Gorbachev as “a man we can do business with.” A humorist might call it the vodka syndrome, except Clinton was never known as a drinker and, of course, the second President Bush had sworn off alcohol.

This is a cause for reflection, when the question is raised as to how the United States might go about organizing its Russian relationship if Vladimir Putin were to be driven to the sidelines by an emerging, though putative, Russian Spring. Recent weeks have witnessed virtually unprecedented (for Russia) mass rallies in Moscow, St. Petersburg and other cities of what journalists have described as emerging middle-class Russians.

Those of us who have a history of frequenting Russia and keeping in touch with developments there are increasingly asked about what this means, whether it will continue or go away, and who is behind it. None of these questions is authoritatively answerable, at least for the time being. Like much of the uprisings of 2011 in the Middle East and North Africa, the Russian movement includes a number of factions and profiles. Together with middle-class protesters who seem, at least for now, not to have a cohesive ideology, there are Russian nationalist and aging communists, disgruntled pensioners and groups flying the banners of disparate causes.

At a distance they seem united, for now, by an attitude toward Putin that ranges from mild distrust to outright antipathy, even hatred. And again, like the Arab Spring, no single leader or small coterie of leaders has emerged to champion the uprising and give it direction. You can’t beat something with nothing, as the old saying goes. And the Arab Spring has given way to faction fighting, sectarian struggles, and citizen- versus-security-forces clashes. To be charitable, the hard work of democracy has begun … and without a Jefferson, Madison or Hamilton among them.

Those Russophiles among us, driven much less by dreamy nostalgia for Tolstoy and Tchaikovsky than by the certain realization that the United States and Russia have many more interests in common than we have differences, choose to believe that the incipient movement toward democracy embraces demands for multiple party elections; media freedom including protection from violence of reporters who uncover corruption; transparency in government operations; an end to cronyism; an independent and honest judicial system; and many of the other basic qualities and institutions normally characterizing democratic societies.

Even during the worst Cold War days, and certainly during the Gorbachev era of glasnost and perestroika, everyday Russians would tell Westerners: “We simply want an ordinary life; we want to live like everyone else.” That could be this movement’s anthem.

But if the Russophobes among us could let up for a time (and there are more of those in foreign policy circles than we would like to imagine), we might have a chance to institute a far-reaching bilateral policy emphasizing our mutual interests, minimizing our differences and seeking Russian support where it would be welcome and meaningful. That includes dealing with Iran and its nuclear potential; quarantining North Korea; managing the five Muslim republics on Russia’s southern border; isolating and crushing terrorism; countering proliferation of weapons of mass destruction; stabilizing world energy distribution systems; and a host of similarly important problems.

This agenda, including lending moral support for the nominally democratic movement in the Russian streets, should operate regardless of whether Vladimir Putin is reelected Russia’s president. Great powers, it has been said even before the arch-realist Henry Kissinger came along, do not have permanent friendships — they have permanent interests. In the great scheme of things, it matters less how Barack Obama (or for that matter, even Newt Gingrich) gets along with Putin or his successor and much more on whether we can identify and pursue, over several successive American administrations, those real and important permanent and mutual interests.

It is manifestly in the interest of the United States to do so. Years from now it will finally come to our understanding that our relationship with Russia is one of our most important.

Shifting Priorities: Investing in Cybersecurity

PSA Staff — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 20:34:08 +0000

This article was written by two Fall 2011 Fellows in PSA’s Congressional Fellowship Program. All CFP articles are produced by bipartisan groups of Democrat and Republican Fellows that were challenged to develop opinion pieces that reach consensus on critical national security and foreign affairs issues.

Cyber-based threats against information infrastructures in the United States have generated an increasing concern for national security. According to a Congressional Research Service report, these emerging threats consist of cyber terrorism, debilitating U.S. command over the electromagnetic spectrum, facilitation of terrorist operations, cyber crimes involving theft of intellectual property, patent violations, or copyright laws, and identity theft. These threats also involve unauthorized probing of tests that target a computer’s configuration and its system defenses and, in some instances, the unauthorized viewing, copying, and extraction of data files. The low expense of access to the internet combined with the ability to operate anonymously, are strong key factors that make information operations enticing for those who are unable to combat the U.S. in conventional warfare. Understanding these real threats against our nation enforces the need for a shift in prioritization and funding to address any future cyber security threats in all capacities.

The vulnerability of cyber security significantly impacts the state of a nation’s economic and national security. Cyber warfare and cyber-crimes have become more frequent and sophisticated in current times. The usage of mobile devices, social networks, and confidential information are constantly threatened as the global society integrates more services and operations with the internet. Chen McGuire, the Vice President of Symantec Corporation’s Global Government Affairs & Cybersecurity Policy, in a House Homeland Security Committee hearing stated, “the volume and sophistication of threat activity increased more than 19 percent over 2009, with Symantec identifying more than 286 million unique variations of malicious software or malware…with an estimated 431 million adult victims globally in the past year, and at an annual combined cost of $388 billion globally based on financial losses and time lost, cybercrime costs are significantly more than the global black market in marijuana, cocaine and heroin combined- which estimate at $288 billion per year.” The threat is real; the results of these attacks are costly to businesses and governmental operations. In order to adequately address these threats, it is imperative that information sharing is increased between all stakeholders; the government, the private sector, and the individual citizen. Effective risk-based approaches must specifically address each individual risk, while the promotion of strong private-public partnerships through innovative research and development. More importantly, accountability measurements must be demanded to prevent costly financial losses while increased protective mechanisms safeguard the rights of everyday citizens.

During the 112^th Congress, legislators have taken considerable steps to address the cybersecurity concerns. Recently, Congressman Dan Lungren (R-CA), Chairman of the Homeland Security Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Infrastructure Protection, and Security Technologies (CIPST), introduced H.R. 3116, the Department of Homeland Security Authorization Act of Fiscal Year 2012. This legislation addresses multiple key issues of emerging cyber threats. H.R. 3116 would require the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to protect federal and critical infrastructure information systems through risk assessment; develop essential security technologies and capabilities to protect the systems, in conjunction with government and private-sector entities; develop and lead nationwide awareness and outreach on the importance of cybersecurity, ways to promote best practices, and training to support the development of the cybersecurity workforce; take other necessary lawful action to accomplish the requirements of this section; coordinate with other relevant federal, nonfederal, and international entities, including suppliers of technology for CI; designate a DHS official to lead cybersecurity activities; ensure coordination with other relevant DHS activities, including intelligence and law enforcement; and report regularly on program coordination to appropriate congressional committees, among other directives.

H.R. 3116 is a commendable first step in addressing the cyber threats that impact the lives of countless Americans daily. The Senate and the Obama Administration have also taken significant steps to address cybersecurity. Despite the strong partisanship in the nation’s capital, threats to cybersecurity should be a point of consensus and unification, as it has an immediate and egregious effect on our nation’s livelihood. Securing cyberspace will take a coordinated effort between the federal, state, and local governments, and also the private sector. As each day goes by, our nation faces new cyber threats from new actors seeking to access classified government information, while attempting the theft of personal information, in order to disrupt our quality of life.

In this digital era we are all connected. Everyone must employ safe and secure computing practices because no individual, business, or government entity should be solely responsible for cybersecurity. We must all understand how online computing practices have an impact on our nation’s cyber security. If we choose to ignore these warnings we will leave our cyber networks vulnerable to future catastrophic events.

There’s a Better Way to Gauge Congress

PSA Staff — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 17:49:59 +0000

Lee Hamilton, Co-Chair of the PSA Advisory Board, is director of the Center on Congress at Indiana University. He was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from the Indianna for 34 years. The original article appeared in the South Bend Tribune and can be found here.

There’s a Better Way to Gauge Congress

I suspect that most members of Congress will want to forget the year that just ended.

The institution that symbolizes our democracy finished 2011 plumbing depths of unpopularity it has never experienced before. Its low approval ratings set records — suggesting, as Gallup put it, “that 2011 will be remembered as the year in which the American public lost much of any remaining faith in the men and women they elect and send off to Washington to represent them.”

The poor jobs picture, the lurching from one brink-of-disaster deadline to the next, the polarization that keeps the parties from working together, the widespread sense that Congress is so dysfunctional it cannot meet the nation’s challenges — all play a role.
These are all valid ways of judging Congress, but they are not the only way. Every year, the Center on Congress at Indiana University polls a group of congressional scholars on how they think the institution is doing, and one of the challenges we face is devising a set of questions that meaningfully probe Congress’s performance. It’s not as easy as you’d think.

The historic mission of the Congress has been to maintain freedom, a goal whose achievement is impossible to measure in a year’s — or even a few years’ — time. Moreover, a well-functioning Congress has to operate on many fronts: as the legislative body representing a diverse nation, as a counter-balance to the president, as an overseer of the federal bureaucracy, as a forger of policy, as two separate institutions (Senate and House) that have to find common ground and uphold processes that allow each one to perform effectively.

The first of Congress’ responsibilities is to protect its constitutional role as a strong, coequal branch of government. It must stand apart from and serve as a check upon the excesses of presidential power. So how well is it safeguarding its powers from presidential encroachment? Does it live up to its proper role in determining the federal budget? How’s it doing at oversight of the executive branch? Is it generating meaningful, politically sustainable policy alternatives or just sitting back and letting the White House take all the political risks? Does it set the national agenda, or act timidly? And does it safeguard the war powers assigned it by the Constitution?

Its second great role is to represent the American people. This means making sure that all voices get a fair hearing and that diverse viewpoints play a part in crafting initiatives — all while safeguarding institutional practices that allow legislation to move forward in a timely manner. Just as important, does Congress spend its time on key issues facing the country, or instead let itself get diverted by partisan concerns or by issues of importance only to well-heeled special interests?

Third, in a country as politically and demographically varied as ours, negotiation and compromise are key to crafting legislation that can enjoy broad political support. To gauge whether Congress is following sound process, you would want to know several things. Are its leaders capable of working hard to forge a consensus? If they can’t, do conflicts over legislation represent substantive differences or mere political game-playing? Does it balance careful deliberation with making decisions? Does it protect the rights of the minority and allow all points to be heard? Is it transparent — so that its members can be held accountable for their actions?

Fourth, does Congress set sufficiently high standards for its individual members? That means keeping excessive partisanship in check and making sure its members are behaving ethically.

And finally, how strong is the connection of members of Congress to their constituents back home? Do they understand their constituents and try to represent them in Washington? Do they make themselves accessible in a variety of settings and speak out for their communities at times of need? Do they listen well and are they closely attuned to the core needs and interests of the people they represent?

All of these questions add up to how well Congress represents the interests of the American people and, as always, it does better on some than on others. Despite its obvious troubles, the picture is not entirely bleak. And I can’t help but believe that the more well-rounded our understanding of where Congress falls short and where it performs well, the better we can hold it to account.

Reducing the Deficit Requires Skill and Risk

PSA Staff — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 15:19:34 +0000

Lee Hamilton is a Co-Chair of Partnership for a Secure America’s Advisory Board, Director for the Center of Congress at Indiana University, and also served in Congress for 34 years. This article originally appeared in the Taunton Daily Gazette and can be found here.

The failure of the congressional Supercommittee to reach an agreement on reducing the deficit was not just bad fiscal news. It was a significant failure of political leadership.

Not only did the committee move us one step closer to a genuine fiscal crisis, but also it put the dysfunction of Congress on full display. At a time of great economic stress, its members lost sight of what failure would cost the country in lost economic growth and foregone job creation. They did not fully appreciate that inaction ensures grave economic risks. Even worse, they sent a signal to the American people — who overwhelmingly wanted to believe that common ground is still possible in a divided age — that partisan politics is stronger than the national interest. Failure robbed Americans of hope at a time when they desperately needed some.

Where do we go from here? We did learn some important lessons from the Supercommittee’s many weeks of work.

An obvious one is how difficult it will be getting our fiscal house in order. The Supercommittee proved that deficit reduction is hard on the substance and even harder on the politics. The fact that its members could not salvage a formal agreement from their discussions, unlike special committees in the past, makes clear that it will take a supreme effort of political will to move the nation past this point. Though even in failure, the committee could have done much more to educate the American public on the hard choices necessary to get our fiscal house in order.
A second, related lesson is that fixing the deficit will require politicians who can set aside the politics of the moment. The members of the special committee were unable and unwilling to do that. Some gave me the feeling that they wanted to defeat an agreement, not achieve one, and none seemed willing to go against their party priorities.

Though they laudably tried early on to keep partisan messaging from derailing their efforts, by the end, each side was trying to make the other look bad. They worked hard to present their own party as flexible and open to solutions on tax increases or spending cuts, and the other as entrenched and unyielding.

Why were the politicians unable to reach a solution when the American people clearly wanted one? The White House and President Obama were mostly silent. Congressional leaders of both parties supported their negotiators’ positions, neither demanding an agreement nor pressuring negotiators to reach one. To their credit, rank and file members of both parties did go on record urging the Supercommittee to set aside partisanship and arrive at a resolution. But their voices could not drown out the ideological activists dead-set against raising taxes on the wealthy or finding meaningful cuts in entitlements.

The members of the Supercommittee had neither the influence on Capitol Hill nor the willingness to forge a solution that would lead the country forward. They did not strive for an agreement large enough to allow room for the necessary trade-offs to solve the problem, and in the end, they and congressional leaders seem to calculate that they would pay a greater political price for reaching an agreement than for failing.

Those who favored a compromise bear some responsibility here: Ideological activists were able to exert more pressure than the majority who wanted to see an agreement. In the future, the voices of moderation will have to be louder.

Meaningful progress on our fiscal problems will require skilled politicians at the highest level to roll up their sleeves and take a risk with their own political bases. It has been done before, when politicians like former Republican Senator Bob Dole and former Democratic Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan stepped up and made hard decisions. They were able, when the occasion demanded, to use their public stature and their political gifts to command attention and sway public opinion.

For the final lesson from the Supercommittee’s failure is that it’s not about the numbers, it’s about political leadership. Our fiscal crisis is still with us. The issues that broke the committee’s back have not gone away. Congress has no choice but to press on. Surely the president and members of Congress must now grasp the magnitude of our fiscal problem and the necessity of shared sacrifice to resolve it.

Sometimes in politics, you have to fail before you can succeed. Even in failure, the Supercommittee provided some valuable lessons. Our hope must be that our political leaders can discern them, and that this failure will pave the way for progress.

How to fix distrust in government

PSA Staff — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 23:37:10 +0000

PSA Advisory Board Co-Chair Lee Hamilton discusses why Americans have come to regard Congress so poorly, arguing that this mood is a result of a dysfunctional Washington mired in partisanship, secrecy, and a lack of accountability. This op-ed originally appeared in The Star Press.

The latest New York Times/CBS News poll had bad news for Congress, whose support is down to single digits. But it had even worse news for the Republic. Americans’ distrust of government, the pollsters found, is “at its highest level ever.”

A lot of this ire is focused on Congress, which an overwhelming majority believe is incapable of acting on behalf of the nation as a whole, but it has come to take in all of Washington. The poll’s findings can be summed up in the words of one respondent, a small-businesswoman from Arizona. “Probably the government in Washington could be trusted at one time,” she told the Times, “but now it seems like it’s all a game of who wins rather than what’s best for the people.”

When so many Americans believe that their representatives in Washington do not have their best interests in mind, something is desperately off-kilter. It means that Americans feel betrayed by how the political class operates.

So the question becomes what can be done to restore the people’s trust in government. May I suggest it involves more than changing policies. It means paying attention to the values that people would like to see embodied in government.

It is a fact of life that American voters respond to likability — a sense of connection — in their candidates. But that’s not how they judge politicians once they’re in office.

Instead, they really do care about how elected officials govern.

To start, they want fairness from Washington. Whatever you think of the Tea Party or Occupy Wall Street, both have touched a nerve, a sense that our political leaders have not just grown distant from the concerns of ordinary Americans, but actively discriminate against them in one way or another. I’ve always been impressed by the importance Americans place on fairness; they strive to be fair to those around them, and they expect government to do the same.

They also want government to be open. This is not a blanket pronouncement — where national security and defense are concerned, or where congressional negotiators need space to find common ground without being forced to posture for the cameras, there is a place for secrecy. But transparency ought to be the rule. Secrecy feeds suspicion and distrust of government. Politicians must be sensitive to this.

Speaking to audiences around the country, I’ve also been struck by the deep thirst for accountability in Washington. It is very hard to determine who’s responsible for any given situation in the federal government — so many people have their hands on promoting or blocking a given initiative, it can seem that the entire political system is designed to shrug off responsibility.

When the economy is floundering, Americans are desperate for work, and Washington seems incapable of coming to grips with the nation’s needs, this is a huge problem. It is hard to respect institutions whose leaders refuse a forthright accounting of, or deny responsibility for, their failures.

Americans do not expect miracles or understate the difficulties of governing. They do not expect a single person to right the ship of state. Quite the contrary. They want a collective effort, a sense that people in government, regardless of party, are rolling up their sleeves and working together to resolve their differences.

Americans have some tolerance for disagreement, but not to the point of gridlock — in the end, they prefer cooperation, not confrontation. And they abhor the sort of brinksmanship that has become a Washington specialty, with its last-minute negotiations and short-term fixes. We have serious long-term problems, and Americans want to see their elected officials working on them. They want remedies, not filibusters and scorched-earth politicking.

Finally, they want honesty. Americans really do want to know the scope of the problems they confront and to make up their own minds about them. They resent politicians who paper over the difficulties of the problems or toss off inadequate solutions to really tough problems. There is, in the country at large, a thirst for basic facts, not spin. The people can handle the truth, and they deserve no less.

Rebuilding trust in American government will require more than changes in rules or policy. It will rest on the manner in which our elected officials conduct the business of government, and their willingness to embrace fairness, openness, accountability, cooperation, competence and honesty.

Lack of trust in government is a far more serious problem than most politicians believe, one that cannot be resolved easily. The solution can only come from a patient, long-term effort to return to our fundamental values and instincts.

Lee Hamilton is director of the Center on Congress at Indiana University. He was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives for 34 years.

Ambassador Linton Brooks Speaks on Nuclear Challenges

Lori Shah — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 17:44:44 +0000

On Monday, September 19^th, Partnership for a Secure America along with the Stanley Foundation and the Hudson Institute hosted Ambassador Linton Brooks in a series of events at the Howard H. Baker Jr. Center, which focused on the nuclear challenges facing the United States. Ambassador Brooks, currently a senior analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, was the lead US negotiator on the first Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START I) and also served as Director of Arms Control for the National Security Council and as an administrator for the National Nuclear Security Administration.

In an interview with Knoxville radio station, WUOT, Ambassador Brooks spoke on why the current global situation is much more complicated than the Cold War. Focusing on Iran and North Korea, Brooks noted that they pose a much different threat than the Soviet Union did because of their track records in supporting terrorism and their disinterest in playing by the normal rules of international relations. Brooks also shared that, in the case of Iran, its desire to become a regional hegemon also drives a continuous increase in arms stockpiling by its neighbors.

On the topic of nuclear energy, Brooks was much more optimistic noting that, despite the tragedy in Fukushima, nuclear energy will see a huge expansion. Therefore, the U.S. will have to decide if it wants to lead in nuclear energy and set an example for responsible development of nuclear power, or let others assume the role.

To hear more, click here to listen to the interview or read Frank Munger’s blog post here.

National Security Experts Launch Energy Initiative

Nathan Sermonis — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 17:43:45 +0000

Last week, the highest level extra-governmental group ever convened to address any public policy challenge met in Washington, D.C. to announce the launch of their new organization – the United States Energy Security Council – formed to advance American energy security. This bipartisan group of 20 influential former cabinet officials, military personnel, retired Senators, and prominent business leaders, includes three PSA Advisory Board members – Robert C. McFarlane, former National Security Advisor, John Lehman, former Secretary of the Navy, and Gary Hart, former Senator (D – Colo.).

At their launch event, USESC founders emphasized the importance of finding solutions to the nation’s current energy dilemma and described the risk associated with America’s reliance on oil as a sole transportation fuel. Across the bipartisan panel, members agreed that, in the interest of national and economic security, America must pursue strategies to diversify the fuel sources used in transportation – eliminating the decades old monopoly that oil has enjoyed in the U.S. transportation sector and diminishing the strategic importance of this resource. McFarlane was certain to point out, however, that the group is not “anti-oil,” but more accurately “pro-fuel choice.”

The depth of this group’s bipartisan membership – drawing from the Carter, Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Clinton, and George W. Bush Administrations, the U.S. Senate, all three military branches, academia, and Fortune 500 leadership – shows the seriousness of America’s energy challenges and is evidence that the will exists among U.S. security, business, and political leaders to work across the aisle to find solutions.

While J. Bennett Johnston, former Senator (R – La.) and USESC member, acknowledged the difficult partisan atmosphere in Washington, he argued that there is still optimism in the halls of government. That optimism, he said, is based in the energy field where Republicans and Democrats can agree on the need for a way forward.

In the case of the USESC, the answer to high energy prices and unreliable fuel supplies is the introduction of viable alternative fuels for U.S. vehicles, including ethanol and methanol. Competition among different fuels, the group said, is the key to creating a new, affordable, reliable American energy sector – one not beholden to the price of oil and actions of producers thousands of miles away.

At the event, Hart described current U.S. energy policy as a doctrine of buying fuel from a market controlled by dangerous places hostile towards American interests and periodically fighting wars to protect America’s access to those resources.

Across the board, the organization’s Republicans and Democrats concluded that periodically suffering from drastically shifting fuel prices, annually sending billions of much-needed U.S. dollars to foreign markets, and sacrificing American lives and treasure to protect global oil supply lines in places like the Persian Gulf has made the nation vulnerable security wise and economically.

For more information, you can visit the U.S. Energy Security Council website www.usesc.org.

Drones Can’t Change War

PSA Staff — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 15:06:52 +0000

William S. Cohen, former Secretary of Defense under Clinton and PSA Advisory Board member, recently wrote an opinion article in Politico discussing the use of drones in modern warfare. Cohen has always supported bipartisan action on issues of national security and as a member of Congress (R-Maine) took a nonpartisan stance on security policy. Since leaving the pentagon, Cohen has penned numerous articles and books and even appeared on the Daily Show. In his most recent article, Cohen focuses on the critical role drones have played in Afghanistan and their place at the center of counter-insurgency vs. counter-terrorism debate.

Among the many issues that Defense Secretary Leon Panetta must ponder in the coming months will likely be whether to recommend shifting U.S. strategy in Afghanistan from counterinsurgency to counterterrorism.

Some critics argue that our current policy of deploying large numbers of ground troops puts more of our men and women at risk for questionable gain and even encourages more Afghans to join the Taliban, fighting against what they claim is an invasion force. Yet the recent gains in clearing out Taliban strongholds and helping to build schools, medical facilities and other civic institutions argue, instead, for staying the course for several more years.

But other factors are sure to intrude to force a resolution of this strategic dispute.

A growing segment of the American people wants to scale back the Afghanistan war effort, which has drained our Treasury of more than $1 trillion, when added to the costs of Iraq. Moreover, the allies who have joined us are also facing enormous pressure to reduce their defense expenditures in manpower and materiel.

The United States, despite pledges of support from its friends, may soon find that it must bear an even greater burden of the battle under way. Sheer necessity, rather than desire, may become the mother of strategic recalculation.

Actually, something of a shift is evident with our increased reliance on armed drones to target those identified as enemy combatants. The increased use of drones in Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere, however, raises significant issues.

For example:

• Who determines when a drone strike is legitimate, and who decides to “pull the trigger” for a given strike?

• How reliable is the intelligence that the U.S. gathers before a strike is ordered?

• How reliable and secure are the thousands of miles of networks and data links involved in the drones’ command and control with the decision makers and policymakers across the globe?

• How accurate are the calculations about collateral damage — casualties among innocent people — expected for each strike?

• Must consent, whether explicit or tacit, be given by leaders of the countries in which the strikes are executed?

• Does the use of drones, along with reduced military presence on the ground, undermine the confidence of the locals that we are willing to assume shared risks?

• What role does Congress play in overseeing war by remote control?

These are not new questions, or ones ignored, by our policymakers and lawmakers since I directed the creation of the armed Predator more than a decade ago.

But there is a broader, philosophical issue that must be addressed: Will waging high-tech warfare risk reducing the destruction of our enemies to an antiseptic video game in the minds of future policymakers?

This is not to suggest that we should not rely on the best technology to protect the lives of U.S. warriors. Or fail to use munitions that, by virtue of their precision, are likely to reduce the killing of innocent civilians.

But we need to be mindful that the ease of pressing a button in a command center thousands of miles from the battlefield to send a missile to its intended target may lead some to think that war itself is a cost-free exercise.

It is anything but cost free or bloodless.

Al Qaeda and its affiliates are likely to seek other hosts to help spread the cancer of terrorism, and there is little doubt that the U.S. will need to act to destroy their dangerous cells. While we were able to wage successful air campaigns in Kosovo and, more recently, in Libya, the “long twilight struggle” against terrorism is not, and will not be, fought solely with air assets or from remote command centers.

The decision to wage war is the gravest that any nation can make. It should always remain a difficult one — and one that involves the careful weighing of the risks of taking, or failing to take, action.

Technology should not prove so dazzling as to blind us to the reality that war will always prove to be the doorway into a hell that is far easier to enter than to exit.

As the World Watches

Jessie Daniels — Fri, 05 Aug 2011 19:46:29 +0000

Former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill famously noted that “Americans can always be counted on to do the right thing…after they have exhausted all other possibilities,” and the recent debt debate was no different. Proving true to form, Congress passed the Budget Control Act of 2011 at the zero-hour. The bill raises the debt ceiling by $2.4 trillion, cuts spending by more than $900 billion over 10 years, and establishes a 12-member bipartisan House-Senate “supercommittee” to recommend up to an additional $1.5 trillion in long-term savings before the end of the year.

The rest of the world, though, didn’t like the soap opera we just went through. Foreign reaction was less than congratulatory after the last-minute agreement and focused on the intractable American political process. Following the passage of the bill, the Economist criticized all sides, calling the debt debate “kabuki-like.” Chinese credit ratings agency Dagong Global “blamed a shaky and untrustworthy political system” as it downgraded US debt. And the Russian press noted that “the obvious inability to reach an agreement that was demonstrated by political forces in the US has had an equally damaging effect on the country… The image of the country as a responsible borrower has suffered most.”

Now that the US has been on the brink of default, an unthinkable proposition until recently, it has changed the way that the rest of the world views us. There is, of course, griping that to some extent has allowed others to take a break from dealing with their own problems to criticize ours. Yet, dismissing foreign viewpoints entirely ignores the importance of taking these viewpoints into account as we burnish our global image, especially if how we go about finding solutions to our long-term challenges is starting to affect the American brand nearly as much as what solutions we find.

In addition, this criticism comes as the second act of the debt drama – the work of the supercommittee – steps into high gear. Few like it. To many, it seems like a common Congressional tactic: if at first you don’t succeed, establish a Congressional committee and kick the can down the road. As a result, the supercommittee has spurred more fodder than inspiration. Speculation over who will serve on the supercommittee has raised concerns that it will become another group fraught with ideological discord. Not surprisingly, many believe that Washington will miss another opportunity for a long-term deficit-reduction solution.

But the supercommittee, while ultimately not the desired course, must rise above these low expectations, not let ideology get in the way of finding effective solutions, and do the hard work necessary to get our fiscal house in order. Across the globe, challenges abound and neither domestic infighting nor foreign criticism of the U.S. political process will alleviate them. Maintaining US power and prestige requires having a strong global brand. And convincing a foreign audience of this strength may now require a little more than quoting Churchill.