Security Policy In The Post-Kuwait World

An Address by Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.

Director of the Center for Security Policy

The Heritage Foundation

September 12, 1990

Introduction

It is hard to imagine a more opportune moment to discuss the issue of security policy than this one. After all, just yesterday, President Bush delivered an important address to the Nation concerning the most important foreign crisis of the day — the dangerous situation arising from Saddam Hussein’s aggression in the Persian Gulf. Just three days ago, he met with Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev in Helsinki, Finland, in the hope of charting a common approach to that crisis.

Moreover, in recent days, Bush Administration cabinet officers have been dispatched on a variety of crucial foreign missions:

• Treasury Secretary Brady and Secretary of State Baker to elicit funds from U.S. friends and allies to help defray the costs to us and to others arising from the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait;

 

• Secretary Baker to pursue sweeping new arms control initiatives with the USSR, the final arrangements for German reunification and an anti-Iraq entente with Syria; and

 

• Commerce Secretary Mosbacher to Moscow with an entourage comprised of captains of American industry, bent on selling the Soviets high technology and know-how for their strategic energy and other economic sectors.

Finally, lest we forget, the House of Representatives is in the midst of its long-awaited debate on the FY1991 Defense authorization bill. Despite the obvious unease of many members of Congress about savaging the military’s programs and capabilities at the very moment that U.S. armed forces face the prospect of imminent hostilities, the majority that drafted the original, flawed version of this legislation for the House Armed Services Committee prior to the Persian Gulf crisis may still be able to muster sufficient votes to do serious harm to the national security.

This listing of events bearing on U.S. security policy is, of necessity, a partial one. Yet it amply illustrates the complexity of the challenges facing American policy-makers at present. It also serves to highlight questionable aspects of the policy course currently being pursued by some in the Bush Administration and on Capitol Hill.

Finally, it offers insights into the job we at the Center for Security Policy have set for ourselves.

I welcome the opportunity afforded me by our friends at the Heritage Foundation to speak to these topics and, in particular, to review for this audience the work of the Center in helping to define sound approaches to U.S. security policy in the post-Kuwait world.

The Bush Address to the Joint Session of Congress

In my opinion, Mr. Bush delivered the finest speech of his presidency — if not of his political career — last night. It was a forceful articulation of his policy and purposes in the Persian Gulf crisis; it largely deserved the highly favorable reception it got from lawmakers, pundits and the press.

I believe, however, that the President’s address was so well received in part because it did not address in any detail two important, and thorny, aspects of the Bush approach to Iraqi aggression:

• First, President Bush did not directly deal with the $64 billion question: What does he intend to do about the prospect that — even if the U.N. sanctions have their desired effect and force Saddam Hussein to withdraw from Kuwait — Iraq will remain the most powerful nation in the region, capable of using ballistic missile-delivered chemical, biological and, shortly, nuclear weapons against its neighbors and others as far away as Europe?

   

 

• Second, the President made several, largely passing, references to the collaborative role of the Soviet Union in this crisis and the prospect for a new and safer "world order." No mention was made of the destructive aspects of that Soviet role — for example, the continued presence of a thousand or more Soviet advisers aiding Iraq’s military, Moscow’s insistence that force not be used to redress Iraqi aggression or unhelpful diplomatic initiatives taken on Baghdad’s behalf. The latter include the Kremlin’s advocacy of an international peace conference designed to obfuscate the Arab-Arab character of the present crisis and to shift the focus of world attention back to the Arab-Israeli confrontation.

   

Neither did President Bush spell out for Congress, as he had intimated during his joint press conference with Gorbachev he would do upon his return from Helsinki, just what was meant by his commitment to "do everything [he] can to help perestroika succeed." Clearly, the Soviet leader is sensitive to the charge that his cooperation, such as it is, on the Middle East is being bought by U.S. economic concessions. A more compelling explanation for the President’s silence on this point, however, is also a rather more sinister one: Perhaps the President did not want to jeopardize the popular appeal of his speech by laying bare the extent to which he proposes to expose the U.S. taxpayer — and perhaps the national security — to new risks in his campaign to assist Gorbachev?

Cabinet Road Shows

These troubling questions are exacerbated by those raised in the course of overseas missions by Bush Administration cabinet officers. Consider the following, illustrative examples:

• Was Treasury Secretary Brady told during the course of his less-than-productive global fund-raising swing that West Germany — which professes to be too broke to share the burden entailed in defending German access to Middle East oil — was about to give the Soviet Union $8 billion to support, and ultimately to relocate, Moscow’s occupation forces in eastern Germany? This, of course, comes on the heels of a $3 billion German check cut to Gorbachev just last June.

 

• In his stop in Tokyo, did Mr. Brady press the Japanese to consider legitimate, alternative means of demonstrating Japan’s willingness to contribute to burden-sharing? One such means would be for Japan to honor its thus-far unfulfilled, nine year-old commitment to defend its own sea-lanes and airspace out to 1,000 miles. This would involve a multibillion dollar purchase of off-the-shelf American military hardware like Airborne Warning and Control System aircraft and tankers — adding immeasurably to the defense of the Western Pacific, offering greater flexibility to U.S. forces otherwise committed to protecting Japan and helping to offset somewhat the yawning balance-of-trade deficit.

 

• In his haste to complete strategic and conventional arms agreements with Moscow, is Secretary Baker repeating widely reported mistakes he made last spring, notably by offering unnecessary and unwarranted concessions inimical to U.S. interests? If, for example — as has been reported — he has agreed to a last-minute Soviet bid to cut American forces in Europe to a mere 70,000-80,000 as part of an initial CFE agreement, he would greatly complicate the prospects for preserving Western defense capabilities and U.S. influence there.

 

• Has Secretary Baker considered — to say nothing of taking any steps to contend with — the security implications of integrating East Germany into NATO, even as several hundred thousand Soviet troops and unknown numbers of KGB and former Stasi personnel continue to operate there?

 

• As he seeks to arrange a new marriage of convenience with Damascus, will Secretary Baker offer to drop Syria from the list of nations sponsoring international terrorism — as was done with Iraq in the early 1980s? Will he propose the sale to Assad of advanced weaponry that may or may not pose an increased threat to Saddam Hussein but which would surely greatly complicate Israeli security in the future?

 

• Finally, will Secretary Mosbacher erode further the little discipline left in international arrangements for denying the Soviet Union militarily relevant high technology? His evident appetite for the exceedingly ill-advised idea of assisting the USSR to resuscitate its declining ability to extract, process and export oil and natural gas suggests that in this area — as in others like advanced computers, fiber optics and machine tools — the Secretary of Commerce simply fails to appreciate the significant strategic risks involved in retooling Moscow’s strategic energy and industrial sectors.

 

• Tragically, this sort of shortsighted policy on the part of the Commerce Department is not unique to dubious deals with the Soviet Union. Just last night, for example, ABC Television’s Peter Jennings recounted in detail how Commerce’s tenacious determination to promote technology flows to Iraq contributed enormously to Saddam Hussein’s deadly military arsenal.

   

The Congressional Assault on U.S. Defense Capabilities

If the issues raised by such questions were not sufficiently unsettling, Congress is exercising its own, frequently alarming, influence on U.S. security policy. The Defense authorization bill now being considered by the House is an excellent case in point.

Immediately prior to the August recess, the Senate acted on its version of this legislation. It stripped some $18 billion dollars from President Bush’s request — denying funds sought for such high priority defense programs as: the C-17 airlifter; the MILSTAR communications system; research under the SDI program, including much of that required to pursue the extremely promising Brilliant Pebbles effort; and procurement money for the V-22 Osprey. Ironically, the case for each of these has only been enhanced by the crisis in the Persian Gulf.

These serious flaws notwithstanding, the Senate bill is a model of probity and prudent investment in national security compared to its House counterpart. The House Armed Services Committee, acting before Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait, voted to take fully $24 billion out of the Administration’s request. In the process, the Committee: imposed far sharper and more precipitous cuts in the armed forces end-strengths; terminated the B-2 bomber; dealt a crippling $1.7 billion cut to the SDI program; halved the ASAT program and placed new, unilateral arms control constraints upon its laser component; canceled the only theater nuclear weapons modernization program still underway, the SRAM-T air-delivered missile system; and calls for a cut-off of fissile materials production which, besides being wholly unverifiable, would jeopardize the viability of America’s nuclear deterrent.

While it is to be hoped that at least some of these problems — particularly those whose absurdity is made manifest by developments in the Persian Gulf — will be corrected in the course of floor debate, many will not. As a result, the likelihood is that a defense bill deficient in important respects will emerge from conference committee. In the past, the President has been reluctant to threaten to veto inadequate defense authorization legislation; if he declines to do so this time on behalf of a robust Strategic Defense Initiative, the B-2 and other vital capabilities, he will have to share responsibility for dangerous shortfalls in the U.S. defense posture.

The Center for Security Policy’s Contribution

Any one of these issues could be reasonably expected to overwhelm policy-makers. The fact that they — and myriad others — must be confronted, assessed and rapidly responded to virtually simultaneously by officials in the executive branch, members of Congress, the press and interested elements of the public at large invites incoherent or inappropriate U.S. policies.

It is for precisely this reason that the Center for Security Policy was created just over two years ago. Drawing upon the considerable talents and first-hand policy-making experience of its 100-member Board of Advisors and its small, core staff, the Center endeavors to assist these key audiences. I am pleased to say that among those whom we are privileged to draw upon are several individuals associated with Heritage — Ed Feulner, Margo Carlisle and Jim Hackett. We believe that the synergy thus provided between the Center’s active "policy network" and the efforts of distinguished "think-tanks" like this one adds powerfully to the effect of our respective undertakings.

By dint of the direct, personal familiarity of those participating in this collaborative Center effort with the sorts of choices facing and needs of policy practitioners, these analyses are brief, highly readable and directly relevant to current, vexing problems. By virtue of their being rapidly produced and disseminated in a timely fashion (principally via fax), they have a unique and powerful impact throughout the security policy community.

On behalf of all of us associated with the Center for Security Policy, allow me to close by saying with the following: We are deeply appreciative of the support given us by our friends here at Heritage. I am especially grateful for this chance to describe something of the Center’s present concerns and to discuss our ongoing efforts to ensure that such concerns constructively inform — and, hopefully, enliven — the policy debate.