Getting Stability and Reconstruction Ops Right…the Next Time by Representative Steve Stockman, Time Magazine Op-Ed.
I am the sponsor of a recently introduced bill, H.R. 2606, along with my colleague Peter Welch, Democrat of Vermont, calling for the establishment of a U.S. Office of Contingency Operations.
Why is this necessary?
Bluntly speaking, the way the United States currently plans for and implements stabilization and reconstruction operations does not work. The experience over the past decade of many of our military personnel and civilians, hundreds of whom lost their lives while involved in reconstruction work in Iraq and Afghanistan, confirm that the status quo is not viable.
In too many instances our national interests were actually harmed. We suffered not only the loss of lives and treasure but lost opportunities. We also suffered a diminution of our reputation as friends of the Iraqi and Afghan people due to duplicative, poorly-planned, and poorly-executed programs.
We must do better…
H.R.2606 - Stabilization and Reconstruction Integration Act of 2013 full text at Govtrack.us.
Comments
"Bluntly speaking, the way the United States currently plans for and implements stabilization and reconstruction operations does not work."
The reason that this is so, one might suggest, has much less to do with any organization and/or implementation problems and much more to do with the incompatible nature of the goals and objectives of the United States -- vis-a-vis the often very different goals and objectives of the native populations and their leaders.
Thus, H.R. 2606 to be considered of little benefit or use -- in that it aims at and seeks to address the wrong problem?
Realistically, would such an office have made the efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq any more viable? Maybe I'm cynical, but I doubt it. I doubt that the established powers at DoD and DoS would be willing to subordinate their resources to or accept direction from such an office, and suspect that it would just become one more element in the bureaucratic stew.
I'm suspicious of any move suggesting that Iraq and Afghanistan would have worked out better if we'd just done things differently. Certainly there are things that might have been done differently, but at root the problems came from vague, unrealistic, ephemeral strategic goals that were grossly out of proportion to the time and resources we were prepared to apply. If your goal is to ride a unicycle up Mt Everest, you don't need a better unicycle, you need a different goal. Tinkering with the unicycle is just a diversion from the real issues that meed to be addressed.
Yes, I agree that this is an idea worth investigating. I have studied this Bill closely. Its strength lies in its simplicity and the expectation of a small agency. It seeks to consolidate the crazy-quilt of programs mish-mashing across several Departments and Agencies and to streamline oversight of whole of government affairs.
The fact that there will be resistance from entrenched bureaucratic interests -- who are living off of the money sacrificed by other people (i.e., tax-payers) -- ought not deter a possible agency for reform. Perhaps the idea will not work.
Nevertheless, the investigations and serious soul-searching incited by hearings and studies inspired by this proposal makes due consideration worthwhile. Creating a fictitious scenario to be knocked down as a means to argue against the idea helps no one. This Bill makes a man-sized effort to integrate the lessons learned over the last ten years into the structure of the USG as it is.
The arguments, at least superficially, seem sound based on repeated failures at reconstruction. We're not talking just about Iraq and Afghanistan, but Haiti, a number of efforts we supported in Africa, etc.
State/USAID and DOD have repeated failed, but so did the CPA in Iraq. Can the U.S. really afford to have a standing organization that directs reconstruction efforts? Can we assume designating a new or existing organization will fix the problem? It certainly didn't do so in the past. There would have to be extensive professional development program (somewhat expensive), and the President would have to be willing to designate this organization as the lead agency/organization and no doubt both State and DOD would push back against that. We haven't matured to the point where we can have an effective Templer like the Brits did in Malaya.
Sounds good at first glance, but when you dig into it more than skin deep and try to understand how it will fit into our system of systems and deeply entrenched bureaucracies, and Congress's meddling to score political points, I suspect this is a half-baked idea.