Biden’s Forthcoming National Security Strategy: Making It Real

While Biden may be tempted to frame his national security strategy around the litany of challenges facing the country and how the U.S. government will respond, he would be better off focusing on a few key priorities.

 
Before long, the White House will release its national security strategy. In many quarters inside and outside the halls of government, this document will be seen as just another bureaucratic exercise with little bearing on the blizzard of issues President Joe Biden and his senior team are facing. The tendency in Washington to play it safe and to stick to the tried-and-true formulations of the past may be especially strong among administration officials who see Biden’s presidency as a restoration of proper order after four chaotic years under former president Donald Trump. The White House could thus be tempted to use the strategy as a tool of domestic politics, trotting out the familiar (and seemingly endless) array of international challenges coupled with an equally familiar set of U.S. government responses and approaches.

But what the president says in the national security strategy actually matters. A strategy that is too prosaic or that lacks realism about the constraints the United States now faces would be a missed opportunity. A better approach would be a concise and realistic statement focused on essentials to help guide policymakers through the stormy waters ahead, while setting the stage for the National Defense Strategy and other top-line strategy documents. Without sounding alarmist or defeatist, Biden’s strategy can be up-front about how core U.S. interests are changing and what implications these changes will have for U.S. foreign and security policy.

 
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Πηγή: carnegieendowment.org