The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) released an open letter to Congress on Monday from more than 20 former top Defense Department officials, as well as retired military leaders, advocating for a new perspective on threats to today’s defense establishment.
The letter cited the Goldwater-Nichols Defense Reorganization Act, which was signed 30 years ago to reorganize the defense of the country for a modern era.
“This year marks the 30th anniversary of the passage of the Goldwater-Nichols Defense Reorganization Act,” the officials said. ”The landmark 1986 legislation sought to improve the quality of military advice, enhance the effectiveness of military operations, and strengthen civilian authority. The subsequent improvements in U.S. military effectiveness are global benchmarks for other militaries. Recently, President Xi Jinping of China announced a set of military reforms for his country that mirror the approaches taken by the U.S. Congress in 1986.”
The contents of the open letter were discussed at the conference on defense reform that CSIS hosted later that day. The letter aims to address concerns that the defense department and other entities are not prepared for the 21st century issues.
“For all its merits, we believe the time is right to reexamine the Goldwater-Nichols Act and national security reform more generally,” the officials said.” We should leverage the interest in defense reform to focus on the most important challenges facing our national defense, which are different than those that drove change at the height of the Cold War. We find two broad problem areas most compelling for reformers.”
One of the issues experts would like addressed is the inefficiency of the bureaucratic side of the nation’s defense enterprise. Multiple agencies and authorities have similar responsibilities but still neglect to communicate with much efficiency.
“First, the complexity of the security environment and the speed with which it changes is unprecedented,” the officials said. “Adversaries and potential adversaries are adapting to this environment in ways that affect U.S. interests, from the broad use of information campaigns and political warfare to the game-changing spread of militarily significant technologies around the globe to the blending of conventional, unconventional, and strategic approaches to deny U.S. access. Moreover, many challenges are transregional and multifunctional in nature, increasing demands for integration in the national command structure. Against this challenge set, the Defense Department, and even more so the broader U.S. national security complex, appear sclerotic in their planning, prioritization, and decision-making processes. We should identify better ways to pace and get ahead of this changing environment.”