ADMINISTRATION OF NATIONAL SECURITY

BASIC ISSUES

I. The President's Problem

The other point is something that President Eisenhower said to me on January 19, 1961. He said, "There are no easy matters that will ever come to you as President. If they are easy, they will be settled at a lower level." So that the matters that come to you as President are always the difficult matters, and matters that carry with them large implications.

President John F. Kennedy, telecast interview, December 17, 1962

By law and practice the President is the chief maker of national security policy. He conducts foreign affairs. He is Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces. He makes the crucial decisions on the budget he submits to Congress. He is the Nation's Chief Executive, responsible under the Constitution for taking care that the laws are faithfully executed. As such, he supervises the departments and agencies. Although he is not in any simple sense their managerfor their responsibilities run not only to him but also to Congresshe is the only coordinator our constitutional system provides.

The new complexities of national security make the task of a President more difficult today than ever before.

The boundary between foreign and domestic policy has almost been erased. Foreign policy, military policy, and economic policy are now intimately linked. The United States has relations with over 100 countries, mutual defense treaties with over 40, and participates in scores of regional and international organizations. Policy must be made and executed in the context of fast-moving and world-shaking events the deadly contest with, and perhaps within, the Communist world, the building of new structures in the free world, the emergence into statehood of new nations with great expectations and greater problems, and advancing technologies that may upset the balances of power.

A President must look to the national security departments and agencies for help in initiating and carrying out national policy. The Departments of State and Defense, the military services, and related agencies at home and in the field are for the most part staffed with experienced, capable, and dedicated people. They are a vast storehouse of information, historical perspective, skills, and resources.

But these assets are not automatically available to a President. He must know how to put them to work in planning and executing national security operations-how to make them serve his needs while they carry on the important tasks that cannot receive his attention. The art of administration is to staff and organize for this purpose. The very size of the national security organization is one of the problems. It is too big for any one man to know all about it. It is so big that unusual astuteness and knowledge are required to draw on it.

Congress, of course, influences national policy and sets limits within which a President can act. It creates departments and agencies; it authorizes programs; it influences the size and composition of the Armed Forces and the nature of aid and information and related policies; it appropriates funds for the conduct of national security policies; the laws it passes affect the Government's ability to hire and hold good people; its attitudes reflect the American people's understanding of national security problems and their willingness to support national security programs.

On the whole, the United States has adjusted quickly to the shifting demands of a world in change. But the process of adjustment has only begun and success is not assured. Many emotionally charged areas must be realistically examined and calmly appraised.

If the Nation is to pass the tests that lie ahead, the Presidency and State and Defense and the other national security agencies must handle their jobs with new excellence. And Congress, too.

II. Dilemmas of Administration

*** it is at this point that we run headfirst into the system of "checks and balances" as it applies to the executive departments.

*** This is really a method of requiring power to be shared-even though responsibility may not be-and of introducing rival claimants from another department with a different mission into the policymaking or decision-taking process.

This is the "foulup factor" in our methods***

Whether or not this itch to get in the act is a form of status seeking, the idea seems to have got around that just because some decision may affect your activities, you automatically have a right to take part in making it *** there is some reason to feel that the doctrine may be getting out of hand and that what was designed to act as a policeman may, in fact, become a jailor.

Robert A. Lovett, Statement before the Senate Subcommittee on National Policy Machinery, February 23, 1960

Argument between conflicting interests and views is healthy-indeed indispensable if kept within reasonable bounds. But it may be carried too far and create what Robert Lovett has called the "foulup factor."

A continuing Presidential dilemma is whom to listen to, and how much, before he moves.

One can appreciate a President's desire to let advisers have their say, and to hear as much as possible before committing himself. Yet it may be best to err on the side of small groups of responsible officers and to avoid large free-for-all sessions which are as likely to confuse as to clarify the choices he faces.

THE PRESIDENT AND THE NATIONAL SECURITY ORGANIZATION

The needs of a President and the needs of the departments and agencies are not identical-and herein lies a source of administrative difficulties and misunderstanding.

What does a President need to do his job?

Essentially he wants to keep control of the situation-to get early warning of items for his agenda before his options are foreclosed, to

pick his issues and lift these out of normal channels, to obtain priority attention from key officials on the issues he pulls to his desk, to get prompt support for his initiatives, and to keep other matters on a smooth course, with his lines of information open, so that he can intervene if a need arises.

As top officials meet the President's urgent requirements, their other duties necessarily receive lower priority. Their regular meetings are canceled. They become less accessible to their subordinates. Ad hoc procedures are devised. Much is done verbally that would normally be put in writing. This all becomes exceedingly hard on subordinate officials, for it interferes with their handling of the usual run of business.

What do the officials of our vast departments and agencies need to do their job?

Essentially they want orderly, deliberate, familiar proceduresaccustomed forums in which to air their interests, a top-level umpire to blow the whistle when the time has come to end debate, and written records of the decisions by which they should be governed.

It is no secret that the abolition of the Operations Coordinating Board came as a disappointment to many at the middle levels of government, who found in it a way of getting within hailing distance of the center of power. Vocal status seeking is one of the curses of government and increases the "foulup factor." But middle-level yearnings for some equivalent of the OCB involve more than status only. They have their origin in the desire to have one's views heard through some set, certain, reliable procedure which binds the highest levels as well as other agencies.

It is worth recalling that the National Security Council was chiefly the inspiration of James Forrestal, who wanted to enhance the defense role in peacetime policymaking and especially to insure regular consultation by future Presidents with their principal civilian and military advisers. The purpose was at least as much to make the Presidency serve the needs of the departments as to make the latter serve the former.

It is not surprising that the departments often find a President's way of doing business unsettling or that Presidents sometimes view the departments almost as adversaries.

A continuing dilemma, demanding a subtle appreciation on all sides of the needs of a President and the departments, is how to manage the Government so that Presidential business is transacted to his satisfaction, and so that the normal run of business, also vital to the national interest, can be transacted in a fashion suited to the needs of large scale organization.

DECISION AT THE CENTER AND DELEGATION

A President can make only the smallest fraction of the total number of decisions relating to national security. His are the guiding or directional decisions, but millions of supporting operational decisions, and associated actions, must be taken by men in the long lines radiating from the White House through the headquarters of the national security agencies to officers in posts throughout the Nation and the world.

Delegation is therefore not merely desirable; it is unavoidable. It is the way an organization gets the day's work done.

Clearly, however, there are powerful forces which push and pull issues to the President's desk and make decentralization difficult.

First, Washington is the center of power and the center has a strong magnetic attraction, especially in a period remarkable for its ease of travel and communication. Because issues can be referred to Washington by radio, cable, and airmail, they are. Because embassy officials can travel to Washington and Washington officials can travel to the field, they do. Foreigners are also attracted, and visits to Washington by heads of state, prime ministers, foreign ministers, and others are increasingly popular. The visitors tend to bring issues with them for decision-because they want to take home some good news.

Second, issues seldom present themselves nowadays as one-department or one-country problems. But Washington is organized into departments and the field into country missions and this pushes decision-making and operations coordination toward the White House. Only the President stands above all departments and agencies and only he and his principal lieutenants can see the problems of a country or a region in the perspective of national policy as a whole.

Third, history records a number of instances in which delegated authority was used unwisely, sometimes with serious consequences. Fourth, the higher that issues are pulled for decision, the greater the chance that the pressure of special interests can be resisted, that irrelevant considerations will be screened out, and that material considerations will be properly weighed.

Fifth, and perhaps most important, in a period when war or peace may hinge on the way in which a quarantine of Cuba is handled, there is a strong tendency for a President to exert control from the center, because of the risks of leaving delicate matters to subordinates. It scarcely is an accident that one characteristic of the second Cuban crisis, perhaps in response to lessons learned from the first, was tight, detailed control from the Cabinet room over a host of subordinate operations.

Yet delegation of the right issues with appropriate guidance to able subordinates is of critical importance. The Nation's security depends not only on a President's skill in handling crises and major issues but also on the steady and competent handling of less vital matters by the department chiefs and the national security organization as a whole.

Without successful delegation, problems will pile up on the President's desk and the talents of key officials in Washington and the field will be underemployed. More important, too much of a President's time and energy will be dissipated on matters of less than first priority. The key to delegation is a clear and reasoned basic policy line authoritatively stated to department and agency heads-and defining as part of the decision itself the priority the policy is to receive. Understanding, more than command, is the secret of successful teamwork.

In our system, two men have the chief responsibility for providing this guidance the President and his first adviser, the Secretary of State. And to get the job done, the relation of the President and the Secretary of State has to be close, marked by solid mutual respect.