Ambassador David M. Abshire Diplomat Studies Past, Prepares For Future With Strategic Thinking by John Shaw It has been said that Washington, D.C., is a city in which the urgent always wins out over the important. Put differently, the relentless, often frantic press coverage of daily events tends to displace strategic thinking and long-term planning. David M. Abshire, a former American government official and diplomat, has been trying for nearly 40 years to get leaders from the U.S. government to examine the lessons of the past and chart a clear, well-conceived course for the future. ìStrategic thinking is now not the full-time job of anyone in government, and it should be,î Abshire said. ìYou have to have people and groups that are thinking strategically. You need smart people looking ahead. In government, the daily pressures tend to push out long-range thinking,î he added. The co-founder of the Center for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS) and the current president and chief executive officer of the Center for the Study of the Presidency, Abshire said he believes the United States must adjust rapidly to the demands of the new international order. Ta ctical skills and a strategic vision, he argues, are imperative for national prosperity and even survival. In an interview in his office in downtown Washington, D.C., Abshire said the American foreign policy community must think boldly and act decisively. ìWe have undergone a profound strategic transformation, but we have not conducted a comprehensive reappraisal of our strengths and weaknesses in a careful way since after World War II,î he said. ìItís very important for us to build agile minds in the military and diplomatic corps,î he added. Friendly and avuncular, Abshire, 76, bears a striking resemblance to one of his heroes, President Dwight D. Eisenhower. A native of Tennessee who grew up near the fabled Lookout Mountain, Abshire has loved history since he was a young boy. ìI read dozens and dozens of books on history and strategy. I was born into a family that loved history,î he said. He graduated from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1951 and served in the Korean War as a platoon leader, company commander and division intelligence officer. Abshire received his doctorate in history from Georgetown University, where he later taught as an adjunct professor at its School of Foreign Service. He entered government on the staff of the House minority leader (1958-60) and then served as the assistant secretary of state for congressional relations (1970-73), the first chairman of the board for International Broadcasting (1974-77), the United States ambassador to NATO (1983-87), and special counselor to President Ronald Reagan in 1987. Abshire also served on the Murphy Commission to review how the U.S. government is organized for foreign policy, and he was a member of the prestigious Presidentís Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board. He played a central role in the creation of the CSIS, a prominent Washington, D.C., think tank that has influenced policy debates since its creation in the 1960s. Abshire is still a vice chairman of CSIS but spends most of his time at the Center for the Study of the Presidency (CSP), which he has directed since 1999. The CSP is a non-partisan, non-profit educational organization that was inspired by Eisenhower and serves as a key resource on issues affecting the modern presidency. Abshireís study of the American presidency provides him with an interesting perspective to assess President George W. Bush, especially since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks transformed his administration. ìWhen you get into a war, the component of leadership is so important. And as I look at war leadership, I think one of the key elements is timing,î he said. ìPresident Bush is now a war president, and his timing so far has been extraordinary. He was very slow to commit us to force. He was careful to put together all the various coalitions. He realized this war is financial, itís political, itís psychological. He stacks up pretty well so far,î he said. Abshire credits Bush for staying focused on defeating the al Qaeda terrorist network in Afghanistan before going after other groups in other countries. ìPresident Lincoln said ëone war at a timeí and he was right. You also have to be enormously agile to build coalitions at various levels. Youíve got to have the agility to look at every angle in the use of power. In this case, youíve got to be very clear in saying you will defeat terrorism but how you do it requires enormous agility,î he added. Abshire argues that for Bush to emerge as a great president he must do more than lead the war on terrorism. ìYour great war presidentsóLincoln, Rooseveltóhad post-war aims. To be successful, Bush has to be bigger than this war. He has to be a leader of a larger vision than just this war,î he said. Abshire has used the CSP aggressively and creatively to shape the current public debate. The center published an interesting study in fall 2000 titled ìTriumphs and Tragedies of the Modern Presidency: Seventy-Six Case Studies in Presidential Leadership.î Drafted as a report to the president-elect, it provides historical case studies on such topics as the first 100 days of a presidency, executive-legislative relations, domestic policy, fiscal policy and international economics, national security institutions, foreign interventions, managing the executive branch and presidential crises. Under Abshireís leadership, the CSP also published a highly regarded study on the need for government investment in science and technology, and it is currently working on a study on the importance of civility to a democracy. But perhaps the project that most clearly reflects Abshireís current passion is a study he organized to review the nationís strategic doctrines, institutions and methods for articulating the United Statesís goals to the world. Abshireís interest in strategic planning and his concern that the United States has not adjusted to post-Cold War challenges prompted him to assemble a team of experts to consider a new strategy for the nation. The group drafted its report in early September of last year, and one of its central themes is that the United States is a vulnerable superpower that has not prepared itself adequately for the demands and dangers of the 21st century. ìWe are in a dramatically new threat environmentóa strategic reversal from the Cold Waróand we have not fully re-equipped and reorganized ourselves to develop critical anticipatory and agile capabilities,î Abshire said. The United States must shift its security posture from ìthe focused mind of the hedgehog toward the agile mind of the fox,î according to Abshire. ìToday we need to become like the fox, grounded in the basic requirements of classical strategy, which is based on agility, speed and coordinated power and guided by a better systemic anticipatory capability in everything we do,î he said. Abshire argues that the U.S. government has not engaged in a strategic reassessment since the years after World War II when President Harry Truman created a new security apparatus, and Eisenhower forged a new global strategy. He cited Eisenhowerís effort to craft this new strategy as an example of intelligent government planning. Eisenhower, Abshire said, convened one of the most significant strategic planning processes of modern times in which everything was on the table from the United Statesís basic approach to the Soviet challenge to the proper American military force structure and economic policy. He noted that Eisenhower charged three teams of strategists to fashion a different global strategy: defeat of communism, containment in Europe and containment across the world. Each team refined its approach and presented it to the president and his national security team during rigorous sessions in the White House solarium. ìOur national security planning processes and structures have not adapted significantly since the end of the Cold War. A new solarium exercise for a new strategic framework is long overdue,î he said. Abshire said the United States needs a new national security consensus and decision-making structure. To project power, he said, the country needs to link military strength, information dominance, creative diplomacy, economic vigor and strong intelligence capabilities. Abshire said he believes that American strategic planning must be institutionalized rather than episodic and that over-compartmentalization in both the executive and legislative branches is an impediment to innovative and comprehensive policies. He backs the creation of a strategic advisory board chaired by the vice president to solicit the best ideas of the private sector and independent experts. This group would study issues across the strategic spectrum, challenge assumptions and probe vulnerabilities. Abshire said this panel would identify new trends in finance, diplomacy, trade, and defense, and give policymakers a second opinion on core assumptions and basic strategies. This new group should be complemented by a special planning unit within the National Security Council, he added. Abshire said that while some are skeptical of planning exercises, many top corporations do regular and exhaustive strategic planning because they recognize it as a crucial investment in their ultimate success. ìThe worldís most powerful nations must do no less,î he said. Abshire hopes a new strategy is developed soon and that U.S. leaders explain and defend it to the American public and the global community. ìWe need a public document, a public grand strategy. It is needed for Congress, the public, and our allies and friends around the world,î he said. Abshire said the United States must find new tools to tell its story to the world. ìPublic diplomacy was a great term in the 1970s, but now itís not. I call our challenge, ëcommunicating America.í The demands of communication now are so much more varied,î he said. ìBold leadership is required to communicate and persuade and win the battle of ideas.î John Shaw is a contributing writer to The Washington Diplomat.