JHU/APL Rethinking Seminar Series Rethinking Global Security Constructs, Threats and Potential Responses.

Transcription

1 JHU/APL Rethinking Seminar Series Rethinking Global Security Constructs, Threats and Potential Responses 15 December 2016 Professor Andrew S. Natsios Director, Scowcroft Institute of International Affairs Bush School of Government and Public Service, Texas A&M Rethinking Foreign USAID and International Development Notes: 1. Below are informal notes of the speaker s remarks as taken by a JHU/APL staff member. 2. Slides used during the presentation are available in the Video Archives 3. Links to the video, audio, and bulletized notes files for this and past seminars can be found on and the JHU/APL YouTube Playlist. Introduction Professor Natsios began his remarks by describing the situation that pulled US Agency for International Development (USAID) directly into the war in Afghanistan and eventually Iraq. Three weeks after the 9/11 attacks, he was called by the National Security Advisor, Condoleezza Rice, to attend an unusual private meeting with the Vice Chairman of the Joint Staff, General Peter Pace, and Richard Haas from the State Department s policy planning think tank. They were told that President Bush worried about how the world and the Afghan people would perceive the upcoming US military intervention in Afghanistan, which was planned to oust the Taliban and al Qaeda. To improve this view, USAID was to be given a larger role so that the military operations would be seen as a rescue of Afghanistan from the extremists. More importantly, the increased activity by USAID was to be highlighted in the open press, including in interviews with Al Jazeera channel. Subsequently, Natsios became the first senior US civilian official in Afghanistan in 10 years. Overall, DEVELOPMENT would have a big role in the battle against terrorism world-wide and its new role was soon written into the National Security Strategy. The 3-D Doctrine: Development, Defense, Diplomacy The elements of national policy now included Development Development has been part of the national strategy through the administrations of two presidents and 4 Secretaries of State so it is not likely to go away USAID was established in 1961 by President Kennedy by Executive Order and then the Foreign Assistance Act gave statutory authority to create it o The functions had existed before in several agencies across the government created by different presidents at different times o Kennedy merged several programs into a single entity that could be act more aggressively world-wide o USAID was first staffed by the people who had run the Marshall Plan the most successful development plan in history The archives of the Marshall Plan are maintained by USAID, its successor Often hear We need to fix foreign USAID when what really needs to be fixed are the demands on foreign USAID o Too often USAID is asked to do contradictory things 1

2 o The federal government needs to determine what it wants done, since USAID can t do opposite things simultaneously Now need a new bi-partisan Foreign Assistance Act, which has not been rewritten since the 1980s o Problem: All domestic controversies (abortion, family planning, gay rights, etc.) get concentrated in USAID programs o USAID can t satisfy all factions in the American political spectrum simultaneously Old system was highly decentralized but has become more centralized over the last 15 years o USAID mission directors held great power in each of the 81 countries receiving USAID Mission directors power was envied by those running other USAID agencies from the World Bank, European countries, etc. USAID mission directors had so much discretion that they were often called proconsuls or viceroys o Heads of state who care about developing their countries rather than looting them still often directly call mission directors, sometimes going around ambassadors Want advice on whom they should promote, etc. since the mission directors worked so closely with so many government officials Would ask for assistance deciding about changing government policies and for technical help to make these changes o Most important person from the US in the 81 developing countries where there are USAID missions is the USAID mission director Natsios noted that he knew he was considered important overseas since he was constantly given presidential suites and other amenities when visiting Countries that need development rely on USAID and its mission directors o Bottom line: USAID has a very different image in the Third World than it does at home Now USAID personnel must work within an earmark system leaving little room for the individual mission director s discretion they once had on how money is spent o Not earmarked by country or project this much money for this hospital in this country o Now earmarked by sector and sub-sector and sub-sub-sector Examples: A $1.5million program for Vitamin A deficiency and a $1billion program for malaria can only spend money on those issues Nixon changed the system to make it more appealing at home since, if asked, Americans often say they don t want to spend money on foreign assistance The fear was that the money would go to corrupt leaders In fact, very little of the USAID money goes through the treasuries of the countries involved o AID mostly works with governments, not through them making a more accountable system on how the money is spent o In the old system USAID officials could be assigned for 7-9 years in a specific country but now it is only 3 years with the option for one year extensions In war zones assignments are one year, which is the opposite of what it should be In patrimonial states where institutions are weak all government functions are based on personal relationships In the US these functions are based on laws and regulations In advanced technological states, government is based on rules The more dysfunctional the country, the weaker the institutions, so the more the state is patrimonial Problem: Such countries now are where USAID will send people for 1- year assignments Could send people to Brazil for a year because they have institutions Should be sending people to Afghanistan for 5-10 years 2

3 There are some expeditionary people in USAID who want to work in such situations for long periods, permitting them to build relationships o Want go to help make significant changes for things like reducing high child mortality rates, etc. o Rules do not allow keeping USAID officers in such situations Bottom line: To improve the situation Natsios has proposed establishing a new Department of International Development as described in his article in Foreign Affairs Foreign Affairs Proposal Professor Natsios and Brian Atwood recently published an article entitled Rethinking U.S. National Security: A New Role for International Development o The authors, one Republican and one Democrat, agree on ways to reform international development efforts Proposal: Establish a cabinet-level, cabinet-ranked department which has a seat on the National Security Council o Move the various government agencies and functions involved in international development into a single organization o USAID would be move there as well as President Bush s Millennium Challenge corporate initiative, the HIV office in the State Department, etc. o US representatives to the World Bank which really isn t a bank but a development institution would also be there Current representatives come from the Treasury Department, which does not have the experts needed to understand what the World Bank really does USAID works very closely with the World Bank but primarily in the field but it has no seat on the World Bank board The British have a single entity to cover the equivalent of the Inter-American Development bank, the African Development Bank, etc. o Bottom line: Basic structural changes are needed in the arrangement of international development agencies of the US government Basic assessment: State building and development does work but it takes time o Not how Defense and State think about it o Often hear You (AID) failed because the country (Iraq or Afghanistan) is still a mess and we don t want to do any more nation building Example of the complications involved in Afghanistan o GEN McChrystal, as Commander, U.S. Forces Afghanistan (USFOR-A), wrote a plan for development, which was subsequently supported by his successor, GEN Petraeus Problem: Those who wrote the plan didn t understand development theory Military misunderstanding: They take concept of nation building too literally it is not an engineering project o The right way to think about it: Must build institutions so that there is someone to maintain any infrastructure that is built Can take years or more to build the necessary institutions to support the infrastructure Can t show progress to meet quarterly or even yearly goals; will take 5-10 years before see any indicators o Often heard but incorrect statement: There is no evidence that development works. It s a waste of money which can be disputed by: S. Korea, which was nearly the poorest country in the world in the 1950s Third of the country was malnourished until the US started feeding the country with its surplus food through Food for Peace 3

4 o Now the 13 th largest economy The fact that it just impeached its president indicates that its government of laws works how it should work in a democratic country USAID mission directors, not anyone from the other USAID agencies, actually sat in cabinet meetings with the first President Park for 18 years o Complained about the 38 economists telling him what to do but he did do what USAID suggested somewhat autocratically o US spent over $6 billion (in 1960s money) over those 18 years and it worked Taiwan was a similar situation and it is now a democratic, capitalist state Indonesia when very poor was helped a great deal by USAID but is not in the same league as S. Korea or Taiwan Result of the huge effort there: A stable democracy with a growing economy Could list at least a dozen countries that had large USAID programs that are now advanced democracies Bottom line: It took years to see these real results Alternative situation: In China Mao s Great Leap Forward caused the worst recorded famine ( ) killing 45 million people because of the development done there At the same time Dr. Norman Borlaug was leading initiatives that contributed to the extensive increases in agricultural production termed the Green Revolution Dr. Borlaug told Prof. Natsios that it was the help he received from USAID that made his initiatives work, not help from the World Bank In a famous speech, he had noted that a Green Revolution was spreading over Asia but he did not mention the famine then going on in China China did not take advantage of the Green Revolution, which was successful because of USAID s support of this Nobel Prize-winning farming concept Involved breeding high yield crops that permitted 2-3 times the amount of output in the same amount of land Result was ending hunger and having enough surplus food to stimulate the industrial production in a number of countries USAID did the implementation of the Green Revolution programs in India, the Philippines, Pakistan, etc. USAID also built 20 agricultural and 13 engineering schools in India that provided the on-going know-how needed to manage the systems The IT schools are now producing the people who man the computer call and support centers in India o Each was closely linked with an American engineering school from 1951 to 1971 o Today s top Indian engineering school was associated with MIT o Young people today usually don t know that USAID built these schools Result: India, the 2nd largest country in the world, a market economy and a functioning democracy, acts as a counterbalance to other countries o USAID involved in making all of this happen by working with the Indian government and other agencies for decades o USAID can t say that they built all of these institutions since the Indians see them as their own how development should work o It is in the US interest to have such a country as an ally now 4

5 Mistakes in Recent Nation-Building How Development Differs from the Other 2 D s On the battlefield the military controls the morale and training of its fighters, its weapons and strategies all depends on what you do or do not do In diplomacy diplomats negotiate with other diplomats from other countries However, in development USAID must work with local officials, universities, government ministers, NGOs, local businesses, etc. o Must convince others to do what USAID suggests; such relationships require more buy-in and partnerships than do the other two D s o Most important thing the USAID officer does is to determine who will be the change agents and reformers Must identify those who want to improve their societies, not loot them More Money Doesn t Mean More Development Problem: The US and the enemy learned the wrong lessons in Iraq and Afghanistan The military thinks that USAID failed there, but there are examples to show that some projects are still succeeding even given the security situation Natsios noted that he used the same standards in USAID as he had done in Massachusetts when he worked there as the chief operating and financial officer o Governmental standard: If you don t spend money by the end of the year, you lose it Basic OMB rule for domestic agencies: If you re not competent enough or swift enough to spend the money you re given, you should have it taken away o Problem: In the developing world, have only weak or non-existent institutions so working with corrupt and unstable governments means that this standard won t work Can t plan when there are insurgencies and violence going on So this rule must be considered nutty for Development o From November 2001 to at least 2012/2013 OMB s only concern was the burn rate in Afghanistan and Iraq Everything was judged on how fast the money was spent, but that wouldn t help to get results or do nation building In Development spending speed can t be arbitrarily sped up o Bottom line: Can t use burn rate to measure success in Development Should not use numbers of engineering projects as measurements of success o The reconstruction program for Iraq involved only engineering projects that were not necessary there Saddam could build things well and there were still many competent engineers available who had already rebuilt the country quickly after the Gulf War o Iraq did need institutions: the health care system didn t exist; the education system was a wreck; there was no internet, etc. so USAID: Brought books and scientific journals (chosen by locals) to university libraries which had only dangerous Baathist propaganda publications Established an internet system, etc. Problem: Using the standards of infrastructure-building and burn-rate as measures of success for USAID work sent the wrong message to the USAID staff o If those in charge demanded such measurements, Natsios allowed his staff to yell at the OMB officials in weekly meetings on their success rates o Natsios wanted OMB told that these were stupid standards even if such metrics were used by DoD and State but the USAID assessment was ignored Conflicting DoD and USAID Timelines The McChrystal plan had inappropriate time horizons 5

6 o DoD s concept was to clear an area militarily of Taliban to permit development that would in a year or two build functioning judicial and educational systems David Kilcullen wrote a famous book concerning development and counterinsurgency but its premise was wrong because to him development only meant engineering projects o Problem: Who will be around to maintain the newly built roads after the developers leave if there are no institutions? o Example: To encourage villagers to tell what they knew about Osama bin Laden, the military brought in generators to provide the village with electricity It was a big success until the diesel fuel ran out in a month and the villagers had no money to buy more Result: Resentment among the villagers caused complaints to USAID who said they didn t / wouldn t do such a thing Such projects should be put on a grid or solar power system or find a way to collect money to buy diesel (hard to do) If introduce people to modernity and then take it away, you cause bad feelings that won t get you information in the future Bottom line: Development must avoid unsustainable projects Some adjustments to time horizons were made to the McChrystal / Petraeus plan at least under McChrystal o OMB still insisted on running development like businesses and measure progress with quarterly metrics o Natsios: Government is not business doesn t and shouldn t make a profit Development involves building institutions so hard to measure accomplishments such as the success of a constitution Even the great US Constitution was not clearly an act of genius for its first 30 years Got lots of complaints at first about the help given to S. Korea for its constitution but it turned out alright eventually Can t imagine the Founding Fathers having to put up with quarterly indicators of success o Can measure some hard science-based elements of agriculture and health but must have the institutions in place to manage such things as sending out seed Fifteen One-Year Programs vs. One Fifteen-Year Program Nancy Lindborg, President of the United States Institute of Peace and former USAID senior staffer, noted this conundrum about reconstruction programs in Afghanistan Old USAID used to run year programs that were reviewed every five years to make sure that they were still on track New USAID is all about quarterly indicators now there are 1,200 indicators James Q. Wilson wrote in Bureaucracy: What Government Agencies Do And Why They Do It that if you can t measure it, bureaucrats will simply stop doing it because OMB wants the numbers Institution building is the hardest thing to measure in development but it s the most important o The one thing that distinguishes highly developed, stable, prosperous societies from poor countries is institutions o The US (87,000 government entities /19 million legal businesses / 2.5 million non-profit organizations) is a nation of institutions built over 400 years from early colonial times o Such development can t be compacted over a few years but there is evidence that progress can be made in a year period Spending More Money Doesn t Provide More Development Recommended reading: The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries are Failing and What Can Be Done About It by Paul Collier about the poorest billion people who are stuck in poverty 6

7 o Research has shown that if foreign USAID is more than 16% of a country s GDP there will be declining returns for what is spent o Problem: In Afghanistan, foreign USAID now makes up at least 92% of its GDP probably an underestimate by the World Bank Under the Bush Administration USAID was spending $1.2 billion in Afghanistan but the Obama Administration wanted to plus up the number significantly to $5 billion o USAID didn t want it but career diplomats called for it o Problem: When more money was sent to Afghanistan, more corruption occurred Concept: Absorptive Capacity, which has two meanings within Development o One meaning relates to macroeconomics but the more relevant meaning involves institutional absorptive capacity: Are there institutions through which to send money? o Example: Budgets for USAID work in the heartland of the insurgency suddenly goes from $200m to $600m, so the mission must figure out how to spend 3 times as much quickly Hard to do without 3 times the number of institutions to spend the money Some institutions already known to be corrupt but USAID still needs to spread out the money coming in among all the relevant institutions Normally, can avoid giving money to the corrupt ones, and give extra technical help to the weak ones with most money going to better ones With triple the money suddenly need to give money to all of them o USAID did not ask for the extra money and no matter what is spent, it won t suddenly build up Afghanistan to look like Kansas City even if DoD and State say so Another problem not discussed: NSC directed USAID to spend 80% of the $5m in the southeast area of Afghanistan where the base of the insurgency is o AID objected since already knew that if gave a village any help, the insurgents would arrive the next day to kill anyone who appears to be accepting outside help Can t spend the money there unless can provide 24-7 security for the villages Should spend money elsewhere to send a message that your people aren t being helped because you are killing people and carrying on a war there Spend money in the stable areas instead o People got the wrong message: If you want more money for your area, then kill people and start an insurgency Afghanis, good business people, quickly learned that killing more people and supporting the insurgency, even if it is hated, tends to gets them more money o Can t even spend the money because of the insurgency since can t protect everyone Problems with Killcullen s premise: o Can never supply enough security to allow the projects to go on o Development needs more than engineering projects o Time horizons are wrong Summary: Development does work USAID needs to be at the table when strategy is being discussed to ensure they can say what is wrong about what others put in their plans about USAID work No other department would stand-by and let another segment of the government rewrite their strategy nor should they Should not let others tell USAID how do their job Do need to be told what the national objectives decided at NSC meetings are but don t want to be told that Development must: o Meet quarterly indicators over two years 7

8 o o Spend more money than can be absorbed Spend all the money in an area that is least capable of absorbing the money QUESTIONS & ANSWERS SESSION Re: Relationships between the Defense and USAID in Disaster Relief Over the last 17 years USAID was already running missions in all the countries except Iraq before the US military arrived o USAID even ran missions in Afghanistan in the 1990s from bases in Pakistan Part of USAID must be expeditionary particularly for disaster assistance particularly in the Bureau for Democracy, Conflict and Humanitarian Assistance (DCHA) o Established when USAID was reorganize starting before 9/11 very controversial effort in which Natsios had to fire people and rearrange duties and responsibilities o New Bureau was focused on failed and fragile states Natsios also created an office of military affairs, now called office of civil military operations o Made up of 20 colonels and 20 senior foreign service officers o Only mission is to do planning especially contingency planning o Besides DoD, USAID is the only organization in the government that does this type of planning Regulations require that to spend money there must be a plan that government ministers have agreed to and this participatory process takes a long time Problem: Because of OMB regulations USAID is now required to show results within one year a stupid concept for the multi-year projects that USAID supports Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance when Natsios ran it almost 30 years ago had 60 employees and a $60 million budget now it has a $1.5 billion budget and 600 employees o Starting in 1990 had self-contained DARTs Disaster Assistance Response Teams which were designed to be expeditionary Usually go out with no military support For the Ebola crisis, the military reported to USAID o The military is happy to be in support of USAID for disaster assistance since they don t want to be the ones making the decisions that need to be made in those instances They don t want to report to State Department or the CDC o Relationships have matured so that USAID and military officers know each other and work well together with well-established procedures o Natsios began a Field Officers Guide (the FOG) in 1990 and it has grown to a very large, detailed document Bottom line: USAID is expeditionary, although not as much as the military, and it now has both the staff and the budget to be so o DCHA Bureau budget is $4.5 billion which includes support for the Food for Peace Office and the Office of Transition Initiatives (for rehabilitation efforts) o DCHA money is not earmarked but must be spent within the area of disaster relief Re: Training the Military about USAID USAID has sent people to train at the Army and other war colleges Retired USAID officers have taught at the Army War College and continue to do so very successfully Most important to get instruction about USAID doctrine into military curriculums 8

9 Re: Cuba Natsios believes that Cuba should have improved its human rights record before the US started opening up its relationship with Cuba, but he accepts the situation as it now stands Can destroy a country with bad institutions and bad leadership as is the case in Venezuela which was once the richest country in Latin America but is now a failing and fragile state In 2000 Natsios wrote a paper on Cuba s food insecurity and still stands by its conclusion that he expected food insecurity there would eventually lead to unrest Food security has been seen to be a flashpoint for general instability such as with the Arab Spring revolutions o The immediate cause was food insecurity created by rapidly rising prices although there were other underlying reasons, too o Natsios predicted problems in the Middle East in 2009 because people who don t think they can eat are likely to do bad things Food security also played a role in the problems before WWII where Japan suffered from localized famines in the 1930s o See the book The Taste of War: World War II and the Battle for Food by Lizzie Collingham for a new perspective on the principle cause of WWII Bottom line: Another world war could be caused by similar shortages if problems are ignored o Need a working free trade system to feed all 7.5 billion people Some countries don t respect the free trade system Some countries can only export goods and import food: See Singapore as an example of the richest country that can t grow enough food for its people o Food counts it has in the Middle East and it will in Cuba o Should focus attention on the agricultural system in Cuba and reforming the collective farming system that has been proven to be a disaster wherever it has been tried Need to move to a private system giving people their own farms so that they get the benefits of what they do Fidel Castro said in a NPR interview ten years ago that Communism doesn t work but subsequently denied saying so Ignoring food security would bring on instability causing people to leave the island en masse Re: Science-based Metrics There are some metrics that are useful rates of deaths are specific enough to be meaningful o Child mortality and maternal mortality rates were nearly the highest in the world in Afghanistan when USAID arrived there o The US has built 400 clinics for preventative care and another 800 were built by European countries and others Not curative care clinics because can save 10 times more children by immunizing children, training pre-natal workers, etc. o Natsios was told that it would take about 7 years to see results in the mortality rates since it would take time to establish clinics and train people Result: Mortality rates did drop by 30% after those 7 years Problem: The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) trashed nearly all the work that both USAID and DoD did there o The way the audit was done was outrageous and irresponsible and the SIGAR should himself be investigated for the broad brush attacks Natsios own work was not audited since the SIGAR came later o USAID s work should be audited but by inspector general from USAID who understands what is involved in USAID s work 9

10 Also had auditors from GAO and OMB all auditing the same thing o See Natsios article on The Clash of the Counter-Bureaucracy and Development There can be indications about how programs are being run but it takes a long time to collect relevant data Bottom line: There can be useful metrics but do you want to spend time collecting the data or getting the work done? o There have been success stories in the past such as the Green Revolution and S. Korea that didn t have to deal with all the indicators that are now expected o USAID did have a field evaluations unit for these earlier programs after 5 years they would interview hundreds of people around the world to see how things were working If things did not look good, would ask the mission s staff why it should not be allowed to continue for another 5 years Would terminate or alter programs not going well o Do need to do evaluations but can t rely strictly on number-based criteria need performance-based evaluations based on field interviews Definitely need evaluations in foreign USAID but need quality, not quantity evaluations Problem: A lot of the reported numbers are just made up done throughout the government 90% of the 1200 indicators used for evaluations are output indicators not outcome indicators Don t judge how many people attended a seminar on democracy but what did they learn Need performance outcome indicators not output indicators Re: Civil Society All advanced democracies have robust civil societies Books about China don t understand that China doesn t have a proper civil society because they don t understand development theory o China may grow fast but will only get to a certain point and hit a stone wall without adequate institutions as noted by Douglas North, Nobel economy prize winner o China has already done the relatively easy stuff but can t run an advanced economy without lots of institutions which make lots of decisions in a decentralized system Must do so through negotiation and without violence The US remains ahead in the world because of its institutions, not its natural resources o Alexis de Tocqueville wrote about that 200 years ago in Democracy in America o America has had 400 years of town meetings to use as an institutional structure o In small towns, those who go to town meetings are the same people who lead all the stakeholder groups in town churches, Scouts, Lions Club, etc. USAID builds civil societies around the world but there is a risk of doing it the wrong way, which would be just doing it to use up the money, not because they want to develop civil society o Governments can crush civil societies overnight as Putin has done in Russia Tens of thousands of organizations had developed in Russia Putin believed (and it was probably true) that some of these groups organized the mass demonstrations in 2012 when he stole the election o USAID and the European Union were thrown out of Russia after the demonstrations because they were accused of corrupting Russians with foreign civil society concepts o Putin used the tax police to shut down civil society Civil society is a counter balance to abuse by the government 10

11 In small towns Republicans and Democrats can work together since the important local issues are not based on ideology o People weren t enemies all the time o Might not vote the same way in state or national elections Civil society has kept the peace because it allows people to deal with local issues outside of ideology o Example: Conservative businessmen in Boston saw the need 30 years ago to help the public school system there when they could not hire adequately trained workers Invested $ million dollars Civil society/business groups got together with parents groups to improve the schools Dictators don t like civil society institutions and often crush them o World Vision NGO, which Natsios ran, helped set up the Russian Nurses Association in the 1990s when there was nothing like it in Russia Russia had no training for nurses so World Vision developed a textbook and helped the association give classes and set up certification systems Built a professional association like those found throughout Western societies o AID has built Western-style labor unions not the politicized ones seen in Europe o AID also set up Chambers of Commerce in Afghanistan and Egypt that are now running on their own o In Russia USAID established 4-H organizations and groups to train young entrepreneurs Civil society includes groups that are not profit-making and not governmental allowing people to work together on a voluntary basis to solve problems of the society in general Re: Problems for USAID When Natsios arrived at USAID, it lacked adequate training programs because of budget cuts o State Department has almost an anti-training culture, seeing training as punitive o AID is more like the military in its attitude toward training and now has a robust training system The Foreign Service hiring system doesn t work well for USAID since it takes 18 months to bring anyone new on board o The USAID personnel system needs to have one very flexible system (not the current 28) so that USAID can quickly plus up to meet crisis demands o Must also be able to retire people quickly to meet changing challenges Problem: There is resistance to innovation in USAID o Resulting from the attitudes of OMB, GAO, and the IG all of whom don t want accept the risks These auditors threaten to make those who do take risks look like thieves or incompetents o By nature USAID officers are entrepreneurial and innovative they want to fix things o Don t know how to fix these countervailing trends Do need more constraint on regulations but can t do away with all of them The worst problem is with the Congressional oversight committees USAID must report to 12 different Congressional committees 11