National Security Strategy: Legislative Mandates, Execution to Date, and Considerations for Congress
Abstract
There is a growing, still highly inchoate, debate among practitioners and scholars, including participants from across the political spectrum, concerning the need to reform the U.S. government s national security system. Reform proponents argue that much of the current architecture was designed to meet the global security challenges of the post-World War II context, and may not be appropriate for addressing 21st-century challenges. That architecture includes the organizations, structures, and processes that govern decision-making, budgeting, planning and execution, and congressional oversight of national security activities. Strategic guidance documents, including formal strategies and other forms of guidance, are a key element of that system. The current debates are timely because a new administration may begin issuing strategic documents early in its tenure in office. National security strategy can theoretically serve several distinct purposes: ! By offering prioritized objectives and indicating which elements of national power ( ways and means ) are to be used to meet them, it can provide guidance to departments and agencies to use in their internal processes for budgeting, planning and executing, and organizing, training, and equipping personnel. ! By clearly linking goals and the approaches designed to meet them, national security strategy can provide the executive branch a key tool for justifying requested resources to Congress. ! By laying out a detailed strategic vision, it can help inform public audiences both at home and abroad about U.S. government intent. Some critics charge that executive branch processes for developing strategy are flawed because, for example, they fail to establish priorities, consider fiscal constraints, or assign responsibilities to specific agencies.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Sep 23, 2008
- Accession Number
- ADA487574
Entities
People
- Catherine Dale
Organizations
- Library of Congress