Government and Politics of the USA
Hillary Term, Lecture 29
American Defence Policy
and Homeland Secuirty
Dr Andrew Glencross ~ andrew.glencross@eui.eu
Hillary Term Essay
• Submit essay online via www.turnitin.com and hard copy to Jane Suiter
- Deadline: 5pm, Monday 10th of March (Hillary term wk 10)
• Choose 1 of 3 titles; strict 2,000 word limit (excluding bibliography)
– “In practice, Congress functions not as a unified institution, but as a
collection of semi-autonomous committees that seldom act in
unison“. Discuss this view, and explain your response.
– What are the consequences of pluralism and federalism for the
policy-making process in the US? Evaluate these consequences
with reference to at least two policy areas.
– Discuss the role played by money in US Presidential elections.
Elaborate your response in the context of attempts at campaign
finance reform since the 1970s and the 2008 Presidential election.
• Details on course website - http://uspoliticstcd.pbwiki.com/Courseassessment
Readings for today
Required reading…
– McKay chap. 12
– Singh chap. 25
Additional resources…
• Andrew Bacevich, The New American Militarism:
How Americans are Seduced by Way (PL-459559)
• Philip Yang, ‘Doubly Dualistic Dilemma: US
Strategies towards China and Taiwan’,
International Relations of the Asia-Pacific
Region, 2006, vol 6., no. 2
• Tom Lansford et al., To Protect and Defend: US
Homeland Security Policy (HL-287-935 )
Agenda
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Understanding terrorist threats
Current Issues in American Defence Policy
US Defence Strategy
What is Homeland Security?
Controversies in Homeland Security
Defence Policy, Homeland Security and
the 2008 Election
Understanding the Threats
There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know.
There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we
know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There
are things we don't know we don't know.
Understanding terrorist threats
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The New Terrorist Threat
Religious – so has self-belief and sense of
superiority that does away with restraint,
personal risk unimportant, sacred mission
Greater Violence – goal is to inflict as much
damage as possible rather than obtain political
objectives
Claiming credit for specific acts less important –
political message is vulnerability and
destruction of way of life
Vulnerability comes from reliance on complex
but fragile systems of communication, transport,
food chain and energy
Understanding terrorist threats
Consequences of the New Terrorist Threat
• Failure of Deterrence – non-state actors not
amenable to rational strategic calculations of
deterrence
• Instead of deterrence, i.e. force as last resort,
US military doctrine now based on
precautionary or pre-emptive use of force to
intimidate states sponsoring terrorism
• Conventional laws of war do not apply to
terrorists – categorized as “unlawful”
combatants, held at Guantanamo or subject to
rendition agreements
• Primary objective of war on terror is to prevent
terrorists obtaining WMD
Current Issues in American Defence Policy
Current Issues in American Defence Policy
• Missile defence: provoking Russian ire and rift
in US European allies, hugely expensive and
unproven
• Antagonists: China’s military spending rising,
equipping itself in high-tech weaponry, capable
of space and cyber warfare
• Counter-insurgency: to deal with so-called
fourth generation warfare, US armed forces
being reconfigured to deal with insurgency
tactics and state-building
US Defence Strategy
• Long War on Terror – emphasis on special
forces, intelligence, diplomacy
• Counterproliferation – WMD underscores need
for US nuclear arsenal
• Major theatre war – US forces equipped to fight
traditional warfare in 2 theatres at a time
• Stability operations and peacekeeping –
another reason for large ground forces and huge
airlift capacity
• Hedging against China – invests in
ultramodern air and naval capabilities
What is Homeland Security?
• OHS set up in
2002
• 3rd largest
department
• 200,000
employees
• Budget: $45 bill
• Secretary: Michael
Chertoff
What is Homeland Security?
• OHS groups together variety of agencies –
Transportation Security Administration,
US Customs and Border Protection, US
Citizenship and Immigration Services, US
Secret Service, Federal Emergency
Management Agency and US Coast
Guard
• Does not include the CIA or FBI
• OHS’s mission not only terrorism, also
targets catastrophic natural disasters and
accidents
Controversies in Homeland Security
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The Patriot Act 2001, 2005
Protect America Act 2007
Military Commissions for trying Guanatanamo inmates
Passenger Name Record
Extraordinary Rendition and the Question of Torture
Controversies in Homeland Security
• Patriot Act – gives intelligence agencies freer
hand to obtain personal information e.g. library
records, allows indefinite detention of aliens
suspected of terrorism
• Protect America Act – introduced after revelation
of warrantless telecommunications surveillance
by NSA, gives
• Military Commissions – in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld
2006, SC found military commissions illegal
because violated Geneva Convention
• PNR controversy – data processed for risk
assessment, ECJ annulled one EU/US
agreement for violating EC privacy rules
Controversies in Homeland Security
Extraordinary Rendition and the Question of Torture
• Rendition – Council of Europe estimates 100
people have been taken within the EU and
“rendered” to other states where they have been
tortured, CIA is investigating “erroneous
rendition”
• Torture – former CIA director Porter Goss
described waterboarding as a “professional
interrogation technique
• In Jul 2007 Bush signed an executive order
prohibiting torture during the interrogation of
suspected terrorists
Defence, Homeland Security and the Election
• McCain: supports pre-emptive war doctrine,
approves holding of US citizens as unlawful
enemy combatants, believes waterboarding is
torture, would close Guantanamo
• Obama: against treating US citizens as unlawful
enemy combatants, against presidential
authorisation of surveillance without warrants,
wants to rebuild nuclear non-proliferation
alliance
• Clinton: supports funding on missile defence,
voted against wiretapping, would close
Guantanamo