THE ROLE AND IMPORTANCE OF THE U.S. NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR

After the resignation of Michael Flynn's resignation, it might be useful to consider the Role and Importance of the U.S. National Security Advisor.

Author: Stephen J. Hadley Former National Security Adviser under President George W. Bush,  A Significant Address Presented at the Scowcroft Legacy Conference Sponsored by the Scowcroft Institute of International Affairs at Bush School of Government and Public Service, Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas on April 26, 2016

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"The position of the U.S. National Security Advisor is one of trust and confidence. Without a National Security Advisor and a National Security Council staff reporting only to the President, it is difficult to see how the President could perform the duties and fulfill the responsibilities given to the President by the Constitution in the area of national security and foreign policy.

The National Security Advisor spends more time with the President than any other member of the President’s national security team. The National Security Advisor is involved in consequential matters that span the globe and affect the world. The National Security Advisor spends a higher proportion of his time on policy substance than any other national security principal. He runs the interagency process that analyzes issues, develops options, and then presents them to the President. And then he oversees the process by which the President’s decisions are implemented by the various departments and agencies of the federal government.

The National Security Advisor is a staff job. He helps  the President play the leading role that the U.S. Constitution gives to the President in national security and foreign policy. It is because it is a staff role that it is exempted from Senate confirmation or public Congressional testimony. This fact puts a special burden on the National Security Advisor to be self-limiting as to power and position. The National Security Advisor must be careful not to usurp the role of the cabinet officers – especially the Secretaries of Defense and State -- to which the Senate has given its confirmation and to which the Congress has appropriated the funds and the personnel slots to conduct the national security and foreign policy business of the country under Congressional oversight. If the National Security Advisor seeks to assume these functions – even if encouraged to do so by the President – then the Congress can rightly cry “foul” and seek to renegotiate the current arrangement that makes the National Security Advisor such a unique instrument for the President. There are times when a national security cabinet officer or agency head is not adequately performing their responsibilities. But the solution in such a case is not for the National Security Advisor to try to substitute for the cabinet officer or agency head – or for the National Security Council staff to try to substitute itself for the responsible agency or departmental staff and draw more responsibility and control into the White House. That is a recipe for failure – for no matter how talented, the National Security Council staff cannot possibly have the necessary expertise or bandwidth to do the job that needs to be done. The solution in such a case is for the cabinet officer or agency head either to raise their game or be replaced by the President. You cannot successfully substitute staff for line. If the line organization is not working, then the line organization needs to be fixed.

The province of the National Security Advisor and the National Security Council staff should be the following:

1. Staffing and supporting the President in playing the President’s constitutional role in national security and foreign policy. This encompasses a wide range of activities that include helping plan the President’s foreign travel, providing background memos and staffing for the President’s meetings and phone calls with world leaders, preparing the President for the meetings of the National Security Council, helping to draft national security and foreign policy speeches, helping to prepare for meetings with Congressional leaders, responding to Presidential requests for all kinds of information and analysis, and briefing the President on the issues of the moment.

2. Advocating and advancing Presidential initiatives within Executive Branch. This does not mean running operations out of the White House. It does mean overseeing the implementation and execution of Presidential initiatives by the relevant departments and agencies of the Executive Branch. If a department or agency is not doing what it should be doing to implement and execute a Presidential initiative, it means alerting the cabinet secretary or agency head in the first instance, and the President if necessary. If the National Security Advisor and the National Security Council staff are not championing Presidential initiatives within the government, no one else will.

3. Injecting a sense of urgency into the interagency process. Getting things done “in the ordinary course of business” too often means that nothing is going to get done at all. Particularly when dealing with a crisis, this is simply not good enough. The role of the National Security Advisor and the National Security Council staff is to allocate responsibilities among department and agencies with respect to a specific matter, set reasonable but urgent deadlines, and hold people accountable for meeting them.

4. Coordinating those important or consequential initiatives and policies that require the concerted effort of multiple departments and agencies to achieve a Presidential objective. Such interagency coordination was one of the specific purposes enumerated for the National Security Council in the National Security Act of 1947. It is the principal reason for the system of interagency committees at multiple levels of government that constitute the “interagency system.” Integrating across the various departments and agencies of the Executive Branch – the “stovepipes” of the interagency system – and setting priorities are central to the mission of the National Security Advisor and the National Security Council staff. This is why the National Security Council staff needs to be small. If the goal is integration – seeing relationships across diverse problem sets - - and setting priorities – among the myriad of issues that come to the President, then it is better to have more information in fewer heads. The job of the National Security Council staff is to get the government to work as much as possible like a single enterprise in pursuit of common goals. When the process succeeds, it is the President’s success; when the process fails, it is the failure of the National Security Advisor and the National Security Council staff.

5. Injecting a sense of strategy into the interagency process. The first thing to concentrate on is  “What are we trying to achieve?” And the next question is: “How are we going to achieve it?”

6. Explaining the President’s policies to the public. The National Security Advisor needs to be careful not to usurp the role of the Secretary of State as the principal foreign policy spokesperson for the administration (or the Secretary of Defense as the principal defense policy spokesperson). But the National Security Advisor is uniquely positioned to elaborate for the public the mind of the President and the President’s perspective – how the President sees an issue, what the President is trying to achieve, and how the President is trying to achieve it. When playing this public role, what matters is not what the National Security Advisor thinks but what the President thinks – and the National Security Advisor needs to speak in the President’s name, and not in his own name. Approached in this way, it is a role that the National Security Advisor’s National Security Council colleagues will understand and respect. If the foregoing six points summarize the “job description” of the National Security Advisor, then what is the “Scowcroft Model” for how the job should be carried out? It has five basic elements.

 1. The National Security Advisor needs to be an “Honest Broker.” Being an “honest broker” means running a fair and transparent process for bringing issues to the President for decision. It means maintaining a “level playing field” in which ideas and views can compete with one another on an equal basis, without “stacking the deck” in favor of one or another approach. It means in particular not using the privileged position accorded to the National Security Advisor in this process to “tilt” the process in favor of the outcome favored by the National Security Advisor. The National Security Advisor must resist the temptation to put his  “thumb on the scales” during the decision process, for this will bias what goes to the President and could potentially narrow the President’s options. In addition, being an “Honest Broker” means:

a. Making the national security principals full participants in the policy process. The national security and foreign policy cabinet secretaries and agency heads are the people who run the departments and agencies of the Executive Branch that will implement and execute any policy initiative or decision taken by the President. So it is important that they not only “buy in” to the President’s initiative or decision but do so with conviction and enthusiasm. The best way to achieve this result is for them to be full participants from the beginning in the process by which the initiative or decision is developed. It is the National Security Advisor’s job to make sure this happens.

b. The National Security Advisor should not insert himself between the President and the principal cabinet secretaries and agency heads. Being an “Honest Broker” does not just mean presenting the views of cabinet secretaries and agency heads to the President in a fair and balanced way. These officials should be the President’s closest advisors on national security and foreign policy matters, and the President should hear from them directly and in person. It is the job of the National Security Advisor to encourage and facilitate direct interaction between them and the President. This can occur in formal National Security Council meetings, in informal group meetings in the Oval Office or in the White House residence, in periodic one-on one meetings between a cabinet secretary and the President (usually with the Vice President, White House Chief of Staff, and the National Security Advisor attending), and over the telephone. The National Security Advisor must not be a conduit to the President’s Cabinet Officers. This will not contribute to strengthening the ties between the President and the President’s principal national security and foreign policy advisors. The National Security Advisor is not in the military chain of command, which runs directly from the President to the Secretary of Defense. Instructions on military matters need to be given in that chain of command – and the National Security Advisor should not seek – or permit himself -- to be inserted into that chain of command.

 c. The National Security Advisor should not undermine his national security colleagues with the President or advance himself with the President at their expense. The job of the National Security Advisor is to help cabinet officers and agency heads to succeed in their jobs – the President needs them to succeed, and so does the country. And their prospects for success are enhanced if they have the confidence and support of the President. It is the National Security Advisor’s job to promote that Presidential confidence and facilitate that Presidential support.

d. The National Security Advisor must maintain the confidence of the other National Security Council principals. Other national security colleagues will be watching to see if the National Security Advisor is truly serving as an “Honest Broker” or whether he’s trying to “game the system” in favor of his  personal policy preferences.

2. The National Security Advisor needs to put the President at the center of the decision making process.

a. The President is the “decider.” The job of the National Security Advisor is to serve the President and enable Presidential decisions. The National Security Advisor is not “the decider.” Indeed, contrary to the general public perception, the National Security Council itself is not a decision making body. By statute, its role is only advisory, a source of information and advice to the President to help the President?

b. The National Security Advisor needs to make sure the national security organizational structure and the interagency process are meeting the President’s needs and evolve over time. Congressional control over the operation of the national security system within the Executive Branch is limited precisely to allow each President to mold the system to his particular leadership and management style. The system and structure are designed to be flexible. Each incoming President should establish the interagency organization and process – and the structure and procedures of the National Security Council staff – that fit the President’s policy priorities and operating style. And these organizational structures, processes, and procedures should adapt over the course of the Presidency.

c. The National Security Advisor needs to bring issues and options to the President for decision – and not try to force a false consensus. It is a great temptation for a National Security Advisor to try to force consensus on an issue and bring that consensus to the President. This may be appropriate for less important issues – if a true consensus can be achieved. Even then, the National Security Advisor should run the issue and the consensus position by the President – for the President may disagree with the consensus, and the President, after all, is the “decider.” But especially for issues of consequence, it is better to bring the issue and a fully fleshed out set of options to the President for decision.

3. The National Security Advisor needs to provide his policy advice to the President in confidence. The National Security Advisor  should never talk publicly about the advice he gives to the President.

4. The National Security Advisor needs to keep a low public profile and operate generally off stage. This is the fourth key element of the Scowcroft Model. The bane of too many Presidential administrations has been all too public competition and conflict between and among key national security and foreign policy principals. Most often such conflict has occurred between the Secretary of State and the Secretary of Defense, but it has also arisen between the National Security Advisor and one or the other of those two cabinet secretaries. Such public competition and conflict is not good for the President and it is not good for the country. It creates an image of disarray that undermines public confidence in the soundness and effectiveness of the administration decision making process in a way that avoids such an outcome. First and foremost, this means that the National Security Advisor must not contribute personally to internal feuds or conflicts either in appearance or in fact. It means that the National Security Advisor must not have too public a profile and avoid actions that would undermine or usurp the role of the cabinet secretaries. Secondly, it means that the National Security Advisor must avoid leaks. In the first place, the National Security Advisor should never be a leaker – if he puts out something on background to the press (in person, by phone, by email, or by tweet), it should only be because the President has directed it -- and it should of course not involve classified information in any way. In the third place, the National Security Advisor needs to run a  disciplined National Security Council staff that does not leak – that does not seek to settle bureaucratic scores through the traditional press or social media – that always approaches its interagency colleagues by giving them the benefit of the doubt and the presumption of good faith (even when it is not always deserved). And finally, the National Security Advisor needs to work with the other national security principals to discourage leaks from the rest of the government – whether by the national security principal directly or through their staff, or by staff members acting on their own. This effort starts with the National Security Advisor running a fair and transparent decision making process in which the national security principals and their department and agencies have an opportunity to participate fully and directly with the President.

5.  The National Security Advisor must accept responsibility. The National Security Advisor is going to make mistakes. The question is what he does then. The best approach for the National Security Advisor is to go to the President, disclose and admit he’s wrong on national security and foreign policy. It can confuse the public in terms of who speaks for the administration on such issues. A principal responsibility of the National Security Advisor is to run the interagency and mistake, accept the consequences, and resign if warranted by the facts or the best interests of the President.