Securing the State: Reforming the National Security Decisionmaking Process at the Civil-Military Nexus

Focusing on top civilian and military advisors within the national security establishment, this significant book looks at four case studies and concludes that when it comes to civil-military relations within the Department of Defense, balanced approaches produce more effective policies and outcomes than dominating structures. Perhaps counter-intuitively, Gibson also argues that this partnership approach at the Pentagon also facilitates more effective civilian control of the military where elected leaders provide direction, decision-making and ensure accountability. What is required is different (although not new, as Gibson points out while reviewing the historical record) thinking concerning how key relationships at the Pentagon ought to be arranged. Specifically, Gibson argues that there needs to be recognition that top-level political appointees and the highest ranking generals in the US military form a civil-military nexus and this entity has the primary responsibility for providing elected leaders (both the President and Congress) with strategic analysis, options, and advice as they sort through alternatives prior to making weighty decisions.The culmination of Gibson's treatise is the advancement of the Madisonian approach to civilian control of the military, a normative framework designed to replace the false choice of Samuel Huntington's Objective Control model and the bad choice of the Subjective Control model, initially practiced by Defense Secretary Robert McNamara and most recently by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. The Madisonian approach calls for changes in US law (revisions to Goldwater-Nichols) and new norms to guide the interactions of key participants who populate the civil-military nexus.This book is destined to influence US strategic thinking and should be added to the syllabus of courses in civil-military relations, strategic studies, and military history. Some of Gibson's recommendations may be controversially received, but given the struggling US policy in Iraq, the time is right for a critical review of US civil-military relations and this book provides the departure point for analysis and a potential way forward.