The Security Narrative
How could security not apply to anything? We can not predict the future, so how would we know what may or may not be a security issue? As we discussed in class today, the context under which policy decisions are made has obviously changed over time, therefore so have the national interests and security strategies. We can find underlying themes- protecting democracy, promoting American values, ensuring peace and prosperity for Americans- but these are just as broad and malleable as the definition of security.
With that said, this malleable definition is completely necessary as we define national security interests, rather than the issues defining themselves. Take, for example, “Fixing the Meaning of 9/11: Hegemony, Coercion,
and the Road to War in Iraq,” by Ronald R. Krebs and Jennifer K. Lobasz, in which they suggest that the national security strategy post 9/11 was developed through rhetoric, rather than actual security threats. The reading for Thursday, “Terrorism and Bathtubs: Comparing and Assessing
the Risks,” by John Mueller and Mark G. Stewart complements that sentiment in suggesting that the American counterterror efforts are essentially frivolous in that terrorism should not be a national security issue because the likeliness of terrorist attack is so slim in a non-war zone. Yet, the U.S. spends $115 billion per year on domestic counterterrorism because of the narrative that terrorism presents a threat to our daily life (Mueller and Stewart).
This brings me to my next point: the politics part of World Politics. After the simulation, we saw that, despite all of our efforts to find a compromise, we had failed to point out what benefits there were for the U.S. In our discussion today, we predicted what each security document would say based on the administration and the domestic political context. During the simulation debrief, we discussed that foreign policy decisions are made based on how it affects the domestic image and audience. Politicians can predict what they think will be most useful for them and construct a narrative to defend their policy decisions.
To answer this week's question, national security should and must apply to any issue. National security is a narrative, a policy agenda, and a domestic attitude framework. If national security were limited, the political implications would be null. Maybe it's wrong to make security decisions based on political ramifications, but it's the way things are done. And nonetheless, so long as we support the narrative, we will support the policy.
You and I both had similar views on that security has to be left up to interpretation in order to evolve with the times. What I liked about your blog was how you mentioned the likeliness of an attack against is enough to fund billions of dollars every year into an organization whose purpose is to try and predict the future proving that we are preparing for a threat we might not even know exists. In writing my blog however, I struggled with determining whether there still can be a general theme that all national security matters are targeted towards? So my question to you is: do you think that the United States can actually bend anything to be a matter of national security or does it have to follow certain "criteria"?
ReplyDeleteMy answer to that is yes. I think we never know what a threat might be, and to define a criteria would be pointless because so many things would have to be included. And with that said, we could never include enough. My mind goes to climate change- one hundred years ago, who would have categorized carbon emissions as a threat to national security? Who would have considered storms as a systemic threat to national security that we could actually fight? Climate change isn't the only unprecedented issue- cybersecurity and nuclear warfare did not exist one hundred years ago. With all that said, I'd like to draw another conclusion that security is perhaps more of a feeling than a physical state. The idea of preserving American values and promoting democracy is our sense of security, though it may not be actual security. But if that's how we've gone about national security for so long, it's not necessarily a flawed plan.
DeleteI agree with your argument overall that security is essentially a malleable term in that any issue of safety could be classified as such. However, I disagree with you in that the US does not have the justification of spending $115 billion on counterterrorism efforts within our own borders. While Terrorism and Bathtubs and you yourself make great points about the inherent ineffectiveness of terrorism abroad, I think homegrown terrorists serve as a larger threat to our national security. Part of this discussion has to do with the fact the institutions such as the FBI and CIA rarely classify mass shooters as terrorists due to the divergence in their actual identity and the perceived stereotype of terrorism in the world post-9/11. Homegrown terrorists, including mass shooters, prove to be a more formidable threat to our safety as a society, yet governmental institutions and the media classify them in an entirely different light.
ReplyDeleteI would also say that homegrown terrorists are a security threat. Just look at the Oklahoma Bomber or the Anthrax attacks. However, if the US is spending so much money on counterterrorism, and those actors are terrorists, then why do these attacks still exist? I understand there is an issue with classifying mass shooters as terrorists which may inhibit some prevention. But look at the shootings in Dayton and Dallas- these are terrorist acts with, as far as I know, little to no attempted counterterrorism before or after the events. It all comes back to the narrative. If these attacks are not part of the security narrative and the political agenda, then they are not a national security issue.
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