Rebasing, Revisited
Thomas Donnelly
Resident Fellow
in Defense and National Security Studies
American
Enterprise Institute
Prepared in
conjunction with a panel presentation for
the Joint
Operations Symposium sponsored by
National Defense University
November
16-17, 2004
The
history of the United States
is a case study in expansionism. From its origins in a diverse and often
squabbling handful of English colonies in the western wilds of the British
Empire to its current position as global hegemon,
Americans have established the habit of looking outward to solve their security
problems. Our “security perimeter” has grown beyond recognition and it
continues to grow. The past century saw the expansion of our perimeter into the
air and space; the new century is pushing our interests into cyberspace. There
is no immediate reason to expect American expansionism to end.
Accompanying
this expansion of the American security perimeter has been a growing network of
military facilities, both along the frontier and internally. Installations like
Forts Riley and Leavenworth
in Kansas
were once outposts for Indian fighting, part of Andrew Jackson’s “Permanent
Indian Frontier” plan, then “hubs” for further force projection. In the 1880s, Fort
Leavenworth
became the home of the Army staff college; Fort
Riley
has for some decades been the home of the First Infantry Division, a unit with
much service in Germany
and in the Persian Gulf.
In Germany, Ramstein Air Force base, near the front line during the Cold War,
is now a key pillar in the American air “bridge” that makes the U.S. Air
Force’s boast of “global reach” a reality. The general pattern has been that,
when one war ends, the United
States fortifies the furthest
reaches of the final front lines and, when the next war begins, it builds new
facilities to support still farther-flung operations.
Thus
it should hardly be a surprise, upon the conclusion of the Cold War and the
rise of a new series of threats to U.S.
security interests, that the network of American installations should evolve.
Had the wars in Afghanistan
and Iraq
not intervened, the first Bush administration already would have begun to
implement its plan for a new “permanent American frontier” and prepare for the
congressional knife fight posed by the domestic Base Realignment and Closure,
or BRAC, process, set to begin next year. Yet even as the reality of the
September 11 attacks and the global war on terror has turned the transformation
of the Pentagon’s global force posture into a strategic imperative of American
national security, significant challenges—diplomatic, fiscal, and
political—still stand in the way.
Bridges
Not Far Enough
The
Bush administration deserves enormous credit for undertaking the overdue work
of reposturing U.S.
forces overseas; the Clinton
administration had little interest in the issue. To be fair, this was primarily
a political decision, not one taken in the Pentagon. But just as President Clinton corrupted the
1995 BRAC process for domestic political gain, he was happy to avoid the
diplomatic costs inherent in withdrawing and repositioning U.S.
forces stationed in Western Europe
or Korea.
Alas,
the current administration’s rebasing plan, like the rest of its defense
program, has partly become a captive to the hope that the missions in Afghanistan
and Iraq
are temporary anomalies. The Bush rebasing plan is bold and ambitious in many
ways, but it is still only a first step—as perhaps is inevitable until the
issues of the long-term U.S. presence in Afghanistan and Iraq are settled.
Although
the administration has yet to fully reveal its plans or much of a timetable, it
has thus far made clear that it intends to reduce the garrisons in Germany
and Korea
significantly, withdrawing at least 25,000 to 30,000 troops from Europe
and almost 15,000 from the Korean peninsula. That will leave about 35,000 U.S.
soldiers in Germany
and about 25,000 in South
Korea. Moreover, many of the
troops in Korea
will be repositioned away from the DMZ to the south, below Seoul.
Such a move will not only render U.S.
forces less vulnerable to a first strike by Pyongyang,
but also facilitate their redeployment in the event of conflicts elsewhere in Asia.
The European contingent will likewise be reconfigured, with new “lily-pad”
transitory bases built in southeastern Europe,
making it easier to support “out-of-area” operations in the Caucasus,
the Middle East,
and Central Asia.
The Greater Middle East. While the Bush
administration’s proposed changes to the global force posture are a good start,
they are far from complete. Most importantly, it does little to reassure both
enemies and allies that the American presence in the Middle
East is in proportion to the “long, hard slog”
described by Defense Secretary Rumsfeld. U.S.
forces in Iraq,
for instance, currently operate out of more than a dozen major sites. While
continuing success in the counterinsurgency campaign may allow—and fairly
soon—for a reduction of the 140,000-plus troops now in Iraq,
no military commander counts on a full withdrawal. And even once the counterinsurgency
inside Iraq
is won, there will still be the matter of regional security. The American
commitment to Iraq
is growing as the country moves toward democracy.
President
Bush has often described Iraq
as the “central front” in the war on Middle Eastern terror. Just as it was
necessary to defend the front lines in Germany
during the Cold War—and the rationale for “forward defense” was political and
strategic rather than military and operational—so it will be necessary to
defend the front in the Middle East.
Clearly, the current Iraqi interim government of Ayad Allawi is in no position
to negotiate a long-term status-of-forces agreement—the legal framework that
would establish the terms of a continued American military presence in the
country—but a legitimately elected Iraqi government will both be able and ready
to do so. Iraq’s
mainstream Shia leaders recognize this fact, and Iraq’s
Kurdish parties will demand continued American presence.
This
need not mean that future U.S.
bases need to be an in-the-face irritant to Iraqi nationalism; although,
indeed, the Kurds would welcome such bases. The backhanded benefit of Saddam
Hussein’s massive army was that it had plenty of airfields and other facilities
stuck out in the desert. These will prove an ideal infrastructure for a
continuing training and strategic partnership between the new Iraqi security
forces and the United States,
and they will generally facilitate long-term U.S.
operations. While neither the current American administration nor any future one
will be eager for more wars in the region, it is folly not to prepare against
the possibility. The operational advantages of U.S.
bases in Iraq
should be obvious for other power-projection missions in the region. Sites in
northern and western Iraq
would be key to patrolling the porous Iraqi borders with Syria
and Iran.
Lesser facilities in the far south would simply be an expansion of other U.S.
posts in the Persian Gulf
and Kuwait.
A
similar logic applies in Afghanistan.
The recent election has legitimized the government of Hamid Karzai, and the
Afghan president has proven himself remarkably adept at creating consensus
while marginalizing rivals and “warlords” who pose a threat to democracy. Yet Kabul’s
hold on the provinces, never strong, is far from solid. Revived opium
agriculture supplies local leaders with the income to buy weapons and maintain
their militias, while Taliban and al Qaeda remnants still lurk, both in Afghanistan
and Pakistan’s
northwest frontier. If Afghanistan
is farther along the path toward stability and representative government than Iraq,
it is still undeniable that a long-term American presence—happily and hopefully
in conjunction with NATO—remains a necessity.
Thus
it comes as no surprise that the Karzai government wants to establish a
status-of-forces agreement—This is key to growing the fragile Afghan National
Army into a force capable of maintaining control by Kabul,
but President Karzai also recognizes the larger, regional role the United
States must play. There is a
willingness to establish a modest network of U.S.
bases in Afghanistan,
notably in western Afghanistan.
In combination with bases in the Persian Gulf and Iraq, such installations
would allow the United States to help “contain” and “deter” a nuclear Iran—an
increasingly likely eventuality.
The
basing implications of the global war on terrorism, or the struggle to
transform the greater Middle East,
go well beyond the Persian Gulf.
They extend well inland into Central Asia,
thus the operations from airfields in Uzbekistan
and Kyrgyzstan.
The Bush administration has also come to accept that the peripheries of the war
in Africa
necessitate new basing arrangements. Thus, the Pentagon established in late
2002 its first sub-Saharan garrison in Djibouti,
located at the strategic chokepoint between the Red
Sea and the Gulf
of Aden, where more than 1,000 troops are
currently deployed as part of the Combined Joint Task Force–Horn of Africa.
In sum, U.S. posture throughout the greater Middle East should be conceived of
as a network or web of mutually supporting facilities that will serve three
purposes: expressing the American long-term commitment to political change in
the region, enabling the deployment of forces to points of crisis, and
sustaining an expanding set of partnerships and alliances with friendly—and
better yet, free—governments.
The Far East and the Indian Ocean.
The situation is much the same in regard to East
Asia and maritime South
Asia. Since the 2001 Quadrennial Defense
Review, the Pentagon has acknowledged the need to hedge against the growing
military power of the People’s Republic of China.
Unfortunately, U.S.
force posture in this vast region remains hobbled by the closure of the major
airfield and port facilities in the Philippines--part
of the initial post–Cold War reductions in the early 1990s. Essentially, the
American security perimeter remains open for several thousand miles from the island
of Diego Garcia
in the western Indian Ocean
to South Korea
and Okinawa.
Any confrontation with China
would thus require U.S.
forces first to deploy forward, ceding the initiative to Beijing.
This
was made plain during the Taiwan
missile “blockades” of 1995 and 1996. In both those years, the Chinese “tested”
short-range ballistic missiles by bracketing Taiwan
with shots that landed intentionally astride the main shipping channels
approaching the island. The demonstration of new Chinese capabilities—and
boldness—sent a shiver of panic through the region, and the Clinton
administration responded appropriately by ordering a pair of aircraft-carrier
battle groups to waters east of Taiwan. One of the lessons for China
was that, in a crisis, it would be two weeks before U.S.
forces could influence the situation.
In
response, the Pentagon has been improving its facilities on Guam,
allowing for B-2 bombers and expanded attack submarine operations. This is a
crucial first step, but its value is diluted by the fact that Guam
is still thousands of miles distant from the most likely crisis points in the
region, especially the Taiwan Strait
and the area east of the island. The current rebasing plan has considered
establishing some position in northern Australia,
but while such a location would ease operations in Southeast
Asia, it, too, is far distant from Taiwan.
Some planners have their eyes on the small island
of Palau,
but such a move is as much a recognition of the dimension of the loss of the Philippines
as of the true value of Palau.
Similarly,
the expansion of facilities in Singapore
helps to reinforce U.S.
presence in the region. By rebuilding part of its port, Singapore
now regularly hosts visits by American aircraft carriers, and cooperation
between the Singaporean and U.S.
navies and air forces is growing. Singapore
is clearly a part of the solution to U.S.
posture problems in East Asia.
With
patience and persistent diplomacy, it might be possible to regain access to the
Philippines.
In particular, the Pentagon and State Department must work together to counter
the strong Filipino nationalism that celebrated the eviction of U.S.
forces a decade ago and remains wary of their return. In doing so, the Bush
administration should keep in mind that public opinion in Manila
remains of two minds, if for no other reason than the loss of revenue that
followed the base closings. The campaign to suppress the Abu Sayyaf terrorists
should likewise have reminded Americans and Filipinos alike of the need for
strategic cooperation, even aside from the question of China.
To be sure, an American military homecoming to the Philippines
would require great delicacy on Washington’s
part and some time to accomplish, but given the operational and strategic value
of the Philippines,
it is time to begin laying the groundwork.
Moreover,
the new Bush administration needs to solidify its position with America’s
two most important traditional allies in Northeast
Asia, Japan
and Korea.
One of the quiet but very great successes of this president’s first-term was to
repair relations with Japan
and then to open new possibilities for expanded strategic and military
cooperation. It was not simply the need to make up for the bashing of Japanese
business practices that marred the early Clinton years, but the need to refocus
the relationship on security matters, particularly the nuclear and missile
threat from North Korea and the rise of China. Japanese strategists were often
more alert to these issues than Americans.
Nevertheless,
the question of U.S.
bases in Japan
is still an open one. The Marines on Okinawa
remain an irritant to the local population. This is simply a Japanese domestic
political reality. Secondly, while Japanese elites might be comfortable in
giving access to U.S.
forces operating in Korea
or, more importantly, over Taiwan,
broader Japanese public opinion would be divided, at best. While this is
primarily a challenge for Japanese political leaders—defining an appropriate
but acceptable geopolitical role for Japan that acknowledges the legacy of
World War II but is not paralyzed by it—it is also a problem for the United
States and a potential military weakness.
The
situation is far worse in South
Korea. If the Japanese are
having trouble facing their future, the Koreans seem to be in denial about
their present. Even if the immediate challenges of what to do about North Korea
can be managed, the U.S. position on the peninsula—which would remain
strategically and operationally key even in a post-reunification situation—is
increasingly precarious. The governing party in South
Korea is driven by an
opposing-party mindset and does not seem ready for a useful dialogue about the
long-term role of U.S.
forces and the centrality of the peninsula to the future strategic balance in East
Asia.
But
perhaps the biggest challenge for the second-term Bush team is to sort out its
thinking on Taiwan
in a post-9/11 context. Before the attacks, the Chinese threat to Taiwan
was the central concern of the Pentagon, which made great efforts to
reconstruct the neglected strategic partnership with the Taiwanese. The
administration’s attitude was most famously captured by President Bush’s pledge
to defend the island “whatever it takes.” But the administration has all but
abandoned, if not entirely reversed, these efforts to focus on the Middle
East. Beijing,
once a nascent strategic competitor, is again a partner in good standing in the
war on terror. Arms sales to Taiwan
are in limbo and military-to-military ties remain tightly restrained. And
President Chen Shui-bian and the democracy in Taiwan
are once again seen as the provocateurs, while Hu Jintao and his fellow autocrats
on the mainland are seen as the force for stability.
Meanwhile,
the challenges to U.S.
forces in operations around Taiwan
are growing. China
continues to build its missile and air forces assiduously, as well as its
submarine fleet. The submarines are meant not only to operate in the Taiwan
Strait itself, but beyond Taiwan
to the east, the favored waters for a U.S.
naval defense of Taiwan.
If direct cooperation and American facilities on Taiwan
remain too provocative, U.S.
force posture in the region must be otherwise optimized to be able to operate
around and over Taiwan
in times of crisis, even as the Chinese try to deny access. Taiwan
is not the only potential point of conflict with China,
but it is nonetheless the natural fulcrum around which U.S.
forces in the Pacific should be positioned.
The
American Nucleus
Taken
together, the emerging U.S.
military stance abroad is, and should be, less a conglomeration of separate
regional basing networks than components that are part of a single unified global
force posture. At the core of this structure are the military facilities in the
United States
itself–a core that is itself also in critical need of reform. And as
controversial as it will be to reposture American forces abroad, it may be even
harder to accomplish a similar task at home.
The
most immediate hurdle is the forthcoming round of the BRAC process. It is also
a great opportunity, however, in part because the administration’s efforts to
call attention to the issue of the military’s overseas posture have changed the
politics of domestic base closures and realignment. The Pentagon’s plans to
move forces out of Germany
and South Korea
and close installations in both places give a greater rationale for sacrifices
at home. At the same time, the chance of providing a home to units withdrawn
from overseas posts provides an argument for keeping domestic facilities open.
Moreover,
it is an open question whether the BRAC process itself has lost legitimacy. The
process worked well initially, principally because the authorizing legislation
was built around an “all-or-none” mechanism. According to a plan drafted by
former representative Dick Armey, the list of bases to be realigned or closed
was to be considered as a total package, leaving Congress bereft of the ability
to consider individual cases separately and instead vote yes-or-no on the
entire list. But after the losses in the 1994 elections, the Clinton
administration manipulated the subsequent round of base closings to permit two
Air Force logistics centers in Texas and California—near closely contested
districts and in key states—to “partially” close—that is, to remain open. Thus
poisoned, the process ground to a halt, with the creation of a “depot caucus”
in the House of Representatives adamantly opposed to further closures. It
remains to be seen whether the political climate has changed, but the recent
public statements of California
governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, a popular Republican with real claims to have
aided President Bush’s reelection campaign, suggests that local political
imperatives are still strong.
Politics
aside, there are important strategic and operational considerations that demand
a reposturing of U.S.
forces at home as well as abroad. While the need to maintain American garrisons
in far-flung corners of the globe is perhaps more crucial than ever, the new
locations—the Middle East; Africa; Central, South, and Southeast Asia; even
southeastern Europe—are not nearly so suited to the kind of support structures
common in western Europe during the Cold War. Iraq
is not yet Germany.
It may be that, in time, these new bases can accommodate troops’ families,
military hospitals, but that time is a long time distant. The continental United
States is not simply the locus
from which American military power is projected abroad; it will increasingly be
where almost all American military families live. The pattern of Army and Air
Force troop rotations is now more like traditional Navy and Marine Corps duty.
And
despite a decade’s worth of incremental improvements, it is uncertain whether,
as a whole, U.S.
installations are capable of sustaining an expanded and extended rotational
posture for units abroad. The arithmetic of power projection is much the same
for facilities as it is for troops: to maintain a base abroad requires a
domestic infrastructure about five times larger. And in fact, the advance of
technologies allows many military command and logistics functions to operate at
a greater distance, a trend that tends to increase stateside responsibilities
and participation in overseas operations. Even some “global” combat functions,
such as the operations of long-endurance unmanned aerial vehicles, are now
controlled from facilities at home. Just as the tactical “tooth-to-tail” ratio
is changing, with a growing support “tail” for every trigger-pulling “tooth”—a
pattern that continues despite the nature of close combat in Iraq and
Afghanistan—likewise the support of an expanding base network overseas will
place greater demands on domestic installations. The administration wisely
plans to better position overseas garrisons to reinforce “laterally” to crisis
spots—as units from Europe have operated away from their home stations for
years, units in Korea are being repositioned and restructured to do the
same—but the core of U.S. power projection remains in the United States.
Another
consideration is where to recruit, train, and station a larger force, most
importantly a larger ground force. In the post–Cold War drawdown, and through
the period of accelerated operations even prior to 9/11 and the invasions of Afghanistan
and Iraq,
the military services made disproportionate cuts in their infrastructure
accounts, including spending for training facilities. The Air Force decision to
close one of its two primary pilot-training bases created almost immediate
problems, and today the Army cannot easily add more than an additional 30,000
soldiers to its roster per year; it simply does not have the facilities to
accommodate more. Any decision to expand Army end strength carries with it the
need to expand facilities. Part of the rationale behind the reductions of the
early 1990s was supposed to be to preserve an “expansible” force, but beyond
lip service, no real effort was made to maintain such a capability. The upcoming
BRAC process will have to begin to remedy this past neglect.
The
potential double whammy of a withdrawal of overseas-stationed forces and an
overall expansion in the forces based at home compounds the problems and the
expense. Fran Lusier of the Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the
withdrawal and restationing of 14,000 soldiers from Korea
would entail about $1.2 billion in infrastructure costs at home. On
such a basis, expanding the Army by 30,000 per year would add another $2.5
billion or so per year in such costs—not counting the cost of the manpower
itself, or the costs of equipping, training, and operating the larger force.
In
sum, the posture of U.S.
forces at home and abroad is one grand question; just as a global superpower
needs a global strategy, it needs a genuinely global military posture. Getting
all the right pieces in the right places will be a long-term effort, constantly
constrained by both domestic and international politics. Nevertheless, the
second Bush administration must strive to set forth a coherent blueprint that
gives some structure to the inevitable horse-trading—particularly in the
contentious BRAC process—to come.