Football coaches and business people say that in times of uncertainty, the best policy is to concentrate on the fundamentals. Among national security professionals, the fundamentals are called Instruments of National Power. These are often broken down into Diplomacy, Information, the Military, and the Economy: the DIME.
Different circumstances call for the elements to be used in different degrees, but every situation includes them all. At the time of writing, it does not appear that all the elements are being used. We can use the DIME more effectively to address the pandemic if we take the following steps.
• Diplomacy: The State Department is currently doing outstanding work assisting U.S. citizens abroad in returning home, but other embassy assets should be coordinated to provide actionable information to policy makers in Washington.
The State Department should begin a worldwide information-harvesting campaign. There should be a weekly tasker to embassies abroad requesting specific information on host government response to the corona virus. This kind of open-source intelligence gathering and analysis is what the Foreign Service does best, and will add to our understanding of the disease's spread.
• Information: The only thing that will bring people together now is the truth. In this case, the truth is pretty hard, but if you expect people to behave like adults, you have to treat them like adults. False hope for a quick fix does more harm than good.
One of the climbers on an early Mount Everest expedition said something to the effect of, "Once you stop looking for an easy way to the top, you can concentrate on the only way to the top, however hard that might be." There is no easy trail to the end of the covid-19 pandemic.
Our leadership must stop suggesting there are any easy outs and concentrate our resources on the hard but proven slog that will get where we all want to be. I am a man of faith and believe in miracles, but don't plan on them. Hope is a virtue, not a strategy.
• The Military: Proposals for use of the military in response to covid-19 have centered on the Defense Department's medical resources. Activating the National Guard, repositioning hospital ships, and utilizing stockpiles of medical supplies are logical and wise uses of these resources. But they don't go far enough in utilizing the expertise of the Armed Forces.
The Defense Department is one of the world's largest and most efficient procurement and distribution operations. Within the department are people and systems that can be mobilized immediately to contract for supplies. U.S. Transportation Command has similar experience moving large quantities domestically and internationally using private and government resources. This contracting and procurement expertise is there to be used. We should use it.
• The Economy: A lot of attention has been paid to maintaining the strength of the American economy, but a strong economy is not a shiny trophy to be kept behind glass and admired. It is a sharp tool to be used in times of national peril. This is not an economic crisis like 2008. It is a public health crisis with economic implications, and the economy should be mobilized to address this crisis.
For instance, manufacturers of FDA-approved ventilators should be compelled by the federal government to enter into licensing agreements with companies such as Boeing and General Motors to manufacture these vital devices.
There will be complex intellectual property issues involved in negotiating the licensing agreements. There are federal agencies with great expertise in things like this. NASA comes immediately to mind.
Our national leadership told us they wanted the jobs they have, and we elected them to do those jobs. As Oliver Wendell Holmes famously said, "The reward of a general is not a bigger tent--but command." You have all been enjoying the bigger tents long enough. It's time to exercise some leadership.
Let's not just use the components of the U.S. military that are featured in war movies, but all the tools that make it strong. General Omar Bradley is often attributed with saying, "Amateurs talk about tactics. Professionals talk about logistics."
If this is a war, then we need to break out all the weapons at our disposal. From the corner shop to Silicon Valley, and from the Boeing production line to the Hanes T-shirt factory, the whole country should be working together for the same goal.
David Abell is a retired Senior Foreign Service Officer. He holds a master's degree in National Security Strategy from The National War College. He served in numerous foreign and domestic postings during his 32-year career, including a two-year assignment as State Department Chair at the Marine Corps War College, where he taught diplomacy and statecraft. This guest column was submitted on March 25.
Editorial on 04/05/2020