Exercise of Power: American Failures, Successes, and a New Path Forward in the Post-Cold War World. Robert M. Gates. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 2020.

Former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates’ latest book is a unique work. Exercise of Power is not a conventional Washington memoir, nor is it a foreign policy textbook. Instead, Gates examines how America can apply its power around the world, and studies the ways it has applied, or failed to apply, the range of its power to foreign policy. The result is a hybrid; part history, part foreign policy text, that makes maximum use of Gates' unique life story. However, while this book examines the tools available to American policymakers, and how they have been used, it pays less attention to the strategies those tools support, making the book less of a comprehensive guide to foreign policy than a how-to book for implementing that policy. Exercise of Power is not a continuation of Gates' memoir Duty. It does not present the linear narrative of a memoir, it is not a history of American foreign policy, nor does it provide an overarching theoretical framework to world affairs. It acts as a user's manual for national power, combined with brief case studies that examine its use.

Robert Gates served as the 22nd Secretary of Defense under two presidents, George W. Bush and Barack Obama.[1] He served for just over four and a half years, from December 2006 to July 2011, making him the third longest serving defense secretary. His appointment was the culmination of a career in national security that spanned over four decades and included appointments as Deputy Director of Central Intelligence, Deputy National Security Advisor, and Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Over twenty-two years, from 1966 to 1989, Gates rose from entry-level analyst at the CIA to Deputy Director, served as Deputy National Security Advisor, under General Brent Scowcroft to President George H.W. Bush, then served as Director of the CIA from 1991 to 1993.

Gates is not only an experienced bureaucrat; he is also an academic. He earned a master's degree in history from Indiana University and a Ph.D. in Russian and Soviet History from Georgetown. After leaving the CIA, he served as an interim dean, and later president of Texas A&M University. In Exercise of Power, Gates successfully combines his academic perspective with Beltway experience. In explaining his goals for the book, Gates writes: “There are many studies and books on how the United States has applied its power since 1993 and should apply it in the future. Few of these authors, however, have actually had power and exercised it; only a handful have been first-hand witnesses to history making, and then nearly always under just one or two presidents”.[2]

The book starts with Gates' description of the elements of national power, a subject of much discussion among theorists of international relations. In his first chapter, entitled "A Symphony of Power" Gates lists 15 different instruments of national power. Gates  distinguishes some instruments of power as "non-coercive.”[3] Gates describes non-coercive elements as instruments that “influence the attitudes and perceptions of other societies or governmental decision making in ways that help a country win support for its own objectives.”[4]  The distinction is not new; in his landmark Politics Among Nations, Hans Morgenthau classified the divide as being between "power" and "influence."[5]

Gates lists three elements of power that can be described as coercive: military, economic leverage, and cyber.[6] In discussing military power, Gates takes a broad historical view, but he focuses his attention on the post-World War II period. He first discusses how, following World War II, the American people had no interest in military conflict, and President Truman dramatically reduced the size of the US military.[7] When the Cold War began, Truman “turned to nonmilitary forms of power to thwart further communist expansionism,"[8] such as assistance to Greece and Turkey, the Marshall Plan, and the formation of the NATO alliance.[9] Gates discusses how the end of America's nuclear monopoly made military conflict with the Soviet Union too dangerous, forcing the United States, with a few exceptions, to compete with the Soviets through other means.[10] Atomic weapons had changed the equation of power, as it became too dangerous for nuclear-armed nations to use military coercion to assert their will. As Morgenthau wrote at the time, "It is one of the paradoxes of the nuclear age that, in contrast to the experience of all of prenuclear history, an increase in military power is no longer necessarily conducive to an increase in political power." [11] Once both nations' nuclear threats cancelled each other out, the magnitude of the potential destructiveness, when compared to the limited nature of most political goals, rendered military force unusable as a means for competing with the Soviet Union.[12] To compete with the Soviet Union, the United States was forced to develop non-military instruments, such as diplomacy, economic aid, and covert action.

The importance of non-coercive, or persuasive, power, and America's neglect of this type of power, to its detriment, is a consistent theme of Gates’ writing.

Gates lists 12 non-coercive elements of power, including diplomacy, intelligence,[13] strategic communications, alliances, culture, and leadership.[14] The importance of non-coercive, or persuasive, power, and America's neglect of this type of power, to its detriment, is a consistent theme of Gates’ writing. In Washington, a city where cabinet secretaries fiercely protect their budgets, Gates is perhaps most famous as being the cabinet secretary who called for an increase in another agency’s budget, the State Department's, pointing out that America only had 6,600 professional Foreign Service Officers; less than the manning of one carrier strike group.[15] He stated: "What is clear to me is that there is a need for a dramatic increase in spending on the civilian instruments of national security -- diplomacy, strategic communications, foreign assistance, civic action, and economic reconstruction and development. Secretary [Condoleeza] Rice addressed this need in a speech at Georgetown University nearly two years ago: “We must focus our energies beyond the guns and steel of the military, beyond just our brave soldiers, sailors, Marines, and airmen. We must also focus our energies on the other elements of national power that will be so crucial in the coming years."[16]

The majority of the book is a series of case studies, where Gates recounts, often from his own experience, how America applied its power in various conflicts. These 10 chapters can be sorted into several groups. He describes what are sometimes called "humanitarian interventions" such as in Somalia, Haiti, and the former Yugoslavia. He devotes a chapter each to the wars in Afghanistan, "War Without End," and Iraq, "A Curse." He devotes chapters to areas that he considers successful examples of the full range of American power, such as Colombia and Africa. He studies the dilemma of intervention in situations that involve potential great power competition and the limits of American power such as Georgia, Syria, Libya, and Ukraine. Finally, Gates devotes chapters to America's relations to near-peer competitors, such as Russia, Iran, North Korea, and China.

Gates' case studies rarely involve stories of the United States being too shy to apply power. Instead, they often tell stories of America using or misusing its power while guided by ignorance or wishful thinking. A series of American presidents, from George H.W. Bush to Barack Obama, worked to integrate China into the global economy, believing that economic prosperity would lead to democracy and improved human rights, Tiananmen notwithstanding. In Russia, American economic experts pushed Yeltsin's government to radically privatize the economy, without considering the effects on ordinary Russians. In Afghanistan, a quick victory over the Taliban led to an open-ended commitment to build a democratic, centralized government in a nation that had never had one before. Gates tells a similar story of Iraq, where a quick military victory was followed by an ambitious effort to build democratic institutions through elections, an effort that made, Gates says, "finding the exit ramp damnably difficult.".[17] 

The book also features two success stories: Colombia and Africa. In Colombia, America worked with a strong local partner in a nation that had a democratic tradition, using nonmilitary means to achieve limited goals. In Africa, the George W. Bush administration instituted the Presidential Emergency Program for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), and later formed the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) to guide development aid to the goals of the Millennium Challenge Account, such as health care, schools and immunizations. Bush increased development aid, and administered that aid through an independent agency, bypassing the State Department for increased accountability. The result was millions of lives saved from HIV, and an increase for America's reputation in the region.

…Gates seems to call for future American presidents to follow Harry Truman’s example and use nonmilitary means to compete with its adversaries around the globe.

Gates’ book seems to have two goals. Its primary goal is to shine a spotlight on the various instruments of American power. Gates wishes to instruct the American public, and especially American policymakers, on the wide array of tools in America's toolbox. Its secondary goal is to advocate a greater use of noncoercive instruments, and a decreased dependence on military force. Without explicitly saying so, Gates seems to call for future American presidents to follow Harry Truman’s example and use nonmilitary means to compete with its adversaries around the globe.

In an online book talk hosted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) Gates said that the origin of the book was the question in his mind of how we got from 1993 to here.[18] In the immediate aftermath of the Cold War, the United States enjoyed a political, military, and economic dominance that was without precedent in modern history, perhaps unmatched since the Roman Empire. Decades later, America faces competition from Russia and China, and is seen as withdrawing from the world. Gates asked himself: How did we get from the mountaintop to where we are today?[19] However, this book, with its narrow focus on means, is unable to fully answer that question because America's fall from hegemony did not come solely because of its failure to use all available instruments of power.

This book is a thorough examination of the means available to American policymakers, but does not look at the ways or the ends as closely.

Although Gates urges America to use more nonmilitary power in its foreign policy, and especially in its great power competitions, he does not offer any guidance where and when to apply that power. This is not a comprehensive roadmap to 21st century foreign policy. American doctrine teaches that strategy consists of ways, means, and ends.[20] Ways are the strategic approaches a country takes, ranging from observation to total eradication of an enemy. Ends are the outcomes or end states sought. Means, the subject of Gates' book, are the resources and capabilities available to policymakers. This book is a thorough examination of the means available to American policymakers, but does not look at the ways or the ends as closely.

To some extent, the end of American hegemony was just as much a result of America's poor choices of ways and ends. It is true that America could have made better use of tools such as strategic communication, trade, and foreign aid. Most observers would say the greater share of responsibility for America's fall goes to America's unwise application of its power, such as the disastrous invasion of Iraq, the cold war with Iran, and the endless war in Afghanistan, all while America allowed inequality to fester at home. Although Gates makes no secret of his disagreement with American policy in Iraq and Afghanistan, he only lightly touches on how American hubris led to these strategic mistakes, and how these mistakes have affected America's place in the world.

Even during the height of the Cold War, foreign policy scholars recognized that domestic factors also affect America’s place in the world. Morgenthau once wrote: "Any country with deep and unbridgeable class divisions will find its national morale in a precarious state."[21] America's class divisions may not be unbridgeable, but they are deep. America's national morale was in a precarious state even before the COVID-19 pandemic, and it may have reached a low point when a mob invaded the United States Capitol on January 6th, 2021. Such levels of partisan division are a greater threat to America's ability to conduct foreign policy than a lack of imagination in using strategic communications or development aid.[22]

It is a common lament that America lacks a grand strategy, or even the capacity to form such a strategy.

While it was once said that politics "stopped at the water's edge" America's relationships with nations such as Israel, Mexico, Russia, and China are colored by political polarization. Scholars use the term polarization to describe several phenomena: the broad divergence of elite ideological positions, the division of the public into separate parties, increasing distrust and dislike of people from the other party, and the fragmentation of the media.[23] This polarization has led to three major challenges to the United States’ ability to conduct foreign policy and wield its power: It makes it more difficult to raise bipartisan support for ambitious or risky undertakings, it makes it more difficult to agree on the causes of failure, complicating efforts to learn and adapt, and the risk of dramatic policy swings from one administration to the next complicates America’s ability to make long-term commitments to both allies and adversaries.[24] This makes American policy seem more erratic and unpredictable to the rest of the world, and reduces America's credibility as a reliable ally.

Gates does an excellent job of examining the ways America can exercise power around the world, some coercive, most non-coercive. That examination forms the basis of Gates' desire to see America compete with China and Russia through non-coercive means such as strategic communications and economic development aid. It is a common lament that America lacks a grand strategy, or even the capacity to form such a strategy. However, any strategy, no matter how brilliant, is only as effective as the means used to implement it. Whatever ends America chooses to pursue in the future, its leaders and strategists will be well served by reading Gates' book.

Daniel Scheeringa has a B.A. and J.D. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and an M.A. in Political Science from Virginia Tech. He served two tours of duty as a Civil Affairs team chief in Operation Iraqi Freedom. He is an attorney in private practice in Chicago.

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Header Image: U.S. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates talks with Personal Security Detail members while waiting for a flight in Kabul, Afghanistan, Dec. 9, 2009.(Jerry Morrison).

Notes:

[1] Department of Defense "Dr. Robert M. Gates Former Secretary of Defense,"accessed February 16, 2021. https://www.defense.gov/Our-Story/Biographies/Biography/Article/602797/

[2] Gates, Robert M. Exercise of Power, (New York, Alfred A. Knopf 2020) 9.

[3] Gates 2020, 30.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Morgenthau, Hans J Politics Among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace, (New York, Alfred A. Knopf 5th ed. rvsd 1973) 30-31.

[6] Gates 2020, 13-30.

[7] Gates 2020, 13-14.

[8] Gates 2020, 14.

[9] Ibid.

[10] Gates 2020, 14-15.

[11] Morgenthau 1973, 31.

[12] Morgenthau 1973, 32.

[13] In discussing "intelligence", Gates refers both to information gathering and analysis, which are non-coercive, and covert operations, which are coercive.

[14] Gates 2020, 30-57.

[15] Gates, Robert M. Landon Lecture, Kansas State University, November 26, 2007. https://www.k-state.edu/media/newsreleases/landonlect/gatestext1107.html

[16] Ibid.

[17] Gates 2020, 210.

[18] Center for Strategic & International Studies "Online Book Event: Exercise of Power: Secretary Robert Gates" June 17, 2020, accessed February 21, 2021. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8LipHsH0bus&ab_channel=CenterforStrategic%26InternationalStudies

[19] Ibid.

[20] Joint Doctrine Note 1-18 Strategy at II-1. https://www.jcs.mil/Portals/36/Documents/Doctrine/jdn_jg/jdn1_18.pdf?ver=2018-04-25-150439-540

[21] Morgenthau 1973, 144.

[22] Schake, Kori,”The U.S. Puts Its Greatest Vulnerability on Display" Defense One February 19, 2021, accessed February 21, 2021. https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2021/02/us-puts-its-greatest-vulnerability-display/172132/

[23] Kenneth A. Schultz (2017) Perils of Polarization for U.S. Foreign Policy, The Washington Quarterly, 40:4, 7-28, DOI: 10.1080/0163660X.2017.1406705

[24] Ibid.