Interagency Cooperation and the Future of Intervention Policy.

• Author: Duffy, Frances

Since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, fifteen years ago this spring, many scholars and practitioners have written post-mortem "lessons learned" based on the shortcomings of the Bush administration's war planning and coordination. Calls for greater interagency cooperation, particularly between the U.S. Department of State (DOS) and the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) have led to some bureaucratic restructuring, but much work remains to be done in order to balance the effectiveness of both U.S. military and soft power capabilities. What problems does the current system still face, and what are the implications for the future of intervention policy?

The U.S. invasion in Iraq was a military-centric effort characterized by weak post-war planning and fractured interagency dynamics. The White House favored DOD plans, despite a 2000-page study produced from a DOS "Future of Iraq" project in which U.S. experts and Iraqi stakeholders foresaw the difficulties of Iraqi regime change. DOS efforts nonetheless failed to provide concrete proposals for action that could compete with those of DOD. An atmosphere of contention between the two agencies further inhibited collaborative efforts during the war's early stages. (1)

The Obama administration was determined not to repeat the mistakes of its predecessors. In early 2011, U.S. and NATO intervened in Libya to prevent violence against civilians by the regime of Moammar Gaddafi, leading to the ultimate overthrow the longstanding dictator. This time, DOS largely led the planning effort by meeting regularly with members of the Libyan opposition and passing guidance to DOD, which implemented a no-fly zone over Libyan airspace alongside NATO partners. Both Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stressed the importance of collaboration and "unity of effort." Some of their integrative efforts were successful; cooperation between DOS and U.S. Africa Command (USAFRICOM) and U.S. European Command (USEUCOM) led to building international coalition support for the military operations. (2) Interagency weapons destruction teams also successfully dismantled Gaddafi's legacy surface-to-air weapons stockpiles.

Unfortunately, overall coordination was still generally weak, with poor guidance from the upper levels leading to confusion and a lack of clear chains of command at the implementation levels. (3) Further, despite a greater role for an empowered DOS, the Obama administration still did not...