HLS801:

Lesson 2: Roles, Responsibilities, Strategy, and Structure of the Homeland Security Enterprise

Definitions of Strategic Thinking

In its simplest description, strategy is simply a plan for doing something.  In respect to national security and homeland security, it includes the science and the art of employing the political, diplomatic, economic, intelligence related, military, and legal instruments of state (tools of statecraft) to achieve national interests.  It describes the way something ought to be done, or that it is proposed to be done.  Although the process may appear to be theoretical, it is essential for practitioners to learn to engage in strategic thinking since the mere planning that it encompasses is a useful act, in and of itself, even if it is never utilized.  If what was originally considered to be an appropriate course of action suddenly seems ineffective, then the process begins anew by making additional assumptions and arriving at a different course of action.

In the security policy world of making decisions which bear on national interests, the process is constantly ongoing, with each change in one variable causing all assumptions to be revisited.  However frustrating the plight of the national or homeland security strategist may appear, the consolation is that there will always be a demand for creative thinking, at least for the very foreseeable future.  One of the main decisions of the 9/11 Commission was that there was a failure of imagination on the part of those charged with thinking about security.  One perspective on this observation is that leaders failed to imagine the full spectrum of risks and threats facing America at the time and failed to appreciate how realistic or likely those risks and threats might be.  It could also entail failures to assess our own capabilities, or our own weaknesses, failure to accurately gauge the mind and intent of terrorist groups and failure to grasp that the global campaign against terrorism would involve several decades of ongoing programs and policies.  As overall global threats and risks change over time, we must be watchful that we don’t lapse into the same kind of unimaginative thinking 15-20 years after a seminal event like the 9/11 attacks.  As noted, strategic thinking is an art in that it is never predictable in absolutes.  As derived from the Greek strategia, it deals with the means being used in various ways to accomplish the ends, often in a prioritized fashion, and subject to the moral orientation of the nation.  Strategic thinking is thus a process in which all variables are considered within a framework or structure. 

Such a framework for a nation’s plan to ensure its security might consist of the following sets of inquiries:

• Assumptions about the environment, domestically and globally
• Assessment of the national interests (survival, prosperity, values)
• Assessments of threats to national interests
• Analysis of national objectives, modified by opportunities and constraints
• Assessment of national capabilities
• Assessment of national priorities, based on capabilities
• Identification of participants and affected parties
• Assessment of ways to implement desired policies and programs
• Declaration of desired outcomes
• Strengthening the federal emergency response structure

The process of determining what the nation’s goals are, how to achieve them (i.e. what tools of national power are available and how to use them) involves making assumptions, and applying priorities.  This is never done in a vacuum or without the consideration of unintended consequences.  Thus, the sequence of using means in certain ways to achieve ends is not a linear one, or the product of a rational actor.  It is more of a constant measuring of results (or effects), and correcting the course of action, so that ultimately a nation (or strategist) arrives at what is an acceptable outcome to it, at that specific point in time, at a cost which is acceptable under those circumstances.  In other words, it is the reality of a nation (or decision maker) arriving at what it is willing to settle for at a price or a cost (compromise), which it is willing to pay (bear or accept).  This is an iterative process, which is constantly ongoing, and often manifests itself as a type of conflict management, with resolution remaining in the distant future. 

Strategic thinking thus results in much more than a plan or a result that is arrived at scientifically.  Strategos entails having a concept, an idea, priorities, and a direction.  With such flexibility and imagination, one can adapt and hopefully use a rational and disciplined allocation of resources to achieve objectives.

When we attempt to understand, analyze and codify what strategic thinking really means it requires some in-depth analysis of its component parts.  Typically it involves problem solving, analysis, leadership and formulation of alternative approaches. Strategic thinking can be understood in many ways; however, one approach which seems reasonable and pragmatic includes the following ingredients:

• vision and leadership [views and perspectives on desired outcome, objective or end state]
• analysis of critical factors  [supporting, enhancing, detracting, shaping, maximizing]
• consideration of alternative pathways  [examination of feasible, desirable, difficult avenues]
• developing plans and enacting them  [taking risks, executing ideas, accomplishing interval milestones]
• consolidating actions/achieving desired results  [confirming fulfillment of objectives, outcomes, end-states]

Exemplary Definitions of "Strategy"