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Mullen: Crisis will squeeze spending

The floundering global economy will force reductions in defense spending and likely drive up global instability, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said Monday.

Speaking to a Reserve Officers Association-sponsored conference in Washington, Adm. Mike Mullen said he is “extremely concerned that one of the outputs” of the economic mess “will be instability in places we might predict” and in other places where planners might not expect calamity.

As Washington continues to combat the crisis with corporate bailout and economic stimulus bills, Mullen thinks “there will not be an institution in our government that will not be affected.”

Although Mullen did not estimate how much annual defense budgets might be pared back, the chairman said the financial crunch means defense officials must “apply resources where we need them not, not just because we have them.”

The theme of Mullen’s speech was change. He told the audience repeatedly that the military is at the epicenter of a coming series of national and worldwide changes.

One of those is already underway.

“Afghanistan is moving to the head of the queue,” Mullen said, meaning the Iraq conflict in coming months will receive fewer resources as the Obama administration attempts to improve the situation in Afghanistan.

Mullen offered a hint of what the Obama administration’s main goal in Afghanistan will be, saying: “Establishing good governance is the lead issue for Afghanistan.”

There are lessons from Iraq about counterinsurgency that U.S. military officials can apply to Afghanistan, Mullen said. But at the same time, there are attributes of Afghanistan — like the tribal factions — that are “more complex than in Iraq.”

He also said Afghanistan policy discussions must include ample consideration of extremist forces being able to set up shop in neighboring Pakistan.

“I never talk about Afghanistan without mentioning Pakistan,” Mullen said.

The bottom line, he said, is to have success in Afghanistan, “we’ve got to have the proper resources and focus.”

In Iraq, Mullen trumpeted last weekend’s elections and the next round of elections as “signature events” on which Washington is focusing heavily.

One key thing federal officials and national security experts have gleaned from the Iraq conflict is that the American military is doing too much.

They also have said other agencies, like the State Department and USAID, are not funded or organized properly to do the kinds of things abroad in which they have expertise.

Mullen agrees. “We’re badly out of balance,” he said. “The military is doing too much.”

What’s this answer? “We have to capacitize other agencies to do more. ... We’re all in this national security piece together,” he said. “We’re all going to have to be more expeditionary in the future.”

For evidence of the need to seek this balance, he said one need look no further than Afghanistan: “The No. 1 thing needed there is good governance, and the military cannot do that.”

It could take a decade or two to build in the kind of “balance” among numerous federal agencies to do complicated things overseas like stability missions, Mullen said.

Combating piracy

Mullen called for more global resources to take on the growing threat of piracy on international commerce.

The chairman said nations must send more ships to places like the Gulf of Aden, and the United Nations must pass stronger piracy resolutions to tamp down what he said has become a “$2.2 trillion illegal economy” on the high seas.

Mullen said some “significant steps” to address these issues have been taken recently, including Kenyan officials agreeing to take piracy suspects when U.S. forces and other militaries capture them.

“The question is, what do you do with pirates when you catch them?” Mullen asked. “Well, now there’s an answer — the Kenyans are going to take them in.”

Officials have been able to determine that “there is a network that is behind this,” he told the luncheon audience.

Ultimately, “the impact of piracy on global commerce, I think, will get government, economic” and other affected stakeholders “together on this,” he said.