National Security Advice to U.S. Presidents: Some Lessons from Thirty Years

Since 1947 the major formal institution for channeling national security advice to Presidents has been the National Security Council. The Council has operated (1) as a forum where senior officials meet with the President; (2) as a focal point for formal policy planning and decision processes; and (3) as an umbrella for establishment of a Presidential foreign policy staff. The first was the goal of its proponents; the last is what it has most importantly become. But the N.S.C. has reflected the relationships among each administration's top officials more than it has shaped them; hence the need to think of broader advisory “systems” combining the formal and the informal. Among the variables shaping such systems are; a President's particular organizational sense; his attitude toward formality and regularity; whether he has (and wants) strong Cabinet officials; how his key advisers work out their role relationships and jurisdictional boundaries; how widely he casts his net for advce; how broad a range of substantive issue involvement he seeks; how much he seeks operational involvement; and his attitude toward divided counsel and interpersonal conflict. Prescriptions about foreign policy advisory systems tend to stress the President's role as decision maker; they should focus also on the oft-competing role of effective Presidential leadership in getting policies and decisions executed. The importance of execution argues for giving the Secretary of State primacy over other advisers; the need to protect the President's decision authority argues for a White House assistant independent of the Secretary, though perhaps with reduced rank. Presidents also need better advice on the domestic politics of U.S. foreign policy, and each could profit from a “mid-term system review” after his institutions and advisory relationships have taken shape.