Policy Implications and Recommendations
At the strategic level, how can the U.S. military
and the broader national security community aim
for, facilitate, and realize sustainable security? This
chapter expanded on the conceptual and policy driv-
ers moving in this direction, but also highlights the
challenges. U.S. national security narrative and policy
directives need to establish sustainable security as an
ultimate aim and define the conceptual framework
under which this can be achieved, particularly assert-
ing the place of fragility, natural resources, and en-
vironmental security. While U.S. policies absolutely
stress the necessity for a smart power approach, in-
teragency terms of reference, incentives, multi-agency
“scaling” and resource sharing, mechanisms are still
insufficiently aligned to be effective at the strategic
level. The USG currently has limited human secu-
rity, fragility, and environmental security monitoring
and early warning capabilities, and none which sys-
tematically cover the breadth of sustainable security.^7
As such, four recommendations are offered to address
these gaps:
- Integrate fragility and natural resource, envi-
ronmental security considerations more fully
into U.S. security policies and strategies. - Expand interagency coordination frameworks
and align them to incentivize action. - Establish an interagency community of interest
to develop a common operating framework that
addresses fragility and sustainable security. - Develop a USG early warning system for con-
flict, instability, and fragility that integrates - NATO’s pilot study on environment and security had
earlier suggested that “the development of early warning indica-
tor systems, data bases, and decision support systems is feasible
and warranted” (NATO 1999, 130).