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2018-01-01

The UAE National Defense College: Building a Legacy of Security Strategists

By: Dr. Thomas A. Drohan

Dean of the National Defense College

Part 1

As the successor to our founding Dean of the National Defense College, Dr. John Ballard, I am fortunate to benefit from his service. Among his contributions is a stream of articles in Nation Shield from August 2013 to October 2016. My first two contributions to his legacy summarize Dr. Ballard’s articles as four core competencies for the security strategist.

This essay focuses on the first two: envisioning the future; and recognizing strategic challenges.

Envisioning the future develops a vision about how national power can be used. This requires abstract thinking and evidence-based thinking. NDC participants study the works of renowned strategists, for instance, not to memorize theories, but to learn how to think theoretically and with foresight.

We analyze theories by identifying assumptions and logic to anticipate future possibilities. We evaluate evidence and assess risks to set conditions that shape an uncertain future.

One of Dr. Ballard’s examples is to envision important emergent actors, such as the Gulf Cooperation Council. This entails making assumptions about what is changing and what is not as we analyze our way through data and information. This academic exercise has great practical importance because the GCC influences global relationships. Another theoretical question Dr. Ballard posed is, how is the character of war changing?

Answering this requires analyzing political issues and personalities, technological developments, economic patterns and social trends. To do this, participants practice dealing with complexity and offering options to national decision makers. In crafting strategy that will be effective tomorrow, not just today, we promote independent judgment and responsible decision-making to out-think adaptive threats.

Recognizing strategic challenges regards proactive thinking as an intellectual responsibility. In an information age marked by expanding access to lethal technologies and social effects, being out-thought often means being out-fought. Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan al Nahyan epitomized this ideal of proactive strategy. His strategic vision clarified many challenges along the way to a unified nation.

This far-sightedness is not easy and certainly takes moral courage. We have to assume that problems will not just go away on their own, and that problems are not unmanageable just because they are unpredictable.

While it may be popular to refer to current issues as confounded by unprecedented change, every time period is filled with a degree of exceptionalism.

Some of the most important challenges facing our region today are the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, corrupt governance, weak leadership, and fear of change. Dr. Ballard pointed out how UAE leaders mobilize latent national capabilities on demand by using such tools as national service, a sovereign wealth fund, and an indigenous weapons production capability. The linkages of these challenges with desired attributes of the future, such as a knowledge-based economy, mean that we can create synergies to realize the ends we envision.

How we frame strategic issues can help or hinder the realization of our desired outcomes.

In the next article, I will complete my review of Dr. Ballard’s thought by discussing his two other themes: framing strategic issues and implementing strategy.

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