With all of the comparisons being drawn between the presidencies of Barack Obama and Franklin D. Roosevelt, it is surprising that one of FDR’s most famous programs has not emerged as a possible model for U.S. policy today: Lend-Lease.
That’s not to suggest that the United States should plunge the rest of the planet into world war as a strategy for domestic economic recovery. But consider the following:
First, global security challenges are on the rise. The dark side of globalization means that technologies and capabilities that previously were the prerogatives of states have increasingly filtered down to non-state actors such as rebels, insurgencies, organized crime and terrorist groups. Disgruntled, poor Somali fishermen have been transformed into the scourge of the western Indian Ocean, continuing to seize vessels and menace shipping despite the presence of a multinational naval flotilla. By fusing with narco-traffickers in Colombia, the FARC can continue purchasing lethal capabilities that allow them to both fuel their continued insurgency against the government in Bogota and defend drug-trafficking routes through other countries in the region. As an example, when Severino Mejia, a security expert with the University of Panama, was asked to assess the Panamanian government’s ability to prevent the FARC from using Panama’s territory as a narcotics trans-shipment point, he bluntly concluded, «We don’t have the firepower to maintain a confrontation.»
Second, countries are cutting back on defense spending, especially in the wake of the global economic crisis. As governments continue to pare back costs in this new age of austerity, national security expenditures are ending up on the chopping block, especially in Europe.
Third, the United States is spread thin. According to Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Gary Roughead, the American navy is the smallest it has been since 1916 — at a time that it must maintain a credible global presence while also supporting U.S. involvement in two active conflicts. The United States simply does not have the resources at its disposal to fill the increasing security gap that is opening. Moreover, public fatigue with the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan make it difficult for U.S. policymakers to generate much enthusiasm for additional interventions elsewhere in the world.
But what if we developed a new approach to matching resources and commitments?
Many smaller countries in the world, particularly those located in dangerous neighborhoods, cannot afford to purchase new defense systems outright. But they do have sufficient budgetary resources to pay for maintenance costs and to enlist the personnel to use the equipment. At the same time, the United States has a shrinking industrial base that is feeling the effects of cutbacks in defense orders.
The genius of the original Lend-Lease program was to get around the cash-and-carry provisions of U.S. law that required other states to pay up front for American equipment, by giving the executive branch the authority to transfer defense materiel to other countries on a «leasing» basis if, in so doing, U.S. national security interests were protected. Other countries, especially the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union, received arms that enabled them to stem the Nazi advance — and the increase in defense orders helped pull U.S. industry out of the slump created by the Great Depression.
What would a 21st-century Lend-Lease program entail?
The threat today is not to halt the juggernaut of Great Powers, but to address — and plug — the gaps in a country’s security perimeter that would otherwise be exploited by criminal gangs, pirates, insurgencies and terrorist organizations. Jamaican Prime Minister Bruce Golding recently observed that the countries of the Caribbean region — which is a growing and important trans-shipment point in the global narcotics trade — «lacked the institutional capacity to secure our borders, patrol our waters and mount an effective counteroffensive against powerful narcotics trade.»
A new Lend-Lease program, therefore, would concentrate on transferring the equipment needed to secure a country’s land, air and maritime perimeters — patrol boats and aircraft, helicopters, lightly armored vehicles, and surveillance and communications equipment — to help reinforce security forces and build up coast guards. There is no need to transfer the latest, state-of-the-art, fifth-generation systems. Older models still in good working order would do the job.
In clearing out its inventory, the U.S. military could then place procurement orders to replace and update its own equipment, guaranteeing a series of orders to companies whose economic future hangs in the balance. In addition, as part of an ongoing Lend-Lease program, defense contractors could be encouraged to restart the production lines for older, simpler models, especially helicopters and patrol boats. This, of course, would be a change for defense contractors who are used to producing the latest — and most expensive — equipment for the Pentagon. It would also break with the trend in recent years to concentrate ever more firepower in fewer platforms — not the best strategy for dealing with pirates and drug traffickers who operate small craft in a vast area.
A Lend-Lease program could also potentially address one of the primary concerns when there is any transfer of U.S. military equipment: how it is used. Because the United States will retain ownership of what is «lent,» Washington has a sovereign right to insist how and under what circumstances the equipment is used. The U.S. can set up in advance the parameters for a Lend-Lease program and set down the obligations of the lease. Conditions would include how much the partner must spend on upkeep of the material, where and how often the capabilities should be deployed, and periodic assessments to determine whether the lease should be renewed — or the equipment taken back.
To test what is admittedly a broad-strokes idea, pilot programs could be started with countries in Latin America and the Caribbean — like Panama and Jamaica — that are already facing off against well-armed and equipped drug cartels, groups that in turn ultimately menace the security of the United States as well. This would then determine how feasible this proposal is in practice.
Sometimes, the programs of the past provide useful models for the future. And at a time when buying power is on the decline, Lend-Lease might be a policy whose time has come . . . again.
Nikolas K. Gvosdev is the former editor of the National Interest, and a frequent foreign policy commentator in both the print and broadcast media. He is currently on the faculty of the U.S. Naval War College.
