Defense chief touts anti-ISIS campaign, NATO alliance in exit memo

The next administration should remain committed to NATO, hold Russia accountable for its actions in Syria and ensure local forces take the lead in defeating ISIS, Defense Secretary Ash Carter said in his exit memo to President Obama released Thursday.

The 19-page memo recapped the Pentagon’s accomplishments and challenges of the last eight years, while also providing a glimpse of where Carter believes the Defense Department should go in the next administration.

“Today’s security environment is dramatically different — more diverse and complex in the scope of its challenges — than the one we’ve been engaged with for the last 25 years, and it requires new ways of thinking and new ways of acting,” Carter wrote.

“As the world changes and complexity increases, we’ll have to change, too — how we invest, how we fight, how we operate as an organization, how we attract and nourish talent, and how we balance risk across the many competing threats the department faces.”

{mosads}Among the accomplishments highlighted by Carter were efforts to deter Russian aggression after its invasion of Crimea in 2014, including creating the European Reassurance Initiative fund, leading NATO in deploying troops to the Baltic states and Poland, and getting 24 NATO countries meeting or on track to meet their defense spending goals.

“The United States must remain engaged with NATO — an alliance of principled and like-minded members backed by strength — to ensure continued progress and to deter and defend against Russian aggression in Europe,” Carter wrote.

President-elect Donald Trump has questioned NATO’s relevancy and raised the possibility of not coming to the defense of NATO allies that are attacked if they haven’t “fulfilled their obligations to us.”

He’s also spoken flatteringly of Russian President Vladimir Putin and has made overtures about improving U.S.-Russian relations.

On Syria, Carter said Russia’s entry into the civil war in 2015 made the situation in the country more “dangerous and violent,” and that the next administration must hold Russia to its stated intentions of fighting terrorism in the country.

“While the choice to intervene was Russia’s to make, and the consequences will be its responsibility, the next administration must hold Russia to account in its promise to combat terrorism and end the civil war,” he wrote.

Carter also said the war against ISIS is achieving results, including pressuring the terrorist group in its Iraqi stronghold of Mosul. The offensive to retake Mosul started in October, and Iraqi forces have taken back most of the eastern portion of the city, though they have yet to penetrate the west.

“I hope that the next administration will keep up the pace of this counter-ISIL military campaign, but they must also ensure that Iraqi Security and Kurdish forces are able to sustain their gains and that reconciliation and effective governance continue,” Carter wrote, using an alternate acronym for ISIS. “It must be local forces who deliver ISIL a lasting defeat, because only they can secure and govern the territory by building long-term trust within the populations they liberate.”

Trump has said both that he has a secret plan to defeat ISIS and that he’ll ask his general to craft a plan within 30 days of his taking office.

Carter also defended the Iran nuclear deal, which Trump has said he wants to scrap.

“The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has confirmed that Iran is complying with its commitments, and it is in our interest to maintain the agreement to check Iran’s nuclear ambition,” Carter said.

But despite the deal, Carter added, Iran remains a security challenge, including its support for the Syrian regime, its support for Hezbollah in Lebanon and its contribution to “disorder” in Yemen.

Carter also called on the next administration to continue implementing the personnel changes that he has made a focus of his tenure, including lifting the ban on transgender troops and opening all combat jobs to women. Both changes can be undone unilaterally, and female and transgender troops have been worried Trump will reverse the changes.

“We have made great strides, but changes to the force require a long-term implementation process,” Carter said. “Moving forward, the department must continue to proceed in a measured and responsible way that ensures the success of individual service members and preserves the unit effectiveness, readiness, cohesion and quality of the all-volunteer force.”

Carter also took shots at Congress, blaming lawmakers for the Pentagon’s budget woes. Carter highlighted the government shutdown in 2013, Congress’ refusal to allow base closures and retirements of old weapons systems, and its “micromanaging” of the Pentagon. 

“This poses a real problem, because every dollar Congress denies us in reform is a dollar we can’t invest in security we need to deter and defend against today’s and tomorrow’s threats,” he said. “I hope that with the focus on reform we’ve recently seen in the defense committees in Congress, we can continue to work together on reform in the future.”