War Powers, War Lies: Part 24: Metastasis
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War Powers, War Lies: A Series
Part 24: Metastasis
Published in the Maryland Daily Record July 30, 2007
As we have seen, the exercise of nuclear war powers was envisioned during the Cold War as being an essentially Executive Branch affair, because of the short decision times involved. This did not mean the rest of the government was thought dispensable should holocaust arrive.
To the contrary, in the early days of the Cold War, when nuclear decapitation of the U.S. government loomed as a serious threat, there was a serious plan to preserve all branches. As is now well known, a secret bunker was built around 1960 under the Greenbrier Hotel in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, which would have housed the entire Congress, or at least whichever portion of it survived Armageddon, until the fallout had cleared. Reportedly there were similar contingency plans for the Supreme Court as well, although little has ever been made public about them. These complemented perennial plans for locating and spiriting away the President or whoever stood highest in Presidential succession, in the event of nuclear attack, to Mount Weather in the Blue Ridge Mountains, or to a mountain six miles north of Camp David.
Until the Carter Administration, the planning both for warmaking itself and for the survival of warmakers and of the larger government was rudimentary. At that point, more careful thought was given to the preservation of the government in the face of nuclear catastrophe. This evolved into something called the Doomsday Project that reached its height during the Reagan Administration, which, to judge by what is known about it, was focused on maintaining not only the lives of the Executive Branch warmakers but also communications among them and between them and the military. The communications hardware never worked properly, however, and so, with the decline of the Cold War, these plans were scrapped during the Clinton years.
Suddenly, with the arrival of 9/11 and the 2001 anthrax attacks, the question of governmental continuity grew more urgent again. There were news reports in 2002 that senior White House, Defense, and State Department officials had been dispatched to fortified bunkers at two undisclosed East Coast locations. Unlike previous plans, these were not a matter of response to attack or the temporary taking of shelter. This time, the deployment was permanent. While the individual officials would rotate, the bunkers were always in use. This was a strictly Executive Branch show; the White House did not even bother to inform Congress, which found out about it from the press.
If the notion of an Executive Branch governing from secret locations of which not even Congress is informed sounds disquieting, more recent actions of the Bush administration are even more so. On May 9, President Bush signed National Security Presidential Directive 51, blandly captioned “National Continuity Policy.” Arguably it is of a piece with previous presidential orders establishing continuity of government policies, including Executive Order 11490 (Nixon, 1969), Executive Order 12656 (Reagan, 1988), and Presidential Decision Directive 67 (Clinton, 1998). To the extent these orders have been declassified, they generally direct federal agencies to make and coordinate contingency plans. PD51 does this too, but there is a difference of tone.
First, the evil to be addressed is different. While EOs 11490 and 12656 spoke in identical language of “any national emergency type situation that might conceivably confront the nation,” there was only one real emergency in mind, specifically named: “a massive nuclear attack.” That uniqueness was for good reason; nothing else readily imaginable would threaten the continuity of the government. PD51 by contrast provides against a “Catastrophic Emergency,” defined as “any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions.” Arguably, this could be a much smaller incident. Arguably, it could have been 9/11.
The objective of PD51 is “Enduring Constitutional Government,” which is “a cooperative effort among the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of the Federal Government, coordinated by the President, as a matter of comity with respect to the legislative and judicial branches…” Although this language is immediately followed by language about “proper respect for the constitutional separation of powers,” it rings a little hollow after language in which the President appears to be appointing himself coordinator of the other branches of government. This note is struck again with this language: “The President shall lead the activities of the Federal Government for ensuring constitutional government.” Not the Executive Branch, Federal Government.
Given the contempt with which the Bush Executive Branch has treated other branches of government and the reluctance of the Executive to submit to checks and balances, these bland words do not sound like a promise of ongoing vitality and independence for Congress and the courts. It is quite foreseeable that another 9/11 event could fall within the category of “Catastrophic Emergency.” At that point, PD51 says the Administration could seize all governmental operations, until, in its view, it had achieved “Enduring Constitutional Government.” If this is anything like as ironic a name as Operation Enduring Freedom, which has endowed Afghanistan with resurgent warlords, a resurgent opium trade, and a resurgent Taliban, we are in trouble.
We have, in short, observed a metastasis precipitated by area bombing and then nuclear bombing, a metastasis in which the war powers of other branches of government have been invaded and may end up nullified by the Executive. Under PD51, the other branches might end up effectively nullified too.
Similar rumblings of worry should affect us as a people. Once upon a time, in the era of movies seen by millions of us as schoolchildren, like Duck and Cover and About Fallout,[1] the Civil Defense authorities at least pretended to have a plan for civilian survival in the face of nuclear war. The agencies behind those film classics morphed into FEMA, which everyone now knows has no realistic plans to save anyone from anything. The truth is, no one cares about us citizens. PD51 is about saving our rulers. So if there ever were a nuclear attack, about all that we could expect to survive in one piece would be the President, his generals and a puppet government, not us. Fortunately, the nightmare nuclear prospect with our present enemies threatens destruction less pervasive than a Soviet first wave could have inflicted. The populace could survive a nuclear 9/11. But if there were a broad nuclear attack or eco-catastrophe, the populace could meet the same fate as the Legislative and Judiciary. The Executive could consume us too, by leaving us exposed while it sat out the trouble under some mountainside.
Chad Stuart and Jeremy Clyde saw it all quite clearly in their 1968 song, The Ark. When the Ark lands after a world-destroying military catastrophe, and the doors open, disgorging the survivors:
But who is this, staring at the sunshine?
… laughing, shoving crying?
Not you, not me, my friend.
Are not these the men of the iron mountain?
Were not these the leaders of the fighting?
You bet. Them and nobody else. That where the current state of war powers and war lies could bring us. Buckle your seatbelts..
Copyright (c) Jack L. B. Gohn
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