Since 9/11 successive administrations have relied heavily on large amounts of security assistance to incentivize counterterrorism cooperation and build the capacity of local partners to achieve US counterterrorism objectives. Yet, most of the time the United States has made only minimal efforts to measure the efficacy of this assistance. All too often the first concrete metric has been the collapse of a partner force, as famously occurred in Iraq with the rise of ISIS. This needs to change.
The good news is that the Department of Defense is developing a set of criteria that it can apply to measure its security assistance programs. This year's Senate version of the National Defense Authorization Act also includes a number of reforms intended to tackle the problem. And as the State Department increases its emphasis on countering violent extremism, it will need to increase the emphasis on monitoring and evaluation. Better coordination across the US government is critical, but as we found during our research for a new study that the Center for a New American Security recently released, monitoring and evaluation will only be effective if it accounts for vagaries in the local environments where security assistance programs are implemented.
To begin with, US counterterrorism security assistance is sometimes overly focused on external threats to partners at the expense of internal stability. When we recently visited Jordan and Kenya – two critical recipients of American counterterrorism security assistance – we found that the overwhelming majority of American support was going to help these states fight ISIS in Syria and Al Shabab in Somalia. Yet the threat from extremist groups to these states is not simply a function of what is happening outside their borders. These countries are also confronting radicalization at home. In too many cases, local governments and internal security forces are part of the problem.
Addressing current shortcomings in internal security requires revamping both where assistance is targeted and how it is measured. This starts with emphasizing security sector reform to improve the capacity, capabilities, and professionalism of the judicial system and domestic security services. The Obama administration explicitly identified this need when it issued Presidential Policy Directive 23, which was aimed at improving US efforts to help partner nations build their own security capacity, consistent with the principles of good governance and rule of law. Implementation of the directive still lags. A better monitoring and evaluation system could spur progress by identifying areas where programs and outcomes are not aligned with the objectives delineated in PPD 23.
Efforts to develop the metrics themselves would benefit from work that is already being done on the ground by innovative non-governmental implementers. Unlike many government programs that historically focused mainly on inputs, local implementers have a track record of developing metrics that assess both the immediate impact of programs and the durability of results over time.
For example, measuring how many police officers or soldiers in a particular program have been trained is not enough. Training must also assess participants' attitudes at the outset of a program, how these attitudes have changed by the end, whether changes in attitude are durable, how training is applied in the field, and whether the application of new methods positively impacts the community being policed. There are tools such as community surveys or focus groups that can help measure these outcomes, though the United States may face considerable challenges in getting honest responses about how secure the local population feels or its attitude towards law enforcement. Thus, local non-government implementers will remain essential even if the United States develops its own monitoring and evaluation mechanisms.
Monitoring and evaluation is also an area where money can make a difference. The United States should devote a larger portion of the budget to measuring the effectiveness of its programs. Policymakers and funders are often averse to this type of funding and would rather put more money into implementation. But measuring the effectiveness of a program and trying to refine and improve it is critical. In some cases the United States might start by funding smaller security assistance programs in specific targeted communities inside a country – most notably those with the highest risk of radicalization. After testing initial results, these types of programs can then be expanded.
Finally, there are some structural challenges that even the most thoughtful security assistance programs are unlikely to overcome. Metrics are not only important for telling us what works or how to refine programs to make them more effective. They are also critical for identifying lost causes where no reasonable amount of assistance, regardless of how well implemented, will achieve stated objectives. As part of any monitoring effort, the United States should also make its programming more transparent by releasing details of objectives, recipient agencies, and funding levels to enable outside assessments by non-governmental organizations.
15 years after 9/11 it has become clear that countering terrorism through support to local partners will perhaps be the central tool in our arsenal. Money, manpower, and influence are finite. It is critical that we develop mechanisms that allow us to continually measure progress and refine programs so we can use our resources as effectively as possible.
Ilan Goldenberg is the director of the Middle East Security Program at the Center for a New American Security. Dr. Stephen Tankel is an assistant professor at American University and a non-resident senior fellow in the Asia-Pacific Program at the Center for a New American Security.