The Foreign Service Journal, October 2021

T he recent events in Afghanistan remind us that we must continue to learn lessons about conflict. This fall marks the 10-year anniversary in November of the Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations (CSO). It is incumbent upon people who call themselves experts in “conflict prevention and stabilization” to exercise a certain humility and reflection at this time, yet also important to recognize CSO as the embodi- ment of one of the “Forever War’s” most important lessons for State—that conflict prevention and stabilization is a field of diplomatic expertise akin to trade or arms control, and the department needs an institutional home for that expertise to prevent and respond to current and future conflict. Building on an organization formed specifically in response to events in Iraq and Afghanistan, CSO has evolved over the past decade from what origi- nally was envisioned as a “whole-of-government czar for Reconstruction and Stabilization” into a functional bureau within State’s J family of civilian security offices and bureaus. Now more like “Diplo- matic Special Forces” than an expeditionary civilian “surge,” CSO supports other department entities in formulating and implementing stabilization policy. CSO’s core capabilities—and policymakers’ needs— have remained constant: deep analysis of conflict’s drivers; rigorous planning of the U.S. approach to conflict; and agile deployment of conflict-expert diplomats where needed. In the future, the U.S. government—and CSO, in particular—must continue to evolve and innovate to meet increasingly complex violence and conflict around the world. Rather than an overhaul, CSO should continue to deepen its core capabilities, add- ing further nuance in the following ways: 1) Refining U.S. conflict analysis and policy— keeping ahead of new factors affecting conflict, like pandemics and climate change; 2) Reforming risk management— getting back into the field to find and engage new local partners; 3) Enhancing mediation and negotiation sup- port— assisting parties who often do not know what they do not know about making peace; and 4) Investing in data and technology— learning to value gaming as the private sector and military do. From Reconstruction and Stabilization to Conflict Stabilization Throughout the 1990s, national security profes- sionals debated what was needed to adapt to increas- ingly frequent “complex operations” as experienced in Somalia, Haiti, Rwanda and the Balkans. The post-9/11 military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq revealed that civilian agencies lacked capabilities for reconstruction and stabilization (R&S) operations, generally understood as “nation-building.” These efforts were envisioned as highly technocratic and multisectoral, akin to U.S. postwar efforts in Germany and Japan—heavy on assistance programming and building state capacity. It was in this atmosphere in 2004 that then-Sen- ators Joseph Biden and Richard Lugar proposed the Reconstruction and Stabilization Civilian Manage- ment Act. That legislation aimed “to provide for the continued development, as a core mission of [State and USAID], of an effective expert civilian response capability to carry out reconstruction and stabiliza- tion operations in a country or region that is at risk of, in, or is in transition from, conflict or civil strife.” Soon after the legislation was proposed, Secretary of State Colin Powell created the Office of the Coordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilization (S/CRS). In 2005, THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | OCTOBER 2021 27 Stabilization/ Conflict Adviser Aneliese Bernard meets with refugees from unstable regions of Nigeria in the Diffa Region of Niger in 2018. A persistent and repeated failure across history has been the failure to understand that the preservation of peace requires active planning, the expenditure of resources and sacrifice, just as war does. —Donald Kagan, On the Origins of War