Danger Room: So do you need have the elders or the people’s buy-in before an operation starts?

Mullen: I think you’ll see the same kind of approach that General McChrystal used in Marja [before the offensive there began]. They are going to meet with a lot of leaders before the operation. That approach worked there, and I think you’ll see it again.

The question then becomes whether NATO truly solicits local buy-in or simply declares that it’s got what it needs to attack. Mullen sounded pretty sure that no matter what, the offensive is on: “I think the operation in Kandahar, which have commenced, will go a long way towards doing that. So that’s sort of the next big step for me, is Kandahar.” (McChrystal has said that the “shaping” operations to secure the areas on the city’s periphery have begun.) That doesn’t sound like a man who’s prepared to take no for an answer.

The U.S. has ruled out a military strike against Iran’s nuclear program any time soon, hoping instead negotiations and United Nations sanctions will prevent the Middle East nation from developing nuclear weapons, a top U.S. defense department official said Wednesday.

“Military force is an option of last resort,” Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Michele Flournoy said during a press briefing in Singapore. “It’s off the table in the near term.”

And just wait for segments of the conservative movement and the Republican Party to freak out, as Bill Kristol did over Adm. Michael Mullen’s similar disinclination for an Iran attack over the weekend. Yet if the lesson of the Bush administration’s experience at the United Nations ahead of the Iraq war is any experience, the only way the Security Council will unite around a sanctions package is if the international community doesn’t believe it’s setting the stage for an American attack. The same goes for a post-Security Council resolution coalition of Iran’s major trading partners that the Obama administration is waiting to assemble. There’s a surprising amount of international willpower for sanctions aimed at stopping Iran’s illicit uranium enrichment activities. There’s absolutely none for seeding the bed for an attack, and the prospect of one will drain away the willpower for sanctions. Hence Defense Secretary Robert Gates’ aggressive pushback on The New York Times’ leak of his January Iran memo, and hence Flournoy’s comments in Singapore.

According to Reuters (via Laura Rozen), Mullen said military strikes — presumably meaning missile strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities — would go “a long way” toward delaying Iran’s nuclear program. That’s tonally different than some of Mullen’s comments earlier this year that threw cold water on the efficacy of military action. Consider this February comment to the press, shortly after Mullen toured the Middle East:

We owe the secretary and the president a range of options for this threat. We owe the American people our readiness. But as I’ve said many times, I worry a lot about the unintended consequences of any sort of military action. For now, the diplomatic and the economic levers of international power are and ought to be the levers first pulled. Indeed, I would hope they are always and consistently pulled. No strike, however effective, will be, in and of itself, decisive.

My emphasis. In fairness, it’s possible to reconcile the two statements — while no single strike could be decisive, a bunch of them could go a long way toward slowing Iran’s nuclear program. But Mullen used to talk about what military strikes couldn’t accomplish, and now he’s venturing toward musing on what they can – while still cautioning that they still carry a big risk of unintended consequences and ought to be the very last resort. If Mullen was looking to tamp down Mideast speculation that a misinterpreted memo from Secretary of Defense Robert Gates meant the U.S. had few military options against Iran, that’s one way to go about it.

Sure, U.S. strikes might set back Tehran’s atomic weapons program — for a while. But the “unintended consequences” of a hit on Iran’s nuclear facilities could easily outweigh the benefits of that delay, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen told a forum at Columbia University.

“Iran getting a nuclear weapon would be incredibly destabilizing. Attacking them would also create the same kind of outcome,” Mullen said. “In an area that’s so unstable right now, we just don’t need more of that.”

If there was any doubt that the Pentagon doesn’t want the January Gates Memo on Iran misinterpreted, let it be allayed.

Gates gave the speech back when he figured he was retiring from government service and felt that he should outline a series of policy measures his successors might find fruitful. In a couple of months, of course, he’d be asked to join an administration that saw eye to eye with him on most issues and valued his insights in areas of disagreement. Nuclear strategy falls into the latter category.

For instance, here’s Gates on the value nuclear weapons pose in deterring a chemical or biological attack:

As long as other states have or seek nuclear weapons – and potentially can threaten us, our allies, and friends – then we must have a deterrent capacity that makes it clear that challenging the United States in the nuclear arena – or with other weapons of mass destruction – could result in an overwhelming, catastrophic response. …

Our nuclear arsenal also helps deter enemies from using chemical and biological weapons. In the first Gulf War, we made it very clear that if Saddam used chemical or biological weapons, then the United States would keep all options on the table. We later learned that this veiled threat had the intended deterrent effect as Iraq considered its options.

He also urged policymakers to consider the changing parameters of attacks that might prompt a nuclear reprisal. While not giving an answer, Gates pointed to the emerging threat of cyberattack as something to consider. “Similarly, future administrations will have to consider new declaratory policies about what level of cyber-attack might be considered an act of war – and what type of military response is appropriate,” he said. The Obama administration has now given its answer, and it’s that a non-nuclear response will be appropriate.

A good chunk of the speech is about the virtues of the Reliable Replacement Warhead, a program that others in the Obama administration view as skirting too close to building new nukes. Josh Rogin reports that the NPR will “thread the needle” on modernizing the nuclear stockpile (which is how Gates views the RRW) without committing to the program.

It’s no secret that Gates is on the rightward edge of the nuclear strategy debate in the administration. But there are areas in Gates’ 2008 speech where disagreement with the 2010 NPR is really just a matter of emphasis. Gates’ defense of conventional forces from 2008, for instance, will be largely codified by today’s document:

A conventional strike force means that more targets are vulnerable without our having to resort to nuclear weapons. And missile defenses reinforce deterrence and minimize the benefits of rogue nations investing heavily in ballistic missiles:  They won’t know if their missiles will be effective, thus other nations will feel less threatened. And let’s not forget the deterrent value of other parts of our conventional military forces.

Gates speaks at noon. It’ll be instructive to hear how he describes his current thinking on nuclear strategy, and whether he addresses his older comments about it.

Robert Gates, who served as defense secretary for George W. Bush and as a national security official for most GOP administrations going back to Gerald Ford, repeatedly and personally vouched that the treaty does not constrain any plans for European missile defense — a Republican priority — adding that it might “hopefully make [the Russians] a partner in a European-wide defense capability” at some point in the future. But between the treaty and the administration’s $5 billion request for maintaining the existing U.S. nuclear stockpile, “I think we addressed the concerns that may have been on the Hill.” Undersecretary of State Ellen Tauscher, who helped negotiate the treaty, added that “this is a strategic offensive weapons treaty,” and discussions with the Russians all focused on that — meaning that missile defense isn’t impacted by its provisions — and the schedule for the phased deployment of the missile shield in Romania is similarly unimpacted.

Whether the merits of the treaty will be enough to satisfy Republicans who want to deal Obama a bloody nose on a top priority of his agenda remains to be seen. While the press briefing went on, Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, issued a statement that despite “a partisan breakdown in recent years,” the treaty poses an opportunity to “renew the Senate’s bipartisan tradition on arms control and approve ratification of this new treaty in 2010. I know that can happen.”

[A]s expected, a diplomatic “We’re Just Not That Into You” move on the civilian nuclear deal and drone strike technology, but a thumbs up on the substantial topics, i.e. development. That is certainly a plus, depending on how well it’s implemented and allocated.

She points to this Washington Post wrap-up as well for the goods:

Most of the agreements announced after the one-day meeting had been decided earlier, including disbursement of a new $7.5-billion, five-year U.S. aid package for Pakistan’s energy, water, agricultural and education sectors. Long-standing Pakistani complaints about nearly $1 billion in promised but unpaid U.S. reimbursements for Pakistan’s counterinsurgency operations had been largely resolved, with the remaining money to be paid by the end of June. The administration said that it would improve on what Pakistan has described as slow delivery of military hardware and that it would keep trying to facilitate better Pakistani access to U.S. markets and a transit trade arrangement with Afghanistan.

All of which is in keeping with Special Representative Richard Holbrooke’s perspective that Pakistan needs to feel like the U.S. is willing to assist Pakistan as it attends to its national and domestic interests if Washington wants to see more robust counterterrorism results.

For Choi, the issue comes down to integrity. “What’s inhumane about ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ is the fact that soldiers have to lie,” he said. “It’s the only federal policy that enforces shame, particularly because these are soldiers willing to risk their lives to protect America.” The measure of the Obama administration’s seriousness to repeal, Choi argued, is its unwillingness to place a provision repealing it in the Defense Authorization Bill and daring senators to filibuster the Pentagon’s funding vehicle.

“What will pave the way for full repeal is a recognition and cognizance on the part of the administration,” Choi said, “that the fundamental reason to get rid of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ is that it sacrifices, violates and compromises the integrity of all soldiers, not just gay soldiers.”

Choi was arrested after leading a protest to the gates of the White House last week to pressure President Obama to live up to his pledge of ending “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” this year. At a Human Rights Campaign dinner last fall, Obama encouraged equal-rights activists to “continue to pressure leaders — including me,” and Choi said he took Obama’s words “as an order.”