The National Security Council: Tool of Presidential Crisis Management

Abstract

This paper critically examines the National Security Council (NSC) with a focus on its role during crisis. The NSC is an essential institutional mechanism for the presidential manage­ment of national security crises. The structure and utilization of the NSC must be optimized for both the generation of policy options for the President and for the oversight of policy implementation. This paper examines the elements of such optimization, summarizes them in the analysis section, and then offers recommendations to enhance the NSC's crisis management role. The paper also, in terms of relevance to presidential crisis management, considers the NSC's origins and committee and staff structure, examines several govern­ment NSC studies, and offers case studies of NSC performance in crises.