Superior defense plans fuse political, economic, military, technological, and sociological power in ways that cover state interests, while conserving resources to the greatest prudent extent. Poor products can increase costs without reducing risks, because forces and funds that support slipshod schemes often fail to furnish security. This critical appraisal of the U.5. defense planning system seeks to serve a five-fold purpose: set assessment standards, appraise U.S. planning in principle, appraise U.5. planning in practice, identify U.S. planning problems and present optional courses of corrective action. The study shows how domestic and foreign policy inputs from the White House, National 5ecurity Council, and State Department affect defense planning.

Defence Planning as Strategic Fact provides and elaborates on an "upstream" focus on the variegated organizational, political and conceptual practices of military, civilian administrative and political leaderships involved in defence planning, offering an important security and strategic studies supplement to the traditional "downstream" focus on the use of force. The book enables the reader to engage with the role of ideas in defence planning, of organizational processes and biases, path dependencies and administrative dynamics under the pressures of continuously changing domestic and international constraints. The chapters show how defence planning must be seen as a constitutive element of defence and strategic studies – that it is a strategic fact of its own which merits particular practical and scholarly attention. As defence planning creates the conditions behind every peace upheld or broken and every war won or lost, Defence Planning as Strategic Fact will be of great use to scholars of defence studies, strategic studies, and military studies. This book was originally published as a special issue of Defence Studies.

This book is a collection of essays by senior defense analysts at RAND, all of whom have been deeply involved in post-Cold War defense planning studies for the Department of Defense. The essays cover a wide spectrum of issues, including alternative strategies and structures for defense planning, conventional deterrence of Third World opponents, modernizing weapon systems and force structures, and planning under uncertainty (a major theme of the book as a whole). Some of the essays are sympathetic to current U.S. methods and policies, whereas others are critical, arguing that radical changes are needed. Taken as a whole, the book provides a provocative cross section of work by experts who understand both the theoretical issues and the practical considerations that the Department of Defense must address. The book will be of interest to policymakers, students of defense planning, and other readers seeking to understand the challenges and choices confronting defense planners as we approach the end of the century.

NOTE: NO FURTHER DISCOUNT FOR THIS PRINT PRODUCT- OVERSTOCK SALE -- Significantly reduced list price The U.S. Government has recently issued seven major studies that together put forth a comprehensive blueprint for major global changes in U.S. national security strategy, defense plans, and diplomacy. These seven studies are brought together in this illuminating book, which portrays their individual contents and complex interrelationships and evaluates their strengths and shortfalls. It argues that while these studies are well-written, cogently argued, and articulate many valuable innovations for the Department of Defense, Department of State, and other government agencies, all of them leave lingering, controversial issues that require further thinking and analysis as future U.S. national security policy evolves in a changing and dangerous world. For all readers, this book offers a quick, readable way to grasp and critique the many changes now sweeping over the new U.S. approach to global security affairs."

This is the pilot in a series of reports on strategic planning conducted within the U.S. Department of Defense. It focuses on the strategic planning responsibilities of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff because planning at that level provides the critical nexus between the strategic direction provided by the National Command Authorities and its implementation by the unified combatant commands and military departments. The authors' thorough understanding of the statutory requirements for strategic planning and the interactions between the Chairman's complex strategic planning process and other key DOD planning systems enables them to explicate today's strategic planning challenges and offer insightful recommendations. Strategic planning in the post-Cold War era has proven to be exceptionally problematic. The plethora of national and international tensions that the east-west confrontation of the Cold War in large measure subdued combine now to create a world replete with diverse challenges to U.S. interests. Equally disturbing is the fact that these challenges are not as clearly defined and easily articulated as was the monolithic Soviet threat. The authors point out that the Cold War provided inherent stability in U.S. strategic planning and that the basic elements of a strategic military plan evolved over time. They go on to argue that the elimination of the National Military Strategy Document and the abandonment of the Base Case Global Family of Operation Plans amounted to recision of the Chairman's strategic plan, and that nothing has been developed to take its place.

An analysis of the implications for U.S. defense planning of the more widespread proliferation of nuclear weapons.

A discontinuity in U.S. defense planning may be looming because of diffusion of inexpensive military technology, geostrategic changes, and the need to prepare forces for diverse adversary types. The way ahead is not yet clear, and economic constraints are a problem. It also seems that the nation needs a comprehensive rebalancing of national security strategy, not just of military capabilities.