DEFENSE TRANSFORMATION:

TO WHAT, FOR WHAT?

Kevin Reynolds

November 2006

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ISBN 1-58487-249-7
iii

FOREWORD

The transformation of America’s armed forces and 

defense establishment has been one of the key overarching objectives of President George W. Bush’s 

administration. Measuring the value of high-technology 

weapons systems and their demonstrated effectiveness 

in the opening stages of both Operations ENDURING 

FREEDOM and IRAQI FREEDOM, Secretary of 

Defense Donald Rumsfeld has increased the pace of 

defense transformation. But beyond enhancing the 

lethality of U.S. forces on the conventional battlefield, 

where is defense transformation headed?

In this monograph, Colonel Kevin Reynolds asks 

the question, “What form is transformation taking 

and what end(s) are the armed forces transforming 

to obtain?” He argues that U.S. foreign and national 

security policies should drive the pace and direction of 

defense transformation, but finds that all too often the 

military’s weapons systems preferences determine the 

shape and form of the armed services transformation 

and their future capability sets. Due to the lengthy 

Research, Development, Testing, and Evaluation 

(RDT&E) time to acquire technologically advanced 

weapons systems, up to and beyond 20 years in many 

instances, future administrations will inherit weapons 

systems and force structures that, although recently 

fielded, were imagined several administrations 

previously and whose capability to support current 

policy may now be limited. Colonel Reynolds concludes 

by arguing that the military should acquire a broad 

range of technologies now in order to present as yet 

unknown future political leaders with a broader range 
iv

of military capabilities with which to pursue future 

U.S. policy preferences.

DOUGLAS C. LOVELACE, JR.

Director

Strategic Studies Institute 
v

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF THE AUTHOR

KEVIN P. REYNOLDS is currently assigned to the 

Department of Distance Education (DDE), U.S. Army 

War College as a professor and course author. Prior 

to his present assignment, he served as the Director 

of First Year Studies within DDE. Commissioned as 

an Infantry Officer in 1973 from Officer Candidate 

School, Fort Benning, Georgia, Colonel Reynolds has 

commanded infantry units from platoon through 

battalion. Additionally, he has served as an operations 

officer at the battalion, division, corps, and army levels 

to include serving as the Chief of Plans, Third U.S. Army 

Forward Command Post during Operations DESERT 

SHIELD and DESERT STORM; and has served as an 

Observer Controller at the National Training Center 

and in the Battle Command Training Program. Colonel 

Reynolds is a graduate of the U.S. Army Command 

and General Staff College and the U.S. Army War 

College. He holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from 

Temple University, an MA in International Relations 

from St. Mary’s University-San Antonio, and a BA in 

Philosophy from the University of Illinois-Chicago.

vii

SUMMARY

The U.S. armed forces are transforming at a rapid rate 

while simultaneously fighting a Global War on Terror 

(GWOT). Changing tactics, techniques, procedures, 

and even organizations when faced with a dangerous 

and adaptive enemy is nothing unusual. Almost all 

successful armed forces have had to master change 

in the face of adversity. However, the changes that 

U.S. armed forces are adopting began long before the 

events of September 11, 2001. To begin to understand 

the scope of defense transformation and its impact on 

the future policy of the United States, the GWOT and 

the operations that define it must be viewed from the 

wider context of U.S. foreign and national security 

policy. Policymakers must recognize that the defense 

transformation decisions they make now are the ones 

with which as yet unidentified future political leaders 

will have to live. 

Ideally, policy should drive the direction and 

form of defense transformation. However, defense 

transformation is not necessarily proceeding in this 

fashion. Rather, the military is pursuing a transformation plan based on its weapons systems technological 

preferences. Although when developed and fielded 

these weapons systems preferences almost assuredly 

will provide U.S. supremacy in state-centric warfare, 

their utility for lesser conflicts is suspect. Due to the 

long lead times associated with weapons system 

development, future political leaders may have their 

policy options constrained by a force structure that, 

although recently fielded, was imagined over 15 to 20 

years previously for a reality that may no longer exist 

when the weapons become operational. The potential 
viii

to have a military force inadequately equipped and 

structured to support future policy has occurred 

largely because of three factors: first, the military, not 

policymakers, are the primary determinants of which 

weapons systems to acquire and develop; second, 

policy formulation planning horizons are much 

shorter than those of weapons systems acquisition; 

last, the military, at the urging of the civilian leadership 

within the Department of Defense (DoD) is pursuing a 

transformation plan based primarily on the somewhat 

narrow theoretical constructs of Network Centric 

Warfare (NCW).

The military, in determining what weapons systems 

are available to choose from, heavily influences the 

choices of the decisionmakers within DoD. De jure 

the Secretary of Defense decides what weapons will 

be funded for development; however, de facto the 

uniformed military steers the course of weapons 

systems procurement. Although the armed services 

would not be willing to relinquish this position, it is 

not a role they created, either. Rather, the exponential 

growth of technology in general and weapons systems 

technology in particular, coupled with the increasing 

complexity of warfare since World War II, have 

compelled the nation’s civilian leadership to defer to 

the military’s expertise in determining which weapons 

and force structures to acquire. Simply stated, neither 

the executive nor the legislative branches of government 

have the time or the inclination to master the arcane 

concepts, processes, and dialect of weapons systems 

development. Seldom do members of the executive 

branch or Congress challenge the military’s weapons 

systems preferences, and when they do, it is in the 

aggregate, i.e., does the military really need that number 

of systems vice do they need the system at all. In rare 
ix

instances, the Secretary of Defense or the Congress will 

cancel a particular weapons development program, 

but this normally occurs only after the program has 

been in development for 15-20 years, its developmental 

costs have far exceeded its projected funding, and 

other weapons systems with similar capabilities have 

obviated the need for it. Congress is more concerned 

with the military’s stewardship of its budget and not 

whether the future military capabilities the armed 

forces are developing will be those that future political 

leaders will need to promote U.S. policy. 

The transformation decisionmaking conundrum 

is compounded by foreign and national security 

policy development lagging behind weapons systems 

procurement and force structure development. This 

phenomenon, referred to in this monograph as “policy 

lag,” results from the differences in the planning 

horizons, budgeting cycles, and predictability forecasts 

between foreign policy/national security strategy 

development on the one hand and weapons systems/

force structure development on the other. Foreign 

and national security policy planning rarely extends 

more than 4 to 5 years, whereas weapons system 

planning is seldom shorter than 12 years, with the 

norm being closer to 15 years. Additionally, policy is 

much harder to budget for since it depends on factors 

in the humanitarian world that are not quantifiable 

or measured easily. Conversely, weapons system 

procurement is easy to quantify, measure, and hence 

budget for. Weapons are material objects and subject 

to laws of science, while human beings, leaders, 

populations, and nation-states are not. Moreover, 

the congressional committees that authorize and 

appropriate funds for the development of weapons 

systems are discrete defense committees within 
x

Congress that are dedicated to military issues. The 

rest of government must navigate through nondepartment specific authorization and appropriations 

committees. Last, the results of foreign and national 

security policy planning are much harder to predict 

even in the short term (4 to 6 years), let alone in the 

long term. However, the development of weapons 

systems is very systematic and foreseeable. Although 

not all inclusive, the differences in planning horizons, 

budgeting cycles, and predictability are the chief factors 

that account for policy development lagging behind 

weapons systems development. Policy lag almost 

always results in the military acquiring tomorrow the 

weapons systems and force structure it needs today.

Last, the military and civilian leaderships within 

DoD are pursing a transformation plan that is based 

on a unitary theoretical operational construct: NCW. 

Combat operations in both Afghanistan and Iraq in 

2001 and 2003, respectively, appeared to have justified 

NCW’s proponents’ belief in this form of warfare. 

But subsequent operations in both countries against 

insurgents, along with other low intensity combat 

undertakings, have called into question the utility 

of NCW as a panacea for America’s future military 

operations. Wholesale adoption of the weapons systems 

and the force structure required to execute NCW could 

leave the United States prepared to fight the most 

dangerous but least likely threats and unprepared to 

fight the lest dangerous but most likely threats.

To mitigate the effects that the factors enumerated 

above have on defense transformation, the senior 

civilian and military leadership should: ensure that 

the congressional committees coordinate their actions 

so as to synchronize foreign/national security policy 

objectives with weapons systems/force structure 
xi

decisions; reform the Defense Acquisition System’s 

bureaucratic structure and procedures in order to 

reduce acquisition timelines significantly; acquire a 

broader range of technologies that will expand the 

U.S. military’s future capability sets; develop a more 

diversified force structure capable of responding to 

the full range of the most likely challenges the United 

States will face; and, apportion the service budgets 

in accordance with the relative share of the missions 

they will receive in the future so they may acquire the 

technologies and force structure they need to obtain 

and promote the nation’s interests.

1

DEFENSE TRANSFORMATION:

TO WHAT, FOR WHAT?

The military is one of several tools America’s 

elected leadership has to promote, further, or obtain 

the nation’s interests. In order not to constrain the 

policy options open to the civilian leadership, the 

military should possess a capability set that will 

enhance or enable the pursuit of a broad range of 

foreign policy and national security strategy scenarios. 

As a result, defense transformation should occur 

with the requirements of national security policy and 

strategy in mind. However, defense transformation is 

not proceeding in this fashion. Rather, the military is 

pursuing a transformation plan based on a group of 

weapons systems technologies which will ensure its 

supremacy in state-centric warfare, but whose utility 

outside of major force-on-force conflict is questionable 

at best. The military’s weapons systems technological 

preferences, not policy, are driving the pace and form 

of the military’s transformation and hence the future 

military capabilities that will be available to the nation’s 

leadership. Due to the long lead times associated with 

weapon systems development, future political leaders 

may have their policy options constrained by a force 

structure that, although recently fielded, was imagined 

15 to 20 years previously for a reality that may never 

have eventuated. 

The potential to have a military force inadequately 

equipped and structured to support future policy has 

occurred largely because of three factors. First, the 

military, not policymakers, primarily determines not 

only which weapon systems technologies to develop, 

but also which ones will even be considered for 
2

development. Second, foreign and national security 

policy development lags behind weapon systems 

procurement and force structure development, instead 

of driving them. This phenomenon, referred to here 

as “policy lag,” results from the differences in the 

planning horizons, budgeting cycles, and predictability 

forecasts between foreign policy/national security 

strategy development on the one hand and weapons 

systems/force structure development on the other. 

Policy lag usually results in the military acquiring 

tomorrow the weapons systems and force structure it 

needs today.1 Last, enamored with its recent success 

during the conventional combat phases of Operations 

ENDURING FREEDOM and IRAQI FREEDOM (OEF 

and OIF, respectively) the military, at the urging of 

the civilian leadership within the DoD, is pursuing a 

transformation plan based primarily on the concepts 

and weapons systems required to implement network 

centric warfare (NCW).2 Pursing a discrete set of 

weapons systems technologies may hinder the military’s ability to respond to other than state-on-state 

warfare scenarios, thus limiting the civilian leadership’s 

policy options. As a result, the military may become 

self-limiting by acquiring primarily those technologies 

it needs to defeat a similarly equipped threat and neglect 

the possibilities offered by alternative technologies. 

The current transformation approach could leave the 

United States preparing to fight the least likely but 

most dangerous conflicts vice prepared for the most 

likely but least dangerous conflicts that it will face.

This monograph explores each of these factors that 

contribute to the incongruence between the transformational capabilities that the military is acquiring and 

their potential inability to support future policy options 

adequately when they are fielded. The monograph 
3

closes by arguing that, since the future is extremely 

difficult to predict, the military should pursue a broad 

range of technologies that will both enhance and 

expand its future capability profile in order to better 

serve policy.

WEAPONS SYSTEMS DECISIONMAKING

In principle, the selection of major weapons systems 

should be the result of a decisionmaking process at 

the national level that begins with the identification of 

U.S. national interests, goals, and objectives in both the 

near and the long term. Next, planners should develop 

the national military strategy or military policy that 

combines with other elements of national power 

(economic, political, and sociological/informational) 

to form the nation’s grand strategy. Nested within the 

grand strategy should be decisions on force structure 

and doctrine, and the identification and acquisition of 

the means or resources to implement the strategy. In his 

book Weapons Don’t Make War, Dr. Colin Gray states: “If 

it is policy to deter attack upon distant friends, strategy 

must specify what is to be deterred, and how and with 

what instruments deterrence is to be achieved. If the 

means for deterrence will not be available for several 

years, then policymakers must decide whether to risk 

a bluff or redefine policy.”3 But the process described 

above, though desirable in theory, is a practice not nearly so orderly, coherent, and fully realized as depicted. It is much more amorphous, with numerous dyadic 

relationships that allow for multipartite negotiations 

at various levels. The process is more circular and 

iterative than it is linear and progressive.4 This 

section will explore who makes the weapons systems 

and transformation decisions and why. Next, it will 
4

examine how those decisions result in military force 

structure and the constraint(s) these acquired military 

capabilities may have on future foreign policy. It 

concludes with a case study involving the acquisition 

of the B-1 bomber that illustrates how past weapons 

systems decisions affect future policy options.

All too often, especially since the beginnings of 

exponential technological development during World 

War II, weapons systems decisions have influenced 

heavily both the national military strategy and the 

military’s force structure. Thus, in part, weapons 

systems decisions determine what the nation’s 

political leadership should do (the strategy its civilian 

leaders should pursue) and what they cannot do (the 

capabilities and limitations of the force structure the 

military adopts to optimize the technology).5 In fact, 

given that most weapons systems have a 12-15 year 

development period, current weapons systems and 

force structure decisions often limit the policy options 

of future administrations that inherit a structure whose 

capability may not meet future policy needs.6 In 1986, 

Gordon Craig and Felix Gilbert, contributing authors 

to the original and subsequent editions of Makers 

of Modern Strategy, expressed essentially the same 

concern:

The actions that will be taken in future crises promise, 

indeed, to be predetermined and automatic in nature. 

One can argue plausibly that the autonomy of the 

political leadership begins to shrink from the moment 

that it authorizes the expenditure of national resources on 

this or that kind of weapons research or the production 

of this or that kind of bomber, missile, or submarine. 

Because of the lead time required for the realization 

of such projects, the decision made today inevitably 

determines or circumscribes policy at a later date, thus 

pre-judging situations that have not been foreseen and 
5

limiting one’s capabilities for contingencies that have 

not yet arisen.7

Weapon system decisions and the force structure they 

drive are fundamentally political decisions, given 

the impact they have on near and short-term policy. 

Leaving these decisions to the military represents a de 

facto abdication of important aspects of foreign policy 

formulation to the military. 

Congress and the President often play the 

services off against one another in the battle over 

funds and programs, but they support the military’s 

technologically-driven weapons systems preferences. 

The military’s weapons systems selections are almost 

never challenged. Judith Reppy and Franklin A. Long, 

in the introduction to their anthology, The Genesis of 

New Weapons: Decision Making for Military R&D, quote 

Edwin Deagle as saying:

The central political feature of the weapon system 

acquisition process is that its control inevitably resides 

mainly in the hands of the services. No one else in the 

system had the information and the financial and staff 

resources, . . . Moreover, no one can match the unique 

claim to control of the military requirement process that 

the wearing of a uniform conveys. Thus, the struggle 

for civilian influence over the acquisition process 

will always be uphill. And, given the differences and 

purposes among the various political constituencies, 

which surround the Pentagon, civilian involvement will 

inevitably be diffuse, fragmented, and pluralistic.8

Both the executive and legislative branches of 

government have hesitated to challenge the military’s 

weapons systems and force structure preferences. 

Given the scope and breadth of the nation’s needs, 

neither the President nor any member of Congress 
6

has the time or inclination to master the technological 

and operational complexity of modern military 

operations. Instead, the U.S. civilian leadership relies 

on the military’s expertise to determine what weapon 

systems to develop and procure; hence, the pattern and 

shape of defense transformation and, by extension, 

the military’s capabilities in support of future foreign 

and nation security policy. Although this trend began 

during the lead-up to World War II, it was the onset of 

the Cold War that tightened the military’s grip on the 

acquisition and transformation process. 

During the Cold War, there was a constant tension 

between spending for defense and spending for social 

programs. For most of the Cold War, presidents strove 

to keep the defense budget within limits. With the 

domestic agenda holding primacy, in the absence 

of a crisis, foreign aid and defense desiderata were 

not always fully funded. Additionally, the program 

timelines seldom extended beyond the near term, i.e., 

to the end of the president’s elected term.9 Moreover, 

most presidents lacked the expertise and the time 

to delve into the arcane world of threat estimates, 

weapons technology, military budgets, force structure, 

and operational employment of military forces; hence, 

they relied on the military for that expertise.10 Even 

a military professional turned politician like General 

Dwight D. Eisenhower considered the development of 

the nation’s conventional force capability a secondary 

issue. Focused on the domestic agenda, Eisenhower 

chose to rely on nuclear weapons and budget ceilings 

to shape R&D, weapons acquisition, strategy, and force 

structure.11

Congress labored under similar constraints. It 

seldom had the expertise to challenge military acquisitions, force structure, or strategy recommendations.12
7

Instead, Congress focused on ensuring that the 

military followed prescribed contracting procedures; 

avoided waste, fraud, or abuse; and distributed major 

defense contracts to as many districts as possible.13

Congressmen did not, nor could they, review military 

weapons acquisition decisions, strategy, and force 

structure within an overarching strategic context.14 In 

The Decisionmaking Role of Congress, Reppy and Long 

wrote:

Just as important, the military utility of new [weapon] 

systems should be balanced against the effect they may 

have on international stability and future security in a 

world where other countries can and do react to U.S. 

technological initiatives. Unfortunately, Congress does 

not analyze these larger issues. . . . Relying, as they 

do, mainly on Pentagon witnesses, the armed services 

committees rarely hear a rounded analysis of the United 

States’ international position, strengths, and weaknesses, 

and the members tend to lose sight of the broader context 

of national security.15

 Likewise, Congress’s committee structure virtually 

precludes a systematic, coordinated, and thorough 

review of weapons acquisition.

The various committees and subcommittees of 

Congress that dealt with the armed forces, foreign 

policy, and technology focused on specific issues. They 

approached each issue narrowly and in a fragmented 

manner.16 For example, among the Senate Armed 

Services Committee’s several subcommittees was 

one dealing with research, development, testing, and 

evaluation (RDT&E), and another that dealt with 

appropriations.17 However, they did not necessarily 

coordinate their approach.18 Hence, a weapon system 

could be approved for testing and development, only 

to have its procurement dollars undercut. Moreover, 
8

these subcommittees did not interface with the Senate 

Foreign Relations Committee. Therefore, the weapons 

system/foreign policy/national security strategy linkage was not strong.19 Finally, committee review often 

boiled down to constituency-related issues, such as 

spending, that aided an individual member’s district.20

Taken together, these factors militated against the 

development of a coherent set of national priorities, 

which the political leadership could have used to guide 

the weapon acquisition process. The constraints of the 

political structure enumerated above promoted the 

military’s autonomy in weapon acquisition decisions, 

strategy development, and force structure during the 

Cold War, which has continued to this day.

MILITARY DECISIONMAKING, FORCE 

STRUCTURE, AND POLICY

The relative autonomy that the military has in 

selecting which weapons systems to develop affects 

national policy in the long term through the development of future force structure. According to Joint 

Publication 1-02, Department of Defense Dictionary 

of Military and Associated Terms (April 2001), force 

structure is the “numbers, size, and composition of the 

units that comprise U.S. defense forces: e.g., divisions, 

ships, air wings.”21 This includes the numbers and 

types of weapons systems the forces have in their 

inventory. Instead of being driven by strategy, weapon 

acquisition decisions tend to be technology-driven.22

The RDT&E process on average consumes between 

10 and 15 years, with some systems taking less time 

(aircraft carriers, 6-8 years) and more technologically 

advanced systems taking much longer (B-1 bomber, 23 

years).23 When weapons systems become operational, 
9

they are placed into an organizational architecture 

designed to maximize their capabilities and within a 

doctrinal context that governs their employment. The 

resultant force structure has inherent capabilities and 

limitations.

The weapons-systems decisions the military 

makes now affect future foreign and national security 

policies when those weapons systems are fielded in 

some 15 years. Contributing to the influence of current 

acquisition decisions on future policy is what could be 

called “policy lag.” Other than in very broad terms, 

rarely does America’s elected leadership outline a 

comprehensive foreign policy that extends beyond 

the incumbent’s term.24 A number of factors account 

for this: the pluralism inherent to the political system, 

the primacy of the domestic agenda, the power of 

the bureaucracy, the presidential life cycle and his 

approval rating, the influence of the news media and 

other political actors, the sharing of powers within 

a federal system, and the tendency of ad hoc crisis 

management to supplant long-term strategy.25 Even 

though presidents are the chief agents for the conduct 

of American foreign and national security policy, their 

power is constrained by the factors just mentioned. 

Thus U.S. foreign policy tends to be disjointed and 

characterized by a series of political compromises.26

The military, on the other hand, does not labor 

under any such constraints. For example, the Air Force 

does not have to sell the nation on what bomber or 

fighter to procure. They may have to lobby Congress 

for money to get the numbers of a particular weapon 

system they need; still, the decision to acquire it 

remains de facto internal to the Air Force.27 Due to 

the nature of the development and acquisition cycle, 

military R&D and acquisition planning almost always 
10

extends 15 to 20 years, while foreign policy planning 

rarely extends beyond the administration’s current 

term. As mentioned previously, the military’s expertise 

and autonomy in the weapons systems development 

process during the Cold War rarely was challenged. 

Consequently, political leaders saw their policy 

options circumscribed by the decisions the military 

had made during previous administrations.28 As the 

Cold War illustrates, future presidents can change 

force structure; however, the political price of doing 

so is normally prohibitive.29 With regard to the B-2 

bomber, for example, over a 7-year period the sunk 

costs were $8.5 billion in R&D and $16.4 billion in 

procurement, producing a total of nearly $25 billion 

spent on the first 15 aircraft alone.30 With such a huge 

previous investment, future presidents will think twice 

about abandoning the weapon. 

Discarding one weapons system for another affects 

the readiness of the force, because it normally requires 

training and restructuring. Still another cost is that a 

major reorganization of the armed forces normally 

involves winners and losers within the political process. 

Benefit redistribution is fraught with political liability 

and jeopardizes the president’s agenda.31 Each new 

president inherits a military force structure that, with 

minor exceptions, was created several administrations 

previously. This phenomenon was previously identified 

as “policy lag.”32 While presidents often tinker with 

military force structure by adding to or taking from it 

incrementally, for the most part they tend to make do 

with the force structure they inherit.33

The development of the B-1 illustrates how problematic it is to expect the military’s current weapons 

systems decisions for acquisitions 20 years in the 

future to actually support the foreign and national 
11

security policies of the nation’s future political leaders. 

When the B-1 bomber finally was fielded, policy had 

changed and the weapon system was obsolete. The 

conceptual development of the B-1 bomber began in 

1961, with the B-70 bomber as part of the Air Force’s 

Advanced Manned Strategic Aircraft program 

(AMSA). This program was designed to meet the 

perceived need by the Air Force to acquire a bomber 

capable of penetrating Soviet air space undetected at 

low or high level. Begun under the John F. Kennedy 

administration, the B-1’s development continued 

through the Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Jimmy 

Carter, and Ronald Reagan administrations.34 The B1 finally entered the Air Force’s inventory in 1986.35

Over the course of the B-1’s development, America’s 

foreign policy orientation changed four times. Flexible 

response gave way to Nixon’s policy of détente, then 

Carter’s accommodation under a theory of complex 

interdependency, and, finally, Reagan’s policy of 

global confrontation with the Soviet Union.36 In fact, in 

1977 the Carter administration cancelled the B-1 after 

over $22.9 billion had been spent on its research and 

development.37 But, like the mythical phoenix, the B-1 

rose from its own ashes during the early years of the 

Reagan presidency, and by the mid-1980s, it entered 

the Air Force’s inventory. 

When Reagan became president, the United States 

began a massive rearmament. The Air Force revived 

the B-1 program, although 4 years had been lost on 

its development, and by 1982-83, 3 years before the B1’s fielding, its utility was questioned in light of the 

B-2 stealth bomber, which the Air Force had been 

developing in secret and concurrently with the B-1.38

Moreover, by the time the Air Force began fielding 

the B-1, the Cold War had begun to thaw as Soviet 
12

Premier Mikhail Gorbachev announced a policy of 

glasnost (openness) and perestroika (restructuring), and 

the Reagan administration began to cooperate with 

the Soviet Union on further limiting strategic weapons 

and promoting nuclear disarmament.39 By the time 

the last B-1 bomber wing was operational, the Cold 

War had ended and the B-2 bomber had replaced it 

on grounds of technological superiority. The story of 

its acquisition is as much a testament to the military’s 

acknowledged expertise, autonomy, and the strength 

of its political alliances as it is an indictment of the lack 

of coordination between weapon system development 

and national security strategy formulation.40 “The 

importance of organizational preferences was striking 

especially in the case of the B-1 program. The Air 

Force’s commitment to the B-1 triumphed over Robert 

McNamara’s outright opposition to it, David Packard’s 

attempt to shape it, and, ultimately, Jimmy Carter’s 

effort to cancel it.”41

The 100 B-1’s procured by the Air Force cost the 

taxpayer over 28 billion dollars after 1981, with more 

than 78 percent of the program’s cost appropriated 

before the first prototype was flown successfully.42

The Air Force certified that the B-1 would be built for 

no more than $28.3 billion as a condition for getting 

congressional approval for its resurrection. As an 

additional measure for quelling political opposition, 

the Air Force improvised a new mission for the plane: 

“At the beginning of 1981, the Air Force plans called for 

B-1s to be converted to carry cruise missiles once the 

Stealths were ready; thus creating a synergistic effect. 

Air Force officers admitted privately that the new 

synergism had more to do with politically justifying 

the B-1B than with attacking the Soviet Union.”43 As it 

turned out, the entire fleet of B-1s had to be retrofitted 
13

at an additional cost of $3 billion. Given the $22.9 billion 

R&D cost prior to its cancellation in 1977, its post-1980 

cost of $28.3 billion, and the additional $3 billion more 

for retrofit, the total cost of the program over 27 years 

was $54.2 billion. Critics of the program called the B1 “a flying Edsel” and “a dismal failure.” They could 

rightly ask what other programs the Air Force could 

have better spent the money on.44

In 1988, Nick Kotz wrote: “The B-1’s development 

has been marred by political indecisiveness, bureaucratic obsessions, Air Force overreaching, parochialism, 

partisan demagoguery, and an utter lack of consensus 

on defense priorities and procurement strategies.”45

By 1994, DoD no longer considered the B-1B a 

strategic weapon, which had been the sole purpose 

for its creation. It was now classified as a conventional 

weapon, having been replaced by the B-2 and the 

venerable B-52H.46

While it is unfair to blame either the military or 

America’s political leadership for not anticipating 

the end of the Cold War, it is fair to question their 

pursuit of a weapons program that by 1981 was 

redundant, if not irrelevant, as a strategic deterrent. 

America’s strategic deterrent resided primarily in its 

array of Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs), 

Intermediate Range Ballistic Missiles (IRBMs), 

Submarine-Launched Ballistic Missiles (SLBMs), cruise 

missile technology, and only secondarily in its manned 

bomber force.47 Moreover, because the military steadily 

upgraded the capabilities of its B-52 force over the 

years, it could have continued to bridge (as it does 

today) the perceived technological gap produced by 

the lengthy development of the B-1 bomber. The end 

of the Cold War was unknowable, but the production 

and fielding of the bomber was predictable, as was the 
14

cost benefit analysis of producing the B-1 in light of 

existing bombers and missiles, future bombers (the B2), and the strategic deterrent capability called for by 

the national security strategy.

The B-1 remains in the Air Force’s active inventory 

as part of the Cold War’s legacy force.48 It has been 

converted to accomplish missions that it was not 

designed for and for which a less costly alternative 

would have sufficed.49 The Reagan, George H. W. Bush, 

Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush administrations 

inherited this weapon system and the force structure 

built to employ it. The aircraft’s life expectancy is 50-

to-70 years, so the B-1 could be around for another 40 

plus years.50 The B-1 is currently configured as a cruise 

missile and smart bomb platform, which can operate at 

extended standoff distances.51 Its acquisition cost, based 

on post-1980 figures, was $280 million per plane. The 

older B-52 can fulfill the same mission, with slightly 

less payload. Its acquisition cost in 1998 constant 

dollars was $32 million per plane. Given the huge 

budget outlays to procure the B-1 and the additional 

costs to maintain, man, and fly (in September 1987, it 

cost $21,000 an hour to operate one B-1); the Air Force 

is unlikely to risk further censure by abandoning it.52

Instead, the B-1 promises to be an aircraft in search of 

a mission. Moreover, it will continue to affect policy 

options if only because its development and operating 

cost have consumed money, and will continue to do so, 

that could otherwise be applied to the development and 

acquisition of more advanced technologies. Similarly, 

strategies that call for the use of military force, especially 

airpower, may be constrained by the presence of this 

weapon system in the inventory: it may not be suited 

to the policy and military strategy the administration 

would like to execute, but it is available.
15

The decision to develop and acquire the B-1 

represented a choice that the military (Air Force) made 

from among other alternatives (for example, upgrading 

the B-52, developing advanced fighters, procuring of 

more B-2s, or acquiring additional strategic lift such as 

the C-5A, C-141, and C-17) predicated on a worldview 

no longer valid when the plane became operational 27 

years later.53 Moreover, the military made the weapons 

systems choices that affected future foreign policy, 

not the elected civilian leadership.54 As a result of this 

asynchrony between policy and weapons systems 

development, or what is referred to here as policy lag, 

the B-1 essentially became obsolete in the final stages 

of its fielding.55

Proponents of the B-1 maintain that its development 

played a useful role in the SALT and later START 

negotiations with the Soviet Union as a bargaining 

chip to encourage the Soviets to reduce their strategic 

weapons. Three factors undermine this claim. First, 

the preponderance of America’s strategic nuclear 

weapons capability resided in its ICBMs, IRBMs, 

and SLBMs. These strategic systems, constituting the 

main threat to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republic’s 

(USSR) existence, were the ones the Soviets wanted 

reduced. Second, the oft-vaunted ability of the B-1 to 

penetrate the sophisticated Soviet air defenses was 

always theoretical and problematic. Once an enemy 

learns of a capability, the technological advantage of 

the weapon system lasts only as long as it takes the 

enemy to develop a countermeasure. Last, given the 

prodigious financial and political resources the Air 

Force expended to procure the B-1, it is difficult to 

imagine it willingly relinquishing the weapon system 

absent quid pro quo in its other weapons programs. Air 

Force prestige and identity were bound up intimately 

with the B-1 bomber.
16

B-1 adherents also played up the versatility of the 

bomber. Even as the B-1’s strategic role diminished, 

it could still perform conventional missions based 

on its considerable standoff capability, or so it was 

claimed. This argument also is flawed. First, the B-1 

was developed and sold to Congress and the American 

people as a strategic weapon, one that would provide 

the United States with a significant military advantage. 

The United States had plenty of less costly alternatives, 

like the B-52, for conventional missions. Moreover, 

the threats America faced in the post-Cold War era 

did not require the capabilities of the technologically 

advanced B-1 to defeat these threats because they were 

not associated with sophisticated air defense systems. 

Last, claiming that the standoff capability of the B-1 

minimizes risk to the crews is equally contentious. The 

standoff capability of the B-1 has nothing to do with 

the aircraft itself; rather, it results from sophisticated 

weapons munitions on board it. Those missiles and 

bombs can be launched with equal effectiveness and 

standoff distance from a dirigible, and for a fraction of 

the cost. 

As the case of the B-1 illustrates, the foreign policy 

options of America’s leadership are constrained (financially and operationally) by the military’s decision to 

acquire specific Cold War weapons systems. In some 

instances, it is not the weapons systems themselves 

that are in question as much as the number of such 

systems in the inventory and the force structure built 

around them. For example, does the United States in 

the post-Cold War era need almost 1,200 (including 

464 in the National Guard) AH-64 Apache Longbow

attack helicopters, weapons systems that were 

designed in the early 1970s to destroy massed Soviet 

armored formations that no longer exist?56 Does the 

nation need 11 nuclear-powered aircraft carriers and 
17

their associated battle groups when the sea lanes are 

not threatened?57 What weapon system technologies 

should the military develop and what force structure 

should the military have, given the threats the nation 

faces, or the capabilities it feels it needs, and the policy 

it wants to implement both at home and abroad? These 

questions are not new; they have been raised before 

and undoubtedly will surface again. Part of the answer 

lies in an examination of the apparent disconnects 

between weapons development and force structure 

decisions, on the one hand, and foreign policy and 

national security strategy decisions, on the other. 

While linking weapon system development, 

acquisition, and future force structure to policy was 

difficult during the Cold War, it became even more of a 

challenge in the post-Cold War era when there is not a 

clearly defined threat on which to focus. Since 1989 and 

the end of the Cold War, there have been four changes in 

national security strategy.58 With respect to America’s 

basic foreign policy stance, the United States shed its 

previous one and adopted a new one in 1990, 1993, 

1996, 2000, and 2002 (see Figure 1 below). The tenor 

of these foreign policy changes has in part depended 

on and been conditioned by the weapons systems 

and force structure the political leadership inherited 

from the Cold War. Even though the armed forces are 

presently changing/transforming, the decisions made 

on what capabilities to acquire and how to organize 

and employ those capabilities remain primarily with 

the military.59 Moreover, due to the nature of RDT&E 

and acquisition system, these decisions drive the 

development of military capabilities that are largely 

independent of policy.60

Figure 1 illustrates the potential disconnect 

between weapons systems development and force 
18

structure on the one hand, and foreign policy on the 

other. It compares changes in foreign policy to the force 

structure at the national leadership’s disposal should 

policy decisions call for the use of force.

Weapons systems and their encapsulating force 

structure do not remain static. Changing technology 

dictates that part of the military’s force structure will 

be in almost constant transition. Presently, the military 

has three force structures (although it acknowledges 

only two, the current and the future force). The first is 

the current force. The current force is a residual Cold 

War-era force designed to defeat a Soviet-based threat. 

It constitutes most of the military’s present force 

structure. The second category, the transition force, 

consists of a percentage of the force that is modernizing 

with prototypes of future force equipment, but which 

is not fully trained or ready. The transition force is a 

bridge between the current force and the force structure 

that the military is building toward, called the future 

force.61 Emerging technology drives the future force’s 

development.

While the terminology used in this figure—current, 

transition, and future force—is most germane to the 

Army, it describes the process that all the services use. 

The Air Force, for example, had the B-52 (current), the 

B-1 (transition), and the B-2 (future) operational at the 

same time. But the most important insight to derive from 

the figure is the relationship among weapons systems 

decisions, the type of force in place or projected to be 

in place, and the potential unsuitability of that force 

with respect to shifts in foreign policy. For example, 

the Cold War current force that was developed and 

acquired to defeat the Soviet threat in central Europe 

is still in existence today and is projected to remain in 

the active components until 2015, longer in the reserve 

components. 
19

	 1970	 1980	 1990	 1993	 1996	 2000	 2002	 2020	 2030+Foreign	 	 Détente	 Bipolar	 Unipolar	Multilateral	 Engagement	 UnilateralUnilateral--?--?--?--?Policy	 	 Confront	Regional	Engagement	 U.S.-Led	Selected	Preemptive	 	 	 Balance	Enlargement	 Coalition	EngageCurrent	 RDT&E*---20%------80%-------95%-----------80%-------------------40%----ReserveForce	Transition	 	 RDT&E*----- 5%-----------20%-----------------------50%----80%-----25%>ForceFuture	 	 	 	 	 RDT&E*-----------------10%--------20%----75%Force*Indicates decision points to develop technology, weapons systems, and force structure for future fielding.

Sources: The White House, National Security Strategy of the United States for the years 1988 through 2000; The 1998 Annual Report on The Army After Next Project, Knowledge and Speed: Battle Force and the U.S. Army of 2025; Department of the Army: United States Army Transformation Campaign Plan, dated April 2001; Department of the Air Force, Global Engagement: A Vision for the 21st Century Air Force.

Figure 1. Foreign Policy and Weapons Acquisition/Force Structure Development.
20

As of this writing, the nation is involved in the 

GWOT that involves military action in a host of 

countries. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld is 

pressuring the services to transform, to think about 

possible futures, and to acquire military technology 

that will give the nation a decisive advantage “across 

the full spectrum” of warfare.62 As the current war on 

terror illustrates, the Cold War legacy force does not 

provide the right fit, but it is available and the Bush 

administration has had to adjust its policy options 

accordingly.63 There have been significant increases 

in the defense budget to acquire the technology and 

capabilities the military needs today. However, as 

Figure 1 illustrates, the technology and force structure 

the military has on the drawing boards today will not 

translate into actual capabilities in any meaningful way 

until 2020 and beyond. Will the current foreign and 

national security policies in force today still be valid 

15 to 20 years into the future? If recent history is any 

guide, the answer is no. The military is researching and 

developing weapons technologies that it needs now, 

but which, when fielded, may not have the right mix 

of capabilities that as yet unanticipated future policy 

options may require. Put differently, the military is 

developing and acquiring the future’s legacy force. 

ACCOUNTING FOR POLICY LAG

While a number of factors contribute to policy lag, 

three are particularly important; namely, the planning 

horizon involved and the number of players in the 

two processes; the budget process they operate within; 

and the predictability of the outcomes of each process. 

Understanding how weapons systems decisions 

precede foreign policy decisions by lengthy intervals 
21

is important to understanding the role that military 

transformation plays in shaping the nation’s future 

foreign policy and national security strategy.

Planning Horizons.

Foreign policy and national security strategy tend 

to have short planning horizons when compared to 

weapon system and force structure development. First, 

policy decisions are governed by the structure of the 

federal government and its political process, whereas 

weapon system and force structure decisions tend to 

be relatively isolated from this process. Second, foreign 

policy and national security strategy formulation tend to 

be White House-centered, while their implementation 

is decentralized. Weapon system and force structure 

planning and execution decisions revolve around the 

military’s preferences. Last, foreign policy and national 

security decisions are visible and subject to censure by 

the electorate, while weapons systems decisions are 

seldom subjected to public scrutiny. The discussion 

that follows elaborates on these distinctions.

The structure of America’s political system works 

against the development of long-range foreign and 

national security policy. Policymakers themselves 

are subject to wholesale change every 6 to 8 years. 

Congressional elections occur every 2 years, presidential 

elections every 4 years, and senatorial elections every 

6 years. Although the chances are slim that the entire 

elected leadership of the country would change in any 

given 8-year period, leadership changes do occur quite 

frequently, and with them changes in foreign policy.64

Figure 1 reflects a 13-year post-Cold War period 

involving three presidents and six nuanced orientations 

in national security policy. Responsibility for the 

formulation and execution of foreign and national 
22

security policy is shared among the various branches 

of government, but rests especially the executive and 

legislative branches. For example, while the president 

can initiate a treaty, the Senate has to ratify it before it is 

formally binding on the nation. Likewise, the president 

can lead the nation into a war, but he cannot declare 

war—that requires an act of Congress.65 The individual 

states play a minor role in the development of foreign 

policy. They offer tax incentives to lure major foreign 

investment, and they exchange trade delegations 

with other nations.66 Within the states, major cities 

such as New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Boston 

negotiate with foreign nations and establish bilateral 

trade and cultural events. The nature of the political 

process that governs the development of foreign and 

national security policy is even more complicating.67

Commenting on the impact of the federal bureaucracy 

on foreign policy, Henry Kissinger wrote:

The American foreign policy bureaucracy is for the 

most part staffed by individuals who have dedicated 

themselves to what is, in American society, a rather 

unorthodox career so that they may promulgate and 

implement their views of a better world. Their opinions, 

moreover, are honed by a system in which policy 

emerges from bureaucratic struggles, which, as Secretary 

of State George Shultz later pointed out, are never finally 

settled. Segmented into a series of individual, and at time 

isolated, initiatives geared to highly specific problems, 

American foreign policy is rarely approached from the 

point of view of an overall concept. Ad hoc departmental 

approaches have more—and more passionate—

spokesmen than does an overall strategy, which often 

has no spokesman at all.68

Other writers have commented on the shortterm orientation of American foreign policy, as well. 

Bruce Russett states that foreign policy measures are 
23

governed largely by domestic policy, “because they 

gratify friends and disarm adversaries at home, not 

because they necessarily seem sensible in some abstract 

principle of the national interests abroad. Furthermore, 

the political horizon shaping those decisions is 

typically a short one, not a vision for the long haul.”69

Additionally, changes in foreign and national security 

policy tend to be incremental and thus support a shortterm vision. As Herbert Simon stated in 1957, political 

decisionmaking is not truly rational, since it is impossible 

to know and process all the information and variables 

that impact on a given issue. Thus, in Simon’s view, 

political decisionmaking occurs in an environment of 

“bounded rationality,” with decisionmaking based on 

the best but partial information available at the time. 

Simon referred to this decisionmaking as “satisficing”; 

that is, picking the course of action that will meet the 

requirements. Expanding on Simon’s concept, Charles 

Lindblom postulated that policy decisions are made by 

marginal analysis in which policies are compared to 

one another and agreement is made on means rather 

than on ends. This “muddling through” phenomenon, 

according to Lindblom, largely accounts for the 

incremental nature of policy changes, as only small 

departures from existing policies are acceptable in the 

face of uncertainties and unclear goals.70

Though numerous actors participate in the foreign 

policy process, the process remains White Housecentered.71 But, as explained above, the president is 

constrained in the initiation of foreign and national 

security policy by the structure of the government and 

the nature of its operation. Even within the executive 

branch, the president’s ability to conduct long-term 

planning is constrained by the agencies he has to work 

with. In the post-Cold War era, the State Department 
24

has proven largely unproductive in developing longrange plans and viable policy. This is due in part to its 

structure as well as to the culture of the organization.72

Most of the State Department’s efforts are spent on 

putting out fires.73 The National Security Council (NSC) 

staff does not focus on long-term planning, either. “The 

NSC staff is small compared to other governmental 

organizations and incredibly overworked. The staff 

responds to the needs of the national security advisor 

and the president who are primarily preoccupied 

with responding to immediate events and day-to-day 

governing. Consequently, there is little time, interest, 

or reward involved in long-term planning.”74

Additionally, a president’s foreign policy agenda is 

governed by what scholars refer to as the presidential 

life cycle, or that period of time when congressional 

lines have not hardened, and the president can work 

foreign policy, national security, and domestic agenda 

issues in a more bipartisan manner. This period can 

last for as little as 3 to 4 months or, in exceptional cases, 

extend for as long as a year.75 Given the short duration 

of the bipartisan phase of the presidential life cycle, 

a president seeking reelection will feel pressed to 

implement those policies that will have a positive effect 

on his chances at the polls. Long-term policies whose 

effects are difficult to measure do little to promote a 

president’s reelection or his party’s political agenda. 

Bruce Russett made the case in 1990 that presidents 

often implement foreign policy measures for purely 

partisan purposes:

A president may impose a grain embargo less to influence 

the Soviet Union than to impress voters at home with his 

toughness against a militarily active foreign adversary; 

a subsequent president may repeal the embargo far less 

because it has achieved its stated foreign policy purpose 
25

than because he needs the domestic political support of 

growers and shippers of grain, and of the members of 

Congress from their states.76

Russett goes on to claim that presidents use the armed 

forces in much the same manner. A show of force, if used 

properly, can rally public opinion and the Congress to 

the side of the president during a crisis and assist him 

in furthering his domestic agenda in its aftermath.77

Moreover, a president’s policies, both foreign and 

domestic, are opened to scrutiny by Congress, the 

news media, and the public.78 Additionally, his party’s 

chances at the polls are affected by his policies and 

their approval by the public. Collectively, these factors 

contribute to the short-term focus of American foreign 

policy. 

The weapon systems and force structure development process does not labor under the same constraints 

that the foreign policy process does. First, the number 

of actors in the process is comparatively limited. 

They consist of the president; the White House staff 

including the NSC and the Office of Science and 

Technology; Office of the Secretary of Defense; 

Defense Science Board; Joints Chiefs of Staff; the 

three military departments (technically the Marine 

Corps is subordinate to the Department of the Navy); 

the Combatant Commanders (formerly known as 

Commanders-in-Chiefs [CINCs]); defense contractors; 

the research and development community consisting 

of government, private, and government-sponsored 

university researchers; and select members of Congress 

serving on committees dealing with weapons systems 

RDT&E and acquisition.79 Although the number of 

actors may seem large at first glance, it is small compared 

to the numbers who play in the foreign policy process. 
26

Moreover, with the exception of the few elected or 

appointed actors such as members of Congress and 

the Secretary of Defense, most of the participants in 

the weapons systems and force structure development 

process are immune from electoral politics. Not having 

to answer to the electorate, they can focus on the longterm aspects of weapons systems development and the 

bona fide merits or demerits of the systems proposed.

The weapons community mentioned above, often 

referred to as the “military-industrial complex,” is 

focused on relatively narrow issues such as the design 

and development of new weapons systems.80 This 

circumscribed approach facilitates long-term planning, 

as the actors involved do not have to worry about the 

interests of those external to the process. The details of 

weapons systems R&D tend to be highly technical and 

arcane, which means players outside of the issue area 

seldom question them. Based on the recommendations 

of the military services, Congress annually appropriates 

funds for R&D, which, in turn, are applied to specific 

weapon programs development. Over the systems’ 

developmental life span (10-15 years depending on the 

system), the cost sunk in R&D and prototype testing 

can become substantial, so much so that these costs 

often argue against canceling the system, even when 

its utility is in doubt. The development of the B-1 and 

the B-2 are cases in point. Additionally, individual 

members of Congress are quick to recognize the job 

and growth benefits that prolonged weapons systems 

development and acquisition bring to their districts: 

“It is not uncommon to find the Congress insisting that 

‘the nation needs’ a particular weapons system that 

the president, the secretary of defense, and the head of 

the armed services that would use the system all insist 

they do not need or want.”81
27

Furthermore, the military’s RDT&E, acquisition, 

and force structure planning process is Pentagoncentered and not subject to the same public scrutiny that 

the foreign policy process is. The military determines 

what weapon system technologies to develop and then 

recommends from among them which ones DoD should 

acquire, with relatively little or no outside interference.82 This is not to say that Congress and the news 

media give the military a free ride. Former Senator 

William Proxmire initiated the “Golden Fleece Award” 

to highlight waste, fraud, and abuse on the part of 

the government to the public and to the media. Yet, 

uncovering 600 dollar hammers and 1,200 dollar toilet 

seats, while sensational and indicative of over-billing by 

defense contractors on the one hand and poor contract 

supervision by the military on the other, does little to 

reconcile national security strategy development with 

weapon systems development.83 Moreover, it does 

not affect the military’s RDT&E, acquisition, or force 

structure development process in any substantive 

way. The decisions on what weapons systems to 

develop, and acquire, and how to structure America’s 

armed forces to use them remain with the military.84

“In the United States, weapons are not purchased by 

the secretary of defense for all the armed services, but 

by the individual services themselves.”85

Taken together, the relatively small number of actors 

(admittedly all actors are not equal), their insulation 

from the electoral process, the technical and arcane 

nature of weapon system development, the distribution 

of research funds and accumulation of sunk costs over 

a period of years, the economic benefits of long-term 

development to congressmen from recipient districts, 

and the closed nature of the decisionmaking process, 

all lend themselves to a long-term planning horizon in 

the weapons systems development process. 
28

Another factor contributing to the difference in the 

nature of the planning process between foreign policy 

and weapons system policy is the nature of the budget 

cycle they operate on, a subject for the next section.

Budgeting Process.

Most government agencies, the State Department 

included, operate on a budget cycle that covers 3 

years. In the current year they are executing one 

budget, presenting next year’s budget to the president 

and Congress for approval and appropriations, and 

formulating the budget for the year after that. Most 

governmental agencies have to navigate their way 

through the congressional budgetary system in order 

to secure the monies they need for their programs. 

This involves an authorization process in which 

they justify to one congressional committee the need 

for the program; and to a different congressional 

committee as part of an appropriations process in 

which they justify the cost of the programs they 

want to implement.86 Often, the authorization and 

appropriations processes overlap. The congressional 

committees seldom coordinate with one another, and 

it is not unusual to have members of Congress on the 

authorization committee approve a program, only 

to have members on the appropriations committee, 

due to partisan issues, refuse to fund it. At any point 

in this process, the program is subject to bargaining, 

compromise, and the necessity for coalition-building.87

While agencies may plan for programs beyond 3 

years, the earliest they can get them authorized is 2 

years in advance. Anything beyond that is subject to 

the winds of political change and the impact of interest 

groups clamoring for inclusion among those receiving 
29

the benefits. Consequently, the budget cycle and the 

political factors that affect it do not reward long-term 

planning within most government agencies.88

Within DoD, however, the budget planning system 

is much more systematic and long-term oriented.89 The 

services plan for the far term (25 years), the mid-term 

(16 years), and the near term (6 years).90 The services 

go through the same congressional authorization and 

appropriations committees’ process, except that their 

committees are dedicated to defense and the armed 

services. Like the committees that deal with the rest of 

government, those that deal with defense have the same 

coordination and synchronization problems. However, 

the military has three advantages in the budgeting 

process which facilitate long-term planning for RDT&E, 

acquisition, and force structure decisions. First, the 

military’s expertise is seldom challenged. Congress may 

quibble over how many of a certain type of weapon the 

military wants, but not on whether the military needs 

it. Recent decisions on procurement of a new nuclear 

carrier for the Navy, a new armed reconnaissance 

helicopter for the Army, and a new advance fighter 

for the Air Force indicate the services’ unchallenged 

discretion in the weapon systems development process, 

given that the threat these three systems were designed 

to defeat no longer exists.91 Second, the participants in 

the weapon systems authorization and appropriations 

process are relatively closed groups that share the same 

interests. Consequently, dissent rarely occurs among 

those called to testify before Congress. Moreover, the 

chairmen of the various armed services committees, if 

not all the members, are from districts and states that 

have been favorably blessed by defense spending. 

Finally, the jargon the weapon systems/force structure 

advocates speak and the process (Program Planning 
30

Budgeting System, or PPBS) they use to identify, 

justify, and acquire their preferred weapons systems 

are complicated, tedious, and arcane. Taken together, 

these three advantages of the military services facilitate 

their weapon system RDT&E, acquisition, and force 

structure long-term planning. 

The services present their budget plans to Congress 

specifying what weapons systems they intend to develop and the long-term plan to research, test, and 

acquire them. Along with this plan, the military 

submits the estimated cost of the system amortized 

over the length of the RDT&E, acquisition, and fielding 

period. Unlike civilian governmental agencies whose 

appropriations cover 1 year, military appropriations 

habitually cover 2 years.92 It is not unusual for Congress 

to fund most of the life-cycle R&D costs in the first several 

years of a weapons development. In the case of the B1 mentioned earlier, Congress approved 78 percent of 

its costs before the first aircraft was flown.93 Similarly, 

between 1984 and 2002, Congress appropriated/

funded over $5.9 billion for R&D on a new Comanche

armed scout helicopter for the Army.94 Eighteen years 

in the making, the program was cancelled in 2004 before 

the military received its first operational model. The 

B-1’s acquisition and that of the Comanche helicopter 

are just two of many cases illustrating the strength of 

the military services in realizing their weapon systems 

preferences in the budgetary process and the ability 

of the military to sustain long-term planning for 

RDT&E, acquisition, and force structure development. 

However, this drawn-out process has certain benefits. 

Defense spending brings with it economic benefits to 

the legislators and their districts.

While the benefits that members of Congress accrue 

for their constituents from foreign policy often are 
31

intangible and impossible to measure, those derived 

from weapon systems and force structure development 

are more concrete. Employment is one of the key benefits 

a congressional leader can bring to his district or state. 

Defense spending plays a major role in employment 

within the United States. Every $1 billion in defense 

expenditures creates between 25,000 and 55,000 jobs, 

depending on whether the calculation includes indirect 

employment effects.95 In 1990, DoD spent over $300 

billion per year; employed over four million people 

(60 percent of all full-time government employees); 

accounted for 30 percent of all Federal expenditures; 

and had over 900 bases, facilities, and properties.96 In 

the year 2000, the personnel figures were lower, but the 

dollar amount was not. DoD employed just fewer than 

three million personnel (2,952,000) and had a budget of 

$291 billion, of which $163.7 billion, or more than half, 

were spent on RDT&E and procurement, which can be 

equated directly to jobs.97 There is a strong correlation 

between the defense payroll or weapons spending 

in a state and congressional voting practices. Some 

members of Congress, expecting their district or state 

to receive substantial contract awards, request that the 

contract award announcement be timed to coincide 

as closely as possible to the congressman’s campaign 

schedule.98 Although not every congressman courts 

the military and defense contracts, those who sit on the 

various armed service committees tend to come from 

districts/states that have a concentration of defense 

contractors.99

The magnitude of defense spending in the United 

States and its very tangible benefits provide legislators 

with strong incentives to support weapons systems 

development, especially if the development and 

acquisition will occur over an extended period. This 
32

benefit is magnified if the weapons system will become 

part of a force structure that is based in the legislator’s 

state/district. Besides direct compensation to the various states for salaries and wages, DoD provides defense 

grants to state and local governments, retired military 

pay, and procurement and research grants. All told, 

defense spending in 2002 accounted for 16.2 percent 

of all federal spending. Excluding programs mandated 

by law, the discretionary budget, defense expenditures 

in 2002 accounted for almost 61 percent of the federal 

budget.100 Given the amount of dollars that flow out 

of DoD for weapons systems and forces structure, it 

is not surprising to find strong legislative support for 

weapons systems with extended development and 

fielding times, those systems that will remain in the 

inventory for some time.

Predictability.

The final factor contributing to the lag of foreign 

and national security policy behind the military’s 

long-term weapons systems development, acquisition, 

and force structure programs deals with programs 

that are tangible and predictable as opposed to those 

that are not. Foreign policy often addresses issues in 

the humanitarian world. It is more difficult for the 

foreign policy community to articulate and justify the 

commitment of resources to a particular humanitarian 

program when its outcomes in the near term, let alone 

the far term, are uncertain and difficult to predict and 

measure. For example, U.S. intervention in Bosnia to 

prevent ethnic cleansing, establish peace, and promote 

democracy continues to be a drain on the nation’s 

economic and military resources (albeit to a lesser extent 

now). While public and congressional support for the 
33

Bosnian intervention still exists, it becomes increasingly 

difficult to justify in terms of national interests and to 

the electorate as the years go by. Will ethnic tensions 

erupt when the U.S.-led coalition departs? How do we 

know that it will not, and what measurement tool do we 

use? When will democracy take hold in Bosnia? If so, 

what type of democracy? What aspects of civil society 

must be in place for democracy to prosper? No one can 

answer these questions with any certainty; there are 

too many murky variables to predict an outcome. 

Foreign policy deals with states and nations, 

composed of human beings representing various 

cultures and civilizations. A policy directed toward a 

state affects its people and, unlike inanimate objects, 

people often respond in unpredictable ways. Consider 

the pre-September 11, 2001 (9/11) policy toward North 

Korea. U.S. policy had been aimed at encouraging 

North Korea to forsake a nuclear program capable 

of producing weapons-grade plutonium in favor 

of a nuclear energy program under the auspices of 

the International Atomic Energy Agency. In return 

for participating in this program, the United States 

encouraged its allies to open a trade dialogue with 

the recalcitrant communist state in order to promote 

regional stability.101 This policy, initiated by President 

Bill Clinton in 1994, changed almost overnight when 

President George W. Bush denounced North Korea 

as a member of the “Axis of Evil” in the immediate 

aftermath of 9/11. North Korea reacted to this 

accusation in a belligerent manner. Now, instead 

of limiting nuclear weapons, North Korea is more 

active and open in pursuing its own nuclear weapons 

program along with the capability to target the United 

States and its allies.102 Also, the North Koreans might 

export the nuclear weapons technology they acquire, 
34

if not the weapons themselves, to rogue states and 

terrorist groups.103 Consequently, a U.S. policy based 

on deterring nuclear proliferation has changed to one 

based on preempting nuclear proliferation through the 

use of force if necessary and recently has reverted to 

multiparty negotiations. These policy swings apply 

beyond Korea to a growing number of potentially 

hostile states capable of acquiring these weapons and 

their delivery systems.104

What the Bosnia and North Korea examples 

illustrate is how often foreign policy can change either 

with the advent of a new administration having a 

different world view or with a single seismic event. 

The number of independent variables a foreign policy 

planner has to deal with is daunting, and many are 

difficult to assess. Moreover, the legislative branch, 

with its narrower focus, contributes to the constant flux 

in U.S. foreign and national security policy. Because 

these factors involve human beings who react in often 

unpredictable ways, they argue for a short-term focus 

in the foreign and national security planning process. 

The weapon systems and force structure development 

process is less turbulent and more predictable since 

it deals in the realm of the science, where objects are 

more tractable.105

 Weapon systems and force structure development 

operate in the realm of science, physics, and mathematics. A weapon system may have people in the loop when 

it is operating, but the system proper, whether it is a 

rifle, missile, aircraft, or ship, is composed of elements 

subject to physically engineered controls. Even those 

systems that feature artificial intelligence, the socalled “smart” and “brilliant” weapons systems, are 

composed of man-made material with a programmed 

range of responses.106 In brief, the development 
35

process uses the scientific method. Weapon developers 

can control the environment and the independent 

variables associated with the systems operation, and 

the procedures and test results are reproducible, 

given the variables they control. Moreover, weapon 

system development follows a formalized procedure 

consisting of several fixed steps: identifying the 

operational requirement; validating its need; full-scale 

development; performance testing; operational testing; 

and fielding and operations.107

Additionally, the military has institutionalized 

the same procedure in its organizational structure. 

In an effort to obtain economy and weapon system 

interoperability across the services, the Joint Staff 

established the Joint Requirements Oversight Council 

(JROC) and the Joint Capabilities Integration and 

Development System (JCIDS) program. These two 

measures enabled the Joint Staff to accomplish the 

first two steps in the weapon development procedure, 

namely, the identification of a requirement and 

its validation.108 Weapons systems identified and 

validated through this process are funded for further 

development and worked into future force structure 

requirements. Though not perfect, the process, 

methods, and organization allow the military to 

acquire weapons systems and develop force structure 

in a systematic, cost-justifiable, and deliberate manner. 

Moreover, the weapon system capabilities vis-à-vis 

the threat they are designed to defeat are predictable, 

a big advantage in the policy struggle at the national 

level. Taken together, the factors described above 

allow the military to forecast its weapon system and 

force structure development well into the future with a 

high degree of probability that it will come to fruition. 

In addition to the military having almost exclusive 
36

jurisdiction over weapons systems decisions and the 

differences in planning horizons between national 

security strategy/foreign policy and weapons systems 

procurement, a third factor that is skewing U.S. defense 

transformation is the military’s and DoD’s almost 

exclusive focus on network centric warfare.

NETWORK CENTRIC WARFARE AND THE 

FUTURE OF DEFENSE TRANSFORMATION

Enamored with the potentially decisive advantage 

that information dominance and precision munitions 

offered in conventional warfare, the military used 

the 1990s to develop the material underpinnings of 

what would become network centric warfare (NCW). 

Throughout the first decade of the post-Cold War era, 

the military maintained its major weapons systems 

preferences. The Navy continued to procure new 

aircraft carriers; the Air Force, new bombers and fighterbombers; and the Army, new attack helicopters. While 

resembling their Cold War counterparts in appearance, 

these weapons systems had significantly enhanced 

capabilities. Many of these systems featured radardefeating technology (stealth) and carried a new and 

advanced family of precision munitions. Additionally, 

they were linked to an array of overhead intelligence/

target gathering platforms that were interconnected 

by secure computers, which provided various users 

at different command levels a common view of the 

battlespace.109 American superiority in emerging 

information/intelligence gathering and precision strike 

technology allowed America’s leaders to detect threats, 

identify targets, and quickly strike them. If attacked, 

the accuracy and power of the munitions virtually 

ensured the target’s destruction. The military codified 
37

this type of warfare in the term NCW.110 According to 

NCW’s authors:

We define NCW as an information superiority-enabled 

concept of operations that generates increased combat 

power by networking sensors, decisionmakers, and 

shooters to achieve shared awareness, increased speed 

of command, higher tempo of operations, greater 

lethality, increased survivability, and a degree of selfsynchronization. In essence, NCW translates information 

superiority into combat power by effectively linking 

knowledgeable entities in the battlespace.111

NCW encapsulates four capabilities that the 

military has pursued for over 25 years, and whose 

recent development technology has accelerated. The 

first is information dominance. All militaries seek to 

gain intelligence on their potential enemies in order 

to determine their size, equipment, capabilities, and 

intentions. Simultaneously, they have attempted to 

deny the enemy information on themselves. Knowledge 

is power, and its acquisition or lack thereof vis-à-vis the 

enemy often determines victory or defeat in combat. 

America’s dominance in space-based and aerial highresolution intelligence systems provides it with an 

unmatched information acquisition capability. Second, 

the military continuously has sought to increase the 

accuracy of the weapons systems it employs. One 

round—one hit—one kill is a goal the military has 

sought for some time.112 Precision munitions not only 

ensure enemy targets are destroyed, but also they 

minimize collateral damage (the damage done to 

noncombatants).113 In theory, precision munitions are 

more economical and efficient, thus freeing weapons 

systems to strike multiple enemy targets simultaneously, and reducing the overall number of weapons 
38

systems in the force structure. For example, during 

Operation DESERT STORM, only 9 percent of the 

munitions used were “smart” or precision munitions.114

Consequently, the Air Force allocated 10 or more aircraft 

to each target. Twelve years later during Operation 

IRAQI FREEDOM, precision munitions accounted for 

over 70 percent of the bombs dropped, and the Air 

Force was able to allocate just two aircraft per target.115

Although the military’s overall force structure shrank 

during the first decade of the post-Cold War era due 

to the advent of enhanced precisions weapons, the 

military’s overall capability, lethality, and effectiveness 

increased.

Third, the military emphasized speed in the 

conduct of its operations. Besides being able to move, 

shoot, and communicate faster than the enemy, the 

armed forces had to think and decide faster than their 

opponents, too. During the Cold War, the military 

invested in weapons systems that were faster, more 

maneuverable, more mechanically reliable, and more 

survivable than anything the Soviet Union could 

field. However, the drive for technological superiority 

did not stop with the end of the Cold War. Instead, 

scientific advances in computer and space-based 

systems propelled weapon system development 

forward. Speed of operations encompasses more than 

fast equipment, it describes how the United States 

plans to pursue its military campaigns. The military 

intends to use the enhanced capabilities of its weapons, 

intelligence, and command and control systems to 

conduct operations simultaneously and continuously 

against an enemy’s political, economic, military, and 

social-psychological-informational centers of power.116

Information dominance and the ability to share it in 

real time at all levels from the White House to the 
39

battalion level provide leaders with a common view 

of the battlespace. This capability allows leaders to 

employ their weapons systems to achieve synergism in 

time, space, purpose, and effect.117 Together, enhanced 

weapons systems combined with precision munitions, 

information dominance, and the ability to decide and 

act rapidly provide the United States with a decisive 

edge over any potential enemy attempting to challenge 

it symmetrically.118

Additionally, the military has continued to 

emphasize the importance of air-and-space-based 

weapons systems in its strategic and operational 

approach to warfare. Airpower has several attractive 

features. First, it can self-deploy to a theater of operations 

and operate from nearby bases in the region, or in the 

case of naval aviation, operate from an aircraft carrier. 

B-2 bombers, with aerial refueling en-route and return, 

can launch their attacks from the continental United 

States, thus obviating the need for overseas bases. 

Second, air power can be used almost immediately 

after political leaders decide that a military response is 

necessary. Third, air power, supported by space-andground-based intelligence systems capable of providing 

digitally transmitted target data to aircraft weapons 

systems in real time, provides political leaders and 

senior military commanders with a much-enhanced 

target discriminating capability.119 Instead of leveling 

an entire section of a residential or industrial area to 

destroy a target, the aircraft equipped with Joint Direct 

Attack Munitions (JDAMS) can land a bomb within 

feet of the aim point. Additionally, formerly difficult 

targets are now vulnerable. Consequently, air power’s 

precision capabilities minimize civilian casualties 

and suffering.120 Last, extended-range precision 

munitions allow aircraft to deliver their attack outside 
40

of an enemy’s air defense capability. Add to this a 

stealth capability, and the Air Force has the ability 

to remain undetected as well. The cumulative effects 

of long-range precision munitions, high-resolution 

overhead target acquisition, and radar defeating 

technologies provide the Air Force with a “stand off” 

advantage (the ability to hit the enemy without being 

hit in return), and minimize the probability of U.S. 

casualties.121 During the Clinton administration, air 

power and cruise missiles (launched from ships and 

planes) were the primary response to terrorist threats 

and attacks against U.S. interests.122 When the terrorist 

attacks occurred on 9/11, the military lacked a specific 

plan for operations in Afghanistan. However, the 

capabilities inherent in the military’s technology and 

force structure enabled President Bush to commence 

combat operations in Afghanistan on October 7, 2001, 

less than a month later. 

Within days of the commencement of military 

operations, American airpower employing a variety of 

air- and sea-launched precision munitions eliminated 

the Taliban’s air force, air defense system, and key 

communications systems.123 Simultaneously, Afghan 

opposition forces supported by U.S. special operations 

force (SOF) teams and close air support launched a 

ground offensive against the Taliban and al-Qa’ida 

forces. The military used air power and precisions 

munitions to isolate the enemy on the battlefield, 

prevent him from reinforcing his positions, deny him 

information on U.S. and allied forces, and ultimately to 

destroy him.124 In December 2001, with the battlefield 

isolated and the Northern alliance pressing the Taliban 

and al-Qa’ida fighters, the United States began deploying U.S. Marines (later Army forces) from the carrier 

battle groups located in the Indian Ocean to secure 
41

key airheads and lodgment areas in Afghanistan.125 In 

addition to direct combat operations, the United States 

distributed thousands of tons of medical and food 

supplies to the Afghan people. These humanitarian 

operations were part of a psychological operations 

campaign to convince the people that U.S. combat 

operations were targeted against the Taliban and alQa’ida forces, and not them.126 The military conducted 

its operations with dazzling speed. American aircraft 

operated around the clock. In the space of 2 years, 

the targeting cycle for Tomahawk land attack missiles 

(TLAMs or cruise missiles) had been reduced from 101 

minutes during operations in Kosovo to 19 minutes in 

Operation ENDURING FREEDOM (Afghanistan).127

U.S forces moved about the country by air to close 

rapidly with identified enemy forces. In less than 6 

months, the Taliban had been removed from power, 

and the al-Qa’ida network in Afghanistan had been 

largely destroyed.128

The military’s success in Afghanistan demonstrated 

its technological superiority and the influence it had on 

the nation’s foreign policy. The campaign was fought 

differently than previous conflicts. Operations featured 

surrogate ground forces, U.S. airpower, information 

dominance, and precision munitions.129 The unique 

mix and synchronization of these elements during 

the fighting encouraged some observers to categorize 

the Afghan operations as a “New American Way of 

War.”130 President Bush clearly was impressed by the 

military’s weapons systems and operational prowess. 

In a December 2001 speech at the Citadel, President 

Bush declared, 

Afghanistan has been a proving ground for this new 

approach. These past 2 months have shown that an 

innovative doctrine and high-tech weaponry can shape 
42

and then dominate an unconventional conflict. . . . The 

conflict in Afghanistan has taught us more about the 

future of our military than a decade of blue ribbon 

panels and think-tank symposiums. . . . When all of 

our military can continuously locate and track moving 

targets—with surveillance from space—warfare will be 

truly revolutionized.131

Critics of the Bush administration’s conduct of the 

war in Afghanistan argue that the President and 

his team have relied too heavily on the military’s 

high-tech capabilities to attain political objectives 

that might have been better served by other 

instruments of power.132 Frederick Kagan in “War 

and Aftermath” claims that President Bush’s vision 

of war 

. . . focuses on destroying the enemy’s armed forces 

and his ability to command them and control them. It 

does not focus on the problem of achieving political 

objectives. The advocates of a “New American Way of 

War,” Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Bush 

chief among them, have attempted to simplify war into 

a targeting drill. They see the enemy as a target set and 

believe that when all or most of the targets have been hit, 

he [the enemy] will inevitably surrender and American 

goals will be achieved.133

What type of war did America enter into in 

Afghanistan and what political objectives governed 

U.S. military action? Answering this question is an 

essential step to establishing a sound strategy and 

identifying the means (resources) to employ. That the 

means should influence the ends is axiomatic. However, 

in Afghanistan, it appears that military action became 

an end in itself. War, some observers say, is about 

killing people and breaking things. This trite statement 

is wrong. Combat operations are about killing people 

and breaking things; however, war is an act of policy 
43

and entails much more than military operations.134

Clausewitz states that each war has its own nature, and 

it is wise to know the nature of the war you are about 

to enter before undertaking it.135 Even with the most 

high-tech military in the world, the U.S. military was 

unable to kill or capture Osama bin Laden and many 

of his lieutenants (a strong tacitly implied mission in 

Bush’s decision to invade Afghanistan). Moreover, 

Afghanistan still is not stable. President Karzai’s central 

government has almost no extractive capability outside 

of Kabul, and its political legitimacy depends heavily 

on the continued presence of U.S. military forces.136

Currently, the Taliban is staging a resurgence in the 

countryside, and fighting continues against pockets 

of Taliban and al-Qa’ida resistance.137 In light of these 

developments, it is reasonable to question whether 

U.S. leaders ever considered the nature of the war 

they led America into, or if they simply relied on the 

military’s technological capabilities as a substitute for 

cogent foreign policy objectives. The decision to topple 

Hussein’s regime just after combat operations began 

in Afghanistan further supports the claim asserted 

here that the military’s high-tech weapons systems 

and capabilities heavily influence America’s approach 

to national security and foreign policy.138 Moreover, 

given that defense transformation is occurring with 

little or no regard to policy, it is likely that this trend 

will continue. 

The decision to invade Iraq on March 19, 2003, and 

the reasons for that decision are complex, controversial, 

and hotly debated as of this writing. What is not being 

debated is the revalidation of America’s military 

supremacy. The U.S.-led invasion featured Special 

Forces, omnipresent airpower, precision munitions 

delivered from the air and sea, four Army division 
44

equivalents, and a space-based computer-driven 

intelligence/targeting system that provided all the 

U.S. forces with the same near real-time picture of 

the battlespace.139 Using advanced weapons systems 

and bold operational maneuver, U.S. and British 

forces conquered Iraq in just over 6 weeks. As with 

Afghanistan, the U.S. Air Force and Navy quickly 

destroyed what remained of the Iraqi Air Force and 

its air defense system. Simultaneously, a U.S Army 

mechanized infantry division and a Marine infantry 

division raced toward Baghdad on either side of the 

Euphrates River, while a British mechanized division 

seized the critical port city of Basra and its nearby 

oil fields.140 The Air Force supported each of these 

ground thrusts with vast amounts of close air support 

armed with precision munitions such as JDAMS and 

Paveway bombs.141 Although, the Iraqi armed forces 

were a shadow of their pre-Operation DESERT 

STORM selves, they still outnumbered the America 

forces in ground troops by a factor of almost four to 

one.142 Iraqi resistance was stiff at times, and bypassed 

pockets of Iraqi soldiers and Fedayeen interfered 

with U.S. lines of supply, causing temporary supply 

delays. Nevertheless, the combination of high-tech 

weapons systems delivering precision munitions, 

airpower, information dominance, and the speed of 

U.S. operations overwhelmed and defeated the Iraqi 

armed forces.143

As brilliant as the American victory was, peace 

enforcement and the reconstruction of Iraq are 

proving much harder.144 Weapons of mass destruction 

have never been found, and a definitive link between 

Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden, and the events of 

9/11 has not been established.145 However, Operation 

IRAQI FREEDOM provided the world, and especially 
45

the Arab states, with an awesome display of American 

military power.146 Unquestionably, the military’s hightech weapons systems, information systems, and the 

capabilities they represent were a major influence on 

Bush’s decision to topple Hussein. In a speech at United 

Defense Industries’ Santa Clara, California, plant on 

May 2, 2003, Bush talked to the importance of weapon 

technology. Using Nazi Germany as an example, he 

said that previously “Military power was used to end 

a regime by breaking a nation.” However, weapons 

technology had progressed exponentially since then, 

such that during Operation IRAQI FREEDOM, the 

United States targeted the Hussein regime and not the 

civilian population.147 The swiftness of the attack sent 

a strong ominous signal to other states in the region 

that harbor terrorists.148 However, as events in the 

Middle East and Iraq have shown, military action, no 

matter how deftly conducted, is a poor substitute for a 

comprehensive foreign policy and grand strategy.149

Having developed a foreign policy that relies 

heavily on America’s military capabilities, President 

Bush has hinted that Iraq may not be the last state 

to undergo regime change at the hands of the U.S. 

military.150 To ensure the United States has the means 

to execute President Bush’s foreign policy, Bush and 

Rumsfeld accelerated the military’s transformation 

program they had begun upon entering office. In 

Rumsfeld’s view, U.S forces were structured to fight 

the Soviet Union, a threat that no longer existed. From 

his perspective, the armed services were hidebound, 

too heavy to deploy rapidly, still individual service 

centric and not joint centric, and wedded to outdated 

operational concepts.151 Although the NCW-based 

transformation of the services has just begun, U.S. 

operations in Afghanistan and Iraq are steps in the 
46

right direction and appear to validate the direction that 

Bush and Rumsfeld see military operations heading. 

In the future, speed, air power, precision munitions, 

and rapidly processed (and shared) information will 

be the hallmarks of U.S. operations.152 As mentioned 

previously, NCW is the concept that articulates how the 

United States will fight future conflicts. To implement 

that concept, all the services must shed the vestiges 

of the past. The Army will have to discard much of 

its heavy armor in favor of weapons systems that are 

deployable rapidly by air, have greater lethality and 

range (over the horizon) than the vehicles they replace, 

and that rely on speed and near-perfect intelligence of 

the enemy for protection instead of heavy steel. The 

Air Force will have to leverage space-based weapons 

systems and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) at the 

expense of manned aircraft. And for its part, the Navy 

must move away from operations based on carrier 

battlegroups and look, instead, to surface action groups 

and arsenal ships. 153 “All the services are working hard 

to implement the technical concepts of Network-Centric 

Warfare in their systems [acquisitions], and even to 

retrofit older systems with the new technology.”154

At issue is not whether the military should transform 

or acquire new technologies—it must. Rather, the 

question is what long-term foreign and national 

security polices should the military be transforming to 

support and what types of technologies will provide 

the military the capabilities that these policies require? 

The weapon technology and force structure that 

are the bedrock of NCW are key variables that have 

enabled the Bush administration to implement its 

unilateral foreign policy and preventive war national 

security strategy, and have been instrumental in 

promoting regime change. The Bush administration is 
47

so enamored with technology that Secretary Rumsfeld 

is pushing the military to transform faster in order to 

implement NCW faster.155

Although Rumsfeld and DoD are attempting to 

shorten the acquisition cycle, most complex weapons 

systems still require 10-plus years to develop and 

field.156 This begs the questions: “In 2015 to 2020, 

when these systems are fielded, will America’s foreign 

policy still be centered on unilateralism, preventive 

war, preemption, and regime change; if not, will these 

weapons systems and force structure be adequate for 

whatever policy is in place or will they limit future 

policy options?” These questions are especially relevant 

in light of the technological limitations and operational 

difficulties that American operations in Afghanistan 

and Iraq have exposed.

As successful as military technology and force 

structure have been in furthering Bush’s foreign 

policy to date, NCW is not without its shortcomings.157

A smaller, faster, more lethal, and high-tech force 

operating with total battlespace awareness may be 

good at toppling state-centric regimes, but it has 

yet to prove very successful in building legitimate 

replacement governments, fighting an insurgency, or 

in establishing democratic and market reforms within 

them.158 Nor has this unmatched military force, despite 

its information dominance, proven capable of toppling 

the more amorphous terrorist regimes. Secretary 

Rumsfeld feels that the military must transform even 

faster if it is to win the war on terror.159 But as events 

in Afghanistan have shown, when a disciplined, 

determined, well-trained opponent expertly uses the 

terrain and his relatively low-tech weapons systems, 

NCW does not work quite as its proponents purport. 

Al-Qa’ida fighters in the Bai Beche and Tora Bora battles 
48

were not cowed by American airpower.160 Most often, 

they repelled initial American and Northern Alliance 

attacks and were defeated only when American and 

Northern Alliance forces used traditional infantrybased fire and maneuver to close with the al-Qa’ida 

fighters to kill or capture them in their positions.161

Likewise, despite its overwhelming technological 

superiority and crushing victory in the combat phase 

of Operation IRAQI FREEDOM, American forces 

have been unable to prevent or defeat the guerrilla 

insurgency that has emerged in Iraq.162

However, these are not the lessons the military 

and many of the civilian leaders in DoD are heeding 

from operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. Focused on 

the direct combat part of war, they are set on acquiring 

weapon technologies that will be instrumental in 

transforming the armed forces into a smaller, more 

lethal, more strategically agile and, thus they argue, a 

more capable force.163 Yet, empirical evidence indicates 

that most of America’s conflicts have been and will 

continue to lie in the shadow land between peace and 

war.164 To support America’s foreign policy objectives, 

the military must be capable of executing the hightech tasks of NCW, as well as the equally demanding 

and important low-tech tasks such as peacekeeping, 

occupation, and nation-building.165 With its reduced 

force levels, the Army is straining under the occupation 

and nation-building missions it has received, while 

attempting to maintain an equitable rotation policy in 

and out of combat zones, sustain the combat readiness 

of its forces for the next contingency mission, and, at 

the same time, transform itself.166 Without a doubt, 

the military should pursue new technologies and 

transformation programs aggressively. But those 

technological and transformation choices should be 
49

informed by future policy direction and the military 

capabilities it requires.167 Instead, the U.S. military and 

DoD appear to be developing a force which will have 

unmatched capabilities for conventional direct combat, 

i.e., killing people, breaking things, and toppling 

regimes; but which will be generally ill-suited for low 

intensity conflict scenarios such as peacekeeping, peace 

enforcement, and nation-building missions.168

CONCLUSION

Ideally, the linkages between foreign policy, grand 

strategy, weapon systems acquisition, and force 

structure should be more formalized and synchronized. 

Greater congressional oversight of the military’s 

decisionmaking concerning the weapons systems 

development and procurement programs, coupled 

with established procedures within and among the 

various congressional committees that address foreign 

policy, national security, and the military, would help 

reduce the apparent inconsistencies both between and 

within presidential administrations. Unfortunately, 

except in times of grave national emergency, the 

structure of the federal government and the pluralism 

inherent in it militate against this type of bi-partisan 

effort. That is not to say that “policy lag” cannot be 

reduced; it can, but at the margins. The effort must 

focus initially on reforming the laborious Defense 

Acquisition System (DAS) and the bureaucracy that 

administers it. To his credit, Secretary Rumsfeld has 

been trying to do exactly that; however, he has met with 

only limited success.169 The nature of the bureaucracy, 

the number of stakeholders in the process (interest 

groups, political actions committees, the RDT&E 

community, etc.), and the political fallout all make 
50

defense acquisition reform difficult, especially when 

the military is engaged in active combat operations. 

Nevertheless, the Secretary of Defense and the military 

must streamline the acquisition process and eliminate/

reduce the bureaucratic procedures and “political 

pork” associated with fielding new equipment and 

weapons systems. 

Technologically-driven transformation has been 

and will remain a trademark of the U.S. military. 

Although most of the rhetoric associated with Defense 

Transformation seems to be closely linked to Secretary 

Rumsfeld and the Bush administration, in reality it is an 

on going process that developed exponentially during 

World War II and was accelerated by the events of the 

Cold War. Since the end of the Cold War, the military’s 

reliance on technologically-advanced weapons 

systems has become even more pronounced, so much 

so that America’s approach to warfighting is defined 

by such technologically arcane terms as “network 

centric warfare” and “effects based operations.” The 

weapons systems, force structure, and concepts that 

undergird the theory of NCW represent only one set of 

military capabilities available to the nation. However, 

the military and DoD are not considering other 

technologies and force structure options seriously.

Initially, combat operations in the GWOT further 

underscored the military’s affinity for high-tech 

weapons systems and DoD’s network centric approach 

to warfighting. Although not without difficulties, 

the application of America’s technological prowess 

during combat operations in Afghanistan and Iraq was 

stunning.170 Currently, all branches of the military are 

increasing the acquisition of advanced technologies 

as they transform to a smaller NCW capable force. 

Additionally, the Bush administration is pursuing a 
51

very aggressive and largely unilateral foreign policy 

that relies heavily on the promises of NCW and the 

technological capabilities of the military.171 But will 

these same military capabilities serve the future policy 

needs of the nation or inhibit them?

The military’s increased reliance on weapon 

system technology and DoD’s embrace of NCW have 

implications for American foreign policy. Unless 

reconciled, the differences in the planning horizons 

between weapons systems acquisition and foreign 

policy will continue to promote policy lag and present 

future leaders with inherited weapons systems and 

force structure. Thus, the military’s weapons systems 

preferences will continue to affect future policy options. 

However, the military’s weapons systems and force 

structure (hence, its capabilities) have not always been 

suited for the missions it has received. Consequently, 

the military’s ability to attain the policy objectives 

assigned it has been questionable. The failure of the 

military’s high-technology forces to obtain policy 

objectives fully in Somalia, Haiti, Kosovo, and most 

recently in Afghanistan and Iraq underscore this claim. 

This trend will most likely continue. Because it takes 

12-15 years (or more) to develop and field a weapon 

system, national leaders will continue to have their 

policy options affected by weapon system acquisitions 

the military made a decade or more previously. 

Contributing to the civilian leadership’s preference 

for the use of military force is the armed services 

responsiveness and adaptability. The speed with 

which information moves, the amount of it, and 

the interaction between peoples and societies that 

technology and globalization promote leave little time 

for national leaders to develop a measured response 

for pressing international situations. The media, world 
52

leaders, Congress, and American citizens clamor for 

an immediate response from the nation’s leadership.172

The military provides the president with a unique 

capability. Whether used to deliver relief supplies or 

bombs, the military can respond almost immediately. 

Although the military’s weapons and force structure 

may not be ideally suited for a particular situation, its 

high-tech capabilities seem to make military action a 

matter of first choice instead of last for the nation’s 

leadership.173

In the post-Cold War era, the military’s 

technologically-driven combat capabilities, coupled 

with the absence of a peer competitor, have been 

instrumental in promoting a unilateral U.S. foreign 

policy that relies heavily on military power to preempt 

potential threats to U.S. interests.174 The military’s 

weapons systems provide unmatched direct combat 

capabilities that it can project almost anywhere in 

the world. Moreover, with its emphasis on precision 

munitions, speed of operations, information dominance, 

and aerial/space systems, the military can single out 

individual military, economic, and political entities 

for destruction, while simultaneously minimizing the 

risk of U.S. casualties and collateral damage.175 This 

capability allowed the Bush administration to topple 

regimes in both Afghanistan and Iraq. Additionally, 

the administration has been able to use the military’s 

capabilities to intimidate/persuade other states (e.g., 

Libya and Syria) with links to terrorist organizations to 

cooperate more fully in GWOT.176

Yet, as enabling as the military’s technological 

capabilities are in one sense, in another they are 

debilitating. In many instances, the military can 

best serve policy in ways other than direct combat. 

Humanitarian relief, peacekeeping, peace enforcement, 
53

counterinsurgency, insurgency, and foreign military 

training (all under the rubric of Military Operations 

Other Than War [MOOTW]) are operations that require 

technological systems and force structures different 

from those needed for high intensity conventional 

combat. High-tech U.S. combat forces can accomplish 

both the direct combat and the MOOTW missions, 

but not simultaneously. MOOTW missions require 

specialized training. Prolonged employment of 

high-tech forces in MOOTW missions degrades the 

combat readiness of the high-tech forces involved. 

A more robust and technologically diversified force 

structure with the capability to perform both high and 

low intensity missions simultaneously would help. 

However, the military, with the full endorsement of 

the Bush administration, is transforming into a smaller, 

faster, more information dominant, and combat 

capable force.177 Although this force structure may be 

superbly equipped for interstate conflict, in the future 

the majority of the missions that the U.S. military most 

likely will perform will be MOOTW missions.178 Military 

operations in Somalia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Iraq 

have shown both the capabilities and limitations of 

high-technology weapons systems in pursuit of policy 

objectives.179

 In pursuing a relatively narrow set of technologies 

such as those encompassed by NCW, DoD is excluding 

other weapons systems and force structure choices, 

which may be more relevant to the types of future 

conflicts the United States is likely to be involved in. 

If the United States is going to prevail in a GWOT, or 

the “Long War” as it is currently referred to, it most 

likely will be involved in more Iraq and Afghanistan 

type scenarios.180 To sustain the war against a global 

insurgency will likely require an increase in ground 
54

forces (Army and Marine), as well as the procurement 

of technologies that will support these forces as they 

engage in combat operations in urban and close terrain. 

However, NCW theory and implementing technologies 

(and the Army’s implementation of it with the Future 

Combat System [FCS]) are predicated on state-centric 

and symmetrical warfare, with political entities whose 

warfighting capabilities resemble those of the United 

States, albeit less technologically advanced. NCW has 

not lived up to its billing in Iraq and Afghanistan against 

insurgents who apply asymmetrical and relatively lowtechnology devices against U.S. forces with increasing 

effectiveness. The military and DoD are only now 

acknowledging that they may be pursuing the wrong 

technological suite, but have yet to come to grips with 

the overall force structure dilemma and acquiring the 

forces capable of sustaining the necessary operational 

tempo to prevail in the “Long War.”181

In order to mitigate the difficulties of aligning 

the military’s weapons systems and force structure 

acquisitions with national strategy and policy objectives, the military must acquire capabilities which 

allow it to fight effectively across the full spectrum of 

conflict. This does not mean the military should prepare 

for all contingencies equally. Rather, it should weigh 

its capabilities in light of future policies and prioritize 

the tasks it most likely will have to accomplish. For 

example, the military’s future force structure may 

include a relatively small number of very high-tech and 

high-cost combat units designed primarily for statecentric warfare (the most dangerous, but least likely 

contingency), and a large number of relatively low-tech 

and medium-cost combat and combat support units 

designed for humanitarian and low intensity warfare 

(the least dangerous, but most likely contingency). 
55

Steven Metz and Raymond Millen caution against 

embracing a single operational concept:

If the United States reaches a point where all that it can 

undertake are rapid decisive operations relying heavily 

on standoff strikes, it will be like a 16th century armored 

knight or mid-20th century battleship—extremely 

adept at a type of combat that has declining strategic 

relevance. Winning 21st century armed conflicts will 

require more than servicing targets. American military 

strategy should thus seek rapid decisive operations but 

also retain the ability to prevail in protracted, complex, 

ambiguous, and asymmetric warfare. To do this requires 

the versatility of landpower.182

During the conventional phase of combat in Afghanistan and Iraq, network centric warfare showed great 

promise; but in subsequent phases, the technology and 

operational concepts have been of little utility in fighting 

insurgencies and terrorist movements. To support the 

nation’s policies effectively, the military must continue 

to pursue a wide range of emerging technologies and 

not become so enamored with a single technological 

concept that it forsakes other capabilities.

RECOMMENDATIONS

To ensure that the U.S. military is transforming 

into a force capable of responding to the full range 

of challenges it will encounter and that it will be able 

provide tomorrow’s political leaders with a broad 

range of military capabilities/responses, national 

leaders should consider implementing the following:

• Improve the coordination/synchronization between and among the congressional committees 

that oversee the defense budget, major weapons 

systems acquisition, service force structure (end-
56

strength) and those committees charged with 

overseeing U.S. foreign policy. Admittedly, this 

recommendation will be a long-term challenge 

for several administrations; but in light of the 

current bitter partisan divide over the war in 

Iraq and Afghanistan, it is an undertaking that 

must begin.

• Transform/reform the Defense Acquisition 

System. Assuming that the technological base 

for a new weapon system is set, there is no reason 

why a weapon system should take 15 to 20 years 

to develop, let alone 29 years as in the case of 

the B-1B bomber. Initial reform actions should 

focus on bureaucratic reduction/elimination 

in order to reduce fielding time. Subsequent 

reform measures should strive to reduce/limit 

the influence of lobbyist and congressional 

pork-barrel maneuvering.

• Defense transformation should seek to expand 

the military’s future capability set by:

—Acquiring a broad range of technologies 

capable of supporting limited conflict 

scenarios (most likely, but least dangerous) as 

well as major conflict scenarios (least likely, 

but most dangerous).

—Developing a more diversified force structure.

The future potential conflicts the United States 

will be involved in are not “one size fits all”; 

why should the armed services’ force structures 

be that way? For example, do all Army units 

need to be fully NCW capable and deployable 

within 96 to 120 hours? Is it possible that the 

U.S. Army needs only a portion of its deployable 
57

forces organized and equipped this way, while 

the remainder of the forces are organized and 

equipped for different contingencies—yet are 

interoperable at key levels with the fully NCW 

capable forces?

• Reallocate the services’ defense budget shares in 

accordance with current and anticipated future 

realities that the nation and its armed forces are 

facing/will face. The U.S. Army and Marine 

Corps are bearing the brunt of the GWOT, or 

the “Long War” as it is being called; yet that fact 

is not reflected in their defense budget shares. 

The Army in FY 05 received 24.9 percent of the 

defense budget, while the Navy and Air Force 

received well in excess of 29 percent each and 

DoD retained 16 percent for DoD-wide programs 

such as missile defense. FY 06 was much 

the same, with the Army receiving only 23.4 

percent; the Navy, 29.8 percent; the Air Force, 

30.3 percent; and DoD programs, 16.8 percent.183

What the services are buying (or not buying as 

the case may be) should be scrutinized carefully 

in light of their present and future missions, 

not just in the “Long War” but also with a view 

toward future conflict scenarios. The Army 

and the Marine Corps will be hard-pressed 

to sustain their present operational tempo, 

maintain/replace their current equipment, and 

develop and acquire the equipment they need 

to transform and expand their capability set 

without receiving a larger share of the defense 

budget. It seems only logical that the designated 

main effort (Army and Marine Corps) should be 

financially weighed accordingly.
58

ENDNOTES

1. Marvin Leibstone, “The U.S. Defense Establishment’s 

Struggle to Transform & Modernize, NATO’s Nations and Partners 

for Peace, Uithoorn: Vol. 49, Issue 4, pp. 10-11.

2. U.S. Department of Defense, Transformation Planning 

Guidance, Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 2003, 

pp. 10-11; U.S. Department of Defense, Military Transformation: A 

Strategic Approach, Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing 

Office, 2003, pp. 3, 23, 16.

3. Colin S. Gray, Weapons Don’t Make War: Policy, Strategy, and 

Military Technology, Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 

1993, pp. 66-81. Gray addresses the linkage between national 

policy, national strategy (military strategy), and the weapon 

acquisition process. Policy guidance, Gray maintains, is often 

not clear due to interplay between domestic and foreign policy 

in a pluralistic and democratic society such as the United States. 

See also Ethan Barnaby Kapstein, The Political Economy of National 

Security, Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press, 1992, 

pp. 116-128. Kapstein provides an account of actors in the weapon 

acquisition process and their preferences. 

4. Amos A. Jordan, William J. Taylor Jr., and Michael J. Mazarr, 

American National Security, 5th ed., Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins 

University Press, 1999, pp. 217-233; Franklin A. Long and Judith 

Reppy, eds., The Genesis of New Weapons: Decision Making for 

Military R&D, New York, Oxford, Toronto, Sydney, Frankfurt, 

and Paris: Pergamon Press, 1980, p. 10. 

5. Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, pp. 

327-328.

6. Michael E. Brown, “Flying Blind: The Politics of the U.S. 

Strategic Bomber Program,” To Reach the High Frontier: A History 

of U.S. Launch Vehicles, Robert J. Art and Robert Jervis, eds., Ithaca 

and London: Cornell University Press, 1992, pp. 27-28; Jordan, 

Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, p. 326; Kapstein, 

The Political Economy of National Security, p. 122.

7. Gordon A. Craig and Felix Gilbert, “Reflection on Strategy 

in the Present and Future,” Makers of Modern Strategy: From 

Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age., Peter Paret, ed., Princeton, NJ: 

Princeton University Press, 1986, pp. 865.

8. Long and Reppy, The Genesis of New Weapons, p. 15.
59

9. Samuel P. Huntington, The Common Defense: Strategic Programs 

in National Politics, New York: Columbia University Press, 1961, 

pp. 218-221; Richard H. Immerman and Robert R. Bowie, Waging 

Peace: How Eisenhower Shaped and Enduring Cold War Strategy, New 

York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998, p. 9.

10. Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, 

pp. 71, 116-21, 200; Adam Yarmolinsky, “The President, the 

Congress and Arms Control,” The Military Industrial Complex: A 

Reassessment, Sam C. Sarkesian, ed., Beverly Hills and London: 

Sage Publications, 1972, pp. 295-297.

11. Aaron L. Friedberg, In the Shadow of the Garrison State: 

America’s AntiStatism and Its Cold War Grand Strategy, Princeton, 

NJ: Princeton University Press, 2000, pp. 130-131; Huntington, 

The Common Defense, pp. 223, 228-29; Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, 

American National Security, pp. 185,200. Huntington’s work offers 

the once popular view that Eisenhower was not involved in the 

details of strategy. Immerman and Bowie and later Friedberg state 

that Eisenhower might not have been involved in the intimate 

details of strategy development or weapons procurement, but 

he was very involved in assessing the strategic consequences of 

strategies and weapons systems and building a national security 

strategy and military force structure for the long term.

12. Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, pp. 

124-125; Yarmolinsky, “The President, the Congress and Arms 

Control,” pp. 296-297.

13. Long and Reppy, The Genesis of New Weapons, pp. 184-185.

14. Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, p. 

127.

15. Long and Reppy, The Genesis of New Weapons, p. 183.

16. Elias Huzar, The Purse and the Sword: Control of the Army 

by Congress through Military Appropriations, 1933-1950, Ithaca, NY: 

Cornell University Press, 1950, p. 400.

17. Long and Reppy, The Genesis of New Weapons, pp. 186-190.

18. Huzar, The Purse and the Sword, pp. 399-401.

19. Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, p. 

126.

20. Ibid., p. 127.
60

21. Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), The Department of Defense 

Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms, Washington, DC: U.S. 

Government Printing Office, 2001, p. 265.

22. Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, pp. 

330-331.

23. John Birkler, et. al., The U.S. Aircraft Carrier Industrial Base: 

Force Structure, Cost, Schedule, and Technology Issues for CVN 77, 

Santa Monica, CA: Rand, 1998, p. 52; Brown, Flying Blind, pp. 

238-245; Nick Koltz, Wild Blue Yonder: Money, Politics, and the B1 Bomber, New York: Pantheon Books, A Division of Random 

House, Inc., 1988.

24. Some would argue that NSC 68 is an example of an overarching National Security Strategy that guided U.S. weapons 

systems acquisition throughout the Cold War. However, NSC 

68 can be viewed best as a policy that prescribed “containment” 

of the Soviet Union as the primary goal of U.S. policy. In fact, 

that goal allowed for various presidents to employ their unique 

strategies. See John Lewis Gaddis, Strategies of Containment: A 

Critical Appraisal of Postwar American National Security Policy, 

Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1982, for a 

more detailed account of the various strategies the United States 

adopted during the course of the Cold War. 

25. Jerel A. Rosati, The Politics of United States Foreign Policy, 

Orlando, FL: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich College Publishers, 1993, 

pp. 30-46.

26. Bruce Russett, Controlling the Sword: The Democratic 

Governance of National Security, Cambridge and London: Harvard 

University Press, 1990, pp. 7-12; Robert M. Stein and Kenneth N. 

Bickers, Perpetuating the Pork Barrel: Policy Subsystems and American 

Democracy, Cambridge, New York, and Melbourne: Cambridge 

University Press, 1995, pp. 141-145.

27. Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, 

p. 331; Kapstein, The Political Economy of National Security, p. 

117; William E. Kovacic, “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice: Public 

Regulation of the Weapons Acquisition Process,” Arms, Politics 

and the Economy: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives, Robert 

Higgs, ed., Independent Studies in Political Economy, New York 

and London: Holmes & Meier Publishers, Inc., 1990, p. 69.

28. Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, pp. 

227, 330-331.
61

29. A major change in the force structure, writ large, of the U.S. 

Armed Forces would entail the canceling of programs already in 

the acquisition cycle, the closure of bases, the opening of another 

base, procurement of new weapons systems, etc. Ultimately, an 

effort of this magnitude would involve a gross redistribution of 

benefits across scores of congressional districts and, short of a 

national emergency of grave proportions, would be resisted and 

hotly debated. For fuller discussion of similarly related issues, 

see Robert M. Stein and Kenneth M. Bickers, Perpetuating the Pork 

Barrel: Policy Subsystems and American Democracy, Cambridge and 

New York: Cambridge University Press, 1995; and Paul Brace and 

Barbara Hinckley, Follow the Leader: Opinion Polls and the Modern 

Presidents, New York: Basic Books, 1993. 

30. U.S. Congress, Congressional Research Service, Weapon 

Systems Data, Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, 

2002, passim; Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National 

Security, p. 329.

31. John Coleman, Party Decline in America: Policy, Politics, and 

the Fiscal State, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1996; 

Ira Katznelson, Theda Skocpol, Social Policy in the United States, 

Princeton Studies in American Politics: Historical, International, 

and Comparative Perspectives, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton 

University Press, 1996, pp. 12-18, 20; Theodore Lowi, “American 

Business, Public Policy, Case Studies and Political Theory,” World 

Politics, Vol. 56, 1964, pp. 688-715.

32. In another sense, weapons systems can be said to lag 

behind policy. For example, foreign policy options may require a 

force structure with certain capabilities that weapons systems in 

the inventory cannot provide. Research and development begins 

now when they are needed, but due to the time involved in their 

development, they are not fielded for 10 to 15 years. Foreign policy 

may have changed several times in the period between concept 

development and fielding, and these weapons systems may not 

support a future administration’s policy needs.

33. This is not to imply that national leaders do not undertake 

innovative changes for the military establishment—they do. 

However, the programs they initiate most likely will come to 

fruition several administrations in the future. For example, 

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld often has bemoaned 

the fact that he is fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan with a force 

structure that was equipped and organized to fight the Cold War, 
62

with most of the weapons systems in the inventory having been 

imagined over 25 years ago. 

34. Koltz, Wild Blue Yonder, pp. 59-65.

35. Brown, Flying Blind, pp. 44, 88, 236-238.

36. Jerel A. Rosati, The Politics of United States Foreign Policy, 

Orlando, FL: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich College Publishers, 1993, 

p. 17.

37. Brown, Flying Blind, p. 264.

38. Ibid., pp. 294-298; Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American 

National Security, pp. 84-85; Ethan Barnaby Kapstein, The Political 

Economy of National Security, Columbia, SC: University of South 

Carolina Press, 1992, passim.

39. Henry Kissinger, Diplomacy, New York: Simon & Schuster, 

1994, pp. 796-797.

40. Koltz, Wild Blue Yonder, pp. 180-199.

41. Brown, Flying Blind, pp. 265-267.

42. Ibid., pp. 281-282.

43. Koltz, Wild Blue Yonder, p. 217.

44. Brown, Flying Blind, p. 292.

45. Koltz, Wild Blue Yonder, p. 249.

46. Les Aspin, Annual Report to the President and the Congress, 

Washington, DC: Department of Defense, 1994, pp. 147-149.

47. John Lewis Gaddis, Strategies of Containment: A Critical 

Appraisal of Postwar American National Security Policy, New York: 

Oxford University Press, 1982, pp. 349-350; Jordan, Taylor, and 

Mazarr, American National Security, pp. 78-81; Kapstein, The 

Political Economy of National Security, passim.

48. Eric K Shinseki, United States Army Transformation Campaign 

Plan, Washington, DC: United States Army, 2001. The Army 

defines the legacy force as the force that evolved from the Cold 

War and was in existence at the time transformation began.

49. Mark D. Mandeles, The Development of the B-52 and Jet 

Propulsion: A Case Study in Organizational Innovation, Maxwell Air 

Force Base, AL: Air University Press, 1998, pp. 291-293.

50. Ibid., p. 291; Shinseki, United States Army Transformation 

Campaign Plan; Dan L. Crippen, Budget Operations for National 
63

Defense, Washington, DC: Congress of the United States, 2000, p. 

26.

51. William S. Cohen, Report of Secretary of Defense to the 

President and Congress-2000, Washington, DC: Department of 

Defense, 2000, p. 55.

52. Koltz, Wild Blue Yonder, p. 227.

53. Brown, Flying Blind, pp. 331-337.

54. Kapstein, The Political Economy of National Security, p. 117.

55. The total dollar amount consisted of the $28.3 billion post1981 cost and the additional $3 billion in modifications incurred 

immediately after fielding.

56. Cohen, “Report of Secretary of Defense to the President 

and Congress-2000,” p. 65; Wolf Kutter, et. al., Army Budget Fiscal 

Year 2000: An Analysis, Arlington, VA: Association of the United 

States Army: Institute of Land Warfare, 1999, pp. 48, 50, 67, 79; 

Shinseki, United States Army Transformation Campaign Plan.

57. Crippen, “Budget Operations for National Defense,” pp. 

15-16; Navy Carrier Battle Groups: The Structure and Affordability of 

the Future Force, Washington, DC: U.S. Government Accounting 

Office, 1993, pp. 49-63; Shinseki, United States Army Transformation 

Campaign Plan.

58. George Bush, National Security Strategy of the United States: 

1991-1992, Washington, DC: Brasseys (U.S.) Inc., A Division of 

Maxwell Macmillan, Inc., 1991; Rosati, The Politics of United States 

Foreign Policy, pp. 17-18. See also the National Security Strategies 

published annually from 1993 to 2002.

59. Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, p. 

327.

60. Long and Reppy, The Genesis of New Weapons, p. 15.

61. The Army recently has discarded the use of the terms 

legacy, interim, and objective force. They now refer to Army force 

structure as being part of either the “Current Force” or the “Future 

Force.” However, a part of the force is neither current nor future 

which I refer to in this paper as transition. Some of the equipment 

has been around for a while (current), some of it is meant to bridge 

the gap between old and new (transition), and some equipment 

and force structure are what the Army wants to have but has not 

been fully developed yet (future). This paper will continue to use 

the three categories since they more closely represent reality.
64

62. The Army’s answer to this challenge is the interim and 

objective forces; however, they will not be fielded for 8 to 15 years, 

respectively.

63. Bob Woodward, Bush at War, New York: Simon & Schuster, 

2002, pp. 42-44.

64. Rosati, The Politics of United States Foreign Policy, pp. 407-

410.

65. Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, 

p. 124. However, the formal declaration of war seems to be a 

mere formality seldom sought. Presidents do commit the nation 

to armed conflict (war) without asking for Congress’s explicit 

approval. Although Congress can threaten to withhold funding, 

past instances indicate that it is highly unlikely that they actually 

would risk the lives of U.S. service members by withholding 

funds.

66. Rosati, The Politics of United States Foreign Policy, pp. 340-

346.

67. Ibid., p. 3.

68. Kissinger, Diplomacy, pp. 717-718.

69. Bruce Russett, Controlling the Sword: The Democratic 

Governance of National Security, Cambridge, MA and London: 

Harvard University Press, 1990, p. 7.

70. James H. Dixon, et. al., National Security Policy Formulation: 

Institutions, Processes, and Issues, Washington, DC: U.S. Government 

Printing Office, 1984, p. 141.

71. Rosati, The Politics of United States Foreign Policy, p. 27.

72. Ibid., pp. 130-132.

73. Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, pp. 

108-109.

74. Rosati, The Politics of United States Foreign Policy, p. 84. Also, 

the foreign policy development process is inherently interagency 

and thus revolves around “turf battles,” political compromises, 

and bureaucratic politics that constitute a pluralistic system.

75. Ibid., p. 45.

76. Russett, Controlling the Sword, p. 11.

77. Ibid., pp. 38-40.
65

78. Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, p. 

97; Rosati, The Politics of United States Foreign Policy, pp. 37-38.

79. Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, pp. 

316-333.

80. Ibid., p. 329.

81. Ibid.

82. Long and Reppy, The Genesis of New Weapons, pp. 16, 182.

83. Kapstein, The Political Economy of National Security, pp. 58-

60.

84. Jordan, Taylor and Mazzar, American National Security, 

pp. 327-328; Alexander Kossiakoff, “Conception of New Defense 

Systems and the Role of Government R&D Centers,” The Genesis of 

New Weapons: Decision Making for Military R&D, Franklin A. Long 

and Judith Reppy, eds., New York: Pergamon Press, 1980.

85. Kapstein, The Political Economy of National Security, p. 17.

86. Rosati, The Politics of United States Foreign Policy, pp. 317-

320. 

87. Ibid., p. 316.

88. Dixon, National Security Policy Formulation, pp. 168-169.

89. Jordan, Taylor, and Mazarr, American National Security, p. 

212.

90. U.S. Army, “Army Planning Programming Budgeting 

Execution System (PPBS)—an Executive Primer,” in Course 5: 

DoD-Organization, Planning, and Strategy—Lesson 3, James Pierce, 

ed., Carlisle, PA: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1999, p. 27.

91. Program Acquisition Costs by Weapon System, Washington, 

DC: Department of Defense, 2003, pp. 1-104. Although the 

Comanche Helicopter program was cancelled by the Secretary of 

Defense, the funds associated with the program were transferred 

into the Apache Attack Helicopter upgrade program. Also, the Air 

Force’s F-22 has come under scrutiny, but only as it duplicates 

the capabilities of the Joint Strike Fighter, another fighter the Air 

Force is developing.

92. Military appropriations are funded 1 year at a time; 

however, they are normally authorized several years out, with 

funding levels adjusted due to inflation each year. The B-1B, 

mentioned earlier, was a case in point.
66

93. Koltz, Wild Blue Yonder, p. 216.

94. U.S. Congress, Congressional Research Service, 2002.

95. Kenneth R. Mayer, “Elections, Business Cycles, and the 

Timing of Defense Contract Awards in the United States,” The 

Political Economy of Military Spending in the United States, Alex 

Mintz, ed., London and New York: Routledge Publishers, Inc., 

1992, p. 17.

96. Rosati, The Politics of United States Foreign Policy, p. 137.

97. Cohen, Report of Secretary of Defense to the President and 

Congress-2000, pp. B-1-2, C-1.

98. Mayer, Elections, Business Cycles, and the Timing of Defense 

Contract Awards in the United States, p. 27.

99. James M. Lindsay, “Congress and the Defense Budget: 

Parochialism or Policy?” Arms, Politics and the Economy, Robert 

Higgs, ed., New York and London: Holmes & Meier Publishers, 

Inc., 1990, p. 177.

100. U.S. Department of Commerce, Federal Expenditures by 

State for Fiscal Year 2002, Washington, DC: Federal Government, 

2002, tables 1-6, p. 10; U.S. Congress, Joint Economic Committee, 

Economic Indicators: January 2006, Washington, DC: U.S. 

Government Printing Office, 2006, p. 33.

101. William J. Clinton, A National Security Strategy of 

Engagement and Enlargement, Washington, DC: The White House, 

1995, p. 28.

102. “Closing Pandora’s Box,” The Economist, January 4, 2003, 

pp. 29-31.

103. Steven A. Cambrone, “Ballistic and Cruise Missile 

Threats,” . . . to Insure Domestic Tranquility, Provide for the Common 

Defense, Max G. Manwaring, ed., Carlisle Barracks, PA: Strategic 

Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2000, pp. 85-86.

104. Clinton, National Security Strategy of the United States, 2000, 

p. 49; George W. Bush, The National Security Strategy of the United 

States, Washington, DC: The White House, 2002, pp. 5-6, 14.

105. In another sense, the weapons system development and 

acquisition process can be viewed as less flexible and rigid than 

the national security policy system, hence not as supportive of the 

policy process as it should be.
67

106. If a weapon system fails, i.e., does not hit its target, goes 

astray, etc., it is normally because of a flaw in its equipment or 

programming. Statistically, given the testing involved in weapons 

R&D, the mean time between failures can be determined, and a 

failure rate for the weapon system predicted.

107. Robert Perry, “American Styles of Military R&D,” The 

Genesis of New Weapons: Decision Making for Military R&D, Franklin 

A. Long and Judith Reppy, eds., New York: Pergamon Press, 1980, 

pp. 94-96; Kapstein, The Political Economy of National Security, pp. 

118-120.

108. The Joint Chiefs of Staff, The Joint Warfighting Capabilites 

Assessment; Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Instruction - 3137.01a, 

Washington, DC: Department of Defense, 1999, pp. 1-37.

109. Frederick W Kagan, “War and Aftermath,” Policy Review, 

2003; Department of Defense, Dictionary of Military and Associated 

Terms, Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 2001, 

p. 51. DoD defines battlespace as, “The environment, factors, 

and conditions that must be understood to apply combat power 

successfully, protect the force, or complete the mission. This 

includes the air, land, sea, space, and the included enemy and 

friendly forces; facilities; weather; terrain; the electromagnetic 

spectrum; and the information environment within the operational 

areas and areas of interest.”

110. Ibid., p. 3.

111. Ibid., p. 4.

112. Bruce D. Berkowitz, War in the Information Age, Hoover 

Institute, 2002, cited April 15, 2004, available from www-hoover.

stanford.edu/publications/digest/022/berkowitz.html.

113. Christopher M. Bourne, Robert J. Smullen, and Thomas 

J. Impellitteri, “Air Delivered Fires in Support of Maneuver,” 

Marine Corps Gazette, Vol. 87, No. 4, 2003.

114. Michael E. O’Hanlon, “A Flawed Masterpiece,” Foreign 

Affairs, Vol. 81, No. 3, 2002, p. 56.

115. Operation Enduring Freedom, Internet, Global Security.org, 

June 24, 2003, cited July 10, 2003, available from www.globalsecurity.

org/military/ops/enduring-freedom.htm.

116. Rowan Scarborough, “‘Decisive Force’ Now Measured by 

Speed, Not Troop Numbers,” The Washington Times, May 7, 2003, 
68

cited October 9, 2003, available from www.nexis.com/research/

search/documentDisplay?_docnum=19&_ansset-W-WD-.

117. Kim Burger, et. al., “What Went Right?” Janes Defence 

Weekly, 2003, cited October 9, 2004, available from www4.janes.

com/K2/docprint.jsp?KeDocKey=/content1/janesdata/mag/jdw/jdw04.

118. Nick Cook, Effects-Based Air Operations—Cause and Effect, 

Internet, Jane’s Defense Weekly, June 18, 2003, cited October 9, 

2003, available from www4.janes.com/K2/docprint.jsp?K2DocKey=/

content1/janesdata/mags/jdw/jdw05.

119. Nick Cook, “The Air Campaign—Trends and Developments,” Internet, Jane’s Defence Weekly, March 26, 2003, cited October 

9 2003, available from www4.janes.com/K2/doc.jsp?K2DocKey=/

content1/janesdata/mags/jdw/jdw04189.h; John Diamond, “A Campaign to Control the Afghan Skies,” October 8, 2003, Internet, Chicago 

Tribune, 2003, cited October 9 2003, available from www.nexis.com/

research/search/documentDisplay?_docnum=6&_ansset=W-WW-; 

Michael Knights, “Air Power over Iraq,” Internet, Jane’s Intelligence 

Review, March 1, 2003, cited October 9, 2003, available from 

www4.janes.com/K2/docprint.jsp?K2DocKey=/content1/janesdata/

mags/jir/jir00548; Russell D. Shaver, et. al., “The Case for Airpower 

Modernization,” Internet, Air Force Magazine, February 1994, 

cited April 11, 2004, available from www.nexis.com/research/search/

documentDisplay?_docnum=3&_ansset=W-WA-A-WZ-.

120. Operation Enduring Freedom.

121. Kagan, “War and Aftermath,” pp. 8-10.

122. Bob Woodward, Bush at War, New York: Simon & Schuster, 

2002, p. 20.

123. Ibid.

124. Bourne, “Air Delivered Fires in Support of Maneuver”; 

Kagan, “War and Aftermath,” p. 7.

125. O’Hanlon, “A Flawed Masterpiece,” p. 51.

126. Operation Enduring Freedom.

127. Ibid.

128. O’Hanlon, “A Flawed Masterpiece,” pp. 50-52; Operation 

Enduring Freedom.

129. Donald H. Rumsfeld, “Transforming the Military,” Foreign 

Affairs, Vol. 81, No. 3, 2002, pp. 21-22.
69

130. Stephen Biddle, “Afghanistan and the Future of Warfare: 

Implications for Army and Defense Policy,” Carlisle, PA: Strategic 

Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2002, p. 2, [fn3]; Kagan, 

“War and Aftermath,” p. 1.

131. Kagan, “War and Aftermath,” p. 2.

132. Ibid.; O’Hanlon, “A Flawed Masterpiece,” p. 48.

133. Kagan, “War and Aftermath,” p. 1.

134. Ibid., p. 6.

135. Carl Von Clausewitz, On War, Indexed Ed., Michael and 

Peter Paret Howard, eds. and trans., Princeton, NJ: Princeton 

University Press, 1976, pp. 88-89.

136. Kagan, “War and Aftermath,” p. 2.

137. Reuters, “Taliban Resurgence Undermining UN Afghan 

Aid Work,” Internet, The New York Times, 2003, cited October 

25 2003, available from www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/

international-afghan-un.html?pagewanted=.

138. Tim Ripley, “Planning for ‘Iraqi Freedom’,” Internet, Jane’s 

Intelligence Review, July 1, 2003, cited October 9, 2003, available from 

www4.janes.com/K2/doc.jsp?K2DocKey=/content1/janesdata/mags/

jir/jir00640.htm; Woodward, Bush at War, p. 49. President Bush 

and his advisors had at their disposal the most technologically 

advanced military in the world, one that if employed, promised to 

bring victory, quickly, with minimal casualties for the U.S. forces, 

and minimal collateral damage. It is difficult to imagine the Bush 

administration launching a preventive war against Iraq without 

having this capability.

139. Burger, What Went Right? cited in Martin Streetly, 

“Airborne Surveillance Assets Hit the Spot in Iraq,” Internet, Jane’s 

Intelligence Review, July 1, 2003, cited October 9, 2003, available from 

www.4janes.com/K2/doc.jsp?K2DocKey=/content1/janesdata/mags/

jir/jir00641.htm.

140. Michael J. Waller, High-Tech Tools of War, News 

World Communications, Inc. Insight on the News, 2003, cited 

October 9, 2003, available from www.nexis. com/research/search/

documentDisplay?-docnum=18&-ansset=W-WD-.

141. Burger, What Went Right?; Christian Lowe, “The New 

Art of War,” Internet, The Daily Standard, April 3, 2003, cited 

October 9, 2003, available from www.nexis.com/research/search/
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documentDisplay?_docnum=11&_ansset=W-WD-, Waller, High-Tech 

Tools of War.

142. Scarborough, “Decisive Force” Now Measured by Speed, Not 

Troop Numbers.

143. Burger, What Went Right?; Scarborough, “Decisive Force” 

Now Measured by Speed, Not Troop Numbers.

144. Kagan, “War and Aftermath,” p. 6.

145. Kenneth M Pollack, “Next Stop Baghdad?” Foreign Affairs, 

Vol. 81, No. 2, 2002, p. 38.

146. George Friedman, “The Next Phase of the War,” The 

STRATFOR Weekly, October 16, 2003.

147. Debra J. Saunders, “Victory Lap Interrupted,” Final Edition, 

Internet, The San Francisco Chronicle, 2003, cited October 9, 2003, 

available from www.nexis.com/research/search/documentDisplay?_

docnum=20&_ansset=W-WD-.

148. Friedman, “The Next Phase of the War.”

149. Thomas L. Friedman, “Free Advice to G.O.P.,” Internet, 

The New York Times, October 23, 2003, cited October 24, 2003, 

available from www.nytimes.com/2003/10/23/opinion/23FRIE.html?

ex=1067996468&ei=1&en=c.

150. Kagan, “War and Aftermath,” p. 6.

151. Woodward, Bush at War, pp. 22-23, 135, 320-321.

152. Scarborough, “Decisive Force” Now Measured by Speed, Not 

Troop Numbers.

153. Waller, High-Tech Tools of War.

154. Kagan, “War and Aftermath,” p. 9.

155. Peter J. Boyer, “A Different War; Is the Army Becoming 

Irrelevant?” 

156. Donald H. Rumsfeld, “Transformation Planning 

Guidance,” Washington, DC: Department of Defense, 2003, pp. 

6-7.

157. Kagan, “War and Aftermath,” p. 15.

158. Ibid., pp. 8, 11-13. Moreover, given the number of 

deployments and the length of the conflicts associated with them, 

it is questionable whether the NCW-driven force structure is 

sustainable, given the type of protracted struggles foreshadowed 

by the “Long War” against terrorism.
71

159. Donald H. Rumsfeld, Memorandum, October 16, 2003.

160. Biddle, “Afghanistan and the Future of Warfare: Implications for Army and Defense Policy,” pp. vii-viii.

161. Ibid., pp. 25, 27-29, 35. 

162. Friedman, “The Next Phase of the War”; Friedman, Free 

Advice to G.O.P.; Michael R. Gordon, “Reality Check in Iraq: 

U.S. Faces a Long Stay,” Internet, The New York Times, October 

19, 2003, cited October 27, 2003, available from www.nytimes.

com/2003/10/19/international/middleeast/19MILI.html?ei=5070&en.

163. Burger, What Went Right?

164. Max Boot, The Savage Wars of Peace: Small Wars and the 

Rise of American Power, New York: Basic Books, A Member of the 

Perseus Books Group, 2002.

165. O’Hanlon, “A Flawed Masterpiece,” p. 9.

166. Kagan, “War and Aftermath”; Fred Kaplan, “He Saw It 

Coming; The Former Bushie Who Knew Iraq Would Go to Pot,” 

New York Times, August 5, 2003; James Kitfield, “Army Troops, 

Budget Stretched to the Limit,” National Journal, 2003.

167. Kagan, “War and Aftermath,” pp. 17-18.

168. Burger, What Went Right?; Kagan, “War and Aftermath”; 

O’Hanlon, “A Flawed Masterpiece,” p. 9.

169. Department of Defense, Military Transformation: A Strategic 

Approach, Washington, DC: Department of Defense, 2003, pp. 6-

8.

170. Kagan, “War and Aftermath,” p. 1; Scarborough, “Decisive 

Force” Now Measured by Speed, Not Troop Numbers.

171. Bush, The National Security Strategy of the United States, pp. 

16, 29-30; Robert Jervis, “The Compulsive Empire,” Foreign Policy, 

No. 137, 2003.

172. Paul Brace and Barbara Hinckley, Follow the Leader: Opinion 

Polls and the Modern Presidents, New York: Basic Books, A Division 

of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., 1992, pp. 1-3, 45-47, 109-14.

173. Epstein, Bush’s 1st Strike Strategy Breaks Tradition. See 

also Francis Fukuyama, “After Neoconservatism,” New York 

Times, accessed February 21, 2006, available from www.nytimes.

com/2006/02/19/magazine/neo.html?ei=5070&en=ff2e00bbb3d3df00.
72

174. M. Elaine Bunn, “Preemptive Action: When, How, and to 

What Effect?” Strategic Forum, July 2003; Nye, “U.S. Power and 

Strategy after Iraq,” p. 65.

175. Burger, What Went Right?; Waller, High-Tech Tools of War.

176. Bunn, “Preemptive Action: When, How, and to What 

Effect?” pp. 6-8.

177. Kagan, “War and Aftermath,” pp. 11-12, 18-19.

178. Boot, The Savage Wars of Peace: Small Wars and the Rise of 

American Power.

179. U.S. House of Representatives Armed Services Committee, 

Operation Iraqi Freedom: Outside Perspectives, October 21, 2003, pp. 

1-14.

180. Peter A. Wilson, John Gordon IV, and David E. Johnson, 

“An Alternative Future Force: Building A Better Army, Parameters, 

Vol. XXXIII, No. 4, Winter 2003-04, p. 28; U.S. Department of 

Defense, Quadrennial Defense Review: February 2006, Washington, 

DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 2006, p. 9.

181. Greg Grant, “U.S. Army Shifts R&D to Urban Combat 

Gear,” Defense News, February 27, 2006, pp. 1, 8.

182. Steven Metz and Raymond Millen, Future War/Future 

Battlespace: The Strategic Role of American Landpower, Carlisle 

Barracks, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 

2003, p. 21.

183. Frank A. DiStasio, Jr., Fiscal Year 2006 Army Budget: An 

Analysis, Arlington, VA: The Institute of Land Warfare, Association 

of the United States Army, 2005, p. 22.