Analysis of Strategy and Strategies of Analysis

by Gompert, David C.; Davis, Paul K.; Johnson, Stuart E.; Long, Duncan

• ISBN13: 9780833045034
• ISBN10: 0833045032
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2008-12-25
• Publisher: RAND Corporation

Summary

"In a fluid global security environment such as ours, assessing the costs, risks, and likely consequences of alternative national defense strategies is as hard as it is essential. The "Global War on Terror," for example, has cost as much as $800 billion more than was first projected. Too often, strategies are chosen without disciplined analysis in response to external events and under pressures of time and politics. The authors show how, even in the face of uncertainty, the costs and other implications of any strategy can be assessed by examining the capabilities needed by U.S. combatant commands - the chief agents of strategy - to fulfill what the strategy expects of them. They then demonstrate how such "outside-in" strategy assessment can be integrated with "inside-out" analysis of how core national strengths can best be exploited in national defense."--BOOK JACKET.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. iii
Figures	p. vii
Tables	p. ix
Summary	p. xi
Abbreviations	p. xix
Introduction	p. 1
The Challenge of Strategic Analysis	p. 3
The Case of GWOT, 2001-2007	p. 4
Next Steps in Defense Planning	p. 7
Toward an Integrated Analytic Framework: The Search for Analogs	p. 9
The Operating-Unit Perspective	p. 15
The "Strategy-to-Costs" Problem	p. 15
Getting Started: Expressing Strategy	p. 22
Operating Units: Agents of Global Strategy	p. 24
The Military Services: Providers and Partners	p. 30
Fitting It Together	p. 31
Illustrating and Analyzing Strategy	p. 37
Expressing Strategy	p. 37
Associating the Cost of Defense with Strategy	p. 41
Portfolio Analysis of Strategy	p. 46
Nonmonetary Resource Implications	p. 54
Basing Strategy on Core Strengths	p. 59
From Strength to Strategy	p. 59
Considerations Bearing on Core Strategy for National Defense	p. 64
Conclusion	p. 71
Bibliography	p. 75
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