CGRS Publications Archive - 2008
2007 NSRD Annual Report — 2008
The RAND National Security Research Division (NSRD) addresses a wide variety of issues at the top of the national and international security policy agenda. This annual report offers a general survey of NSRD work in 2007, including research on counterinsurgency, strategic planning, intelligence analysis, sea basing, Asian geopolitics, military divorce, the Army's assignment policy for women, and improving mental health care for servicemembers.
Afghanistan: State and Society, Great Power Politics, and the Way Ahead: Findings from an International Conference, Copenhagen, Denmark, 2007 — 2008
Compiles papers presented at a June 2007 international conference on the problems that Afghanistan faces in the wake of the U.S.-led attack on al Qaeda and the Taliban; the challenges confronting the NATO International Security Assistance Force in coordinating nation-building activities in Afghanistan; and ways to address these issues.
After the War: Nation-Building from FDR to George W. Bush — 2008
From the post-World War II era through the Cold War, post-Cold War era, and current war on terrorism, this volume assesses how U.S. presidential decisionmaking style and administrative structure can work in favor of, as well as against, the nation-building goals of the U.S. government and military and those of its coalition partners and allies.
Aircraft Carrier Maintenance Cycles and Their Effects — 2008
This research brief summarizes RAND's analysis of the feasibility of different cycle lengths and their effect on the operational availability of Nimitz-class aircraft carriers. The authors also examine cycle length impact on shipyard workloads.
Analysis of Strategy and Strategies of Analysis — 2008
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 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.
Analytic Support to Intelligence in Counterinsurgencies — 2008
Operations in Iraq and Afghanistan have shown that U.S. forces need more-effective techniques and procedures to conduct counterinsurgency. They will most likely face similar, irregular warfare tactics from future enemies. This monograph examines the nature of the contemporary insurgent threat and provides insights on using operational analysis techniques to support intelligence operations in counterinsurgencies.
An Argument for Documenting Casualties: Violence Against Iraqi Civilians 2006 — 2008
This study examines available open-source data on Iraqi civilian fatalities and assesses problems associated with previous collection efforts. The authors present a new and more robust RAND Corporation Iraqi civilian violence dataset from which they derive observations about trends in targeting and weapons in 2006. These findings lead to a proposed framework for future civilian fatality data-collection efforts in Iraq and beyond.
Asia, America, and the Transformation of Geopolitics — 2007
A Cold War strategy of nation and economy building in Asia resulted in extraordinary economic growth, Cold War victory, and regional peace. Now neglect of economic priorities, erosion of America’s leadership in Asian regional institutions, Chinese filling of the vacuum, Japanese alienation from neighbors, risks to globalization, and loss of America’s Cold War balance between China and Japan could lead to drastically different scenarios, ranging from renewed Cold War to a reversal of alliances.
Assessing Compensation Reform: Research in Support of the 10th Quadrennial Review of Military Compensation — 2008
Military compensation is a pillar of the all-volunteer force. Its importance is such that it is reviewed every four years to determine whether it is adequate to meet the U.S. military's objectives. To inform the 10th Quadrennial Review of Military Compensation, this monograph presents the results of estimation and simulations of a model designed to assess the U.S. military's current retirement-benefit system and several policy alternatives.
Assessing the Tradecraft of Intelligence Analysis — 2008
This report assesses intelligence analysis across the main U.S. intelligence agencies and makes a number of recommendations, some of which parallel initiatives that have begun in the wake of the December 2004 legislation, for instance, create a Deputy Director of National Intelligence as a focal point for analysis, establish a National Intelligence University, build a Long Term Analysis Unit at the National Intelligence Council, and form an Open Source Center for making more creative use of open-source materials.
Breaking the Failed-State Cycle — 2008
Insecurity in the 21st century appears to come less from the collisions of powerful states than from the debris of imploding ones. This paper aims to improve the understanding and treatment of failed states by focusing on critical challenges at the intersections between security, economics, and politics and on the guiding goal of lifting local populations from the status of victims of failure to agents of recovery.
A Call to Revitalize the Engines of Government — 2008
The federal government has come to rely extensively on contractors to carry out the nation's business. This paper argues that such reliance is harmful, in part because the interests of private contractors sometimes conflict with those of government. Rostker calls for better oversight of contractors and for a reevaluation of when it is and is not appropriate and cost-effective to use contractors to help carry out the business of government.
A Cautionary Case Study of Approaches to the Treatment of Missing Data — 2007
Presents findings from a case study of different approaches to the treatment of missing data. Casewise deletion can perform less well than expected. Unsophisticated imputations, such as mean and conditional mean, performed better than expected.
Caution Nation-Builders: Gender Assumptions Ahead — 2008
Drawing the female population into the nation-building process will be good for a country's post-conflict progress and stability.
The Challenges of Trying Terrorists as Criminals: Proceedings of a RAND/SAIS Colloquium — 2008
When charges of terrorism are made, courts must strive to balance the rights of the parties, particularly the accused, on the one hand, and national security, on the other. Special and sometimes unique questions may arise in such cases, including admissibility of evidence, deference to the other branches of government, and prosecutors' duties of disclosure. Throughout, the process must avoid any appearance of departure from open justice.
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