Underkill: Scalable Capabilities for Military Operations amid Populations — 2009

The battle for Gaza revealed an extremist strategy: hiding in cities and provoking attack to cause civilian deaths that can be blamed on the attacking forces. The U.S. and allied militaries, having no options but lethal force or no options at all, are ill-equipped to defeat this strategy. The use of lethal force in dense populations can harm and alienate the very people whose cooperation U.S. forces are trying to earn. To solve this problem, a new RAND study proposes a “continuum of force” — a suite of capabilities that includes sound, light, lasers, cell phones, and video cameras.

In missions ranging from counterinsurgency to peacekeeping to humanitarian intervention to quelling disorder, the typical small unit of the U.S. military should and can have portable, easy-to-use, all-purpose capabilities to carry out its missions without killing or hurting civilians that may get in the way. The technologies for these capabilities are available but have not been recognized as a solution to this strategic problem and, consequently, need more high-level attention and funding.

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Assessing Irregular Warfare: A Framework for Intelligence Analysis – 2008

The objective of this study was to provide an analytic framework for intelligence analysis of irregular warfare (IW) environments that could be used as the basis for a subsequent IW intelligence analysis curriculum development effort. The authors conducted a review of recent policy, strategy, doctrinal, and other materials pertaining to IW, concluding that although the term irregular warfare remains somewhat nebulous, situations considered within the realm of IW generally can be thought of in terms of two main stylized types: (1) population-centric IW situations, which include such missions as counterinsurgency, foreign internal defense, and support to insurgency, where the indigenous population is the center of gravity; and (2) counterterrorism operations, whether conducted as one element of a theater commander's campaign or as part of the U.S. Special Operations Command-led global war on terrorism, where a cellular network is being targeted. The authors identify the intelligence and analytic requirements associated with each of these two stylized forms of IW and describe a top-down framework, or analytic procedure, that can be used for assessing IW environments. Also included is a list of references to IW-relevant doctrinal publications.

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Final Report of the Panel on the Department of Defense Human Capital Strategy — 2008

Lieutenant General Glenn A. Kent was a uniquely acute analyst and developer of American defense policy in the second half of the twentieth century. His 33-year career in the Air Force was followed by more than 20 years as one of the leading analysts at RAND. This volume is not a memoir in the normal sense but rather a summary of the dozens of national security issues in which Glenn was personally engaged over the course of his career. These issues included creating the single integrated operational plan (SIOP), leading DoD's official assessment of strategic defenses in the 1960s, developing and analyzing strategic nuclear arms control agreements, helping to bring new weapon systems to life, and many others. Each vignette describes the analytical frameworks and, where appropriate, the mathematical formulas and charts that Glenn developed and applied to gain insights into the issue at hand. The author also relates his roles in much of the bureaucratic pulling and hauling that occurred as issues were addressed within the government.

Glenn A. Kent, David Ochmanek, Michael Spirtas, Bruce R. Pirnie

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