Publications
"Nobody does defense policy better than CSBA. Their work on strategic and budgetary topics manages to combine first-rate quality and in-depth research with timeliness and accessibility—which is why so many professionals consider their products indispensable." – Gideon Rose, Editor of Foreign Affairs, 2010-2021
Search Publications
Studies
The Military-Technical Revolution: A Preliminary Assessment
This net assessment of the military-technical revolution, issued in July of 1992, is perhaps the best-known assessment prepared by the Office of Net Assessment. It has, I believe, held up well over time. The strategic management issues it raised should still be of special interest to top-level Department of Defense officials.
Studies
The Transformation of Strategic-Strike Operations
The US military is currently investing billions of dollars annually in developing and deploying a broad range of new precision-guided and electronic-strike weapons. These weapons are revolutionizing the way military organizations are thinking about future conflict. Perhaps nowhere are the potential implications of these weapons more significant than in the case of nuclear forces and strategic-strike operations. For the last forty years, the US strategic deterrent has centered on a triad of intercontinental bombers and land- and sea-based ballistic missile forces.
Studies
The Conflict Environment of 2016: A Scenario-Based Approach
What kind of military will the United States require in 2016? Given the uncertainties involved, it is impossible to say with a high degree of confidence. However, it will not be a close descendant of its Desert Storm military. Military-related technologies are progressing and diffusing too rapidly to assume that the future competitive environment will merely be a linear extrapolation of the recent past. Potential competitors have the incentive and will increasingly also have the means to present the United States with very different and more formidable challenges in 2016 than did Iraqi forces a quarter of a century earlier.