Focusing the Lens: A Framework for National Security Decision-Making With a Case Study of National Missile Defense (Paperback or Softback)

Can decision-makers determine whether the timing is favorable before pursuing a specific course of action in implementing a national security program, particularly an innovation that requires simultaneous changes in technology, organization, strategy and policy? National security innovators have no problem inventing a "very clever pudding," but knowing when the pudding will be cooked becomes a more difficult task. To answer such a question, this paper develops the Lens Framework: a tool for analyzing the myriad of players and issues that color and shape the decision-making landscape. At the heart of this framework is the idea that, in an environment of constrained and competing resources, the decision to expend intellectual and fiscal capital to push a program forward must be accompanied by a predictive assessment of whether the program has the requisite consensus for success. This assessment is most difficult when the program requires fundamental changes in government institutions, policy, and technology; specifically, when it is a national security innovation.

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