As Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the first Clinton Administration -- the nation's second-highest-ranking military officer -- Admiral Bill Owens saw the challenges facing the U.S. military up close and strove to bring about change from inside the Pentagon. In this trenchant, fascinating, forward-looking book, written with veteran military reporter Ed Offley, he explains the full extent of the crisis the U.S. military faces, and proposes a daring solution: the Revolution in Military Affairs.
Admiral Owens predicts that a national defense "train wreck" is imminent, as the military equipment acquired during the Reagan era suddenly becomes obsolete. Even if politicians and citizens were willing to commit trillions of dollars to new weaponry in peacetime, Owens thinks it would be foolish to do so. Rather, he argues, the military should take advantage of astonishing recent advances in computing, communications, and satellite surveillance to change the very nature of our military -- from one based on force and might to one based on knowledge and information.
The Revolution in Military Affairs would transform the way the U.S. forces wage war. It would bring about a smaller yet stronger and more mobile U.S. military, able to defend U.S. interests overseas at a moment's notice. Meanwhile, through a worldwide satellite network, it would be able to observe the enemy's movements as they unfold -- to lift the "fog of war" that has bedeviled strategists all through the history of warfare.
The revolution Admiral Owens calls for requires a transformation of the Defense Department, the Pentagon, and the military bureaucracy. Can it be done? Owens argues that it must be done -- and done right away. His book is the best account of the inner workings of the military today; it is a blueprint for a more capable, more affordable military, and it speaks directly about America's opportunities and responsibilities as the world's dominant military power.
