Donald Rumsfeld could scarcely have produced a more comprehensive Quadrennial Defence Review (QDR) than the one presented to Congress on February 7th. It also shows the degree to which Iraq has forced the old curmudgeon to change his views of the world. The QDR predicts threats to America over the next two decades, and lists the things the Defence Department wants to counter them. Like its predecessors, it continues to wrestle with the challenge of using technology to "transform" America's armed forces. But it is the first QDR that takes account fully of the post-September nth world. (Its immediate predecessor, issued just days after the terrorist attacks, included plenty of analysis but fewer cures.) It is also the first to be drafted-over ten months, by 500 Pentagon employees-with America at war, and it shows.
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