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think tank

 RAND  link Powerbase Sourcewatch Website
File:RAND-logo.png
FormationMay 14, 1948
FounderHenry H. "Hap" Arnold
HeadquartersSanta Monica, ,Leiden,Arlington,Pittsburgh
Typethink tank
SubgroupsRand Europe
Staff1,700
SloganTo be the world's most trusted source for policy ideas and analysis
InterestsMutually Assured Destruction
The RAND Corporation is an influential US think-tank with extremely close links to the US military and the corporate sector. It emerged out of the alliance between big business and the state during the Second World War and played an important role in developing Cold War strategy. Today it conducts research into many areas of public policy but has a strong focus on security and international relations.

Origins and history

The RAND Corporation grew out of the merging of the corporate and state sectors in the United States that occurred during the WWII – what President Eisenhower later famously dubbed the 'Military-Industrial Complex'. As RAND itself states on its website: “There were discussions among people in the War Department, the Office of Scientific Research and Development, and industry who saw a need for a private organization to connect military planning with research and development decisions.” [1]

RAND began life as a project of the Douglas Aircraft Company, which had made enormous profits from the war, producing thousands of American bombers. It was conceived at a meeting on 1 October 1945 between Henry Arnold, Commanding General of the Army Air Force; MIT's Edward Bowles, a consultant to the Secretary of War; Donald Douglas, of Douglas Aircraft Company; Douglas' Chief Engineer Arthur Raymond, and his assistant Frank Collbohm. Then known as Project RAND, its name was taken from the term research and development. [2] By early 1948 Project RAND had grown to 200 staff members and on 14 May 1948 it broke off from Douglas Aircraft Company to become an independent, non-profit organisation. On 1 November 1948, the Project RAND contract was formally transferred from the Douglas Aircraft Company to the RAND Corporation. The Ford Foundation provided $1 million for the new corporation, [3] and the new think-tank also had $5 million in remaining funds from Project RAND at its disposal. [4]

Cold War Strategy

Denis Healey, probably the most important figure in the development of American style 'strategic thinking' in Britain, makes the following comments on RAND in his memoires:

[RAND] had established itself as the leading think-tank for Pentagon, and had access to all its secrets. They were mainly economists by training, and had developed a vocabulary for 'thinking about the unthinkable' which had all the weaknesses of economic jargon. The universe of nuclear strategy was so difficult to comprehend, and the horrors it contained were so repugnant to normal people, that its study required the same clinical detachment as the study of venereal disease. But that very detachment tended to blind the experts to the human realities, and to enslave them to abstract concepts, the validity of which had never been tested.[5]

Extending Russia

File:Extending Russia Chess.png
RAND report specifies six measures the US could take to "extend" the Russian Federation

In 2019, RAND produced a report on a research project entitled “Extending Russia: Competing from Advantageous Ground”:

The purpose of the project was to examine a range of possible means to extend Russia. By this, we mean nonviolent measures that could stress Russia’s military or economy or the regime’s political standing at home and abroad.
The steps we posit would not have either defence or deterrence as their prime purpose, although they might contribute to both. Rather, these steps are conceived of as measures that would lead Russia to compete in domains or regions where the United States has a competitive advantage, causing Russia to overextend itself militarily or economically or causing the regime to lose domestic and/or international prestige and influence.
The report specified six measures the US could take to "extend" the Russian Federation:
“Measure 1: Provide Lethal Aid to Ukraine,”
“Measure 2: Increase Support to the Syrian Rebels,”
“Measure 3: Promote Regime Change in Belarus,”
“Measure 4: Exploit Tensions in the South Caucasus,”
“Measure 5: Reduce Russian Influence in Central Asia,” and
“Measure 6: Challenge Russian Presence in Moldova.”[6]

Locations

"RAND has four principal locations, Santa Monica, California; Arlington, Virginia (just outside Washington, D.C.); Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; and RAND Europe headquarters in Leiden, The Netherlands. RAND Europe also has offices in Berlin, Germany, and Cambridge, the United Kingdom." Since 2003, RAND has also operated the RAND-Qatar Policy Institute in Doha, Qatar.

Notable RAND participants


Resources, external links, notes

Further reading

  • Abella, Alex. Soldiers of Reason: The RAND Corporation and the Rise of the American Empire (Harcourt, 2008). ISBN 978-0-15-101081-3.
  • S.M. Amadae. Rationalizing Capitalist Democracy: The Cold War Origins of Rational Choice Liberalism (University of Chicago Press, 2003).
  • Martin Collins. Cold War Laboratory: RAND, The Air Force and the American State (Smithsonian Institute, 2002).
  • Paul Dickson Think Tanks, New York: Atheneum, 1971. - Contains a chapter and much other discussion of Rand.
  • Thomas and Agatha Hughes, eds. Systems, Experts, and Computers: The Systems Approach in Management and Engineering After World War II (The MIT Press. Dibner Institute Studies in the History of Science and Technology, 2000).
  • Fred Kaplan. The Wizards of Armageddon" (Stanford University Press, 1991).
  • Clifford, Peggy, ed. "RAND and The City: Part One". Santa Monica Mirror, October 27, 1999 – November 2, 1999. Five-part series includes: 1; 2; 3; 4; & 5. Accessed April 15, 2008.
  • Bruce L. R. Smith The Rand Corporation: Case Study of a Nonprofit Advisory Corporation, Cambridge, Mass: Harvard university Press, 1966.
  • Mark Trachtenberg. History & Strategy (Princeton University Press, 1991).

References

  1. ↑ RAND Corporation website, A Brief History of RAND, (accessed 24 October 2008)
  2. ↑ RAND Corporation website, A Brief History of RAND, (accessed 24 October 2008)
  3. ↑ RAND Corporation website, A Brief History of RAND, (accessed 24 October 2008)
  4. ↑ Donald E. Abelson, A Capitol Idea: Think-Tanks and US Policy (McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP, 2006) p.75
  5. ↑ Denis Healey, The Time of My Life (London: Penguin, 1989) p.246
  6. ↑ "US Targets Georgia as a Tool to Extend Russia"
  7. ↑ RAND Corporation Habitable Planets for man (6.4 MB PDF)
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