On March 13, a friend of mine in Washington sent me an email saying the Pentagon had announced a surprising statement that said, “As part of the Department's ongoing commitment to strengthening our national defense, the secretary of defense has directed the disestablishment of the Office of Net Assessment (ONA).”
Although the Japanese media hardly reported on this momentous decision on an obscure office that focused on long-term strategic planning and analysis for the Department of Defense, it must have been a big shock for Washington's national security community.
I instantly replied to him, “So it's finally come." Recently, I stopped hearing from friends in the ONA, so I wasn’t surprised — I had already prepared for the possibility that it might get the axe. March 13 will be remembered as a funeral of sorts for America’s practitioners of strategic analysis, though I don’t think this will immediately have a major impact on U.S. strategy toward China.
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