Decision-Making for Defense

When President Kennedy appointed Robert McNamara Secretary of Defense in January, 1961 and McNamara called on Charles Hitch to join him, a new era of defense policy leadership was clearly at hand.

Great problems of organization had emerged along with vast increases in American responsibility for the security of the free world in the post-war era of rapidly changing military technology. Defense department unification and other controversial questions of organization of the defense establishm...