One of the few things I respect Donald Rumsfeld for has been his attempt to reform the structure and bureaucracy of the military. Killing the Crusader self-propelled artillery program, for example, was a smart move. It hurts double to say that, because I was a tanker (making the Crusader kin of a sort) and much of the work would have been done here in Minnesota. But the Crusader was a hulking Cold War relic, unsuited for the sort of lighter, nimbler, more flexible military that I agree we need to build.

That's why this essay from the Armed Forces Journal caught my eye. It argues that whatever his intentions, Rumsfeld has (once again) messed up the execution, missing his big chance to make a difference in how the military operates.

Every four years the Pentagon does something called a Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR), which is supposed to outline what the military's situation and structure will be in the coming years. That, in turn, is supposed to guide assembly of the military budget.

But it doesn't.

The QDR calls for greater mobility, but the budget terminates both of the Air Force's airlift programs. The report says America is engaged in a "long war" against terrorism, but the budget cuts back the Army's planned number of combat brigades. The report says the Pentagon needs to rely more on market forces in its business practices, but the budget proposes creation of a monopoly for producing the most popular military engine in the world.

That disconnect between rhetoric and reality is a bad start, but luckily we can write it off as irrelevant. That's because this QDR — Rumsfeld's last opportunity to radically reshape the military — doesn't really matter. It comes too late in the budget and political process. The Bush administration's influence is on the wane as 2008 approaches, and if Rumsfeld wanted to make lasting changes he had to start last year. He didn't.

2001 was wasted on strategic reviews and staffing decisions. Then came 9/11, followed by Afghanistan, Iraq and Abu Ghraib — all distractions that meant no traction for the 2001 QDR. When Bush won a second term and it was time for another QDR, Rumsfeld hadn't accomplished anything "transformative".