Even before the attacks of 9/11, Donald Rumsfeld had the foresight to realise that the US military had to change from the lumbering behemoth it became during the cold war to a nimbler machine capable of using stealth, skill and technology to fight terrorist groups. But he has failed to carry this revolution much further in his latest Quadrennial Defence Review, released late last week.

Indeed it proposes maintaining virtually all the sort of weapons systems such as destroyers, submarines and fighter-bombers that were thought essential during the cold war, while remedying none of the troop shortages the US has since experienced in trying to pacify Iraq and Afghanistan.