Ivana Ke

The Commission on Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution (PPBE) Reform asked the RAND Corporation for an independent analysis of PPBE-like functions in selected countries and non-Department of Defense federal agencies. This executive summary distills key insights from nine case studies of budgeting processes across comparative organizations, as detailed in three companion volumes.

The Commission on Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution (PPBE) Reform asked the RAND Corporation for an independent analysis of PPBE-like functions in selected countries and other federal agencies. In this volume, RAND researchers conduct case studies of the defense budgeting processes of China and Russia.

This paper shares the results of an exercise hosted by the RAND Corporation to explore the risk of escalation from Chinese activities in the gray zone to conventional war. The results showed an overall low risk of Taiwanese escalation because of Chinese military power and Chinese and U. S. constraints on Taiwan's decisionmaking. The exercise's U. S. team would consider escalation to military force only if Taiwan faced an existential threat.