Donald Rumsfeld failed to impose the two objectives he stated in 2001: To transform defense by focusing the military on its traditional missions and move it away from nation-building and to restore civilian authority over the military and US freedom of action simultaneously by abandoning the post-Vietnam Powell doctrine. In fact, the conditions engulfing Iraq led in the short term to Rumsfeld?s resignation and the restoration of military authority over civilian decision making. In the long term, the cyclic nature of civilian-military relations in the US has led to a reassessment of both the possibility of a coherent strategy and the theoretical validity of objective civilian control advocated by Samuel Huntington.