Meeting our national security needs is a complex undertaking that requires personal dedication, world-class talent and well-honed technical skills. All are qualities that define our national security research staff, and reflect an institution-wide commitment to a public service mission.

CNA's Center for Naval Analyses—a federally funded research and development center (FFRDC) for the Navy and Marine Corps—uses scientific methods to address issues related to military preparedness, operations evaluation, systems analysis, foreign affairs, strategic relationships, humanitarian operations and logistics.

Our efforts are defined by a unique brand of multi-disciplinary, field-based real-world, real-time research and analysis that combines observation of people, decisions, and processes. CNA analysts work on the ground, directly with operating forces on such issues as finding the best ways to employ new weapons and technologies and how to handle the complex command-and-control relationships critical to multinational alliances and coalition operations.

CNA analysts pioneered the field of operations research and for over 65 years our special relationship with the Navy and the national defense community has allowed CNA to acquire unique competencies and develop sharp analytic excellence; and have kept us continually engaged in working with vast and complex data sets, undefined problems of scope and scale, and issues of great urgency and immediacy.

Our access, knowledge base, experience, field presence, and institutional memory are powerful assets in addressing national security issues. And our superior operations research and long-range concept development allow us to address military challenges and opportunities with clarity and imagination.

Today, our goal is the same as it was when we began our work during World War II: to serve as an unfailing source of high quality, impartial information in order to give leaders the expert, cutting-edge analyses needed to improve decision making.