Rich was formerly Vice President in charge of RAND's National Security Research Division and Director of the National Defense Research Institute, the federally funded research and development center that provides research and policy analysis to the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the defense agencies, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Department of State. He was also responsible for national security studies sponsored at RAND by the intelligence community, Department of Energy, and private foundations. He has published numerous classified and unclassified RAND reports, including studies of the B-2 acquisition strategy, trends in weapons acquisition, multinational coproduction of aerospace systems, various readiness issues, and other topics related to national defense.