I believe that the council didn't make the best choice. As evidenced from the actions of some of our church leaders on that board who fought for a different course. That being said it has become a different organization now.
But I know for a fact that the capitulation occurred because of the lawsuits and the debt. Without those underlying weights, the BSA may have attempted to hold off changing, but the leader at the time had come from the military and saw what was happening there. He didn't see a way maintain the current trajectory with the way the nation was moving and law was moving in regards to these issues.