Strategy

by Lawrence Freedman

  3. There is no evidence of this, although he had been influenced by Clausewitz (there are regular references to “centers of gravity”) and Liddell Hart.

  4. J. C. Wylie, Military Strategy: A General Theory of Power Control (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1989), first published in 1967. A biography is provided by John Hattendorf’s introduction.

  5. Henry Eccles, Military Concepts and Philosophy (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1965). On Eccles see Scott A. Boorman, “Fundamentals of Strategy: The Legacy of Henry Eccles,” Naval War College Review 62, no. 2 (Spring 2009): 91–115.

  6. Wylie, Military Strategy, 22.

  7. On the importance of the distinction, see Lukas Milevski, “Revisiting J. C. Wylie’s Dichotomy of Strategy: The Effects of Sequential and Cumulative Patterns of Operations,” Journal of Strategic Studies 35, no. 2 (April 2012): 223–242. Twenty years after the first publication, Wylie believed that cumulative strategies were more important. Military Strategy, 1989 edition, p. 101.

  8. His collected works can be found at http://www.ausairpower.net/APA-Boyd-Papers.html. The key books on Boyd are Frans P. B. Osinga, Science, Strategy and War: The Strategic Theory of John Boyd (London: Routledge, 2007); Grant Hammond, The Mind of War, John Boyd and American Security (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 2001); and Robert Coram, Boyd, The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War (Boston: Little, Brown & Company, 2002).

  9. John R. Boyd, “Destruction and Creation,” September 3, 1976, available at http://goalsys.com/books/documents/DESTRUCTION_AND_CREATION.pdf.

  10. John Boyd, Organic Design for Command and Control, May 1987, p.16, available at http://www.ausairpower.net/JRB/organic_design.pdf.

  11. The theory was popularized by Edward Lorenz, a diligent meteorologist who discovered the “butterfly effect” while searching for a way to produce more accurate weather predictions. Minuscule changes in his initial input to mathematical calculations for weather predictions could have extraordinary and unpredictable effects on the outcomes. The butterfly effect comes from a 1972 paper by Lorenz to the American Association for the Advancement of Science entitled, “Predictability: Does the Flap of a Butterfly’s Wings in Brazil Set Off a Tornado in Texas?” For a history of chaos theory, see James Gleick, Chaos: Making a New Science (London: Cardinal, 1987). On complexity theory, see Murray Gell-Man, The Quark and the Jaguar: Adventures in the Simple and the Complex (London: Little, Brown & Co., 1994); Mitchell Waldrop, Complexity: The Emerging Science at the Edge of Order and Chaos (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1993). On the relationship between scientific theories and military thought, see Antoine Bousquet, The Scientific Way of Warfare: Order and Chaos on the Battlefields of Modernity (New York: Columbia University Press, 2009); Robert Pellegrini, The Links Between Science, Philosophy, and Military Theory: Understanding the Past, Implications for the Future (Maxwell Air Force Base, AL: Air University Press, August 1997), http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/saas/pellegrp.pdf.

  12. Alan Beyerchen, “Clausewitz, Nonlinearity, and the Unpredictability of War,” International Security (Winter 1992/93); Barry D. Watts, Clausewitzian Friction and Future War, McNair Paper 52 (Washington, DC: National Defense University, Institute for Strategic Studies, October 1996).

  13. John Boyd, Patterns of Conflict: A Discourse on Winning and Losing, unpublished, August 1987, 44, 128, available at http://www.ausairpower.net/JRB/poc.pdf.

  14. Patterns of Conflict, 79.

  15. U.S. Department of Defense, Field Manual 100-5: Operations (Washington, DC: HQ Department of Army, 1976).

  16. William S. Lind, “Some Doctrinal Questions for the United States Army,” Military Review 58 (March 1977).

  17. U.S. Department of Defense, Field Manual 100-5: Operations (Washington, DC: Department of the Army, 1982), vol. 2-1; Huba Wass de Czege and L. D. Holder, “The New FM 100-5,” Military Review (July 1982).

  18. Wass de Czege and Holder, “The New FM 100-5.”

  19. Ibid.

  20. Cited in Larry Cable, “Reinventing the Round Wheel: Insurgency, Counter-Insurgency, and Peacekeeping Post Cold War,” Small Wars and Insurgencies 4 (Autumn 1993): 228–262.

  21. U.S. Marine Corps, FMFM-1: Warfighting (Washington, DC: Department of the Navy, 1989), 37.

  22. Edward Luttwak, Pentagon and the Art of War (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1985).

  23. Edward Luttwak, Strategy: The Logic of War and Peace (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987), 5. For a flavor, see Harry Kreisler’s conversation with Edward Luttwak in Conversations with History series, March 1987, available at http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/conversations/Luttwak/luttwak-con0.html.

  24. Luttwak, Strategy, 50.

  25. Gregory Johnson, “Luttwak Takes a Bath,” Reason Papers 20 (1995): 121–124.

  26. Jomini, The Art of War, 69 (see chap. 7, n. 5). On the development of the concept of operational art, see Bruce W. Menning, “Operational Art’s Origins,” Military Review 77, no. 5 (September–October 1997): 32–47.

  27. Jacob W. Kipp, “The Origins of Soviet Operational Art, 1917–1936” and David M. Glantz, “Soviet Operational Art Since 1936, The Triumph of Maneuver War,” in Michael D. Krause and R. Cody Phillips, eds., Historical Perspectives of the Operational Art (Washington, DC: United States Army Center of Military History, 2005); Condoleeza Rice, “The Making of Soviet Strategy,” in Peter Paret, ed., Makers of Modern Strategy, 648–676; William E. Odom, “Soviet Military Doctrine,” Foreign Affairs (Winter 1988 / 89): 114–134.

  28. See also Eliot Cohen, “Strategic Paralysis: Social Scientists Make Bad Generals,” The American Spectator, November 1980.

  29. He had also been given a prominent place in an essay by Gordon Craig in the remarkable 1943 collection, Makers of Modern Strategy. It was retained for the 1986 edition. Gordon A. Craig, “Delbrück: The Military Historian,” in Paret, ed., Makers of Modern Strategy. Delbrück’s Geschichte der Kriegskunst im Rahmen der Politischen Geschichte, 4 vols., 1900–1920 (a further three volumes in the series were completed by other writers by 1936), did not begin to appear in English until 1975: Hans Delbrück, trans. Walter J. Renfroe, Jr., History of the Art of War Within the Framework of Political History, 4 vols. (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1975–1985).

  30. J. Boone Bartholomees, Jr., “The Issue of Attrition,” Parameters (Spring 2010): 6–9.

  31. U.S. Marine Corps, FMFM-1: Warfighting, 28–29. See Craig A. Tucker, False Prophets: The Myth of Maneuver Warfare and the Inadequacies of FMFM-1 Warfighting (Fort Leavenworth, KS: School of Advanced Military Studies, U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, 1995), 11–12.

  32. Charles C. Krulak, “The Strategic Corporal: Leadership in the Three Block War,” Marines Magazine, January 1999.

  33. Michael Howard, “The Forgotten Dimensions of Strategy,” Foreign Affairs (Summer 1979), reprinted in Michael Howard, The Causes of Wars (London: Temple Smith, 1983). Gregory D. Foster, “A Conceptual Foundation for a Theory of Strategy,” The Washington Quarterly (Winter 1990): 43–59. David Jablonsky, Why Is Strategy Difficult? (Carlisle Barracks, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 1992).

  34. Stuart Kinross, Clausewitz and America: Strategic Thought and Practice from Vietnam to Iraq (London: Routledge, 2008), 124.

  35. U.S. Department of Defense, Field Manual (FM) 100-5: Operations (Washington, DC: Headquarters Department of the Army, 1986), 179–180.

  36. U.S. Marine Corps, FMFM-1: Warfighting, 85.

  37. Joseph L. Strange, “Centers of Gravity & Critical Vulnerabilities: Building on the Clausewitizan Foundation so that We Can All Speak the Same Language,” Perspectives on Warfighting 4, no. 2 (1996): 3; J. Strange and R. Iron, “Understanding Centres of Gravity and Critical Vulnerabilities,” research paper, 2001, available at http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/usmc/cog2.pdf.

  38. John A. Warden III, The Air Campaign: Planning for Combat (Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 1988), 9; idem, “The Enemy as a System,” Airpower Journal 9
, no. 1 (Spring 1995): 40–55; Howard D. Belote, “Paralyze or Pulverize? Liddell Hart, Clausewitz, and Their Influence on Air Power Theory,” Strategic Review 27 (Winter 1999): 40–45.

  39. Jan L. Rueschhoff and Jonathan P. Dunne, “Centers of Gravity from the ‘Inside Out,’ ” Joint Forces Quarterly 60 (2011): 120–125. See also Antulio J. Echevarria II, “‘Reining in’ the Center of Gravity Concept,” Air & Space Power Journal (Summer 2003): 87–96.

  40. Carter Malkasian, A History of Modern Wars of Attrition (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2002), 5–6.

  41. Ibid., 17.

  42. Hew Strachan, “The Lost Meaning of Strategy,” Survival 47, no. 3 (Autumn 1990): 43–59. David Jablonsky, 2005): 47.

  43. Rolf Hobson, “Blitzkrieg, the Revolution in Military Affairs and Defense Intellectuals,” The Journal of Strategic Studies 33, no. 4 (2010): 625–643.

  44. John Mearsheimer, “Maneuver, Mobile Defense, and the NATO Central Front,” International Security 6, no. 3 (Winter 1981–1982): 104–122.

  45. Luttwak, Strategy, 8.

  46. Boyd, Patterns of Conflict, 122.

  16 The Revolution in Military Affairs

  1. See Lawrence Freedman and Efraim Karsh, The Gulf Conflict (London: Faber, 1992).

  2. Reflected in title of a book by editors of U.S. News & World Report, Triumph Without Victory: The Unreported History of the Persian Gulf War (New York: Times Books, 1992).

  3. See Andrew F. Krepinevich, Jr., “The Military-Technical Revolution: A Preliminary Assessment,” Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, 2002, 1, 3. In the introduction to this edition, Krepinevich provides more detail on Marshall’s role. See also Stephen Peter Rosen, “The Impact of the Office of Net Assessment on the American Military in the Matter of the Revolution in Military Affairs,” The Journal of Strategic Studies 33, no. 4 (2010): 469–482. See also Fred Kaplan, The Insurgents: David Petraeus and the Plot to Change the American Way of War (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2013), 47–51.

  4. Andrew W. Marshall, “Some Thoughts on Military Revolutions—Second Version,” ONA memorandum for record, August 23, 1993, 3–4. Cited in Barry D. Watts, The Maturing Revolution in Military Affairs (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, 2011).

  5. A. W. Marshall, “Some Thoughts on Military Revolutions,” ONA memorandum for record, July 27, 1993, 1.

  6. Andrew F. Krepinevich, Jr., “Cavalry to Computer: The Pattern of Military Revolutions,” The National Interest 37 (Fall 1994): 30.

  7. Admiral William Owens, “The Emerging System of Systems,” US Naval Institute Proceedings, May 1995, 35–39.

  8. For an analysis of the various theories, see Colin Gray, Strategy for Chaos: Revolutions in Military Affairs and the Evidence of History (London: Frank Cass, 2002). Lawrence Freedman, The Revolution in Strategic Affairs, Adelphi Paper 318 (London: OUP for IISS, 1998).

  9. Barry D. Watts, Clausewitzian Friction and Future War, McNair Paper 52 (Washington DC: NDU, 1996).

  10. A. C. Bacevich, “Preserving the Well-Bred Horse,” The National Interest 37 (Fall 1994): 48.

  11. Harlan Ullman and James Wade, Jr., Shock & Awe: Achieving Rapid Dominance (Washington, DC: National Defense University, 1996).

  12. U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, Joint Publication 3–13, Joint Doctrine for Information Operations (Washington, DC: GPO, October 9, 1998), GL-7.

  13. Arthur K. Cebrowski and John J. Garstka, “Network-Centric Warfare: Its Origin and Future,” US Naval Institute Proceedings, January 1998.

  14. Department of Defense, Report to Congress, Network Centric Warfare, July 27, 2001, iv.

  15. Andrew Mack, “Why Big Countries Lose Small Wars: The Politics of Asymmetric Conflict,” World Politics 26, no. 1 (1975): 175–200.

  16. Steven Metz and Douglas V. Johnson, Asymmetry and U.S. Military Strategy: Definition, Background, and Strategic Concepts (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, 2001).

  17. Harry Summers, On Strategy: A Critical Analysis of the Vietnam War (Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 1982). The review was by Robert Komer, Survival 27 (March/April 1985): 94–95. See also Frank Leith Jones, Blowtorch: Robert Komer, Vietnam and American Cold War Strategy (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2013).

  18. The distinction was developed in Department of Defense, Joint Pub 3–0, Doctrine for Joint Operations (Washington, DC: Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1993). See Jonathan Stevenson, Thinking Beyond the Unthinkable, 517 (see chap. 13, n. 9).

  19. Douglas Lovelace, Jr., The Evolution of Military Affairs: Shaping the Future U.S. Armed Forces (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, 1997); Jennifer M. Taw and Alan Vick, “From Sideshow to Center Stage: The Role of the Army and Air Force in Military Operations Other Than War,” in Zalmay M. Khalilzad and David A. Ochmanek, eds., Strategy and Defense Planning for the 21st Century (Santa Monica, CA: RAND & U.S. Air Force, 1997), 208–209.

  20. Remarks by the President at the Citadel, Charleston, South Carolina, December 11, 2001. See also Donald Rumsfeld, “Transforming the Military,” Foreign Affairs, May/June 2002, 20–32.

  21. Stephen Biddle, “Speed Kills? Reassessing the Role of Speed, Precision, and Situation Awareness in the Fall of Saddam,” Journal of Strategic Studies, 30, no. 1 (February 2007): 3–46.

  22. Nigel Aylwin-Foster, “Changing the Army for Counterinsurgency Operations,” Military Review, November/December 2005, 5.

  23. For example, Kalev Sepp’s critique of the American focus on killing insurgents rather than engaging the population and training local forces to be like the Americans in “Best Practices in Counterinsurgency,” Military Review, May–June 2005, 8–12. See Kaplan, The Insurgents, 104–107. Kaplan provides a thorough account of the shift in American military thinking over this period.

  24. John A. Nagl, Counterinsurgency Lessons from Malaya and Vietnam: Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2002). The title picked up on T. E. Lawrence’s aphorism.

  25. David Kilcullen, The Accidental Guerrilla: Fighting Small Wars in the Midst of a Big One (London: Hurst & Co., 2009).

  26. David H. Petraeus, “Learning Counterinsurgency: Observations from Soldiering in Iraq,” Military Review, January/February 2006, 2–12.

  27. On the “surge,” see Bob Woodward, The War Within: A Secret White House History (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2008); Bing West, The Strongest Tribe: War, Politics, and the Endgame in Iraq (New York: Random House, 2008); Linda Robinson, Tell Me How This Ends: General David Petraeus and the Search for a Way Out of Iraq (New York: Public Affairs, 2008).

  28. On the links with Boyd, see Frans Osinga, “On Boyd, Bin Laden, and Fourth Generation Warfare as String Theory,” in John Andreas Olson, ed., On New Wars (Oslo: Norwegian Institute for Defence Studies, 2007), 168–197, available at http://ifs.forsvaret.no/publikasjoner/oslo_files/OF_2007/Documents/OF_4_2007.pdf.

  29. William S. Lind, Keith Nightengale, John F. Schmitt, Joseph W. Sutton, and Gary I. Wilson, “The Changing Face of War: Into the Fourth Generation,” Marine Corps Gazette, October 1989, 22–26; William Lind, “Understanding Fourth Generation War,” Military Review, September/October 2004, 12–16. This reports the findings of a study group which he convened at his house.

  30. Keegan, A History of Warfare and van Creveld, The Transformation of War, for both see Chapter 7, n. 14; Rupert Smith, The Utility of Force: The Art of War in the Modern World (London: Allen Lane, 2005); Mary Kaldor, New & Old Wars, Organized Violence in a Global Era (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1999).

  31. “The Evolution of War: The Fourth Generation of Warfare,” Marine Corps Gazette, September 1994. See also Thomas X. Hammes, “War Evolves into the Fourth Generation,” Contemporary Security Policy 26, no. 2 (August 2005): 212–218. This issue contains a number of critiques of the idea of fourth-generation warfare, including one by the author. This was republished as Aaron Karp, Regina Karp, and Terry Terriff, eds., Global Insurgency and the Future of Armed Conflict: Debating Fourth-Generation Warfare (London: Routledge, 2007). For a full account of Hammes�
��s ideas see his The Sling and the Stone: On War in the 21st Century (St. Paul, MN: Zenith Press, 2004); Tim Benbow, “Talking ‘Bout Our Generation? Assessing the Concept of ‘Fourth Generation Warfare’” Comparative Strategy, March 2008, 148–163 and Antulio J. Echevarria, Fourth Generation Warfare and Other Myths (Carlisle, PA: U.S. Army War College Strategic Studies Institute, 2005).