I'm not going to admit how long it took me to figure out that this was a parody.

...it would have actually used the word "metrics." Probably several times.

You aren't cynical. You are concise.

After quite a bit of reflection, I really like Boyd's idea of strategy: "A mental tapestry of changing intentions for harmonizing and focusing our efforts as a basis for realizing some aim or purpose in an unfolding and often unforeseen world of many bewildering events and many contending interests."

Might seem like a bit much to wrap your head around but then so is strategy. It is choice-taking but it also involves seeing and synthesizing the whole of what is happening in the world around us and adapting our aims and efforts as necessary to make the proper choices in context.

What I see is a lot of (bad) operational decisions passed off as strategy and not a lot of deep thought (or dissent) on what our national security strategy should entail in keeping with the Constitution. Quite a bit of prideful reluctance to admit our mistakes, learn from them and make course corrections as well.

On second thought if you consider spreading fear in the public realm and bolstering the military-industrial complex in order to grant government greater power over the people as the aim of our current strategy, then yes, I suppose you could say we have a strategy that is working very well.

In essence, the first thought means our strategy makers are idiots and the second thought means that they are actually fairly intelligent and simply pursuing aims they don't want to be known to us. I don't really like either of those thoughts... Maybe someone has a better analysis?

A common mistake is to confuse operations with strategy. Our strategy has been clear -- I don't argue correct. It was to inflict regime change on regimes that were both reachable and contributing to the terrorism that culminated in 9/11. An element of the strategic decision was to defer dealing with Iran.

The Taliban regime in Afghanistan harbored al Qaida and refused to cough them up.

Saddam's nonsense had kept us based in Saudi Arabia for over a decade, and, if one reads the "Letters to the Umma," the fatal error of foreign troops based in KSA should become clear. Several authors point out that the only way out of KSA was through Baghdad. The cost of staying there was not clear until the days after 9/11.

As far as operations, I hope this topic is mined for the next decade and produces something akin to the revolution of Air-Land Battle back in the early 80s. It should be clear that we do not have valid operational concepts.

As one who was in Iraq during the so-called surge, I can agree about what the awakening really was, at least in the province where I served.

The US Army spent so many years watching trees grow in the Fulda Gap that it came to conflate doctrine with strategy, a failure persisting to this day. I've yet to see from the Army a viable strategic approach to conflict with any adversary not a peer competitor.

This LIC stuff, like close-air support for the Air Force and mine warfare for the Navy, is something that the Army just doesn't think it should ever be called on to do and certainly - it being so trivial a form of combat - should not be expected to devote effort to understanding or actually get competent at.

"Give us more money, more troops, more technology, more gear" is not a strategy, but that's what you get from My Favorite Army in its stead. Yet all visible plans for a future Army show continuation on the same vector, no inflection or reflection, just more of the same. Army Reform is a pressing need, but not to the Army.

"...and more time..."

RD

Forward defense right on the inner-German and Czech borders was a NATO pseudo-strategy driven by German political considerations. I always wondered if we'd actually try fighting like that but all the plans sure looked like that.

I remember Bundeswehr took some old Wehrmacht General (Hermann Balck I think) on a staff ride on the border. They took him up to some autobahn crossing into East and asked him how he'd defend it. Hermann said he wouldn't defend the border at all, he said he just let Warsaw Pact drive west for about 4 days then cut them off in a pocket by double envelopment at border or somewhere east of there. The Bundeswehr were not too receptive of that idea.

That front never had much depth, especially after French quit NATO in 66.

well done Hunter...well done
BTW, hope your signed up for the ASAP course

I don't start for another few weeks so its a bit premature. Also I understand that ASAP is selective, so while I might try for it I also might not get it. I think that National Security Policy Program (NSPP) or the Eisenhower Series College Program (also selective) might be more up my lane though. Especially as an RC guy where I have a much better chance of putting to use the skills I'll learn in NSPP or ESCP.

Please do convince me that I am wrong though. I simply don't know enough yet to make a determination.

Why pick this topic? Look at Mr. Ricks and his COIN. Why did the USAF completely fail to defend America on 911? Do you guys teach a course on that? I doubt it.

Yes, we teach a courses on air power and its role in irregular war, as well as some pretty uncomfortable lessons on why the Air Force took so long to establish its role in the current wars.

As for your claim about the Air Force failing to protect the US on 9/11 - I don't get your point, and even if I were to get your point, I'd likely vociferously disagree with it.

Cheers,

John

What happened to Cheney in between Desert Storm and the Vice Presidency? I seem to remember him as well respected for what he did and didn't do with respect to the military as Sec Def.

David Wurmser

My thanks to Zathras for his thoughtful comments. I'd like to respond to the two ideas that Zathras implied from my comment:

First, I do not suggest for one moment that the military does strategy better than civilians. Indeed, my assertion that politicians should also learn the art and science of strategy is based on a real fear I have that strategy just left to the military is disastrous. If strategy is the bridge between political purpose and military feasibility then that bridge must be built and maintained by military AND civilian strategists. Indeed, how you infer that the military make "better" strategists than civilians is beyond me.

How, then, do we inculcate a culture of learning the strategic arts and science among our politicians? I would argue that while prior military service can be helpful, often all that does is create a tactical and operational mindset. Rather, it would be refreshing if our politicians took an educational route that was not solely based on law or business school. A classical liberal education would provide the critical faculties required of a strategist.

Second, Zathras takes issue with my phrasing "our politicians of all stripes," calling it lazy thinking. Really?! What utter, pedenatic nonsense. President George W. Bush, Vice-President Cheney, and Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld are politicians. Also complicit in the Iraq and Afghanistan debacles are members of the House and Senate Armed Services Committees of both parties - also politicians; after all, they've funded these wars. Looking further back, it took one President (LBJ), a number of his advisers, and a Secretary of Defense (McNamara), as well as a complicit Capitol Hill - politicians all - to bequeath us the Vietnam mess. If Presidents, Vice Presidents, Cabinet members, and members of the House and Senate - Republican or Democrat - aren't politicians, then perhaps Zathras could enlighten us as to who is?

I've re-read my comment out of concern that my wording of it might have inadvertently misled any reader, and frankly I do not see how Zathras inferred what he did from it. I can only assume that Zathras read into my comment what he desperately wanted to read into it. His inferences are his alone, and are not inferences that I made.

The fact of the matter is that a number of US military schools teach strategy, and actually teach it well; the problem is that we have to teach it to too few officers. My lament was that when politicians are not versed in the arts of strategy they leave themselves vulnerable to being hoodwinked by those with vested service interests into decisions that they might otherwise would not have made. We need civilian and military strategists, possessed of critical thinking faculties and independent intellects, who are then able to speak truth to power.

The simplest explanation that makes sense: Cheney was one guy when he worked for the elder George Bush (also for Gerald Ford) and another when he worked for the younger George Bush.

I am a somewhat less than fervent admirer of H.W. Bush, whom I thought wedded by temperament and limited imagination to passivity and reaction. As a career staff man, though, he had a deep respect for the value of orderly procedures and a traditional view of the prerogatives of his office. It never would have occurred to him to have his own Vice President assume the role Cheney did during his son's first term, or to have his Secretary of Defense presume to be anything other than the President's subordinate.

The younger Bush was a lesser man, unable to set limits on the ambition of subordinates his White House staff couldn't control. He also entered office profoundly ignorant of national security policy (along with a somewhat lengthy list of other subjects), something that had not been true of his father. This would have forced him to be heavily dependent on somebody; he chose to be dependent on Cheney.

I never thought the various theories about Cheney having changed his disposition or personality between 1992 and 2001 were particularly credible. The main thing that changed for him was his boss.

I'm no fan of Cheney, but to pin US strategic blunders on him alone is more than a stretch. I remain faithful to my previous comments on this matter.

Cheers,

John

but since you are here, here it is:

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/files/fp_uploaded_documents/110606_0_SF%20-1001%20Strategic%20Reasoning%20Document.pdf

cheers,
tom

Steve M says: "Or are multiple teams incapable of making unique plans because all of the planning officers are trained by the same war colleges? ie. does this lack of variety lead to lack of creative thinking?"

I can't help but be reminded of the chapter in Gladwell's book Blink where he talks about Van Riper handing the BLUFOR their asses during Millenium Challenge. Van Riper was a rare gem, but he's not an entirely unique one.

We've got lots of talent hidden away in little grey planning cells that never see the light of day. SAMs grads are highly vaunted. We do send guys like Petraeus, McMasters, etc. off to other schools to get new views.

I like to think that we can build these strategic thinkers. I am absolutely opposed to the idea they are born that way, so there's only one alternative. I guess I am going to find out soon.

actually, no, it does not come down to a single team of high ranking officials, I am sure many who read this blog know and understand JSAP, and the "CHOP" process that goes throughout all COCOMs and services, from plans to doctrine.
When you get a chance STEVEO, talk to someone who has been involved in planning and can explain JOPES and APEX to you.

... but nowhere near enough, and there is no guarantee that they'll be in the military, or worse still, our military. That's why we have schools like SAASS, SAMS, SAW, and the rest. We assume that even if there's a natural-born strategic genius, he or she would be one in several million and therefore not enough to meet our voracious strategic demands. Hence we educate strategists, and contrary to Tom's suggestion, we actually try to make it a rigorous, intellectually challenging, and deep education at that.

Cheers,

John

Thanks guys

"That's why we have schools like SAASS, SAMS, SAW, and the rest"....for the record: Although these schools have strategic/strategy in the title, they are not strategic in nature & are more focused on detailed operational level planning and implementation. The misconception that these are truly "Strategic" level courses is truly sad, as leaders see people graduating from these schools as "golden children" and great thinkers. I have worked with SAMS graduates who couldn't plan they're way out of a box....

Thanks for your comment.

No, our graduates are field grade officers (O4-O-5), though many do reach the rank of O-6. However, schools like SAASS have only been around for 20 years, and so our graduates have yet to 'perculate' through to the top of the system. Also, it should be noted that our school, and its equivalent in our sister services, are small and so there are very few graduates to go around.

Here's the problem - schools like the one I work at produce 50 -plus graduates a year (as of AY13-14, that number will be reduced to about 40-plus as we take our share of the budget crunch). The demand for our graduates outstrips supply, and while they may have been versed in the strategic arts and sciences they still have to follow the orders of their superiors when back out in the big, bad world.. I'd like to claim that if all of our O-9s and O-10s were graduates of schools like SAASS that we would have better strategic thinkers at the top, but even then such an education cannot innoculate against putting service imperatives over national interest, misjudgment, and the fact that, as I have said, military strategist are but one half of the equation.

Your frustration, however, proves my point. When we leave strategy solely to the military then we're the poorer for it. That said, I know a number of graduates who have counseled against the conventional military wisdom and have suffered for it.

Lastly, I do not claim that we are doing a self-congratulatory 'fine job' teaching strategy - I am saying, rather, that we are doing it far better than Tom Ricks would have you believe.

Our budget crunch, along with the reduction in graduates and faculty, will take effect in AY12-13, not AY13-14. Apologies.

We had this knockout dragout a few months ago. Strategic, Operational, Tactical levels of war. Tactical can (and does) stretch all the way to the Corps level. So anyone short of the three star is probably operating at that level. Above that is the realm of the operational and strategic.

In other words, the GOs screwed the pooch. Not the O6s and O5s. Now the obvious next step is well why didn't they learn the right stuff when they were O5s and O6s. I don't know.

But you must consider that maybe they learned the right stuff and weren't given the latitude to execute thusly. Remember the spectrum between able/willing and unwilling/unable (and the mix between those two extremes). Perhaps they were able but not willing - or in this case lacked the moral courage to tell their bosses the plan was destined to fail.

Look to TRs books - I don't recall which one - which shows the Phase IV plan for Iraq on a handful of .ppts and tell me we weren't setting ourselves up for failure. Phases I-III were brilliant and worked admirably, but none of it matters because they always remember the last thing you screwed up, and that screw up has continued in various forms for a decade. OOPS.

I've said it before, Tommy Franks lacked the ability/willingness to make the workable Phase IV plan, and although not directly responsible Shinseki lacked the guts to make sure we didn't run into that buzzsaw. Shinseki voiced his concerns, but he didn't back it up with his heart/convictions. He sat there and took it. Over and over he took it. Meanwhile Keane smartly saw the writing on the wall, took his ball and went home, then reinserted his ball through the backdoor. Keane deserves another medal; brass balls, ability, and willingness, in spades.

I do believe that the GOs are responsible. Armchair quarterbacking the decision making in '02-'03 is easy (would be more difficult if more of the decisions had been good ones....but I suppose that technically I am not allowed to say things like that). That said, even now getting something different in front of GOs is no mean task. How can our decision makers, GOs and senior civilian authorities, make better decisions if all they ever see is the same stuff? If they do not actively surround themselves with the cynical strategist? That SAASS/SAMS grad who will tell the GO that his/her GO GFI is not really that great, that his/her favorite metric does not actually measure anything, and that providing ppt slides to higher might make the staff there happy but does nothing to advance the stated goals and objectives of the organization.

As JBS points out: buck the system and get yourself screwed (my take on his verbiage).

It is funny that in TR's latest post he points at the new Westmoreland bio wherein the author apparently asks how someone that unintelligent and incurious (my words) went that far.

Are our military systems so set that anyone who bucks the ppt trend just does not make it to a position where they can execute some strategic thought? Why do I hear generals state that they hate ppt? Usually just before they go and sit through an hour or more of ppt?

I'm biased on this, as I did my Ph.D. under Colin's supervision, but I second Z1739's recommendation of Colin's latest book 'The Strategy Bridge: Theory for Practice' (Oxford University Press, 2010).

Cheers,

John

Here's the link.

http://www.all-acronyms.com/cat/2