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For over a decade, The Strategy Bridge has helped to lead a conversation among practitioners, scholars, and students about strategy, national security, and military affairs. Written early in 2013 our guiding principles reflect what we have always tried to do here.

1. Writing and strategy are communal affairs. We exist to develop a community of thinkers and writers who seek to improve the level of discussion in these areas.
2. By creating this community, we will support the authorship of quality content in the areas of policy, strategy, and military affairs.
3. By creating this community, we will also create networks of individuals that support current thinkers and practitioners, as well as support the development of future leaders in these areas.
4. Forever in our sight should be the development of the next generation of thinkers and practitioners in the realm of strategy.

We believe these principles to be as true today as they were when written a decade ago. The Strategy Bridge built an amazing community and helped shape an online publication world that looks remarkably different. We hold great faith in the next generation of strategy thinkers and practitioners. While we fervently believe that there remains much work to be done, we also believe that the time is right for that work to occur elsewhere.

Just as strategy must change and adapt, so too must its practitioners determine when the strategy has run its course. The Strategy Bridge’s journal will remain online and it will remain free as it always has, a repository of the work of our community, as a resource for future research, and as a marker on the path to our community’s development and the development of those who will come next.

Strategy requires deep study, rigorous thinking, deliberate writing, and honest debate. It has been our absolute honor to have participated in this project with you for so many years. We look forward to continuing the conversation in other ways, through the sustainment of our Strategy Bridge Podcast and our in-person strategy sessions, and perhaps in new ways in the future.

Strategy is always about positional advantage, about ensuring an opportunity for another move, a next step, a follow-on decision. We look forward to watching our community’s next moves.

The Strategy Bridge Journalhas been brought to you by our Managing Editors, Dr. Heather Pace and Dr. Katherine Voyles and our Editors Robert Mihara, Brett Friedman, Jo Brick, Marc Milligan, Nicole Dean, and Ryan Waddle; delivered by our Communications Team Daniel Clark, Rowan Wise, and David Retherford; and supported by our Assessments Team Katherine Batterton and Kimberly Hale. The Strategy Bridge Board of Directors are Richard Ganske, Mikhail Grinberg, Tyrell Mayfield, and Eric Murphy.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

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Vasily Vereshchagin (Wikimedia)

The Russian invasion of Ukraine continues, and examining Russian culture is still a minefield since Russia launched its February 2022 Special Military Operation. Concerts featuring the music of famous Russian composers came under fire.[1] Ballet tours were shuttered.[2] Russian art and cultural exhibitions were questioned, postponed, or canceled.[3] Russian food and drink came under scrutiny, with bar owners dumping bottles of vodka into storm drains for social media.[4] Competing images of stalwart Russians supporting Putin and the Russian occupation saturated Russian state media over the last year. But there is dissent in modern Russia, as should be expected given the rich history of dissent among Russian artists who historically challenged oppression and the ruthless activities of authoritarian regimes.[5] These Russian artists and artworks deserve consideration by national security and defense professionals to understand an adversary’s political and social undercurrents.

One such Russian who provides an ideal case study at this moment in history is Vasily Vereshchagin, an artist whose works were so jarring and raw that even German Field Marshall Helmuth von Moltke the Elder barred his soldiers from viewing Vereshchagin’s Berlin exhibition in 1890, out of frustration and concern that Vereshchagin’s monumental Apotheosis of War might instill confusion in the newly unified German military.[6] Today, Vershchagin’s work offers insight into the complexities of Russian military culture, highlighting a long history of friction between political expectations of victory and the realities of violent warfare in distant lands. Vereshchagin’s art protests war and promotes peace through accurate and brutal depictions on canvas, whether we choose to look or not.

*The Apotheosis of War (Vasily Vereshchagin/WikiArt)*

The Apotheosis of War, the famous painting of piled skulls on a barren field and notorious confuser of German generals, was painted in the aftermath of the 1868 siege of Samarkand, one of countless bloody battles during the two-year long Russian campaign to occupy the region of Bukhara in Central Asia. Based on accounts of an ancient Mongol army piling the skulls of its vanquished enemies outside of conquered cities as a warning against resistance to Mongol occupation, history repeated with the equally violent Russian occupation. Tongue-in-cheek, Vereshchagin dedicated his painting "to all great conquerors, past, present and to come.”[7] Today, the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow displays Apotheosis, and it is the cover art for countless military strategy and history textbooks, sometimes ironically and sometimes not. Apotheosis is a reminder to military and political leaders that violent actions in foreign lands rarely result in a peaceful occupation.

Vereshchagin’s unconventional approach to political critique mirrors his unconventional life. Born in a family of minor nobles in October of 1842, Vasily Vasilyevich Vereshchagin was groomed for military service at a young age, attending the Tsarskoe Selo military academy and entering the Sea Cadet Corps like many aristocratic Russian sons. Despite the outward incongruence of a military life and an artistic nature, young Vereshchagin sketched and painted throughout his initial military apprenticeship. Once complete, he enrolled in the Imperial Academy of Fine Arts to refine his talents.[8] By his own admission, he was unmoored and restless.[9] Military obligations and art school complete, he joined the Russian diplomatic corps in his twenties, looking for an opportunity to travel and paint. Vereshchagin was posted throughout Central Asia, and his artistic skills matured.[10] It was there that the young painter first experienced the military operations that influenced his battle art for years to come. Detailing his thoughts and experiences in travel journals that would later be published as his memoirs, Vereshchagin compared the Russian Imperial occupations throughout Central Asia to similar Western European military presences around the world. “Until we set ourselves deliberately and systematically to colonize the country, Russian Turkestan, I am convinced, will be Russian in name only,” he noted, continuing with, “Our position in Turkestan is like that of the French in Algeria; the only way to prevent the people from constantly rising against us it to colonize the country.”[11] He also observed abuses against local people and their beliefs by Imperial Russian soldiers and occupiers, detailing the outward disdain of Central Asian people toward their oppressors.

*Mountain stream in Kashmir (Vasily Vereshchagin/WikiArt)*

Traveling with the Russian diplomatic corps between Turkestan, Siberia, and western Europe throughout the latter half of the 1860s, Vereshchagin painted detailed works of Central Asian life. Also keen to expose the harsh realities of foreign occupation, some of his artwork countered Imperial Russia’s image of military prowess and inherent nobility. Russian violence and atrocities during the 1868 Siege of Samarkand would inspire Apotheosis, Vereshchagin’s most famous work. Flush with paintings and sketches by the end of his diplomatic tour, Vereshchagin’s Turkestan Series became a solo exhibition in the 1873 London Crystal Palace art show.[12] The exhibition showcased a blend of regional landscapes, local people in daily life, and controversial scenes of Russian occupation and oppression. When the exhibition traveled to Russia the next year, military and political elite were immediately critical. Not only would Apotheosis of War be denied exhibition in his homeland during the 1874 St. Petersburg show, but so would another controversial piece: Left Behind, a jarring image of a dying soldier deserted by his fellow soldiers.[13] Despite his artistic talent and the stark honesty of his artwork, Russian censorship prevailed. To escape the controversy, Vereshchagin was back on the road and painting his way through the Himalayas, India, and Tibet by the end of the year.

*After Failure (Vasily Vereshchagin/WikiArt)*

Two years later, Vereshchagin returned to Russia and the growing regional instability that was edging toward open conflict in the Caucasus and Balkans. He requested to join the Russian Army staff as a volunteer, bound for campaigns against Turkish forces in Plevna, Shipka, and other battles throughout the Tundzha Valley region, which runs through modern-day Bulgaria along the Edirne River and empties into modern Turkey. As both a staff officer and artist, Vereshchagin drafted sketches during the war for paintings that became some of the most definitively critical images of the war and Imperial Russian Army. In his memoirs, Vereshchagin wrote, "[a]s soon as the war was finished I returned to my studio, and began to transfer my impressions to canvas—impressions of battles, wounds, disease, and all sorts of misery, the inevitable attendants of every war. The result was such that people would not believe me; they said that I lied, that my pictures were the work of my imagination.”[14] With all of his recent experiences and sketches in hand, the Russian artist would paint some of the most subversive protest art of the century.

*Before the attack. At Plevna (Vasily Vereshchagin/WikiArt)*

Vereshchagin’s protest and bleak artistic depiction of Russian military operations was not unfounded. A stagnation androt within the aristocratic ranks of the imperial officer corps had been brewing for decades and would not change even in the wake of the Balkan and Caucasus campaigns.[15]

[E]verything related to the health of the troops … [was] completely to the integrity of the brigadier-generals, who in turns related on the colonels of the regiments; and the result was that in reality there was no control whatever… [following reports from a doctor about missing supplies]… The officer in command of the division acted in extremely patriarchal fashion, for he questioned the colonel of the regiment, and in consequence removed the doctor from his post, ascribing his damaging statement to his personal dislike of the colonel.[16]

His critical stance on the care of soldiers, wounded, and prisoners became more pointed with the loss of two siblings during the campaign.[17] The roots of institutional incompetence and lethargy were systemic throughout the later half of the nineteenth century, even in the wake of vast military reforms sponsored by Dmitrii Miliutin, the Minister of War from 1861 to 1881.[18] Drinking, gambling, and graft were entrenched, and social stratification prioritized honor and noblesse over efficiency and effectiveness, particularly in the officer ranks.[19] Training conscripted troops focused almost exclusively on drill and ceremony and eschewed maneuver-focused adaption.[20] Mired in the red tape of a regimental economic system that left procurement of supplies up to the infantry regiments themselves, company bookkeeping and expenditures documentation undermined formation even further.[21] “The behavior of senior officers—factionalism, cliquishness and a notorious inability to coordinate operations—may be interpreted as a logical outgrowth of their experiences as junior officers and commanders of regiments (when, as proprietaries of estates, they had no need for and gain no experience in coordination).”[22] In success or defeat, the Russian military steadily permitted a culture of willful negligence and Vereshchagin witnessed it all.

Two paintings from this era provide a unique platform to examine both Vereshchagin’s skill with oil and canvas and his talent for political critique. A Resting Place for Prisoners and The Road of War Prisoners both depict events following the Imperial coalition’s victory at the Battle of Plevna in the winter of 1877. In Resting Place, a snowstorm pushes up waves of snow across the center of the canvas. Between wispy drifts, glimpses of Turkish prisoners and their Russian captors on horseback appear. The hoofs of a dead horse and the wheels of a broken carriage protrude from a snowdrift in the foreground. A line of squatting prisoners, exposed to the elements, is visible in the distance. The Road of the War Prisoners depicts the same storm’s aftermath. Blue skies have replaced the stormy darkness. Contrasting sharply with the white snow and pale blue sky, black crows perch atop telegraph wires and wander between lifeless bodies left on either side of the road. Vereshchagin painted both pieces at the height of the European Impressionist movement, as painters experimented with visible brushstrokes to evoke shifting light and shadow and to reflect the human experience of nature. As an artist that could paint both striking detail and ephemeral sunlight in the same artwork, Vereshchagin’s paintings from the Russo-Turkish War highlight his talent for blending both Realism and Impressionism to create striking, shocking artworks. Both paintings—part of the collection of the Brooklyn Museum curated to be viewed together—provide a complete statement on actions and consequences.[23]

From a cursory glimpse, the Russo-Turkish War appears to be a victory for Imperial Russia and its coalition over the Ottoman Empire. Like leaning toward a painting for a closer look, a deeper examination of the conflict, however, reveals more details on the war’s impact on Kurdish, Bulgarian, Armenian, and countless other peoples. The campaigns exacerbated regional violence towards Armenian and Jewish communities throughout the Caucasus and Balkans. British observers recounted atrocities and ethnic cleansing by both Russian and Ottoman forces.[24] Violence in the wake of a victory is, sadly, not uncommon, but the voracity of the Russian troops left an indelible mark on Vereshchagin, echoing in his portrayals of soldiers, prisoners, and civilians impacted by the warring factions.[25] His work was decidedly antiwar, portraying death with a level of clarity that was unwelcome to the Russian aristocracy.[26] In fact, both A Resting Place for Prisoners and The Road of War Prisoners were offered originally for acquisition to the czar’s private collection and rejected, despite Vereshchagin’s commissioning as an imperial war painter. With no prospect for purchase in his homeland, he sold both canvases to New York collectors in 1891.[27]

*Transportation Of The Wounded (Vasily Vereshchagin/WikiArt)*

There is no shortage of war, and no shortage of anti-war art, in the world. In countries where authoritarian regimes ruthlessly sensor artists, social media has continued to smuggle art and messages out to the wider world. Throughout history, certain anti-war artists or political protesters have enjoyed a rare kind of privilege stemming from relationships with the very same political leaders they depict. Vasily Vereshchagin was one of these rare individuals. As an aristocrat, he was protected. As an artist, he walked a fine line by honestly portraying the Imperial Russian military as unethical and unprofessional. Vereshchagin recognized this and sought new paths and places to share his views through art.

I already knew from the stories told by other members of my profession what disagreeable treatment artists are exposed to in some regions, especially on the part of the preservers of order, and how they are generally taken for revolutionists and agitators… I said to myself more than once that it would be well to curtail my visits to my native plains, and to go to some country which, with fewer endearing associations, offered greater liberty of action.[28]

Vereshchagin died on April 13, 1904, aboard the Russian battleship Petropavlovsk when it struck sea-mines near Port Arthur. He was 61 and still painting battlefields. His last work, a picture of Admiral Stepan Makarov presiding over a war council, was recovered from the wreck almost undamaged. His artistic efforts to promote peace through an honest representation of war lives on today, whether we chose to boycott it or accept it. Examining Russian art may seem challenging for the foreseeable future, but it is imperative that defense and national strategy professionals seek out dissenting voices and amplify them. Anti-Putin artists have emerged from both the Ukrainian and Russian art worlds, all facing the same threat of political persecution if caught. Over the last two decades, 78-year old Russian pensioner and former art teacher, Yelena Osipova, has been protesting Putin and holding up her artworks in public spaces around St. Petersburg. Others remain anonymous. The underground artist simply known as Koin began painting and sharing graphic depictions of Russian political leaders on social media when opposition leader Alexei Navalny was arrested in 2021. Since then, their series of portraits of Russia’s politicians and elites as grotesque vampires and monsters has also been shared across social media. Pressure from the international art community can provide a measure of protection, ensuring that dissenting artists do not simply disappear, but that is only if an artist is well-known and recognized. Looking at historic Russian anti-war art can provide an excellent start to examine today’s artists, and the works of Vasily Vereshchagin could be that point of departure. After all, if it is shocking enough to make Moltke the Elder clutch his medals, maybe we should all take a peek before it is too late.

Nikki Dean is a seemingly perpetual graduate student with the University of Kansas and is a recently retired U.S. Army Aviation officer. Her research focuses on art looting, illicit markets, curation, and collections management in war. She tweets into the void from @doctrinatrix_C2 and Instagrams randomly @doctrinatrix. The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect those of the University of Kansas, U.S. Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Suppression of the Indian Revolt by the English (Vasily Vereshchagin/Wikmedia)

Notes: [1] Matthew Weaver, “Cardiff Philharmonic removes Tchaikovsky performance over Ukraine conflict,” The Guardian, March 09, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/mar/09/cardiff-philharmonic-orchestra-removes-tchaikovsky-over-ukraine-conflict?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other.

[2] Emma Pinedo, “Madrid’s Opera House cancels Russian’s Bolshoi ballet show after Ukraine invasion,” Reuters, March 04, 2022, https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/madrids-opera-house-cancels-russias-bolshoi-ballet-show-after-ukraine-invasion-2022-03-04/.

[3] Sophia Kishkovsky, “London’s Saatchi Gallery cancels Russian-organised show of Ukrainian art social media backlash,” The Art Newspaper, August 17, 2022, https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2022/08/17/londons-saatchi-gallery-cancels-russian-organised-show-of-ukrainian-art-after-social-media-storm.

[4] Yahoo Entertainment (@yahooentertainment), original video content from Evel Pie. “#Vegas bar protests Russian invasion by allowing customers to purchase $300 bottles of Russian-produced #vodka to dump out,” TikTok, February 28, 2022, https://www.tiktok.com/@yahooentertainment/video/7069823352277601582?lang=en.

[5] “Russian Art & Soviet Nonconformist Art,” accessed June 10, 2023, Zimmerli Art Museum of Rutgers University, https://zimmerli.rutgers.edu/collections/russian-art-soviet-nonconformist-art.

[6] David Schimmelpenninck van der Oye, “Vasilij V. Vereshchagin’s Canvases of Central Asian Conquest,” Chaier d’Asie central 17/18, (2009), 182, https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/224150223.pdf.

[7] Clayton Schuster, “The Apotheosis of War,” Sartle, accessed June 10, 2023, https://www.sartle.com/artwork/the-apotheosis-of-war-vasily-vereshchagin. Originally noted and discussed by Russian biographer, Fedor I. Bulgakov in 1905 in his work V.V. Vereshchagin i ego proizvedenija [V.V. Vereshchagin and his Works].

[8] van der Oye, 186.

[9] van der Oye, 187.

[10] Vassili Verestchagin, Soldier-Painter-Traveler, Autobiographical Sketches, Volume I,

translated from German and French by FH Peters (London, UK: Richard Bentley & Son: 1887), 99-103.

[11] Ibid, 144-145.

[12] van der Oye, 182. The show itself was discussed in the April 7, 1873 London Times article, “Central Asia at the Crystal Palace.”

[13] van der Oye, “Vasilij V. Vereshchagin’s Canvases of Central Asian Conquest,” 202.

[14] Vassili Verestchagin, Soldier-Painter-Traveler, Autobiographical Sketches, Volume II,

translated from German and French by FH Peters (London, UK: Richard Bentley & Son: 1887), 275.

[15] Maureen P. O’Connor, The Vision of Soldiers: Britain, France, Germany, and the United States Observe the Russo-Turkish War, War in History 4, no. 3 (July 1997), 267-271.

[16] Verestchagin, Soldier-Painter-Traveler, Autobiographical Sketches, Volume II, 137.

[17] Ibid, 210-220.

[18] John Bushnell, “The Tsarist Officer Corps, 1881-1914: Customs, Duties, Inefficiency,” The American Historical Review 86, no. 4 (October 1981), 754 – 755.

[19] Ibid, 754.

[20] Ibid, 764.

[21] O’Connor, “The Vision of Soldiers,” 267-276.

[22] Bushnell, 773-774.

[23] “A Resting Place of Prisoners” and “The Road of War Prisoners,” European Art, Collection Menu, Brooklyn Museum, accessed June 10, 2023, https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/opencollection/objects/4630.

[24] O’Connor, “The Vision of Soldiers,” 279-280, 288.

[25] Verestchagin, Soldier-Painter-Traveler, Autobiographical Sketches, Volume II, 187, 275.

[26] Verestchagin, Soldier-Painter-Traveler, Autobiographical Sketches, Volume II, 275.

[27] “A Resting Place of Prisoners” and “The Road of War Prisoners,” European Art, Collection Menu, Brooklyn Museum, accessed June 10, 2023, https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/opencollection/objects/4630.

[28] Verestchagin, Soldier-Painter-Traveler, Autobiographical Sketches, Volume II, 330.

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Michael Howard, the great British historian, once advised that military officer who wish to avoid the pitfalls of military history should study in width, depth, and context—studying the great sweep of military history to see what changes and what does not; studying a single campaign in all its complexity to “get beyond the order created by the historian;” and studying the nature of the societies that fight the wars we seek to understand.

Here at The Strategy Bridge, we feel very much the same way about the study of strategy, and we work hard to realize this width, depth, and context in the books we review each week.

We believe the study of strategy is a broad one, encompassing a host of topics, ranging from the explicit study of the long sweep of military history to analysis of the possibilities for war and warfare in the future, from the use of air power in the Falklands to the use of artillery in the desert and to modern naval operations, and from China to Russia to Africa. You’ll find this width—and much more—in our reviews and our reviewers from 2023.

Some destinations in the intellectual landscape of strategy, national security, and military affairs deserve repeated visits, repeated efforts to unpack their complexities, and just as we’ve used #Reviewing to explore the width of the intellectual landscape, so have we plumbed some of its depths in 2023. Leadership is an area rich in its depth, for example, and we’ve looked to lessons from Admiral Chester Nimitz, Major General Samuel Curtis, President Ronald Reagan, and even from science fiction. Strategic questions of race affecting the U.S. Army, the U.S. Navy, and American society have been much on our minds, as have critical questions of civil-military relations past and present raised by recent history.

And just as Michael Howard advises, we have explored the interactions between strategy, national security, and military affairs and the societal contexts within which they operate. We looked at the emergence of the Geneva Conventions and their influence on the norms driving how we fight wars. We’ve looked at the influence of economics and the marketplace on national security. We’ve even looked at how technological, biological, legal, economic, psychological, sociological, and political issues will shape the future of humanity as we explore and settle in outer space.

Our explorations have been varied in 2023—width, depth, and context go hand in hand—and we’ve enjoyed and learned from it all! Thanks to all of you for coming on the journey with us this year!

#TheBridgeReads

 Buy on Amazon  *Paths of Dissent: Soldiers Speak Out Against America's Misguided Wars*. Edited by Andrew Bacevich and Daniel A. Sjursen. New York, NY: Metropolitan Books, 2022.**Read a review from Tim Bettis** **here****:**

Despite its omissions, Paths of Dissent is an exceptionally substantive and moving book for anyone interested in personal accounts at the intersection of ethics and military service…As America exits another costly decades-long counterinsurgency era into an uncertain future, it requires courageous dissenters…to avoid national security malpractice. It is only by capturing the perspectives of those who are willing to make personal sacrifices in informing the public’s understanding of war that principled countries can avoid waste and hypocrisy in its conduct.

 Buy on Amazon  *An Army Afire: How the US Army Confronted Its Racial Crisis in the Vietnam Era*. Beth Bailey. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2023.**Read Daniel Sukman’s review** **here****:**

An Army Afire offers lessons for leaders throughout the joint force in how to approach and solve complex and seemingly overwhelming problems. Bailey’s work is an important addition to the historical record of the U.S. military, and, more specifically, the U.S. Army. Innovative ideas and novel courses of action are necessary for combat and institutional actions. The military that fought in the 1991 Gulf War, and later in Afghanistan and Iraq were more than the product of combat platforms, the Goldwater-Nichols Act, and AirLand Battle; it was a force composed of a diverse set of men and women who stood on the shoulders of those who suffered and fought to change a system of inequality.

 Buy on Amazon  *Reconsidering American Civil-Military Relations: Military Society, Politics and Modern War*. Edited by Lionel Beehner, Risa Brooks and Daniel Maurer. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2020.**Read Chiara Ruffa’s review** **here****:**

Reconsidering American Civil-Military Relations shows how the various views of civil-military relations have transformed in a dramatic fashion, but also how much we rely on old conceptual tools to study new phenomena. It definitely shifts existing conversations about civil-military relations, allowing us to imagine that it is possible to move beyond Huntington…Moving past Huntington's model means recognizing complication and fluid boundaries. This departure from Huntington could also build better military and civilian expertise to understand and navigate civil-military relations, rather than dangerously assuming superiority in a military class that is isolated from democratic society.

 Buy on Amazon  *A Short History of War**.* Jeremy Black. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2022.**Read a review from Jean-Michel Turcotte** **here****:**

A Short History of War will certainly be welcomed by a larger public interested in military history. Not only has Black remarkably explored multiple facets of the global history of war, but he also highlights complex elements regarding the evolution of warfare over a long period of time. In addition, the volume is written in a language accessible to a general public unfamiliar with the field of war history which helps to democratize debates and discussion about the nature of war.

 Buy on Amazon  *Inheriting the Bomb: The Collapse of the USSR and the Nuclear Disarmament of Ukraine**.* Mariana Budjeryn. Baltimore, Maryland: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2023.**Read Shawn Conroy’s review** **here****:**

Inheriting the Bomb looks at the diplomatic process that led to the removal of nuclear weapons on the territories of newly independent Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine, with a focus on the latter. Inheriting the Bomb contributes to a resurgence of interest in Ukraine’s denuclearization in the wake of Russia’s first invasion of Ukraine in 2014. Mariana Budjeryn highlights the complexity (a myriad of factors) rather than contingency (one factor) that affected Ukraine’s denuclearization.

 Buy on Amazon  *Fighting the Fleet: Operational Art and Modern Fleet Combat*. Jeffrey R. Cares and Anthony Cowden. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2021.**Read Tyler A. Pitrof’s review** **here****:**

Fleets, Cares and Cowden argue, have four functions—striking, screening, scouting, and basing—and proper naval operational art is the ability to defeat an opponent by appropriately combining all four. While Cares and Cowden make no bones about the fact that this work is a math-heavy textbook intended for current naval officers, the two retired captains nevertheless succeed in crafting an accessible entryway into the world of modern naval command and planning in a text that is a spare 101 pages, plus technical appendices.

 Buy on Amazon  *Is Remote Warfare Moral? Weighing Issues of Life and Death from 7,000 Miles*. Joseph O. Chapa. New York, NY: Public Affairs, 2022. **Read a review from Christine Sixta Rinehart** **here****:**

Is Remote Warfare Moral? Weighing Issues of Life and Death from 7,000 Miles by Joseph O. Chapa is a thoughtful and necessary contribution to the literature on RPA warfare. The book’s biggest contribution is that of a primary source from a seasoned veteran and RPA instructor in the United States Air Force. The book also elucidates some of the ambiguity surrounding RPA warfare.

  *The American Way of Irregular Warfare: An Analytical Memoir**.* Charles T. Cleveland and Daniel Egal. Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 2020.**Read M.T. Mitchell’s review** **here****:**

While satisfied with the U.S. military’s tactical performance in irregular warfare, Cleveland rejects the argument that special operations can raid their way to victory or capture enough terrain. Cleveland uses the strategic failures of the U.S. in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan to argue the U.S. military must focus on its failure to structurally, doctrinally, and militarily invest in irregular warfare to succeed.

 Buy on Amazon  *Autumn of Our Discontent: Fall 1949 and the Crises in American National Security*. John Curatola. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2022.**Read David W. Bath’s review** **here****:**

Curatola’s most important accomplishment is creating a comprehensive look at how the United States changed its perspective on national security policy during 1949 by identifying and highlighting the importance of the lesser known national security issues that may have been hidden by the creation of the nuclear bomb.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Wandering Army: The Campaigns that Transformed the British Way of War*. Huw J. Davies. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2022.**Read Brandon Bernick’s review** **here****:**

The Wandering Army offers a new and powerful perspective on debates surrounding the British way of war. By suggesting observational and experiential learning in previous wars led to experimentation and knowledge diffusion throughout the officer class, Davies challenges previous views on an old subject. As such, he makes a great contribution to the field of military history and is one that should be considered of interest to experts as Davies crafts a very interesting book that furthers opportunities for study and debate.

 Buy on Amazon  *Backfire: How Sanctions Reshape the World Against U.S. Interests*. Agathe Demarais. New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2022.**Read Gregory Brew’s review** **here****:**

In a series of short, engaging, and clearly written chapters, Demarais breaks down why the U.S. found sanctions such an appealing policy instrument; how their widespread use in the 1990s and 2000s triggered changes and upheavals, as countries around the world coped with the issues of challenges of compliance; and, finally, how sanctions implementation has generally backfired, imposing costs on the U.S. and its allies while encouraging targeted states towards policies and strategies designed to insulate their governments and economies from U.S. pressure.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Lone Leopard*. Sharifullah Dorani. Bedford, England: S&M Publishing House, 2022.**Read Matthew C. Brand’s review** **here****:**

In his novel The Lone Leopard, Sharifullah Dorani provides a sweeping view of the struggle that Afghans endured under the burden of foreign influence, ethnic and religious seams, and the clash between traditional conservative cultural norms versus more modern liberal western ideals. The book does an excellent job of bringing the reader into the complicated societal mosaic that makes Afghanistan so unique.

 Buy on Amazon  *Writing Wars: Authorship and American War Fiction, WW1 to Present*. David F. Eisler. Iowa City, IA: University of Iowa Press, 2022.**Read a Jared Young’s review** **here****:**

Simply put, Writing Wars is necessary reading for scholars and writers working at the intersections of literary, military, and American studies. The interdisciplinary nature of the book also makes it well suited for a variety of classes. In addition to American Literature and History courses, select chapters on higher education’s influence on the genre and the ethics of authorship would make for insightful reading in creative writing classes that consider the history of writing programs or how identity politics figures into the ethos of storytelling. This potential widespread readership of Writing Wars is timely. With the ongoing military conflict in Ukraine and the reverberating effects of the U.S. campaigns in the Middle East, there is a need for a new wave of war fiction and, perhaps more importantly, a diverse collection of voices to tell such stories. Eisler’s book emphasizes the critical importance of this need and illuminates how those diverse voices can effectively address it.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Future of Decline: Anglo-American Culture at its Limits**.* Jed Esty. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2022.**Read a review from Katherine Voyles** **here****:**

Esty’s slim book charts what he terms “declinism” to powerful effect, distinguishing declinism from decline: “Decline is a fact; declinism is a problem. American decline is happening, slowly but inevitably. It is a structural and material process. Declinism is a problem of rhetoric or belief.” This story of America on a downhill slide that Esty tells is not self-consciously set in opposition to today’s national security concerns—whether they are framed as integrated deterrence, multi-domain operations, or large-scale combat operations—but the implications of Esty’s account are profound for what America might look like on the backside of decline.

 Buy on Amazon  *Victor in Trouble**.* Alex Finley. Athens, Greece: Smiling Hippo Press, 2022.**Read a review from Nicole E. Dean** **here****:**

Finley’s work is part of a long and glorious tradition of satire in the world of military and foreign affairs. Her books are a welcome mental break for modern audiences, but the wellspring of military and diplomatic satire was already deep. For autocratic societies, where censorship is a defining characteristic, satirists walk fine lines to say quiet thoughts out loud.

 Buy on Amazon  *Strategiya: The Foundations of the Russian Art of Strategy*. Edited by Ofer Fridman. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2021.**Read B.A. Friedman’s review** **here****:**A shroud of myth and legend surrounds Russian strategy. As far back as the 1980s, the U.S. began looking at the widespread use of precision-guided munitions and other associated technology because the Russians had an allegedly more advanced conception of their potential. In 1982, the operational level of war debuted in U.S. doctrine, allegedly because it existed in Soviet doctrine. The only way to combat such misconceptions is to take the Russians at their word. Specifically, by reading their words. *Strategiya: The Foundations of the Russian Art of Strategy*, edited by Dr. Ofer Fridman, Lecturer at King’s College London, is one of the best weapons available.

 Buy on Amazon  *A Republic in the Ranks: Loyalty and Dissent in the Army of the Potomac**.* Zachery A. Fry. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2020.**Read Kathryn Angelica’s review** **here****:**

Zachery A. Fry reimagines the camps and battlegrounds of the Army of the Potomac as focal points of ideological debate. Enlisted men not only reflected partisan divides of the broader Northern public but directly engaged in the political process through correspondence, voting, and political resolutions. This book sheds light upon mobilization within the ranks to reframe notions of political space and activity during the Civil War.

 Buy on Amazon  *Putin’s Wars: From Chechnya to Ukraine*. Mark Galeotti. Oxford, UK: Osprey, 2022.**Read a review from Andrew Forney** **here****:**

Labeled an acute threat by the U.S. Department of Defense in its 2022 National Defense Strategy, the Russian military in Ukraine revealed itself as the flimsiest of paper tigers, a modern-day Potemkin army meant to prop up a faltering regime and its neo-imperialist visions. Where were the unmanned vehicles and the modernized tanks and the fire strikes employed in eastern Ukraine in 2014? Was that army actually a mirage, with the real army now being bled dry eight years later? There was no way that two disparate things, two photo negatives of each other, could exist at the same time. Can two divergent ideas—or two opposite armies—both be true?

 Buy on Amazon  *Space Civilization: An Inquiry into the Social Questions for Humans Living in Space*. James Gilley. London, United Kingdom: Lexington Books, 2020.**Read Brian Green’s review** **here****:**

In Space Civilization: An Inquiry into the Social Questions for Humans Living in Space, political science professor James Gilley provides an ambitious interdisciplinary overview of the social factors, from the interpersonal to the international levels, that will affect humanity’s ability to become a truly interplanetary species. In its relatively short format, the book moves briskly through many of the broad technological and biological, legal, economic, psychological, sociological, and political issues that will shape the future human exploration and potential settlement of outer space.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Turkish Arms Embargo: Drugs, Ethnic Lobbies, and U.S. Domestic Politics**.* James F. Goode. Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 2020.**Read a review from Bob Beach** **here****:**

Goode’s corrective to the history of this incident is an important work in the study of U.S. foreign policy entering its last phase of the Cold War. Goode skillfully places the embargo in a new light, emphasizing the role of ethnic lobbies, the U.S. war on drugs, and the political negotiations on Capitol Hill. Long considered a failure of U.S. foreign policy in a time of executive turmoil and legislative assertiveness, Goode suggests the episode was a demonstration of the dynamics of political processes in a functioning representative society.

 Buy on Amazon  *Reagan’s War Stories: A Cold War Presidency*. Benjamin Griffin. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2022.**Read Chris Booth’s review** **here****:**

Highly engaging and thought-provoking, Griffin has put together an insightful book that leaves the reader with an improved understanding of pop culture’s impact on Reagan in not only leading the nation through the Cold War, but in the totality of his life as well.

 Buy on Amazon  *Flying Camelot: The F-15, the F-16, and the Weaponization of Fighter Pilot Nostalgia**.* Michael W. Hankins. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2021.**Read Luke Truxall’s review** **here****:**

In Flying Camelot: The F-15, the F-16, and the Weaponization of Fighter Pilot Nostalgia, Michael W. Hankins argues that starting as early as the 1960s, a group of fighter pilots and reformers sought to change the procurement process for aircraft to emphasize the importance of the fighter pilot and air superiority missions. Hankins states that this resulted in the development and acquisition of the F-15 and F-16 fighters by the United States Air Force. Hankins further asserts that these reformers sought to change how fighter pilots were trained to emphasize the importance of dogfighting and air superiority campaigns over other aspects of air combat.

 Buy on Amazon  Armies in Retreat: Chaos, Cohesion, and Consequence. Edited by Timothy G. Heck and Walker D. Mills. Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: Army University Press, 2023.**Read Marshall McGurk’s review** **here****:**

Military leaders and policy makers would be foolish to believe that war with a peer adversary would not involve some form of retreat or retrograde. Retreats can lead to routs, or they can provide critical time to rally forces for new campaigns or counteroffensives. Routs must be avoided, but such disaster may befall those who fail to study the history of armies in retreat.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Digital Silk Road: China’s Quest to Wire the World and Win the Future*. Jonathan E. Hillman. New York, NY: Harper Business, 2021.**Read Christopher D. Booth’s review** **here****:**

This short, yet comprehensive, and extensively documented examination of the Digital Silk Road and the Chinese Communist Party’s efforts to develop world-dominating technology (through collaboration between the military, state-owned enterprises, and closely associated parastatal private companies), will be of interest to policymakers, national security professionals, and hopefully U.S. and Western business leaders.

 Buy on Amazon  *Rise of the Rocket Girls: The Women Who Propelled Us, From Missiles to the Moon to Mars**.* Nathalia Holt. New York, NY: Back Bay Books, 2017.**Read Amy E. Foster’s review** **here****:**

Nathalia Holt’s book on the women of JPL and their contributions to the United States’ history in space is a welcome addition. JPL is only one of twenty NASA centers. The women and their contributions at each NASA center deserve attention and recognition. What Nathalia Holt has done with this book is remind readers that women’s work for NASA did propel us to the Moon and Mars.

 Buy on Amazon  *Mastering the Art of Command: Admiral Chester W. Nimitz and Victory in the Pacific*. Trent Hone. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 2022.**Read a review from Lewis Bernstein** **here****:**

Hone’s study shows Nimitz understood command is an art based on collaboration that relies on effective personal relationships to extract ideas and understand new opportunities. He adopted his subordinates’ ideas and made them part of his own plans. Nimitz never backed away from difficult decisions and when appropriate was as bold as any commander. He relied on unified command with decentralized execution combined with the continual consideration of options; the figures and tables Hone provides show this in operation.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Peacemaker: Ronald Reagan, the Cold War, and the World on the Brink*. William Inboden. New York, NY: Dutton, 2022.**Read Laren Turek’s review** **here****:**

The Peacemaker: Ronald Reagan, the Cold War, and the World on the Brinktakes up the banner of attributing the end of the Cold War to the foreign policy acumen and foresight of Ronald Reagan. Indeed, it suggests that Reagan possessed a remarkable perspicacity that allowed him to perceive the world's historic changes on the horizon well before others did, and that this, plus his innate optimism, helped him lead the United States toward a better future.

 Buy on Amazon  *To Boldly Go: Leadership, Strategy, and Conflict in the 21st Century and Beyond**. Jonathan Klug and Steven Leonard, Eds. Haverton, PA: Casemate, 2021.***Read Brett Swaney’s review** **here****:**

Drawing on a universe of science fiction franchises including The Expanse, Star Wars, Star Trek, Ender’s Game, Starship Troopers, Dune, Earthseed, The Murderbot Diaries, and many more, a wonderful array of authors, who are strategic thinkers in their own right, offer fresh perspectives in 35 chapters that span 6 major themes: leadership and command; military strategy and decision making; ethics, culture, and diversity; cooperation, competition, and conflict; the human relationship with technology; and toxic leaders.

 Buy on Amazon  *Military Alliances in the Twenty-First Century**.* Alexander Lanoszka. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2022.**Read a review from Davis Ellison** **here****:**

In this welcome addition to the literature on alliances, international relations scholar Alexander Lanoszka makes an optimistic case for the continued salience of the U.S.-led alliance system. In his two-hundred-page study, he reviews the most common areas that past studies have focused on: alliance formation, fears of entrapment and abandonment, burden-sharing, warfare, and alliance termination.

 Buy on Amazon  *Cinema and the Cultural Cold War: U.S. Diplomacy and the Origins of the Asian Cinema Network**.* Sangjoon Lee. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2020.**Read Ben Griffin’s review** **here****:**

The book primarily examines how during the first two decades of the Cold War, the Asia Foundation utilized funding from the Central Intelligence Agency to support the work of, and establish connections between, anti-communist filmmakers throughout east Asia…Cinema and the Cultural Cold War is a welcome addition to the growing historiography on how Cold War belligerents actively sought to influence popular culture both domestically and abroad.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Big Picture: The Cold War on the Small Screen**.* John W. Lemza. Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2021.**Read Peter Molin’s review** **here****:**

The subject of John W. Lemza’s scholarly study The Big Picture: The Cold War on the Small Screen is a U.S. Army-produced documentary television series called The Big Picture that ran from 1951-1971 on network, local, and educational stations, as well as on the Armed Forces Network of overseas stations. Lemza’s study is relevant to our own era in which a gaping civil-military divide separates the American public from the military, and in which the military largely fails to communicate a compelling appreciation of its goals, virtues, and activities.

 Buy on Amazon  *Desert Redleg*: *Artillery Warfare in the First Gulf War**.* L. Scott Lingamfelter. Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 2020.**Read a review from Kevin Woods** **here****:**

The book’s title alone might suggest a more general history or analysis of the use of artillery in the Gulf War, but the book is primarily a wartime memoir framed by the experiences of a senior artilleryman whose perspectives were shaped in the Cold War’s final decade. As a memoir, Desert Redleg lands somewhere between the classic campaign and sentimental forms. In an appendix, the author dedicates a chapter to lessons of the war gleaned from a broader military and geo-political perspective.

 Buy on Amazon  *Wars of Revelation: The Transformative Effects of Military Intervention on Grand Strategy*. Rebecca Lissner. New York, New York: Oxford University Press, 2018.**Read Christi Siver’s review** **here****:**

Reconsideration of U.S. grand strategy is critical in the context of the ongoing war in Ukraine alongside rising tensions with China. Rebecca Lissner’s Wars of Revelation makes a compelling argument that past U.S. military interventions have played an important role in shaping U.S. grand strategy.

 Buy on Amazon  *Our Best War Stories: Prize-winning Poetry & Prose from the Col. Darron L. Wright Memorial Awards**.* Edited by Christopher Lyke. Johnston, Iowa: Middle West Press, 2020.**Read a review from Scott Noon Creley** **here****:**

This collection is remarkable because, whether or not everything in each story is strictly speaking factual, everything is true. If you’re interested in military culture, the ongoing cultural change in the armed forces, or just looking for excellent writing from veterans and their families, this is a book that belongs on your shelf.

 Buy on Amazon  *Tales from the Cold War: The U.S. Army in West Germany 1960-1975*. Michael D. Mahler. Dahlonega, Georgia: University Press of North Georgia, 2021.**Read Kevin Li’s review** **here****:**

Knowing the Cold War historical context, namely the necessity of, and the paradoxical relations between the deterrence mission in Europe and the mission of fighting limited wars around the globe is indispensable for understanding Mahler and his comrades’ experiences in U.S. Army Europe.

 Buy on Amazon  *Master Negotiator: The Role of James A. Baker, III at the End of the Cold War**.* Diana Villiers Negroponte. Bloomington, IN: Archway Publishing, 2020.**Read Javan David Frazier’s review** **here****:**

The title of Negroponte’s book nicely sums up her work. Her first four segments explore questions and themes related to James Baker’s overall time as secretary of state. She explores the real goal for the foreign policy review initiated by the National Security Council and how it affected all aspects of President George H.W. Bush’s administration; the challenges of German reunification and Germany’s admission to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO); the response of the United States to the June 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre; and the aftermath of Saddam Hussein’s August 1990 invasion of Kuwait.

 Buy on Amazon  *Military History for the Modern Strategist: America’s Major Wars since 1861*. Michael E. O’Hanlon. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2023.**Read J.P. Clark’s review** **here****:**

Michael O’Hanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, is an influential advisor to the national security elite with a reputation for deep expertise and careful judgment. Though O’Hanlon is a political scientist, he argues that military history can usefully inform current policy debates. His latest work, Military History for the Modern Strategist: America’s Major Wars since 1861, attempts to do just that through a survey of over 150 years of U.S. military history.

 Buy on Amazon  *On Killing Remotely: The Psychology of Killing with Drones*.Wayne Phelps. NY, NY: Little, Brown and Company, 2021.**Read Caleb Miller’s review** **here****:**

To date, moral injury remains a syndrome, that is, a group of symptoms lacking clear definition or cause. Phelps exemplifies a possible way ahead in On Killing Remotely. In terms of quantifiability, Phelps makes room for analyzing a new arena for moral injury without stretching the term past its breaking point. In terms of severity, Phelps clarifies that stakes can be high without involving immediate personal danger, thus opening up discussions of comparable scenarios with the potential to morally injure. In terms of technology, Phelps distinguishes between kinds of unmanned or remote aerial technology, sketching a taxonomy and noting the unique stressors of each tool or mission.

 Buy on Amazon  *Waging a Good War: A Military History of the Civil Rights Movement, 1954-1968**.* Thomas E. Ricks.New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2022.**Read Christopher G. Ingram’s review** **here****:**

Ninety years after the abolition of slavery in the United States, Blacks faced a dominant caste system in the 1950s that used the violence and power of the state to deny equal treatment or opportunity across the deep south. In more general terms, when confronting an imbalance of power, a subjugated people face a choice between submission or finding a way to alter the nature of the fight. To overcome this disparity, the Civil Rights Movement developed a strategy that aligned their actions to their desired change.

 Buy on Amazon  *Blood/Not Blood Then the Gates: Poems*. Ron Riekki. Johnston, IA: Middle West Press, 2022.**Read a review from Zac Rogers** **here****:**

Ron Riekki’s new collection of poems Blood/Not Blood Then the Gates is a pitiless, unsentimental, and piercing insight into the legacy of extreme violence on a human being. The volume left me with the strong impression that redemption is neither sought nor expected. What is needed is relief.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Avoidable War: The Dangers of a Catastrophic Conflict Between the US and Xi Jinping’s China*. Kevin Rudd. New York, NY: Public Affairs, 2022. **Read Ian Boley’s review** **here****:**

All told, Kevin Rudd’s The Avoidable War is very much worth the time and effort. Through a series of missteps in execution, it takes Rudd a while to get the reader onboard with his topic. Once there, however, the information provided is valuable, and Rudd’s perspective from personal experience does give his words an air of authority in these matters. For those starting out on their journey to understand what is arguably the world’s most important contemporary competition, this book is a fine place to begin.

 Buy on Amazon  *War Transformed: The Future of Twenty-First Century Great Power Competition and Conflict*. Mick Ryan. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2022.**Read a review from Brian Kerg** **here****:**

The character of war is rapidly changing. The increasing availability of evolving technology confounds previous frameworks for military operations. Socioeconomic factors and demographic shifts complicate manpower and force generation models for national defense. Ubiquitous connectivity links individuals to global audiences, expanding the reach of influence activities. And a renewed emphasis on strategic competition enhances the scope of military action below the threshold of violence. This is the world that Mick Ryan explores in War Transformed: The Future of Twenty-First-Century Great Power Competition and Conflict.

 Buy on Amazon  *Union General: Samuel Ryan Curtis and Victory in the West**.* William L. Shea. Lincoln, NE: Potomac Books, 2023.**Read Lindsey R. Peterson’s review** **here****:**

Shea successfully demonstrates that more attention should be paid to this understudied Union general. Curtis’ wartime emancipation policies should shift historians’ narrowed focus away from the Eastern Theater to more thoroughly integrate the trans-Mississippi West into their analyses of wartime emancipation. Hopefully, Union General will inspire other historians to incorporate Curtis into the current historiography on wartime emancipation, the Missouri and Arkansas home front, and Civil War memory. Ultimately, Union General is a worthy addition to the scholarship on military leadership and will appeal to readers.

 Buy on Amazon  *Air Power in the Falklands Conflict: An Operational Level Insight into Air Warfare in the South Atlantic*. John Shields.Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: Air World, 2021.**Read a review from Heather Venable** **here****:**

The line between celebrating heritage and creating a fully-rounded history can be a fine one in many institutional histories. Appreciating this tendency, Royal Air Force-insider John Shields reassesses the 1982 Falklands Conflict, seeking to explode multiple myths while also providing a better assessment of the air campaign by focusing on the operational rather than the tactical level of war.

 Buy on Amazon  *Grand Delusion: The Rise and Fall of American Ambition in the Middle East**.* Steven Simon. New York, NY: Penguin Press, 2023.**Read Joe Buccino’s review** **here****:**

Simon reviews more than four decades of American endeavors in the region from the perspective of eight presidential administrations ranging from Jimmy Carter to Joe Biden. The book’s chapters illuminate cabinet-level thinking on vexing national security issues: Iranian influence in the Levant in the 1980s, the response to the U.S. Marine Corps barracks bombing in Beirut, the Persian Gulf War, the unsolvable Israel-Palestine quandary, and the rise and fall of Saddam Hussein and the resultant chaos in Iraq and Syria.

  *From Hegemony to Competition: Marine Perspectives on Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations**.* Edited by Matthew R. Slater. Quantico, VA: Marine Corps University Press, 2022.**Read B.J. Armstrong’s review** **here****:**

From Hegemony to Competition: Marine Perspectives on Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations offers thoughtful examinations of important elements of the transition to what the 2018 National Security Strategy called a new era of Great Power competition and how new Marine Corps concepts continue to develop. This book’s great strength is the questions that it is asking, and the rigorous efforts put forth to study them.

 Buy on Amazon  *Cold War Liberation: The Soviet Union and the Collapse of the Portuguese Empire in Africa, 1961–1975*. Natalia Telepneva. University of North Carolina Press, 2022.**Read a review by Charlie Thomas** **here****:**

The history of African decolonization is inherently linked with the processes, rivalries, and challenges of the global Cold War. Even those states that saw a pacific removal of colonial authority, such as Ghana or Senegal, did so under the shadow of the rivalry between the capitalist and communist states. However, the process was even more stark in Southern Africa, where the Cold War saw the contests for armed African liberation interpreted as proxy conflicts between the two ideological blocs.

 Buy on Amazon  *Against All Tides: The Untold Story of the USS Kitty Hawk Race Riot*. Marv Truhe. Chicago, IL: Lawrence Hill Books, 2022.**Read B.J. Armstrong’s review** **here****:**

The “Kitty Hawk Race Riot'” holds an important place in American naval history. An illustration of the deep and unavoidable connections between the sailors and officers of the Navy and the society they served during the Civil Rights era, it is often mentioned in passing but rarely examined in detail. Marv Truhe’s new book sets out to rectify that oversight and to help readers dive deeply into both the details of the history and the important questions it raises about the Navy of the 1970s as well as the Navy of the 21st century.

 Buy on Amazon  *Preparing for War: The Making of the Geneva Conventions*. Boyd van Dijk. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2022.**Read Brian Drohan’s review** **here****:**

International humanitarian law has only appeared to be absent during recent wars in Yemen, Syria, and Ukraine, but Boyd van Dijk’s Preparing for War: The Making of the Geneva Conventions reveals that the 1949 Geneva Conventions have an enduring influence. He shows that the Conventions have retained their legal, moral, and ethical applicability through a contextualized understanding of their history.

 Buy on Amazon  *Heat + Pressure: Poems from War*. Ben Weakley. Johnston, Iowa: Middle West Press, 2022.**Read Marshall McGurk’s review** **here****:**

A design draws you in through color or shock; a title intrigues you. Heat + Pressure: Poems From War by Ben Weakley delivers on the initial interest brought about by its unique title that sits in bold letters over the melted green army figure on the cover. Heat + Pressure shows how today’s warriors can become poets and help veterans synthesize war and their reintegration into society.

 Buy on Amazon  *Mud Soldiers: Life Inside the New American Army*. George C. Wilson. New York, NY: Scribners, 1989.**Read Harrison Manlove’s review** **here****:**

Mud Soldiers: Life Inside the New American Army is an examination of the post-Vietnam U.S. Army and the pre-Gulf War Army. It serves as an excellent supplement to recent works on the AVF by authors like Beth Bailey, Bernard Rostker, and William A. Taylor. Author George C. Wilson writes a broad study of Charlie Company, 2nd Battalion, 16th Infantry Regiment (2-16), 1st Infantry Division spanning two generations of soldiers.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Military and the Market*. Edited by Mark R. Wilson and Jennifer Mittlestadt. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2022.**Read Sam Canter’s review** **here****:**

Looking beyond more traditionally studied factors such as battlefield tactics, leadership, and military strategy, new studies under the general War and Society umbrella take into account social dynamics such as race, class, and gender in the context of national defense and warfare. In the case of The Military and the Market, the wide scholarly aperture offered by the War and Society approach extends to marketplace and economic factors, adding additional layers of complexity to American military history.

  *Die Selbständigkeit der Unterführer im Kriege*. Karl Woide. Berlin: Eisenschmidt, 1895.**Read a review from Panagiotis Gkartzonikas** **here****:**

In pre-nineteenth century wars with linear tactics, initiative existed but was not necessary in the same ways. From the Napoleonic Wars onwards, initiative became imperative, mainly due to the increase in the size of armies. The third chapter examines how we should interpret the principle of initiative. Woide believes that it should be made obligatory for the entire army, its implementation should be formalized and it should be considered a professional duty.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

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“If I must make war, I prefer it to be against a coalition.”
–Napoleon[1]

Two months after the collapse of Kabul, NATO published a fact sheet on lessons learned from its experiences in Afghanistan that proclaimed, “NATO’s engagement in Afghanistan demonstrates the immense strength of Allies working in pursuit of a common goal.”[2] This statement seems to imply that NATO somehow succeeded in Afghanistan by holding itself together politically. This statement is indicative not just of how coalitions of states conduct war, but more importantly by how multinational organizationsdo so.

Much of the coalition warfare seen in the past thirty years has not been conducted by coalitions per se, but rather by organizations such as NATO, the UN, and the European and African Unions. While much has been written on this type of warfare from a state-centric, international perspective, little has actually been written from an organizational, multinational perspective. This is especially the case of NATO, which is almost universally dominated by descriptions of U.S.-European bilateral relationships. These organizations, however, have their own internal dynamics that have significant impact on the outcomes of operations. Whether NATO in Afghanistan or the UN in Rwanda, these dynamics center primarily on the relationships between civilian and military authorities.

How can civil-military relations be used as a lens for us to understand the outcomes of wars in which multinational organizations are involved? This piece uses civil-military relations as a guide (rather than a strict framework) and the specific case of NATO to show the benefit of applying this approach. It shows, using the example of NATO in Afghanistan, how civil-military dynamics within the organization itself structured the campaign and impacted the alliance’s strategy and operations.

Reading Multinational Civil-Military Relations There is a gap in scholarship on the relationships between the civilian and military authorities within multinational organizations. Few studies on civil-military relations theory consider NATO, and few studies of NATO explicitly explore its civil-military dynamics. This lacuna has created an ahistorical impression that such relationships either do not really exist, or that they are far less consequential than the bilateral relationships that exist within organizations.

 Buy on Amazon  Civil-military theorists since the middle of the twentieth-century have largely ignored NATO. Samuel Huntington and Morris Janowitz make a few references in their foundational studies, while more recent studies by Peter Feaver or Risa Brooks make no substantive reference at all.[3] Indeed, the most recent *Routledge Handbook of Civil-Military Relations*contains no substantive treatment of NATO, the UN, or any other organization. This despite their near constant presence in every conflict since the end of the Cold War. An excellent, though dated, exception to this is Canadian author Douglas Bland’s theoretical work and historical study of the NATO Military Committee.[4]

Conversely, much of the literature on NATO is heavily focused on state-centric sources that essentially reduce the history of the alliance to a presidential history of the United States. Some of this can be ascribed to the largely unquestioned presumption that what happens in Washington is what happens in NATO. Both in practice and in the literature this is untrue. Additionally, there is a dearth of sources on NATO’s internal dynamics. The NATO Archives are far behind most national archives in terms of disclosures. The historical office of Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) has not made any documents available past 1958. From personal research experience, however, this is only an excuse, as numerous national declassified and released sources provide detailed and lengthy considerations on NATO’s internal work, though that is itself often only until the mid-1990s. Again, exceptions to this include Ryan Hendrickson’s 2006 book on the role of the NATO Secretary General, which explicitly includes civil-military relations in its analytical frame.[5] The work, however, is outdated and some cases are now contradicted by more recently available archival sources.

In both the theoretical and empirical literature, there is also a significant U.S.-centrism. Hew Strachan lamented this in his own considerations on civil-military relations, noting how the near-ubiquitous Huntingtonian constitutional framework of civil-military relations is predicated on the unique situation of the United States in the early- to mid-1950s. Timothy Andrews Sayle’s 2019 book on NATO, while comprehensive in its coverage of the Cold War, is almost exclusively focused on Anglo- and Franco-American relations (with some added German focus as well).[6] While certainly consequential, this largely misses the role of the integrated, multinational staffs that work(ed) on a permanent basis both in Europe and North America. Focusing on the disputes between Charles de Gaulle and Lyndon Baines Johnson or Tony Blair and George W. Bush hardly scratches the surface of NATO.

Fully comprehending the civil-military relations of multilateral organizations requires accessing and understanding a broader array of primary sources. Importantly, this involves comparative and cross-archival research between national and international sources. For example, one internal NATO study on organization received only short mention in U.S. and NATO documents, but has a fully detailed folio available within the UK National Archives at Kew. Such is also seemingly the case for the UN and other organizations. This also puts a particular premium on conducting new interviews with officials from these organizations, an urgent effort by scholars of NATO and other organizations as archival sources will begin to wear thin in the coming decades. Indeed, there is a risk of a digital dark age in studying these organizations as the avalanche of digital evidence is either automatically destroyed or held behind classification barriers in perpetuity.[7]

Applying the New Prism: The Case of NATO in AfghanistanA particularly apt case for the application of the civil-military lens is the NATO missions in Afghanistan. Why did NATO fail in Afghanistan? Most look to failings in Washington or London, or maybe to the failures of interagency processes inside the country itself. Few have looked to NATO itself, the organization that did in practice command a significant portion of the Afghan efforts, particularly training. An excellent example of some coverage on this front has been the Danish scholar Sten Rynning’s work on NATO’s organizational learning during and after the war.[8] There is room for more.

Applying the lens of NATO’s civil-military relations lends a new angle on understanding the alliance’s failure to defeat the Taliban. Both the Washington Post’s “Afghanistan Papers” release, newly conducted interviews by this author, and underutilized secondary literature paint a picture of an alliance that overly deferred to the optimistic (and sometimes untruthful) military authorities in Kabul and elsewhere, both on strategy development and in operational-level information related to Afghan troop readiness.

In the development of NATO strategy, the civil-military divide is especially clear. NATO largely deferred to Washington in the strategic direction of the Afghan campaigns, though on at least one notable occasion there was an attempt by NATO civilian staff in Brussels to assert some control over the alliance mission. The development of the Comprehensive, Strategic Political-Military Plan (CSPMP), led by the NATO International Staff between 2007 and 2008, aimed to provide a comprehensive set of multinational objectives around which the NATO staff in Kabul could cohere their efforts. As it was ultimately a product agreed upon by all of the NATO countries, it was bureaucratically quite the achievement in Brussels.[9]

*General Stanley McChrystal in Kabul, Afghanistan, in 2009. (Omar Sobhani/Reuters)*

There was one small issue. When the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) commander at the time, General Stanley McChrystal, received the CPMSP, he and his staff considered it useless and did not take it into account when setting strategy for the ISAF mission. Theo Farrell’s work on the war states frankly: “McChrystal’s team found the NATO strategic plan to be pretty useless as a source of guidance for their redrafting of the ISAF campaign plan.”[10] The seeming casualness with which a military commander in the field dismissed the political strategy agreed by his civilian superiors would, in most national contexts, likely lead to accusations of insubordination or an inappropriate flexing of military power. This was not the case in NATO.

Would McChrystal or his followers embracing the CSPMP made any significant difference in the outcome in Afghanistan? It is unlikely. The CSPMP is only one indicative episode in which the relationship between Kabul and Brussels was deeply and structurally flawed and lacked effective civilian oversight. It also highlights a reluctance for field commanders to engage with senior civilians who are not in theater on matters of strategy. There is little evidence, however, that the military commands in Kabul would have found a capable partner in Brussels. As the next example shows in clear form, the military effort vastly outweighed the civilian in terms of staff sizes and authorities.

On Afghan readiness reporting, the situation was little better than in the formulation of strategy. Primary source evidence shows a clear and lengthy pattern of overly-optimistic and occasionally outright false reporting to Brussels from the military missions in Kabul. For a number of reasons, be it careerism or simply naivete, the ISAF and Resolute Support Mission (RSM) commands passed flawed or false information up the chain of command from Kabul to Joint Force Command-Brunssum, to SHAPE, which would then be agreed by the Military Committee, which would only then be presented to the civilian authorities in the North Atlantic Council and the supporting International Staff. By this stage, the reporting had been massaged and pushed into an acceptable form by the military authorities of NATO, while it was received by a NATO Operations Division staff of often fewer than five staffers. In Kabul itself the NATO Special Civilian Representative for Afghanistan (SCR), notionally the civilian counterpart to the ISAF commander, played no role in overseeing the content of the periodic reports sent to Brussels. There was, in effect, no civilian control of the NATO ISAF and RSM missions.

This dynamic has since been confirmed by NATO’s former Assistant Secretary General for Operations John Manza, writing that “reports from the field were often overly optimistic and watered down as they climbed the chain of command.”[11] Official reports from the UK, the Netherlands, and from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction all confirm the same trend.[12] Past field research at ISAF headquarters also suggests the same.[13] What becomes abundantly clear from this evidence, and considered within a civil-military perspective, is that NATO officials were hugely deferential to military officers and did not adequately oversee the Afghan missions. This failure by NATO’s political leadership, both in Kabul and in Brussels, to adequately hold military reporting to account and oversee the development of the Afghan forces directly contributed to the collapse of Afghan forces in 2021.

A Call for More This piece is only a small corner of the author’s ongoing research in applying a civil-military lens to NATO’s history. It is as readily applicable to strategy development in the early Cold War as it is to studying operational control during the 2011 Libya intervention. Beyond NATO, such an approach would be useful in exploring the strategies and operations of the UN, EU, AU, or any other structured multinational organization with both civilian and military components. Each of these organizations sits on a trove of underutilized primary sources, sources that are vital to understanding their internal dynamics and how they shaped the course and outcome of any number of conflicts.

Beyond the wider application of the analytical frame, there remains the urgency in collecting as much data as possible on these organizations as time goes on. As already noted, a digital dark age is coming, if it is not already here, that will stymy research into multinational organizations for years. Oral history projects with adequate attention (and funding) will be vital to circumvent the byzantine and outdated declassification standards of these large organizations. Without such structured collection, there will not be enough evidence to apply a civil-military lens to in the first place.

Davis Ellison is a PhD Candidate in the King’s College London Department of War Studies and a Strategic Analyst at The Hague Centre for Strategic Studies. His research is on civil-military relations within and between NATO’s institutions.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

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Header Image: NATO Flags at North KIA, Kabul Afghanistan, 2017 (Tyrell Mayfield).

Notes: [1] Ole R. Holsti, P. Terrence Hopmann, John D. Sullivan, Unity and Disintegration in International Alliances (New York, NY: Wiley, 1973), 22.

[2] “Foreign Ministers address lessons learned from NATO’s engagement in Afghanistan”, NATO, December 1 2021, https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/news_189512.htm?selectedLocale=en.

[3] Samuel P. Huntington, The Soldier and the State: The Theory and Politics of Civil–Military Relations (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 1957), 357; Morris Janowitz, The Professional Soldier: A Social and Political Portrait (Glencoe, IL: Free Press, 1960), 314–17; Peter D. Feaver, Armed Servants: Agency, Oversight, and Civil-Military Relations (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2005); Risa Brooks, Reconsidering American Civil-Military Relations: The Military, Society, Politics, and Modern War, ed. Risa Brooks and and Daniel Maurer (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020).

[4] Douglas L. Bland, The Military Committee of the North Atlantic Alliance: A Study of Structure and Strategy (New York: Praeger, 1990).

[5] Ryan C. Hendrickson, Diplomacy and War at NATO: The Secretary General and Military Action After the Cold War (St. Louis, MO: University of Missouri, 2006).

[6] Timothy Andrews Sayle, Enduring Alliance: A History of NATO and the Postwar Global Order (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2019).

[7] Matthew Connelly, The Declassification Engine: What History Reveals about America’s Top Secrets (New York: Pantheon Books, 2023), 347–75.

[8] Sten Rynning and Paal Sigurd Hilde, “Operationally Agile but Strategically Lacking: NATO’s Bruising Years in Afghanistan,” LSE Public Policy Review, May 2, 2022, 1–11; Sten Rynning, “Still Learning? NATO’s Afghan Lessons beyond the Ukraine Crisis,” in NATO’s Return to Europe: Engaging Ukraine, Russia, and Beyond, Edited by Rebecca R. Moore and Damon Coletta (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 2017).

[9] Diego Ruiz Palmer, “NATO Review - NATO’s Engagement in Afghanistan, 2003-2021: A Planner’s Perspective,” NATO Review, June 20, 2023, https://www.nato.int/docu/review/articles/2023/06/20/nato-s-engagement-in-afghanistan-2003-2021-a-planners-perspective/index.html.

[10] Theo Farrell, Unwinnable: Britain’s War in Afghanistan 2001-2014 (London: Vintage, 2017), 284–85.

[11] John Manza, “I Wrote NATO’s Lessons from Afghanistan. Now I Wonder: What Have We Learned?,” Atlantic Council (blog), August 11, 2022, https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/i-wrote-natos-lessons-from-afghanistan-now-i-wonder-what-have-we-learned/.

[12] “Missing in Action: UK Leadership and the Withdrawal from Afghanistan, First Report of Session 2022–23” (London: UK House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee, May 17, 2022), https://committees.parliament.uk/publications/22344/documents/165210/default/; “Between Wish and Reality: Evaluation of the Dutch Contribution to Resolute Support” (The Hague, Netherlands: Ministry of Foreign Affairs Policy and Operations Evaluation Department, March 2023), https://english.iob-evaluatie.nl/publications/reports/2023/05/19/dutch-contribution-resolute-support; Krisanne Campos, “Lessons Learned Record of Interview - Unnamed NATO Official” (Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, February 23, 2015), background_ll_01_xx_brussels_02232015, The Washington Post’s “Afghanistan Papers,” https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/investigations/afghanistan-papers/documents-database/.

[13] Farrell, Unwinnable: Britain’s War in Afghanistan 2001-2014, 374.

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Thomas Crosbie and Anders Klitmøller

How should senior military officers in democratic states influence their domestic political environments? The flippant answer is that they should not; they should do as they’re told. The American civil-military relations literature, written largely in the shadow of Samuel P. Huntington’s myth of an apolitical military, has consistently downplayed the positive role officers play in politics, to such a degree that we have only a dim outline of what constitutes appropriate and effective political influence by officers Thus, in practice, we fear that too many officers find their professional military education fails to prepare them for the realities of being a commander. They discover to their chagrin that there is no neutral ground available; even doing nothing is a willful political act, rife with significance, which is easily turned against them. We do not believe that officers can remove themselves from politics by “playing the neutral card.” Apolitical neutrality often seems prudent from a traditional perspective, but can fail spectacularly when applied in practice. We argue instead for a new theoretical posture, for soldiers and scholars alike, that foregrounds the political agency of officers. We call this the military politics approach.

*General Mark Milley with President Trump as he departs the White House en route to St. John's Church. (Patrick Semansky/AP)*

Mark Milley and the Neutral CardThe fundamental problem with playing the neutral card was underscored when President Donald Trump told Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley to join him for a short walk (which ended up taking them to Lafayette Square).[1] When told to come, Milley played the neutral card and went. One week later Milley reflected, “My presence in that moment and in that environment created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics.”[2]

What should Milley have done, if doing nothing is also doing something? Milley’s answer provides no great insight: “We must hold dear to the principle of an apolitical military…and that is not easy.”[3] Milley’s misstep and his subsequent frustration were not surprising. Officers are not educated in how to navigate complex political environments, not least because there is so little research done on this topic. Whatever the cause, there is no structured means to develop political competencies, and indeed most officers in democratic countries spend their careers being told that they are and must remain apolitical.[4]

We see a need for a new theoretical language to describe the ways officers do politics, and for a more open discussion, particularly in military education, for what constitutes effective and appropriate political influence. Consider Stanley McChrystal’s reflections on the politics of the military: “The process of formulating, negotiating, articulating and then prosecuting even a largely military campaign involved politics at multiple levels that were impossible to ignore.”[5] Indeed, we would turn the dominant argument, captured in McChrystal’s formulation, on its head. By denying that officers can, should, and do seek political influence, we (practitioners, scholars, educators) are collectively guilty of a grand deception, elevating officers to a position of enlightened disinterest that is false and untenable. The truth is that officers are powerful and their words have an impact—and so does their silence. The question is not whether one should speak or remain silent, but which tactics of influence can be deemed appropriate (and inappropriate) given the situation the senior officers find themselves in.[6] Our approach is, admittedly, discordant with the dominant traditions in American civil-military relations scholarship. Indeed, it is so far beyond the pale that we find it easier to make the case by pivoting to an alternate frame, military politics.

The Problems with Civil-Military Relations Buy on Amazon Civil-military relations and military politics have long co-existed in the global literature, although the former has almost entirely eclipsed the latter in the American context. Civil-military relations was introduced in 1940 to broadly encompass any research “bearing upon those problems of public policy which were posed by the prospect of a continuing high mobilization even in peacetime, and by the continuing necessity for a careful coordination of military, diplomatic, and industrialization policy.”[7] A little over a decade after the term was introduced, several efforts were launched to reappraise American civil-military relations.[8] Amid this flurry of activity, the young Samuel P. Huntington, working closely with the sociologist Morris Janowitz, achieved a theoretical breakthrough by using the theory of professions as the primary explanans for military effectiveness and subordination to civilian authority.[9]

The breakthrough established what became the civil-military relations subfield as we know it, coalescing (in the U.S.) around Huntington’s distinctive vision of civilian control. Peter D. Feaver and others disrupted the field in the late 1990s, giving rise to several alternative paradigms.[10] Feaver notably abandoned the use of the military profession as an explanatory variable, and shifted instead to a principal-agent model.[11] This tradition explored the gaps that separate civilian and military policy preferences. Unfortunately, both earlier and later traditions are marked by serious theoretical problems that severely limit their conceptual coherence and predictive value. Let us briefly summarize their limitations.

Huntington asked why some militaries succeed in being both effective and subordinate? And he answered: because those militaries have a professional officer corps and lack civilian meddling in military affairs. This works because a professional officer corps has monopolized expert knowledge, has a collective identity, and internalizes a sense of responsibility to the client (the state). In other words, some militaries are effective (expert) and subordinate (responsible) because they are professional (which means, in part, expert and responsible). This is equivalent to saying that to succeed, you need to be successful.[12]

 Buy on Amazon  Feaver asked the same question. His answer: some militaries succeed in being both effective and subordinate because they are closely overseen by civilian masters who make credible threats to keep them working. They succeed (are effective and subordinate) because they are successful (are effective and are subordinated). But why would we assume that such a tightly managed military is committed to or capable of ensuring the security of the state? Logically, we would expect almost any other outcome. Indeed, militaries run by officers who are primarily motivated by their fear of civilian punishment and who are at all times conscious of civilian oversight seem more likely to become good at buffering from civilian oversight and satisfying civilian preferences than to become good at achieving military security or wielding the military instrument.[13]

David Pion-Berlin and Andrew Ivey have argued for “scrutiny or revision” of American civil-military relations theory based on counter-indications from Latin American states, noting military dissent “has garnered no new powers for the military, nor has it eroded civilian supremacy,” but has effectively checked certain forms of corrupt behavior by civilian leaders.[14] Indeed, as Risa Brooks has argued in her analysis of the “paradoxes of professionalism”, there is still lively scholarly debate among American civil-military relations scholars concerning what constitutes effective and appropriate political influence by American officers.[15]

From Civil-Military Relations (Back) to Military PoliticsHuntington in the early 1960s still seemed uncertain about the name for the field he dominated. In an influential article published in 1961, he used “military politics” and “civil-military relations” interchangeably, and chose the former for the name of a widely reviewed edited volume he published in 1962.[16] Eventually, he dispensed with the “military politics” language, and indeed the term was abandoned by the core of the field by the early 1960s, although it was retained by scholars studying militaries overtly involved in domestic politics (mainly in authoritarian states).[17]

The military politics subfield we propose is, by contrast, primarily concerned with military-political behavior in democratic contexts. This emerging subfield foregrounds the role of military actors, institutions, and events in explaining political realities, focusing particularly on the active role played by officers in shaping their political environments.[18] This literature guides officers to become reflexive practitioners in their domestic political arenas. Here Roennfeldt has argued for “wider officer competence,” specifically in managing politically dilemmas; Allen proposed that the field adopt the “political savvy” scale to describe the political attributes that officers need to succeed; Coletta and Crosbie have argued that officers should be encouraged to develop not just wisdom but also virtù.[19] What these suggestions share in common is the idea that our scholarship should help officers be more effective in their political engagement, not to advance the interests of the military, but rather to achieve better democratic outcomes.

Although rarely communicated to officer-students, many specific methods of political influence have been noted in the literature. Best known is perhaps the “resign in protest” debates of 2017-2018.[20] Less noted have been forms of military voice ranging from Sarkesian’s “enlightened advocacy” to Feaver and Kohn’s categories of insist, advocate, advise and “be neutral” to Brooks’s observations of officers directly appealing to the public, grandstanding, shoulder-tapping, politicking and so on, or the notions of engaging in a continuous or iterative dialogue. We could logically also consider theories of social influence originating from literatures beyond the military domain, including influence tactics such as pressure tactics, legitimating tactics, coalition tactics, personal appeals, ingratiation, inspirational appeals, consultation, rational persuasion, and collaboration.[21] In this sense, officers never stand powerless before their civilian masters, for they are always armed with the tools of influence (whether they have refined these tools or not).

Let us reconsider Milley’s position from a perspective of military-political agency. Milley was directed to join the president in what turned out to be a partisan photoshoot. Through inaction, Milley believed he unintentionally brought the military into domestic politics. What we argue is that the military was (and always is) already fully inside domestic politics. What went wrong was that Milley, by playing the neutral card, chose an inappropriate tactic for the situation. A range of tactics could have been considered (and perhaps where) including advising, advocating, or insisting on a different course of action, pressuring the president, building a coalition to oppose the president’s directive, or ingratiating himself with the president in an attempt to exert a softer form of influence.[22] Those were also potential choices, and future officers who find themselves in Milley’s position would be better served considering the full banquet of options, and their appropriateness for the given situation, rather than view themselves as forced to play a losing card.

As a final word, we believe it is important to acknowledge that this theoretical intervention carries with it a risk to democracy. By following our suggestions, unethical officers may find inspiration in how to improperly influence their political environments. It is justified because it addresses what we consider to be a greater risk: another generation of ethical officers expected to muddle through the political landscape they are required to inhabit. By refining our language to better approximate how these relations really work in practice, we aim to provide civilians and military professionals alike with valuable new tools to navigate these very challenging environments. Sunlight, in this case, is the best disinfectant.

Thomas Crosbie is an Associate Professor in the Institute for Military Operations at the Royal Danish Defence College. He is the editor of the Military Politics book series with Berghahn Books.

Anders Klitmøller is an Associate Professor in the Institute for Leadership and Organization at the Royal Danish Defence College.

The views expressed are the authors’ alone and do not reflect those of the Danish Ministry of Defence, the Royal Danish Defence College, or the Danish Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: U.S. Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark A. Milley, Pentagon, Arlington Virginia, 2019 (Spc. Keisha T Brown).

Notes: [1] Robert Kagan provides an extensive discussion of the incident. He asserts that “the military remains as wedded as ever to the tradition of military abstention”, despite Milley’s misstep, in Robert Kagain, “The Battle of Lafayette Square and the Undermining of American Democracy” Brookings, June 6, 2020, https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-battle-of-lafayette-square-and-the-undermining-of-american-democracy/. Also, Kori M. Schake has argued in traditional civil-military relations terms that Milley’s behavior was apolitical and appropriate in Kori M. Schacke, “The Military and the Constitution Under Trump” Survival: Global Politics and Strategy, Vol. 62 (2022) https://doi.org/10.1080/00396338.2020.1792096

[2] David Welna, “Gen. Mark Milley Says Accompanying Trump To Church Photo-Op Was A Mistake,” NPR, June 11, 2020, https://www.npr.org/sections/live-updates-protests-for-racial-justice/2020/06/11/875019346/gen-mark-milley-says-accompanying-trump-to-church-photo-op-was-a-mistake

[3] Ibid.

[4] We draw a significant distinction here between “structured” and “unstructured”. Officers, Non-Commissioned Officers, and Warrant Officers who rise to the top of their fields will have almost certainly benefited from mentors passing on hard-won lessons in political effectiveness. War Colleges, as well as CAPSTONE, and PINNACLE-type courses, likewise create unstructured or loosely-structured opportunities for officers to meet and learn from a variety of politically-savvy actors, in uniform and out. What is missing, and what we call for, is explicit and transparent education in gaining appropriate political competencies.

[5] McChrystal in the book by Lawrence Freedman, Command: The Politics of Military Operations from Korea to Ukraine (Dublin: Allen Lane, 2022), pp. 513.

[6] For work on influence tactics see: Falbe, Cecilia M., and Gary Yukl. "Consequences for Managers of Using Single Influence Tactics and Combinations of Tactics." Academy of Management Journal 35, no. 3 (1992): 638-52.; for work on ’hard’ versus ’soft’ influence tactics see van Knippenberg, Barbara, Rob van Eijbergen, and Henk Wilke. "The Use of Hard and Soft Influence Tactics in Cooperative Task Groups." Group Processes & Intergroup Relations 2, no. 3 (1999): 231-44.

[7] These civil-military relations were of interest because they had already begun to show signs of stressing America’s democratic institutions. See William T.R. Fox, “Civil-Military Relations: The SSRC Committee and Its Research Survey”, World Politics 6, no. 2 (1954): 278-288.

[8] See pages 22-23 of Thomas Crosbie “What is Military Politics?” in Military Politics: New Perspectives ed. Thomas Crosbie, (Berghahn Books, 2023).

[9] Damon Coletta and Thomas Crosbie, “The Virtues of Military Politics” Armed Forces and Society 47:1 (2021): 3-24.

[10] Peter D. Feaver, “The Civil-Military Problematique: Huntington, Janowitz, and the Question of Civilian Control” Armed Forces and Society 23:2 (1996), pp. 149-178; and Peter D. Feaver Armed Servants: Agency, Oversight, and Civil-Military Relations (Harvard University Press, 2003); and Rebecca L. Schiff, “Civil-Military Relations Reconsidered: A Theory of Concordance” Armed Forces Society Vol. 22, No.1 (Fall 1995), pp. 7-24; and Deborah Avant “Conflicting Indicators of “Crisis” in American Civil-Military Relations” Armed Forces & Society” (April 1998).

[11] See Suzanne C. Nielsen “Civil Military Relations Theory and Military Effectiveness” in Handbook of Military Administration ed. Jeffrey A. Weber and Johan Eliasson (New York: Routledge, 2007); See also Deborah D. Avant “Are the Reluctant Warriors Out of Control? Why the U.S. Military is Averse to Responding to post-Cold War Low-Level Threats” Security Studies 6:2 (1996/1997), pp. 51-90, since Avant also used the Principal-Agent framework.

[12] Peter D. Feaver, Armed Servants: Agency, Oversight, and Civil-Military Relations (Harvard University Press, 2003); and Thomas Crosbie “What is Military Politics?” in Military Politics: New Perspectives, ed. Thomas Crosbie (Berghahn Books, 2023), pp. 27-30.

[13] This argument is expanded in Thomas Crosbie “What is Military Politics?” in Military Politics: New Perspectives ed. Thomas Crosbie (Berghahn Books, 2023) pp. 27-30.

[14] David Pion-Berlin and Andrew Ivey, “Military dissent in the United States: Are there lessons from Latin America?” Defense & Security Analysis, Taylor & Francis Journals, Vol 37(2) (April 2021), pp. 36-37.

[15] Risa Brooks, “Paradoxes of Professionalism: Rethinking Civil-Military Relations in the United States,” International Security 44(4)(2020), pp. 7-44.

[16] Samuel P. Huntington, Changing Patterns of Military Politics, (Free Press, 1962)

[17] See Thomas Crosbie “What is Military Politics?,” in Military Politics: New Perspectives ed. Thomas Crosbie(Berghahn Books, 2023) pp. 30-33, for a summary of this literature.

[18] Thomas Crosbie, “Military Politics as Research Program” in Military Politics: New Perspectives, ed. Thomas Crosbie (Berghahn Books, 2023), pp. 246-252

[19] Carsten F. Roennfeldt “Wider Officer Competencies: The Importance of Politics and Practical Wisdom,” Armed Forces and Society 45:1 (2019), pp. 59-77, and; Charles D. Allen “Military Officers Need to Be Politically Savvy,” Australian Journal of International Affairs (2018) – The attributes noted by Allen are social astuteness, interpersonal influence, networking, and apparent sincerity. See also Damon Coletta and Thomas Crosbie, “The Virtues of Military Politics,” Armed Forces and Society 47(1) (2019): 3-24.

[20] James M. Dubrik, “Taking a ‘Pro’ Position on Principled Resignation,” Armed Forces and Society 43:1 (2017), pp. 17-28; and Peter D. Feaver, “Resign in Protest? A Cure Worse than Most Diseases,” Armed Forces and Society, 43:1 (2017), pp. 29-40; and Richard H. Kohn, “On Resignation,” Armed Forces and Society, 43:1 (2017), pp. 41-52; and Don M. Snider, “Dissent, Resignation, and the Moral Agency of Senior Military Professionals,” Armed Forces and Society, 43:1 (2017), pp. 5-16.

[21] see Falbe and Yukl (1992) see also Lee, Soojin, Soojung Han, Minyoung Cheong, Seckyoung Loretta Kim, and Seokwha Yun. "How Do I Get My Way? A Meta-Analytic Review of Research on Influence Tactics." The Leadership Quarterly 28, no. 1 (2017): 210-28.

[22] see van Knippenberg, van Eijbergen, and Wilke (1999)

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Super Bowl XXV marked a high point in the relationship between the average citizen and the United States Armed Forces. The January 1991 game—best remembered for Scott Norwood’s field goal attempt missing wide right, leaving the Giants victorious, and starting an impressive streak of futility for the Bills—took place less than two weeks after the air campaign of Operation Desert Storm began. Throughout the night, the nascent war threatened to upstage the game itself. Whitney Houston delivered a classic performance of the national anthem in front of a sellout crowd in Tampa, each of whom waved a small American flag as aircraft from nearby MacDill Air Force Base screamed overhead. Rather than air the halftime show live, ABC opted to have Peter Jennings deliver an update on the war in Iraq. This was ironic, and merciful to the viewing audience, as the show itself was a celebration of Disney’s “It’s a Small World.” With frequent references to the war throughout, shots of servicemembers in the crowd, and a parade of children with deployed parents waving yellow ribbons, the broadcast created what historian Melani McAlister called a “multilayered patriotic display.”[1] Eighty million people watched it live on ABC.[2]

*Whitney Houston singing the national anthem at the Super Bowl in 1991. (George Rose/Getty)*

CNN’s coverage of the first night of bombings in Iraq drew an audience of similarly epic size, particularly impressive for a new network. Almost 60 million watched on the network itself and 225 independent affiliates simulcasting CNN’s coverage.[3] The network’s continuous coverage of the conflict established it as essential viewing and sped the decline of network news in favor of cable, sparking the creation of rivals Fox News and MSNBC by the late 1990s. As the U.S. military celebrated its victory in Operation Desert Storm, it numbered around two million uniformed service members, enjoyed a sprawling defense industrial base, and an adult population of whom 31% were veterans.[4] As the Cold War ended, military life was interwoven into that of the average American.

As the U.S. sought to move past the Cold War, its efforts to cash in the resulting peace dividend severed many of the most prominent links between the military and the broader population. Massive defense-related spending cuts led to fewer bases, servicemembers, and industry jobs, causing the military to vanish from many communities and leaving only ghost facilities to mark its past relationship. The reduced size of the force meant fewer having served, resulting in fewer veterans to share their experience and be part of local communities. Only one in eight men and one in 100 women today have experience serving in the military, a number the Census Bureau projects will fall to one in 14 men with women remaining at the same level.[5] The smaller military consolidated onto fewer bases over five rounds of Base Realignment and Closurec—ommonly known by its acronym, BRAC. Between 1988 and 2005, over 130 installations across 33 states and territories closed or saw drastically reduced usage.[6] These closures left both economic and environmental devastation in their wake, as clean-up costs potentially exceeded the savings from closing the installation.[7] Reduced military spending also roiled the defense industrial base, leading many contractors to either go out of business or merge. The number of aerospace and defense prime contractors went from 51 in 1990 to five today. Contractors for ground vehicles and tanks went from nine to three.[8] Communities reliant on the industrial base ended up suffering in many of the same ways as those that saw BRAC closures. The loss of jobs led to significant economic downturns and drastically altered the identity of many communities.

Despite this severing of the military from other parts of civil society, the public continued to support the military, placing more confidence in it than other public institutions. Today, even though the overall response is near an all-time low, 60 percent of those polled expressed a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in the military, placing it only behind small business in the Gallup poll.[9] A Reagan Foundation poll in 2022 painted a bleaker picture, with only a plurality of those surveyed expressing a great deal of confidence in the military and only 13 percent of 18-29 year old respondents were extremely or very willing to serve with 25 percent somewhat.[10] The disparity between support and interest in serving is a predictable outcome of a process started during the Reagan administration and carried through each administration since that equates to simply supporting the troops with the fulfillment of a patriotic duty.[11] Understanding or direct engagement was not a requirement, something that afforded political and military leaders broad latitude in using the military and avoiding serious inquiry on strategic missteps.

The recent decline in support paired with a crisis in recruiting reveals the fragility of the late Cold War civil-military dynamic and exposes how little the military has done to make itself relatable to society or understandable to most Americans. Similarly messaging does little to counter inaccurate depictions that take root in the popular imagination, such as that all veterans are simultaneously heroic but also nearly irreparably damaged. In a recent study looking at veterans in the workplace, Daniel Peat and Jaclyn Perrmann Graham found there was a “sense of stigmatization for nearly every veteran” they interviewed due to mental health perceptions.[12]

To combat this, a growing refrain to the force from military leadership is for individuals to be more active in telling their service stories. While this storytelling can be a good thing, it shifts much of the burden of communication from the institution to an already overtaxed force and presumes the message will be framed in a manner that reflects favorably on the service. It also overlooks that the reach of recent veterans and those currently serving is much smaller than it used to be. Finally, this communication has also already been occurring for years, which is why as of 2022 nearly 60 percent of recruits have a family member in the military, with 30 percent having a parent in the service.[13] A Wall Street Journal article this summer highlighted how this reliable “pipeline is now under threat” as well.[14] Given the size of the military is not likely to grow and old bases are not going to come back, the volume of storytellers and their reach will continue to diminish. To repair its relationship with the American public, the military needs to do more to leverage traditional and new media to amplify the stories of servicemembers and communicate better both what life in the military is like and what it does. This should not be a recruitment campaign, but rather a reintroduction. Recruitment campaigns contain a clear ask and rely on the assumption the audience has familiarity with the military. Given the separation between the military and the public this assumption is faulty. The military needs to reach out and show the American people what it actually does to support the nation and rebuild the foundation on which recruitment rests.

In the early years of the Cold War, the Army found itself in a similar position. It struggled to explain its utility on the assumed nuclear battlefields of the future to both policymakers and the American public. To bridge this perception gap, the Army turned to an innovative technology and growing communication medium: television. Beginning in 1951 and running for twenty years, the Army produced and distributed a show called The Big Picture. Initially debuting in primetime on ABC before moving to a syndication model, the half hour show highlighted a wide array of topics related to the Army. With over eight hundred episodes, the show is among the longest running in television history, won an Emmy, and was a launching pad for many who would find success in the broader television and movie industries. Historian John Lemza notes The Big Picture was a point of contact between the Army and the American people and “a mediating point between the Army’s internal image-makers and the wider world of public opinion.”[15]

Beginning as a showcase for the Army in the Korean War, the show expanded, covering the service’s history, special initiatives and technology, soldier experiences, and the roles of different branches and units. Ideas for episodes came from a variety of places and shifted frequently, allowing it to show “mud-level GI perspective, complementing it with a broader understanding of events.”[16] The show ended in 1971 amid rising concerns about its budget, around three-quarters of a million dollars annually, and accusations, most prominently from Senator Fulbright, that it attempted to influence foreign policy.[17] As it went off the air, it was still reliably carried by over 350 stations in the U.S. as well as 50 tied to the Armed Forces Radio and Television Service.[18] In Lemza’s telling, the cancellation meant the U.S. Army “surrendered a key piece of media terrain that might have served it well into the future as it continued to defend its relevance with the American public.”[19]

Reacquiring this terrain should be a focus of the military as it seeks to close the civil-military gap. While the media environment is vastly different, today making a literal return of The Big Picture an unlikely solution, the content-hungry nature of contemporary mass media should create opportunities for partnership. As with The Big Picture, doing so would require an investment in both people and capital. Many in uniform are trying to take their stories to a broader audience via social media, publishing on sites like this one, and public speaking around military communities. However, these efforts tend to stay within the increasingly small military and military-adjacent audiences. The resources available to the Department of Defense could help push them onto a larger stage. The benefit of reintroducing the American people to what their military does for them makes it a worthy effort. Reversing the chasm between the public and their military is too important to wait for another unlikely convergence of a popular war, mega pop star and a Bills Super Bowl appearance.

Ben Griffin is an Army officer and the chief of the Military History Division in the History Department at the United States Military Academy. He is also the author of Reagan’s War Stories: A Cold War Presidencyfrom the Naval Institute Press and is currently working on a follow up, Imagined World Orders: Tom Clancy and U.S. National Security. He can be found on Twitter/X at @BenGriffin06. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Military Academy, U.S. Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: U.S. Air Force Honor Guard Ceremonial Flight, Washington, DC, 2017 (Sgt. Kalie Frantz).

Notes: [1] Melani McAlister, Epic Encounters: Culture, Media, & U.S. Interests in the Middle East since 1945, (Berkeley; University of California Press, 2005), 252.

[2] “Super Bowl Ratings History (1967-present)” Sports Media Watch, accessed December 3, 2023, https://www.sportsmediawatch.com/super-bowl-ratings-historical-viewership-chart-cbs-nbc-fox-abc/.

[3] Variety Staff, “CNN Reigns in Desert Storm,” Variety January 20, 1991, accessed December 3, 2023, https://variety.com/1991/more/news/cnn-reigns-in-desert-storm-99128411/.

[4] Jonathan Vespa, “Those Who Served: From World War II to the War on Terror”, Report ACS-43, US Census Bureau, June 2, 2020, accessed December 3, 2023, https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2020/demo/acs-43.html.

[5] Vespa.

[6] “Base realignment and Closure (BRAC) Sites by State,” Environmental Protection Agency, accessed December 3, 2023, https://www.epa.gov/fedfac/base-realignment-and-closure-brac-sites-state

[7] Ralph Vartabedian, “Decades Later, Closed Military Bases Remain a Toxic Menace,” New York Times October 2, 2023, accessed December 3, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/27/us/military-base-closure-cleanup.html.

[8] “State of Competition with the Defense Industrial Base,” Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment, February 2022, accessed December 3, 2023, https://media.defense.gov/2022/Feb/15/2002939087/-1/-1/1/STATE-OF-COMPETITION-WITHIN-THE-DEFENSE-INDUSTRIAL-BASE.PDF.

[9] “Confidence in Institutions,” Gallup, accessed December 3, 2023,https://news.gallup.com/poll/1597/confidence-institutions.aspx.

[10] “Reagan National Defense Survey” Ronald Reagan Institute, November 2022, accessed December 3, 2023, https://www.reaganfoundation.org/media/359970/2022-survey-summary.pdf.

[11] Benjamin Griffin, Reagan’s War Stories: A Cold War Presidency, (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2022), 172.

[12] Daniel M Peat and Jaclyn Perrmann-Graham, “Where Do I Belong? Conflicted Identities and the Paradox of Simultaneous Stigma and Social Aggrandizement of Military Veterans in Organizations” in The International Journal of Human Resource Management, VOL 34, NO 17, (September 2022): 3410.

[13] Jonathan Ahl, “Most Military recruits Come From Families of People Who Served. Experts Say That’s Not Sustainable,” The American Homefront Project, June 2, 2022, accessed December 3, 2023, https://americanhomefront.wunc.org/news/2022-06-02/most-military-recruits-have-family-members-who-served-experts-say-thats-not-sustainable.

[14] Ben Kesling, “The Military Recruiting Crisis: Even Veterans Don’t Want Their Families to Join,” The Wall Street Journal, June 30, 2023, accessed December 3, 2023, https://www.wsj.com/articles/military-recruiting-crisis-veterans-dont-want-their-children-to-join-510e1a25.

[15] John Lemza, The Big Picture: The Cold War on the Small Screen, (Lawrence: University of Kansas Press, 2021), 36. Many of the episodes of The Big Picture are available online through the National Archives.

[16] Lemza, 31.

[17] Lemza, 137, 90.

[18] Lemza 137.

[19] Lemza, 263.

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Buy on Amazon  The recent coups in sub-Saharan Africa have ushered in a new era in civil-military relations in the Francophone states of the continent. While military intervention and insurgency have long been a feature of politics in the region since decolonization, the quick succession of regime change and the seizure of power by a new generation of juntas against long standing personalist dictatorships suggests a break in previous political patterns. And this is especially true in light of assumptions that have informed thinking since the Third Wave of Democratization at the end of the Cold War.[1]

Put simply, over the last three decades many states had gone the way of electoral authoritarianism or personalist rule, rather than continue the older and more precarious tradition of military regimes.[2] This state of affairs seems to be changing. Previous studies on coup dynamics can helpfully inform our understanding of this moment, but the new, cascade-like contagion of military-led regime-changes requires an analytic approach that is sensitive to the specific conditions of the geopolitical environment and internal domestic transformations operating in the region today.

To that end, we can shed light on the contemporary phenomenon unfolding in parts of West and Central Africa today by emphasizing two relevant conceptual dimensions that interact with each other. First, the internal guardianship self-perception of institutionalized and semi-institutionalized armed forces in the relevant states.[3] Second, the deep and abiding concentration of multigenerational resentment at foreign influence (in this case, specifically French post-colonial quasi-hegemony).[4]

Self-perceptions of a guardianship role for the armed forces mixed with decades of resentment has crystalized specifically within the officer corps of a range of Francophone African states. And this combination has been, perhaps surprisingly, supported by important elements within the urban poor and middle-classes. Yet this sharply and specifically motivated discontent has only been activated recently, and has been operationalized into critical, regime-defying political expression due to a rapidly shifting geopolitical context. Indeed, broader uncertainty surrounding the international state system and the flagging relative primacy of Western states and institutions has opened a new, political opportunity structure in which non-French alternatives to security have become at least symbolically available.

Intriguingly, all of this can be profitably conceptualized through recourse to the mid-20th century label of praetorianism. The praetorian framework was popularized by the eminent political scientist Samuel P. Huntington, in parallel with several French theorists of the state in the 1950s and 1960s.[5] Concisely put, the praetorian state is one in which political groups fight each other directly for power, rather than through mediating institutions, and in which armed organizations hold a significant advantage due to their relative professionalism and self-conception vis-à-vis weakly institutionalized but mobilized political structures and are able to use independent political power to achieve their aims.[6] As a result, praetorianism is sustained military intervention in civilian politics, unbarred from prior norms of restraint, divide-and-conquer coup-proofing, or either subjective or objective control.

The focus on praetorianism in Africa, which had once been a core concern of political-military analysis in the 1960s and 1970s, receded in the subsequent decades. This diminution in the application of the concept was due to the consolidation of a variety of personalist dictatorships in the wake of military coups and counter-coups of the prior era, as well as the survival and evolution of many former single-party nationalist regimes into dominant-party regimes (which still maintained an overall authoritarian character).[7] The number of coups across Africa declined precipitously after the end of the Cold War, and outside of the Arab world (which continued to experience significant military rule), a transition to either personalist or party-based authoritarianism—or electoral democracy—has been the modal outcome.

The new era represents a return to the praetorian dynamic, in which militaries are intervening ever more frequently in the affairs of sclerotic and underperforming personalist or oligarchic-electoral authoritarian regimes. This article surveys this reality, and suggests that the model of a self-perceived guardianship claim interacting with deep-seated resentment at decades of post-colonial influence from the metropole explains the cascade of regime-changes across Francophone sub-Saharan Africa. Yet this is only possible due to a new political opportunity structure disfavoring long-standing elites and old imperial legacy security provisions.

Inherent Civil-Military AntagonismIn a system with competing power centers, relations can often become antagonistic. Carl Schmitt’s concept of friend/enemy distinction views all political struggles as consisting of a bipolarity.[8] This bipolarity is equally applicable to civil-military relations, especially in cases where one is not unquestionably subordinate to the other. Institutional separations coupled with distinct interests can heighten these antagonistic tensions. One type of enemy is the internal enemy that must be fought and destroyed rather than the enemy that can be negotiated with and tolerated. Civil-military relations can become so strained that the military leadership ends up viewing the civilian leadership as an internal enemy that is unacceptable. In stable regimes, civil-military relations can remain generally rivalrous. In unstable ones, however, this antagonism reaches new heights whereby each ends up viewing the other as an existential threat in what is perceived as a zero-sum competition for power.

In his work The Soldier and the State, Huntington argues, “The one prime essential for any system of civilian control is the minimizing of military power.”[9] However, this creates an inherent contradiction in unstable states, such as those sub-Saharan states that have suffered from terrorism and insurgent warfare:

“The subjective definition of civilian control presupposes a conflict between civilian control and the needs of military security…The steps necessary to achieve military security are thus viewed as undermining civilian control. On the other hand, the effort to enhance civilian control in the subjective sense frequently undermined military security.”[10]

Weakening militaries, possibly in pursuit of regime survival and wanting to coup-proof their system, makes it harder for civilian elites to manage security challenges effectively, which in turn creates tensions with military officers. Meanwhile, simply being unable to provide security, even if not intentionally seeking to weaken the armed forces, can also produce the same effects.

Resentment can be defined as a subjective feeling of discontent caused by either real or perceived marginalization. Unstable regimes, which are at risk of collapse due to either internal or external pressures, have a smaller reservoir of power that can be shared by their very nature. As with any resource, the less there is of it, the fiercer the competition over it becomes. The greater the instability, the more existential the struggle becomes. In the case of countries like Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger, a confluence of factors has meant that civilian conduct and failures have produced resentment. This frustration, coupled with growing terrorist violence, has enabled militaries to seize powers and upend the pre-existing civil-military relationship status quo. Foreign interference, worsening security, and deteriorating civil-military ties all contribute to the shrinking of the reservoir of power, intensifying the battle for authority.

French Hegemony as a Source of ResentmentExternal actors, whether intentionally or not, can provoke resentment through their mere presence. In Francophone Africa, high levels of dependency on France by political rulers has resulted in the civilian elites being viewed by the military as an oligarchic elite captured by the French or enabling French economic interests to remain dominant, which in turn has generated generational grievances.[11] In the face of entrenched inequalities, whether ethnic or regional or defined by some other identity markers, militaries tend to enable greater levels of social mobility. Upwardly mobile officer classes are particularly susceptible to the feeling of resentment, and the feeling that in an extraordinary situation they can actually do something about it.

The recent spate of coups in the Sahel region have often been accompanied by anti-French sentiments. The new military leaders, as well as a large part of the citizenry, have framed their coups in the context of resentment against French neo-colonialism, often symbolized by the large French military presence in their countries. These coups stand in contrast to previous French-backed ones. In the recent cases of Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger, the expulsion of French forces is often framed as a reclaiming of national sovereignty. Following France’s President Emmanuel Macron announcement that French troops would leave Niger, Niamey’s new rulers issued a statement noting that “we are celebrating this new step towards Niger’s sovereignty,” describing the departure as “a historic moment.”[12]

Resentment in the region comes in two distinct yet connected forms. French military presence has created discontent but so has the civilian willingness to enable it. In his speech at the second Russia-Africa summit, Burkina Faso’s interim president Ibrahim Traoré expressed his view that “[w]hat is the problem are African heads of state who contribute nothing to these people who are fighting, but who sing the same song as the imperialists, calling us militias, calling us men who don’t respect human rights.”[13]

*Captain Ibrahim Traoré, Transition President of Burkina Faso. (Lamine Traoré/Voice of America/Wikimedia)*

Seizure of power does not necessarily result in the immediate abatement of resentment, which can in fact carry on and become a guiding force in a military junta’s entrenchment. A recent example has been the debacle surrounding France’s ambassador to Niger. Following the ouster of President Bazoum, the new rulers in Niamey insisted on the departure of French military forces and its ambassador. Instead of accepting the new status quo, Macron refused to recognize the new government and resisted pressure to withdraw his emissary and troops. While Macron eventually relented, this brazen disregard of the military’s wish not only further deepened the military’s resentment but also strengthened popular hatred of all things French, resulting in the military’s resentment becoming widely shared with the general populace.

Guardianship as a Praetorian Prerequisite Armed forces are often viewed both by themselves and society at large as playing a unique role in society, namely as a guardian.[14] This self-perception has resulted in frequent military interventions in domestic politics.Civilianized governments, by excluding the armed forces from political decision making may risk exacerbating resentment. Exclusion during times of crises in particular can worsen the relationship. This combination of self-perception as protectors of the nation from foreign and domestic threats along with a sense of alienation from civilian leaders creates a particular hostile civil-military relationship. By being cut out from a traditional role that they may have grown accustomed to, the challenge to the military’s power may increasingly seem existential.

In unstable states, existential threats may be confronted through extra-constitutional means. Successful military coups often combine resentments internal to the military and wider social discontent held by the wider citizenry. Oftentimes, such coups can be described, as Nadine Olafsson does, “as acts of social justice.”[15] A defense of the population from the threat or danger that the civilian leadership is seen as posing can be a trigger. In 2023 Mali’s new rulers declared 14 January “National Day of Recovered Sovereignty.”[16] This was a patriotic commemoration of the one year anniversary of popular protests in response to the threat of sanctions by the French-backed Economic Community of West African States. While not explicitly targeting a previous civilian government, albeit neighboring ones, it did build on the idea that national sovereignty was defended by the people and the military, not a civilian authority. It reinforces the notion that even in violating a constitution, the military remains the ideological guardian of the nation. Similarly, the establishment of the Alliance of Sahelian States by Ougadogou, Bamako, and Niamey has further signaled the perceived legitimacy of the military as the ultimate source of sovereignty.

Military juntas, such as those in Latin America, can often be non-ideological or define themselves by their opposition to a particular ideology, such as communism. In Francophone Africa, however, guardianship is itself the ideology, protecting the country from its direct enemies, such as Islamist rebels, or their indirect ones, such as incompetent or self-interested civilian rulers. Following the ousting of President Bazoum, General Abdourahamane Tiani did not declare himself the new president of the Republic of Niger but rather as “president of the National Council for the Safeguard of the Homeland,” arguing that his civilian predecessor tried to convince the populace that “all is going well… [but] the harsh reality (is) a pile of dead, displaced, humiliation and frustration.” [17]

*General Abdourahamane Tiani, speaking on national television in Niamey (AFP)*

A military guardian self-identity compels armed forces in unstable states to intervene in politics, producing a praetorian state of affairs. In his article focusing on praetorianism in former British colonies in West Africa, Claude E. Welch found that a key factor was the “precipitous declines in the legitimacy and effectiveness of civilian governments.”[18] This actually creates a reinforcing cycle, since ineffective governments produce resentment while simultaneously becoming more vulnerable to military coups. In the case of contemporary Francophone Africa, civilian failures to combat terrorism while simultaneously often producing non-power sharing regimes have created the necessary conditions and incentives for praetorianism to emerge.

Changing International EnvironmentWhile military resentment is by no means new in postcolonial Francophone Africa, changing circumstances both regionally and globally have allowed it to play a significant role in the militaries’ growing assertiveness. Over a century of colonial or neocolonial hegemony has rapidly given way. Unlike before, the region’s military leaders have greater room to maneuver with a smaller risk of backlash. During the Cold War, popular souverainiste political figures like Burkina Faso’s Thomas Sankara or the Congo’s Patrice Lumumba were easily replaced through force, either directly or indirectly, and replaced by more compliant and pro-Western—usually pro-French—leaders.

In the 2020s, however, new actors have appeared on the scene. The Russian Federation along with its Wagner fighters were seen as viable alternatives to the French military.[19] Economically, China’s astonishing development along with its active role in building Africa’s infrastructure without any strings attached to domestic politics has made Beijing more attractive than Paris. Multipolarity, as well as a growing willingness more broadly in the Global South to resist perceived hegemony of the Global North, alters the framework in which resentment is understood. Previously, military leaders may have been resentful but unwilling to act on it due to the absence of a potential support structure, which could manifest itself in the forms of counter-coups or foreign interventions. Now, however, the previous check that maintained the civil-military balance has been removed in favor of the latter.

Despite being governed by a civilian government, the Central African Republic has come to represent a potential pathway that is not dependent on old colonial masters. With Moscow’s backing, Bangui has been able to push back rebels while throwing off the yoke of Paris.[20] The Russian presence has attracted much attention, both by faraway observers as well as neighboring military officers. Notably, neither Russian nor Russian-backed groups have played a direct role in military coups in recent years in Africa. However, their proximity and willingness to aid post-coup governments have changed the internal calculus with direct consequences for civil-military relations.

Roman Emperor Septimius Severus’ final advice for his sons and successors was, “Be harmonious, enrich the soldiers, and scorn all others.”[21] In recent years, however, several Francophone African countries have had governments that were discordant, causing a feeling of scorn among the soldiers while enriching the civilian elites. A failure to recognize the fundamental antagonism that exists in civil-military relations in unstable states while losing legitimacy due to worsening violence and dependency/alignment with France has turned civilian governments into easy targets. An ingrained sense of guardianship, intensified by growing resentment, coupled with a changing international milieu has given military officers across the region both the motivation and the capacity.

Naman Karl-Thomas Habtom is a doctoral student at the University of Cambridge and a former guest researcher at the Swedish Defence University, Université libre de Bruxelles, and the Hans Blix Centre at Stockholm University. His research focuses primarily on post-war military and diplomatic history and he writes widely on contemporary security policy and international affairs.

Dr. Julian G. Waller is a Research Analyst at the Center for Naval Analyses and a Professorial Lecturer in Political Science at George Washington University. His research areas include authoritarian politics, illiberal ideological dynamics, Russian strategic decision-making, and political-military affairs. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of his employers or affiliated institutions.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Flags of the African Union member states. (GCIS)

Notes: [1] Huntington, Samuel P., The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century, Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1993.

[2] Morse, Yonatan L. "From single-party to electoral authoritarian regimes: The institutional origins of competitiveness in post-Cold War Africa." Comparative Politics 48, no. 1 (2015): 126-151; Bratton, Michael, and Nicolas Van de Walle. "Neopatrimonial regimes and political transitions in Africa." World Politics 46, no. 4 (1994): 453-489.

[3] Kandil, Hazem. “Military, Security, and Politics in Regime Change: Explaining the Power Triangle” In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics, 2021.

[4] Hunter, Lance Y, Josh Rutland, and Zachary King, “Leaving the Barracks: Military Coups in Developing Democracies,” Politics & Policy, Volume 48, Issue 6, 2020, pp. 1080.

[5] Huntington, Samuel P., Political Order in Changing Societies, foreword by Francis Fukuyama, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996

[6] ​​Perlmutter, Amos. “The Praetorian State and the Praetorian Army: Toward a Taxonomy of Civil-Military Relations in Developing Polities.” Comparative Politics 1, No. 3, 1969, pp. 382–404.

[7] Bratton, Michael, and Nicholas van de Walle. Democratic Experiments in Africa: Regime Transitions in Comparative Perspective. Cambridge Studies in Comparative Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997

[8] Schmitt, Carl. The Concept of the Political: Expanded Edition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007

[9] Huntington, Samuel P., The Soldier and the State: The Theory and Politics of Civil-Military Relations, Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press, 1967, pp. 84

[10] Ibid.

[11] Gerits, Frank, “La France en Afrique: pourquoi les politiques de Macron ont accru la méfiance et la colère,” The Conversation, 7 September 2023, url: https://theconversation.com/la-france-en-afrique-pourquoi-les-politiques-de-macron-ont-accru-la-mefiance-et-la-colere-212988

[12] “Niger : le régime militaire « célèbre une nouvelle étape vers la souveraineté »” Le Point, 25 September 2023, url: https://www.lepoint.fr/monde/niger-le-regime-militaire-celebre-une-nouvelle-etape-vers-la-souverainete-25-09-2023-2536722_24.php#11

[13] ‘“A slave who cannot assume his own revolt does not deserve to be pitied,” says Ibrahim Traoré of Burkina Faso,’ Peoples Dispatch, 2 August 2023, url: https://peoplesdispatch.org/2023/08/02/a-slave-who-cannot-assume-his-own-revolt-does-not-deserve-to-be-pitied-says-ibrahim-traore-of-burkina-faso/

[14] J. Patrice Mcsherry, “The Emergence of “Guardian Democracy”,” NACLA Report on the Americas, 32:3, pp. 16-24, 1998

[15] Olafsson, Nadine, “When Military Coups d'état Become Acts of Social Justice,” E-International Relations, 17 January 2020, url: https://www.e-ir.info/2020/01/17/when-military-coups-detat-become-acts-of-social-justice/

[16] “Journée nationale de la souveraineté retrouvée,” Secrétariat Géneral du Gouvernement, 2023, url: https://sgg-mali.ml/fr/actualites/90/journe-nationale-de-la-souverainet-retrouve.html,

[17] “Niger's General Abdourahamane Tiani declares himself leader after coup,” France 24, 28 July 2023, url: https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20230728-niger-s-general-abdourahamane-tchiani-declared-new-leader-following-coup-state-tv

[18] Welch, Claude E., “Praetorianism in Commonwealth West Africa,” The Journal of Modern African Studies, Vol. 10, No. 2 (July 1972), pp. 207

[19] Habtom, Naman Karl-Thomas, “The Potential Consequences for Africa of an FTO Designation of the Wagner Group,” Lawfare, 6 March 2023, url: https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/potential-consequences-africa-fto-designation-wagner-group

[20] Lechner, John, Are Russian mercenaries bad for the Central African Republic? Responsible Statecraft, 11 April 2023, url: https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2023/04/11/are-russian-mercenaries-bad-for-the-central-african-republic/

[21] Cassius Dio, Roman History, Book LXXVII.

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It has been more than thirty years since the Romanian Revolution of 1989 brought the army into the streets. Thankfully, it now poses no danger to democratic governance and is not threatening to seize political power. But after almost twenty years of NATO membership, defense planning and procurement still occurs with limited civilian oversight. And this has persisted without drawing much notice from academics working on civil-military relations.[1] Conceptually speaking, almost all analysis here can be thought of as addressing some species of the principal-agent problems that arise from misalignment between the interests of the civilian government (the principal) and the military that acts on its behalf (the agent). But it can also be categorized by the type of regime in question. For authoritarian governments and emerging democracies, most work is essentially focused on coups and fundamental questions about civilian control of state violence; in consolidated democracies, attention shifts to decisions about the use of force abroad.[2] Romania is a consolidated democracy, the army stays in its barracks and shows no sign of leaving, and its limited resources and EU membership make it highly unlikely to unilaterally deploy force beyond its borders, so analysts give it little attention. This is a mistake.

In this article, I draw on interviews with current and former officials, officers, and civilian experts to illustrate the civil-military challenge Romania faces. Specifically, I argue that a combination of political consensus, institutional design, and a dearth of civilian expertise allow the military to operate with little meaningful oversight, and that ignoring cases like Romania’s creates important blind spots for policymakers. To conclude, I suggest that the U.S. should adjust the security assistance programs it offers to allies and partners to cultivate robust civilian expertise that is independent of existing military structures and capable of executing effective oversight.

*Romanian Palace of Parliament (Romania Journal)*

On the Ground in BucharestIn 2015, Romanian President Klaus Iohannis and representatives of all major parliamentary parties signed a pledge to increase defense spending to two percent of GDP starting in 2017, and to keep spending at this level for at least ten years.[3] Working from the certainty this provided, the Ministry of National Defense (MApN) developed a ten-year investment plan covering force modernization efforts through to 2026.[4] In response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Iohannis pledged to allocate 2.5 percent of GDP to defense spending, and while my conversations in Bucharest did not include politicians directly, the sources I did speak with reliably suggested that defense spending levels are not a live issue in Romanian politics.[5]

But this consensus is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it ensures funding will remain available for badly-needed force modernization efforts. On the other, it means there has been no serious political debate about how that spending should be undertaken. The military is left alone to plan and implement defense acquisitions, and parliament rarely, if ever, asserts itself over the details of actual defense planning. The military zealously classifies everything, partly to stifle public debate and partly due to the ongoing influence of communist-era practices. And politicians are unable (they lack the knowledge or expertise) or unwilling (defense issues are not a priority for most Romanians) to exercise much oversight.[6]

The institutional design of Romania’s defense acquisition process also favors the military’s decision-making autonomy. This begins with the way planning and acquisition choices are sequenced. Requirements are translated into acquisition programs entirely behind closed doors, and internally to the Ministry of National Defense (Ministerul Apărării Naționale or MApN). With no real public debate, defense staffers execute market studies, evaluate alternatives, and ultimately decide on program specifications and an acquisition strategy. Here, Romanian procurement law exempts government-to-government deals (a category which includes all Foreign Military Sales transactions with the U.S.) from full public tenders, so when the military fears an open procurement may yield an outcome it prefers to avoid, it has the discretion to launch a government-to-government process instead, to ensure it gets exactly what it wants.[7]

*Romanian Ministry of National Defense (Wikimedia)*

Furthermore, only large-scale programs—defined as those valued at more than €100M—require parliamentary approval, but even when parliament is required to weigh in, the Ministry of National Defense decides what they see. I was told at least once that the military prefers to be less than forthcoming about systems’ total expected life-cycle costs, to avoid spooking politicians with an even larger up-front price tag.[8] And for programs valued at less than €100M, there is no explicit need to secure parliamentary approval at all.[9]

Finally, Romania suffers from limited expertise on defense issues in the non-military government bureaucracy, and especially in formats that are independent of the military. The government's main defense think tank, Institutul pentru Studii Politice de Apărare și Istorie Militară (ISPAIM), is subordinated to the Ministry of National Defense. And while the defense college is ostensibly there to train civilian government staff so they can conduct effective oversight, the reality is that the military ends up training the civilians to think like they do.[10]

The Ministry of National Defense also has a direct presence throughout key elements of the Romanian state bureaucracy. One former senior Air Force officer indicated that the defense ministry has its own coordination offices embedded in key national security ministries, e.g. foreign affairs, finance, and economy. If he needed something from the Ministry of Finance, he could call and be sure to reach another military officer.[11]

Some of this is inevitable. The line between “expert who knows how things work on the inside” and “insider with major conflicts of interest” is blurry in the best circumstances, and liaison offices to smooth cooperation across areas of different functional expertise make sense. But even assuming no ill-intent, it is easy to see how the end result is a defense establishment that is essentially being asked to self-regulate.

Ultimately, the cross-party consensus on defense issues, the military’s ability to exploit the institutional arrangements that govern defense policymaking, and the lack of technical civilian defense expertise in non-military organizations have created an environment in which military decision makers are able to design, execute, and implement defense programs in relative isolation, without political input or robust public debate.[12] These programs are then presented to parliament for up-down votes in which the strength of the cross-party consensus on defense issues, and politicians’ reluctance to be seen as denying the military necessary resources, means they are essentially always approved. The result is that American-style defense politics (like legislative committee hearings, politicians writing letters to demand answers from service chiefs, Congress forcing the Air Force to keep the A-10 in service or the Navy to buy more F/A-18s) are essentially non-existent.

Implications for Research & PolicyThe Romanian experience holds lessons for researchers and policymakers. They need to pursue more detailed cross-national case studies. By traditional metrics, Romania does not raise civil-military red flags, and it sits in a blind spot for typical academic approaches to the subject. Still, there is ample evidence that its defense acquisition policy lacks robust civilian oversight. But to identify this kind of shortcoming, researchers must look under the hood and trace actual policy processes, map out granular institutional structures, and evaluate how civilian control is exercised on a day-to-day basis, even when questions about the use of force or high-level political stability are not in play. At the policy level, it suggests that American policymakers should not understand supporting defense reform in NATO allies as a purely military-to-military exercise. Rather, the U.S. needs to engage NATO allies in Eastern Europe, like Romania, in the political and social aspects of policymaking, to help foster a new generation of staffers and bureaucrats with the technical expertise necessary to effectively manage defense acquisitions.

To address this, U.S. policymakers could consider a range of options, all of which would be designed to build human capital outside of military institutions, to strengthen civilian and political oversight capabilities. In-country advisory missions could embed technical advisors within allied ministries of defense and focus on training civilian and political staff. It may also be valuable to expand pathways for promising defense and foreign policy professionals abroad to study at American professional military education institutions. By focusing on non-military students, these programs could help cultivate a community of expertise in allies overseas that is better-positioned to execute an oversight function. Finally, the U.S. could consider developing opportunities for foreign non-military staff to embed with Department of Defense or Congressional structures to gain firsthand experience with acquisition planning and political oversight. These opportunities could be modeled on existing congressional fellowship programs which fund opportunities for staff from non-profits and other outside organizations to work directly on Capitol Hill in a policy capacity. Direct legislature-to-legislature working groups, designed to build capacity in defense oversight could also achieve some of the same goals.

*EUCOM, Romanian defense officials discuss security cooperation in Romania and the Black Sea on October 2023. (U.S. European Command)*

ConclusionDiscussions about civilian control of the military tend to generate mental images of tanks in the streets and coups d’états. Thankfully in Romania this is not a relevant fear. But a close examination of the situation on the ground underscores the need to avoid complacency in evaluating civil-military relations, even countries that are like Romania—staunch NATO allies, EU members, and consolidated democracies.

Here, a combination of political consensus, institutional structures, and limited civilian expertise has afforded the Romanian military the autonomy to execute major aspects of defense policy with little in the way of contested democratic oversight. Luckily, the outcomes this has produced so far have been positive, for Romania and for the United States. Romania is a committed member of the Euro-Atlantic community, a close U.S. ally, and of late a buyer of multiple advanced American-made platforms and systems.

But this is no reason to ignore what the Romanian experience illuminates. Analytically, it is important to capture underlying realities, even when the surface-level picture seems positive; democratically, it is important for civilian political bureaucracy to exercise real oversight over major budgetary decisions. As the war in Ukraine has made clear the necessity of strengthening NATO-member capabilities, the Romanian example can likewise illuminate the challenges that remain with East European allies and that future security assistance can be designed to address.

Eoin Lazaridis Power is a PhD candidate in political science. His dissertation focuses on defense-industrial and maritime security institutions in Europe; other research interests include international financial regulation, Eastern Europe and the Balkans, and field experiments. The fieldwork referenced in this article was conducted in Romania in the summer of 2023, and funded by a State Department Title VIII Research Fellowship with the Middle East Institute’s Black Sea Program.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Romanian Flag (Romania-Insider.com)

Notes: [1] Thomas-Durell Young, Anatomy of Post-Communist European Defense Institutions. The Mirage of Military Modernity (London: Bloomsbury, 2017). Yf Reykers and Daan Fonck, “No wings attached? Civil–military relations and agent intrusion in the procurement of fighter jets,” Cooperation and Conflict 55, no. 1 (2020): 66-85.

[2] See Risa A. Brooks, “Integrating the Civil–Military Relations Subfield,” Annual Review of Political Science 22, no. 1 (2019): 379-398 for a helpful overview.

[3] Alina Grigoras, “Pact On Increased Defense Budget Signed,” Romania Journal, January 13, 2015, https://www.romaniajournal.ro/top_news/pact-on-increased-defense-budget-signed/.

[4] George Vișan, “How to Spend on Defense: Romania’s 2 Percent Conundrum,” Eurasia Daily Monitor 14, no. 69 (2017), https://jamestown.org/program/spend-defense-romanias-2-percent-conundrum/.

[5] Cristian Andrei, “Decizii CSAT | Iohannis: Majorăm cheltuielile pentru apărare la 2.5% din PIB, România devine hub al ajutorului umanitar,” Europa Liberă România, March 1, 2022, https://romania.europalibera.org/a/decizii-csat-iohannis-cheltuielile-pentru-aparare-l2-5-din-pib/31730305.html. Independent Defense & Security Analyst. Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (Bucharest), Program Assistant. ISPAIM, Senior Research Analyst.

[6] ISPAIM, Senior Research Analyst. Independent Defense & Security Analyst. HotNews, Editor; in his view there is effectively no parliamentary influence on defense acquisition at all, even via informal channels.

[7] Romanian Land Forces; Chief of Structures & Armament Planning Directorate, (former). Romanian Air Force, Officer (former). MApN, Director General (former). Independent Defense & Security Analyst.

[8] Senior Military Official (former).

[9] Romanian Air Force, Officer (former). MApN, Director General (former). Independent Defense & Security Analyst.

[10] University of Bucharest, Faculty of Business and Public Administration, Professor. ISPAIM, Senior Research Analyst.

[11] MApN, Strategic Planning Directorate, Strategies & Plans Branch, Head (former).

[12] MaApN, Director General (former). Independent Defense & Security Analyst.

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Stephen M. Saideman, Philippe Lagassé, and David Auerswald

In most democracies, legislatures have far less oversight power over their militaries than we might expect. The U.S. Congress and its relationship with the American armed forces is the exception, rather than the rule. Indeed, many legislatures around the world lack some of the basic instruments required to understand what their armed forces are doing, notably security clearances, subpoena power, and adequate staffing. In this article, we address the hypothesized role for legislatures in democratic civil-military relations and then demonstrate that many bodies fall short of what scholars might expect based on theories derived from the American case. We then focus on two key factors that shape whether a legislature will be a relevant actor in a democracy’s civil-military relations: the number and scope of committees charged with defense oversight and executive control over them.

The Role Legislatures Could Play in Civil-Military Relations West side of the U.S. Capitol (Martin Falbisoner/Wikimedia)

Democracies face a common challenge in contemporary international relations: how to ensure transparency and accountability at home while competing against authoritarian regimes.[1] Legislative oversight is one way to finesse this contradiction—that the public may not be able to directly monitor the executive branch, but legislators do so on its behalf, as in the American case. The U.S. Congress matters greatly in American civil-military relations, because it has access to information, the willingness to engage in oversight, and the power to use that information in ways that are meaningful to the executive branch and the armed forces. The U.S. Congress has at least six committees that conduct some form of oversight of U.S. national defense agencies. Committee members have security clearances, sizable staffs composed of experts, and can, in theory, compel witness testimony and subpoena documents. Prior to the dramatic polarization in Congress over the past 20 years, the localized nature of candidate selection and the traditional weakness of party discipline permitted Representatives and Senators to exercise oversight powers.[2] Today, legislative oversight increasingly depends on partisan control of each congressional chamber. Finally, Congress can use the information it gathers to influence the defense budget, alter defense policy through legislation, and confirm or reject the appointment and promotions of military officers and senior defense officials. The latter is getting much attention lately due to Senator Tommy Tuberville’s blocking of hundreds of promotions.[3] The key here is that congressional oversight powers put the Congress into the heads of military officers and those in the Department of Defense before, during, and after they act.

The American case might suggest that significant legislative oversight over the armed forces is normal in democracies, but, as we found in our research, the norm is actually one of much weaker scrutiny by most legislatures.

In a comparison of fifteen democracies in North and South America, East Asia, Oceania, and Europe, we found that only the German Bundestag has a legislature with as much information, interest, and influence as the U.S. Congress. While it may seem obvious that having access to classified information would be necessary for a defense committee to do its job, many members of many defense committees have no access. Most defense committees also have very small staffs compared with the U.S. Congress. Of the democracies we studied, only the Bundestag has an impact on line-items in the defense budget akin to that of the American legislature. When we interviewed members of the Chilean Congress, they were focused on trying to learn how much was being spent on the military, not on influencing the spending. When we asked members of the various militaries if they considered the legislature as an overseer, whether the Parliament or Congress was in their heads when making decisions, most said no or not much.

*Reichstag building seen from west, Berlin, Germany. (Norbert Nagel/Wikimedia)*

Our study focused on three attributes that together produce oversight: whether legislators have access to information, whether they are willing to engage in oversight, and whether they could use the information in ways that would get the attention of the military and the executive. The table below summarizes what we found via interviews in each of these countries.

*Variations in Legislative Oversight Over the Armed Forces [4]*

Explaining Legislative Oversight Over the Armed ForcesOur initial hunch was that there were key differences among different types of democracies. We believed that Westminster (British-style) parliaments, European parliamentary systems, and congresses in presidential systems should behave differently. Our research quickly disabused us of that notion. We found significant oversight variation within each regime type, and that two key factors mattered across all of these systems: the number and focus of legislative oversight bodies and executive control of these bodies. In other words, who is supposed to be overseeing the military and how much discretion do they have to do it?

Defense committees are given most of the legislative responsibilities to oversee the armed forces in democracies, but many countries do not have a dedicated defense committee. In several democracies, the relevant committee is a combined Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee. This does not necessarily result in weak oversight; the Foreign and Defense Committees of the French and Australia Senates, for instance, conduct greater oversight than does Canada’s dedicated National Defence Committee of the House of Commons. That said, in other cases, defense is often treated as a secondary consideration in these mixed committees, leading to weaker oversight.

In some democracies, legislators do not need to conduct oversight because alternative actors do it for them. The extra-parliamentary Swedish Defense Commission is an example of such an actor. The point is that alternative oversight mechanisms allow parliamentarians to focus on other issues instead of oversight. In such places, there may not be less oversight overall, but it will be performed by unelected agents rather than legislators. In other cases, we found government actors that empowered legislative oversight in a complementary fashion. Germany’s Parliamentary Commissioner for the Armed Forces, for example, is a super-ombuds position selected by the Bundestag’s defense committee with the charge of reporting its findings directly to the committee.

The second question focuses on whether the executive can muzzle legislative overseers, as no President or Prime Minister wants to be exposed to criticism. Strong executive control means weak legislative oversight. This factor helps to explain why presidentialism, systems where the head of government is not selected by the legislature but by the public, did not produce the outcomes we expected from institutional rivalry between the president and legislature. Some presidential systems are actually hyper-presidential, where the executive branch utterly dominates the legislature.[5] We found low oversight in these countries, as is the case in Brazil and Chile. Westminster systems vary more than we expected, as party discipline in Canada and New Zealand usually squelches oversight, whereas greater backbench independence in the United Kingdom and the lack of a government majority in the Australian upper house allows oversight to thrive. Coalition politics in European parliaments produces varying levels of oversight. Parties in a governing coalition will want some oversight if their party does not control the defense portfolio, since scandals will hurt all parties in the coalition. At the same time, they do not want too much scrutiny since any bad news will rebound against them. It is not surprising that many of our moderate cases, such as Belgium, Finland, and Norway, fit into this category.

*Palace of Westminster, Big Ben, and Westminster Bridge as seen from the south bank of the River Thames. (Terry Ott/Wikimedia)*

Conclusion The big takeaway is that there is far less legislative oversight over militaries around the world than one might expect. Even in those places where military overreach led to catastrophe, such as pre-World War II Japan, there are far fewer legislative guardians guarding the guardians. The American example does not help us understand how civil-military relations works in most democracies, given that the U.S. Congress has more power and influence than other legislatures, save for the German Bundestag. Instead, we found significant variation in legislative oversight across democracies.

Reforms do not have to be heroic to improve legislative oversight. Establishing a dedicated defense committee and granting members access to classified information would go a long way to improving oversight, without involving major constitutional change. For those countries with non-parliamentary oversight institutions, we suggest building connections between those and legislative defense committees so that the latter is empowered rather than disincentivized. Finally, in countries where legislators see themselves as party loyalist first and parliamentarians second, effective legislative oversight may remain frustratingly out of reach. Asking tightly disciplined parties in Canada and elsewhere to loosen their control of committees would likely be fruitless. As partisanship and polarization take over American politics, in fact, our study suggests that even congressional oversight may weaken as a result.[6]

Stephen M. Saideman is the Paterson Chair of International Affairs at Carleton University, Director of the Canadian Defence and Security Network, and co-host of the Battle Rhythm podcast. His address at various social media outlets is @smsaideman.

Philippe Lagassé is the Barton Chair of International Affairs at Carleton University. He provided independent, third party oversight of major Canadian defence procurements from 2012-2022.

David Auerswald is a Professor of Security Studies at the U.S. National War College and a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council. This review essay reflects his own views and not necessarily those of the U.S. government or the Department of Defense.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Flags of NATO Countries (University of Notre Dame)

Notes: [1] Michael P. Colaresi, Democracy Declassified: The Secrecy Dilemma in National Security (Oxford University Press, 2014).

[2] Linda L. Fowler, Watchdogs On The Hill: The Decline of Congressional Oversight of US Foreign Relations (Princeton University Press, 2015).

[3] To be clear, Tuberville is using this power to push the Biden administration to change its policies regarding abortion, not because he is seeking to correct military misbehavior that he learned via oversight. All the same, he has a power that most legislators around the world do not, as few legislatures have any role in the promotion of senior officers. See Erin B. Logan, “Tommy Tuberville’s Blockade On Military Promotions, Explained,” Los Angeles Times, September 6th, 2023, https://www.latimes.com/politics/newsletter/2023-09-06/tuberville-military-promotion-block-abortion-biden-essential-politics.

[4] For coding, see our article David Auerswald, Philippe Lagassé, and Stephen M Saideman, "Some Assembly Required: Explaining Variations in Legislative Oversight over the Armed Forces," Foreign Policy Analysis 19, no. 1 (2023).

[5] David Samuels and Matthew Soberg Shugart, Presidents, Parties, And Prime Ministers : How The Separation Of Powers Affects Party Organization And Behavior (Cambridge ; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010); Matthew Soberg Shugart and John M. Carey, Presidents And Assemblies : Constitutional Design And Electoral Dynamics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992).

http://www.loc.gov/catdir/toc/cam025/91045043.html. Gary W Cox and Scott Morgenstern, "Latin America's reactive assemblies and proactive presidents," Comparative Politics (2001); and Marcelo Alegre and Nahuel Maisley, 'Presidentialism and Hyper-Presidentialism in Latin America', in Conrado Hübner Mendes, Roberto Gargarella, and Sebastián Guidi (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Constitutional Law in Latin America (2022; online edn, Oxford Academic, 13 Jan. 2022),.

[6] Linda L Fowler, Watchdogs On The Hill: The Decline Of Congressional Oversight Of US Foreign Relations (Princeton University Press, 2015).

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The shadow of major scholars in the field of civil-military relations like Samuel Huntington—especially his privileging of the officer corps’ relationship with civilian leadership and that same corps’ professionalism as the most important guarantor of sound civil–military relations—may still loom too large for students and practitioners of national security. Scholars conversant with civil-military relations, however, have pushed and continue to push us to expand our frameworks for understanding and practicing civil-military relations. Civil-military relations can include but is also far more than the study of coups or the explosive and tendentious interactions between prominent generals and U.S. presidents. It is also the study of the daily and ongoing inter-relationships between a nation’s population, its government, and its military—that timeless trinity Clausewitz identified—that can unfold in a myriad of dynamic ways.[1]

As such, *The Strategy Bridge* wanted to explore the state of civil-military relations in the United States and beyond for the final quarterly series of 2023. This quarterly’s articles take new perspectives on issues both familiar and unexpected.

In our first piece, provocatively entitled “Legislative Oversight Over the Armed Forces Is Overrated,” Stephen M. Saideman and Philippe Lagassé leave the U.S. behind to take a more global look at civil-military relations. They argue that U.S. legislative oversight over its military is a model that is fruitless to seek around the world, where countless national legislatures lack the same infrastructure, even within democracies. The authors provide practical solutions as to how nations can take small steps to provide more oversight.

  Eoin Lazaridis Power then turns our attention to the specific case of Romania, pointing to how it can be problematic to assume civil-military relations are healthy in nations. Romania appears to be a “consolidated democracy” not meriting special attention. But, reiterating a point made by Saideman and Lagassé, serious oversight is lacking that could lead to a myriad of problems. Power proposes that the U.S. expand its security assistance program to provide stronger civilian oversight of the military.

  Our focus then shifts to the continent of Africa to explore a recent string of coups in a specific context. In “Guardianship and Resentment in Precarious Civil-Military Relations,” Naman Habtom-Desta and Julian Waller explore the strong scorn many African militaries have increasingly cast upon their civilian governments, resulting in a rise of coups, especially in former French colonies. These coups have been partially enabled by the changing context that is the West’s seeming floundering with the simultaneous rise of competing, non-Western models from peer competitors.

  From a traditional focus on coups but in a new context, we pivot to how new technology may fundamentally reshape civil-military relations. In “The Normativity of State-Sanctioned Killing: Why the Hard Case against Machine Learning in Military Intelligence Production is Institutional,” Zac Rogers describes the potential results of a “sprawling public-private sector digital ecosystem.” The military’s use of vast amounts of seemingly innocuous information collected on its citizens through machine learning potentially disrupts the foundation of civilian interaction with the military. Where a citizen’s right to obscurity had been assumed before the arrival of the digital age, it now has to be reexamined and secured. Rogers contends that we must engage thoughtfully with this new realm of civil-military relations because it connects each civilian more deeply with the act of killing than has been the case before because of the changing context of a new kind of digital total war.

  *The Strategy Bridge* then returns to the more traditional realm of civil-military relations, although once again focused on the specific context of today in exploring the relationship of U.S. society to its military. In “Finding a New Big Picture,” Ben Griffin explores the U.S. Army’s past attempts to connect with its civilian stakeholders and suggests how it and the U.S. military as a whole can work to minimize an increasing gap between a professional military and a society increasingly unfamiliar with that professional military. He does that by exploring one of the longest-running television shows in U.S. history, *The Big Picture,* produced by the Army beginning in 1951.

  The next article continues in a similar vein although flipping the script. Thomas Crosbie and Anders Klitmøller, both instructors of professional military education, discuss not what servicemembers should *not* say but what they *should* say in ”Beyond the Neutral Card: From Civil-Military Relations to Military Politics.” Pointing out the long shadow of Samuel Huntington’s flawed insistence on apolitical officers, they argue that there is no shared understanding of what “constitutes appropriate and effective political influence by officers.” They embrace the notion of military-political agency, which relies on the assumption that the military fully operates within domestic politics whether it wants to or not. A more active approach, counterintuitively, may result in healthier civil-military relations than simply seeking to be apolitical at all costs.

  Finally, Davis Ellison concludes the series by applying civil-military relations to the specific context of coalition operations in Afghanistan to identify the gap in the literature on relationships between the civilian and military authorities within multinational organizations. In particular, Ellison argues that General Stanley McChrystal undermined civil-military relations when he discarded NATO’s strategic guidance.

  Taken together, the articles in this quarterly series guide the reader through three continents to offer multiple perspectives on civil-military relations. They do so while touching on multiple intersections of Clausewitz’s trinity of the government, military, and society, an arguably more useful and timeless perspective than Samuel Huntington’s increasingly dated ideas. We hope this provides a historically-informed and analytically insightful set of accounts of civil-military relations.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Champs-Elysees, Paris, France, 2017 (Manu Sanchez).

Notes: [1] Jessica D. Blankshain, "A Primer on US Civil–Military Relations for National Security Practitioners," Wild Blue Yonder 1, no. 4 (2020): 1-30: 3.

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The Future of Decline: Anglo-American Culture at its Limits. Jed Esty. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2022.

In an age of great power competition, Jed Esty’s The Future of Decline: Anglo-American Culture at its Limits is urgent precisely because it is countercultural to the DoD strategic-level documents that emphasize great power competition. Esty’s slim book charts what he terms “declinism” to powerful effect, distinguishing declinism from decline: “Decline is a fact; declinism is a problem. American decline is happening, slowly but inevitably. It is a structural and material process. Declinism is a problem of rhetoric or belief.”[1] This story of America on a downhill slide that Esty tells is not self-consciously set in opposition to today’s national security concerns—whether they are framed as integrated deterrence, multi-domain operations, or large-scale combat operations—but the implications of Esty’s account are profound for what America might look like on the backside of decline.

To get a sense of what Esty means by declinism, it is helpful to work through one of the early examples he provides. He points to the show The Newsroom, in particular an off-the-cuff speech by Jeff Daniels’s character, Will McAvoy. In a speech McAvoy briefly runs through America’s place relative to other countries to devastating effect, he laments the country’s lost achievement and ambition, before summing up, “America is not the greatest country in the world anymore.”[2] Two ways of measuring declinism are worth lingering on here: the weighing of America’s standing against that of other countries and putting America today in the balance against America in the past to find it wanting. Esty’s examination of declinism within each of those measures is also multifaceted, spanning many arenas—from economic standing, to scientific and technological innovation, to cultural production and cache. I also take it to encompass concerns around how America cares for its people and how the state uses violence in their name.

Declinism looks and feels very different depending on who is deploying its rhetoric. A potent rhetoric that bears some relation to—but is not fully coextensive with—the structural and material conditions of decline, its rhetoric is exercised by people who occupy a wide variety of places on the political spectrum. Broadly speaking, Esty sees two groups employing declinism: “the technocratic center left” and adherents of a “center right pragmatism.”[3]

What interests him far more, however, than this taxonomy is their overlap—he is committed to taking seriously “the wonkish center” that practices “mainstream declinism.” Because it is here that declinism reaches its fullest expression: that America is not in decline but can perch for as long as it wants to at the apex of the global order. Declinism promises that decline can be slowed, halted, and even reversed. Just before his stark assessment of America’s standing in the world, McAvoy says that “[t]he first step in solving any problem is recognizing that there is one.”[4]

A feature of declinism, then, is that it is about talking about talking about the problem of decline and greatness. It is not about the problem itself. Esty’s attention to rhetoric across domains as varied as politics, economics, and culture is a powerful reminder of his expertise in fiction and culture. The facts of decline, its features, causes, and effects, take a backseat to the prevalence of simply talking about an American downward trajectory in the same breath as talking about American greatness.

The contradiction at the very heart of declinism—that American greatness remains and that it has already passed—animates some of the best parts of Esty’s book. Instead of spending his considerable gifts only dissecting the nature of declinism and the forms it takes, he turns his attention to its latent possibilities. An America actually in decline, that can acknowledge itself as such, in Esty’s telling, may be a more just, equitable, and peaceable America than an America characterized by declinism. Esty conjures a vibrant, vital, and globally relevant America on the backside of decline; it is rich with care for those who need it most—children, to be sure, but not only children, and dotted with the new construction of revitalized infrastructure.

Most of all Esty sketches a future free from the anxious push and pull of declinism. Released from that burden, America might transcend the anxiety at the center of and produced by the declinism’s inherent dialectical tension and move into the possibility of creating and fostering new narratives in relationship to its people, and itself in relationship to the world. Esty presents his 10 Theses in a supremely compelling chapter, “After Supremacy.” He holds that:

1. American decline is neither catastrophic nor avoidable.
2. The fate of American capitalism is not the fate of global capitalism.
3. Global success leads to cultural and political stagnation for apex nations.
4. Declinism projects scarcity and austerity, but even on the downslope elite nations and elites within nations retain wealth for generations.
5. Hegemony describes an intranational and international set of relations.
6. Belief in national superiority is part of the moral infrastructure of white supremacy.
7. Rise-and-fall rhetoric reframes the expansion of empire as a masculine adventure.
8. Epic tales of imperial rise-and-fall distort the narrative of national decline.
9. The historical experience of the UK establishes the contours of decline culture, but American patterns will be different.
10. Narratives about decline are more powerful than metrics and statistics.[5]

Declinism is pernicious precisely because it is imbricated in existing structures of racial, economic, gender, national and international inequity, and exploitation of people’s labor and of the planet’s natural resources. Decline, by contrast, opens possibilities of remedy and redress. New forms of sociality within a country and relations between countries are not inevitable on the other side of decline, but they are certainly easier to imagine and realize than under the current conditions of declinism.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Future of Decline*—as its title might suggest—anchors itself in a number of different historical moments. These historical moments act in two ways: they help bring into fuller view the particular features of declinism, and they are examples of how countries organize themselves on the other side of decline. This enormous historical sweep allows Esty to chart America in decline and the particular look and feel of American declinism by placing its trajectory alongside that of the British Empire. A central feature of post-imperial Britain is nostalgia and reverence for a Victorian past, and what’s more the persistence of the values of that era into the twentieth century—the time when the Empire was at its full strength, when Britain was a superpower.

Esty does not find it inevitable that America will do the same, but America’s national attachment to the Cold War may indicate a strain of unwillingness to reimagine America. He writes, “Just as Victorian ruling-class values long held sway over UK culture and politics, now a reverential view of American greatness cuts across class and regions, locked in the amber of an Eisenhower-Kennedy era version of the technical triumph over economic limits."[6]

Culture holds a central place in the book as a whole but receives special attention at the end. Culture matters so much to Esty because it is one feature of declinism; moveover, it expresses the contradiction at the heart of declinism in particular ways. He comments, “Because American optimism is tinged with anxiety, melancholic stories of autumn and twilight, diminishment and collapse—or of Greatness Restored—always seem to command center stage.”[7] Today’s glut of remakes and sequels is an expression of the tug of war that characterizes decline because they either look to the past or rely on previously told stories. New forms of culture, fresh narratives, and novel ways of telling stories will be part of how America resolves its collective feelings about decline.

The very notion of greatness is central to today’s strategic national security, defense, and military documents. But greatness is not the only way that America relates to itself, that America relates to the world, and that Americans relate to one another. Esty’s focus on decline and declinism focuses attention not just on greatness but on the fraught and complicated ways that this idea interacts with greatness. For my own part, I don’t know whether the wager at the center of Esty’s book is right: that an America that actually dealt with its own decline might be more just and equitable than the way it is configured today. Nevertheless, there is something palpable and convincing in the notion that the future is worth our collective attention and that it is not circumscribed only by greatness.

Katherine Voyles holds a Ph.D. in English and serves as the Program Director for the School for Academic Degrees at the Graduate School for Army Chaplain Corps Professional Development in the U.S. Army Institute for Religious Leadership. She writes on issues of national defense in culture and the cultures of national defense. The views expressed are the author’s and do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Barn Flag, Washington 2018 (Specphotops).

Notes: [1] Esty, Jed. The Future of Decline: Anglo-American Culture at its Limits. Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 2022, 1.

[2] Esty, Decline, 6.

[3] Esty, Decline, 7.

[4] Esty, Decline, 6.

[5] Esty Decline, 33-56.

[6] Esty, Decline, 70.

[7] Esty, Decline, 92.

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Die Selbständigkeit der Unterführer im Kriege. Karl Woide. Berlin: Eisenschmidt, 1895.

A Russian General, the First Advocate of Auftragstaktik: Battlefield Initiative from Sedan to DonbasIs there any value today in reviewing a book published at the end of the nineteenth century? The answer in this case is yes, because the book is still relevant today…and not only on the grounds of history. Firstly, it is the first book to deal exclusively with the concept of Auftragstaktik, or mission command, long before the term was coined. Secondly, the concept is in the limelight because of the war in Ukraine. Many sources, from like the Financial Times, to The Economist, to Mick Ryan have been attributing the Ukrainian military’s success against the Russians to the adoption of the NATO practice of mission command.[1]

*Карл Маврикиевич Войде or Karl Mavrikievitch Woide (Wikimedia)*

While teaching at the Hellenic Military Academy a few years ago, I discovered the Russian General Karl Mavrikievitch Woide’s book On the Initiative of Subordinate Leaders in War. The book had been translated into German[2] and French, and from the French edition[3] it was translated into Greek in 1907 by Major Ioannis Velissariou. My surprise was great for two reasons.

Firstly, Velissariou is a legend in the Greek military and his name has become synonymous with initiative. As the commander of a battalion of Evzones, elite light infantry, during the siege of Ioannina, the largest Greek effort in the First Balkan War, he demonstrated exceptional initiative and leadership qualities.[4] He finally fell fighting in July 1913 while leading his battalion from the front in the Second Balkan War, at the battle of Kresna Gorge.[5]

Secondly, it is remarkable that the first non-German to recognize the concept now called Auftragstaktik, or mission command, was a Russian general. Karl Woide (1833-1905)—whose name appears in French as De Woyde, in German as Woide or Voide, and in Russian as Voide or Vojde—was a prominent military writer. He first wrote a penetrating analysis of the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71, The Causes of Victories and Defeats in the War of 1870. His two-volume work was translated into German and French and went through repeated editions.[6] The Russian general wondered what caused the continuous successes of the Germans and the constant defeats of the French. He was the first neutral observer to attribute the German victory to the “officially recognized and obligatory independence of the subordinate leaders.”[7] Furthermore, he considered that the “initiative of the subordinates acted as a force multiplier that increased the drive of the higher command.”[8] The Germans at that time hardly ever used the term Auftragstaktik when discussing issues of command. Rather, they spoke of selbständigkeit,meaning independence, initiative, and autonomy.[9]

Evidently thinking that the subject of initiative was worth separate discussion, Woide wrote the book under review, Die Selbständigkeit der Unterführer im Kriege (On the Initiative of Subordinate Leaders in War), in which he thoroughly examined this issue. Not translated into English, the book remained relatively unknown in the Anglophone world.

The book is divided into eight short chapters. In the first chapter, the introduction, Woide summarizes his conclusions from the experience of the Prussian army in the War of 1870. He argues that “the amazing successes achieved by the German army in the campaign of 1870 are due, in large part, to initiative of subordinates. Because the French were ignorant of it during 1870-71, it gave them the impression of a newly perfected weapon.”[10]

The second chapter deals with how initiative arose in modern wars. In pre-nineteenth century wars with linear tactics, initiative existed but was not necessary in the same ways. From the Napoleonic Wars onwards, initiative became imperative, mainly due to the increase in the size of armies. The third chapter examines how we should interpret the principle of initiative. Woide believes that it should be made obligatory for the entire army, its implementation should be formalized and it should be considered a professional duty. In addition, initiative must be exercised within defined limits because it is a double-edged sword.

In the fourth chapter, the Russian general points out that initiative should not be confused “with the fury of attacking anywhere regardless of the circumstances or marching to the sound of guns.” In other words, true initiative has nothing to do with arbitrary actions. The fifth chapter deals with the recognition and interpretation of the situation, i.e. what we now call situation assessment.

In the sixth chapter emphasis is placed on the fact that subordinates, if they correctly assess the situation, can anticipate the expected orders. Of course the compass that unifies the actions of everything is the common purpose, the superior’s intent as we would say today. In the seventh chapter, the distinction between the execution of orders according to their letter or their spirit is developed. He considers obvious “on the one hand the successful consequences of intelligent insubordination and on the other, the disastrous consequences of literal submission to the order.” It is interesting that “intelligent disobedience” is still in the military discourse today. Indicatively, the American Army Chief of Staff Mark A. Milley in 2017 stated, “a subordinate needs to understand that they have the freedom and they are empowered to disobey a specific order, a specified task, in order to accomplish a purpose.”[11]

In the last and longest chapter, Woide summarizes all aspects of initiative, with the aim of stimulating study and thought, since he considers that cognitive education is necessary for its establishment. He observes that the right of initiative has been recognized and sanctioned in the armies, “but it is far from being exercised everywhere and understood in its proper sense. The good will is not lacking, but it is not sufficiently understood that the implementation of the new principle requires a complete transformation of the command methods”.[12]

Influence Buy on Amazon The Germans, who developed selbständigkeit as a command philosophy, analyzed and discussed the subject extensively from 1870 to 1914.[13] Nevertheless, it is interesting that Woide’s books also influenced the German army, where subordinates’ independence took the form of educational principle, which was criticized for its excess and partly attributed to Woide’s input.[14] Germany, with its huge armies, increased lethality, and wide dispersion of forces, was best adapted to the battlefields of the industrial age. To overcome the chaos and fog of war, the German army found the solution to decentralized command by developing the initiative of subordinates at all levels. It was a whole philosophy and not a technique, which gradually evolved and received the name Auftragstaktik.

The most important question is, how much did Woide’s writings on initiative influence the armies of his day? At first, in his own country, although his two books were included in the curricula of the military academies, they failed to influence the entrenched thinking of the leadership of the Russian army.[15] Alexander Solzhenitsyn, in his astonishing blend of fiction and historiography, August 1914, describing the Battle of Tannenberg at the beginning of the First World War, dissects the mentality of the Russian army leadership by emphasizing:

“Provided you stuck to the letter of regulations, orders, and directives, you could make as many blunders as you liked; you could be defeated, you could retreat, be routed, run away—no one would ever blame you and you would not even be called upon to investigate the cause of your failure. But woe to you if you once diverged from the letter, if you ever thought for yourself or acted on your own initiative; then you would not even be forgiven your successes, and if you failed, you would be eaten alive.”[16]

August 1914 is an excellent read about how a petrified army—completely devoid of initiative and where mediocrity reigns—makes war. Some authors believed the Soviet system limited the freedom of tactical commanders while maximizing that of operational level commanders.[17] However, in the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian war, we have not noticed initiative by Russian commanders at either the tactical or at the operational level.

The U.S. Army adopted Auftragstaktik in the 1980s, and while it has officially incorporated mission command in its doctrine, it has been less successful in utilizing it in operations. David Barno and Nora Bensahel maintain that mission command often remains aspirational in practice. The reasons for this failure include excessive bureaucracy, extensive micromanagement, widespread risk aversion, and endemic distrust.[18] Today, mission command is part of NATO doctrine and all western armies have adopted and practice it, or at least that is what they claim.[19]

 Buy on Amazon  Turning to recent events, are the successes of the Ukrainians in the war against the Russians due to the adoption of mission command? If that holds true, then there are three explanations. Firstly, a military descendant of Soviet tradition could adopt and practice mission command in a matter of a few years or even months, when other militaries struggle for decades to incorporate it and this is an amazing feat. Secondly, we could probably attribute everything that works in the battlefield to mission command. However, by doing so we run the risk of robbing mission command of its meaning. Thirdly, a military can succeed in the battlefield even without practicing mission command. The Red Army defeated the *Wehrmacht*; proving mission command is not a silver bullet on the battlefield.[20]

ConclusionSome authors, such as the historian Robert Citino, argue mission command is not transferable beyond the historical and social context in which it was developed.[21] Many others, such as Martin van Creveld and Stephen Bungay, claim that a non-German Army can emulate this approach despite its unique German cultural roots.[22] In fact, the German concept of Auftragstaktik has spread widely as mission command and been emulated by many militaries, although employing it has been difficult for most Western militaries. But, as Eitan Shamir demonstrated in his excellent study Transforming Command, to successfully exercise this concept, militaries have to overcome two gaps. The first gap is between understanding mission command and putting it into doctrine, that is the interpretation gap; the second one is the praxis gap between doctrine and its practical application during operations.[23] In other words, it is not enough merely to adopt mission command; you must also adapt it to your own particular circumstances. Recently, some other authors such as Conrad Crane and Amos Fox have criticized the cult of mission command and highlighted the flaws of the concept.[24] Eventually, it seems that we need more research on command approaches because they are generally poorly studied, and hence poorly understood.[25]

Major General Panagiotis Gkartzonikas, Hellenic Army (Ret.) is the editor of the military strategy e-journal STRATEGEIN and founder and president of Advanced Battlefield Studies – GREECE.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Soldier, Thievpal, France (National Library of Scotland).

Notes: [1] Ben Hall, ‘’Military Briefing: Ukraine’s Battlefield Agility Pays Off’’, Financial Times, May 26, 2022; ‘’What Is Mission Command? Democracy and Freedom Can Play a Role in Military Effectiveness’’, The Economist, July 25, 2022; Mick Ryan, ‘’A Tale of Three Generals — How the Ukrainian Military Turned the Tide’’, Engelsberg Ideas, October 14, 2022.

[2] Karl Mavrikievitch Woide, Die Selbständigkeit der Unterführer im Kriege (Berlin: R. Eisenschmidt, 1895).

[3] Charles De Woyde, De l'Initiative des chefs en sous-ordre à la guerre (Paris: L. Baudoin, 1895).

[4] Richard C. Hall, The Balkan Wars 1912-1913: Prelude to the First World War (London: Routledge, 2000), 83-5.

[5] Ibid, 121-22.

[6] Woide, Die Ursachen der Siege und Niederlagen im Kriege 1870 (Berlin: Mittler & Sohn, 1894-1896) and in French, De Woyde, Causes des Succès et des Revers dans la Guerre de 1870 (Paris: L. Baudoin, 1899-1900).

[7] Woide, Die Ursachen, Ι, 5.

[8] Woide, Die Ursachen, ΙΙ, 428.

[9] Robert Citino, The German Way of War: From the Thirty Years' War to the Third Reich (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2005), 308-10.

[10] Voide, Die Selbständigkeit, 5.

[11] David Barno and Nora Bensahel, ‘’Three Things the Army Chief of Staff Wants You to Know’’, War on the Rocks, May 23, 2017, https://warontherocks.com/2017/05/three-things-the-army-chief-of-staff-wants-you-to-know/.

[12] Voide, Die Selbständigkeit, 122.

[13] Stephan Leistenschneider, Auftragstaktik im preußisch-deutschen Heer 1871 bis 1914 (Hamburg: Mittler & Sohn, 2002).

[14] Marco Sigg, Der Unterführer als Feldherr im Taschenformat: Theorie und Praxis der Auftragstaktik im deutschen Heer 1869 bis 1945, (Paderborn: Ferdinand Schoningh, 2014), 220-21.

[15] Olaf Rose, Carl von Clausewitz: Zur Wirkungsgeschichte seines Werkes in Rußland und der Sowjetunion 1836-1991 (Munich: Oldenbourg, 1995), 61.

[16] Alexander Solzhenitsyn, August 1914 (New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1972), 124. See also Christian E.O. Millotat, ‘’Die Schlacht von Tannenberg im Spiegel des literarischen Meisterwerks von Alexander I. Solschenizyn – August 1914, Das Rote Rad, Erster Knoten,’’ Military Power Revue der Schweizer Armee, no. 2 (December 2014): 38-48.

[17] For example Michael Eisenstadt and Kenneth M. Pollack "Armies of Snow and Armies of Sand: The Impact of Soviet Military Doctrine on Arab Militaries," in The Diffusion of Military Technology and Ideas, ed.Emily O. Goldman and Leslie C. Eliason (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2003), 68-70.

[18] David Barno and Nora Bensahel, Adaptation under Fire: How Militaries Change in Wartime (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2020), 265-68.

[19] North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Allied Joint Publication-3 (AJP-3), Allied Joint Doctrine for the Conduct of Operations (NATO Standardization Office, 2019).

[20] Robert Leonhard, The Art of Maneuver: Maneuver Warfare Theory and Airland Battle (Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 1994), 52-8.

[21] Citino, The German Way of War, 310.

[22] Martin van Creveld, ‘’On Learning from the Wehrmacht and Other Things’’, Military Review, Vol. 68, no 1 (January 1988): 70-1; Stephen Bungay, The Art of Action: How Leaders Close the Gaps between Plans, Actions, and Results (London: Nicholas Brealey Publishing, 2011), 76-82.

[23] Eitan Shamir, Transforming Command: The Pursuit of Mission Command in the U.S., British and Israeli Armies, (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2011), 6-7.

[24] Conrad Crane, ‘’Mission Command and Multi-Domain Battle Don’t Mix’’, War on the Rocks, August 23, 2017. https://warontherocks.com/2017/08/mission-command-and-multi-domain-battle-dont-mix/; Amos C. Fox, ‘’Cutting Our Feet to Fit the Shoes: An Analysis of Mission Command in the U.S. Army’’, Military Review, Vol. 97, no 1 (January-February 2017): 49-57.

[25] Martin Samuels, “Understanding Command Approaches”, The Journal of Military Operations, Vol. 1, no. 3 (Winter 2012): 25-29.

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Armies in Retreat: Chaos, Cohesion, and Consequence. Edited by Timothy G. Heck and Walker D. Mills. Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: Army University Press, 2023.

  If the adage that we as human beings learn more from our failures than from our successes is true, then all would be wise to study how this truism applies in their own professional context by reading *Armies in Retreat: Chaos, Cohesion, and Consequence*. Military leaders and policy makers would be foolish to believe that war with a peer adversary would not involve some form of retreat or retrograde. Retreats can lead to routs, or they can “provide critical time to rally forces for new campaigns” or counteroffensives.[1] Routs must be avoided, but such disaster may befall those who fail to study the history of armies in retreat.

The Tale of the TapeTimothy G. Heck and Walker D. Mills have compiled a worthwhile starting point for future scholarship on retreats. Armies in Retreat is one of the longer Army University Press publications, notching a hefty 435 pages. This bulk should not dissuade readers, who can select readings appropriate to their interests, whether ancient Greece, the World Wars, or the thought-provoking cyber warfare chapter.[2] The themes of chaos, cohesion, and consequences easily serve as topics for leader professional development sessions at all echelons. The list of retreats, many not known from popular literature, makes the book all the more compelling for the novice and the professional military historian alike, and can be paired with more well-known retreats like General George Washington’s retreat to Valley Forge or Field Marshal William Slim’s march out of Burma.[3] All of the vignettes deal with the land domain, and thus there is room for scholarship on retreats and retrogrades in the air and maritime domains. Enterprising students and scholars can also explore what retreats and retrogrades might look like in the space and cyberspace domains.

Three Themes: Chaos, Cohesion, and Consequences “The Grande Armée Crossing the Berezina” by January Suchodolski (National Museum in Poznań/Wikimedia)

The opening salvos of the book provide vignettes from the Napoleonic Wars to World War II about what must be avoided: routs. Throughout the chapters, two themes emerge: first the lack of detailed planning and second the need for decisive leadership. The text shows that élan does not supplant “local overmatch in numbers, modern weapons, and logistics,” poor task organization, structure, or lack of intelligence.[4] Routed units fracture before combat begins; military units do not come together after shooting starts.

The second section describes cohesive units that execute breakouts, retreats, and rear-guard actions with aplomb. The historical range widens, starting with the Plataean breakout and night raid during the Peloponnesian War and running through to the 3rd Transportation Military Railway Service (3TMRS) during the Korean War.[5] Three themes resonated throughout the eight vignettes. First, the need for competent leaders with the technical skills and experience required to execute the task at hand. Second, detailed planning of the action and its desired aftermath. Third, a willingness to accomplish the mission with the capabilities at hand. It is important to reinforce that morale and mission accomplishment is tied to technical competence and prior training. The American and Korean railroad engineers and logisticians of the 3TMSR and Korean National Railroad were successful primarily through their technical expertise and professional discipline.[6]

Finally, the book reaches what might be the strongest section: consequences. The authors here speak not only of cohesion or disintegration, but of a variety of timely themes such as command climate, civil-military relations, the power of memory in the midst of defeat, and the consequences of poor planning. Policymakers and government professionals should take note of the chapters concerning Lord Cornwallis’ 1781 Yorktown campaign and the evacuation from Gallipoli in 1915-16. Military operations are at the behest of political masters and the government pocketbook. When government and military leadership are not aligned, the outcomes become decidedly bad, especially for soldiers on the ground.

The All-Encompassing Theme: Leadership and FollowershipAnother theme that resonates throughout all the vignettes: the need for strong leadership and followership.[7] Both require trust, trust built through relationships, competence, training, and oftentimes previous success. The “Fighting 69th” of Bull Run, though forced from their positions, were the last to hold due to strong leadership and training, hence the narrative “we did retreat but we were not beat.”[8] The American IX Corps was less fortunate where a trusted commander was removed, trust in new leaders was poor, and the competence of Corps and Division commanders was constantly in question. The authors suggest such poor leadership competence and lack of trust led to the rout at Chancellorsville, hence the mistrust of German-American soldiers and units throughout the rest of the Civil War. Units with poor command climate and mediocre leadership do not rise to the occasion in any of the examples given in Armies in Retreat; they suffer needless casualties through combat, climate or weather, disease, and capture. This is why training and ruthless accountability for competent leadership matters. When the chips are down, units fall back to the level of their training.

*A column of troops and armor of the 1st Marine Division move through communist Chinese lines during their successful breakout from the Chosin Reservoir in North Korea. (Corporal Peter McDonald/USMC Photo/Wikimedia)*

Armies in Retreat provides opportunity for reflection. Indeed, one wonders if studying retreats and retrogrades can bring more warfighting functions to the forefront such as protection and the use of air defense to support a withdrawal. Military leaders can reflect on how they would train their forces to remain cohesive during times of trial. Training in engineering and heavy weapons gains renewed importance when considering a fighting withdrawal. Sustainment, reconstitution of units, and movement mechanisms between frontlines and rear areas require detailed planning that cannot be left to luck or chance.

Perhaps instead of fighting offensive-minded wet gap crossing during exercises, Army brigades might learn more by fighting rearguards, delaying actions, or fighting withdrawals. Readers need only refer to the skill of Hülsen’s 1760 fighting retreat, the bravery of the Provisional Air Corps Regiment at Bataan, or the skill of the 3rd TSMR and KNR to see not only the complex, technical nature of such operations, but the moral and ethical quandaries as well.[9] It is one thing to order a unit to its death to seize an objective; it is another thing entirely to order a unit to fight a delaying action, knowing that a few words “had condemned ten thousand men to death or mutilation.”[10] Armies in Retreat also shows how time-consuming and difficult it is to train rigorously, and it makes the decisive military victories seem all the more remarkable.

A Call to Action Subtly, Armies in Retreat also serves as a call to action to think critically and creatively about how U.S. forces, allies, and partners could compel adversaries to withdraw or cause a rout. Field Manual (FM) 3-0 Operations speaks of the defeat mechanisms destroy, dislocate, disintegrate, and isolate.[11] Leaders reading Armies in Retreat should reflect, theorize, and war-game how to defeat adversaries in all dimensions and domains. These reflections, paired with more scholarship and discourse, should inform the refinement of joint and allied doctrine and all military training and education. Military professionals and civilian policymakers can learn from recent U.S. failures and see that seizing terrain or winning the population is not enough to achieve victory. Those associated with the application of military power should not be afraid to take failure as a mentor, and extend their study beyond the great victories.

Marshall McGurk is an Army officer and a 2023 graduate of the School for Advanced Military Studies. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: “The Retreat” by Louis Eugène Benassit the retreat of General Bourbaki’s army during the Franco-Prussian war in February 1871. (Cardiff Museum)

Notes: [1] J.D. Work “The Retreat of Cyber Forces after Offensive Operations,” in Armies in Retreat: Chaos, Cohesion, and Consequences ed. Timothy G. Heck and Walker D. Mills (Leavenworth, Kansas: Army University Press, 2023), 401.

[2] An argument could be made for an Army University Press cyber warfare series based on J.D. Work’s chapter alone.

[3] The lesser-known examples are a tribute to the editors and chapter authors who remind us of the richness of the military history field.

[4] Tyler D. Wentzell, “Shattered: The XVth Brigade against Franco’s 1938 Aragon Offensive,” in Armies in Retreat: Chaos, Cohesion, and Consequences (ed. Timothy G. Heck and Walker D. Mills (Leavenworth, Kansas: Army University Press, 2023), 67, and Marcin Wilczek, “Polish Horsemen in the Chaotic Withdrawal of 1939,” in Armies in Retreat: Chaos, Cohesion, and Consequences ed. Timothy G. Heck and Walker D. Mills (Leavenworth, Kansas: Army University Press, 2023), 91.

[5] Jonathan H. Warner, “Fly by Night: Plataean Evacuation and Night-Fighting in the Peloponnesian War,” in Armies in Retreat: Chaos, Cohesion, and Consequences (ed. Timothy G. Heck and Walker D. Mills (Leavenworth, Kansas: Army University Press, 2023), 99, and Eric Allan Sibul, “The Railroad Saved our Neck: United Nations Command Retreat in Korea, Winter 1950-51,” Armies in Retreat: Chaos, Cohesion, and Consequences ed. Timothy G. Heck and Walker D. Mills (Leavenworth, Kansas: Army University Press, 2023), 241.

[6] Eric Allan Sibul, “The Railroad Saved our Neck: United Nations Command Retreat in Korea, Winter 1950-51,” Armies in Retreat: Chaos, Cohesion, and Consequences ed. Timothy G. Heck and Walker D. Mills (Leavenworth, Kansas: Army University Press, 2023), 264-265.

[7] Walker D. Mills, “Conclusion,” in Armies in Retreat: Chaos, Cohesion, and Consequences (ed. Timothy G. Heck and Walker D. Mills (Leavenworth, Kansas: Army University Press, 2023), 427.

[8] Catherine V. Bateson, “‘We Did Retreat but Were Not Beat: The Irish-American Experience at Bull-Run as Told Through Civil War Songs,” in Armies in Retreat: Chaos, Cohesion, and Consequences ed. Timothy G. Heck and Walker D. Mills (Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: Army University Press, 2023), 327, 338.

[9] Alexander S. Burns, “Hülsen’s Retreat: The Campaign in Saxony, August-October 1760,” and Frank A. Blazich Jr., “Airmen into Infantry: The Provisional Air Corps Regiment at Bataan, January-April 1942” in Armies in ed. Timothy G. Heck and Walker D. Mills (Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: Army University Press, 2023)

[10] C.S. Forster, The General (Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England: Penguin Books, 1936), 230. It is a concise novel with lessons for moral and ethical decisions stemming from WWI combat. For a non-fiction example, see Paik-Sun Yuip, From Pusan to Panmunjon: Wartime Memoirs of the Republic of Korea’s First Four-Star General (Lincoln, Nebraska: Potomac Books, 1992).

[11] US Department of the Army, Field Manual (FM) 3-0, Operations (Washington, DC: Government Publishing Office, 2022), 6-21—6-25.

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A Republic in the Ranks: Loyalty and Dissent in the Army of the Potomac. Zachery A. Fry. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2020.

Suddenly thrust into the role of national protectors, Civil War soldiers became intimately entwined with the fate of the Union. Histories of the front lines often detail their encounters with the brutality of the battlefield, miserable conditions, and the cruelty of slavery. A Republic in the Ranksprovides a new perspective on this military history by examining the internal political divisions among enlisted men. Zachery A. Fry reimagines the camps and battlegrounds of the Army of the Potomac as focal points of ideological debate. Enlisted men not only reflected partisan divides of the broader Northern public but directly engaged in the political process through correspondence, voting, and political resolutions. This book sheds light upon mobilization within the ranks to reframe notions of political space and activity during the Civil War.

 Buy on Amazon  Part of the University of North Carolina Press’ Civil War America “Landmark Series,” edited by Peter S. Carmichael, Caroline E. Janney, and Aaron Sheehan-Dean, the book contributes to broader scholarship examining how the Civil War transformed the national government and its relationship with the American people. Divided into two sections, *A Republic in the Ranks* explores how enlisted men debated the meaning of partisan loyalty in the early stages of the war and understood the significance of their political voice and how junior officers in particular directed the political engagement of the ranks. In addition to enlistment and voting records, Fry sifted through mid-to-late war newspaper accounts to reveal soldiers’ participation in both local and national politics. His reliance on a wide range of sources allows this book to trace the evolution of the army’s collective political consciousness throughout the war.

Soldiers simultaneously embraced the independence of military manhood and sought to replicate the comforts of home. Charged with electing their own junior officers, volunteer companies immediately engaged in partisan political processes. A Republic in the Ranks frames the relationship between junior officers and enlisted men as both fraternal and patriarchal. The organization of Union troops contributed to the emerging Republican consensus. Elected officers both directed the military service of their regiment and modeled moral virtue and professionalism for inexperienced soldiers. Loyalty to the Union flag and popular military figures like General McClellan initially fostered unity among men who were otherwise divided by education, ethnicity, and class. As confidence in Union leadership waned, regiments relied upon internal leadership to give voice to mutual complaints. Fry highlights the political awareness of enlisted men who filtered their war-time experiences and trauma through partisan perspectives.

The year 1863 served as a critical military turning point during the Civil War, and political engagement increased leading up to the 1864 presidential election. After months of exhausting service, soldiers not only confronted the terror of the battlefield and the reality of slavery in the South, but forged deep bonds within individual regiments. Concern about peace-at-any-price measures, pro-Confederate secret societies, and disloyalty in the ranks prompted sixty-one regiments to issue political manifestos in support of the Lincoln administration and Republican policies in 1863. Fry demonstrates the power and impact of these political resolutions, consciously crafted to demonstrate the collective voice of the armed forces. Significantly, nine resolutions with broad regional representation explicitly addressed slavery. Sentiments included endorsements of the Emancipation Proclamation, support for the enlistment of Black soldiers, and declarations that situated the abolition of slavery at the center of the war effort. These political manifestos reflected the ideological unification of enlisted men, and the emergence of the Army of the Potomac as a social and political institution neatly aligned with Republican initiatives.

Fry’s A Republic in the Ranks also explores political campaigning within the Union Army, first through surrogate ballots and later through active engagement in public discourse. Lengthy furloughs allowed soldiers to speak in public meetings, take part in local elections, and encourage support of absentee voting among the armed forces. Debates over whether enlisted men should or could cast ballots in the 1864 presidential election led to sophisticated political campaigning among soldiers and veterans. Fry identifies the formation of veteran’s clubs as an extension of the army apparatus. Pressure from these organizations and enlisted men themselves led to Edwin M. Stanton’s General Order No. 265, which outlined procedures for wartime absentee voting. Through highlighting this process, the book situates the transformation from civilian to soldier at the heart of the political transformations of the Civil War era.

*Portrait of Edwin Stanton (Library of Congress/Wikimedia)*

Additionally, Fry provides six detailed appendices that both demonstrate the archival foundation of this book and direct historians to examine underutilized army records. In addition to a methodological essay, these include a bibliography of the 1863 political resolutions, regimental participation in the Philadelphia Free Military School, and voting returns for the 1863 and 1864 elections. The titles of these political resolutions, mostly published in local newspapers, are eye-catching. Reflecting Fry’s assertion of an emerging institutional identity for the Army of the Potomac, they claim to represent “The Loyal Voice,” “Noble Sentiments,” and “The Patriotism of the Soldiers.”[1] Voting returns from the 1864 election also offer a glimpse into partisan loyalty among enlisted men. Even though thousands of ballots from New York, Connecticut, and Minnesota were never counted, these returns, sometimes published in local papers, represent the public political identities of enlisted men.

Fry addresses the revolutionary enlistment of nearly two hundred thousand men of color into the Union army, particularly the establishment of “candidate schools” to train white commanding officers. However, he leaves space for examining the impact of Black enlistment on the developing political identity of the Union army. Nine of sixty-three resolutions made by white soldiers offered an explicit endorsement of emancipation, but Fry’s analysis does not examine how white enlisted men interacted with enlisted men of color beyond their role as commanding officers. It is not clear to what extent their campaigning reflected burgeoning claims for the expansion of political rights in the post war period. Furthermore, Fry does not consider the unique brand of political consciousness developed within Black regiments themselves. The segregation of the armed forces and the decision to appoint white officers to Black regiments precluded the opportunity for African American soldiers to elect junior officers and enact the political process within their ranks. The decision to enlist alone was an overtly political act, imbued with claims for full citizenship and the extension of political rights. Enlisted men of color participated in the political process and campaigned through actions, if not words, for the right to vote. Reframing African American soldiers’ military participation through Fry’s political lens might open a new avenue of exploration.

Kathryn Angelica is a PhD Candidate at the University of Connecticut. Her dissertation explores Black and white women’s activism in the Civil War era.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

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Header Image: Union soldiers pose during the Siege of Petersburg in Virginia in 1864. (Library of Congress)

Notes: [1] Zachery A. Fry, A Republic in the Ranks: Loyalty and Dissent in the Army of the Potomac (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2020), 193.

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Grand Delusion: The Rise and Fall of American Ambition in the Middle East. Steven Simon. New York, NY: Penguin Press, 2023.

 Buy on Amazon  American overreach in the Middle East since the Iranian revolution is examined by Steven Simon in his new book *Grand Delusion: The Rise and Fall of American Ambition in the Middle East*.[1] Simon reviews more than four decades of American endeavors in the region from the perspective of eight presidential administrations ranging from Jimmy Carter to Joe Biden. The book’s chapters illuminate cabinet-level thinking on vexing national security issues: Iranian influence in the Levant in the 1980s, the response to the U.S. Marine Corps barracks bombing in Beirut, the Persian Gulf War, the unsolvable Israel-Palestine quandary, and the rise and fall of Saddam Hussein and the resultant chaos in Iraq and Syria.

Simon, a former diplomat and policy advisor with deep experience in American Middle East policy, skewers the catastrophic choices made by one administration after another. The author’s experiences allow him to go inside many of these decisions, revealing the motivations, assumptions, and often broad confusion underlying the few triumphs and many blunders. Simon’s explanation of the sad specter of America’s war in Vietnam War and its role in shaping policy in the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations is illuminating. Simon served in these administrations and observed the role of American sentiment and memory of that war in adjudicating policy in the Middle East. Simon also cleverly demonstrates, in revealing fashion, the surprising similarities between American presidential administrations in dealing with Iran. Many of the chapters are full of critical analysis and the kind of insight only someone involved in the decision-making can offer. In particular, the author’s insight on the Clinton administration’s development of the Oslo Accords is largely unavailable elsewhere.[2]

In the end, however, the book is not quite the sum of its parts and falls short of delivering a conclusive perspective, a comprehensive view, or a broad set of proposed policies. In focusing on his own observations and role in making decisions about American policy in the Middle East, the author does not go far enough to provide the kind of insight the book proposes to offer. Indeed, the narrow focus and the failure to provide alternative perspectives, particularly regarding the American response to a complex region’s deeply entrenched divides, ultimately diminishes the depth of the book’s insights.

A View of Misguided Ambition in the Middle EastGrand Delusion tends to oversimplify the multifaceted issues facing the Middle East. Simon frequently reduces complex geopolitical, cultural, and historical dynamics to convenient explanations. Some of these reductions seem to be a stylistic decision: Simon appears to want to get in and out of critical moments quickly to move the narrative along. This makes sense, given that there are many books covering in detail the major events he glosses over such as the Iranian hostage crisis, the Persian Gulf War, the rise of ISIS, and more.

At times, however, Simon seems to intentionally limit the material presented to that which fits his narrative. This reductive approach hinders the reader's understanding of the intricate and often contradictory motivations behind various actions. For example, he attributes the failure of the Arab Spring entirely to American mismanagement and lack of understanding.[3] This section of the book does not consider the domestic factors, historical legacies, and geopolitical interests that shaped the outcomes of the movement in different countries. By neglecting the complex interplay between external and internal dynamics, Simon's analysis falls short of a full exploration of the events he describes.

Throughout, Simon consistently reinforces his argument that American ambition in the Middle East has been inherently flawed and misguided, even when it does not make sense to do so. For example, Simon dismisses the development of an international coalition that defeated ISIS through a combination of precision airstrikes and ground assaults–a rare and remarkable strategic and operational success.[4] Simon claims, without much exploration, that ISIS’ territorial control was unsustainable irrespective of any opposing counteroffensive.

Similarly, Simon dismisses the Abraham Accords–the 2020 normalization of relations between Israel, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain–in a mere 127 words.[5] The historic series of agreements serves as perhaps the Trump administration's signature diplomatic achievement in the Middle East.[6] By bringing the Israel Defense Forces and Arab militaries together in collaborative deterrence planning, the set of agreements created a new bulwark against Iran and advanced a new regional security architecture organized around shared threats. Indeed, the Abraham Accords represent a significant opportunity for American interests as well as stability in the region and deserve more analysis. Simon derides the agreements because the Emirates are disinclined to partner with Israel in a war with Iran. While this is accurate, the agreements, by fostering trade relations, seek to build a regional deterrence that might preclude a war with Iran. This oversight is consistent with Simon’s narrow perspective on regional complexities.

*President Donald J. Trump with the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Bahrain Dr. Abdullatif bin Rashid Al-Zayani, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Minister of Foreign Affairs for the United Arab Emirates Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan , on their way to sign the Abraham Accords at ceremonies on the South Lawn of the White House. (Tia Dufour/White Hose Photo)*

The book is more memoir than history, and its rigid structure–each of its eight chapters covers the decisions of a single administration–confines its diagnostic scope. Throughout, Grand Delusion focuses on events as they occurred without delving into the historical underpinnings that shaped the region's trajectory. This omission weakens the analysis by neglecting the historical grievances, conflicts, and power dynamics that continue to reverberate in the present.

The first portion of the book especially could use more context. The book’s sweep starts in 1979 and ends with the present-day decisions rendered by the Biden administration. However, an understanding of the American response to regional chaos at the end of the Carter administration must build on a foundation of historical understanding. While earlier presidents generally partnered with Iran, the dynamic shifted with Jimmy Carter. This shift in the region is due almost entirely to the Islamic Revolution and the stunning loss of the Shah–Henry Kissinger’s “king of kings” and champion of American interests in the Middle East.[7] Indeed, Kissinger's empowerment of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi–a policy that helped drive the Shah’s fall, the Iran-Iraq War, and the subsequent spiraling chaos–goes unexamined in the book.[8] While Simon's extensive experience within the U.S. State Department and the National Security Council grants him a unique perspective on the intricacies of U.S. policies and the resultant failures, that perspective was surely rooted in the critical decisions American administrations made about Iran before 1979.[9]

Indeed, the Carter administration itself–which presided over enormous consequential moments such as the Camp David Accords, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat’s Israeli visit, and the calamitous attempt to rescue American hostages in Tehran–comes in for a mere 17 of the books 422 pages.[10] Worse, Simon makes only passing reference to the 1953 U.S.-aided coup of Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh, an action with generational impacts on American policy in the region.[11] Indeed, the view of American motivation by not only Iranian hardliners but also many Arab leaders is based, at least in part, on the lingering legacy of the removal from power of Iran’s democratically-elected leader.[12]

No Solution: A Lack of Policy PrescriptionWhile Grand Delusion effectively highlights the failures and pitfalls of American ambition in the Middle East, it falls short in offering concrete policy prescriptions for moving forward. Critique, while valuable, is only part of the equation; a comprehensive analysis should also explore potential pathways for improved policy-making.

Grand Delusion compels readers to question prevailing assumptions about American motives in the Middle East. By exposing the gap between rhetoric and reality, the book urges us to critically examine the narratives presented by policymakers and media outlets. Simon's retrospective analysis carries valuable lessons for shaping future American foreign policy. However, this book provides no real roadmap for avoiding the pitfalls of unchecked ambition.

Simon’s critique is scathing. Deservedly so. But it is also limited. That’s unfortunate. At a time when Iran’s nuclear enrichment nears weapons-grade levels, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia looks to broker normalization agreements without American involvement, and violence on the West Bank and Gaza continues unabated, the stakes of American policy for the Middle East are too important for criticism without fulsome understanding or an alternative solution.

Joe Buccino served as the Communications Director for U.S. Central Command from April 2021 until July 2023. His book Burn the Village to Save It, about the 1968 Tet Offensive, is due out in the fall of 2024.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, U.S. President Jimmy Carter, and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin at the White House in 1978. (Diana Walker/Getty)

Notes: [1] Simon, Steven. Grand Delusion: The Rise and Fall of American Ambition in the Middle East. New York, NY: Penguin Press, 2023.

[2] U.S. Department of State. Accessed August 26, 2023. https://history.state.gov/milestones/1993-2000/oslo.

[3] Al Jazeera. What Is the Arab Spring, and How Did It Start? Arab Spring: 10 years on News | Al Jazeera, December 17, 2020. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/12/17/what-is-the-arab-spring-and-how-did-it-start.

[4] The Coalition Against ISIS. The Global Coalition Against Daesh, June 9, 2023. https://theglobalcoalition.org/en/.

[5] The Abraham Accords - United States Department of State. U.S. Department of State, January 13, 2021. https://www.state.gov/the-abraham-accords/.

[6] Daroff, William. Abraham Accords: A Diplomatic Success Story Worthy of US Support. The Jerusalem Post | JPost.com. Accessed August 26, 2023. https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-735717.

[7] Grandin, Greg. How One Man Laid the Groundwork for Today’s Crisis in the Middle East. The Nation, September 29, 2015. https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/how-one-man-laid-the-groundwork-for-todays-crisis-in-the-middle-east/.

[8] Indyk, Martin. Master of the game: Henry Kissinger and the Art of Middle East Diplomacy. New York, NY: Knopf, 2022, pages 121 – 179.

[9] IISS. Accessed August 26, 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20130812192055/http:/www.iiss.org/en/persons/steven-s-simon.

[10] U.S. Department of State. Accessed August 26, 2023. https://history.state.gov/milestones/1977-1980/camp-david; Hazaimeh, Hani. “When Sadat Went to Israel.” Arab News, October 6, 2021. https://www.arabnews.com/node/1659751; Bowden, Mark. Guests of the Ayatollah: The first battle in America’s war with militant Islam. New York: Grove Atlantic, 2018, 119 – 147.

[11] Wu, Lawrence, and Michelle Lanz. How the CIA Overthrew Iran’s Democracy in 4 Days. NPR, February 7, 2019. https://www.npr.org/2019/01/31/690363402/how-the-cia-overthrew-irans-democracy-in-four-days.

[12] Gambrell, Nasser Karimi and Jon, ToI Staff, Robert Philpot, Agencies and ToI Staff, Emanuel Fabian, Jacob Gurvis, Afp, et al. 70 Years Later, a CIA-Backed Coup Still Roils Iran-US Relations. The Times of Israel, August 25, 2023. https://www.timesofisrael.com/70-years-later-a-cia-backed-coup-still-roils-iran-us-relations/.

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Writing Wars: Authorship and American War Fiction, WW1 to Present. David F. Eisler. Iowa City, IA: University of Iowa Press, 2022.

 Buy on Amazon  In his new book, *Writing Wars: Authorship and American War Fiction, WW1 to Present*, David F. Eisler grapples with one of the most complex questions in war fiction studies: Who can and should write a war story? Throughout the 20th century, scholars have maintained that personal experience is essential to an authentic tale of combat and military service. As Samuel Hynes explains, soldiers’ perspectives supersede that of civilians for the simple fact that they were “there, in history.”[1] And while Paul Fussell suggests the “real war is unlikely to be found in novels,” he also maintains that literary representations should be left to the actual “participants.”[2] As leading critics in the field, Hynes and Fussell’s positions have influenced scholarly consensus on the matter of authorship within the genre. Only those who have worn the uniform earned the right—and trust among readers—to fictionalize their experiences.

In Writing Wars, however, Eisler—a veteran himself—views the authority of experience as an outdated premise with serious ethical shortcomings. Instead, he avers that both soldiers and civilians have the ethos to tell war stories, and society at large has a need to read them. While his argument is largely theoretical, tracing how the cultural capital of soldier-authors’ experiences changed over time, it hinges on a critical moment in American military history: the abolition of conscription in 1973. Without a military draft, the all-volunteer force led to a “growing abdication of responsibility” among civilians, thereby increasing the “separation between the military and American society,” which is known as the civil-military gap.[3] Whereas civilians bought war bonds or took factory jobs during earlier campaigns, they could now participate, if at all, to the extent they felt comfortable doing so. As a result, veteran-authors were left to grapple with the social and political implications of their nation’s wars. Through a series of cultural and close readings, Eisler outlines how veterans have responded to this dilemma, slowly relinquishing their cultural capital to let—even encourage—civilian-authors to tell their own war stories. This shift in authorship allows veterans “to share the experiential and interpretative burden of the conflicts with the disconnected population.”[4] Moreover, in addressing the vast ramifications of each war, civilian-authors also take responsibility in narrowing the civil-military gap that has adversely influenced society’s perception of soldiers and the military in recent years.

To this end, Eisler’s book posits a radical intervention among the current debates on the topic. Kate McLoughin and Jennifer Haytock, among others, suggest reading works by noncombatants such as nurses or engineers for a nuanced and diverse portrait of combat and military service. Eisler redefines the boundaries of the necessary experience for writing war stories altogether by accounting for civilians among this group of writers. His argument, then, opens the floodgates for waves of new critical analyses of war fiction old and new, which is a feat only trumped by the stakes of Writing Wars. In finding the historical justification to include civilian works, Eisler likewise finds a way to address the growing fissure between the military and society. Whereas the authority of experience once helped veterans find jobs and publishing opportunities, it has since become counterintuitive, marginalizing those on the other side of the conflict and insulating those with no service experience. Writing Wars shows how the “dispersion” of authority can potentially triage this issue and breathe new life into a genre that many scholars fear was growing stale and myopic.[5]

To realize his argument, Eisler applies pressure to combat gnosticism, a theory developed by Jeffrey Campbell to account for the specific military context of a veteran-author’s ethos. Combat gnosticism first gained traction during the early 20th century when critics assumed soldiers’ experiences translated to more authentic representations in fiction. With more wars came more war stories, and combat gnosticism snowballed into a hallmark that defined the genre.Writing Wars adopts this historical development for its structure and methodology.That is, Eisler dissects the credence attributed to veterans’ experiences through a cultural survey of 20th and 21st century politics, conflicts, and a miscellany of literature. Working chronologically, he deftly elucidates the rise of combat gnosticism in the fiction of World War I and World War II to its gradual destabilization during the Vietnam War years and finally its diminishing relevance in representations of the Global War on Terror. This approach serves Eisler’s culminating argument well, as it contextualizes later readings that examine how veteran and civilian authors have developed narrative techniques to address the civil-military gap. All of this makes for an organic and logical presentation, allowing readers to delve into the nuanced histories and literary analyses laced throughout the book.

 Buy on Amazon  The first half of *Writing Wars* historicizes soldier-authors’ monopolization of war fiction in the 20th century. In the first chapter, Eisler traces the origins of combat gnosticism back to representations of World War I. When several inaccuracies called the integrity of John Dos Passos’ *Three Soldiers* (1921) into question, veterans were hired to determine the integrity of his novel, which they reviewed favorably on the grounds that he—in some capacity—served in the war. This decision adversely impacted the reception of civilian-authored war stories, which were previously well received by critics and readers, and enshrined combat gnosticism as the paramount qualification in the burgeoning genre. Eisler explores how this preference evolved during World War II in his second chapter. During the mid-century period, creative writing programs touted personal experience as the single most important factor in crafting a story. For thousands of veterans enrolling in such programs on the GI Bill, their military service gave them the ethos necessary to tell war stories. Eventually, their academic networks led to job opportunities in publishing houses and colleges across the country, where they could further act as gatekeepers of war fiction against civilian-authors. In his third chapter, Eisler analyzes how Vietnam veterans consolidated their personal experiences over other forms of knowledge. Through close readings of literature, interviews, and conference proceedings, Eisler explains how soldiers developed formal innovations such as a “rhetoric of trauma” to push back against sordid anti-war narratives and instead help readers get as close as possible to the truth of the war.[6] As a result, “personal experience was no longer the primary source of narrative authority, it was the *only* source.”[7]

The midpoint of Writing Wars marks a shift in argumentation. Whereas previous and subsequent chapters deftly analyze the implications of authorship within the genre, Chapter 4 is the book’s fulcrum, explicating why there was a theoretical shift away from the preference for veteran-authored fiction following the Vietnam War. The abolition of the draft was likewise the abolition of combat gnosticism. While it seems the turn to an all-volunteer force would only strengthen soldiers’ grip on the genre, Eisler contests that it had the opposite effect. Veteran-authors were now compelled to “share the experiential burden of their memory with the rest of society.”[8] This dispersion of authority served as a counterbalance to the consequences of the all-volunteer force; it invited civilian-authors to grapple with the physical, emotional, and mental hardships of wars from which they were now safeguarded. Additionally, at this point in history, the numerous cultural representations of 20th century wars formed an epistemological archive that imbued civilian-authors with what Eisler describes as the “extratextual sources of authenticity” necessary to pen war stories.[9]

 Buy on Amazon  With the theoretical shifts in the authorship of war fiction outlined, Eisler turns his focus in the books’ final chapters to analyzing post-Vietnam literature. In Chapter 5, he explains how civilian-authors relied on their own experiences to tell stories about soldiers’ homecomings. Their representations of characters struggling to reacclimate posed a necessary critique of the nation’s superficial bloviating and thank-you-for-your-service culture. Eisler’s sixth chapter examines how the formal techniques developed by veteran-authors expressed a “more complex ethics of literary representation.”[10] In an effort to include previously overlooked identities, they remediated the “Other”—the marginalized non-U.S. character defined by malevolency or an uncivilized demeanor. Resisting such tropes, veterans illustrated more humanizing portraits, which encouraged readers to think about the consequences of U.S. military interventions and sympathize with those from nations affected by such campaigns. As Eisler argues in the seventh chapter, though, there are consequences to the dispersion of authority. Novels such as Jon Chopan’s *Veterans Crisis Hotline* depict characters whose only option in life was military service that left them physically and emotionally scarred. These depictions undermine public confidence in its military, framing the armed forces as a social wastebasket that exploits the bodies and minds of outcasts and criminals.

While veteran-authored works such as Roy Scranton’s War Porn posit countervailing narratives, illustrating how civilians’ overzealous contempt of modern wars wears on returning soldiers, Eisler argues more needs to be done. If the genre is to thrive, it must evolve beyond the “metonymic archetypes” of trauma narratives to forward more complex portraits of military personnel and civilians on all sides of a conflict.[11] As messy as it might sound, that approach is the pathway to an authentic representation, a concept that may further ameliorate the current fissure in the civil-military gap.

  As successful and thrilling as Eisler’s book is in reaching this culminating reflection on the state of the genre, it falters in a few areas of its execution. At the local level, the literature reviews that preface each chapter—particularly the latter entries—bog down and stall what are otherwise engaging discussions. On a larger scale, *Writing Wars* struggles to find a balanced narrative through-line. The first three chapters focus on the cultural and historical circumstances that engendered veteran-authors’ monopoly on the genre while drawing measured attention to the primary sources. The last three chapters reverse this dynamic, emphasizing the war literature following Vietnam. As a result, readers make a jarring pivot during the fourth and middle chapter, jumping from the historically based arguments of the first half to the more formal series of close readings in the second. The shifting methodology, at times, creates a sense of unevenness in the reading experience.

These minor flaws, however, do not overshadow the redeeming qualities and overall success of Writing Wars. For one, Eisler avoids retreading familiar ground in his close readings. While the quintessential veteran-authors—names that include Hemingway, Mailer, Jones, and O’Brien—occupy some room, they are not the focus. Rather, Eisler opts for lesser known texts, which makes for a refreshing discussion. What is more, he gracefully synthesizes his materials. Typical in works of scholarship on war fiction, historical miscellany is often used to prop up close readings. In Writing Wars, however, Eisler manages these materials in tandem with the literature, riffing them off of each other. In slowly tracing this dichotomy over the course of the book—from its historically focused first half to his literary centric second half—he illuminates a critical terrain that scholars working along similar lines have gestured toward but never exclusively tackled: War fiction and society are so deeply interwoven at this point in time that they must be discussed in proximity to each other to excavate the varying political critiques underscoring each work.

And perhaps the most remarkable attribute is the book’s readability. As dense as some of the arguments can be, Eisler’s prose remains lucid and precise. Not only does his firm grasp on the written language help him cogently unpack complex theories and ideas, but it also distills the stakes of this argument with sobering clarity: war fiction can play a critical role in closing the civil-military gap that skews society’s perception of the armed forces and their service members’ individual experiences.

Simply put, Writing Wars is necessary reading for scholars and writers working at the intersections of literary, military, and American studies. The interdisciplinary nature of the book also makes it well suited for a variety of classes. In addition to American Literature and History courses, select chapters on higher education’s influence on the genre and the ethics of authorship would make for insightful reading in creative writing classes that consider the history of writing programs or how identity politics figures into the ethos of storytelling. This potential widespread readership of Writing Wars is timely. With the ongoing military conflict in Ukraine and the reverberating effects of the U.S. campaigns in the Middle East, there is a need for a new wave of war fiction and, perhaps more importantly, a diverse collection of voices to tell such stories. Eisler’s book emphasizes the critical importance of this need and illuminates how those diverse voices can effectively address it.

Jared Young is an instructor in the English Department at SUNY Orange. He received his PhD from Oklahoma State University. His interests include 20th century war fiction, disability studies, and modernism. His works has appeared or is forthcoming in the Journal of Literary and Cultural Disability Studies, H-War, and The Mailer Review.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: The only photo taken during World War II of J.D. Salinger. (Denise Fitzgerald/PBS)

Notes: [1] Samuel Hynes, The Soldiers’ Tale: Bearing Witness to Modern War (New York, NY: Penguin Books, 1997), 2.

[2] Paul Fussell, Wartime: Understanding the Behavior in the Second World War (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1989), 270, 291.

[3] David F. Eisler, Writing Wars: Authorship and American War Fiction, WWI to Present (Iowa City, IA: University of Iowa Press, 2022), 6, 4.

[4] Eisler, Writing Wars, 16.

[5] Eisler, Writing Wars, 5.

[6] Eisler, Writing Wars, 81.

[7] Eisler, Writing Wars, 67.

[8] Eisler, Writing Wars, 85.

[9] Eisler, Writing Wars, 88.

[10] Eisler, Writing Wars, 142.

[11] Eisler, Writing Wars, 185.

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Ten years ago, a disparate group of field-grade military officers toiled away at their keyboards. The world of national security blog posting was nascent, and several of them were working on individual projects, attempting to make sense of the world they found themselves in, seeking to share thoughts and ideas that would help shape the future. Through sheer happenstance of timing and a little bit of luck, they found each other and realized they could accomplish much more together than any one of them could on their own. So was born The Strategy Bridge.

They envisioned it as a marketplace of ideas where practitioners, theorists, and students could collaborate in a new virtual space to develop themselves and one another, challenge each other’s assumptions, and share a professional discourse that had the potential to influence policymakers in the United States and the world. It would be a place where thoughts could bridge the gap between the current and the ideal.

It began on October 25, 2013, with the publication of an article from one of our founders, Nathan K. Finney, entitled ”Bridging Divides: Thoughts on a Startup Conference.” Another founder, Rich Ganske, followed closely behind with his thoughts on ”Building Better Generals,” to which Don Vandergriff responded with an ”Addendum to ‘On Building Better Generals.’” Next, Chris Zeitz gave the community a look at “Network Theory Vs. Networks in Theory,” and Rich Ganske then returned with thoughts on the importance of revolutions in military affairs. With the publication of these five articles, the foundation was laid for The Strategy Bridge to become what it is today: an organization focused on the development of people in strategy, national security, and military affairs.

Ten years later, The Strategy Bridge has grown from a few like-minded individuals to a global community comprising tens of thousands of readers, writers, thinkers, and decision-makers.

Thanks to the tools of modern mass communication, The Strategy Bridge has built an audience of more than 360 thousand unique annual visitors from 99 countries, with over 32,000 Twitter followers, nearly 10,000 Facebook fans, and more than 4,500 followers on LinkedIn. This marketplace of ideas boasts 1,787 unique journal articles (including nearly 450 national security-related book, movie, and even video game reviews) by more than 630 authors. The organization has hosted hundreds of new model mentoring gatherings in locations as diverse as Washington D.C., Boston, MA; Carlisle, PA; Leavenworth, KS; and even Canberra, New South Wales. Thanks to the talents of our podcast host and producer, we’ve published nearly 50 episodes to date on topics ranging from strategic education to the politics of the space race.

For the last seven of those ten years, The Strategy Bridge has hosted an annual student writing contest, publishing scores of student essays, sharing their ideas, and awarding thousands of dollars in prize money to participants, while simultaneously developing the writing abilities of hundreds more.

The Strategy Bridge Is, Was, and Will remain Free Importantly, this repository of ideas and exposure to discussions with leaders and experts all came at no cost to our audience and community. Since its inception, The Strategy Bridge has remained free. Free of paywall access controls. Free of advertising. Free. Thanks to a dedicated group of volunteers made up of editors, featured contributors, producers, event hosts, marketers, and generous donors, access to ten years of content has remained available to the entire community without any strings.

It is with sincere gratitude that The Strategy Bridge team offers thanks to our entire community. To those who have contributed to our archive, to those who have participated in our events, and to those who have given of their time and their skills to further our endeavor we say, “Thank you for ten wonderful years!” We hope that as members of this community, each of you has gained by the experience some small fraction of the benefit you have bestowed upon us by your participation.

THank you to Every Member of the Bridge Community

The Strategy Bridge is a Non-Profit 501(C)(3) organization, dedicated to the development of people in Strategy, National Security, and Military Affairs. Click here to learn more about The Strategy Bridge.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

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The Big Picture: The Cold War on the Small Screen. John W. Lemza. Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2021.

 Buy on Amazon  The subject of John W. Lemza’s scholarly study *The Big Picture: The Cold War on the Small Screen* is a U.S. Army-produced documentary television series called *The Big Picture* that ran from 1951-1971 on network, local, and educational stations, as well as on the Armed Forces Network of overseas stations. The intent of the television series was to allow the Army to “tell its story” to the American public by offering weekly half-hour vignettes of Army battles, operations, culture, and weaponry, as well as portraits of memorable units and soldiers.[1] Lemza’s studyis relevant to our own era in which a gaping civil-military divide separates the American public from the military, and in which the military largely fails to communicate a compelling appreciation of its goals, virtues, and activities. Lemza recovers a historical chapter in which the Army much more successfully married its messages with the possibilities of television technology, the entertainment realm, and the tastes of emerging mass-viewing audiences. The account of how it did so, and why the endeavor eventually collapsed, is full of intriguing insights and historical details.

Billed by the Army as “an official television report to the nation from the United States Army,” The Big Picture series is now largely forgotten, or remembered primarily for its portentously strident tone that relentlessly affirms the value and valor of the Army.[2] But the show was popular in its time and was long-lasting: over its 20-year run, the Army produced 823 episodes, first broadcast on network television and later syndicated to 426 local commercial, educational, and cable television stations, as well as 51 stations on the Armed Forces Network.

Series episodes combined war footage primarily shot by the Army Signal Corps or images commissioned by the Army Pictorial Center (APC) to serve a particular episode’s needs. In some cases, created scenes were shot in the studios of the Army Pictorial Center. Most episodes were introduced by on-screen hosts, either Army officers and non-commissioned officers in uniform or civilian journalists, to include luminaries such as Walter Cronkite, Edward B. Murrow, and Ronald Reagan. Stirring martial music and stock footage of parades and waving flags highlighted the grandeur and patriotic valence of each episode’s subject. Many episodes, however, also contained graphic combat footage drawn from World War II, Korean War, and Vietnam War archives.

Lemza excels in establishing the 1950s cultural context that engendered The Big Picture series and allowed it to flourish. Especially important was the rise of the television industry as an entertainment medium, the popularity of which was immediately evident. By 1955, for example, 65% of American homes had television sets. Lemza describes how the Army adroitly partnered with the television industry—primarily the big national networks based in New York—to leverage the power of television to influence (while entertaining) viewers. Importantly, Lemza notes that the series was just one of a number of shows in the early 1950s produced by the military in conjunction with the television industry to meet audience appetites. The Army’s series ran alongside similar efforts by the Air Force, the Navy, and the Marine Corps, as well as other productions by the Army.

The branches’ respective efforts to publicize their virtues on network television were more competitive than cooperative, however, because the stakes were high. The Army, for example, worried the other branches were better positioned to curry favor with Washington politicians for funding dollars and with the American public to boost recruitment. As a consequence, The Big Picture episodes frequently promoted the Army’s continuing relevance in an age of high-tech Cold War conflict with Russia. Lemza reports that the shows sponsored by other military branches lasted just a few years at most, so while the Army was not successful in winning every battle for dollars in Washington or recruits among the American populace, it can be said to have won the television war. While not uncritical of some aspects of the show’s production, Lemza asks us to appreciate the overall craftsmanship and savvy of the show’s creators that allowed the series to survive for twenty years while other military-informational shows perished.

Lemza appears to have watched all 823 episodes of the series and helpfully categorizes episodes into three groups. The largest number of episodes are those Lemza deems “historical” and “informational, instructional, and educational.”[3] A second group of episodes asserts the Army’s importance in ensuring America’s safety in Cold War competition with the Soviet Union and its proxy states. But Lemza’s chief interest is in his third category of episodes: those that extoll an exceptionalist vision of American superiority that is both defended by and reflected in the Army.[4] An example of a The Big Picture episode that ties military endeavor with the American way-of-life is “The Right to Bear and Keep Arms.” The episode describes weapon ownership and proficiency as an integral part of American history and identity and salutes the close relationship of the Army and the National Rifle Association. Though many episodes were much more anodyne—for example, those that described the Army’s commitment to community engagement and aiding disaster relief—episodes such as “The Right to Bear and Keep Arms,” as well as others that describe the important role played by chaplains in the military, opened up the series to criticism. The charge, mounted with increasing fervor as the Vietnam War and the cultural battles of the 1960s unfolded, was that the series went beyond objective telling of the Army story to partisan political advocacy and a slanted portrayal of what constitutes essential American characteristics. While acceptable in the 1950s, unquestioning connection of Army endeavor with ideological and political stances became increasingly problematic in the late 1960s and contributed to The Big Picture’s demise.

Lemza also usefully tracks the show’s effort to document the Army’s embrace of social change over the years. Unfortunately, the effort was, in his estimation, spotty. Several episodes highlighted the numbers and roles played by women in the Army, but Lemza asserts the portraits were often patronizing and condescending. African-Americans are featured coincidentally in group shots of soldiers marching and fighting throughout the show’s run, but no episodes were dedicated specifically to highlighting Army opportunities for Black Americans. Unflattering race-related events, such as riots by Black soldiers in Germany in 1955 and 1970, were definitely not addressed by The Big Picture episodes. Even more curious to Lemza is the failure of the series to sing the praises of Japanese-American units such as the 442nd Infantry Regiment and the 100th Infantry Battalion that fought valiantly in World War II, even as the series routinely dedicated many other episodes to heroic exploits by other soldiers and units.

So why did the series end in 1971, even, as Lemza reports, it was being aired on more stations than ever before in its run? Though the show was still widely syndicated, it was not being broadcast in big urban markets and even on the small markets where it still appeared it often was scheduled in non-prime time slots. An early sign that the America viewing public was not completely enthralled with the Army’s overly-serious regard for its own greatness was present even in the early years. In the 1950s, for example, more contrarian–even subversive–portraits of military life were rendered by popular TV comedies such as The Phil Silvers Show, a precursor to later military sit-coms such as Hogan’s Heroes; Gomer Pyle, USMC; and eventually (after The Big Picture’s demise) MASH. Lemza also notes that the popularity of “serious” war literature such as Catch-22 and Slaughterhouse-Five* pointed to a public appetite for representations of war and the military that were not so high-minded and obviously partial.

 Buy on Amazon  This growing sentiment fed into the biggest reason for the end of the series’ run: its failure to adjust to growing public disillusionment and cynicism about the military precipitated by the Vietnam War and the draft. The events leading to the final downfall came in the late 1960s, when liberal Washington politicians such as Senator William Fulbright charged the series with political advocacy in support of the Vietnam War and wondered at the dedication of resources to its production.

Lemza touches lightly on liberal vs. conservative political debate, but concurs that by 1971 the series had run its course. He quotes an announcement in the military’s own Stars and Stripes newspaper that suggests the Army felt the same: “There are several reasons for canceling the half-hour show. One is the fact that the Army wanted for some time to come up with something that, it feels, is more relevant to the problems of the service today.”[5] Reflecting on the Stars and Stripes pronouncement, it is interesting that the Army has struggled in the decades since 1971 marketing itself to the American public through collaboration with the entertainment industry and by leveraging media and informational possibilities.

While the Army has occasionally mounted successful recruiting campaigns—the “Be All You Can Be” campaign from the 1980s arguably being the most distinguished—the record of its public relations apparatus over the years cannot be judged as anything but feeble. Thinking especially about the post-9/11 wars, much has been made of the civil-military divide that separated the American people from understanding the nature of military endeavor in Iraq and Afghanistan and the human face of the soldiers, marines, airmen, and sailors who served in those wars. The effort to bridge the divide has consisted largely of novels and memoirs from fighting men and women themselves, reporting by interested journalists, and Hollywood movies of varying fidelity and sympathy. That the military as an institution has not tried harder to manage the impression it makes on the American people is notable.

Lemza is not shy about calling The Big Picture series propaganda, and episodes watched today can feel very one-sided, dated, and square.[6] However, the comment sections on YouTube videos of episodes are full of praise from other viewers who find the series on-point and even inspirational—documentary evidence of an Army that is perceived as once strong and an America that is viewed as once great. The fissure points to the division in outlooks characteristic of America today on virtually every subject and in every realm. The social congruence that united the military, the populace, and the entertainment media in the 1950s is long gone, and new endeavors that draw on The Big Picture’s virtues and capitalize on the lessons learned from its shortcomings seem not to have even been attempted. Lemza’s study invites wonder what a show that tells the Army's story in a way that pleases all factions of American viewing audiences might look like today.

Peter Molin is an Assistant Teaching Professor and Director of Collège Writing and Research at Rutgers University.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: American Forces Network, Incirlik AB, Turkey 2023 (Airman 1st Class Kevin Dunkleberger). The appearance of U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) visual information does not imply or constitute DoD endorsement.

Notes: [1] John W. Lemza, The Big Picture: The Cold War on the Small Screen (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2012), 12.

[2] “Exercise Arctic Night: The Big Picture.” Nuclear Vault, YouTube.

[3] Lemza, The Big Picture: The Cold War on the Small Screen, 150, 156.

[4] Lemza, The Big Picture: The Cold War on the Small Screen, 124.

[5] “Army Famed Series Signs Off. ‘The Big Picture’ Fades from TV Screen,” Stars and Stripes (Pacific Edition), 15 July 1971, 3. Quoted in Lemza, The Big Picture: The Cold War on the Small Screen, 189.

[6] Lemza, The Big Picture: The Cold War on the Small Screen, 72.

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To Boldly Go: Leadership, Strategy, and Conflict in the 21st Century and Beyond. Jonathan Klug and Steven Leonard, Eds. Haverton, PA: Casemate, 2021.

 Buy on Amazon  The best science fiction is about exploring big ideas. It offers a creative vehicle for stimulating an imaginative journey into future scenarios, engaging in an earnest examination of potential technologies and their impact on society, and illuminating the human element in conflict. *To Boldly Go: Leadership, Strategy, and Conflict in the 21st Century and Beyond*, leans into this tradition by bringing diverse authors together to mine mostly well-known science fiction literature as a springboard for deeper discussions about strategy, leadership, and conflict.

Jonathan Klug, a professor at the U.S. Army War College, and Steven Leonard, a faculty member at the University of Kansas and senior fellow at the Modern War Institute at West Point, build on a trend in which pop culture offers accessible lessons for national security leaders, strategists, and organizations. Recent examples include Winning Westeros: How Game of Thrones Explains Modern Military Conflicts (2019) and Strategy Strikes Back: How Star Wars Explains Modern Military Conflict(2018). What immediately separates To Boldly Go, however, is the expansive note it strikes. Drawing on a universe of science fiction franchises including The Expanse, Star Wars, Star Trek, Ender’s Game, Starship Troopers, Dune, Earthseed, The Murderbot Diaries, and many more, a wonderful array of authors, who are strategic thinkers in their own right, offer fresh perspectives in 35 chapters that span six major themes: leadership and command; military strategy and decision making; ethics, culture, and diversity; cooperation, competition, and conflict; the human relationship with technology; and toxic leaders.

       From the very first page, it is evident that Klug and Leonard set out to explore the nexus of strategy and science fiction with enthusiasm. A foreword by Major General Mick Ryan, whose book *War Transformed*examines 21st century conflict, sets the stage by noting how science fiction offers many insights for contemporary military organizations and for preparing future military leaders.[1] Indeed, many military leaders and national security strategists have recommended reading science fiction as an exercise in creative and intelligent thinking about the future. Among the proponents of reading science fiction is Admiral James Stavridis (USN, ret) who once recalled that among the most treasured books in his library was Frank Herbert’s *Dune.*

Indeed, military and national security professionals have increasingly sought to incorporate science fiction into strategic planning and thinking.[2] In 2013, the Atlantic Council commissioned a project to examine the future of conflict through the use of science fiction which resulted in a unique anthology of short stories. The U.S. Marine Corps has published a series of graphic novels with Marine authors that also creatively explores the character of future warfare. Similarly, the U.S. Army has experimented with its own graphic novel, Invisible Force: Information Warfare and the Future of Conflict.[3]It is also no surprise that Ender’s Game is often a feature of Marine Corps reading lists. The Chief of the Australian Army reading list, the Canadian Defense Force, and the French Defense Innovation agency have also sought to leverage science fiction to think creatively about strategy, warfighting, and technological disruption. Perhaps better known in military sci-fi are Stavridis and Elliot Ackerman’s 2034: A Novel of the Next World War and August Cole and Peter Singer’s Ghost Fleet, which attempt to extrapolate future scenarios based on emerging technologies such as autonomous drones, warships, and quantum computing.

It is easy to forget, however, that the potency of science fiction, and perhaps the sub-genre of military science fiction, as a way to imagine or forecast about the character of future conflict is built on an older tradition. During the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, the world was shocked by the rapid and unanticipated German victories against the French. This perpetuated a sense of alarm throughout Europe, particularly in the United Kingdom, and fueled a conversation around future naval battles, the importance of railway systems for transporting soldiers, the revolutionary effect of the electric telegraph, new rifles, and new artillery.[4] Into that revolution in military affairs, The Battle of Dorking: Reminiscences of a Volunteer written by General Sir George Tomkyns Chesney, was published in May 1871. Chesney wrote about a fictional invasion, defeat, and humiliation of England by Germany, and fed a national desire to understand the shape of wars to come. As illuminated by I.F. Clarke in The Tale of the Next Great War, 1871-1914 (1995), an anthology of short stories written during those consequential decades in the run-up to World War I, Chesney’s The Battle of Dorking was the beginning of a flood of future war stories, with all of their forecasts and expectations preserved with an amber-like quality, that whirled right up through the summer of 1914.[5]

In 2023, science fiction remains a useful mechanism for strategists striving to discern trends and anticipate potential futures, convey new ideas, or generate fresh perspectives about the fundamental nature and the evolving character of war and leadership. In that sense, To Boldly Go makes excellent use of its alchemic approach of merging contemporary strategic thinkers with their favorite works of science fiction. While every reader will no doubt find value and favorites among them, a few stand out.

Rebecca Jensen’s essay, “Calm Men Who Deal Death Wholesale,” is a poignant reflection on trauma.[6] Drawing on Lois McMaster Bujold’s Shards of Honor, Jensen explores the concept of moral injury, the idea that war inflicts more than physical and mental injury on its participants. It is a particularly impactful essay after over a decade of U.S. military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Similarly resonant is M. L. Cavanaugh’s “Blood Lessons,” which reflects on the importance of learning from losing battles against superior adversaries.[7] Cavanaugh deploys a Clausewitzian lens to view the range of battlefield-learning, as illustrated by the sci-fi movies and TV series, Battle: Los Angeles, Edge of Tomorrow, and Falling Skies, as a reminder to readers that winning wars is often about learning better and faster than an adversary, even while losing battles. It is a dynamic being witnessed in real-time as Russia continues to prosecute its war against Ukraine, and it is imperative that U.S. military leaders and national security professionals capture, understand, and engage with it in real-time.

 Buy on Amazon  Of course, one might expect a fair amount of attention and emphasis on the potential of emerging technologies such as AI, quantum computing, biotechnology, etc., to change the character of warfare, with resultant impacts on leadership and strategy. And while *To Boldly Go* certainly folds ample discussion of technology into its various chapters, it also provides a balanced take as exemplified by retired Army Special Forces Colonel Liam Collins who strikes a valuable note of caution against the glorification of technology and the overemphasis on hardware in war at the expense of the human element.[8] It is a theme readily observed in *Star Wars*, *Dune,* and *Starship Troopers*, and it is particularly pertinent in a moment when extraordinary excitement, fear, and uncertainty over the potential of artificial intelligence systems abound. Chapters by Theresa Hitchens and Erica Iverson also capture the promise and peril of technological futures by exploring the risks of human expansion into outer space from different, though complementary angles. Hitchens highlights the parallels and risks associated with commercially driven expansion into space, as depicted in *The Expanse**,* while Iverson invokes *Star Trek* and *The Forever War*, among others, to comment on the character of space warfare.[9]

Finally, Kathleen J. McInnis’ “Sun Tzu, Ender, and the Old Man”is an important cautionary tale about the risks involved when filtering the world through rose-tinted socio-cultural and political lenses.[10] This form of strategic hubris is the enemy of strategic empathy, the ability to put oneself in the mind of one’s adversaries and allies, which McInnis notes is an area in which the United States appears to be lacking. Intriguingly for military strategists, McInnis points out that the United States tends to overlook really listening to allies and partners, and often de-prioritizes institutions of international diplomacy while empowering the military, even though political discussion is the heart of democracy.[11]

It is McInnis’ essay that might also serve as a bridge to critique this anthology. While To Boldly Go draws on a healthy mix of science fiction work and worlds from genre behemoths like Star Wars and Star Trek, and the lesser well-known (but no less beloved) universes of Earthseed, the Murderbot Diaries, and Old Man’s War, among many others, the range of science fictions stories mined for their insights are predominantly of Western perspective and flavor. The essayists too, largely hail from either the United States, the United Kingdom, or Australia. For a project that leverages science fiction to think more creatively about military operations, organization, leadership, and strategy, it would have enriched the discussion to have drawn on science fiction works from a broader, perhaps global, perspective.

Dr. Will Roper, a former Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics once said, “We either become sci-fi or become history.”[12] Science fiction is one tool among many for strategists and national security professionals to explore potential futures, ignite creativity, and prompt important questions. It is also about becoming comfortable thinking about futures that will most certainly usher in dramatic technological and societal change. To better prepare for this coming challenge, To Boldly Go is both an engaging and entertaining exploration of strategy, leadership, and conflict through the medium of science fiction. It encourages its readers to discard staid conventions, ossified assumptions, and embrace a creative approach to strategic thinking. While not every essay will necessarily appeal to every reader, there are insights and lessons in equal measure for the novice and expert alike. To Boldly Go is an accessible, creative on-ramp, an effective bridge for deeper considerations of strategy and war in the 21st century.

Brett Swaney is an Assistant Research Fellow at the Institute for National Strategic Studies at the National Defense University. The opinions expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the National Defense University, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Space Shuttle Orbits Above Earth, 2021 (NASA).

Notes: [1] Jonathan Klug and Steven Leonard, eds., To Boldly Go: Leadership, Strategy, and Conflict in the 21st Century and Beyond (Havertown, PA: Casemate Publishers, 2021), vii.

[2] Andrew Liptak, The U.S. Military Is Turning to Science Fiction to Shape the Future of War, Medium, July 29, 2020, available at https://onezero.medium.com/the-u-s-military-is-turning-to-science-fiction-to-shape-the-future-of-war-1b40d11eb6b4

[3] Hannah Graf, ‘Invisible Force’ Graphic Novel Shows the Possible Future of Cyber Warfare, ArmyTimes, July 14, 2020, available at https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2020/07/14/invisible-force-graphic-novel-shows-the-possible-future-of-cyber-warfare/

[4] I.F. Clarke, ed., The Tale of the Next Great War, 1871-1914: Fictions of Future Warfare and Battles Still-to-Come, (Syracuse University Press, 1995), 13

[5] I.F. Clarke, ed., The Tale of the Next Great War, 1871-1914: Fictions of Future Warfare and Battles Still-to-Come, (Syracuse University Press, 1995), 15.

[6] Rebecca Jensen, “Calm Men Who Deal Death Wholesale,” in To Boldly Go, eds. Jonathan Klug and Steven Leonard (Havertown, PA: Casemate Publishers, 2021), 190.

[7] M.L. Cavanaugh, “Blood Lessons,” in To Boldly Go, eds. Jonathan Klug and Steven Leonard (Havertown, PA: Casemate Publishers, 2021), 174.

[8] Liam Collins, “Man > Machine,” in To Boldly Go, ed. Jonathan Klug and Steven Leonard (Havertown, PA: Casemate Publishers, 2021), 223.

[9] Theresa Hitchens, “The Flag Follows Trade,” in To Boldly Go, eds. Jonathan Klug and Steven Leonard (Havertown, PA: Casemate Publishers, 2021), 128, and Erica Iverson, “The Final Frontier,” in To Boldly Go, Eds. Jonathan Klug and Steven Leonard (Havertown, PA: Casemate Publishers, 2021), 166.

[10] Kathleen J. McInnis, “Sun Tzu, Ender, and the Old Man,” in To Boldly Go, eds. Jonathan Klug and Steven Leonard (Havertown, PA: Casemate Publishers, 2021), 92.

[11] Kathleen J. McInnis, “Sun Tzu, Ender, and the Old Man,” in To Boldly Go, eds. Jonathan Klug and Steven Leonard (Havertown, PA: Casemate Publishers, 2021), 97.

[12] Rebecca Kheel, “Air Force uses AI on Military flight for first time,” The Hill, 12/16/2020, available at https://thehill.com/policy/defense/530455-air-force-uses-ai-on-military-flight-for-first-time/

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The Peacemaker: Ronald Reagan, the Cold War, and the World on the Brink. William Inboden. New York, NY: Dutton, 2022.

William Inboden’s recent book The Peacemaker: Ronald Reagan, the Cold War, and the World on the Brink takes up the banner of attributing the end of the Cold War to the foreign policy acumen and foresight of Ronald Reagan. Indeed, it suggests Reagan possessed a remarkable perspicacity that allowed him to perceive the world's historic changes on the horizon well before others did, and that this, plus his innate optimism, helped him lead the United States toward a better future. This is an argument that invites scrutiny, of course. The book also offers readers a deeply researched, detailed, and comprehensive account of foreign policy making within the Reagan administration, and this is where it makes its most useful contribution to our understanding of this period. Before delving into a more critical assessment, however, a holistic overview of the book is in order.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Peacemaker* proceeds chronologically, beginning a couple of years before the 1980 election campaign and ending with Ronald Reagan’s last day in office. Inboden breaks each chapter up into many short sections, allowing him to weave together multiple stories and to chronicle all of the events, challenges, and conflicts that emerged simultaneously at every given moment of the Reagan presidency. For example, chapter 6, which covers the first part of 1983, moves breathlessly from the issuance of National Security Decision Directive (NSDD) 75, to a speech Reagan made to the National Religious Broadcasters, to diplomacy with Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone, to talks with the Soviets, and then moves on to discussions about the Strategic Defense Initiative, defense exercises in the Kurils, meetings with Afghan rebels, challenges in Suriname, South Africa, and Beirut, and more. Throughout these sections, Inboden does not shy away from covering the conflicts that divided Reagan’s advisors, whether they were petty interpersonal or interagency clashes or more serious philosophical and strategic disagreements. This was a purposeful stylistic approach on Inboden’s part, one that imparts a visceral sense of “the chaos of policymaking as it felt to Reagan and his team,” with the constant churn and crush of events meaning that “no issue could be considered on its own, no decision deferred in the fullness of time, because the world does not wait on the White House Situation Room calendar.”[1] It also makes clear how much personality and contingency can shape policy. While this messy reality is true for any presidential administration, it is an aspect that other narrative approaches might have masked. Embedding this sense of chaos within the structure of the book is very effective at illuminating the challenges of executive leadership and foreign policy decision making.

Inboden’s granularity does not come at the expense of a bigger picture analysis or thematic thread. Despite the wide range of events, large and small, that Inboden surveys in each chapter, he still fleshes out the core themes that he outlines in his introduction: the fundamental importance of alliances and personal relationships to Reagan’s foreign policy strategy, the role of historical memory in shaping Reagan’s sense of personal and national mission, the paradoxical relationship between force and diplomacy in his “peace through strength” concept, and the set of beliefs about religious faith, freedom, ideology, and tragedy that undergirded his reading of the Cold War conflict and the possibilities for a post-Cold War world.[2] He is especially effective at integrating a discussion of the significant and still understudied role that religion and religious belief played in shaping U.S. foreign relations.

Despite its intellectual and literal heft (it comes in at nearly 600 pages with notes), the book reads quickly due to Inboden’s compelling writing style. A section on the 1985 hijacking of the ship the Achille Lauro is a great example. Even a well-known event in Inboden’s retelling reads like a suspenseful thriller. He moves through the key events—the hijacking, the murder of ship passenger Leon Klinghoffer, the docking of the ship in Egypt, the coordinated escape of the hijackers on EgyptAir 737, the U.S. F-14 Tomcats intercepting the flight and forcing it to land in Italy, and then the U.S. Navy Seals and hundreds of Italian soldiers surrounding the plane on the tarmac—interspersing these action-packed moments with details about the negotiations, discussions, and decisions happening simultaneously within the Reagan White House. He then neatly links the resolution of the incident with one of his core themes. Because the plane had landed in Italy, the Italian government prosecuted the hijackers. Although three of the men were sentenced to lengthy prison terms, Yasser Arafat, Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization, successfully pressured Italian Prime Minister Bettino Craxi to set the mastermind of the operation free. Inboden notes that this outcome left Reagan “angry for a few days,” yet the president forgave Craxi quickly because he “did not want to risk a rift with a friend on the eve of” the planned summit with the Soviet Union in Geneva.[3] Per Inboden’s argument, alliances and personal relations were paramount to Reagan.

Indeed, there are numerous moments in each chapter where Inboden’s identified themes shine through. This lends considerable coherence despite the “fog of war” narrative approach and on the whole these themes are analytically useful and compelling.

Yet the essential characterization of Reagan that Inboden seeks to present through the book is one that will inspire much debate among historians. Throughout The Peacemaker, Inboden implies that Reagan had a strategy from the outset of his presidency “to win the Cold War without firing a shot” by “extend[ing] one hand in friendship to the Soviet Union while using the other hand to try to bring it down.”[4] Although Inboden does note that the administration did not define a comprehensive grand strategy at the start of Reagan’s first term, he suggests throughout that Reagan had an almost instinctual grand strategy, one that he pursued with dogged focus until he succeeded in triumphing over the Soviet adversary. In one chapter, Inboden argues that while in 1982 “most elite opinion saw the Soviet Union as stable and resilient,” Reagan had a (gut-based) insight that Soviet military spending was unsustainable.[5] Reagan formalized his instincts and ideology through NSDD-32—a policy document that laid out a strategy of “pressuring the Soviet system on every front…not only to exploit its weaknesses, but to produce a reformist leader.”[6] Inboden contends that Reagan then spent “the rest of his first term looking for such a Soviet reformer. In his second term, he would find one.”[7] This suggests much of the agency rested with Reagan. Yet finding that reformist leader in Gorbachev does not mean that Reagan, his advisors, or the strategy of NSDD-32, engineered this outcome. Hope and instinct did not produce this outcome. Historical contingency (including the contingency of the relationship that developed between Reagan and Gorbachev) as well as factors internal to the Soviet Union did, as historians such as Melvyn Leffler, David Priestland, James Wilson, and Vladislav Zubok have demonstrated powerfully in their work.[8]

*Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev is welcomed to the White House in Washington, D.C., by U.S. President Ronald Ronald Reagan on December 8, 1987. (Arnie Sachs/REUTERS)*

Inboden’s own evidence makes this reality clear, too. He allows that “Gorbachev’s accession stemmed primarily from larger dynamics within the Soviet system” in concert with “Reagan’s rigid position,” as well as from Gorbachev’s own “vision and shrewd maneuvering.”[9] He describes throughout the internal economic rot and external economic shocks that rocked the Soviet Union, not to mention the Chernobyl disaster and the war in Afghanistan. Inboden also highlights the moments when “Gorbachev seized the initiative,” such as when he released dissident Anatoly Shcharansky or when he called for the elimination of nuclear weapons and announced a unilateral plan to reduce Soviet stockpiles, a move that “caught the Reagan administration off guard.”[10] In discussing U.S.-Soviet arms reduction talks, he acknowledges that Gorbachev was the one that “made a big concession,” that, at a crucial moment, “Gorbachev changed his mind” about leaving a summit after their scheduled time was over and agreed to continue to meet, and that, at a later meeting, Gorbachev backed down from his earlier demands.[11] Internal Soviet politics and Gorbachev’s decision making also played key roles in hastening the collapse of the Soviet Union. Inboden’s assertion that Reagan, “like Franklin Roosevelt…led his nation and its allies in vanquishing a totalitarian empire” oversimplifies the historical record and exaggerates Reagan’s role.[12] Reagan certainly mattered, but his strategy was not the only factor that led to the demise of the Soviet Union; historical works that consider non-U.S. sources tend to offer more balance (and less mythmaking) on this score.

There are other instances in the book where Inboden ascribes more clarity and power to Reagan’s strategy than is perhaps warranted. He suggests nuclear freeze activists did not appreciate that Reagan was actually “the nuclear abolitionist-in-chief” and not the saber-rattling warmonger they saw him as because they did not realize Reagan “detested Soviet communism even more” than nuclear weapons “and remained determined to build up America’s nuclear arsenal in order to bring down both the Soviet Union and the world’s most destructive weapons.”[13] He also asserts Reagan recognized that right-wing dictators “were wasting assets” whose “authoritarianism came at the expense of destabilizing discontent from their citizens and erosion of America’s moral capital.”[14] The Reagan administration, of course, did not eliminate nuclear weapons and it continued to support right wing dictators in Latin America and beyond. Inboden does make the reality clear; he is not uncritical of the administration’s missteps. Yet his framing of Reagan’s strategy tends to downplay most of the unsavory aspects of the Reagan presidency. For example, when he suggests the Reagan Doctrine “helped free Nicaragua, Angola, Afghanistan, and Cambodia from communist misrule but left behind divided, impoverished countries awash in armed factions, instability, and corruption,” he acknowledges but still underplays the culpability for the devastation wrought and the abuses tolerated through U.S. policies.[15]

The Peacemaker is thus an exciting but provocative read. It gives readers what often feels like a front row seat to the inner workings of the Reagan White House as it grappled with an enormous range of foreign policy challenges. The depth and breadth of this coverage is very welcome, as there are few books that provide such a comprehensive study of Reagan’s foreign policymaking process. Inboden is a skilled historian and a captivating storyteller. Yet the book also tends to downplay the significance of the wide range of factors that led to the end of the Cold War and to mythologize Ronald Reagan. It will surely spark much debate among historians for this reason, as it leaves the core question of why and how the Cold War ended as open to historical interpretation as ever.

Lauren Turek is an associate professor of history and the director of the Diplomacy, Security, War, and Peace Studies concentration in the International Studies department at Trinity University in San Antonio, TX, where she teaches courses on modern United States history, U.S. foreign relations, and public history. Her first book, To Bring the Good News to All Nations: Evangelical Influence on Human Rights and U.S. Foreign Relations, was published in 2020 as part of the Cornell University Press U.S. in the World Series. Her articles on religion in American politics and foreign relations have appeared in Diplomatic History, the Journal of American Studies, and Religions and she has contributed chapters to a number of edited volumes.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: President Ronald Reagan at his desk in the Oval Office, Washington, D.C. 1986 (Carol Highsmith).

Notes: [1] William Inboden, The Peacemaker: Ronald Reagan, the Cold War, and the World on the Brink (New York: Dutton, 2022), 7.

[2] Ibid, 7-12.

[3] Ibid, 370.

[4] Ibid, 65, 84.

[5] Inboden, The Peacemaker, 135.

[6] Ibid, 139.

[7] Ibid.

[8] Melvyn Leffler, For the Soul of Mankind: The United States, the Soviet Union, and the Cold War (New York: Hill and Wang, 2007); David Priestland, The Red Flag : A History of Communism (New York: Grove Press, 2009); James Graham Wilson, The Triumph of Improvisation: Gorbachev's Adaptability, Reagan's Engagement, and the End of the Cold War (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2014); Vladislav Zubok, A Failed Empire: The Soviet Union in the Cold War from Stalin to Gorbachev (Chapel Hill, NC: UNC Press, 2007); Vladislav Zubok, Collapse: The Fall of the Soviet Union (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2021).

[9] Inboden, The Peacemaker, 329.

[10] Ibid, 382.

[11] Ibid, 412, 414, 431.

[12] Ibid, 478.

[13] Inboden, The Peacemaker, 175.

[14] Ibid, 304-305.

[15] Ibid, 461.

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The Strategy Bridge explores the state of civil-military relations in the United States and beyond for the final quarterly series of 2023. What are the most pressing issues to consider? What overlooked issues may be key to understanding, influencing, and managing the future of civil-military relations? These two-wide ranging questions could be framed in a number of ways, but we envision publishing essays providing our readers with insights into:

-The historiographical development of scholarship on civil-military relations

-Contemporary civil-military relations in the United States

-Trends in contemporary civil-military relations on other continents

-Short- and long-term indicators and important correlations regarding coups

-Characteristics of civil-military relations in autocracies, theocracies, democracies, and other governmental forms

-Insights on civil-military relations in peacetime and wartime (or across the conflict continuum)

-What it means for military officers to be political and what it means for them to be partisan

-How the nexus of the people, the state, and the military shape civil-military relations

-Factors enabling successful civil-military relations and the factors at odds with them

-Civilian perspectives and responsibilities with respect to civil-military relations, both government (Executive, Congressional, etc.) and civil society

Submissions should conform to our submission guidelines. They should be concisely written, 1000-2000 words in length (excluding citations), and must include appropriate footnotes formatted consistent with the Chicago Manual of Style. We highly encourage writers to download our submissions template to save time and to ensure that your submission aligns with our editorial requirements.

Submissions should be scoped narrowly enough to make a complete and meaningful argument backed up by compelling evidence. All submissions must be received no later than 21 October 2023. Those submissions selected for publication will be published beginning in December 2023.

We know our community will have ideas to add to this conversation and we look forward to reading your writing!

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Champs-Elysees, Paris, France, 2017 (Manu Sanchez).

Notes:

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Earlier this year, The Strategy Bridge asked civilian and military students around the world to participate in our seventh annual student writing contest on the subject of strategy.

Now, we are pleased to present an essay selected for Honorable Mention from Brendan Tower, a recent graduate of the Eisenhower School.

Dispelling myths of an unfathomable cyber domain would allow the United States to build cyber deterrence and incrementally reshape cyberspace for stability. Stability in cyberspace occurs when cyber-criminals get apprehended and aggressor states get held accountable—both exceptions rather than the rule at present. The United States and like-minded partners should forge cyber deterrence by building resilience to attack, enhancing the capability to respond, and demonstrating a willingness to act. China’s manpower advantage extends to cyberspace and requires a technical and organizational offset if the United States expects to compete in cyberspace. Implementing tokenized internet access, avoiding splinter-net formation, creating a cyber reserve force, and delegating cyber-attack responses are concrete, tangible avenues the United States could take in securing this future. The establishment of a cyber reserve force, in particular, would provide critical cyber deterrence by distributing defensive and responsive cyber capabilities across the attack surface.

Shooting the RainExperts at a prominent government cybersecurity agency likened their defense attempts against cyber-attacks to shooting rain falling out of the sky—ineffective and overwhelming. President Biden lays out the challenge facing the United States in the cyber realm through the 2022 National Security Strategy (NSS): “Our societies, and the critical infrastructure that supports them, from power to pipelines, is increasingly digital and vulnerable to disruption or destruction via cyber attacks.”[1]

*President Biden and the National Security Strategy (White House)*

The strategy neglects to explain why the United States and like-minded nations face this challenge. The United States invented the Internet and developed the most prominent internet and technology companies—so why does the United States seem overwhelmed by this ephemeral threat?

Cyberspace is often framed inaccurately as an unlimited, incomprehensible domain that confounds rational analysis for policy creation. Cyberspace complexity is similar to the complexity of an ecosystem, yet ecosystems do not engender the same panic-inducing irrationality.[2] Ecosystems express relative stability, whereas the cyber domain remains unstable. Cyberspace complexity continues to grow, with only 64.6% of the world’s population currently internet-connected and annual digital connectivity growth over three times the population growth, 2.9%, and 0.84%, respectively.[3] Establishing stability in cyberspace is the goal, where economic activity progresses without widespread fear of attack and criminals and nefarious state actors alike are held accountable. Eventually, the cyber domain will reach stability, given the action and reaction behavior between the provocateurs and defenders. In the years before natural stability occurs, fortunes of nations will rise and fall, incentivizing the United States, as the current leader in prosperity, to hasten the approach to stability through creative policies.

Policymakers must understand the nature of the cyber domain to innovate policy that hastens stability. Recognizing that cyberspace is neither boundless nor incomprehensible but more akin to the land domain than the sea, air, and space, the landscape of challenges and how governments tackle find better parallels in the land domain. For example, the diversity of threats in the land domain ranges from trespassing and kidnapping to invasion and war crimes. Cyber threats are equally pervasive and segregating cybercrime from cyber-attack and cyber espionage is a necessary component of the division of responsibility and jurisdiction. The remarkable growth in cybercrime necessitates a local enforcement capability to attribute and aid just resolution of this lower-level cyber-attack.[4] The ability for local enforcement to conduct cyber investigations varies significantly across the United States, leaving gaps in protection.

One critical difference between the land and cyber domains is cyber’s rapid evolution. Most police work involves similar crimes conducted under similar methods under similar motives. Even the motivations for Russia’s second invasion of Ukraine stem from a classic geopolitical power struggle, unchanged for millennia. As noted by a cyber security expert at a leading U.S. technology company, the rapid advances in cyber security create an arms race for adversaries to innovate new methods of attack.[5] Often, the most successful attackers are “Advanced Persistent Teenagers,” those raised in an integrated cyber world. These individuals have considerable time to focus on a target to discern and exploit vulnerabilities. While the land domain lends itself toward a hierarchical framework, the rapid evolution in cyberspace advantages a horizontal structure. A flat structure facilitates swift detection and classification of new threats and disseminates threat telemetry quickly without burdensome reviews. The capacity and capability of U.S. adversaries in cyberspace exceeds the U.S. in the former and rapidly approaches equivalency in the latter as described in the 2023 National Cybersecurity Strategy (NCS):

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) now presents the broadest, most active, and most persistent threat to both government and private sector networks and is the only country with both the intent to reshape the international order and, increasingly, the economic, diplomatic, military, and technological power to do so. Over the last ten years, it has expanded cyber operations beyond intellectual property theft to become our most advanced strategic competitor with the capacity to threaten U.S. interests and dominate emerging technologies critical to global development.[6]

If strategic competition shifts to a great power war, China possesses the manpower advantage in the cyber realm. The United States requires a technical and organizational offset to counter that advantage. Given China’s drastic manpower advantage, the United States needs to invest time, capital, and manpower into building a credible cyber deterrence.

Resilience to AttackTo enhance overall resilience to cyber attacks, the United States should improve cyber system design for security, create a cyber reserve organization to integrate cybersecurity expertise within public and private enterprises, and discourage the formation of “splinter-nets” by allies and partners by listening to legitimate concerns and collaborating for just solutions.

As identified in the United States 2023 National Cybersecurity Strategy, creating inherently secure cyber infrastructure is a national priority.[7] The openness of nascent Internet and software infrastructure benefited from transparency to foster rapid innovation and improvement. However, the volume of wealth traversing cyberspace today requires a security baseline rather than a transparency baseline. Models for inherently secure networks exist, such as the online governance system of Estonia.[8] “E-Estonia,” in establishing zero-trust cyber architecture, instituted a high barrier to data exchange and collection, which prevents many U.S. companies, like Alphabet and Meta, from executing their business strategies. The United States, working with European regulatory partners, should create a zero-trust exchange infrastructure that validates permissions to access data and balances data access for privacy and private industry.

A critical step in zero-trust infrastructure is validating user authenticity. The e-Estonia system utilizes digital keys embedded in their national ID system to allow access to all government sites and many commercial enterprises. Adding a physical key is already commonplace in the U.S. government, where access to the Secret Internet Protocol Routing Network (SIPRNET) used by the Department of Defense and State Department is controlled with a user-issued token, the same size and shape as an ID card. Google’s Titan security key offers another possible physical key solution.[9] While the United States’ cultural history likely precludes adopting a national identification card, the federal government could create a template from which states could adapt. Standardizing the method of physical key implementation will improve understanding and trust in the security tool, as users could maintain the same key for life and start in childhood. Estonia’s financial industry served as an early adopter of digital key log-in. The advantages of reduced fraud saved such significant revenue that the industry incentivized expanded use of key log-in. Once the benefits of zero-trust infrastructure and improved data protection hit the population (like filing taxes in under three minutes!), cultural apprehension will likely dissipate.

Moving beyond the improved system design, creating a cyber reserve force in the United States would provide mutually beneficial technical experience, expertise, and information to private and public enterprises and respond against large-scale cyber-attack. The reserve structure allows experts to continue working in the private sector, benefiting innovation and economic prosperity while organizing a capability to leverage in a crisis. The United States should use tax benefits, access to privileged intelligence, and support of nationwide cyber defense expertise to incentivize the participation of private companies. The “New Social Contract” released by the Office of the National Cyber Director calls for improving the public-private partnership in cyberspace, precisely the purpose of cyber reserves.[10] These cyber reservists should be screened for security clearances to allow access to sensitive threat information. Today, civilian activists play a crucial role in cyber defense, attribution, and offensive cyber in the conflict in Ukraine,[11] the Cyber Defense Unit of Estonia,[12] and North Atlantic Fellows Organization (NAFO)[13] employ civilian volunteers to conduct a range of cyber operations, including identification and countering Russian disinformation and email phishing to identify Russian soldiers accused of war crimes.[14] Incorporating motivated civilians like these and offering additional resources would enhance cyber resilience. A network of experts across the private sector would share threat telemetry faster and remedy vulnerabilities at the speed of relevance.

A more resilient Internet provides little value to the United States if its allies and partners splinter their networks. Privacy concerns associated with significant technology companies scraping data without transparency perpetuate distrust of U.S. companies across the globe and, most significantly, in Europe. Growing calls for the nationalization of data and tighter privacy controls would hamper the development of new advanced technologies like artificial intelligence and cede the advantage to China, whose ruling communist party has no regard for the privacy of its citizens, much less the privacy of foreigners. The United States should value and respect privacy concerns and criticisms from allies and explore shared regulatory action to build commercial trust and accountability. As described in the 2022 National Security Strategy, “We are working closely with allies and partners, such as the Quad, to define standards for critical infrastructure to rapidly improve our cyber resilience, and building collective capabilities to rapidly respond to attacks.”[15] Keeping an open Internet is vital to success in strategic competition and relies on a collaborative approach that integrates concerns of U.S. allies and partners.

Capability to RespondConcurrently with the adjustments making cyber infrastructure more resilient, the rules-based international order ought to bolster its ability to respond. In meetings with Ministry of Defense delegations in Latvia, Estonia, and Finland and officials across multiple U.S. departments, developing capabilities to respond to cyber-attacks is a lower priority than building resilience and often not worth pursuing. However, adversaries will remain incentivized to continue their onslaught without the ability to inflict punitive action, like USCYBERCOM’s defend forward.[16] Some of this reluctance stems from overreliance on USCYBERCOM’s exceptional capabilities and failure to appreciate the manpower and resource constraints. USCYBERCOM cannot serve as the lone guarantor of the world’s cyberspace. From the 2023 National Cybersecurity Strategy:

The governments of China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, and other autocratic states with revisionist intent are aggressively using advanced cyber capabilities to pursue objectives that run counter to our interests and broadly accepted international norms. Their reckless disregard for the rule of law and human rights in cyberspace is threatening U.S. national security and economic prosperity.[17]

To build better capability, the United States should leverage offensive cyber capabilities within the Cyber Reserve force discussed earlier and expand tuition and training assistance for cyber-related fields. Cybersecurity experts require years of training and education, contributing to a considerable shortage of trained workforce in both the private and public sectors.[18] Cyber reserves, through an initial training program, could alleviate some of this knowledge deficit and provide an avenue for professional development and subsidize higher certifications. In strategic competition, the cyber forces of the United States are already near capacity to respond to attacks and would likely come under significantly greater assault during a direct conflict with Russia or China.[19]

Cyber reserve personnel should be trained and empowered for limited hack-back techniques. A hack back consists of a counter-attack to negate the gains of the cyber attacker. For example, if a bank witnessed illegal activity diverting funds, a cyber reserve employee could use authorities under the cyber reserves to enter criminal networks and recover the funds. By incentivizing participation in the cyber reserves, an organized network of experts becomes enmeshed across the cyber-attack surface, improving the overall ability of the United States to detect, attribute, and respond to cyber-attacks. Additionally, trends forming in disparate aspects of society, like elementary education and the electric power grid, could coalesce to recognize a broad attack and trigger a federal response. Only through closer coordination and integration between public and private organizations can the defenders out-innovate attackers and raise the expertise threshold necessary to conduct cyber-attack. As responses’ regularity and effectiveness grow, adversaries’ risk calculus shifts. No longer able to attack with impunity, they must now consider the repercussions of each attack. With defenders across the spectrum using the best practices and intelligence, shooting the rain appears within reach.

Another critical aspect of the cyber reserves is the capacity for improved cyber defense during armed conflict between great powers. A recent congressional policy scenario revealed weaknesses and tough choices in protecting U.S. national interests under a hypothetical conflict with China.[20] The team chose to defend critical military networks over day-to-day infrastructure and massive disinformation campaigns, leaving millions of Americans without essential services and under the influence of a Chinese Communist Party information campaign. A 300,000-strong reserve force, comparable to the National Guard, would provide a tremendous boost available to surge capability during a conflict. The breadth of expertise envisioned in the cyber reserves would defend critical infrastructure while supporting an invaluable advantage in every U.S. conflict, allies and partners. Cyber reserve coordination and participation in NATO teams like the Cyber Rapid Reaction team and state teams like France’s Cyber Citizen Reserve strengthens the bonds with NATO allies and partners.[21]

Willingness to ActThe final and most challenging aspect of achieving cyber deterrence is demonstrating the willingness to act. With the ultimate aim of influencing adversary decision-making, the campaign to demonstrate willingness involves domestic and international information operations, execution of a cyber response playbook, and lastly, patience. Deterrence through capability and willingness imposes punishment greater than potential benefits. As detailed in the 2022 National Defense Strategy (NDS), U.S. adversaries already possess significant capabilities:

The PRC employs state-controlled forces, cyber and space operations, and economic coercion against the United States and its Allies and partners. Russia employs disinformation, cyber, and space operations against the United States and our Allies and partners, and irregular proxy forces in multiple countries.[22]

Russian and Chinese capacity create a tough but surmountable challenge to overcome.

*U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin (Leah Mills/Reuters)*

Domestic information operations should message the steps taken to improve cyber resilience, build the capability to respond, and report successes and failures. The desired end state for the operation is an active, honest, and reassuring narrative for a broad domestic audience. By raising awareness of the cyber threats and sharing methods to improve resilience, the open society framework of the United States allows adversaries to witness the effort and expense, or Clausewitz’s value of the object, that the United States is willing to expend. For the international audience, the United States should target allies and partners to participate in and improve their own resilience, intelligence, and response processes. Conversely, the United States should inform adversary state populations of the risks their governments bring to average citizens and the possible repercussions. For instance, messaging that failed attempts to attack the United States through cyberspace will incur sanctions, and successful attacks will incur a proportionate, not necessarily cyber, response.

The cyber response playbook, operational plan, or menu of cyber options already exists but needs to expand to include cyber reserve capability and improve transparency to the public. Thousands and eventually hundreds of thousands of additional technicians will be available to execute responses, freeing top-tier experts at the National Security Agency (NSA) and USCYBERCOM away from lower complexity operations and preserving their focus for the most technical challenges.[23] Offensive cyber actions, including defend forward, require presidential authorization or, in some limited cases, Secretary of Defense approval.[24] This raises the necessity threshold, allowing the highest priority operations to get requested and leaving low priority operations in queue. Presidential authority also tends to slow down the authorization process, reducing the timeliness of response actions. Embedding agility across the attack surface would speed OODA loop in responding to cyber-attacks.[25] A key benefit to presidential authorization is the well-considered and careful deliberation on risks of unintended consequences and escalation.[26] However, escalation in cyberspace has shown to be limited or non-existent, with no instance of any cyber-attack escalating to a kinetic response.[27]

Understanding the risks of unintended consequences for lower-tier responses could be developed and recorded over time to determine the practicality of delegating low-consequence cyber responses to subordinate commanders. The Secretary of Defense directed the use of cyberspace to degrade malicious actors in the 2022 National Defense Strategy: “We will conduct cyberspace operations to degrade competitors’ malicious cyber activity and to prepare cyber capabilities to be used in crisis or conflict.”[28] Expanding the permissible actors in the United States to include private companies with cyber reserve force employees would signal potent willingness and determination in backing up deterrence.

After the information campaign and cyber response playbook are in motion, patience should prevail, as any expectation of immediate cyber deterrence is unlikely. Only the sustained improvement in resilience, demonstrated growth in capability, and conveyed willingness to act will change the risk calculus of adversaries. The nuclear taboo developed slowly, and the same can be expected in cyberspace.

ConclusionBy adjusting our paradigm for understanding the threats and opportunities in cyberspace, the United States can incrementally build cyber deterrence to shift the balance toward stability. States will still develop and exploit vulnerabilities. However, the proliferation of simple cyber tools for criminal usage can be defeated through increased resiliency. Improved capability and a demonstrated willingness to respond will encourage states to limit offensive cyber to espionage, saving cyber-attacks for the onset of hostilities where attribution is no longer a concern. Reshaping our national cyber defense organization by creating a cyber reserve force, implemented in a flatter, horizontal organization than typically found in government, can disseminate defensive and responsive cyber capabilities against U.S. adversaries. Working by, with, and through allies and partners, the United States can out-collaborate its adversaries, reinforcing the values of the rules-based international order.

Brendan Tower is an officer in the U.S. Navy. He completed a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from the University of Washington in 2007, a Master in Business Administration from Seattle University in 2014, a Master of Arts in Defense Strategic Studies from the Naval War College in 2019, and a Master of Science in National Resource Strategy from the Eisenhower School in Washington D.C in 2023. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the Department of the Navy, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: BLUE, 2020 (Travis Burcham).

Notes: [1] Joe Biden, National Security Strategy of the United States of America (White House, October 2022), pg 34.

[2] Albert O. Olagbemiro, “Cyberspace as a Complex Adaptive System and the Policy and Operational Implications for Cyber Warfare,” May 22, 2014.

[3] “Digital Around the World,” DataReportal – Global Digital Insights, accessed April 28, 2023, https://datareportal.com/global-digital-overview.

[4] Paul Abbate, “2020 Internet Crime Report” (Federal Bureau of Investigation: Internet Crime Complaint Center, 2020).

[5] “Cybersecurity Expert from Leading US Technology Firm” (Palo Alto, CA, April 12, 2023).

[6] Joe Biden, National Cybersecurity Strategy (White House, March 2023), pg 3.

[7] Joe Biden, pg 1.

[8] “E-Estonia - We Have Built a Digital Society & We Can Show You How,” e-Estonia, April 13, 2023, https://e-estonia.com/.

[9] “Titan Security Key - FIDO U2F USB-C NFC Bluetooth - Google Store,” accessed April 20, 2023, https://store.google.com/us/product/titan_security_key?pli=1&hl=en-US.

[10] Chris Ingliss and Harry Krejsa, “The Cyber Social Contract: How to Rebuild Trust in a Digital World,” Foreign Affairs 101, no. 1 (February 21, 2022), https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2022-02-21/cyber-social-contract.

[11] Michael Peel, “Fake News: How Lithuania’s ‘Elves’ Take on Russian Troll,” February 4, 2019.

[12] “CCDCOE,” accessed April 25, 2023, https://ccdcoe.org/library/publications/the-cyber-defence-unit-of-the-estonian-defence-league-legal-policy-and-organisational-analysis/.

[13] “#NAFO and Winning the Information War: Lessons Learned from Ukraine | CSIS Events,” accessed March 15, 2023, https://www.csis.org/events/nafo-and-winning-information-war-lessons-learned-ukraine.

[14] “Report: Ukraine Hackers Trick Russian Army Wives to Expose Kremlin Pilots Accused of Bloody Civilian Bombings,” Get the Latest Ukraine News Today - KyivPost, accessed April 25, 2023, https://www.kyivpost.com/post/15134.

[15] Joe Biden, “National Security Strategy of the United States of America” (White House, October 2022), pg 34.

[16] “CYBER 101 - Defend Forward and Persistent Engagement,” U.S. Cyber Command, accessed April 25, 2023, https://www.cybercom.mil/Media/News/Article/3198878/cyber-101-defend-forward-and-persistent-engagement/https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cybercom.mil%2FMedia%2FNews%2FArticle%2F3198878%2Fcyber-101-defend-forward-and-persistent-engagement%2F.

[17] Joe Biden, National Cybersecurity Strategy, pg 3.

[18] “Cybersecurity Expert from Leading US Technology Firm.”

[19] “What It Will Look like If China Launches Cyberattacks in the U.S.,” POLITICO, April 16, 2023, https://www.politico.com/news/2023/04/16/chinese-hackers-military-taiwan-invasion-00092189.

[20] “What It Will Look like If China Launches Cyberattacks in the U.S.”

[21] NATO, “Cyber Defence,” NATO, accessed March 15, 2023, https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_78170.htm.

[22] Lloyd Austin, “National Defense Strategy, Nuclear Posture Review, and Missile Defense Review” (Department of Defense, October 27, 2022).

[23] James Van de Velde, “Industry Study 3-4 Networking and Media” (Washington D.C., February 23, 2023).

[24] Paul C. Ney, “DOD General Counsel Remarks at 2020 U.S. Cyber Command Legal Conference,” March 2, 2020.

[25] “The D-n-i Echo: The Essence of Winning and Losing, by John R. Boyd,” May 14, 2011, https://web.archive.org/web/20110514132512/http://www.danford.net/boyd/essence4.htm.

[26] Caroline Krass, “DOD General Counsel Remarks at 2023 U.S. Cyber Command Legal Conference,” April 18, 2023, pg 3.

[27] Jason Healey, “The Escalation Inversion and Other Oddities of Situational Cyber Stability,” Texas National Security Review, September 28, 2020, https://tnsr.org/2020/09/the-escalation-inversion-and-other-oddities-of-situational-cyber-stability/.

[28] Lloyd Austin, “National Defense Strategy, Nuclear Posture Review, and Missile Defense Review," pg 6.

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Earlier this year, The Strategy Bridge asked civilian and military students around the world to participate in our seventh annual student writing contest on the subject of strategy.

Now, we are pleased to present an essay selected for Honorable Mention from Sakeena Siddiqi, a recent graduate of the Eisenhower School.

China’s influence operations have evolved to employ “information laundering” to shape global narratives. Information laundering—the process of introducing disinformation into the Internet ecosystem and legitimizing it through transitions from fringe sites to public discourse—is the next generation of information operations. While Russia’s 2016 election interference is a well-documented and heavily litigated example of this process, China’s social media forays have been characterized as more overt and less skillful.[1] Their actions have garnered minimal engagements, were easily attributed, and were ultimately blocked as state-sponsored content.[2] However, China’s recent history with influence operations demonstrates a continually evolving tactic and narrative, with information laundering as the most recent and successful approach. “Borrowing a boat out to sea” translates to a Chinese term for the government’s approach to using foreign media to deliver its message.[3]

What It IsInformation laundering follows a three-step process.[4]

• Placement constitutes the development of a counterfeit narrative.
• Layering progresses the narrative through multiple platforms, using enablers, amplifiers (e.g., influencers), and accelerators (e.g., echo chambers) to help the narrative to go viral while hiding the original source.
• Integration introduces this narrative into mainstream discourse via traditional and new media.

The process benefits the originator by obscuring their identity while influencing perceptions, gaining followers, and normalizing the positions of the originator.[5] The narrative washes through four types of enablers: “discovery (search engines), information (news and research), opinion (blogs and discussion forums), and expression (social networks, gaming, and online shopping).”[6] Borrowing their credibility results in the counterfeit narrative appearing factual.[7]

Information laundering differs from cloaking, whereby a counterfeit narrative attempts to gain legitimacy by appearing as a reputable source, using techniques such as residing on a benignly named website, using a “.org” URL, or mimicking the appearance of a legitimate site.[8]

Pace University Associate Professor of Communication and Media Studies Adam Klein pioneered the concept of information laundering.[9] Samantha Korta, a researcher from the Naval Postgraduate School, expanded Klein’s model to encompass all counterfeit narratives, including disinformation (deliberately false information) and malinformation (true information deliberately contorted by context and presentation to be misleading).

 *Information Laundering 2.0 Model[10]*

Humans and the Internet: WhY Information Laundering WorksCharacteristics of the internet, human behavior, and fake news foster information laundering’s success. First, the internet ecosystem enables fake news to spread across real networks. Information can now cross platforms and access millions—significantly more than traditional media sources like print newspapers or radio broadcasts.[11] Social media algorithms incentivize article proliferation, resulting in additional engagements without validating accuracy.[12] Additionally, mainstream culture is no longer limited to traditional news media and has expanded to include “other news, pseudo-news, and flat-out false news sites” through enablers.[13] Freedom House notes that “[t]he public use of smartphones to document events in real time turned ordinary internet users into citizen journalists.”[14]

Second, humans gravitate towards—and accept as fact—information they are predisposed to believe. Echo chambers, a natural outgrowth of social interaction, can thus be exploited “by cognitive factors such as confirmation bias, implicit egotism, and false consensus effect.”[15] Further, the third-person effect theorizes that people overestimate others’ susceptibility to fake news while underestimating their own, leading to a “my bubble is safer than yours” view.[16] While aware that fake news abounds, not only are people receptive to confirmatory data, they are also prone to reject disaffirming data regardless of veracity.

Third, counterfeit narratives lend themselves to proliferation, with one theory being that “false news is more novel and that more novel information is more likely to be retweeted.”[17] A Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) study of tweets from 2006 to 2017 confirmed that false news, with politics as the largest rumor category, “diffused farther, faster, deeper, and more broadly than truth in all categories of information,” noting it was 70 percent more likely to be retweeted.[18] Notably, their findings were unchanged when removing bots from the analysis, indicating falsehoods spread via human “peer-to-peer diffusion.”[19] The study used multiple fact-checking organizations to label news as true or false. The difficulty in this assessment arguably also benefits counterfeit narratives as they cannot immediately be discounted.

China’s Use of Influence OperationsChina’s history with influence operations in social media traces strategic pivots in narratives, audiences, and approaches. China’s 2011 Military Dictionary described public opinion warfare as “creating a favorable public opinion environment for political initiative and military victory,” through the “comprehensive use of various media means and information resources to fight the enemy.”[20] From their perspective, the extensive U.S. engagement in Internet infrastructure, service providers, consumption, and de facto use of the English language constitutes a threat in public opinion warfare which justifies defensive actions.[21] Public opinion warfare continues in times of both peace and war, with peacetime operations aimed at “long-term infiltration into the objects of the society’s and culture’s deep structure, changing the awareness and conviction of the enemy masses.”[22]

Disinformation operations are a long-standing practice for China, with the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) only one of many agencies engaged in propaganda efforts.[23] PLA social media experts train in political warfare with goals of improving PLA image and correcting misperceptions.[24] China also operates two pillars of Chinese propaganda: the Central Propaganda Department and the United Front.[25]

The earliest pro-China influence operations using social media date to 2017, with subsequent propaganda networks uncovered by Graphika in 2019, 2020, and 2021, and by the Australian Strategic Public Policy Institute (ASPI) in 2020, Stanford Internet Observatory in 2020, and Bellingcat in 2020.[26] In June 2018, President Xi Jinping encouraged “telling China’s story well and molding a positive national image” while “actively using overseas social media platforms.”[27]

Graphika termed the networks “Spamouflage Dragon,” as spam-producing accounts also published political messages blaming then-presidential candidate Donald Trump for racial divisions.[28] Graphika could not, however, attribute the postings to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and the effectiveness of the campaign was stymied by lack of engagement and being blocked by social media companies.[29] Additionally, the audience was likely Chinese Communist Party officials, with kudos being earned by members for a high number of postings rather than for actual outside engagements.[30]

*Spamouflage Dragon (Bleeping Computer)*

Marking a shift in audience, Buzzfeed News reported in March 2019 on the first indications of Chinese persona accounts or trolls on Western social media.[31] Actual attribution occurred in August 2019, when Twitter removed China’s state-sponsored tweets regarding the Hong Kong protests.[32] These tweets proved Chinese social media influence operations were aimed, for the first time, at Western audiences.[33] They also indicated China’s study of Russian and Iranian techniques: “using high-volume bot accounts, co-opting spam infrastructure (Twitter clients) to spread political messages, and amplifying controversial content.”[34]

More importantly, these also hinted at a narrative shift as China’s influence operations expanded from promoting the so-called China Story to tackling U.S. concerns in the first half of 2020.[35] In March 2020, China operated a combination of falsely generated accounts and repurposed accounts, indicating coordinated, systematic postings to alter international COVID messaging and deflect criticism.[36] Similarly, in June 2021, ProPublica and the New York Times reported on Uyghur content videos attempting to directly rebut and discredit a speech from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo critical of the Chinese Communist Party speech.[37] The report proved that China was generating counterfeit narrative content in direct response to Western reports.

In May 2021, Xi Jinping proposed that China “expand [the CCP’s] circle of friends in international public opinion,” pushing for use of influencers to amplify China’s story line.[38] Information laundering, as described in the following two case studies, is therefore the next evolution of the preceding efforts for embedding disinformation and malinformation. The studies contrast in the identification and attribution of counterfeit narratives, thereby revealing different ways the information model applies in practice.

Uyghur Muslims in XinjiangChina’s social media approach to the Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang exemplifies the shifts in narrative and audience for disinformation. China initially conducted its Western social media engagements via Twitter, largely through state-sponsored media accounts.

The Chinese disinformation campaign began on 19 June 2020 with a reply and retweet referencing Xinjiang, with the retweets as a method to amplify and expand followers.[39] China has specifically pushed a counterfeit narrative to refute reports of genocide, imprisonment, and torture—atrocities dating back to 2017 as determined by former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.[40] Secretary Pompeo’s anti-CCP stance arguably drove this campaign, after his tweets overtook Chinese state-sponsored accounts for the most likes regarding Xinjiang.[41]

The information laundering model can be overlaid onto subsequent Xinjiang social media efforts. From 2020 to 2021, the use of domestic YouTubers, termed “frontier influencers,” softened messaging and added a facade of authenticity.[42] In contrast to earlier videos of Chinese officials echoing Chinese Communist Party propaganda, these vloggers were usually young women, typically Chinese minorities implicitly speaking for their entire ethnicity or region and showcasing their appearance and dancing skills.[43]

Generation of these videos stems from management agencies called multi-channel networks (MCNs) who produce videos and alter search algorithms through fresh content and frequent postings, while serving to hide their Chinese Communist Party connection.[44] In 2021, multi-channel networks accounted for about 40% of “top-performing accounts with more than 10 million followers on Chinese social media platforms.”[45] One organization, the Xinjiang Audio-Video Publishing House, links to the Chinese Communist Party’s United Front Work Department as the funded arm of Changyu Culture, which in turn were amplified on Twitter and YouTube via fake accounts.[46] A 2022 report from China’s National Radio and Television Administration (NRTA), a member of the CCP’s Central Propaganda Department, identified YouTube as “the main new media platform for the distribution of Chinese short videos overseas” with 169 million fans for the top 100 Chinese YouTube video contents, with the top three channels run by individual influencers.[47]

The effectiveness of these videos is difficult to discern, as some accounts created for the Changyu Culture YouTube channel solely subscribe, rather than watch, the videos—giving the appearance of high engagement.[48] Nonetheless, the integration into YouTube highlights several lessons learned. First, the frequent and fresh content rises to the top of search results with algorithms prioritizing new channels and postings, thus displacing older content.[49] Second, politicizing video titles, even when completely unrelated to the actual content, dilutes searches for credible news and increases video engagements.[50] Third, use of multi-channel networks allows YouTube to monetize the accounts and ensures payment for the creators without identifying them as propaganda, therefore side-stepping state-sponsored account labels.[51]

In line with Xi’s 2021 directive, China’s information laundering evolved to a new phase: the use of foreign influencers. Most notably, in what author Rush Doshi describes as the “information supply chain,” the latest influencers are Western and white: Canadian, British, South African, and American.[52] As of December 2021, The New York Times documented six of these influencers as having 130M views and 1.1M subscribers on YouTube.[53] While the influencers claim to have editorial control and deny being propaganda, these claims are dubious given amplification by Chinese officials and the absence of other foreign reporters in the region.[54] Further, several hallmarks of Chinese influence operations color these videos: use of algorithms and video shares by accounts with no digital background, payments via multi-channel networks, and a pro-China, travelogue-style approach.[55]

An April 2023 search of “Xinjiang” on YouTube demonstrates the efficacy of this approach. The first few suggested videos are from Jason of “Living in China” and Rafa of “Rafa Goes Around,” crowding out credible news on the ongoing genocide and imprisonment. The videos clearly aim at a Western audience, with both men speaking in English and employing upbeat tones, travelogue-style editing, and click-bait titles like “The Xinjiang THEY don’t want you to see…”[56]

Hunter Biden’s LaptopA second case of malinformation aligns less neatly with the information laundering model and highlights the difficulty with attribution to the Chinese Communist party, thus illustrating how the tactic can escape detection. Gui Wengui, an exiled Chinese billionaire, initially coupled real data recovered from Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop with false statements that the material came from Chinese sources, depicted criminal sexual activity, and definitively proved the CCP’s control over President Joe Biden.

Guo ran a social media enterprise (Guo Media) originally established to promote anti-CCP narratives, but now noted for its disinformation campaigns on COVID, U.S. election-fraud, and Hunter Biden.[57] Guo had historic ties to Chinese intelligence, with his U.S. exile blurring his status as pro- or anti-CCP.[58] A federal court suit labeling Guo “a dissident hunter, a propagandist, and an agent in service of the People's Republic of China” ended without clear evidence of his position.[59]

Following initial placement of the malinformation on GTV, Guo Media employed layering techniques, using multiple networks such as Discord, GitHub, Google Drive, and both paid and voluntary personnel for translation and content production to amplify messaging through the use of real social media accounts (supporters referenced as “ants”).[60] After leaving the White House, Steve Bannon contracted with Guo’s media company for strategic consulting services to facilitate access for Guo Media to media personalities and to guide the company on industry standards.[61] Bannon and Guo’s interests aligned given the anti-CCP stance both held, which reinforced the active amplification step.[62]

*Steve Bannon and Guo Wengui in 2018 (Don Emmert/AFP)*

The information laundering process trails through the story’s timeline, though the imperfections peek through with this case. Demonstrating all phases of the process, the Post published its article three weeks after Guo’s network had been airing it, following amplification by Bannon.[63] The Guo media networks, though, aimed at Chinese-speaking audiences with postings in Asia—along with Guo’s anti-CCP narrative—before being picked up by the Washington Examiner and UK’s Daily Mail in a successful integration.[64] The anti-CCP claims did not figure in the more widespread Post story, thus eroding the initial counterfeit narrative and its intended impact. Additionally, Guo’s background adds a wildcard, complicating attribution; either he served as a Chinese intelligence operative, thus successfully hiding the Chinese Communist Party connection, or he operated as an independent entity.

Counter-Information Laundering RecommendationsCountering information laundering must address the primary factors facilitating it: human cognition and social media platform operations. Human cognition factors require a two-pronged approach: near-term incorporation of assessment speed bumps and long-term research on psychological and sociological features. In parallel, social media platforms require a nuanced approach, encouraging voluntary actions as a means to preserve reputational credit. Specific recommendations include the following.

Human Cognition

• Fund research on the cognitive, social, and organizational aspects of information laundering, to increase understanding of its effectiveness and operation.[65]
• Given that human diffusion accounts for the spread of false news, incorporate “accuracy nudges” on social media platforms.[67]
• Add flagging mechanisms of suspect news.[68] Having users self-moderate content is imperfect and subjective, but may alert social media platforms of coordinated activity and potential disinformation.

Social Media Platforms

• Use credit fraud monitoring tactics to flag fraudulent activity like spree-posting, a hallmark of coordinated activity. Monitor, identify, and remove automated accounts, bots, spam, and AI-generated profiles and content.[66]
• Increase transparency of monetized accounts. MNC-funded accounts may not carry a “state-sponsored content” label but alert the viewer that the content is paid.
• Publicize network analysis of viral hashtags and videos, so users can assess whether information originates from single sources, from coordinated activity, or from truly organic grassroots organization.

ConclusionWhile Russia sees information space as a constant battleground, China’s operations hinge on “establishing the country as a global hegemon in the international order and on the key objective of maintaining positive global opinion.”[69] China has built an international media empire with state media bureaus, foreign media companies, and partnerships overseas in regions like Africa.[70] Chinese officials contracted for radio broadcasts, worked through diplomats (sometimes called “Wolf Warrior Diplomacy”), submitted op-eds, conducted interviews with U.S. outlets like NPR and Fox News, and paid for China Daily inserts in publications like the Washington Post and the New York Times.[71]

While China is creating and deploying disinformation and malinformation “with the end goal of instilling paranoia, one-dimensional critical thinking, and cognitive blindspots,” the social media campaigns mounted thus far appear to have little or no disruptive impact.[72] The lack of measurable success may therefore support a status quo approach of allowing counterfeit narratives to trickle through the internet.

For U.S. national security, information laundering presents a challenge for threat assessments. While Chinese literature recommends the tactic to conduct public opinion warfare, the current activities fall below the thresholds of both armed conflict and criminal activity. The trajectory of China’s influence operations proves information laundering to be a low-stakes operation with little risk of reprisal, but one that is likely to continue. Following the case study detailed above, for example, President Xi Jinping pushed in July 2022 for the “launch [of a] multi-level, omni-directional, three-dimensional propaganda about Xinjiang direction abroad [and to] perfect the work of ‘inviting in’…and tell China’s Xinjiang story well.”[73]

The evolution of these operations demonstrates increasing skill with a tactic of which the U.S. is largely ignorant and therefore ignoring.[74] As China has proven a propensity to improve abilities, narratives, and approaches, three emerging developments could raise information laundering from an annoyance to an actionable threat.

First, the advent of artificial intelligence (AI) to create user profiles, images, and videos could easily be exploited across the information laundering process.[75] Artificial intelligence could generate believable content for placement, further manipulating confusion between false and true news, and increase engagement through well-crafted fake accounts serving as amplifiers during the layering process—ultimately easing and accelerating integration.

Second, while China has taken advantage of freedoms afforded by Western social media, the increasing popularity of platforms like TikTok flatten the placement and layering process by bringing Western audiences directly to the content source.[76] Thus, blocking apps like TikTok may also slow the laundering process by requiring the Chinese Communist Party to continue to navigate Western platforms where the U.S. retains some measure of control. This also betters the ability of the U.S. to incentivize its platforms to control the spread of misinformation and disinformation through labeling, attribution, and bot removal.

Third, China appears to be expanding into joint campaigns with Russia. The Biden administration has identified disinformation campaigns regarding bioweapons labs in Ukraine, with China amplifying Kremlin propaganda.[77] Further, the campaign has integrated into U.S. mainstream media, following placement and amplification in QAnon networks.[78] The U.S. government must therefore continue to monitor and pre-bunk (i.e., anticipate, disprove, and discredit) upcoming counterfeit narratives in alignment with the Department of State’s Global Engagement Center (GEC) approach.[79]

Given that China’s information laundering falls within the bounds of competition, their activity does not qualify as either criminal or conflict. Thus, a proportionate response at this stage should focus on measures aimed at the factors which facilitate information laundering: human cognition and social media platforms. The U.S. is uniquely positioned to appropriate funds and engage the science and technology communities for research and development efforts. Further, the U.S. government can incentivize social media platforms through multiple methods. For example, legislatively offering tax incentives for costs associated with these recommendations encourages their implementation. Non-legislatively, government officials can drive greater engagement and traffic (which equates to advertising revenue) by patronizing those platforms which remove counterfeit narratives.

Sakeena S. Siddiqi is a Department of Navy civilian with 17 years of acquisition experience spanning commercial and non-commercial acquisitions, major weapon systems, professional services, and policy. The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of the Department of the Navy, the Department of Defense or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

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Header Image: Social Media Logos in 3D, 2023 (Marila Shalabaieva).

Notes: [1] Renée Diresta, Carly Miller, Vanessa Molter, John Pomfret, and Glenn Tiffert, Telling China's Story: The Chinese Communist Party's Campaign to Shape Global Narratives, (Stanford, CA: Stanford Digital Repository, 2020), 44, 47, https://doi.org/10.25740/pf306sw8941.

[2] Diresta et al, Telling China’s Story, 44. See also Craig Timberg and Shane Harris, "Chinese Network of Fake Accounts Targets Trump," The Washington Post, August 13, 2020, https://www.proquest.com/newspapers/chinese-network-fake-accounts-targets-trump/docview/2433067427/se-2.

[3] Nathan Beauchamp-Mustafaga and Michael S. Chase, Borrowing a Boat Out to Sea: The Chinese Military’s Use of Social Media for Influence Operations, (Washington, DC: John Hopkins Foreign Policy Institute, 2019), v, https://www.fpi.sais-jhu.edu/borrowing-a-boat-out-to-sea-pdf.

[4] Samantha Korta, “Fake News, Conspiracy Theories, and Lies: An Information Laundering Model for Homeland Security,” Homeland Security Affairs (March 2018): 80, https://www.proquest.com/scholarly-journals/fake-news-conspiracy-theories-lies-information/docview/2206253872/se-2

[5] Ibid.

[6] Korta, “Fake News,” 84.

[7] Korta, “Fake News,” 99.

[8] Noah Arjomand, "Information Laundering and Globalized Media: Part I - The Problem," Center for International Media Assistance (blog), August 20, 2019, https://www.cima.ned.org/blog/information-laundering-and-globalized-media-part-i-the-problem/.

[9] Korta, “Fake News,” 77.

[10] Korta, “Fake News,” 81.

[11] Cindy Otis, “The Mainstreaming of Conspiracy Theories,” interview by Darragh Worland, Is That A Fact, News Literacy Project, audio transcript, https://newslit.org/podcast/the-mainstreaming-of-conspiracy-theories/.

[12] Sanja Kelly, Mai Truong, Adrian Shahbaz, Madeline Earp, Jessica White, Manipulating Social Media to Undermine Democracy (Washington, DC: Freedom House, 2017), 2, https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-net/2017/manipulating-social-media-undermine-democracy.

[13] Korta, “Fake News,” 88-89.

[14] Kelly et al, Manipulating Social Media to Undermine Democracy, 15

[15] Korta, “Fake News,” 62, 73

[16] Elena-Alexandra Dumitru, "Is ‘Letting the Truth Get in the Way of a Good Story’ enough? Journalists' Perception on Fake News," Journal of Media Research 14, no. 3 (November 2021): 76, https://www.proquest.com/docview/2615893167.

[17] Vosoughi Soroush, Deb Roy, and Aral Sinan, "The Spread of True and False News Online." Science 359, no. 6380 (March 2018): 1150, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aap9559.

[18] Vosoughi Soroush et al, "The Spread of True and False News Online,” 1147, 1149.

[19] Vosoughi Soroush et al, "The Spread of True and False News Online,” 1150.

[20] Kenton Thibaut, Chinese Discourse Power: Ambitions and reality in the digital domain (Washington DC: Atlantic Council Digital Forensic Research Lab, 2022), 10, https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/in-depth-research-reports/report/chinese-discourse-power-ambitions-and-reality-in-the-digital-domain/.

[21] Beauchamp-Mustafaga and Chase, Borrowing a Boat, 4.

[22] Beauchamp-Mustafaga and Chase, Borrowing a Boat, 9.

[23] Beauchamp-Mustafaga and Chase, Borrowing a Boat, v.

[24] Thibaut, Chinese Discourse Power, 7.

[25] Diresta et al, Telling China's Story, 7.

[26] Ross Burley, Analysis of the Pro-China Propaganda Network Targeting International Narratives, (London, UK: Centre for Information Resilience, 2021), 4, 7, https://www.info-res.org/post/revealed-coordinated-attempt-to-push-pro-china-anti-western-narratives-on-social-media., 4,7.

[27] Beauchamp-Mustafaga and Chase, Borrowing a Boat, 27.

[28] Timberg and Harris, "Chinese Network of Fake Accounts Targets Trump."

[29] Ibid.

[30] Diresta et al, Telling China's Story, 44

[31] Beauchamp-Mustafaga and Chase, Borrowing a Boat, 94. See also Diresta et al, Telling China's Story, 15.

[32] Diresta et al, Telling China's Story, 20.

[33] Diresta et al, Telling China's Story, 25

[34] Ibid.

[35] Fergus Ryan, Ariel Bogle, Albert Zhang and Dr Jacob Wallis, #StopXinjiang Rumors: The CCP’s decentralised disinformation campaign, (Barton, Australia: Australian Strategic Policy Institute, 2021), 6, https://www.aspi.org.au/report/stop-xinjiang-rumors.

[36] Jeff Kao and Mia Shuang Li, “How China Built a Twitter Propaganda Machine Then Let It Loose on Coronavirus,” ProPublica, March 26, 2020, https://www.propublica.org/article/how-china-built-a-twitter-propaganda-machine-then-let-it-loose-on-coronavirus.

[37] Jeff Kao, Raymond Zhong, Paul Mozur, and Aaron Krolik, “How China Spreads Its Propaganda Version of Life for Uyghurs,” ProPublica and New York Times, June 23, 2021, https://www.propublica.org/article/how-china-uses-youtube-and-twitter-to-spread-its-propaganda-version-of-life-for-uyghurs-in-xinjiang.

[38] Ryan et al, #StopXinjiang Rumors, 43

[39] Ryan et al, #StopXinjiang Rumors, 30

[40] Michael R. Pompeo, “Determination of the Secretary of State on Atrocities in Xinjiang,” Department of State, 2021, https://2017-2021.state.gov/determination-of-the-secretary-of-state-on-atrocities-in-xinjiang/index.html.

[41] Zhang et al, Strange Bedfellows, 6.

[42] Fergus Ryan, Daria Impiombato and Hsi-Ting Pai, Frontier influencers: The new face of China’s propaganda, Report No. 65/2022 (Barton, Australia: Australian Strategic Policy Institute, 2022), 6, 8, https://www.aspi.org.au/report/frontier-influencers.

[43] Ryan et al, Frontier Influencers, 25.

[44] Ryan et al, Frontier Influencers, 3-4

[45] Ryan et al, Frontier Influencers, 36

[46] Ryan et al, #StopXinjiang Rumors, 31

[47] Ryan et al, Frontier Influencers, 11

[48] Zhang et al, Strange Bedfellows, 15

[49] Ryan et al, Frontier Influencers, 33

[50] Ryan et al, Frontier Influencers, 31

[51] Ryan et al, Frontier Influencers, 41. See also Kao et al, “How China Spreads Its Propaganda Version of Life for Uyghurs.”

[52] Thomas Brown, “How China Is Influencing YouTubers into Posting State Propaganda,” Medium, November 16, 2021, https://medium.com/swlh/how-china-is-influencing-youtubers-into-posting-state-propaganda-db72acf18dfa.

[53] Paul Mozur, Raymond Zhong, and Aaron Krolik, "YouTube Influencers are Tools in Beijing's Propaganda Blitz," New York Times, December 14, 2021, https://www.proquest.com/newspapers/youtube-influencers-are-tools-beijings-propaganda/docview/2609572913/se-2.

[54] Ibid.

[55] Ibid.

[56] Jason (@JasonLiving in China), “The Xinjiang THEY Don't Want YOU to see...,” YouTube, March 17, 2023.

[57] Graphika, Ants in a Web, (Graphika: 2021), 3-4, https://graphika.com/reports/ants-in-a-web. See also Jeanne Whalen, Craig Timberg and Eva Dou, “Chinese businessman with links to Steve Bannon is driving force for a sprawling disinformation network, researchers say,” Washington Post, May 17, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/05/17/guo-wengui-disinformation-steve-bannon/.

[58] Dave Davies, "The Inscrutable Aims of Steve Bannon's Enigmatic Chinese Benefactor," NPR, October 20, 2022, https://www.npr.org/2022/10/20/1130184401/the-inscrutable-aims-of-steve-bannons-enigmatic-chinese-benefactor.

[59] Ibid.

[60] Graphika, Ants in a Web, 5-6

[61] Jonathan Swan and Erica Pandey, "Steve Bannon's secret contract with a Chinese billionaire," Axios, October 29, 2019, https://www.axios.com/2019/10/29/steve-bannon-contract-chinese-billionaire-guo-media.

[62] Graphika, Ants in a Web, 22

[63] Graphika, Ants in a Web, 24.

[64] Dan Friedman, " Exclusive: Leaked Messages Reveal the Origins of the Most Vile Hunter Biden Smear," Mother Jones, April 7, 2022, https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2022/04/hunter-biden-laptop-guo-wengui-bannon-giuliani/.

[65] Korta, “Fake News,” 118

[66] Professor Brief to Eisenhower School Seminar on Operations in the Information Environment, “AI and Autonomy,” Stanford University, April 11, 2023.

[67] Nyla Husain, " On Social Media, Sharing Mindset Makes People Worse at Judging Accuracy," American Association for the Advancement of Science, August 6, 2021, https://www.aaas.org/news/social-media-sharing-mindset-makes-people-worse-judging-accuracy.

[68] Ibid.

[69] Diresta et al, Telling China's Story, 41

[70] Lili Pike, “How China Uses Global Media to Spread Its Views—and Misinformation,” Grid News, May 18, 2022, 2.

[71] Diresta et al, Telling China's Story, 9. See also Sarah Cook, "Beijing's Global Megaphone: The Expansion of Chinese Communist Party Media Influence since 2017," (Washington, DC: Freedom House, 2020), 7, https://freedomhouse.org/report/special-report/2020/beijings-global-megaphone.

[72] Thibaut, Chinese Discourse Power, 7

[73] Ryan et al, Frontier Influencers, 9

[74] Ryan et al, Frontier Influencers, 3

[75] Beauchamp-Mustafaga and Chase, Borrowing a Boat, 101

[76] Beauchamp-Mustafaga and Chase, Borrowing a Boat, 104

[77] Edward Wong, " U.S. Fights Bioweapons Disinformation Pushed by Russia and China," The New York Times, March 10, 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/10/us/politics/russia-ukraine-china-bioweapons.html

[78] Elise Thomas, “QANON goes to China – via Russia,” Institute for Strategic Dialogue, Last Modified March 23, 2022, https://www.isdglobal.org/digital_dispatches/qanon-goes-to-china-via-russia/.

[79] Department of State, Global Engagement Center, Brief to Eisenhower School Seminar on Operations in the Information Environment, March 17, 2023.

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Earlier this year, The Strategy Bridge asked civilian and military students around the world to participate in our seventh annual student writing contest on the subject of strategy.

Now, we are pleased to present an essay selected for Honorable Mention from Tyler Self, a student at the Naval Postgraduate School.

The conventional wisdom of naval analysts maintains that a country’s maritime strategy occupies a place of prime importance in determining the course of its naval shipbuilding. According to Sir Julian Corbett, “Classes of ships which constitute a fleet are, or ought to be, the expression in material of the strategical and tactical ideas that prevail at any given time.”[1] Alfred Thayer Mahan also writes, “Conditions and weapons change; but to cope with the one or successfully wield the others, respect must be had to…those wider operations of war which are comprised under the name of strategy.”[2] More recently, Andrew S. Erickson has written that “ships are the ultimate embodiment of maritime strategy,” while other analysts state that “ships are the essential element of the ‘means’ by which the ‘ends’ of maritime strategy are achieved.”[3] In a study of late-nineteenth century U.S. naval expansion, Benjamin Apt observed, “A powerful nation did not make do with accumulated older craft simply because they were at hand but rather constructed its navy according to explicit strategic requirements.”[4] These authors bare this premise explicitly, but the idea behind much of their analysis is never overtly stated.

*Alfred Thayer Mahan and Sir Julian Corbett (Wikimedia and Project Gutenberg)*

How does a country’s maritime strategy determine fleet design? An ideal, rational model involves a flow of requirements. This may be conceptually understood by the following formulation: maritime strategy exists as a component of grand strategy and establishes mission requirements, which in turn generate capabilities requirements, before final decision on shipbuilding’s technical requirements. By linking ends and means, strategy should ensure acquisitions and innovation remain directed toward a clearly defined goal.

Such a framework resembles the structure of the U.S. military’s first unified maritime strategy document.[5] Procedurally, the process outlined above resembles how former US Secretary of the Navy Andrew Lehman described the 1986 US maritime strategy’s role in shipbuilding. “First strategy, then requirements, then the [Program Objective Memorandum], then budget,” he said.[6] In order to ensure “strategic guidance and priorities…strongly influence the plans across the shipbuilding plan horizon,” the U.S. Navy’s resource allocation process involves planning, programming, budgeting, and execution in consecutive steps.[7]

In contrast to the ideal, rational model, the influence of non-strategic factors, defined as ideas or desires not derived from maritime strategy, often impose themselves on naval shipbuilding. While always present in the compound thinking of decision-makers, when their influence supersedes that of maritime strategy, it may be expected that incongruence between strategy and ship capability results. Maritime strategies often change as a country grows in power, and therefore historical case studies of countries that grew from fledgling navies to powerful fleets may shed light on where, when, and how non-strategic factors supersede maritime strategy in naval shipbuilding.

A case study of Imperial Germany presents an opportunity to test the influence of maritime strategy in naval expansion from what Holger H. Herwig calls “modest beginnings.”[8] Germany embarked on intentional naval expansions that elevated the navy from its early modesty. While the constituent kingdoms and duchies that combined to form it possessed few ships, by pursuing naval expansion effectively from embryonic beginnings, Imperial Germany inhabited an ideal context in which the formulation and execution of maritime strategy can be observed due to its lack of naval tradition. Study of its naval expansion allows for control of the variable of inheritance, as well as any inertia associated with the old ways of doing things.

The analysis below proceeds first by establishing where Germany’s navy stood in certain eras and what maritime strategy it embraced, then outlines how its naval shipbuilding reflected strategy. After that, discrepancies are examined to determine the role of non-strategic factors. By a disaggregation of strategic and non-strategic factors, the case study will parse apart the diverse motives driving decision-making in shipbuilding programs.

The Stosch Era, 1872-1883When Germany unified in 1871, the Imperial German Navy (IGN) inherited the Prussian shipbuilding program and a small navy of iron-clads and armored frigates from the North German Confederation.[9] The Prussian program, passed in 1867, called for the construction of “sixteen armored warships, twenty unarmored corvettes, eight dispatch boats,” and twenty-two gunboats over ten years.[10] This modest navy reflected its relative unimportance to German strategic thinking.

Rolf Hobson traces the beginnings of the German school of naval thought to Alfred Stenzel, “the first teacher of naval strategy and history at the Marine-Akademie” from 1875-1881.[11] Hobson characterizes Stenzel as “the most pronounced representative of tendencies within early German naval thought which can also be substantiated by other references,” and describes his naval thought as “one long attempt to baptize Clausewitz with salt water.”[12] The substance of Stenzel’s thought may be summarized in the following passage:

Whether directly or indirectly: The destruction of the enemy forces is the foundation of all military activity; in order to bring it about, we have only one means, combat. The end for which the crew is recruited, clothed, trained and fed, for which the ships are built, equipped, and armed—is simply to fight at the right time at the right place.[13]

Stenzel held naval warfare to be “essentially very similar” to land warfare, and Hobson writes that he “seem[ed] to regard secondary operations such as commerce interdiction and blockade as akin to Clausewitz’s pursuit after battle: the object is to complete the destruction of the enemy’s organized resistance.”[14] Nevertheless, as Hobson argues, Stenzel’s teaching “provided the theoretical framework within which the Imperial Navy developed” until Alfred von Tirpitz.[15]

Albrecht von Stosch, appointed as Germany’s first chief of the Imperial Admiralty in January 1872, sought to shape the navy as an adjunct to the army. As an army general himself, he called the navy a “living coastal defence,” and Holger Herwig characterizes the role of Stosch’s navy as “prevent[ing] an enemy landing on German soil and, if possible, safeguard[ing] German coastal cities from enemy shelling.”[16] He viewed the navy as an extension of land power, even formulating naval tactics based on that of infantry, and swore to circumscribe naval growth when he told the Reichstag, “I do not believe that we are called…to compete with states that have already developed large fleets.”[17] In a new country that owed its unification to its powerful army, such a position by the head of the navy would not register controversy. As David Olivier would observe of Stosch’s navy, it “was an unofficial subsection of the army, and any efforts expended on behalf of the navy were in no way to interfere with the needs of the army.”[18] The appointments of Stosch and his successor Leo von Caprivi to head the navy, while serving as army generals, virtually ensured the priority of the army in military spending, as the navy would lack a forceful advocate in spending matters.

In part due to his influence with the Reichstag, Stosch secured its near unanimous rejection of large ships in April 1873.[19] The account provided by Olivier depicts Stosch admitting the army must come first and that the navy’s role must remain confined to coastal defense, blockade prevention, and “overseas duties,” the last of which was understood to mean showing the flag, merchant escort, and guerre de course in wartime.[20] In rejecting larger warships, Stosch and the Reichstag rejected guerre d'escadre against Britain or France.

In 1873, upon concluding that the 1867 shipbuilding plan could not be met in time, Stosch commenced a new expansion plan to add to the armored fleet five corvettes, and two floating batteries, as well as an additional eight corvettes, four dispatch boats, and twenty-two torpedo boats to the unarmored fleet.[21] (Stosch would later cancel the floating batteries and dispatch boats in favor of thirteen armored gunboats.[22]) Torpedo boats and gunboats would suffice to protect the North Sea coast because “in it the vulnerable area was limited to the Elbe, Weser, and Jade estuaries.”[23] The eight new unarmored corvettes procured under this plan, already obsolete by the time of completion, would become the overseas workhorses of the German navy for two decades in showing the flag, gunboat diplomacy, and colonial matters.[24] The armored corvettes, meanwhile, suffered from “limited range, seaworthiness, and fighting value.”[25] Stosch’s 1873 expansion program set the agenda conceptually until the end of his tenure, and as the only systematic program until 1898, its influence percolated into decision-making until Tirpitz. With few exceptions, Germany would adhere to Stosch’s 1873 naval expansion program even beyond its expiration.

As Sondhaus points out, however, Stosch’s 1873 program had few direct connections to the strategic needs of the state.[26] Olivier writes that it possessed a “contradiction…between the demands of defence in home waters and an emphasis on lighter cruising vessels.”[27] The Leipzig- and Bismarck-class unarmored corvettes, built for commerce raiding, posed an intractable strategic problem in the fact that they could not attack enemy commerce without overseas support—which the government refused to provide by refraining from colonialism—while it was also widely understood they would be useless in fleet action against a first-rate maritime power in European waters.[28] Toward the end of his tenure, Stosch would argue his shipbuilding program increased Germany’s value as an ally, and Caprivi would later echo this argument in 1884, even as other European countries’ naval expansions surged past Germany’s.[29]

The primary benefits of Stosch’s 1873 plan lay in Stosch’s intentions outside the realm of maritime strategy. His close friend Gustav Freytag recalled that “he expressed his determination to have everything that the German navy required procured in Germany.”[30] As a newcomer to the maritime realm, Germany lacked the manufacturers and facilities to build or maintain modern ships. Stosch, however, awarded all gun contracts to the German company Krupp, and commissioned companies like A.G. Weser in Bremen, A.G. Vulcan in Stettin, Norddeutsche Schiffbeau A.G. of Kiel, and the imperial shipyard in Danzig to build his ships.[31] German shipyards evolved and modernized as a result. Sometimes, however, Stosch’s patronage of German industry came at a price. Even as “compound iron-and-steel” armor rendered the navy’s planned armored corvettes obsolete, Stosch persisted in their construction, utilizing “‘sandwich’ armor of alternating wrought iron and teak” from a Dillengen foundry.[32] Nevertheless, Stosch’s fleet plan “freed the navy from its dependence on foreign builders and supplies” and therefore “laid the foundation of the naval-industrial complex that helped make Germany a first-class sea power after the turn of the century.”[33]

By stimulating German domestic industry, Stosch’s naval expansion also assisted Germany’s recovery from the depression of the 1870s and helped stamp out socialist agitation. Besides rising employment within the private and imperial shipyards, Sondhaus writes that Stosch, “to retain experienced workers…did not hesitate to authorize the imperial shipyards to pay higher wages than their private counterparts.”[34] Sondhaus also documents how the imperial shipyard in Kiel, already a “hotbed of Social Democratic sentiment,” retained skilled workers by “habitually hir[ing] workers idled by strikes at private shipyards and machine shops.”[35] By providing employment to the burgeoning working-class on the coast, Stosch’s shipbuilding program kept laborers too busy to protest.

From Caprivi to Tirpitz, 1883-1897 Leo von Caprivi, Chief of the Admiralty (Wikimedia)

With the appointment of Stosch’s successor, Leo von Caprivi, in early 1883, the navy entered an improvisational era lacking any systematic shipbuilding programs. Caprivi informed the Reichstag that he would “focus on short-term goals rather than propose another long-term plan.”[36] Also an army general, he described his own intention to keep the navy “within narrow limits, as narrow as our conditions permit.”[37]

According to Sondhaus, in the period of 1883-1888 the Imperial German Navy suffered from “tactical and strategic confusion that reigned under Caprivi.”[38] That Caprivi was an army general, like Stosch, almost certainly made him susceptible to maritime strategic confusion in an era filled with innovation in technology that seemed to threaten old ways of thinking. Caprivi’s tenure coincided with the popularity of the French Jeune École school. At the theoretical level, the debate between these two schools of thought created uncertainties that derailed any hope for a second systematic naval shipbuilding program.

The Jeune École was perhaps most of all responsible for confusion in maritime strategy and shipbuilding in the 1880s. It achieved popularity thanks to the writings of French maritime theorists Richild Grivel, Théophile Aube, and Gabriel Charmes.[39] Grivel wrote that the French navy could not “permit itself any illusions regarding an inequality so clearly revealed by geography, history, and statistics.”[40] After conceding British superiority at sea, the Jeune École aimed to articulate “what [a navy] could achieve in a position of inferiority, with the limited resources at hand,” and emphasized coastal defense using torpedo boats and gunboats to prevent decisive defeat of one’s army, as well as cruisers for waging war on a superior enemy’s shipping to whittle down its economy.[41] In Charmes’s words, the Jeune École “seek[s] by a series of individual catastrophes to destroy general prosperity.”[42]

As for Caprivi, he appears to have endorsed a view closer to Stenzel’s school of thought than that of the Jeune École. Upon taking office, he convened an Admiralty Council that affirmed major principles of the Jeune École, especially commerce raiding, but Caprivi chose to reject the Council’s conclusions regarding cruiser warfare two months later before the Reichstag.[43] As an army man, Caprivi embraced the navy’s roles in coastal defense and in challenging blockades, despite acknowledging that the Imperial German Navy could not hope to destroy those of the great naval powers. He wrote, “Rules for a melee are few and simple. For every ship sunk a hostile ship must be incapacitated. No ship should leave the melee as long as it can use any of its weapons. Torpedo-boats are not to leave the melee when they have used up their torpedoes, but are to hinder hostile torpedo boats.”[44]

To best prepare for the envisioned melees off the German coast, Caprivi hoped to boost the navy’s battle fleet. He wrote that “wherever there is struggle for control of a part of a sea, one cannot dispense with armored ships…A navy which concentrates on the land or on the coast no longer deserves its name.”[45] However, rapid innovation in nickel-steel armor, smokeless powders, and armor-piercing shells threatened any battle fleet construction with immediate obsolescence.[46] Caprivi, mindful of the possibility of wasting money on the navy, wrote that “a navy like ours cannot afford the luxury of failed experiments…We will rather proceed cautiously in the area of development of armoured ships.”[47] Construction of the Siegfried-class armored ships would wait until 1887, while Caprivi chose instead to build seventy torpedo boats for coastal defense and ten unarmored cruisers.[48]

*A lithograph of the Siegfried-class coastal defense ship SMS Heimdall (Wikimedia)*

By delaying construction of the Siegfried-class, Caprivi’s tenure resulted in employment at private shipyards and the imperial shipyard at Kiel falling almost 50% because, as Sondhaus observes, Caprivi’s ad hoc constructions did not provide the “the numbers of jobs nor the stimulus for domestic industry that larger armored projects had in the past.”[49] In torpedo boat construction, the navy awarded nearly all contracts to Schichau of Elbing, but divided the considerably fewer cruiser projects between all other shipyards.[50]

Kaiser Wilhelm II replaced Caprivi in July 1888 with Vice Admiral Count von Monts, the first navy man to lead the Imperial German Navy. His seven-month tenure, and those of Vice Admiral Baron von der Goltz from January 1889 to May 1895 and Admiral Eduard von Knorr from May 1895 to February 1897, remained bedeviled by the Jeune École with uncertainties in the effectiveness of fleet actions and commerce raiding.[51] The accession of Wilhelm II to the throne in mid-1888 caused further development confusion. His naval thinking reflected the broader debate in miniature, and he constantly wavered between the philosophies of the Jeune École and a Mahanian battle fleet.[52] Building programs under Monts and Goltz featured torpedo boats, cruisers, dispatch vessels, and even the Brandenburg- and Kaiser Friedrich III-class battleships, such that one liberal politician lamented the “limitless fleet plans.”[53]

The twenty-five-year period beginning with the appointment of Stosch and ending with the appointment of Tirpitz is one of immature developments in German maritime strategy. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it shares with Stenzel’s body of thought a profound lack of “an ideology of sea power.”[54] What is more, the influence of the Jeune École, whose popularity coincided with Caprivi’s tenure in the 1880s, exhibited an influence that further confused German naval thought, as Caprivi himself oscillated between opinions of commerce raiding as either “an anachronism” or “decisive.”[55] The only axiom that remained constant was the need for the navy to provide coastal defense.

During this era, a period marked by rapid technological change and skyrocketing costs of naval shipbuilding, German leaders chose not to compete with the great naval powers at naval expansion. Instead, naval shipbuilding occurred in furtherance of maritime strategy based heavily on land warfare and the consequent primacy of the army. Nevertheless, the construction of more robust ships, such as Stosch’s Sachsen-class armored corvettes, reflected a need to supply German industry with projects that filled capacity and spurred employment, even at the expense of heightened costs and immediate obsolescence.

The Tirpitz Era, 1897-1916With the ascension of Alfred von Tirpitz to state secretary of the Imperial Navy Office, the Imperial German Navy gained an advocate with a vision for true, systematic naval expansion endorsed by the Kaiser. Already, in 1894, he had advocated for a modern battlefleet in Service Memorandum IX, where he argued:

A state that has sea interests or—what is equivalent—world interests must be able to represent them and to make its power felt beyond territorial waters. National world trade, world industry, and to a certain extent high-seas fisheries, world transportation, and colonies are impossible without a fleet capable of taking the offensive.[56]

*Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz (Wikimedia)*

By pursuing Tirpitz’s vision, the Imperial German Navy would free itself from the domination of army priorities, as well as alienate Great Britain by its challenge in the maritime domain.

German maritime strategy underwent fundamental change under Tirpitz. The navy’s mission before his tenure emphasized coastal defense, showing the flag overseas, and sometimes commerce raiding, but Tirpitz sought to strengthen the fleet past such strategies that implied naval weakness. While sometimes inconsistent in his precise mission for the navy, he sought to reorient the fleet toward an offensive posture. At his most optimistic, Tirpitz calculated that by achieving a 2:3 ratio of battleships with Britain, Germany could dominate the North Sea due to a combination of its greater concentration of warships in theater and greater number of warships kept in active service.[57] Germany could wield this threat like “a sharp knife, held gleaming and ready only a few inches away from the jugular vein” of Britain.[58] At his most pessimistic, Tirpitz’s Risk Theory, outlined in his preamble to the second Navy Law, argued that victory at sea did not necessarily need to occur, because “the destruction of the German fleet would so much damage the enemy that his own position as a world power would be brought into question.”[59] In other words, a pyrrhic victory by the Royal Navy would neutralize the British fleet from the war and permanently weaken Britain on the international stage.

Tirpitz’s Mahanian bent in maritime strategy came to dominate German naval thinking due to the promotional and repressive efforts of Tirpitz himself. In 1898, Tirpitz ordered the distribution of a German translation of Mahan’s The Influence of Sea Power upon History, whose popularity worldwide strengthened Tirpitz’s strategic theories, already formulated in 1894.[60] He paired these promotional efforts with repression when a book written by Vice Admiral Curt von Maltzahn, planned for publication in 1899, “stressed the advantage of avoiding sea battle against overwhelming forces and suggested that the battle fleet should not dominate the fleet's resources, so as to retain the flexible use of cruiser warfare.”[61] By utilizing his proximity to the Kaiser, Tirpitz succeeded in preventing the book’s publication and suppressing its discussion by officers in public.[62] Even the Kaiser’s idea of a cruiser-battleship hybrid never made headway, and Tirpitz subjected other detractors to personal attacks.[63] In short, as Herwig writes, “young officers who associated too closely with cruiser or submarine tactics could be assured of short careers.”[64]

As part of directing the Imperial German Navy toward a Mahanian offensive strategy, Tirpitz spearheaded a naval expansion program that emphasized the battle fleet. Wilhelm II signaled this significant reversal of course in an order that “greater expenditure on coastal defenses be avoided and that those defense measures made necessary by the increase of the fleet be assigned higher priority than others.”[65] With the goal of sixty capital ships and forty light cruisers, his Naval Laws of 1898 and 1900, as well as various supplementary bills, mandated that the navy acquire modern battleships, armored cruisers, and light cruisers from German shipyards and automatically replace commissioned ships after set service lives.[66] Even after Britain’s HMS Dreadnought transformed the naval arms race in 1906, Tirpitz and his inner circle decided to continue their building program in the face of dire financial straits and without consultation with other financial and strategic stakeholders.[67]

While Tirpitz represented a sea change in maritime strategy and naval shipbuilding, his expansion program was also informed and motivated by domestic factors. Perhaps most contentious in the historiography is how much to understand Tirpitz’s naval expansion as “social imperialism.”[68] According to this explanation, German imperialism served to hinder the forces of liberalization and socialism, and thereby maintain the privileged status of conservatives and industrialists. This social-historical explanation relies on Tirpitz’s private letters, such as when he wrote, “In this new and important national task of imperialism and in the economic gain that will result from it, we have a powerful palliative against both educated and uneducated social democrats.”[69] Because Tirpitz and Kaiser Wilhelm II viewed the fleet as the growing instrument of Germany’s imperial power, historians like Hans-Ulrich Wehler and Eckert Kehr conclude that the Imperial German Navy under Tirpitz expanded for this reason.[70] Strongest of all, Kehr argues that all German armament policy may be understood through this lens when he writes, “The actors were under the impression that they were acting independently, and yet…they merely executed what was predetermined by social power relations.”[71]

While contentious in the historiography over how much they explain German leaders’ decision-making, social-historical factors shed considerable light on how Tirpitz consolidated domestic political support for the passage of his Navy Laws through the Reichstag. Appeals to special interests in Hanseatic cities like Hamburg and heavy industry became vital to dispelling resistance aroused by Berlin banks and university professors.[72] The Reichstag coalition that passed the 1900 Navy Law consisted of middle-class industrialists and conservative agrarians.[73] While the industrialists stood to profit from building the ships, the agrarians received tariffs on imported cereal grains that privileged domestic agriculture and helped offset the budget deficits exacerbated by Tirpitz’s shipbuilding program.[74]

The interests of industrialists shaped the modernization of the fleet, sometimes to its detriment. From 1894, Krupp, in conjunction with Dillinger, held a monopoly on nickel-steel armor and guns that “constantly drove ship prices up” between 1894 and 1909, before the American Midvale Company began to compete with Krupp armor in Germany.[75] The soaring price of capital ships, especially after the launch of HMS Dreadnought, became the recurring objection of Reichstag deputies. Even in 1897, backlash from the pro-navy Center party against a navy budget that included construction of a single Kaiser Friedrich III-class battleship forced the budget commission to reduce its estimates by 19%.[76] By 1908, with resistance building, Tirpitz resorted in some cases to awarding contracts for battleships and cruisers without prior approval by the Reichstag.[77]

*Lithograph of the battleship SMS Kaiser Friedrich III (Wikimedia)*

Tirpitz’s policies within the navy also led to the slow adoption of turbine propulsion in German battleships. Turbine engines represented a significant improvement in surface ship propulsion. HMS Dreadnought was the first battleship constructed around a turbine engine plant, although British naval experimentation with the Parsons turbine had occurred since 1901.[78] Tirpitz, however, restricted navy procurement to German firms and left all innovation to the private sector.[79] These policies enabled the British to maintain superiority in speed and firepower for some time. The reciprocating engines of the Imperial German Navy forced its battleships to use two guns with hexagonal mountings on each side, instead of Dreadnought’s centerline turrets that brought more guns to bear during a single broadside.[80] Eventually, the navy contracted with Parsons, but because Tirpitz refused so long to either rely on a foreign firm such as Parsons or to steer turbine development, the Imperial German Navy did not construct its first turbine-powered battleship until 1911.[81]

Perhaps the most glaring departure from Tirpitz’s fleet plan was the German submarine program. Tirpitz was outspoken about the submarine’s incongruency with German maritime strategy. “The U-boat is, at present, of no great value in war at sea,” he said.[82] Nevertheless, “under pressure from close aides,” Tirpitz contracted with Krupp to build the Imperial German Navy’s first submarine in 1904, and authorized 1.5 million German Marks for experimentation.[83] The popularity of the Jeune École and commerce raiding had not faded in France, and as a result French improvements in submarine technology caught the eye of some in the Imperial German Navy.[84] Tirpitz never succeeded in completely stamping out other maritime theorists like Karl Gakter, Kurt von Maltzahn, and Lothar Persius from advocating commerce raiding.[85] According to Tirpitz’s memoirs, the Imperial German Navy’s experimentation with submarines sought to improve their propulsion, so as to increase their blue water capabilities.[86] Six years of testing proved the superiority of diesel engines over petrol engines, and from 1910 to 1914 the Imperial German Navy ordered twenty-six submarines.[87] It should be noted that, unlike Tirpitz’s battleships, submarine acquisition was greatly assisted by the fact that they “tended to come in extremely close to contract cost,” which aided their continued funding by the Reichstag.[88]

ConclusionGermany did not have a strong maritime tradition, and its navy began as an extension of army power, whose force had united their nation. As such, it functioned as a coastal defense force with little to no independence from land-based power. In its earliest days, articulated maritime strategies remained conspicuously absent, although maritime strategizing certainly occurred. Not until it reached a mature stage did Germany begin to articulate explicit maritime strategy.

Beyond strategy, domestic factors in Imperial Germany impacted naval shipbuilding. Domestic factors could strengthen naval expansion or constrain it. In Germany, naval shipbuilding became an important source for the Kaiser and navy leaders to pay to the blue-collar classes in places like Kiel, Bremen, Danzig, and Wilhelmshaven. As centers of social-democratic organization, reliable employment in these cities minimized the opportunity for shipyard workers to organize. The navy’s patronage of shipyard-related industries also subsidized technological innovation in sectors such as armor and steel.

It may be inferred, therefore, that the conventional wisdom of the primacy of maritime strategy in naval shipbuilding may also hold true for mature navies. At all times, but especially for rising navies, non-strategic factors such as economic subsidies and technological innovation may exhibit influences that precede or override maritime strategy in naval shipbuilding. Put another way, leaders often exhibit composite thinking in naval shipbuilding decisions, but maritime strategy’s primacy does not always hold.

Tyler Self is an officer in the U.S. Navy. His first assignment was Auxiliaries Officer onboard USS INDEPENDENCE (LCS 2) from 2017 to 2020. His second assignment was Anti-Submarine Warfare Officer on USS MUSTIN (DDG 89) from 2020 to 2022. He is currently at the Naval Postgraduate School, where he is completing a thesis on Chinese maritime strategy and naval shipbuilding.

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Header Image: Master-at-Arms 2nd Class Taylor Gawryluk, Gulf of Aden, 2021 (Master-at-Arms 2nd Class Dana Cisneros).

Notes: [1] Julian S. Corbett, Some Principles of Maritime Strategy (New York: Longmans, Green and Co., 1918), 93.

[2] Alfred Thayer Mahan, The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 (Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1898), 7, https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.32044013659107&view=1up&seq=9.

[3] Andrew S. Erickson and Manfred Meyer, in Modern Chinese Maritime Forces, ed. Larry Bond and Chris Carlson (Admiralty Trilogy Group, 2022), 3; Christopher P. Carlson and Jack Bianchi, “Warfare Drivers: Mission Needs and the Impact on Ship Design,” in Chinese Naval Shipbuilding: An Ambitious and Uncertain Course, ed. Andrew S. Erickson (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2016), 19.

[4] Benjamin L. Apt, “Mahan’s Forebears: The Debate Over Maritime Strategy, 1868-1883,” Naval War College Review 50, no. 3 (Summer 1997): 105, https://www.jstor.org/stable/44638752.

[5] A Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower (Washington, DC: United States Marine Corps, United States Dept. of the Navy, United States Coast Guard, 2007).

[6] Dmitry Filipoff, “Secretary John Lehman on Strategic Credibility and Leveraging Command of the Seas,” Center for International Maritime Security, March 22, 2021, https://cimsec.org/secretary-john-lehman-on-strategic-credibility-and-leveraging-command-of-the-seas/.

[7] Irv Blickstein et al., Navy Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution: A Reference Guide for Senior Leaders, Managers, and Action Officers (Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 2016), 8, https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/tools/TL200/TL224/RAND_TL224.pdf; Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, Report to Congress on the Annual Long-Range Plan for Construction of Naval Vessels for Fiscal Year 2023 (Washington, DC: Pentagon, 2022), 10, https://media.defense.gov/2022/Apr/20/2002980535/-1/-1/0/PB23%20SHIPBUILDING%20PLAN%2018%20APR%202022%20FINAL.PDF.

[8] Holger H. Herwig, “Luxury” Fleet: The Imperial German Navy 1888-1918 (London: The Ashfield Press, 1987), 9.

[9] Lawrence Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik: German Sea Power Before the Tirpitz Era (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1997), 108–9.

[10] Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 86.

[11] Rolf Hobson, The German School of Naval Thought and the Origins of the Tirpitz Plan 1875 ~ 1900 (Oslo: Institutt for Forsvarsstudier, 1996), 18, https://fhs.brage.unit.no/fhs-xmlui/handle/11250/99521.

[12] Hobson, The German School, 18–19.

[13] As quoted in Hobson, The German School, 21.

[14] Hobson, The German School, 21.

[15] Hobson, The German School, 22.

[16] As quoted in Herwig, Luxury Fleet, 13.

[17] Herwig, Luxury Fleet, 13; Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 108.

[18] David H. Olivier, German Naval Strategy, 1856-1888: Forerunners to Tirpitz (New York: Taylor & Francis, 2004), 91.

[19] Olivier, German Naval Strategy, 89, 96.

[20] Olivier, German Naval Strategy, 89, 91.

[21] Ivo Nikolai Lambi, The Navy and German Power Politics, 1862-1914 (Boston: Allen & Unwin, 1984), 5.

[22] Lambi, The Navy, 6.

[23] Lambi, The Navy, 5.

[24] Lambi, The Navy, 6; Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 114.

[25] Lambi, The Navy, 6.

[26] Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 143.

[27] Olivier, German Naval Strategy, 99.

[28] Olivier, 106.

[29] Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 143, 168.

[30] Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 111.

[31] Olivier, German Naval Strategy, 105; Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 111, 114.

[32] Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 136.

[33] Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 111, 140.

[34] Lawrence Sondhaus, “The Imperial German Navy and Social Democracy, 1878-1897,” German Studies Review 18, no. 1 (February 1995): 52, https://www.jstor.org/stable/1431518.

[35] Sondhaus, 53, 55.

[36] Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 153.

[37] As quoted in Lambi, The Navy, 6.

[38] Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 172.

[39] Arne Røksund, The Jeune École: The Strategy of the Weak (Boston: Brill, 2007), 1, 6, https://doi.org/10.1163/ej.9789004157231.i-242.

[40] As quoted in Røksund, 3.

[41] Røksund, x–xi, 7; Lawrence Sondhaus, Naval Warfare, 1815-1914 (New York: Taylor and Francis, 2012), 142, https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203132234.

[42] As quoted in Røksund, 8.

[43] Olivier, German Naval Strategy, 145, 147.

[44] As quoted in Lambi, The Navy, 10.

[45] Lambi, The Navy, 7.

[46] Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 180; Herwig, Luxury Fleet, 26.

[47] As quoted in Olivier, German Naval Strategy, 147.

[48] Lambi, The Navy, 9; Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 166.

[49] Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 165, 168.

[50] Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 164, 166.

[51] Lambi, The Navy, 9.

[52] Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 176.

[53] As quoted in Herwig, Luxury Fleet, 25.

[54] Hobson, The German School, 21.

[55] Lambi, The Navy, 6, 9.

[56] As quoted in Dirk Bönker, “Global Politics and Germany’s Destiny ‘from an East Asian Perspective’: Alfred von Tirpitz and the Making of Wilhelmine Navalism,” Central European History 46, no. 1 (March 2013): 73, https://www.jstor.org/stable/43280550.

[57] Herwig, Luxury Fleet, 36.

[58] Paul Kennedy, “Tirpitz, England and the Second Navy Law of 1900: A Strategical Critique,” Militärgeschichtliche Mitteilungen, no. 2 (1970): 38, ProQuest.

[59] As quoted in Hobson, The German School, 47.

[60] Holger H. Herwig, “The Failure of German Sea Power, 1914-1945: Mahan, Tirpitz, and Raeder Reconsidered,” The International History Review 10, no. 1 (February 1988): 69, https://doi.org/10.1080/07075332.1988.9640469.

[61] John B. Hattendorf, “The Caird Lecture, 2000: The Anglo‐French Naval Wars (1689–1815) in Twentieth‐Century Naval Thought,” Journal for Maritime Research 3, no. 1 (2001): 55, https://doi.org/10.1080/21533369.2001.9668312.

[62] Lambi, The Navy, 166.

[63] Herwig, Luxury Fleet, 38; Carl-Axel Gemzell, Organization, Conflict, and Innovation: A Study of German Naval Strategic Planning, 1888-1940 (Stockholm: Esselte Studium, 1973), 60–61.

[64] Herwig, Luxury Fleet, 39.

[65] Lambi, The Navy, 168.

[66] Herwig, Luxury Fleet, 36.

[67] Holger H. Herwig, “The German Reaction to the Dreadnought Revolution,” The International History Review 13, no. 2 (May 1991): 278, https://www.jstor.org/stable/40106367.

[68] Hans-Ulrich Wehler, “Bismarck’s Imperialism 1862-1890,” trans. Norman Porter, J. Sheehan, and T. W. Mason, Past & Present, no. 48 (August 1970): 151, https://www.jstor.org/stable/650484.

[69] As quoted in Hans-Ulrich Wehler, “Bismarck’s Imperialism 1862-1890,” trans. Norman Porter, J. Sheehan, and T. W. Mason, Past & Present, no. 48 (August 1970): 152, https://www.jstor.org/stable/650484.

[70] Wehler, 153; Eckart Kehr, “Anglophobia and Weltpolitik,” in Economic Interest, Militarism, and Foreign Policy (Berkeley,CA: University of California Press, 1977), 39, 82.

[71] Eckart Kehr, “Class Struggle and Armament Policy in Imperial Germany,” in Economic Interest, Militarism, and Foreign Policy, ed. Gordon A. Craig, trans. Grete Heinz (Berkeley,CA: University of California Press, 1977), 75.

[72] Eckart Kehr, “The Social and Financial Foundations of Tirpitz’s Naval Propaganda,” in Economic Interest, Militarism, and Foreign Policy (Berkeley,CA: University of California Press, 1977), 83–84, 87, 89.

[73] Gary E. Weir, Building the Kaiser’s Navy: The Imperial Navy Office and German Industry in the von Tirpitz Era (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1992), 53.

[74] Weir, 53; Steinberg, “Review: The Tirpitz Plan,” The Historical Journal 16, no. 1 (March 1973): 199, https://www.jstor.org/stable/2637924.

[75] Weir, Building the Kaiser’s Navy, 31, 109.

[76] Sondhaus, Preparing for Weltpolitik, 216, 218.

[77] Herwig, Luxury Fleet, 69.

[78] Herwig, Luxury Fleet, 46.

[79] Weir, Building the Kaiser’s Navy, 29, 95.

[80] Herwig, Luxury Fleet, 59.

[81] Weir, Building the Kaiser’s Navy, 96, 199; Herwig, Luxury Fleet, 46.

[82] As quoted in Weir, Building the Kaiser’s Navy, 52.

[83] Herwig, Luxury Fleet, 86–87.

[84] Gary E. Weir, “Tirpitz, Technology, and Building U-Boats, 1897-1916,” The International History Review 6, no. 2 (May 1984): 178, https://www.jstor.org/stable/40105369.

[85] Weir, “Tirpitz,” 175.

[86] Alfred von Tirpitz, My Memoirs, by Grand-Admiral von Tirpitz, Volume II (England: Hurst & Blackett, 1919), 571, https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc1.31210006877748.

[87] Tirpitz, 572; Herwig, Luxury Fleet, 87.

[88] Weir, “Tirpitz,” 184.

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Earlier this year, The Strategy Bridge asked civilian and military students around the world to participate in our seventh annual student writing contest on the subject of strategy.

Now, we are pleased to present an essay selected for Honorable Mention from Stephen Kopach, a recent graduate of the National War College.

The United States and its adversaries are engaged in a high-stakes contest to gain the upper hand in cyberspace. The U.S. approach to cyber governance—outlined in the Declaration for the Future of the Internet—favors multi-stakeholder engagement to promote an “open, free, global, interoperable, reliable, and secure” Internet.[1] Integral to the U.S.-backed model is a system that promotes fundamental human rights such as freedom of expression and privacy.[2] China and Russia are attempting to assert control over the digital domain by steering the international community toward a closed and controlled model of Internet governance. Authoritarian regimes in Beijing and Moscow have led a movement to challenge the status quo in favor of a system that elevates the concept of cyber sovereignty and seeks to fragment the web into repressive splinternet enclaves.[3] These governments value complete control of all information and networks transiting their territories and are attempting to push this concept through foreign policy engagement. The repressive vision of China and Russia for a closed and controlled Internet threatens America’s long-term national security and economic interests and challenges democratic values, which are advanced through the unrestricted flow of information and ideas on a free and open web.

To counter Russia and China, theUnited States must set conditions to attract international support for its democratic vision of the Internet. To strengthen America’s military and economic leverage over its adversaries, the United States should employ a multi-faceted strategy that persuades the international community to rejectthe illiberal, authoritarian model for cyberspace and align with the West. America can achieve this by continuing its proactive engagement on cyber norm dialogues at the UN and other multilateral forums, countering Chinese and Russian efforts to dominate technical standard-setting international bodies, and outcompeting China in the race to dominate next-generation information communication technology (ICT). In accomplishing these goals, America will constrain China and Russia economically and militarily by limiting their access to advanced technology, increase economic prosperity for American citizens by safeguarding tech innovation and expanding access to new markets, and secure America’s leadership role in a multipolar world weighted technologically and ideologically toward the West.

Authoritarian regimes challenge the existing Internet governance system by advancing competing dialogues in international forums, sponsoring state-backed participants in Internet governance organizations, and establishing information communication technology footholds worldwide. Authoritarian regimes have proposed competing initiatives at the UN and in regional forums to steer the conversation in a self-serving way. In 2019, Russia proposed an alternative dialogue under a UN Open-Ended Working Group (OEWG) construct after the U.S.-backed UN Group of Governmental Experts (GGE) discourse on the norms, rules, and principles of responsible state behavior in cyberspace reached an impasse.[4] Russia objected to the GGE proposal for applying international law to cyberspace, particularly humanitarian law, which they viewed as a threat to sovereignty and an infringement on their domestic affairs.[5] Authoritarian regimes have built legitimacy for their competing model by having additional voices at the table to challenge America’s dominant role in negotiating international cyber norms.[6] An expanded range of international and regional forums allows countries to choose between competing ideas of internet governance models, which can muddy the water and make consensus difficult. Beyond the UN dialogue, Russia and China have sought to shape technical aspects of the cyber environment by manipulating technology standard-setting bodies.

China and Russia have sought to steer dialogue to their favored vision of cyberspace by advancing preferred candidates into leadership roles among multilateral bodies like the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), which influences information communication technology technical standards and protocols.[7] China and Russia often advance hand-picked candidates who will drive technical committee discussions toward their preferred internet standards.[8] According to the Heritage Foundation, an independent think tank:

China, Russia, and other countries have sought for years to impose constraints on the Internet through intergovernmental regulation and treaties to censor or block content and activities they deem offensive or damaging to their interests. They would very much like to shift governance to organizations such as the ITU, where governments enjoy full participation while the private sector’s role is limited.[9]

Russia lost its 2022 bid to lead the International Telecommunications Union against an American contender, providing some near-term relief for open-internet advocates.[10] However, many study groups have representatives from Chinese companies like Huawei and China Telecom holding vice chairmanship positions.[11] Authoritarian regimes will continue to establish new regulatory frameworks and strive to achieve market dominance in information communication technology to dictate the terms of web access.

China has pushed countries to adopt its infrastructure, service providers, and preferred media to establish a foothold in regions where it would like to expand economically and exert political influence.[12] Beijing is developing splinternets under the banner of internet sovereignty and assembling coalitions behind their vision through coercive economic policies.[13] According to Freedom House, an independent internet research nonprofit, “At home and on the international stage, authoritarians are on a campaign to divide the open internet into a patchwork of repressive enclaves.”[14] Many authoritarian countries welcome China’s assistance and see value in having digital infrastructure that allows them to create sovereign networks for maintaining internal control.[15] Beijing uses the Digital Silk Road to lure other countries into accepting its information communication technology, which is steeply discounted through government subsidies.[16] Adopting Chinese infrastructure, in turn, leaves these countries vulnerable to technical exploitation and economic coercion.[17] In 2012, for example, China helped the African Union build its headquarters in Addis Ababa as “a gift from China to the friends of Africa” but put backdoors in the IT infrastructure to monitor and exfiltrate organizational data back to Shanghai.[18] Beijing would like to use its monopoly of markets to push foreign policy goals using aggressive Wolf Warrior and debt trap diplomacy.

The technology war has created new battlegrounds in regions like the Middle East where China is actively courting traditional U.S. regional allies such as Saudi Arabia. Riyadh recently signed agreements for Beijing to build its cloud computing infrastructure.[19] On the other hand, Jordan chose to rip-and-replace Chinese telecom for Western options at a high cost to preserve its security relationship with Washington.[20] This battle is consequential because if China becomes the de facto 5G leader globally, it will have greater leverage in establishing the rules for governance over the associated technology. As authoritarian governments attempt to entice or co-opt middle powers toward their repressive model, the United States should use its own strengths to maintain its role as the global leader in internet governance.

China and Russia will continue to shape cyberspace in ways that ultimately harm U.S. interests unless America pushes back.Tolerance of unacceptable behaviors in cyberspace creates new norms by setting unwanted precedents within the international arena. Efforts by authoritarian regimes to advance the sovereign internet model present a real threat to liberal democracy. Chinese and Russian efforts to shape the Internet to suit their interests warrant a concerted and coordinated response by the United States government and its allies. The United States must implement a strategy to promote a cyberspace aligned with its values where online actors respect international law and human rights.

Shaping and Enforcing Rules and NormsThe first objective of this strategy is to increase support for the U.S.-favored cyber policies in multilateral dialogs. To accomplish this goal, the United States should build tools for promoting American views, enhance its leadership role in international forums, and incentivize states to adhere to established norms and principles for responsible state behavior in cyberspace. This goal requires investment in U.S. cyber resources, sustained diplomatic engagement, and a willingness to call out and punish bad behavior.

The first step is for the United States to develop and invest in means for promoting its views in multilateral dialogs. To achieve meaningful outcomes, the United States must develop expertise, institutions, and tools across the interagency to advocate the U.S. position in cyberspace and foster the development of expertise in cyber policy. The U.S. State Department should continue to build its cadre of foreign and civil service cyber officers with expertise on digital issues and empower them to push cyber issues during bilateral and multilateral negotiations. Workforce development will involve recruiting STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) expertise and providing cyber-specific training and education to the workforce.

The United States can bolster current federal workforce expertise by reinforcing educational institutions and encouraging engagement with public universities. The Foreign Service Institute can closely coordinate with the National Defense University’s College of Information and Cyberspace to build a curriculum on international cyber engagement. The Foreign Service Institute should expand its curriculum to train and equip its officers with the expertise to engage on cyber issues. Its “Cyber Diplomacy Tradecraft” course is a significant first step to improving workforce knowledge and fluency in cyber policy issues.[21] The Department of Education can help grow domestic talent through initiatives like “Raise the Bar: STEM Excellence for All Students,” which aims to improve readiness and global competitiveness and forge closer links between government organizations and academia.[22]

New organizations such as the State Department’s Bureau of Cyberspace and Digital Policy can help foster engagement among allies and partners during international forums. The interagency should also promote cross-organization knowledge through joint rotational assignments and facilitate seamless intergovernmental movement of cyber experts. For example, Cyber Command's hunt forward operators would gain a new perspective by serving in policy roles at the State Department, while diplomats could gain an appreciation of the utility of offensive technical operations by completing a tour at combat support agencies like the National Security Agency (NSA). The government should also encourage increased circulation of cyber expertise between the government and the private sector through sabbaticals and cross-training programs. People are attracted to the private sector for salaries and perks like telework but are attracted to government service because of the unique mission and sense of purpose.[23] To improve retention and encourage a whole-of-government cyber workforce, the government should create pathways for experts to move back and forth between the government and private sector.

By leveraging these new capabilities,the United States can maintain its leadership role in international cyber-governance dialogues. A more capable cyber diplomacy workforce can more effectively convince global community members to adhere to established cyber norms through sustained bilateral, regional, and multilateral engagement.[24] The State Department’s mission at the UN will continue to advocate the U.S. position to the global community. The UN First Committee, which covers disarmament and international security, also handles the cyber governance discussions under the frameworks of the Group of Governmental Experts and Open-Ended Working Group, has played an instrumental role in setting up the global cyber rules of the road.[25] Norms established through years of back-and-forth negotiations have helped reduce risk by encouraging confidence-building measures, increased transparency, mutual predictability, collaboration, and measures of restraint. Diplomats also play critical roles in multilateral organizations like the G7 and regional forums like the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the Organization of American States (OAS), where area-specific issues are considered. The State Department must continue bilateral talks with countries based on the unique needs and circumstances of the relationship, often based on requests for U.S. assistance in technology infrastructure and development.[26] Together, these efforts are developing a standard code of conduct in cyberspace and building cyber capacity among friends and allies.

Embassy country teams worldwide should be empowered to lead initiatives with foreign governments on cyber-related issues. Cyber liaisons at each embassy can forge relationships with host nation cyber organizations and facilitate U.S. private industry engagement to help build partner capacity and business relationships. Most embassies have a foreign service officer that handles the cyber portfolio, but this is often one of many issues they cover.[27] Cyber should not be relegated to a collateral duty but a primary area of expertise and focus. Where not doing so already, Ambassadors should convene cyber and technology country team working groups that bring together interagency partners within the embassy to manage cyber engagement.

During interagency engagement with foreign actors, representatives of the U.S. government should encourage their counterparts to reaffirm their commitment to the voluntary, non-binding norms established under the UN Group of Governmental Experts framework for responsible state behavior in cyberspace.[28] These include interstate cooperation on cyber incident response and combating cybercrime, agreement to not conduct cyber-attacks against critical infrastructure, respect for privacy and human rights in cyberspace, and agreement not to harm cyber emergency response teams.[29] The goal should be to reinforce the non-binding frameworks and provide training to countries on the value of these principles to promote stability. The United States interagency must set an example by upholding expected standards of behavior in cyberspace wherever practicable. This means closer coordination between the Department of Defense, the Intelligence Community, and the Department of State and deconfliction at the National Security Council to weigh the benefits of offensive cyber efforts against possible disruption of other foreign policy initiatives. The NSA is constantly engaged with interagency partners, including through representatives at embassies, to weigh the implications of cyber initiatives on diplomatic efforts and how the two can work together toward the best outcome for national security.[30]

For the final line of effort, the United States should incentivize adherence to consensus-based norms and prepare to punish egregious violations. Washington can incentivize acceptance and adherence to the international code of conduct by offering security and economic benefits to those who align with the West. This could include preferential trade partnerships brokered by the Department of Commerce’s International Trade Administration and the U.S. Trade Representative for nations engaging in responsible cyberspace behavior. Conversely, the United States can threaten to withhold such benefits for states that violate rules and impose costs through sanctions and other punitive measures. For instance, the Department of Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control can implement economic sanctions in response to unacceptable acts. The International Trade Administration can create export controls on advanced technologies.

The State Department can wield the diplomatic and information instruments of power to help establish consensus on violations of norms to form a free world coalition that can stand together to condemn unacceptable cyber behavior. America must maintain the drumbeat during diplomatic engagements on U.S. red lines and be prepared to act when they are violated. If groups of states are willing to attribute attacks to a particular belligerent, they can collectively agree on appropriate retaliatory measures. In 2018, the so-called Five-Eye partners and other allied states attributed the NotPetya ransomware attack to Russia GRU and later activities of a Chinese cyber intellectual property theft to China's Ministry of State Security.[31] This type of group naming-and-shaming can be effective in deterring future activity and arm diplomats ahead of negotiations with China and Russia. The United States should wield cyber and non-cyber tools as points of leverage to impose costs and hold our adversaries at risk.

In select cases, punitive actions may include a military response to cyber-attacks violating international law above certain thresholds. U.S. Cyber Command can retaliate in kind against cyber-attacks or create strategic ambiguity with other instruments of power. There are many cyber lessons learned from the conflict in Ukraine. As the cyber environment has matured, the U.S. Defense Enterprise has figured out what works and what fails. For cyber deterrence, the key is reciprocity of value rather than effect.[32] The Defense Department should be ready to employ all measures including U.S. military force to punish violations exceeding certain thresholds, such as a catastrophic attack on domestic infrastructure. The justification for such retaliation against a cyber-attack will require international state attribution and public condemnation of international law violations.

Setting Technical Standards and ProtocolsThe second objective of this strategy is for standard-setting organizations to adopt free, open, secure, and reliable internet standards and protocols. To achieve this goal, the United States should empower U.S. non-government stakeholders, build trust and relationships with foreign partners, and use an American values-based proposition to dissuade the adoption of internet standards that benefit repressive regimes. The United States and its allies gain a significant advantage over China and Russia if they set the Internet’s technical baseline.

Washington should start by empowering non-governmental entities favoring the free and open internet model to take proactive roles in standard-setting bodies.[33] The United States can provide financial support and public recognition to U.S. technology firms, academics, or other private sector experts to encourage participation in multi-stakeholder engagements on cyber issues.[34] This recognition could come from organizations such as the Defense Department or the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) or come as recognition at the national level through presidential-level awards. The U.S. government can legitimize existing multi-stakeholder models by working with the private sector through the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, U.S. Cyber Command, and the NSA to improve network security and patch vulnerabilities. This partnership will demonstrate the critical role non-government entities play in enhancing internet reliability while allowing the United States to take a leadership role in internet standard-setting discussions.[35]

The United States government must continue its leading role in multilateral technical setting organizations like the International Telecommunication Union. It is equally essential to ensure that authoritarian regimes cannot manipulate multilateral forums by directing government-sponsored candidates to push their agenda. The United States should use various messaging tools, such as the State Department’s Office of Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, to highlight Russia and China’s efforts to install state-sponsored individuals into these bodies. The United States should also take advantage of events like Russia’s war in Ukraine to marginalize and delegitimize authoritarian participation. Russia’s aggression has already led to several of their candidates not receiving visas to attain International Telecommunication Union, making them unable to influence outcomes in their favor.[36]

A second priority is for America to build trust among the international community through cyber outreach initiatives and foreign engagement on cybersecurity issues.The United States can increase outreach and collaboration with technically like-minded countries and seek new engagement with neutral or adversary-aligned states.The United States should increase engagement with foreign internet stakeholders, including governments, industry leaders, and civil society institutions, to demonstrate American commitment to partnership on issues of concern. Through mechanisms like the U.S.-EU Trade and Technology Council, the United States can promote initiatives to build partner capacity.[37] Non-aligned countries and emerging internet markets, particularly across the Global South, will be more likely to support U.S.-backed internet standards if the United States establishes trust through dialogue and exchange of best practices.[38]

Beyond talk, the United States must make meaningful financial contributions to organizations like the World Trade Organization for building information and communications technology infrastructure to promote innovation, trade, and new technology-based markets in developing countries. Economic efforts could involve an update to the 1996 Information Technology Agreement to allow a tariff-free flow of information and communications technology across borders to boost the technology sector in developing states. The United States can also promote cyber training and education opportunities, which may lead to a better appreciation of the risks presented by the authoritarian model and the benefits of a free and open Internet.[39] Existing government institutions such as the National Defense University’s College of Information and Cyberspace or the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence can serve as cyber knowledge repositories. These organizations should harness expertise in academia, think tanks, and the private sector. American technical experts should be encouraged to join cyber training teams assembled to address specific foreign training needs. This, in turn, will improve trust and attract countries toward the Western approach. Private cybersecurity firms from Mandiant to Microsoft have proven their worth in helping Ukraine defend against Russian cyber-attacks. “Cyberposses” have helped Kyiv detect malware, thwart attacks against critical infrastructure, and protect data.[40] There is no doubt that the rest of the world is watching the model set by American firms enabled by the U.S. government.

The last step is for America to make a compelling argument for its preferred technical standards within international bodies by extolling the values of a free and open Internet, including protecting civil liberties, human rights, and privacy.China and Russia have used their tightly controlled networks to suppress dissenting voices, censor critics, repress minority groups, restrict access to information, and criminalize communication, in gross violation of international law. The U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Cyberspace and Digital Policy has made “Advancing Digital Freedom” a key topic for consideration, noting, “We support a vision of our open digital future rooted in enduring U.S. values” with “cyberspace and digital policy…anchored in democratic principles, openness, and human rights.”[41] In April 2022, the United States partnered with over 60 nations to release The Declaration of the Future of the Internet, charging the international community to “recommit to its vision for internet freedom by articulating and demonstrating how democratic states can address complex cybersecurity threats and digital harms through innovative, collaborative, and democratic means.”[42] The State Department should wield its strategic communications plan to promote America’s vision for a free and open Internet. Diplomats should make this a primary tenet of engagements related to technology.

The third objective of this strategy is to achieve global market domination of next-generation information and communications technology. To achieve this goal, the United States must outcompete authoritarian regimes by investing in the technology sector to increase America’s competitive advantage, making a compelling argument for global adoption based on the merits of U.S. technology, and lowering barriers to adopting Western information and communications technology through subsidies and foreign aid. Being the market leader in technology is essential for America to retain its competitive edge against authoritarian regimes who would otherwise use their information and communications technology advantage to push their repressive network agenda.

To outcompete China and Russia, the United States must first maintain its competitive advantage in information and communications technology through broad investment and regulation to promote innovation and counter China’s unfair market advantage.Washington should provide government funding to support research and development in the technology sector.[43] The United States must set a regulatory environment encouraging innovation while posturing the U.S. technology sector to compete in the global marketplace. The United States can dictate secure-by-design technical standards in hardware and software development if it maintains the dominant position as a market leader in information and communications technology, along with technically capable partners like Japan, South Korea, the Netherlands, and Taiwan which together control the means of producing the most advanced microchips.[44] The federal government’s $1.5 billion pledge under the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act to boost efforts by the National Institute of Science and Technology, the National Science Foundation, and the Department of Energy’s Office of Science represents the type of action needed to outcompete China.[45]

The Commerce Department will lead innovation efforts by directing funding toward specific priorities and sectors, as outlined on Chips.gov, to maximize the impact of federal dollars.[46] Tailored engagement includes working with the private sector to build domestic production capabilities for critical technologies such as microprocessors and cutting-edge microelectronics to reduce dependence on complex offshore supply chains. Commerce can also restrict adversaries from acquiring critical or sensitive information and communications technology by tightening the Export Control Act. In 2022, the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security limited the export of “Advanced Computing and Semiconductor Manufacturing Items” to China because their use in military technologies and applications is antithetical to U.S. interests.[47] Commerce should continue to refine its export controls and work closely with the Departments of State, Justice, and Treasury to impose diplomatic, legal, and financial costs against entities and actors attempting to circumvent prohibitions. America’s biggest point of leverage is its economy, which can be used to slow down China by restricting market access. The U.S. should continue implementing its strategy for selective decoupling from China regarding critical information and communications technology to bolster Western technological advantage and bargaining position as it shapes cyber regulation.

*U.S. President Joe Biden signs the CHIPS Act (Evan Vucci/AP)*

With a secured technical advantage, the United States canpersuade the global community to adopt American information and communications technology based on its technical merits and economic and security benefits stemming from technological alignment with the United States and the dangers posed by alignment with China.America must advocate for adopting U.S. information and communications technology based on the factors that make Western technology superior to Chinese alternatives, including performance, security, and interoperability. The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative and the Departments of State and Commerce should advocate for adopting American technology and work to establish trade organizations focused on strengthening technical cooperation. For example, the U.S.-EU Trade and Technology Council has strengthened Trans-Atlantic cooperation by facilitating cooperation on emerging technologies, securing semiconductor supply chains, and enhancing trade, security, and economic prosperity for participants.[48] Technical cooperation facilitates security cooperation through trust building and network interoperability. This model should be replicated across other regions and expanded to include a broader range of stakeholders. The United States should engage potential adopters of Western technology in a transparent, open, and fair manner in stark contrast to the offerings of Russia and China.

Washington must highlight the dangers to countries choosing to adopt authoritarian government technology from a surveillance, security, and reliability standpoint. The U.S. Intelligence Community can share insights about the vulnerabilities posed by Russian and Chinese ICT with foreign governments to raise awareness about potential risks. Over the past several years, many European governments, including Germany, the UK, and Sweden, have reconsidered using Huawei and ZTE hardware in their telecommunications architecture due to discovered vulnerabilities. The Director Global Public Policy Institute in Berlin says this policy shift is long overdue, noting, “You don’t make yourself dependent on companies that are beholden to the Chinese party-state, because that would repeat mistakes we’ve made with Russia.”[49]

The intelligence community can demonstrate China’s pattern of forcing companies to transfer intellectual property and steal trade secrets through human spies and cyber theft.[50] The 2023 Intelligence Community Annual Threat Assessment notes, “China’s cyber espionage operations have included compromising telecommunications firms, providers of managed services and broadly used software, and other targets potentially rich in follow-on opportunities for intelligence collection, attack, or influence operations.”[51] The intelligence community and State Department must emphasize these warnings during economic and trade discussions with counties technically aligning with China. Countries experiencing buyer’s remorse for adopting Chinese information and communications technology may be receptive to switching to U.S. technology when it comes time to upgrade, presenting a window of opportunity for action.

Finally, the United States should provide subsidies and technology aid packages to facilitate the adoption of its information and communications technology. The United States should lower barriers to adopting Western technology, even if it is a near-term financial loss, to gain first mover advantage in competitive markets. America can subsidize technology across the developing world to enter countries that might otherwise turn to cheaper hardware from China out of necessity.[52] The U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) can provide foreign direct investment that directly supports information and communications technology infrastructure projects in underserved areas of the globe. For example, the Development Finance Corporation has funded African data centers to “increase internet speeds, reduce internet costs, and provide essential information and communications technology services to African businesses and consumers.”[53] Development Finance Corporation projects can expand access to the Internet, build reliable and affordable networks, and continue to support technology industry projects in areas like “telemedicine, fintech, and online learning.”[54] The U.S. Treasury and the U.S. Trade Representative can also dissuade the adoption of Chinese-produced or controlled information and communications technology by threatening to restrict access to Western financial markets and information sharing in areas related to security cooperation.

This strategy requires financial and political investment by the United States. In the near term, the government must dedicate billions of dollars to build out the U.S. cyber diplomacy capabilities, reinforce organizations that execute new cyber-focused missions, and incentivize participation in cyber norm dialogs. The United States must also make even more significant financial investments in the private sector to promote digital innovation and subsidize certain technologies to ensure their adoption by potential allies in the global marketplace. Diplomats and policymakers must expend political capital to institute internal organizational changes and convince foreign governments to side with the United States on cyber issues.

This strategy pits the U.S. view of cyberspace against authoritarian systems, which could create tension among allies who value tighter control of their information space. Freedom House lists allies and close trading partners like Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Bahrain, Thailand, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, and Vietnam as “not free” on their internet freedom scale.[55] Pushing these countries too aggressively to adopt free and open internet standards could jeopardize other important diplomatic, security, and economic ties.

On the flip side, there are certain opportunity costs for strictly adhering to the tenets of a free and open Internet, such as losing potential strategic advantage gained by conducting offensive operations on friendly foreign networks. To maintain credibility in international dialogue, it is imperative that the United States carefully balances the tension between these two positions and errs on the side of ethical behavior. This will give America the moral high ground against cyber-related subversion by China and Russia.

ConclusionThe U.S. strategy to positively shape the international community to favor a democratic and accessible Internet requires a sustained, long-term commitment. Practiced behaviors, precedents, dialogue, and agreements will set expectations and reinforce norms over time. Washington must use a comprehensive, whole-of-government effort using various approaches and options to shift the environment away from China and Russia’s repressive vision of cyberspace.Authoritarian regimes will continue to push for norms and governance structure in cyberspace, favoring an illiberal model that threatens the U.S. vision of a free and open domain.The United States can take an active role in countering this authoritarian vision. In doing so, America will protect its interests and retain its leadership position within the rules-based international order.

Stephen Kopach is a Marine Corps Reserve Officer and a recent graduate from the National War College. He previously served as the Executive Officer for the Marine Attaché Detachment and is a Department of Defense federal civilian. He holds a Bachelor’s of Arts in Biology from Boston University, a Master’s of Science in Strategic Intelligence from the National Intelligence University, Master’s of Arts in National Security and Strategic Studies from the U.S. Naval War College, and a Master’s of Education from Auburn University. The views expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Department of the Navy, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

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Header Image: QR codes close-up photography, , 2019 (Boris Bobrov).

Notes: [1] The White House, Declaration for the Future of the Internet, April 2024, https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/Declaration-for-the-Future-for-the-Internet_Launch-Event-Signing-Version_FINAL.pdf.

[2] The United Nations, “Universal Declaration of Human Rights,” December 10, 1948, https://www.un.org/en/about-U.S./universal-declaration-of-human-rights.

[3] Megan Stifel, “Maintaining U.S. Leadership on Internet Governance,” The Council on Foreign Relations, February 21, 2017, https://www.cfr.org/report/maintaining-U.S.-leadership-internet-governance.

[4] Elaine Korzak, “UN GGE on Cybersecurity: The End of an Era?,” The Diplomat, July 31, 2017, https://thediplomat.com/2017/07/un-gge-on-cybersecurity-have-china-and-russia-just-made-cyberspace-less-safe.

[5] Korzak, “UN GGE on Cybersecurity”

[6] Thomas Lynch III ed., Strategic Assessment 2020, National Defense University Press, 2020, https://ndupress.ndu.edu/Portals/68/Documents/Books/SA2020/Strategic-Assessment-2020.pdf, 227.

[7] Brett Schaefer and Danielle Pletka, “Countering China’s Growing Influence at the International Telecommunication Union,” The Heritage Foundation, March 7, 2022, https://www.heritage.org/global-politics/report/countering-chinas-growing-influence-the-international-telecommunication.

[8] Schaefer, “Countering China’s Growing Influence.”

[9] Brett Schaefer and Danielle Pletka, Countering China’s Growing Influence at the International Telecommunication Union, The Heritage Foundation, March 7, 2022, https://www.heritage.org/global-politics/report/countering-chinas-growing-influence-the-international-telecommunication.

[10] Justin Ling, “The Election That Saved the Internet From Russia and China,” Wired, October 30, 2022, https://www.wired.com/story/itu-2022-vote-russia-china-open-internet.

[11] John Seaman, “China and the New Geopolitics of Technical Standardization, “Policy Center for the New South, January 2020, https://www.ifri.org/sites/default/files/atoms/files/seaman_china_standardization_2020.pdf.

[12] Robert Greene and Paul Triolo, “Will China Control the Global Internet Via its Digital Silk Road?” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, May 8. 2020, https://carnegieendowment.org/2020/05/08/will-china-control-global-internet-via-its-digital-silk-road-pub-81857.

[13] Dan York, “What Is the Splinternet? And Why You Should Be Paying Attention,” Internet Society, March 23, 2022, https://www.internetsociety.org/blog/2022/03/what-is-the-splinternet-and-why-you-should-be-paying-attention.

[14] Adrian Shahbaz, “2022 Freedom on the Net.”

[15] Justin Sherman and Robert Morgus, “Authoritarians Are Exporting Surveillance Tech, And With it Their Vision for the Internet,” Council on Foreign Relations, December 5, 2018, https://www.cfr.org/blog/authoritarians-are-exporting-surveillance-tech-and-it-their-vision-internet.

[16] Michelle Marcus, “Combatting the Seen and Unseen Threats of China’s Digital Silk Road,” Network for Strategic Analysis, September 15, 2022, https://ras-nsa.ca/combatting-the-threats-of-chinas-digital-silk-road.

[17] Marcus, “Combatting the Seen and Unseen.”

[18] Ghalia Kadiri, “In Addis Ababa, the headquarters of the African Union spied on by Beijing,” Le Monde, January 26, 2018,

https://www.lemonde.fr/afrique/article/2018/01/26/a-addis-abeba-le-siege-de-l-union-africaine-espionne-par-les-chinois_5247521_3212.html.

[19] Aziz El Yaakoubi, Yomna Ehab, and Jason Neely, Saudi Arabia signs MoU with China's Huawei -statement, Reuters, December 28, 2022, https://www.reuters.com/technology/saudi-arabia-signs-mou-with-chinas-huawei-statement-2022-12-08.

[20] Telecomreview.com, February 13, 2023, https://www.telecomreview.com/articles/reports-and-coverage/6777-can-jordan-afford-to-rip-and-replace-chinese-equipment-amid-5g-rollout

[21] Congress.gov, “S.Hrg. 117-221 — Training the Department of State’s Workforce for 21st Century Diplomacy,” April 3, 2023, https://www.congress.gov/event/117th-congress/senate-event/LC68067/text.

[22] U.S. Department of Education, “You Belong in STEM,” https://www.ed.gov/stem.

[23]Information obtained by author on U.S. interagency research trip, March 27-31, 2023.

[24]Kristen Eichensehr, “The U.S. Needs a New International Strategy for Cyberspace,” Just Security, November 24, 2014, https://www.justsecurity.org/17729/time-u-s-international-strategy-cyberspace/.

[25] Tomaš Minárik, et al., “11th International Conference on Cyber Conflict: Silent Battle. Proceedings 2019” CCDCOE, June 2019, https://ccdcoe.org/uploads/2019/06/CyCon_2019_BOOK.pdf.

[26]Information obtained by author on U.S. interagency research trip, March 27-31, 2023.

[27]Discussion attended by author during U.S. interagency research trip, March 27-31, 2023.

[28] Bart Hogeveen, “The UN norms of responsible state behaviour in cyberspace,” Australian Strategic Policy Institute, February 2022, https://www.aspi.org.au/report/un-norms-responsible-state-behaviour-cyberspace.

[29] Hogeveen, “The UN norms.”

[30] Information obtained by author on U.S. interagency research trip, March 27-31, 2023.

[31] Harriet Moynihan, “The Application of International Law to State Cyberattacks,” Chatham House, December 2, 2019, https://www.chathamhouse.org/2019/12/application-international-law-state-cyberattacks/1-introduction.

[32] Information obtained by author on U.S. interagency research trip, March 27-31, 2023.

[33] Kristen Cordell, “The International Telecommunication Union: The Most Important UN Agency You Have Never Heard Of,” Center for Strategic and International Studies, December 14, 2020, https://www.csis.org/analysis/international-telecommunication-union-most-important-un-agency-you-have-never-heard.

[34] Melanie Hart and Jordan Link, “There Is a Solution to the Huawei Challenge,” The Center for American Progress, October 14, 2020, https://www.americanprogress.org/article/solution-huawei-challenge.

[35] Megan Stifel, “Maintaining U.S. Leadership on Internet Governance,” Council on Foreign Relations, February 21, 2017, https://www.cfr.org/report/maintaining-U.S.-leadership-internet-governance.

[36] Ling, “The Election That Saved the Internet From Russia and China.”

[37] The White House, “U.S.-EU Joint Statement of the Trade and Technology Council,” December 5, 2022, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2022/12/05/u-s-eu-joint-statement-of-the-trade-and-technology-council.

[38] Megan Stifel “Maintaining U.S. Leadership on Internet Governance.”

[39] Ling Zhu, “A Revisit of the Domain Name System After Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine,” Congressional Research Service, March 23, 2022, https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IN/IN11898.

[40] Dina Temple-Raston, “Exclusive: Rounding up a cyberposse for Ukraine,” The World, December 2, 2022, https://theworld.org/stories/2022-12-02/exclusive-rounding-cyberposse-ukraine.

[41] U.S. Department of State Bureau of Cyberspace and Digital Policy, “Key Topics,” https://www.state.gov/key-topics-bureau-of-cyberspace-and-digital-policy/#freedom

[42] The White House, Declaration for the Future of the Internet, April 2024, https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/Declaration-for-the-Future-for-the-Internet_Launch-Event-Signing-Version_FINAL.pdf.

[43] Makada Henry-Nickie, Kwadwo Frimpong, and Hao Sun, “Trends in the Information Technology Sector,” Brookings, March 29, 2019, https://www.brookings.edu/research/trends-in-the-information-technology-sector.

[44] Pieter Haeck, “The Netherlands to block export of advanced chips printers to China,” Politico, March 8, 2023, https://www.politico.eu/article/netherlands-impose-restrictions-chips-export-to-china-asml.

[45] The White House, “FACT SHEET: CHIPS and Science Act Will Lower Costs, Create Jobs, Strengthen Supply Chains, and Counter China,” August 9, 2022, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2022/08/09/fact-sheet-chips-and-science-act-will-lower-costs-create-jobs-strengthen-supply-chains-and-counter-china; and Ina Fried, “U.S. to spend $1.5 billion to jumpstart alternatives to Huawei,” Axios, December 7, 2022, https://www.axios.com/2022/12/07/huawei-alternatives-5g-cellural-equipment-oran.

[46] U.S. Department of Commerce, “Commerce Department Launches CHIPS.gov for CHIPS Program Implementation,” August 25, 2022, https://www.commerce.gov/news/press-releases/2022/08/commerce-department-launches-chipsgov-chips-program-implementation.

[47] U.S. Department of Commerce, “Commerce Implements New Export Controls on Advanced Computing and Semiconductor Manufacturing Items to the People’s Republic of China (PRC),” Bureau of Industry and Security, October 7, 2022, https://www.bis.doc.gov/index.php/documents/about-bis/newsroom/press-releases/3158-2022-10-07-bis-press-release-advanced-computing-and-semiconductor-manufacturing-controls-final/file.

[48] Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, “Fact Sheet: U.S.-EU Trade and Technology Council Advances Concrete Action on Transatlantic Cooperation,” December 2022, https://ustr.gov/about-us/policy-offices/press-office/fact-sheets/2022/december/fact-sheet-us-eu-trade-and-technology-council-advances-concrete-action-transatlantic-cooperation.

[49] Rob Schmitz, “Germany moves toward restrictions on Huawei, as Europe sours on China,” NPR, March 8, 2023, https://www.npr.org/2023/03/08/1154315168/germany-china-huawei-restrictions.

[50]Anja Manuel, “How to Win the Technology Race with China,” Stanford University, June 18, 2019, https://fsi.stanford.edu/news/how-win-technology-race-china.

[51] Office of the Director of National Intelligence, “2023 Annual Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community,” February 6, 2023 https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/ATA-2023-Unclassified-Report.pdf.

[52] Ann Mei Chang “Foreign Assistance in the Digital Age,” Brookings, February 1, 2016, https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/ChangForeignAssistanceintheDigitalAge.pdf

[53] U.S. International Development Finance Corporation, “Overview,” https://www.dfc.gov/who-we-are/overview.

[54] U.S. International Development Finance Corporation, https://www.dfc.gov/who-we-are.

[55] Shahbaz, “2022 Freedom on the Net.”

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Earlier this year, The Strategy Bridge asked civilian and military students around the world to participate in our seventh annual student writing contest on the subject of strategy.

Now, we are pleased to present an essay selected for Honorable Mention from Sam Brown, a recent graduate from the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School.

Since the turn of the century, cyber warfare has developed into a new domain of conflict. Cyber warfare has recently brought new conceptual frameworks to strategic thinking. Persistent engagement, sometimes called active defense or hunt forward, is a new paradigm within the domain. In short, persistent engagement enables American cyber warriors to take a more forward-leaning posture, proactive rather than reactive. This approach has critics, of course. At times, persistent engagement seems to be little more than a thin veneer of justification for aggressive offensive action. Stepping back to a more theoretical level, the question is whether a new paradigm is even necessary. The answer to this question is an unqualified yes.

The primary purpose of this work is to explore why shifting to a new paradigm was so necessary. This will involve a brief historical summary of cyber conflict. Furthermore, an analysis of the deterrence paradigm that came before persistent engagement must be included. Of course, persistent engagement itself must be described. To wrap up, a follow-on question will be discussed. What precedents and norms does persistent engagement set for the international community? How cyberspace is being normed is the main thrust of persistent engagement’s critics. Thus, establishing whether the policy is creating or reacting to its environment is an important distinction.

Cyber Strategy: Origins and DevelopmentCyberspace originated in the 1970s and 1980s as the American military developed new information technology for communications.[1] Information technology’s interconnected nature enabled a user on one system to affect other systems’ functionality. A malicious actor could potentially cripple an entire communication system. Once information technology became integrated with physical control systems, the ability expanded to remotely causing physical damage. Quick proliferation in the commercial and private worlds meant this vulnerability now threatens everybody. Given information technology’s ubiquity and low cost of entry, the range of potentially malicious actors is quite broad. On the one hand, nation state actors employing national level agencies have a lot to gain from espionage and can apply damaging or destructive cyber actions in a more military-like manner. On another extreme, individuals can wreak havoc for profit or personal ideology. In between, there are plenty of non-state groups active in cyberspace from organized crime to “hacktivist” organizations.

Until recently, the U.S. approach to defending against these threats had been to adapt the deterrence paradigm to cyberspace.[2] Deterrence itself was born out of the advent of nuclear weapons and the early Cold War.[3] Previously, militaries had defended their own civilian population from other, invading militaries. However, between the sheer destructive force of a single nuclear weapon and the advent of long-range strike capability, attackers could entirely bypass an opposing military’s defense to get straight to the civilian population. This necessitated a strategic shift. No longer could the threat of attacks be adequately defended against; rather, they must be deterred from attacking in the first place. The deterrence theory that grew out of this reality placed high value on concepts like credibility and commitment.

When cybersecurity began to arise as a serious issue, the United States was fresh out of the Cold War. Adapting the strategy that had just won the Cold War was natural enough and no paradigmatic alternative was seriously considered. Consequently, American policy makers labored under a number of assumptions. First, establishing American credibility in cyberspace, or the threat of American counterattack, was critical. Additionally, routine statements have been made reiterating the importance of cyberspace to U.S. interests to establish commitment in the domain.[4] In turn, this raised important legal questions. For instance, what constitutes an armed attack in cyberspace? Other problems of deterrence-based thinking, such as escalation risk or the question of how states can adequately signal intentions in an arena with a defining feature of non-attributability, have been embedded in the cyber policy conversation.

The trickle-down policy from this strategic framework struggled. Particularly in the 2010s, the United States was on the receiving end of an increasing volume of malicious cyber behavior that it struggled to deal with effectively. The Shamoon virus, presumably Iranian, nearly wrecked the global economy.[5] The North Korean hack of Sony was less economically damaging, but brought home the threat of state actors targeting American corporations.[6] Individual cyber actors extended the threat down to an even smaller level with increasing ransomware attacks against an array of American targets ranging from private individuals to corporations and government entities.[7] Russian use of cyberspace to meddle in American elections was perhaps the most concerning threat.[8] Throughout this period as well, the Chinese government used cyberespionage to exfiltrate vast amounts of American corporate secrets worth an incalculable sum.[9]

Clearly, the American posture in cyberspace was deterring very little. Many called for a more proactive response.[10] Deterrence theory’s shortcomings have become apparent. At the theoretical level, much like the nuclear weapons that necessitated a paradigmatic shift to deterrence, cyberspace’s unique characteristics shift the strategic environment. The non-attributability of cyber weapons and the defiance of physical location inherent in cyberspace are novel features that undercut the assumptions of deterrence. More practically, low consequence attacks in cyberspace put the United States between a rock and a hard place. On one hand, responding aggressively to such attacks under the deterrence paradigm risks escalation. Is the United States willing to risk war over something like the loss of some of Boeing’s proprietary data? On the other hand, doing nothing undercuts American credibility and commitment in cyberspace. Neither option prevented nor recouped mounting losses.

Describing Persistent EngagementAround 2018, U.S. Cyber Command approved a new approach, persistent engagement, that many see as a paradigmatic shift away from deterrence.[11] Persistent engagement cuts out an attack as a prerequisite to action. Rather, cyber warriors are authorized to actively search out and take down malicious actors in cyberspace. Because these actions are not physically destructive and cyberspace is so dynamic, such engagements must persist to remain effective. Authorizations only extend to going after an adversary’s ability to conduct cyber-attacks on the United States. Presumably, although offensive measures are taken, the actions remain strictly defensive in objective. Hence we have the term active defense. In addition, teams can be preemptively sent forward beyond the walls of U.S. Cyber Command to help potential targets of cyber-attacks hunt down malicious actors on their own systems, or hunt forward. Viewed in traditional military terms, persistent engagement is offensive action for defensive purposes.

*Director of the NSA and Commander of the U.S. Cyber Command Paul Nakasone speaks during a hearing on April 15, 2021 in Washington, D.C., where he suggested that deterrence “is a model that does not comport to cyberspace.“ (Al Drago-Pool/Getty)*

The strategy has its critics.[12] Some felt that active defensive measures had already been in use. Persistent engagement was an ex post facto policy justification and opened the floodgates to many more cyber operations. Generally, taking preemptive offensive action is a slippery slope. Although a preemptive offensive does have international legal justification, cyberspace’s non-attributional character makes justifiable proof for it tricky. Currently, cyberspace is viewed as an internationally un-normed environment. As such, persistent engagement risks a classic chess fork problem. Either it can be potentially illegal under international law, or it could establish a precedent that justifies offensive actions by an adversary actor. Furthermore, the institutional logic of authorizing the command responsible for cyber operation to take offensive actions it deems necessary to defense is dubious. Persistent engagement certainly has its flaws.

Nonetheless, persistent engagement was a necessary development and is not completely detached from the realities of cyberspace. There are a couple of factors that lend it weight. The first is the shortcomings of its predecessor. With a deterrence paradigm hamstringing decisionmakers, something new had to be tried.[13] Persistent engagement is that something. We can usefully view it as an experiment rather than a permanent solution. More time will provide more data on its efficacy. This new data can be used to evolve persistent engagement theory. Perhaps deterrence theory could even be amended. Potentially, alternative paradigms could be worked out. Regardless, something needed to break out of the deterrence paradigm while providing some current functionality. For all its flaws, persistent engagement has done that.

Furthermore, persistent engagement is closely aligned at a theoretical level with one of cyberspace’s unique characteristics. Cyberspace warps physical geography to near irrelevance.[14] A skilled cyber operator can jump from system to system, regardless of location or system type. Hypothetically, someone on a laptop in Mongolia could jump from a smart refrigerator in Spain to a cell phone in Costa Rica to an oil pump control in Kuwait with relative ease. This blurs the traditional lines of state sovereignty. It also removes meaningful buffers between a malicious actor and their target; there is no military or police force to fight through or bypass, at least not in the same way as conventional domains. All users of cyberspace are potentially always at risk.

Consequently, it would seem that to adequately protect cyberspace, nothing threatening should be tolerated in cyberspace in the first place. Zero reaction time or warning to malicious acts means that the possibility of attack must be closed off before it materializes. This is the driving idea behind persistent engagement.[15] Threats are neutralized as soon as they are discovered. Obviously, persistent engagement operations will never achieve perfect success. The sheer logistical problem of persistently engaging all threats is impossible. But at least persistent engagement is a framework from which to work. As for the sovereignty problem, persistent engagement does not solve it, but neither is it encumbered by it in the way deterrence-based thinking was. After all, it is the domain itself, not merely the operations, that challenge the sovereignty norm.

This all begs the question of persistent engagement’s results. At this point, we have only had five years of persistent engagement, leaving us with limited and murky data points. Results are mixed and should be analyzed with a healthy dose of skepticism. Chinese corporate espionage has tapered off since its height a decade ago, but this began before the shift to persistent engagement and is probably unrelated.[16] Ransomware attacks continue unabated.[17] Any drop-off in the severity of ransomware attacks could be attributed to the American reiteration of critical infrastructure redlines following the Colonial Pipeline attack; a point that would actually suggest successful application of deterrence theory.[18]

Nonetheless, there may be some reason to hope for the efficacy of persistent engagement. After revelations of Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential elections, U.S. Cyber Command was tasked with protecting both the 2020 presidential and 2022 midterm elections.[19] Presumably, their attempt to accomplish this relied heavily on active defense measures. No major interference with either election has cropped up. Persistent engagement’s other large success has been the war in Ukraine. Cyber warfare has not played a major role in the kinetic war despite Russia possessing some of the most advanced cyber warfare capability in the world. U.S. Cyber Command attributes this to the success of their hunt forward units deployed in the lead up to the war.[20] Again, this must be taken skeptically. There are alternative explanations. In both cases, it is very difficult to prove a negative. However, these are cases where persistent engagement seems to have enabled successful, high stakes cyber operations.

Persistent Engagement, International Norms, and ImplicationsOn a larger scale, persistent engagement has yet to be problematic in the international arena. No other countries have taken cyber actions under the justification of persistent engagement. The United States’ closest partners, its adversaries, and even non-aligned cyber powers such as India have not protested persistent engagement’s implementation. American partners stand to benefit from a proactive response. The cyber defense of Ukraine is an excellent demonstration of this. The interests of non-aligned actors in cyberspace have yet to emerge. Adversaries’ seeming acquiescence is at first blush more perplexing. Their endeavors in cyberspace stand to suffer direct setbacks from more active American defense. However, China and Russia may view persistent engagement as falling within their own strategic view of cyberspace. American norming of that framework would make tactical setbacks acceptable.

Russia does not distinguish between information and cyber operations; the latter is a subset of the former.[21] The Russian threat perception is that conflict in this domain has been ongoing for some time. Consequently, persistent engagement’s offensive actions are expected in the Russian paradigm. It validates deeply held Russian views. Legal justifications are largely irrelevant. Chinese interests are a bit more nuanced. While they share Russian doctrine, they do not share Russian paranoia.[22] Rather, they are primarily concerned with protecting their own sovereignty.[23] Controlling discontent at home and foreign perceptions abroad are national security issues for Beijing. They have conducted many operations to this end. Given the Chinese perception of what constitutes a national security threat, persistent engagement’s aggressive defense of American interests is not dissimilar. For both countries, persistent engagement is not an American innovation to be decried, but the United States showing up late to the party.

*A Ukrainian army soldier checks her phone after a military sweep in the outskirts of Kyiv, in April 2022. (Rodrigo Abd/AP)*

This raises an important endogeneity question. Is persistent engagement an agenda setting or reactionary piece of policy? Most criticism is predicated on persistent engagement setting precedents that will come back to haunt American interests. Will this strategic paradigm be used as justification for future cyber-attacks against the United States? Persistent engagement pushes hard where we should tread lightly with this consideration in the background. However, this train of logic would be completely derailed by the existence of other precedents. From the Chinese and Russian perspective, persistent engagement sets no precedents. So, critics have been asking the wrong questions. Rather than worry about legally justifying attacks against themselves, American strategic thinkers should be wondering if persistent engagement cedes too much to Russian or Chinese interests and paradigms.

China’s vision of cyberspace can be compared to land with clearly defined boundaries and jurisdictions. The key word that routinely appears in Chinese thinking is “sovereignty.” Russia adheres to a similar vision. On the other hand, the United States’ vision of cyberspace is more like the world’s oceans, a global common available to all with an internationalized system of regulations and enforcement. It is in this distinction that persistent engagement risks playing into Chinese or Russian designs. But it will not necessarily do so. The same documents that articulate the persistent engagement paradigm also articulate U.S. commitment to a free and open internet. Nonetheless, by playing at the Chinese and Russian level tactically, the United States needs to avoid following them strategically. Persistent engagement must maintain a globalist outlook when defining the American interests it protects.

ConclusionsPersistent engagement is a strategic paradigm for cyberspace born out of failure. Deterrence theory proved neither flexible enough nor well adapted to the domain. A new domain called for a new strategy. Rather than prevent cyber-attacks by convincing the attacker the cost is not worth the risk, persistent engagement seeks to prevent cyber-attacks by disabling the attacker’s capacity preemptively. There are fears around the precedents that persistent engagement sets and how those norms may one day be quite damaging. However, these concerns miss the broader nature of the environment and the already emerging norms that called for a response. To be fair, open questions remain. How the role of national sovereignty in cyberspace continues to develop could drastically alter the evolution of persistent engagement. Nonetheless, persistent engagement is a much sounder starting point for American cyber strategy than deterrence.

Sam Brown currently serves as a Lieutenant in the United States Navy. He recently graduated with a Master of Arts in Security Studies from the Naval Postgraduate School and is stationed in Manama, Bahrain. This essay reflects his own views and not necessarily those of the Department of the Navy, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Marine Corps Forces Cyberspace Command, Fort George Meade, Maryland, 2020 (Staff Sgt Jacob Osborne).

Notes: [1] Fred Kaplan, Dark Territory: The Secret History of Cyber War, (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2016), 2-12.

[2] Angus King et al., United States Cyberspace Solarium Commission Report, (Washington, D.C.: The Cyberspace Solarium Commission, 2020).

[3] Thomas Schelling, Arms and Influence, (London: Yale University Press, 2008), 22-79.

[4] Leon Panetta, “Defending the Nation from Cyberattack,” Office of the Secretary of Defense, October 11, 2012, http://www.defense.gov/Speeches/Speech.aspx?SpeechID=1728. This speech by the then Secretary of Defense is a good sampler of this approach.

[5] Chris Kubecka and Jack Rhysider, “EP30: Shamoon,” January 22, 2019, in Darknet Diaries, produced by Darknet Diaries, podcast, MP3 audio, 35:11, https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/30/.

[6] Hewlett-Packard, Profiling an Enigma: The Mystery of North Korea’s Cyber Threat Landscape, HP Security Briefing Episode #16, (HP Security Research, 2014), 3.

[7] Tim Maurer, Cyber Mercenaries: The State, Hackers, and Power, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018): 13-14.

[8] Benjamin Jensen, Brandon Valeriano, and Ryan Maness, “Fancy Bears and Digital Trolls: Cyber Strategy with a Russian Twist,” Journal of Strategic Studies 42, no. 2 (2019): 212-234.

[9] Lyu Jinghua, “What Are China’s Cyber Capabilities and Intentions?,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, April 1, 2019, https://carnegieendowment.org/2019/04/01/what-are-china-s-cyber-capabilities-and-intentions.

[10] Lucas Kello, “Cyber Legalism: Why It Fails and What To Do About It,” Journal of Cybersecurity (2021): 1-15. Again, a good example of the sentiment in the field.

[11] U.S. Cyber Command PAO, “CYBER 101 – Defend Forward and Persistent Engagement,” United States Cyber Command, October 25, 2022, https://www.cybercom.mil/Media/News/Article/3198878/cyber-101-defend-forward-and-persistent-engagement/.

[12] Jason Healey, “Triggering the Forever War, in Cyberspace,” The Cipher Brief, April 1, 2018, https://www.thecipherbrief.com/article/tech/triggering-new-forever-war-cyberspace. Yet again, one sampling.

[13] Michael Fischerkeller and Richard Harknett, “Deterrence Is Not a Credible Strategy for Cyberspace,” Foreign Policy Research Institute (2017): 381-393, https://doi: 10.1016,

[14] Jon Lindsay, “Stuxnet and the Limits of Cyber Warfare,” Security Studies 22, no. 3 (2015): 375-376.

[15] Emily Goldman and Michael Warner, “The Military Instrument in Cyber Strategy,” SAIS Review of International Affairs 41, no. 2 (2021): 56-57.

[16] Brandon Valeriano, et. al., Dyadic Cyber Incident Dataset v 2.0, Harvard Dataverse, September 2017, 2022, https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/CQOMYV.

[17] Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Annual Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community, (Washington, D.C.: Office of the Director of National Intelligence, 2023), 28.

[18] U.S. Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Department of Homeland Security Strategy, (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Homeland Security, 2018), 11.

[19] Cyber National Mission Force Public Affairs and NSA Public Affairs, “How U.S. Cyber Command, NSA Are Defending the Midterm Elections: One Team, One Fight,” U.S. Cyber Command, August 25, 2022, https://www.cybercom.mil/Media/News/Article/3139691/how-us-cyber-command-nsa-are-defending-midterms-elections-one-team-one-fight/.

[20] Cyber National Mission Force Public Affairs, “Before the Invasion: Hunt Forward in Ukraine,” U.S. Cyber Command, November 28, 2022, https://www.cybercom.mil/Media/News/Article/3229136/before-the-invasion-hunt-forward-operations-in-ukraine/.

[21] Michael Connell and Sarah Vogler, “Russia’s Approach to Cyber Warfare,” N00014-16-D-5003, (Washington, D.C.: Center for Naval Analyses, 2017), 3-6.

[22] Jinghua, “Chinese Cyber Capabilities and Intentions.”

[23] Michael Kolton, “Interpreting China’s Pursuit of Cyber Sovereignty and Its View on Cyber Deterrence,” The Cyber Defense Review 2, no. 1 (2017): 119-154.

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Earlier this year, The Strategy Bridge asked civilian and military students around the world to participate in our seventh annual student writing contest on the subject of strategy.

Now, we are pleased to present one of the Third Place winners from Collin Van Son, a current student at the University of Denver.

For a field that prizes logic and rationality, nuclear strategy is ripe with contradiction. Even the most basic premise of nuclear deterrence—that the best way to prevent nuclear war is by preparing for it—seems paradoxical. In working toward an effective and ethical nuclear doctrine, today’s strategists would do well to acquaint themselves with two experts on the merits and dangers of self-contradiction: F. Scott Fitzgerald, author of The Great Gatsby, and George Orwell, author of 1984.

F. Scott Fitzgerald on Living with Contradiction F. Scott Fitzgerald (Wikimedia)

In a 1936 essay published in Esquire magazine, F. Scott Fitzgerald asserted, “The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.”[1] Common sense would seem to disagree: in our day-to-day lives, holding two contradictory ideas is a recipe not for brilliance but indecisiveness—a fatal flaw in any strategist. But the logic of nuclear deterrence is far removed from our day-to-day experience. Indeed, the ability to tolerate self-contradiction—i.e., paradox—is a trait to be desired in all nuclear strategists.

Consider the doctrine of mutually assured destruction as enshrined in the Cold War nuclear postures of the United States and the Soviet Union. By 1962, the year of the Cuban Missile Crisis, the two superpowers possessed a collective 28,862 warheads that they were capable of delivering via bombers, inter-continental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), and submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs).[2] By keeping their bombers on ready alert, burying their ICBMs in hardened silos, and sending their nuclear-armed submarines on stealthy underwater patrols, both sides had secured a second-strike capability. For American nuclear planners, this meant abandoning the idea of a splendid first strike; even if the U.S. launched an all-out surprise attack, enough Soviet nuclear weapons would survive to inflict devastating damage on the United States. The Soviets faced the same dilemma. Regardless of who fired first, mutual destruction was assured.

But mutually assured destruction (MAD) is more than just a standoff. It also poses a paradox. In the words of U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara at the dawn of the MAD era, “Nuclear weapons serve no military purpose whatsoever. They are totally useless—except only to deter one’s opponent from using them.”[3] That is, the usefulness of nuclear weapons lies solely in their ability to prevent their own use. This self-negation complicates the theory of the nuclear revolution, whose early proponents believed the threat of nuclear weapons would make all forms of warfare less likely. Less than a year after the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, strategist Bernard Brodie concluded, “Thus far the chief purpose of our military establishment has been to win wars. From now on its chief purpose must be to avert them.”[4] But instead of witnessing a nuclear peace, the decades following Brodie’s pronouncement saw the U.S. and the Soviet Union engage one another in proxy wars around the globe. By allowing nuclear weapons to cancel themselves out, MAD had made way for another case of contradiction: the stability-instability paradox.

*Image from the 1983 film, Wargames (IMDB)*

For an illustration of the stability-instability paradox, consider two scenarios. In the first, two nuclear-armed adversaries perceive themselves to be on the brink of nuclear war. This could be because State A’s arsenal is far superior to State B’s, leading B to fear a splendid first strike by A, and A to fear that B could fire first under a use-it-before-you-lose-it mentality. In the second scenario, the two powers are much more evenly matched, and both possess a secure second-strike capability. Since there are few incentives for either side to launch a first strike, both judge the risk of nuclear war to be relatively low. At first glance, the first scenario (strategic instability) appears far more dangerous than the second (strategic stability). But the overriding sense of danger which characterizes the first scenario will have the positive effect of encouraging both sides to act with caution and restraint. By contrast, the apparent safety of the second scenario will embolden both sides to engage in localized disputes or proxy wars. This propensity for low-level risk-taking increases the overall likelihood of conflict—and since even a small conflict carries a non-zero chance of going nuclear, it is not immediately clear whether strategic stability makes nuclear war more or less likely. Add to this the fact that the real world is far murkier than the two extremes outlined above, and one can see why “the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time” is a requisite for nuclear strategy.

If the stability-instability paradox is an unintended consequence of mutually assured destruction, there is yet another paradox, this time an explicitly ethical one, at the center of MAD itself. As discussed, the stabilizing effect of MAD depends on the threat of massive retaliation—if you annihilate my society, then I will use my second-strike capability to annihilate yours. But is such a threat truly credible? Returning to the Cold War example, an all-out surprise attack by the Soviet Union would have left the United States shattered beyond recognition. With tens of millions of Americans dead and the nation’s largest cities reduced to rubble, those in charge of retaliating against the Soviets would be forced to ask themselves: What is the point? Deterrence having so obviously failed, what strategic or moral basis could there possibly be for firing back? Not only would a retaliatory strike kill tens of millions of Soviet civilians and raise the specter of a global nuclear winter, it would also do nothing to change the fact that the United States, for all practical purposes, had ceased to exist. It follows that, having suffered an all-out nuclear attack, the only acceptable response is not to respond. Retaliation would be nothing less than genocidal nihilism.

But this conclusion, no matter how sound and ethically self-evident, threatens to unwind the entire logic of MAD. For if one side concludes that a nuclear second strike is too criminally insane to ever be carried out, then suddenly an all-out first strike begins to look like a feasible option for the other side. In essence, then, pledging oneself to a bare-minimum standard of ethics—“I shall not wage nuclear war when there is nothing left to protect or gain”—could actually make nuclear war more attractive for the side that strikes first, thereby calling into question whether such a statement, in light of its consequences, can truly be called ethical. Thus, the deterrent value of MAD comes to depend on each side’s stated or implied willingness to carry out mass murder to no end whatsoever. The implication for strategists is, to put it mildly, sobering: Mutually assured destruction proposes to keep the world safe by promising to destroy it for no reason other than spite.

 Buy on Amazon  This is not an easy conclusion to stomach, nor should it be. In fact, as the following section seeks to demonstrate, one of the most dangerous things a nuclear strategist can do is to desensitize themselves to their discipline’s contradictions. Like pebbles in a shoe, the paradoxes of nuclear strategy should make themselves felt in every step the strategist takes. Not only is this deeply unsatisfying, it can also be personally painful at times. Small wonder, perhaps, that the essay in which Fitzgerald extolled the virtue of self-contradiction was titled “The Crack-Up.”

George Orwell on the Danger of Internalizing ContradictionGeorge Orwell wrote of the ability “to hold simultaneously two opinions which cancelled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them.” Fitzgerald would likely call this the mark of a first-rate intelligence.[5] But this quote from Orwell’s novel 1984 refers to something far more sinister: doublethink. In Orwell’s dystopian vision of England-turned-surveillance-state, doublethink represents the internalization and weaponization of paradox. As explained in the novel, doublethink means:

To know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies…to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it, to believe that democracy was impossible and that the Party was the guardian of democracy, to forget whatever it was necessary to forget, then to draw it back into memory again at the moment when it was needed, and then promptly to forget it again: and above all, to apply the same process to the process itself—that was the ultimate subtlety: consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed. Even to understand the word “doublethink” involved the use of doublethink.[6]

Some of these features of doublethink—“to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it”—can be leveled as critiques of nuclear strategy, whose practitioners contemplate the mass murder of millions and do so in the name of peace. Consider the fact that Strategic Air Command (SAC), which operates U.S. nuclear bombers and ICBMs, has for its motto, “Peace is Our Profession.” Though Strategic Air Command arrived at a variant of this motto three years before 1984 was published, it is hard not to see it as an homage to Orwell’s fictional state, in which “[t]he Ministry of Peace concerns itself with war, the Ministry of Truth with lies, the Ministry of Love with torture and the Ministry of Plenty with starvation.”[7] One could also point to the most sophisticated Cold War-era U.S. ICBM, the MX missile, which was capable of carrying up to 12 independently targeted, 300-kiloton thermonuclear warheads—enough to replicate the destruction of Hiroshima more than 276 times over.[8] The MX’s more popular name? The Peacekeeper. As Orwell might argue, “These contradictions are not accidental, nor do they result from ordinary hypocrisy; they are deliberate exercises in doublethink.”[9]

One may be tempted to dismiss the significance of this so-called doublethink; slogans and nicknames are, after all, only words. But this is to miss the core of Orwell’s argument that the language we use shapes the way we think. The implications this has for nuclear strategy were captured in vivid detail by Carol Cohn in her landmark article “Sex and Death in the Rational World of Defense Intellectuals.” In it, Cohn describes her immersion in the world and the language of nuclear planners, and how it began to change the very way she thought:

Like the White Queen [of Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass], I began to believe six impossible things before breakfast. Not because I consciously believed, for instance, that a “surgically clean counterforce strike” was really possible, but instead because some elaborate piece of doctrinal reasoning I used was already predicated on the possibility of those strikes, as well as on a host of other impossible things.[10]

 Buy on Amazon  As Cohn tells it, a nuclear discourse populated by euphemisms (“collateral damage”) and oxymorons (“clean bombs”) is more than just discordant—it is dangerous. This is because such language “makes it possible to be radically removed from the reality of what one is talking about, and from the realities one is creating through the discourse.”[11] For example, referring to a class of nuclear weapons as “tactical nukes” obscures the fact that, in the words of strategist Thomas Schelling, “However few the nuclears used, and however selectively they are used…their consequences *will not be tactical*. With nuclears, it has become more than ever a war of risks and threats at the *highest strategic level*.”[12] By slipping contradictions like “tactical nukes” into the day-to-day language of nuclear strategy, doublethink-like practices threaten to obscure the true cost of nuclear war, in the same way that calling a weapon of mass destruction a Peacemaker calls into question what peace really means.

Now, all professions rely to some degree on jargon and abstraction, and nuclear strategy is no exception. The goal, then, should not be to purge or rewrite the nuclear lexicon. Indeed, if strategists were forced to abandon the term “countervalue strike” and instead refer to “civilian mass murder attacks” when giving presentations or talking to colleagues, the very unpleasantness of doing so would likely drive most strategists out of the field entirely, leaving only those few who have no qualms about contemplating mass murder—and these are the very people we should be keeping far away from nuclear strategy. The only acceptable alternative involves threading a difficult cognitive needle. Like Fitzgerald’s first-rate intelligence, nuclear strategists must learn “to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time.” Doing so, however, is inherently frustrating; when faced with a paradox, our immediate instinct is to try to resolve it. But as Orwell makes clear through the concept of doublethink, attempts to reconcile the irreconcilable achieve only the corrosion of language and thought. Contradictions should be seen not as flaws but as fundamental features of nuclear strategy. Does this consign nuclear strategists—and, by extension, the societies they serve—to perpetual discomfort? Likely it does. But discomfort at the thought of nuclear use can hardly be considered a bad thing. This points to perhaps the most important paradox of our nuclear age, one best articulated by Fitzgerald himself: “One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise.”[13]

Collin Van Son is a graduate student (Master of Arts in International Security) at the University of Denver’s Josef Korbel School of International Studies.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Minuteman III Intercontinental Ballistic Missile, Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, 2021 (Carrie Campbell).

Notes: [1] Fitzgerald, F. Scott. “The Crack-Up.” Esquire, February 1936.

[2] Norris, Robbert S., and Hans M. Kristensen. “Global Nuclear Weapons Inventories, 1945–2010.” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 66, no. 4 (July/August 2010), 81.

[3] McNamara, Robert S. “The Military Role of Nuclear Weapons: Perceptions and Misperceptions.” Foreign Affairs 62, no. 1 (Fall 1983), 79.

[4] Brodie, Bernard. “Implications for Military Policy.” In The Absolute Weapon: Atomic Power and World Order, 62. New Haven: Yale Institute of International Studies, 1946.

[5] Orwell, George. 1984. 1949. Reprint, Signet Classic, 1961.

[6] Ibid.

[7] “Strategic Air Command.” U.S. Centennial of Flight Commission. Accessed May 6, 2023. https://www.centennialofflight.net/essay/Dictionary/SAC/DI185.htm.; Orwell, 1984.

[8] Gregersen, Erik. “Peacekeeper Missile.” In Encyclopaedia Britannica. n.d. Accessed May 6, 2023. https://www.britannica.com/technology/missile.

[9] Orwell, 1984.

[10] Cohn, Carol. “Sex and Death in the Rational World of Defense Intellectuals.” Signs 12, no. 4 (Summer 1987), 713.

[11] Ibid., 715.

[12] Schelling, Thomas. Arms and Influence. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1966, 111. Emphasis added.

[13] Fitzgerald, “The Crack-Up.”

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“It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.”
—Attributed to Mark Twain

Twain's quote provides two key lessons: first, why double negatives in a sentence are a terrible idea, and second, how assumptions can lead one into trouble. Assumptions affect all levels of decision-making; however, when national leaders make assumptions, trouble can rapidly escalate to chaos and turmoil.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his military suffered from chaos and turmoil throughout the first year of the war in Ukraine. These failures were driven by numerous factors, ranging from micromanagement of military decisions by Putin himself to limited resupply capabilities inside Ukrainian territory.[1] Before the conflict, one significant assumption existed in Russia’s favor: that its cyber and electronic warfare capabilities could exert enough influence to shape the war in their favor. Russian cyber warfare capabilities have been in the limelight since their Military Intelligence Directorate and Federal Security Service hackers infiltrated the Democratic National Convention servers during the 2016 U.S. Presidential elections.[2]

*Russian President Vladimir Putin (Mikhail Metzel/AP)*

These accomplishments led to Russian leadership assumptions regarding cyber and electronic warfare capabilities against Ukraine. These assumptions led to complacency, and that complacency killed Russian momentum in Ukraine. As a result, initial attempts at cyber warfare have produced minimal gains, and electronic warfare units have failed to downgrade Ukrainian capabilities effectively.[3] While Putin has succeeded on certain fronts, such as degrading the Ukrainian economy, his assumptions concerning cyber and electronic warfare's effectiveness have assisted in driving his Ukrainian offensive toward failure. [4]

First, by analyzing Russia’s past success in cyber and electronic warfare, this essay examines how Putin developed his assumption that Russian cyber operations would overwhelm Ukrainian cyber security measures. Second, it explores how these assumptions contributed to complacency and failure in the war in Ukraine. Finally, the essay discusses how Russia’s failures in Ukraine will shape the future of cyber and electronic warfare.

Russia: A Modern History of HackingBefore the war in Ukraine, Russia's cyber network attack and exploitation capabilities were considered reputable following two successful ransomware and critical infrastructure attacks.[5] First, the successive industrial control system attacks on the Ukrainian electrical grid in 2016-17 reinforced the assumption that Russia would successfully integrate cyber warfare into its 2022 invasion of Ukraine. [6] Second, the 2017 NotPetya attack further illustrated the Russian intelligence community's advanced cyber and electronic warfare capabilities.[7]

In the winter of 2016-17, Russian cyber and electronic capabilities struck at the infrastructural stability of Ukraine. Russian-backed hacking organizations infiltrated Ukrainian industrial control systems that oversaw the electrical grid in Kyiv's neighboring cities.[8] The hackers used a specialized approach as they moved along the industrial control system cyber kill chain.[9] Unlike Russia’s future NotPetya attack, which self-replicated and spread throughout systems indefinitely, the 2016-17 Ukrainian electrical grid attacks illustrated the more meticulous hands-on approach Russian hackers could employ.

This attack demonstrated the vast array of damage cyber network attacks could entail. The Russians used a three-pronged approach to target the Ukrainian electrical industrial control system.[10] Initially, they manipulated the connections between the digital and physical breaker systems.[11] This manipulation allowed Russian malware to destroy the backup breakers when Ukrainian engineers attempted to reroute power.[12] Next, the Russians overwhelmed the Ukrainian help desks with robotic calls.[13] This type of attack is known as a denial of service, intended to reduce the Ukrainian population's confidence in their government's response abilities.[14] Finally, Russian cyber efforts promoted misinformation online, claiming the electrical industrial control system failures stemmed from aging infrastructure rather than a foreign-born cyber network attack.[15]

Later in 2017, the global financial system suffered from the most significant cyber network attack in history. Likely backed by the Russian Military Intelligence Directorate and Federal Security Service operatives, the attack originated from a malware system known as NotPetya.[16]

*Screenshot of the splash screen of the payload of the original version of Petya (Wikimedia)*

Through the covert international hacking organization known as the Shadow Brokers, Russian hackers acquired access to the leaked National Security Agency's EternalBlue penetration program, which at the time represented cutting-edge hacking capabilities.[17] EternalBlue found and implemented zero-day exploits, which are opportunities "when security teams are unaware of their software vulnerability, and they’ve had 0 (zero) days to work on a security patch or an update to fix the issue.”[18] These exploits expedite the cyber kill chain process, which originates with basic reconnaissance and typically finalizes with an attack or espionage.[19]

Traditionally, the reconnaissance and infiltration portion of the cyber kill chain can take months to complete. However, EternalBlue offered Russian hackers zero-day exploits in the form of backdoor entry into systems.[20] Backdoors are coding loopholes that create an "undocumented way of gaining access to computer system(s).”[21] EternalBlue identified these backdoors for Russian hackers, allowing them to rapidly move down the cyber kill chain directly to installation and action initiation.[22]

*Lockheed Martin’s Cyber Kill Chain [23]*

The endgame of the Russian hackers in the NotPetya attack was to cripple the internal tax and auditing system of Ukrainian banking. Instead, NotPetya began replicating uncontrollably and spreading to any system tangentially connected to the Ukrainian financial system.[24] The less concerning outcome of NotPetya was the cost to the global economy of over $10 billion.[25] The more significant concern was Russia's access to and use of EternalBlue, which allowed the Russians to continue implementing Zero Day exploits.

Both NotPetya and the 2016-17 industrial control system attacks illustrate the hacking capabilities of the Russian intelligence community. With a definitive history of manufacturing and spreading misinformation, crippling the global economy, and conducting spoiling attacks on your enemy, why would Russia not assume they would roll over Ukraine in the cyber realm?

Complacency KillsRussia has struggled to gain momentum throughout its invasion of Ukraine, including in the cyber domain. Like the wide physical front opened at the beginning of the war, the Russian intelligence community has attempted a broad cyber network attack and espionage campaign to cripple Ukrainian resistance.[26]

The Russian Military Intelligence Directorate and Federal Security Service units hacked into multiple Ukrainian nuclear power sites, claiming the Ukrainians were using said sites to manufacture chemical weapons and other illegal capabilities. [27] Multiple hacking organizations with close ties to the Russian intelligence community have penetrated the Ukrainian federal government and military readiness sites and installed Wiper malware.[28] This malware format permanently destroys critical data storage capabilities and has been further used on industrial control system sites throughout Ukraine during the invasion.[29]

The Russians have also targeted Ukrainian defense satellites and telecommunications firms, while also manufacturing bot farms to feed disinformation into Ukrainian public discourse. [30] However, due to two key points, most cyber network attacks have failed to meet their objectives.

First, foreign influence and assistance have improved the cyber defensive capabilities of Ukraine since the 2016-17 industrial control systems infiltration. Since the publication of the Cyber Security Strategy of Ukraine in March 2016, Ukrainian officials have been sponsoring Western foreign assistance in developing and maintaining defensive cyber capabilities.[31]

Private firms such as Microsoft and Wordfence have aided Ukraine since the beginning of the Russian invasion, providing protective measures unavailable during the 2016-17 industrial control system incidents.[32] Because Russia used the same cyber network attack methods from 2016-17, international private organizations had the opportunity to correct zero-day exploits and patch other software shortcomings.

Concurrently, the U.S. military aided the Ukrainian cyber defense buildup before the latest invasion began. A task force of U.S. Cyber Command soldiers and leadership arrived in Ukraine months before the invasion.[33] These efforts shored up flaws throughout the Ukrainian military’s cyber networks, limiting the infiltration ability of Russian intelligence groups.[34]

Ukraine’s increased defensive capabilities correspond with Russia's inability to coordinate cyber network attacks and espionage with actual kinetic attacks. As a result, the Russian military could not logistically support Putin's plan of taking Kyiv in under a month.

A lack of logistical planning was evident, with ineffective cyber network attacks and electronic warfare brigades unable to support forward combat arms units. Furthermore, electronic warfare units were unprepared to face the U.S.-provided single channel ground and airborne radio system (SINCGARS) radios and drone systems operating outside Russian jamming capabilities.[35]

Moreover, logistical failures led to unplanned and hasty retrogrades by the Russian military, with units leaving behind equipment they deemed inessential. This unaccounted equipment included the Krasuhka-4 and Leer-3 electronic warfare networks, which are Russia's premier unmanned aerial vehicle and wireless network jamming systems. Both systems have fallen into Ukrainian hands, which will minimize their long-term effectiveness in this war.

*Krasukha-4 Ground-based Jammer (Vitaly V. Kuzmin)*

The only notable example of cyber success for the Russians has been the jamming and destruction of a television tower in eastern Ukraine.[36] Without adequate forward progress on the physical front, cyber network attack operations have played a much less critical role than expected for the Russians.

Lessons Learned and Future ImplicationsWith a contemporary history of cyber network attacks and espionage successes, the odds were in Russia’s favor for cyber and electronic warfare to steamroll Ukrainian defenses. Unfortunately, determining the precise cause of failure is complex, and it is impossible to evaluate nebulous concepts like complacency.

Russia's failure comprises many factors, ranging from micromanagement to logistical miscalculations. However, one clear, practical lesson the international community can take away from the war in Ukraine is the effectiveness of cyber and electronic warfare in a conventional fight.

First, while Russian cyber offensives may have failed in the first year of a haphazard campaign, the entire experience has been emblematic of what to expect in future conflicts. The main lesson is the potential scope of destruction by a robust cyber operation working in tandem with traditional kinetic means.

Second, Ukraine should expect Russian cyber operations to continue now that the war has become a grinding, drawn-out conflict rather than a dash for Kyiv. In addition, the U.S. and other nations must focus on the continued integration of cyber capabilities into conventional warfare, especially concerning advanced threats such as China.[37]

Finally, integrating corporations such as Microsoft into a public-private partnership with the Department of Defense will better equip both parties to enhance their security against future cyber offensives. Moreover, providing Cyber Command servicemembers and expertise to Ukraine before the conflict that began in 2022 proved effective in patching aged security measures and limiting any costly zero-day loopholes.

Overall, it is difficult to determine if Russian cyber capabilities were overhyped or underperformed in a new and unique environment. Nonetheless, what any nation can take away from Russia's struggles is to not remain complacent because "it's what you know for sure that just ain't so" that will get you in trouble.

Jonathan Beto is currently a Security Studies graduate student at Georgetown University’s Walsh School of Foreign Service. The views expressed are the author’s alone.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Untitled, 2021 (Anton Maksimov).

Notes: [1] “Five Reasons Why Russian Forces Are Struggling in Ukraine,” n.d. Defense One, https://www.defenseone.com/threats/2022/03/five-reasons-why-russia-struggling-ukraine/362636/.

[2] Buchanan, Ben, 2020, The Hacker and the State: Cyber Attacks and the New Normal of Geopolitics, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 214–239.

[3] Lewis, James, 2022, “Cyber War and Ukraine,” Www.csis.org, June 16, 2022, https://www.csis.org/analysis/cyber-war-and-ukraine.

[4] The World Bank, 2022, “Russian Invasion to Shrink Ukraine Economy by 45 Percent This Year,” World Bank, April 10, 2022, https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/press-release/2022/04/10/russian-invasion-to-shrink-ukraine-economy-by-45-percent-this-year.

[5] Buchanan, Ben, 2020, The Hacker and the State: Cyber Attacks and the New Normal of Geopolitics, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 289–305.

[6] “Analysis of the Cyber Attack on the Ukrainian Power Grid Defense Use Case,” 2016, https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/58/2016/12/21181126/E-ISAC_SANS_Ukraine_DUC_5.pdf.

[7] Greenberg, Andy, 2018, “The Untold Story of NotPetya, the Most Devastating Cyberattack in History,” WIRED, August 22, 2018, https://www.wired.com/story/notpetya-cyberattack-ukraine-russia-code-crashed-the-world/.

[8] “NERC | Report Title | Report Date I Modular ICS Malware,” 2017, https://assets.contentstack.io/v3/assets/blt36c2e63521272fdc/blt4f6cc0b6358c6883/607f235a6371c75a11ad9f5a/E-ISAC_SANS_Ukraine_DUC_6.pdf; “Analysis of the Cyber Attack on the Ukrainian Power Grid Defense Use Case,” 2016, https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/58/2016/12/21181126/E-ISAC_SANS_Ukraine_DUC_5.pdf.

[9] “The Industrial Control System Cyber Kill Chain | sans Institute,” n.d. Www.sans.org. https://www.sans.org/white-papers/36297/.

[10] “NERC | Report Title | Report Date I Modular ICS Malware,” 2017, https://assets.contentstack.io/v3/assets/blt36c2e63521272fdc/blt4f6cc0b6358c6883/607f235a6371c75a11ad9f5a/E-ISAC_SANS_Ukraine_DUC_6.pdf.

[11] Ibid.

[12] Ibid.

[13] Ibid.

[14] Ibid.

[15] Ibid.

[16] Greenburg, Andy, 2018, “The Untold Story of NotPetya, the Most Devastating Cyberattack in History,” WIRED, August 22, 2018, https://www.wired.com/story/notpetya-cyberattack-ukraine-russia-code-crashed-the-world/.

[17]

[18] Ibid.

[19] Ibid.

[20] Buchanan, Ben, 2020, The Hacker and the State: Cyber Attacks and the New Normal of Geopolitics, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 270–287.

[21] Nieles, Michael, Kelley Dempsey, and Victoria Yan Pillitteri, 2017, “An Introduction to Information Security,” An Introduction to Information Security, June, https://doi.org/10.6028/nist.sp.800-12r1.

[22] Hutchins, Eric, Michael Cloppert, and Rohan Amin, 2011, “Intelligence-Driven Computer Network Defense Informed by Analysis of Adversary Campaigns and Intrusion Kill Chains., https://www.lockheedmartin.com/content/dam/lockheed-martin/rms/documents/cyber/LM-White-Paper-Intel-Driven-Defense.pdf.

[23] Ibid.

[24] Greenberg, Andy, 2018, “The Untold Story of NotPetya, the Most Devastating Cyberattack in History,” WIRED, August 22, 2018, https://www.wired.com/story/notpetya-cyberattack-ukraine-russia-code-crashed-the-world/.

[25] Ibid.

[26] “An Overview of Russia’s Cyberattack Activity in Ukraine Special Report: Ukraine Digital Security Unit,” 2022, https://query.prod.cms.rt.microsoft.com/cms/api/am/binary/RE4Vwwd.

[27] Heilman, Greg, 2022, “Why Is Russia Interested in Controlling Nuclear Power Plants in Ukraine?” Diario AS, March 7, 2022, https://en.as.com/en/2022/03/07/latest_news/1646686014_463478.html; News, A. B. C. n.d. "Russia Escalates False Chemical Weapons Claims about U.S., Ukraine by Bringing Them to U.N.," ABC News, https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/russia-escalates-false-chemical-weapons-claims-us-ukraine/story?id=83366504.

[28] Team, Microsoft 365 Defender Threat Intelligence, 2022, “Destructive Malware Targeting Ukrainian Organizations,” Microsoft Security Blog, January 16, 2022, https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/.

[29] “Digital Technology and the War in Ukraine,” 2022, Microsoft on the Issues, February 28, 2022, https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2022/02/28/ukraine-russia-digital-war-cyberattacks/; “Industroyer2: Industroyer Reloaded,” 2022. WeLiveSecurity, April 12, 2022, https://www.welivesecurity.com/2022/04/12/industroyer2-industroyer-reloaded/.

[30] Nakashima, Ellen, 2022, "Russian Military behind Hack of Satellite Communication Devices in Ukraine at War's Outset, U.S. Officials Say," Washington Post, March 24, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/03/24/russian-military-behind-hack-satellite-communication-devices-ukraine-wars-outset-us-officials-say/; Brewster, Thomas. n.d. “‘Most Severe’ Cyberattack since Russian Invasion Crashes Ukraine Internet Provider,” Forbes, Accessed March 18, 2023, https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2022/03/28/huge-cyberattack-on-ukrtelecom-biggest-since-russian-invasion-crashes-ukraine-telecom/?sh=381c15037dc2; “Ukraine Destroys Five Bot Farms That Were Spreading ‘Panic’ among Citizens,” n.d. ZDNET, Accessed March 18, 2023, https://www.zdnet.com/article/ukraine-takes-out-five-bot-farms-spreading-panic-among-citizens/.

[31] "CYBER SECURITY STRATEGY of UKRAINE 1 General Provisions," n.d. https://ccdcoe.org/uploads/2018/10/NationalCyberSecurityStrategy_Ukraine.pdf.

[32] “Ukraine Universities Hacked as Russian Invasion Started,” 2022, Wordfence. March 1, 2022, https://www.wordfence.com/blog/2022/03/ukraine-universities-hacked-by-brazilian-via-finland-as-russian-invasion-started/.

[33] Srivastava, Mehul, Madhumita Murgia, and Hannah Murphy, 2022, “The Secret US Mission to Bolster Ukraine’s Cyber Defences ahead of Russia’s Invasion,” Financial Times, March 9, 2022, https://www.ft.com/content/1fb2f592-4806-42fd-a6d5-735578651471.

[34] “CYBERCOM Sent a ‘Hunt Forward’ Team to Help Ukraine Harden Systems,” n.d. Www.meritalk.com, Accessed March 18, 2023, https://www.meritalk.com/articles/cybercom-sent-a-hunt-forward-team-to-help-ukraine-harden-systems/.

[35] “The Fall and Rise of Russian Electronic Warfare,” 2022, IEEE Spectrum, July 30, 2022, https://spectrum.ieee.org/the-fall-and-rise-of-russian-electronic-warfare.

[36] “Berdyansk: Life under Russian Occupation,” n.d. Iwpr.net, Accessed March 18, 2023, https://iwpr.net/global-voices/berdyansk-life-under-russian-occupation.

[37] Cancian, Mark, Matthew Cancian, and Eric Heginbotham, 2023, “The First Battle of the next War Wargaming a Chinese Invasion of Taiwan,” https://csis-website-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/publication/230109_Cancian_FirstBattle_NextWar.pdf?VersionId=WdEUwJYWIySMPIr3ivhFolxC_gZQuSOQ.

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In On War, the great Prussian strategist General Carl Von Clausewitz proposes that there are two crucial factors in affecting a successful military campaign: one is “the sum of available means” and the other is “the strength of the will.”[1] Today, in the ultimate “battle laboratory” of Ukraine, this Clausewitzian thesis is being put to the test.[2] There, western allies led politically by the United States, which along with the United Kingdom has supplied most of the financial assistance and matériel, have committed themselves to supplying the embattled Ukrainian Armed Forces—therefore taking on an ever increasing part of “the sum of available means.”[3] Regarding “the strength of the will,” this is supplied fully by the Ukrainians, and no one could possibly claim that they have faltered given the extraordinary acts of bravery and sacrifice shown by their troops who refuse to yield in the face of ceaseless Russian offensives. Yet Clausewitz asks his readers to consider another question when setting out the basic manner in which wars tend to be conducted: what is the value of the political object being sought in undertaking the defeat of an enemy?

*“The Charge of the Light Brigade” by Richard Caton Woodville, Jr. (Wikimedia)*

Tension between Russia and the West is hardly novel—consider the Crimean War of the mid-nineteenth century. Britain and France, in an alliance with the Ottoman Empire, declared war on Russia on the 28th of March 1854. The purpose of this expeditionary war was, as Home Secretary Viscount Palmerston put it, to “curb the aggressive ambition of Russia.”[4] The great trading powers have always sought to defend their trade routes and their ability to access global markets. So Britain needed to prevent Russian regional hegemony from spreading to the Ottoman Near East where it could threaten trade routes to Britain’s far eastern empire. Western support for today’s war in Ukraine is far removed from this outmoded political justification, but it is striking how the justification for arming Ukraine is reminiscent of Palmerston’s logic. Western leaders today seek to ensure Ukrainian sovereignty as an independent nation, free from the Kremlin’s control. Yet, irrespective of the political justification for conflict with Russia, the military objectives of war never change in principle.

Clausewitz writes that “the military power must be destroyed, that is, reduced to such a state as not to be able to prosecute the war.”[5] This adage describes the present policy of the United States and its allies in seeking the defeat of the Russian military in Ukraine. In broad strategic terms, this policy appears to be obviously advantageous to the United States and its allies.

Russia, formerly the Soviet Union, has sat as a strategic thorn in the side of the West since the end of the Second World War. At the conclusion of that titanic clash, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill asked the Chiefs of Staff to provide plans for an allied invasion of the Soviet Union which would have, astoundingly, seen the British and Americans join up with the remains of the German Army for a campaign against the Red Army. Appropriately, this plan was code named Operation Unthinkable.[6] Reading the outline given to Churchill by the Chiefs of Staff, one is struck by the lack of comprehension of the strategic realities of the day. The closest the document ever gets to acknowledging the near insurmountable challenge of taking on the Red Army at the height of its powers, the same army that had just defeated the largest land invasion in history and then marched across the face of Eastern and Central Europe to take Berlin, is this: “The one thing certain is that to win it would take us a very long time.”[7] Defeating the military power of the Russian Federation today, however, is not the same proposition as defeating the Red Army in 1945. The Russian armed forces have not acquitted themselves well in Ukraine, and their logistical problems, as well as questions of command and decision making, show that their military power is second rate. The difference between the professionalism and combat effectiveness of Russian troops in 1945 and today would be far more relevant for western strategic planners were it not for one crucial point—the revolution in strategy which followed the advent of nuclear weapons.

Consider China. In the wake of the Second World War, Chinese dictator Mao Tse-tung coveted a nuclear weapon.[8] His programme for attaining the technology required to build a bomb, not to mention technical assistance from the Russians, was a long game. Eventually this long game, which Mao considered the cornerstone of his superpower programme, paid dividends—China’s first atomic bomb was detonated at Lop Nor in the Gobi desert on the 16th of October, 1964.[9] Developing the requisite technology to build and successfully test an atomic weapon in an essentially agrarian society beset by devastating famines and kleptocratic governance was a minor miracle. The cost was tremendous. Mao understood a simple truth: possessing nuclear weapons changes the strategic calculus. Possession of the ultimate weapon reduces, but does not replace, reliance on conventional forces.

Russia today possesses a formidable, if unevenly upgraded, nuclear arsenal. What Russian forces have lost since 1945 in fighting ability has been compensated for by that nation’s strategic arsenal. Therefore the battlefield success of Ukrainian forces in wearing out the Russian army cannot bring about the political objective sought by the United States if the intention is to collapse the Russian regime, perhaps by forcing an end to Vladimir Putin’s tenure at its head. What it can and will achieve is the destruction of Russia’s conventional fighting strength. The question remains: what will the cost of such a policy be?

Putin, like Mao, is interested in amassing as much power—military and geopolitical—as he can in his lifetime. It is probable that the invasion of Ukraine represents the end point of a grotesque personal gambit played by Putin after twenty plus years at the head of the Russian state. At the end of March, Putin signposted that he is considering stationing Russian nuclear forces in his satellite state, Belorussia.[10] As echoes of the Euromissile Crisis resound, discussing the nuclear ramifications of the Ukraine War can no longer be avoided. The precedent for dealing with nuclear confrontation, as set out by the Pershing II and cruise missile deployments to Europe made by the United States, which succeeded in deterring Russia at the time from continuing and expanding its SS-20 deployments, is to meet one’s opponent with sufficient strength to conclude an agreement on favourable terms. This is consistent with Clausewitz’ tenets of war. What is different about the nuclear encounter is that it makes real something which Clausewitz stated to be a practical impossibility, namely that all the battles can happen at once—the definition of a nuclear exchange.

*Cartoon by French cartoonist Plantu: “Beware of American "Pershings” (Le Monde)*

Those who advocate the continued arming of Ukraine should consider making the dual-track argument and approach this strategic conundrum by equaling the Russian pledge, signaling American willingness to deploy nuclear forces to Europe—just as in the Euromissile Crisis—should Putin go ahead with the mooted nuclear force deployment in Belorussia. Opening the discussion around nuclear weapons, Russia, and Ukraine would lift the pall of silence on the subject and add depth to the existing body of literature which focuses overwhelmingly on conventional forces.[11] In the Ukraine War, strategic echoes from the past sweep across to us. Whether or not we choose to listen is another question, but depending on this hangs the fate of many people and perhaps very, very many more than we suspect.

Rowan Wise holds a Bachelor’s Undergraduate Degree in Politics from Queen’s University Belfast. His research focuses on strategic studies as well as the defense and national security affairs of the United States of America and the United Kingdom. Rowan lives in Northern Ireland, United Kingdom.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

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Header Image: Operation Unthinkable, 2020 (Wikimedia Commons).

Notes: [1] Carl Von Clausewitz, On War, Translated by Colonel J. J. Graham (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1962), 5.

[2] Speech given by then UK Chief of the Defence Staff, General Sir Nick Carter to an audience at Policy Exchange regarding setting out the Integrated Operating Concept, https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/chief-of-the-defence-staff-general-sir-nick-carter-launches-the-integrated-operating-concept (accessed March 30th, 2023).

[3] Military assistance to Ukraine since the Russian invasion, Research Briefing, House of Commons Library, https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-9477/ (accessed March 30th, 2023).

[4] Simon Sebag Montefiore, The Romanovs 1613-1918 (London: Weidenfield & Nicholson, 2016), 379.

[5] Clausewitz, On War, 27.

[6] Operation Unthinkable, text of planning documents from the British Chiefs of Staff held by The National Archives, https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/resources/cold-war-on-file/operation-unthinkable/ (accessed March 31st, 2023).

[7] Operation Unthinkable.

[8] Jung Chang and Jon Halliday, Mao: The Unknown Story (London: Vintage Books, 2007), 456.

[9] Ibid., 589.

[10] Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Hosting Russian Nuclear Weapons Will Have Far-Reaching Consequences for Belarus by Artyom Shraibman https://carnegieendowment.org/politika/89394 (accessed April 1st, 2023).

[11] Centre for Strategic and International Studies, A New Euromissile Crisis? NATO and the INF-Treaty Crisis in Historical Perspective, https://www.csis.org/analysis/new-euromissile-crisis-nato-and-inf-treaty-crisis-historical-perspective (accessed April 1st, 2023).

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IntroductionThanks to near-real time reporting from the battlefield, open-source intelligence, and many good streams of analysis—to include reports from the Institute for the Study of War and assessments from Michael Kofman and Mark Galeotti—the Russo-Ukrainian War provides a rare and information-rich occasion to compare competing proxy war strategies.

When examining proxy strategies, it is important to remember that a proxy is simply an actor (Actor B) who a principal (Actor A) relies on as an in-lieu-of actor to advance its own political-military interests. In Ukraine, Russian proxy strategy resides on one side of the spectrum and the U.S. proxy strategy on the other. While Ukraine is fighting for its national sovereignty and the restoration of its territorial integrity, the U.S. is relying on Ukrainian military operations to defeat Russia. The defeat of Russia serves multiple U.S. interests, aside from just helping Ukraine remain a sovereign state. These interests include advancing both the relevance and importance of NATO and the European Union, continuing to spread Western idealism and democracy at the expense of balance-of-power politics and single-party authoritarianism, and strategically weakening Russia’s standing within the international system. In the sad irony that accompanies war, both strategies feed off one another, having transformed the conflict into a grinding war of attrition.[1]

This point is important because it tends to be lost in the castigation of Russia’s poor tactics and in the goading of Ukrainian forces by the U.S. to adopt maneuver-centric tactics.[2] In reality, the competing Russian and U.S. proxy strategies create a circular logic. Understanding that a proxy is an in-lieu-of actor, the purveyor of a proxy strategy can mold that strategy to fit their needs, goals, resources, risk considerations, and the type of proxy available (or any combination thereof). Accordingly, the firepower-centric proxy strategy of the U.S. contributes to Russia’s human wave proxy strategy; and Russia’s human wave strategy contributes to the firepower-centric, technology diffusion proxy strategy of the U.S., which, when cycled over time, creates the devastating war of attrition that is playing out in eastern Ukraine.

The goal of this essay is not to vote one way or another on whose strategy is better or more ethical. Moreover, the goal is not to inject emotion or virtue-signaling into this paper. The purpose of this paper is to provide an objective comparison of proxy strategies, while not advocating for, or against either of the involved participants. The ultimate goal of this paper is to illustrate, as objectively as possible, how the Russian and US proxy strategies feed off one another to fuel a war of attrition.

Russian Proxy StrategyRussian proxy strategy at the outset of the Russo-Ukrainian War relied on speed and obfuscation to spring a fait accompli to take control of Crimea in February 2014.[3] Yegveny Prigozhin’s Wagner Group and other contractual proxies worked alongside unmarked Russian regulars to take Crimea.[4] By mid-March, Crimea’s new government, a blatant Russian proxy, put forth a referendum of independence from Ukraine, becoming in the eyes of Russia the Republic of Crimea, and was subsequently absorbed into the Russian Federation.[5]

*Yevgeny Prigozhin (L) with Vladimir Putin during a dinner with foreign scholars and journalists in 2011. (Misha Japaridze/Reuters)*

In April 2014, the Kremlin relied on a similar proxy strategy to unofficially annex significant portions of Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts. The goal was to take control of Donetsk and Luhansk before Ukraine or the international community could comprehend the situation. The Kremlin sought to move more quickly than Kyiv could counter and consolidate military forces on territorial acquisitions before a lax international community could respond.[6]

During the opening phase of the Donbas campaign the Donetsk People’s Army (DPA) and the Luhansk People’s Army (LPA) fit the definition of exploited proxy; a composite force created by the Russian military to fulfill combat duty that would have otherwise been filled by Russian armed forces.[7] Further, the Kremlin’s proxy strategy sought to keep Russian forces in the shadows at the campaign’s outset. Nevertheless, Western friends, partisan internet users, concerned local citizens, and others used social media; cell phone signal forensics; theater intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance; and open-source intelligence to unmask Russia’s hidden hand.[8] To be sure, not long after Russia dispatched army forces to Luhansk Airport and Ilovaisk in August 2014, it became evident that the conflict was not merely the result of a band of erstwhile separatists from the state’s eastern reaches conspiring against Kyiv. Instead, it was unmistakable that the conflict was a concerted Russian foreign policy gambit seeking to both undermine Kyiv and take sovereign Ukrainian territory.

Russia’s proxy strategy evolved from one that emphasized obfuscated intervention, to one that used proxies as an auxiliary to take the sting off biting combat losses and provide policymaker’s more strategic flexibility. From August 2014 onwards, Russia did next to nothing to hide its involvement in the conflict.[9] Instead, the Kremlin used the the Donetsk People’s Army, the Luhansk People’s Army, and Wagner as a millstone, while using its army as a holding force and to deliver the coup de grâce, when applicable.[10]

Using the Donetsk People’s Army, the Luhansk People’s Army, and Wagner as auxiliaries—or outsourced fighters, as Galeotti refers to them—Russia creates military and political time by jettisoning many of the risks associated with warfighting.[11] Every proxy killed or wounded in action equals one less Russian regular killed or wounded. This exchange dynamic helps preserve the army, while still advancing an aggressive, goal-seeking foreign policy.

Concurrently, the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Armies evolved from an exploited proxy to a cultural proxy. Cultural proxies are those that share a cultural bond with their principal, and therefore involve fewer agency costs, have high autonomy, and are trusted with more challenging operations.[12] Despite coming up short while fighting independently at Donetsk Airport, Luhansk Airport, and Ilovaisk in 2014, it is not a stretch to assume the Kremlin began to see the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Armies as a steadfast expedient for Russian military forces in Ukraine.

The evolution of the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Armies from exploited to cultural proxies was not entirely an acknowledgement of brotherhood. The evolution reflected a calculated move by the Kremlin to position the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Armies as culpable partners in a future invasion of Ukraine.[13] Russifying the proxy army would accelerate the movement of the population of the Donetsk and Luhansk’s oblasts towards future annexation. Moreover, given the premium placed on land forces when a large operation to denationalize Ukraine came, the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Armies would have to be trusted to operate independently.

When Russia expanded its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, both Wagner and the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Armies took on distinct roles. Wagner, seen as a trustworthy proxy because of its contractual bond with the Kremlin, was afforded significant latitude to operate independent from the Russian Army, but still under Russia’s National Defense Management Center (NToSU).[14] The Russian General Staff’s unified field command must request Wagner support from Prigozhin, who possesses the approval authority for the group’s tactical employment.[15] This contributes to many of the problems of command and control, logistics support, and combined arms that plague the Russian military effort in Ukraine.[16]

*Militants of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic stand outside a military mobilization point in the separatist-controlled city of Donetsk, Ukraine, in February 2022. (Reuters)*

Additionally, Wagner’s status as a private company afforded it the opportunity to hire personnel differently from the Russian Army. Wagner quickly hired and rapidly sent contractors to the front to reinforce and or augment existing military operations. During the summer of 2022, Wagner quickly drew up 40,000 contractors, largely recruited from Russian prisons, while the Russian Army remained dependent on the state’s bi-annual conscription process.[17]

Wagner fits with a traditional Russian view on attrition’s utility in warfare. Russian military strategist Alexander Svechin writes that when a quick, decisive strike is out of the question, “geographical objectives and secondary operations” become strategic imperatives.[18] More specifically, Svechin asserts:

The weary path of a strategy of attrition, which leads to the expenditure of much greater resources than a short destructive strike aimed at the heart of the enemy, is in general, chosen only when a war cannot be ended by a single blow. The operations of a strategy of attrition are not so much direct stages toward the achievement of an ultimate goal as they are stages in the deployment of material superiority, which would ultimately deprive the enemy of the means for successful resistance.[19]

Taken in the context of Russia’s failure to quickly topple Kyiv and control Kharkiv in late February 2022, Wagner’s use in places such as Mariupol and Bakhmut makes more sense. Russia failed to win the conflict with a quick, decisive strike on Kyiv, and the Kremlin thus likely reasoned that the best strategy to defeat Ukraine resides in out-resourcing Ukraine and exhausting their manpower reserves. Wagner facilitated that shift in strategy, which likely contributed to their increased importance after the Russian military’s early failures around Kyiv and Kharkiv.

By February of 2022, the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Armies had become trusted cultural proxies for Russia and were given a set of tasks similar to those of Wagner.[20] Russia used them as a bite-and-hold force, primarily concerned with consuming Kyiv’s personnel and equipment in large attritional affairs in the Donbas.[21]

The use of Wagner and the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Armies as attritional battering rams and operational distractions provided the Kremlin the strategic flexibility for Russian forces to capture territory along the Sea of Azov, creating the long-coveted land bridge to Crimea. Moreover, in keeping with Svechin’s postulate on attrition, Moscow’s proxies provide a covering force for Russia to further invest its position along the Sea of Azov. Simultaneously, Moscow’s proxies fight bite-and-hold battles with the Kyiv’s armed forces meant to exhaust their personnel and equipment.[22]

What’s more, high-end weaponry like HIMARS and other precision munitions are expensive, exist in limited quantities, and are not being produced in a way befitting the requirements of industrial warfare.[23] Again, keeping Svechin’s thoughts on attrition in mind, it is not a stretch to assert the Russian military strategy intentionally paired slow, grinding combat with the Ukrainian’s reliance on high-end weapons from the U.S. and other Western partners in an effort to exhaust those stockpiles.

In short, the Kremlin’s strategy does not appear as haphazard as a lot of reporting suggests.[24] Ukraine has inflicted as many as 30,000 casualties, to include 9,000 killed in action, on the Wagner Group since the start of the conflict.[25] Considering that estimates indicate that the Wagner Group numbered approximately 50,000 at its high-water mark, the losses are staggering.[26] Reporting on losses for the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Armies are not as clear as those of Wagner. Open-source information does not present a holistic or necessarily trustworthy picture. Nevertheless, reporting indicates the Donetsk People’s Army began the conflict with roughly 20,000 soldiers.[27] By November 2022, combat operations inflicted 19,540 casualties.[28] While Russia’s proxy army was absorbing these casualties, Russia’s regular forces tended to be more oriented on consolidating their holdings along the land bridge to Crimea and fending off local challenges to those territorial possessions.[29] In effect, Russia’s proxy strategy appears intent on somewhat protecting its regular army, while using its proxy armies as an offset mechanism.

U.S. Proxy Strategy Ukraine’s defense, which has been nothing less than awe-inspiring, is underpinned by a complementary U.S. proxy strategy. It is important to note that exploitation is not what fuels this strategy. Instead, the U.S. approach is a pragmatic strategic response to Russia’s unfortunate decision to try and eliminate Ukraine from the political map.

The proxy strategy pursued by the U.S. is one of technology diffusion between the U.S. and Ukraine that rests on the idea of a transactional proxy relationship.[30] States relying on other states as a proxy is not a new idea. Scholar Geraint Hughes, for instance, notes that the U.S. has long used Israel to support American interests in the Middle East, among other examples.[31] Scholar David Lake makes a similar statement regarding state-to-state proxy operations. Lake supports this assertion by highlighting U.S. reliance on Saddam Hussein and Iraq as an in-lieu-o’ actor to combat Iran’s push for regional hegemony during the Iran-Iraq War.[32] In Iraq’s case, the U.S. used indirect control to keep its involvement obfuscated from the public.[33] In Ukraine, on the other hand, the U.S. has done next to nothing to keep its involvement hidden. As ironic as it might seem to the casual observer, overt proxy employment, whether a state actor or a non-state actor, aligns with traditional proxy strategy. Hughes notes that “...in certain cases it should be noted that sponsor states do not always seek to conceal their assistance to proxy forces.”[34]

As noted above, the relationships in state-to-state principal-proxy interactions are generally transactional. In a transactional relationship, Actor A takes a backseat role and does not participate in the conflict through the use of its own armed forces.[35] Instead, Actor A participates by sharing intelligence with Actor B, equipping and training Actor B’s forces, and providing Actor B’s government with financial support.[36] Unlike coalitions and alliances, however, in proxy relationships Actor A transfers the majority of tactical risk, including the material costs of war, to Actor B.[37]

*Vladimir Putin, Francois Hollande, Angela Merkel, Petro Poroshenko during Minsk II negotiations (AFP)*

During the period between the Minsk II agreement and February 2022, the U.S. and its Western partners did not utilize a proxy strategy in Ukraine. Instead, they focused on deterrence and provided security assistance and security force assistance. When Russia did invade Ukraine, U.S. policy evolved from deterrence to defeating Russia on the battlefield, albeit with Ukrainian forces doing the fighting and dying.[38]

Presidential Drawdown Authority is a tool that allows the U.S. president to provide military and financial support to other states and international organizations to address emergencies in real time.[39] Initially, this authority was used to provide primarily financial support, but it did involve a small number of meaningful armaments.[40] By mid-March 2022, the Presidential Drawdown came with a number of high-impact weapon systems, which pushed the conflict toward parity between Ukraine and Russia. This package included 600 Stinger anti-air missile systems, 2,600 Javelin anti-tank rocket systems, 40 million rounds of small arms ammunition, and one million artillery rounds, grenades, and mortars.[41] As the conflict continued, the U.S. provided expanding lethal aid packages, eventually resulting in the transfer of the High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS), High-Speed Anti-Radiation Missiles (HARM) Avenger Air Defense Systems, and a multitude of other sophisticated weapons.[42] By the summer of 2022, these aid packages helped Kyiv turn the tables on Moscow, illustrated by the devastating number of casualties the Ukrainian armed forces inflicted on Russian forces.[43]

FindingsBy the early summer of 2022, Ukraine’s forces had inflicted upwards of 80,000 casualties on the Russian military—a withering number for six months of combat. [44] As a result, it appears that Russia adapted its general strategy, and its proxy strategy in particular, to account for the U.S. technology diffusion proxy strategy.

It appears Russia’s proxy strategy shifted to offset the Ukrainian advantage in firepower through mass—that is, throwing more soldiers at the problem than U.S. and Western munitions stockpiles can withstand over time. The Wagner Group’s authorization to recruit personnel from the Russian prison system is perhaps the most notable example of the Kremlin’s shift regarding its proxy strategy.[45] With the failure of Russian blitzkrieg, the Russian military embraced its population and materiel asymmetry with Ukraine, and shifted to a strategy of attrition oriented on exhausting Ukraine’s resources, its political and domestic will to fight, and the ability and will of the U.S. and other Western friends to continue providing weapons, training, and money to Kyiv.[46] The enlistment of approximately 40,000 prisoners by Yegveny Prigozhin to augment Wagner’s 10,000 contract fighters provided the Russian Army with approximately four additional division’s worth of disposable proxy manpower.[47] That infusion of manpower has allowed Russia to compensate for the significant casualties inflicted on the Russian military and proxy forces by the U.S. proxy strategy of technology diffusion and its vigorous execution by Ukrainian armed forces.

ConclusionRussian and U.S. use of proxy strategies complement one another to fuel a war of attrition. Russia’s human wave response to expensive and limited U.S. firepower is not unreasonable, despite perhaps being quite cynical and fatalistic. Russia’s human wave proxy strategy both protects conventional Russian army forces by redirecting combat to disposable proxies and frees the conventional army to reinforce territorial and political gains along the Sea of Azov.[48] Simultaneously, the U.S. proxy strategy is a logical response to an undersized and outgunned Ukrainian military. The Ukrainians fighting at distance with U.S. artillery, missiles, and rockets while using urban terrain to offset Russian strength makes complete sense. But the interaction of these two proxy strategies, both logical in their own right, fuels a devastating war of attrition, depletes weapon stockpiles, and generates significant numbers of casualties.

Amos Fox is a PhD Candidate at the University of Reading, an associate editor at the Wavell Room, and is the Deputy Director for Development for the Irregular Warfare Initiative. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: 436th Aerial Port Squadron, Dover Air Force Base, Maryland, 2022 (Mauricio Campino).

Notes: [1] Seth Jones, Riley McCabe, and Alexander Palmer, ‘Ukrainian Innovation in a War of Attrition,’ Center for Strategic and International Studies, 27 February 2023, accessed 30 March 2023, available at: https://www.csis.org/analysis/ukrainian-innovation-war-attrition.

[2] Peter Dickinson, ‘2022 Review: Why Has Vladimir Putin’s Ukraine Invasion Gone Badly Wrong?”, Atlantic Council, 19 December 2022, accessed 29 March 2023, available at: https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/2022-review-why-has-vladimir-putins-ukraine-invasion-gone-so-badly-wrong/; Natasha Bertrand, Alex Marquardt, and Katie Bo Lillis, ‘The US and Its Allies Want Ukraine to Change its Battlefield Tactics in the Spring,’ CNN, 24 January 2023, accessed 29 March 2023, available at: https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/24/politics/ukraine-shift-tactics-bakhmut/index.html.

[3] Orlando Figes, The Story of Russia (New York: Metropolitan Books, 2022), 290-291.

[4] Candace Rondeaux, ‘Decoding the Wagner Group: Analyzing the Role of Private Military Security Contractors in Russian Proxy Warfare,’ New America, 5 November 2019, accessed 18 April 2023, available at: www.newamerica.org/international-security/reports/decoding-wagner-group-analyzing-role-private-military-securitycontractors-russian-proxy-warfare/.

[5] Figes, The Story of Russia, 291-292.

[6] Altman, ‘By Fait Accompli, Not Coercion,’ 884.

[7] Amos Fox, “On Proxy War: A Multipurpose Tool for a Multipolar World,” Journal of Military Studies, Forthcoming: 10.

[8] Sean Case, ‘Putin’s Undeclared War: Summer 2014 – Russian Artillery Strikes Against Ukraine,’ Bellingcat, 21 December 2016, accessed 20 March 2023, available at: https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2016/12/21/russian-artillery-strikes-against-ukraine/.

[9] Victoria Butenko, Laura Smith-Spark, and Diana Magnay, ‘US Official Says 1,000 Russian Troops Have Entered Ukraine,’ CNN, 29 August 2014, accessed 30 March 2023, available at: https://www.cnn.com/2014/08/28/world/europe/ukraine-crisis/index.html

[10] Mark Galeotti, Putin’s Wars: From Chechnya to Ukraine (New York: Osprey Publishing, 2022), 316-318.

[11] Galeotti, Putin’s Wars, 316;Hughes, ‘Syria and the Perils of Proxy War,’ 523.

[12] Amos Fox, “On Proxy War,” Journal of Military Studies, (Forthcoming): 13-14.

[13] DPR is the Donetsk People’s Republic, which is the name given to the Russian controlled portion of Donetsk Oblast. LPR is the Luhansk People’s Republic, which is the name given to the Russian controlled portion of Luhansk oblast.

[14] Mark Galeotti, Pavel Baev, and Graeme Herd, ‘Militaries, Mercenaries, Militias, Morale, and the Ukraine War,’ George C. Marshall Center for Security Studies, November 2022, accessed 18 March 2023, available at: https://www.marshallcenter.org/en/publications/clock-tower-security-series/strategic-competition-seminar-series-fy23/militaries-mercenaries-militias-morale-and-ukraine-war.

[15] Galeotti, Baev, and Herd ‘Militaries, Mercenaries, Mercenaries, and Morale and the Ukraine War’.

[16] Galeotti, Baev, and Herd, ‘Militaries, Mercenaries, Militias, Morale, and the Ukraine War.’

[17] Mike Eckel, ‘Russia Proposes Major Military Reorganization, Conscription Changes, Increases Troop Numbers,’ Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 23 December 2022, accessed 30 March 2023, https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-military-reorganization-expansion/32190811.html.

[18] Alexander Svechin, Strategy (Minneapolis, MN. East View Information Services, 1991), 246.

[19] Svechin, Strategy, 247.

[20] Kateryna Stepanenko and Karolina Hird, Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, May 18, (Washington, DC: Institute for the Study of War, 2022).

[21] Thomas Gibbons-Neff, Marc Santora, and Natalia Yermak, ‘Tens of Thousands of Civilians Are Now Largely Stranded in the Middle of One of the War’s Deadliest Battles,’ New York Times, 16 June 2022, accessed 30 March 2023, available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/16/world/europe/sievierodonetsk-ukraine-civilians-stranded.html.

[22] Andrew Meldrum, ‘Battle Rages in Ukraine Town; Russia Shakes Up its Military,’ Associated Press, 12 January 2023, accessed 20 March 2023, available at: https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-donetsk-9cc363adc31419311cadb3c5ed8e0601; Paul Niland, ‘Putin’s Mariupol Massacre is One of the 21st Century’s Worst Crimes,’ Atlantic Council, 24 May 2022, accessed 20 March 2023, https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/putins-mariupol-massacre-is-one-the-worst-war-crimes-of-the-21st-century/.

[23] Alex Vershinin, ‘The Return of Industrial Warfare,’ RUSI, 17 June 2022, accessed 20 March 2023, available at: https://www.rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/commentary/return-industrial-warfare.

[24] Peter Dickinson, ‘2022 Review: Why Has Vladimir Putin’s Ukraine Invasion Gone So Badly Wrong?,’ Atlantic Council, 19 December 2022, accessed 17 April 2023, available at: https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/2022-review-why-has-vladimir-putins-ukraine-invasion-gone-so-badly-wrong/.

[25] John Kirby, ‘Press Briefing by Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre and NSC Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby,’ White Press Briefing, 16 February 2023, accessed 19 April 2023, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/press-briefings/2023/02/17/press-briefing-by-press-secretary-karine-jean-pierre-and-nsc-coordinator-for-strategic-communications-john-kirby-9/.

[26] Andrew Kramer and Antoly Kurmanaev, ‘Ukraine Claims Bahkmut Battle is Wagner’s ‘Last Stand’,’ New York Times, 7 March 2023, accessed 19 April 2023, available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/07/world/europe/bakhmut-ukraine-russia-wagner.html.

[27] David Axe, ‘The Donetsk Separatist Army Went to War in Ukraine with 20,000 Men. Statistically, Almost Every Single One of Them Was Killed or Wounded,’ Forbes, 18 November 2022, accessed 19 April 2023, https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2022/11/18/the-donetsk-separatist-army-went-to-war-in-ukraine-with-20000-men-statistically-almost-every-single-one-was-killed-or-wounded/?sh=497acf411c09.

[28] Axe, ‘The Donetsk Separatist Army Went to War in Ukraine,’.

[29] Max Seddon and Christopher Miller, ‘Crimean Bridge Explosion Leaves Russian Supply Lines Exposed,’ Financial Times, 9 October 2022, accessed 19 April 2023, available at: https://www.ft.com/content/453d8aff-b8f2-42a3-919b-10a327475dfb.

[30] Amos Fox, ‘Ukraine and Proxy War: Improving Ontological Shortcomings in Military Thinking,’ Association of the United States Army, Landpower Paper 148 (August 2022): 3-4.

[31] Geraint Hughes, My Enemy’s Enemy: Proxy Warfare in International Politics (Brighton, England: Sussex University Press, 2014), 13-14.

[32] David Lake, ‘Iraq, 2003-2011: Principal Failure,’ in Eli Berman and David Lake, ed., Proxy Wars: Suppressing Violence Through Local Agents (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2019), 240.

[33] Lake, ‘Iraq, 2003-2011,’ in Berman and Lake, ed., Proxy Wars, 240.

[34] Hughes, My Enemy’s Enemy, 5.

[35] Fox, “On Proxy War,” 11.

[36] Fox, “Ukraine and Proxy War,” 11.

[37] Fox, “On Proxy War,” 3-4.

[38] ‘Fact Sheet, US Security Cooperation with Ukraine,’ US Department of State, 4 April 2023, accessed 19 April 2023, available at: https://www.state.gov/u-s-security-cooperation-with-ukraine/.

[39] ‘Fact Sheet, US Security Cooperation with Ukraine,’ US Department of State.

[40] ‘Fact Sheet on US Security Assistance to Ukraine as of 21 April 2022,’ US Defense Department, 22 April 2022, accessed 20 March 2023, available at: https://www.defense.gov/News/Releases/Release/Article/3007664/fact-sheet-on-us-security-assistance-for-ukraine-roll-up-as-of-april-21-2022/.

[41] ‘Fact Sheet on US Security Assistance to Ukraine.’

[42] ‘Fact Sheet, US Security Cooperation with Ukraine.’

[43] Arabia, Bowen, and Welt, ‘US Security Assistance to Ukraine.’

[44] Ellen Mitchell, ‘Russian has Seen 70,000 to 80,000 Casualties in Attack on Ukraine, Pentagon Says,’ The Hill, 8 August 2022, accessed 20 March 2023, available at: https://thehill.com/policy/defense/3593041-russia-has-seen-70000-to-80000-casualties-in-attack-on-ukraine-pentagon-says/; Jim Garamone, ‘Russian Efforts to Raise Numbers of Troops ‘Unlikely to Succeed,’ US Official Says,’ DoD News, 29 August 2022, accessed 19 April 2023, available at: https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/3143381/russian-efforts-to-raise-numbers-of-troops-unlikely-to-succeed-us-official-says/.

[45] ‘Russian Federation: UN Experts Alarmed by Recruitment of Prisoners by “Wagner Group”,’ United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner, 10 March 2023, accessed 20 March 2023, available at: https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2023/03/russian-federation-un-experts-alarmed-recruitment-prisoners-wagner-group

[46] Eugene Rumer, ‘Putin’s War Against Ukraine: The End of the Beginning,’ Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 17 February 2023, accessed 19 April 2023, available at: https://carnegieendowment.org/2023/02/17/putin-s-war-against-ukraine-end-of-beginning-pub-89071.

[47] ‘Brutality of Russia’s Wagner Gives it a Lead in Ukraine War,’ Associated Press, 27 January 2023, accessed 30 March 2023, available at: https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-wagner-group-yevgeny-prigozhin-803da2e3ceda5dace7622cac611087fc

[48] Olivia Yanchik, ‘Human Wave Tactics are Demoralizing the Russian Army in Ukraine,’ Atlantic Council, 8 April 2023, accessed 19 April 2023, available at: https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/human-wave-tactics-are-demoralizing-the-russian-army-in-ukraine/.

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The conflict in Ukraine offers unexpected insight into a military construct that had previously been mostly theoretical. Ukrainian ground forces, fighting beneath an information domain dominated almost exclusively by American intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities, while no U.S. forces fight in the conflict, is what military theorists and strategists in the 1990s described as a vertical coalition. They conceived it as the future of American warfare, during a brief period in which violent ground-based conflict among powerful states was believed, by some, to be vanishing from the world. The correlating concept of sovereign identity, as the founding principle of nation-statehood, was considered by these vanguard thinkers to be malleable or changing in historically unprecedented ways. Tracing the brief history of vertical coalitions reveals the unravelling of an entire way of seeing the world, even as the construct makes its first appearance in the most unexpected war of the 21st century. That history offers a live study in how truth, hubris, and reality trade blows through the lens of military technology and concepts under modern conditions.

Vertical CoalitionsAccompanied by the misappropriation of several insights from the natural sciences, lots of talk in the 90s within the U.S. national security and strategy communities centred on what advantages could be expected from the future of networked digital information technologies.[1] As essentially the owner and administrator, the U.S. stood peerless atop this regime of tech. No other nation approached the American military’s capacity to sense and shoot with rising precision. But how would such dominant battlespace knowledge be translated into military and strategic outcomes? Serious heads such as the late Andrew Marshall and his pupil Andrew Krepinevich frequently counselled on the need for technological innovations to be culturally and organisationally materialised for advantage to accrue, lest their value be squandered.[2] One answer spanning the gamut from tactics to strategy was the concept of vertical coalitions.[3] Vertical coalitions offered a U.S. military enterprise wielding dominant battlespace knowledge the prospect of greater strategic value, for lower operational cost, and reduced political risk.

Vertical coalitions were a military adaptation of the vertical alliance concept in corporate business. There it describes a business-level strategic relationship between a firm and its suppliers or distributors aimed at improving competitive advantage. Vertical alliances deepen relationships between the firm and its suppliers and distributors through the exchange of knowledge and commercial intelligence to mutual benefit. When a supplier or distributor agrees to work exclusively with a firm, it can bring about a lock-out dynamic that further enhances the firm’s competitive advantage by denying valuable commercial intelligence to rivals. Suppliers benefit by becoming actively involved in product design and distribution arrangements. A supplier might only agree to being locked in if it sees for itself a strategic advantage in doing so, for example where a firm might have a powerful market position or, better yet, a monopoly. Choosing the right partner is an important factor in the success of the strategy, making common intentions and compatible visions of the business a must. In the business world, actors considering a vertical alliance analyse each other’s corporate cultures to map learning opportunities and avert communication problems. It’s easy to see why military thinkers considering the implications of the digital networked age would be attracted.

One of the chief thinkers on vertical coalitions for the military was Martin Libicki. He described the way U.S. air power and expeditionary forces were used in combination with a beleaguered ally that was expected to provide the bulk of ground forces. In contrast to horizontal coalitions, which involved two or more brigades fighting side-by-side, Libicki thought that future military coalitions would be decidedly more vertical and that the emerging concept of dominant battlespace knowledge would be the critical enabler. In sum, it was a vision for how the United States would fight and win in the future. In 1995, Libicki wrote:

We would supply overall intelligence on the whereabouts and movements of distant echelons. Our overhead systems (both space and air breathing) would permit pinpointing of enemy platforms. Our distributed sensor systems would be put in place to operate, analyze, and convert data into fire-control solutions. This would permit friendly forces to take precise measure of the enemy, providing them with real-time one-shot, one-kill capability. We might even control the targeting once they have fielded the weapon. In some cases, the United States might be able to tilt the contest to one side without unambiguous proof that we had intervened at all. The use of stand-off sensors as a substitute for forces also frees us from the necessity of overseas bases; they permit more operations to be planned and conducted from international waters.[4]

Critically, vertical coalitions offered partner states a quid pro quo. As the predominant actor in the information domain, the U.S. was conceivably able to provide access to otherwise unavailable information to partner states. In this way, the dominant battlespace knowledge concept was plausibly scalable. It did not apply only to high-intensity warfare. The U.S. could provide information on everything from environmental degradation, law enforcement particularly in the maritime domain, transportation, transnational crime, disaster relief and so forth. In return, U.S. sensor systems require access to such entities as open skies, extant monitors and databases, supply lines and logistics would be granted. Libicki sensed the underlying political tension. He thought that such an arrangement was contingent on the provision of information at such a level of detail that the U.S. could not be accused of only giving access to information that only supported its objectives.

Nonetheless, the status of the U.S. would have a subtle but pervasive effect on what partners saw when they plugged into the system. It guarded U.S. sensitivities, emphasised strengths, and acted as a powerful moderator by reinforcing some transparency. Broadly speaking, Libicki enunciated a vision of the illumination of the battle space and the unbundling inclusion of allies and partners to keep alliances and coalitions together, drive down risk and mistrust, and increase cooperation.[5]

This expansive vision had a technical Achilles heel. How would vertical coalitions turn out in a world where cyber vulnerability became the defining condition of the electromagnetic spectrum? Further, was it a realistic prospect when politics among nations returned to historical norms, after a brief and hubristic post-Cold War hiatus? Either way, few military analysts anticipated we would get the chance to see a vertical coalition in action, let alone in a war with the Russian Federation in the 21st century. The fate of nation-states in vertical coalitions with the U.S. should now be front of mind in every capital in which the digital age progresses apace, because we are watching the construct operate in the furnace of battle.

*A U.S. Army instructor pictured together with Ukrainian servicemen during a 2019 exercise near Lviv in western Ukraine. (Gleb Garanich/Reuters)*

Sovereignty in NetworksTear-lines and NOFORN classifications have long been a reality of coalitions. The political and technical logistics of information sharing carry a rather tortured legacy in military operations, even among the closest of allies. Today, governments frequently espouse their commitment to the importance of, from an Australian example, “full knowledge and concurrence” regarding the use of national military forces, platforms, personnel, and territory. A closer look reveals moving hands.[6] The functionality of information systems has been a chief critique over the past three decades since Libicki wrote. It is easier to point out the vulnerabilities in cyberspace than it is to tackle the question of sovereign accountability within networks. Knowledge and concurrence is arguably understood to be a matter of administrative confidence in the systems. It’s still about what the system spits out, and what actions we take. People under sovereign government care about why their government acts.

Several features of the war in Ukraine raise new questions in the discourse on vertical coalitions of the 1990s. Few envisioned the senior partner supplying all the armaments, and at such draining cost. U.S. dominance in high-end weapons was not expected to be accompanied by the drain on basic artillery stocks witnessed in Ukraine. In addition, the vertical nature of the coalition is underpinned by the horizontally dispersed geographical footprint of the digital stack that drives digitized warfare. A targeting system developing fire-control solutions is part of the military kill chain, is thus a legitimate target in war, and is happening outside local territory.[7] In this way, vertical coalitions create horizontal risks.

Crucially, the increasing use of statistical inference software for intelligence products and decision-making within U.S.-led coalitions introduce new political questions. Beyond tear lines and the use of a NOFORN classification, the inscrutable nature of statistical inference products buries issues of knowledge and concurrence for sovereign governments deeper. The private sector entanglement enjoins a sprawling commercial ecosystem of digital stakeholders, vulnerabilities, and influences of interest to governments sending forces into battle without transparent access to intelligence tools. Indeed, the inscrutable nature of vanguard automated data science may present the greatest challenge within coalitions we have seen to date. To return to Libicki’s political tension, in the age of statistical inference, the system administrator may be unaware of the origins of certain features of an intelligence output, let alone able to present itself as transparent. In other words, the way the intelligence might support parochial interests is buried too. If it arrived via a neural network of mathematical probabilities, who would know? Don’t ask the data scientists because they cannot tell you.

One thing is known. The disciplines of security studies and international relations are not yet in possession of the explanatory tools to grapple with these issues. Until they are, our understanding of politics among sovereign nation-states—allies, partners, and enemies—is mired in an opaque interregnum. Political leadership can only be downstream from this, democratic accountability even further. This is dangerous, because sovereign people will demand their government acts in ways that do not violate their political identity. If governments can’t say why they acted, because the reason was a probabilistic inference spawned from the fusion of poisoned and leaking data, the absence of an answer is not an answer. Not when lives, and the meaning of those lives as political actors, are at stake.

Zac Rogers is a writer and researcher based at Flinders University in Adelaide, Australia. He is currently working on a defence-funded research project examining the use of advanced data-driven decision-making tools by the military.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: MQ-9 Sunset Flight, Creech Air Force Base, Nevada, 2018 (Senior Airman Christian Clausen/DVIDS)

Notes: [1] See for analysis of the misappropriation of insights from the natural sciences Sean T. Lawson, Nonlinear Science and Warfare: Chaos, Complexity and the U.S. Military in the Information Age (Routledge, 2013).

[2] Most recent see Andrew F. Krepinevich, The Origins of Victory: How Disruptive Military Innovation Determines the Fates of Great Powers (Yale University Press, 2023). See for overview of Marshall, Andrew F. Krepinevich and Barry D. Watts, The Last Warrior: Andrew Marshall and the Shaping of Modern American Defense Strategy (Hachette UK, 2015).

[3] See Martin Libicki, “DBK and Its Consequences,” in Dominant Battlespace Knowledge (National Defense University, 1995), http://www.dodccrp.org/files/Libicki_Dominant.pdf.

[4] Libicki, p.13.

[5] Zac Rogers, “Networked Security in the Western Pacific: A Web Without a Spider” (Flinders University of South Australia, 2018), https://flex.flinders.edu.au/file/fe4756db-277d-457e-9f8c-23a6233002fe/1/ThesisRogers2019Open.pdf.

[6] For Australian government definition of “knowledge and concurrence” see Clinton Fernandes, Sub-Imperial Power: Australia in the International Arena (Melbourne University Publishing, 2022), 44.

[7] Cabinet Ministers of Ukraine, “Government Approves Decision to Introduce Delta System in the Defense Forces,” Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, February 4, 2023, https://www.kmu.gov.ua/en/news/uriad-ukhvalyv-rishennia-shchodo-zaprovadzhennia-systemy-delta-v-sylakh-oborony.

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IntroductionThe Russian invasion of Ukraine may have come as a surprise to some foreign policy and military experts. Yet, that a state would carry out such an act of “naked aggression” should not come as a surprise to any who have engaged in even a cursory study of international politics.[1] While some scholars have noted that humans, thence states, have become less violent or that states have grown more inclined to cooperate over time, the historical record bears out a contradicting set of facts.[2] The fact is that the nature of human beings, and the nature of international politics, is such that there will always be bad actors. The result is that states, to ensure their own security and survival, must recognize this fact and prepare accordingly. A brief overview of liberal and neorealist international relations thought allows us to examine, in light of the war in Ukraine, select key assumptions of the liberal and neorealist international relations paradigms that have been challenged and validated, respectively.

The Risk of Validating Military Operational Lessons Learned Too Early

The Strategy Bridge second quarter call for submissions included an interesting set of observations from senior U.S. military leaders. These observations point to some of the potential biases career professionals can bring to the discussion and the risk of determining lessons to be learned while combat operations continue.

Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army, General James McConville, repeated the maxim that amateurs study tactics and professionals study logistics; General Mark Kelly, Commander of Air Combat Command, pointed to a lack of air superiority as Russia’s problem; while General David Berger, Commandant of the Marine Corps, used the conflict to argue that ‘winning the reconnaissance/counter-reconnaissance fight early on [is] critical.’[3]

  Though each observation may be accurate on its own terms, each is also incomplete. These officers, like most, view the world through the lens they have developed over a career in their particular branch of service and career specialty. A bureaucratic model of politics suggests that “where you stand depends on where you sit.”[4] You see what you see, you study that which you see, and the evidence sought and found will tend to support predetermined notions.

What does this have to do with the assumptions made prior to and during this particular conflict in Ukraine? First, the quote about logistics is true to the point of being cliché. Second, it has been well-established that a lack of air superiority is problematic on the battlefield. Yet, when neither side dominates the air, other aspects of offense and defense come into the fore. Lastly, Sun Tzu could have made the same observation about reconnaissance thousands of years ago. These observations regarding the viewpoints of senior leaders are not meant to demean the intelligence of these leaders, but to suggest that our understanding of the unfolding situation is incomplete and simplistic. It is easy to armchair quarterback this conflict at the tactical level, but it is not over yet. While the military in particular may be able to glean early tactical lessons from both sides of this conflict, it is too early to draw operational and strategic lessons from this war. Much like correctly predicting when or where the next war will occur, accurately predicting the final results of this conflict is improbable—especially regarding potential enduring second- and third-order effects. Yet, valid expectations about war and peace, interstate relationships, and the future of conflict are possible. Tactics change with context, strategy less so. An assumption that the use of military force—even naked aggression—will continue to be a key aspect of international relations will endure.

There are several military and political assumptions regarding the war in Ukraine worthy of continued discussion. For example, Russia likely assumed the objectives of the invasion would be achieved quickly, and Ukraine would not be able to offer significant resistance. The West assumed that Russia would not continue an invasion if it faced stiff resistance. Some pundits may have assumed the war Russia launched was merely limited in nature, seeking to secure a route to a warm sea port or to protect ethnic Russians. Others assumed Russian aggression was to secure a key industrial and agricultural region of the former Soviet Union that Russia cannot afford to lose.[5] Another important assumption is that Putin would possibly back down in the face of near-universal condemnation of his actions.[6]

All of these assumptions are important, but too specific to the context to be useful in the examination of possible futureevents. What the situation does provide is additional evidence in the empirical record that assumptions central to liberal international relations theory are faulty. That international relations have moved beyond realpolitik and hard-nosed calculations based on relative power and position is incorrect. Even the Strategy Bridge call for papers provides some insight into what those assumptions might be, given the use of the term “Russia’s naked aggression,” indicating a moral element to the situation.[7] To quote a famous movie character, “Is there another kind?”[8]

A Notch for Neorealist TheoryA brief review of the primary assumptions of neorealist scholarship is necessary. First, interstate interactions take place within a system of anarchy. There is no power or authority higher than the state that is empowered to enforce international rules or to prevent one state from attacking or otherwise harming another. Second, because of the anarchical nature of the world, states must always be concerned about their own survival. This leads to a third crucial point—that states seek security as their primary interest. Liberal theory suggests that once state security is assured, the state can have myriad additional interests, which can lead to instances of cooperation, and possibly even enduring peace. In contrast, neorealist literature expects that cooperation through alliances is merely a byproduct of the quest for survival and security. Neorealism expects that in a world characterized by anarchy, cooperation only occurs when it benefits the security interests of a state.

Scholars, policymakers, and military experts should not conflate the way the world works—as it is characterized by anarchy, survival, security—with the conduct or results of a specific conflict. The execution of combat operations and the results of those operations should not lead military and political experts to conclusions that naked aggression may be prevented by strong alliances among liberal democracies. Nor should potential military success in Ukraine create the false impression that at some future point other states will not act aggressively. The neorealist expectation that Russia felt threatened by NATO expansion, as posited by noted scholars George Kennan and John Mearsheimer, resulted in predictable behavior.[9] No matter how naked the aggression is deemed by others, how ill-informed the attack was, or ill-fated the Russian invasion might turn out to be, military failure in any instance cannot and should not influence thinking on how the world works in terms of the potential triggers for violent actions by state actors. That said, a brief examination of key liberal assumptions that have been challenged by this specific situation is in order.

Challenged liberal assumption #1: State survival and security are no longer the primary concern of the modern state. Cooperation between states is more economically sound. A neorealist would assume that Ukraine would beg to differ and wishes it could go back in time and make preparations for its own security.

Challenged liberal assumption #2: Modern alliances, unlike those of the past, are stable and reliable. The enduring NATO alliance purportedly provides evidence to support this assumption. However, the enduring nature of NATO is easier to explain. NATO survives because the threat endures.

*Russian and NATO flags (NATO)*

The events that preceded the Russian aggression against Ukraine, both decades and immediately prior to the 2022 invasion, provide additional evidence in the long historical record of similar acts that are best explained by neorealist theories. The fact that the war continues as a quagmire for Russia while Western nations provide just enough aid for Ukraine to continue the fight also provides ammunition to support the predictions and conclusions of neorealism. It follows that some specific neorealist assumptions are supported by the events in Ukraine.

Validated neorealist assumption #1: A state’s interest in survival will outweigh international norms, alliances, and other cooperative measures when push comes to shove. The result of such interests may even result in acts others view as naked aggression.

Validated neorealist assumption #2: A state cannot rely on others to prevent aggression. Relying on others to come to your aid—after aggression—worked this time for Ukraine, but only because the West, and the U.S. specifically, have a direct interest in a weakened Russia. Alliances are but “temporary marriages of convenience.”[10]

Validated neorealist assumption #3: Security is a state’s prime directive. NATO’s interests are solidly based on insecurity that results from an anarchic international system. NATO endures because the need for the marriage persists. Russia remains the primary threat to Europe.

Validated neorealist assumptions #4: “We will... miss the Cold War.”[11] The bipolar system was theorized as being the most stable possible under anarchy. That has proven to be the case. While a supposed unipolar era after the Cold War ended was thought to be relatively peaceful, it was not. The world has witnessed since the end of the Cold War “a return to the multipolar distribution of power that characterized the European state system from its founding.”[12]

The United States seeks a weakened Russia—as neorealist thinking suggests. That is the strategic goal in supporting Ukraine. Evidence of this fact is found in the incremental approach to providing military and economic aid to Ukraine. The United States and the rest of the West has been doing just enough, just in time. A free and democratic Ukraine would merely be icing on the cake, regardless of how policymakers and the press sell that as the primary reason for Western support to Ukraine. The U.S. strategic goal of a weakened Russia confirms, as does Russia’s naked aggression in the first place, the assumptions of neorealist thought on international relations.

The inclusion of additional states into the NATO alliance came with the potential for predictable responses from Russia. In fact, the desired intent of including such nations into the alliance may have been to provoke the Russians into a foolish incursion—a bold claim, but not a unique one.[13] Given decades of neorealist thinking, and even Russia’s own use of reflexive control, it is not far-fetched to see the Russian invasion of Ukraine being purposefully triggered by the West in order to see Russia weakened militarily and isolated on the world stage. Russia had no recourse but to invade, despite potential misgivings about ultimate success. “Putin [had] been warning of this invasion, in one form or another, for 15 years.”[14]

Moreover, the inability of Ukraine to defend itself was well-known, possibly viewed by analysts as a “Gray Rhino”—an obvious and significant problem that was long-ignored.[15] The Russian invasion of Ukraine was probably one of the most inevitable and easily foreseen international political events in recent decades. The United States often does not predict accurately where and against whom the next major war will be fought, but there are some instances where conflict between less than peer competitors is predictable—even stated well in advance by the aggressor.[16] The West, and particularly the United States, would be wise to take such threats seriously. Neorealist conceptions of international relations will continue to offer clear insights into the triggers of conflict.

**Conclusion**Vindication for the assumptions of neorealism does not equate to a *jus ad bellum* for Russia. Useful and accurate international relations theory should be morally agnostic. Putin will not succeed militarily in the face of the substantial Western support for Ukraine. That is less an assumption and more of a given, and it is the goal of the West. However, relying on alliances has always been a dangerous proposition—just ask the Melians.[17] If Russia were a lesser power, not a threat to European nations, and also a long-time rival of the United States, there is no guarantee that Ukraine would have the robust support it has received. Is the sovereignty of a non-democratic state less sacrosanct than that of a nominally democratic one? Defense of sovereignty against so-called naked aggression should apply universally, but it does not. States will continue to defend others only when it is in their own interests to do so.

This instance of cooperation and conflict in world affairs will not resolve the dispute between ontological world views. There will likely never be a grand theory of international politics. However, some models remain more useful than others. None will be able to predict the exact where and when of the next war, let alone the outcome of that conflict. The expectations of neorealism, however, provide a parsimonious model with which to examine events and identify the most important variables which determine the causes, or triggers, of cooperation and conflict. Identification of such triggers can go far in informing foreign policy responses to prevent or mitigate conditions that lead to war.

Brent Lawniczak is a retired Marine aviator and currently serves as assistant Professor of Military and Security Studies at the U.S. Air Force Air Command and Staff College. He is the author of the book Confronting the Myth of Soft Power in U.S. Foreign Policy. This essay reflects his own views and not necessarily those of the U.S. Air Force, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Russian Tank, Ukraine, 2022 (Dmitry Bukhantsov).

Notes: [1] “2Q23 Call for Strategy Bridge Submissions,” The Strategy Bridge, February 13, 2023, https://thestrategybridge.org/the-bridge/2023/2/13/2q23-call-for-strategy-bridge-submissions.

[2] Steven Pinker, The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined (New York, NY: Penguin Books, 2011); Robert O. Keohane, After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy (Princeton University Press, 2005).

[3] “2Q23 Call for Strategy Bridge Submissions.”

[4] Rufus E. Miles, “The Origin and Meaning of Miles’ Law,” Public Administration Review 38, no. 5 (1978): 399–403, https://doi.org/10.2307/975497.

[5] Keith Gessen, “Was It Inevitable? A Short History of Russia’s War on Ukraine,” The Guardian, March 11, 2022, sec. World news, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/11/was-it-inevitable-a-short-history-of-russias-war-on-ukraine.

[6] Joseph R. House, “Remarks by President Biden Providing an Update on Russia and Ukraine,” The White House, February 15, 2022, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2022/02/15/remarks-by-president-biden-providing-an-update-on-russia-and-ukraine/; U.S. Department of State, “United States Department of State Press Briefing,” United States Department of State, April 10, 2023, https://www.state.gov/?post_type=state_briefing&%3Bp=92333; United Nations, “General Assembly Resolution Demands End to Russian Offensive in Ukraine,” UN News, March 2, 2022, https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/03/1113152.

[7] “2Q23 Call for Strategy Bridge Submissions,” (italics added).

[8] A Few Good Men (1992) - IMDb, 1992, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104257/characters/nm0000197.

[9] Matt Johnson, “Mearsheimer: Rigor or Reaction?,” Quillette, February 15, 2023, https://quillette.com/2023/02/15/mearsheimer-rigor-or-reaction/; Ted Galen Carpenter, “The U.S. and NATO Helped Trigger the Ukraine War,” CATO Institute, March 7, 2022, https://www.cato.org/commentary/us-nato-helped-trigger-ukraine-war-its-not-siding-putin-admit-it.

[10] Johnson.

[11] Johnson.

[12] Johnson.

[13] Robert H. Wade, “Why the US and Nato Have Long Wanted Russia to Attack Ukraine,” Long School of Economics and Political Science (blog), March 30, 2022, https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/2022/03/30/why-the-us-and-nato-have-long-wanted-russia-to-attack-ukraine/; James Emery, “NATO’s Checkmate: Baiting Ukraine To Provoke Russia To Invade,” Eurasia Review, March 22, 2022, https://www.eurasiareview.com/22032022-natos-checkmate-baiting-ukraine-to-provoke-russia-to-invade-oped/.

[14] Gessen, “Was It Inevitable?”

[15] Michele Wucker, The Gray Rhino: How to Recognize and Act on the Obvious Dangers We Ignore (Macmillan, 2016).

[16] Besiki Luka Kutateladze, “Why the Ukrainian Invasion Was Predictable: ‘It’s Time the World Finally Learns a Lesson on Russia,’” FIU News, March 2, 2022, https://news.fiu.edu/2022/why-the-ukrainian-invasion-was-predictable-its-time-the-world-finally-learns-a-lesson-on-russia; Christian Alexander Alvarado, “Russian Invasion of Ukraine ‘Predictable and Avoidable,’ UA Expert Says,” The Daily Wildcat, February 24, 2022, https://www.wildcat.arizona.edu/article/2022/02/n-ukraine-reax; Nomaan Merchant, “US Intel Predicted Russia’s Invasion Plans. Did It Matter?,” AP NEWS, February 25, 2022, https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-vladimir-putin-business-europe-8acc2106b95554429e93dfee5e253743.

[17] Robert B. Strassler, ed., The Landmark Thucydides: A Comprehensive Guide to the Peloponnesian War (New York, NY: Free Press, 1996), 351–57.

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To mark the passing of a year since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent return of high intensity conflict to Europe, we wanted to look to the recent past instead of to an unknown future. We asked: How then should we reflect on this experience? What happened to our previously held assumptions in the wake of Russia's aggression? Which assumptions were challenged; which were validated?

Looking to the past instead of the future has a few distinct conceptual advantages. First, the desire to collect lessons learned often drives analysis to the tactical or, at best, operational level where information is more granular and events and actions are easier to measure or quantify. Second, these analyses look to apply lessons in preparation for the next conflict—though we cannot know how, when, or where it will take place. Militaries are notoriously bad at predicting future conflicts and this is likely even more true in the middle of a conflict.

Our community approached this question from a number of different perspectives. Taken together these perspectives offer a well-rounded understanding of the nature of the assumptions that were in play prior to the conflict and how they shape the state of the conflict today.

Beginning with the issue of grand strategy, Brent Lawniczak questions many of the assumptions of liberal international relations to offer a neorealist perspective as a better alternative for understanding the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Among a number of neorealist assumptions he sees validated, for example, he views alliances as existing primarily for survival and self-interest.

Next, Zac Rogers highlights how Ukraine has brought into play the unexpected costs of vertical coalitions. This idea came into prominence in the 1990s in light of US technological ascendency. Partners would be expected to provide the bulk of ground forces while the US would contribute more exquisite capabilities such as airpower. Ukraine has now challenged that model, Rogers argues. For example, the extent to which the kill chain has been spread horizontally through numerous nations creates legitimate targets outside Ukraine, thus resulting in the significant expansion of risk, thus greatly amplifying the costs to the US of these coalitions.

Amos Fox then provides an important perspective to how we can next understand the war in Ukraine as undergirded by the dynamics of proxy war. The firepower that the US provides to Ukraine results in Russia’s response to protect its conventional army by using human wave tactics made possible by drawing on prisoners and Wagner mercenaries. Taken together, the two proxy approaches result in costly attrition because each proxy’s strategies “feed off” the other’s.

Rowan Wise then addresses the nuclear spectre. Framing his article within the long history of Russia relations with the West, he stresses how the Soviet Union’s development of a nuclear arsenal changed that relationship considerably. Borrowing from Clausewitz, Wise asks the reader to consider what political objectives the U.S. might be seeking and how those might be problematic in light of Russia’s nuclear weapons.

Shifting from nuclear weapons, Jon Beto examines why Russia’s seemingly vaunted cyber and electronic capabilities did not seem to be as effective as anticipated. Beto explores Putin’s problematic assumption regarding Russian superiority and how this created complacency because "it's what you know for sure that just ain't so" that will get you in trouble.

Similarly, Joshua Ratta looks at Russian problems in hybrid warfare given some pre-2022 thinking that Russia had “perfected” this form of warfare. What this view failed to see, is that Russia’s 2014 success in Ukraine owed much to the “opportune conglomeration of fortuitous circumstances and opponent weaknesses in Russian targeted areas.” The U.S. has also demonstrated that it is better at hybrid warfare than some initially thought. Although hybrid warfare proved to be overhyped, it will continue to be used by both Russia and the US as they engage in strategic competition.

Even more amorphous than hybrid warfare, yet equally powerful, is the battle for meaning occurring in the digital sphere. Nathan White argues observers too often measure progress in this conflict in terms of the geographical progression of the conflict on a map when the battlespace in the digital realm—such as public opinion, for example—could be an even more critical realm.

Mariya Omelicheva picks up on similar themes, suggesting “mainstream perspectives on war ascribe an outsized importance to the tangible aspects of conflict and underplay the role of intangibles as useful guides for understanding the sources and outcomes of war.” Because war is as much shaped by the larger society that enables it as it is by its combatants, it is essential to understand the national identity of one’s opponent to understand that war’s character. To understand Russia’s war in Ukraine, one must above all understand Russian identity.

Our series then pivots back to Clausewitz’s notion of friction. Alessandra Nisch urges the U.S. to draw on John Boyd’s injunction to operationalize friction. Nisch reveals how much friction ultimately benefited Ukraine. Due to externally applied friction in Ukraine such as the quick imposition of economic sanctions, Putin’s primary assumptions—“that the invasion of Ukraine would be quick and easily accomplished, that the world would denounce but not stop it, and that it would sufficiently deter NATO expansion”—all crumbled under the imposition of external friction from U.S. and NATO partners.

In a similar sphere, Nathan Colvin uses the war in Ukraine to challenge U.S. assumptions about the likelihood of large-scale combat operations. He argues this conflict demonstrates that the “costs of modern conventional war are so high it is difficult to justify its use.” While the U.S. should continue to focus on large-scale combat operations, the primary reason is to deter conventional war since it is highly unlikely to occur. The challenge for the U.S., however, comes in balancing that investment with developing the ability to engage in non-large-scale combat operations, which is essential to enabling deterrence by denial.

Should deterrence fail, Julian Waller then explores how problematic Russian assumptions can be useful for the U.S. in light of potential engagement with either Iran or China. In both of these cases, the most important lesson the U.S. can glean is regarding “ideological realities on the ground” of both elites and the population at large. Russia’s faults in Ukraine represented more than a simply intelligence failure but also highly-flawed “sociopolitical assumptions.”

Jerry Garzon explores both deterrence and flawed assumptions in his analysis of whether economic deterrence works or not. Prior to invading Ukraine, Russia made several reasonable but ultimately flawed assumptions, one of which was that it would not be subject to crippling economic measures given past historical precedent. Thus the U.S. did not offer a credible economic deterrent. And, while not necessarily showing a noticeable impact, quickly-imposed economic measures may prove just as significant as what is occurring on the battlefield.

Finally, Robert Umholtz ruminates on possible outcomes to the conflict. Contextualizing this conflict within a long legacy of invasions, scorched earth policies, and popular insurgencies reveals that both sides will pay any cost to win. He predicts that diplomacy will not bring the two nations to any sort of compromise, with neither side being content to cede the ultimate prize: Crimea.

We hope you get as much from reading these essays as we did!

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Operation in Eastern Ukraine, 2022 (Ministry of Defense of Ukraine).

Notes:

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Fighting the Fleet: Operational Art and Modern Fleet Combat. Jeffrey R. Cares and Anthony Cowden. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2021.

 Buy on Amazon  In *Fighting the Fleet**,* Jeffrey Cares and Anthony Cowden persuasively assert that current American joint operational doctrine fails to properly explain how a fleet works, leaving a dangerous gap in the practical knowledge of current military leaders.[1, 2] Fleets, they argue, have four functions—striking, screening, scouting, and basing—and proper naval operational art is the ability to defeat an opponent by appropriately combining all four. While Cares and Cowden make no bones about the fact that this work is a math-heavy textbook intended for current naval officers, the two retired captains nevertheless succeed in crafting an accessible entry into the world of modern naval command and planning in a text that is a spare 101 pages, plus technical appendices.

Fighting the Fleet is split into five main chapters. The first four chapters (“Naval Power,” “Search and Surveillance,” “Logistics and Maneuver,” and “Control”) each conclude with essential lessons for planners and flag officers. The fifth chapter (“Fighting Fleets in the Robotic Age”) relates how Cares and Cowden believe their ideas will remain relevant in the future. Each chapter builds upon the preceding text to advance the reader from a basic conception of sea power to an understanding as to why fleets have four separatefunctions that are critically interdependent such that they must be exercised in tandem to be effective.

 Buy on Amazon  In concisely distilling the nature of naval power, the authors rely on the writings of three naval thinkers whose ideas they argue have largely been forgotten despite their continued relevance: Rear Admiral Bradley Fiske’s *The Navy as a Fighting Machine*(1916), Rear Admiral J.C. Wylie’s *Military Strategy: A General Theory of Power Control*(1967), and Captain Wayne P. Hughes Jr.’s *Fleet Tactics* (1986). These works, Cares and Cowden argue, are particularly important today due to the popular preoccupation with, “function, organizational block diagrams, or lists of principles, not unlike cookbook authors more concerned with dictating proper kitchen procedure than with making the best meal.”[3]

Cares and Cowden argue that “making the best meal” as an admiral begins with an understanding of the naval (as opposed to commercial or maritime) aspect of sea power. This is, in its very nature, fundamentally different from land-based or air power, as fire and maneuver are inseparable concepts at sea. As technology has evolved in the last century, this uniqueness of naval power gave rise to Wayne Hughes’ concept of “salvo warfare,” which posits that modern naval combat consists of a series of interactions between pulses of offensive power and defensive power.[4] While there are important lessons that can be learned from this approach to understanding combat, Cares and Cowden make a point of explaining the limitations of mathematical prediction in this manner, as well as how the very concept of salvo warfare depends on the ability of fleets to find each other in the crowded yet vast oceans of the world. In reducing the oft-redefined concept of C4ISR (command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance) to simply “search”and “surveillance” for naval purposes, Fighting the Fleet demonstrates through search theory that merely setting the right circumstances to findan enemy for an exchange of salvoes is a daunting problem even with modern systems.

 Buy on Amazon  Complicating finding and engaging enemy fleets is the fact that navies must carry their ordnance and fuel over great distances. They must also be able to replenish effectively before and after combat, a task that might have to be accomplished while remaining at sea. To break down this daunting problem, Cares and Cowden propose reconceptualizing maneuver in the three phases of Fiske’s day. In the authors’ reconception, properly integrating logistical considerations into our thinking on naval power means planning operations in terms of cruising, approach, and attack, corresponding to strategic, operational, and tactical levels and terms, respectively. In portraying how logistics must be handled at each stage of this process, *Fighting the Fleet* asserts that combat, maneuver, and logistics are inseparable concepts that must be planned in concert with one another.

With these concepts in mind, Cares and Cowden ultimately turn to four functions of fleets derived from J.C. Wylie: strike, scout, screen, and base. Building on their discussion of Hughes and Fiske, the authors argue that these three theories “are the fleet commander’s tools for controlling the pattern of tactical events in a naval campaign…fleet commanders can wield the four functions to achieve, sustain, and leverage control at sea for victory.”[5]

Interestingly, Fighting the Fleet only briefly addresses why the ideas of Fiske, Wylie, and Hughes have largely been forgotten:

Indeed, as it is presented today at the Naval War College, naval operational art is joint operational art, which is at its core Army operational art. It is as if Wylie and Fiske never existed. Today a “joint sailor” is not someone who thinks like a sailor at all but one who thinks almost entirely like a 1980s-vintage Army planner.

This is harsh criticism but not unwarranted. The services play their own unique roles within the context of a joint campaign. Universal, Army-derived joint language is twice insufficient: it is too generic for services’ use in planning their idiosyncratic missions, and it fails to give the joint planner a complete understanding of how the unique parts fit into a complex whole.[6]

While joint doctrine is problematic for the reasons laid out throughout the book, Cares and Cowden argue the Navy’s principal problem is that it has no way of expressing its own doctrine to itself before translating it into joint language. Rediscovering that vernacular is, ultimately, the mission of this work. This is an important argument which is only briefly outlined in the introduction. An earlier presentation of some of these details would have made the impact even more powerful.

With the common use of drone surveillance and attacks in Ukraine, it appears the world may very well be moving from what Fighting the Fleet calls the “Missile Age” to the “Robotics Age.” Rather than obviating the lessons the authors seek to teach, Cares and Cowden instead assert that in all likelihood the previously discussed concepts will continue to be important:

[B]uoyancy, power, search, surveillance, movement, logistics, and control will all continue to operate in their same, uniquely naval ways in the robotic future. The fundamental difference—a difference of degree, not of character—will be the extent to which future naval forces become even more controllable, versatile, adaptive, and survivable as these new technologies are perfected and embraced. This is simply a step further along a continuum in the evolution of naval combat theory.”[7]

 Buy on Amazon  The difference of degree that Cares and Cowden describe is portrayed in their fifth chapter as enabling distributed combat as the successor concept to salvo warfare. While this is a term familiar to many in the warfare community, *Fighting the Fleet* specifically portrays distributed combat as the decentralization of command and offensive power enabled by robotics. With the ability of an overall commander to both rapidly consolidate and disperse their forces, the enemy can be continuously kept off-balance by obfuscating one’s intentions until the very moment a first salvo is loosed. The combat scenario then proposed which utilizes these ideas is a uniquely enlightening exercise the likes of which has been lacking in virtually all past descriptions of distributed combat.

Fighting the Fleet bucks the expectation that many might have for a self-declared textbook involving the use of statistical analysis and theoretical probability, even for the uninitiated. Indeed, the book offers more than just a valuable primer for staff officers and fleet commanders. The clear, concise, and lucid flow of the authors’ ideas make Fighting the Fleet an ideal way for any historian with an interest in understanding the basic problems faced in modern naval command.

Tyler A. Pitrof is a historian with the Naval History and Heritage Command working in support of the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations. Holder of a Ph.D. from the University of Maryland, Tyler’s research focuses on the relationship between U.S. Navy command culture and technological change in the twentieth century interwar period. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect the official position of the Department of the Navy, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: U.S. Navy ships conduct a refueling-at-sea, Atlantic Ocean, 2019 (Mass Communication Specialist Seaman Jarrod A. Schad).

Notes: [1] Jeffrey R. Cares is currently the CEO of Alidade Incorporated, a consulting firm for the U.S defense industry. A retired Navy captain, he frequently lectures at U.S. service colleges on the future of combat.

[2] Anthony Cowden is a retired Navy captain who spent time in the Naval Reserve as well as the active force. A surface warfare officer, he has both worked in the defense industry and served as a member of the faculty at the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island.

[3] Jeffrey R. Cares and Anthony Cowden, Fighting the Fleet: Operational Art and Modern Fleet Combat (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2021), 5.

[4] Cares and Cowden, Fighting the Fleet, 15-19.

[5] Cares and Cowden, Fighting the Fleet, 60.

[6] Cares and Cowden, Fighting the Fleet,69.

[7] Cares and Cowden, Fighting the Fleet, 82.

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A Short History of War. Jeremy Black. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2022.

The phenomenon of war is present throughout the long history of human civilizations, and the archeological record suggests human societies have organized and evolved according to their capacities of making war, among many other influences. In other words, war in its various forms has transcended times and spaces from the ancient to the present, leaving very few organized groups of humans untouched by armed conflicts. The recent book by Jeremy Black, A Short History of War, offers an overview of the fascinating evolution of war from a military perspective. Black, a well-known scholar in the field of war history and former professor at the University of Exeter, offers here a historical perspective on war and warfare over a long timeline to understand the nature of this social phenomenon and its global evolution from what he calls the “oldest evidence of war” until today.[1]

 Buy on Amazon  Through forty short chapters, the author examines diverse case studies representing, chronologically, various aspects of war at different times and in different areas around the world. The scope of the book is expansive in terms of time and space, going from ancient times to the 2020s and exploring the variety of warfare in the Middle East, China, India, the Greek and Roman Empires, Japan, Africa, Australasia, Oceania, and the Americas. As the title suggests, the book is an introduction to the history of war and warfare. But, more precisely, it is a military history of the practice of war. Black focuses largely, but not only, on strategies, tactics, fortifications, armaments, naval power, artillery, cavalry, technologies, the use of massive resources, as well as the geography of battlefields. The last two chapters and the conclusion move away from historical analysis to offer some reflective remarks. There the author claims the necessity for a “less western-centric military history” as well as an extensive use of a cultural approaches in analyzing the military past to fully understand the global evolution of war. Black concludes with short comments on the future of war arguing that this phenomenon and its terrible consequences on human conditions are not only elements of the past, but still very present today and will continue to influence international affairs in the coming years.

The book does a fine job providing a global perspective by including multiple areas, cultures, and groups of people, showing that the phenomenon of war is far from being limited to the Western world. The central argument made by Black—that war transcends human societies worldwide for thousands of years—is quite convincing. His approach, however, is confusing at certain points. Although the author’s comprehensive global and long-time history of war is impressive, the structure of the book suffers from a certain lack of clarity. It is only in the short conclusion that the author details his objectives and arguments. A short introduction would have been useful to better understand existing debates on war and the contribution of this book.

Throughout the chapters, the focus is on the practice of war rather than on a larger discussion of the importance of war and different warfare in societies over time. This emphasis on solely military aspects neglects other dimensions also important in armed conflicts, such as legal and moral debates, diplomacy, philosophical thinking, psychological impact, economics, and human conditions. For instance, the influence of social movements, race, gender, class struggles, nationalism, capitalism, globalization and neo-imperialism on the practice of war are not considered in Black’s analysis. Current armed conflicts around the world show that warfare remains interconnected with multiple factors that go beyond military understanding. In terms of structure, the book features numerous brief chapters moving from one aspect to another, seemingly unconnected except for chronology, and each chapter covers various spaces and long periods of time. Consequently, the contribution of this book to larger debates is difficult to fully grasp.

…the influence of social movements, race, gender, class struggles, nationalism, capitalism, globalization and neo-imperialism on the practice of war are not considered in Black’s analysis.In addition, the book is, at times, short of reflection about the definition and conceptualization of war and warfare, especially on non-military dimensions such as beliefs, emotions, bodies, identities, mentalities, behaviors, and representations. A rich scholarship has developed on the history of war showing that experience, practice, and representation of armed conflicts nuance the “traditional” military perspectives, extending the war beyond the battlefield.[2] For instance, the evolution of the phenomenon of war over time involved larger mobilization of people and resources including women and children. Those aspects have notably contributed to blurring the frontier between combatants and non-combatants as well as expanding the consequences of war on societies. The meaning of concepts such as battle and battlefield have also evolved over centuries according to the character of warfare. Meanwhile, wars have contributed to transnational discussions on humanity, refugees, international humanitarian law, human rights, ethical and moral debates on non-conventional warfare, as well as peace movements. Finally, directly connected to warfare is the complex transition from war to peace. After the official end of combat, war continues to have major impacts on societies in terms of political, social, and cultural changes. Among the numerous examples showing the blurred demarcation between war and peace are displaced people, the return to civil life for soldiers, the wounded and their families, the destruction (and reconstruction) of infrastructure, institutions and human lives, the trauma of war, the mourning of death, the memory of violence, national and international reconciliation, and testimonies of war. Those aspects also impacted the practice of war as well.[3]

*“War” by Jackson Pollock (The Met)*

Despite these remarks, A Short History of War will certainly be welcomed by a larger public interested in military history. Not only has Black remarkably explored multiple facets of the global history of war, but he also highlights complex elements regarding the evolution of warfare over a long period of time. In addition, the volume is written in a language accessible to a general public unfamiliar with the field of war history which helps to democratize debates and discussion about the nature of war. For an academic readership, however, the structure of the book will raise questions about historiographical debates, although the call of the author for a cultural turn and the need for a global and a less western-centric approach to military history is promising for future research in the field. It is obviously difficult for scholars to cover such a vast and complex subject for a particularly long period without inevitably neglecting some aspects, areas of the world, ethnic groups, as well as various experiences of war. In other words, war has been so deep-rooted in societies for centuries and such a complex phenomenon impacting millions of people that it remains a major challenge for historians to address a comprehensive and accessible understanding of its evolution since ancient times. In this sense, the contribution of Black is admirable.

Jean-Michel Turcotte is a postdoctoral fellow at the Leibniz Institute of European history in Mainz, Germany. His research interests focus on war captivity, international history, and the development of the Geneva Conventions since the 19th century.

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Header Image: “Massacre en Corée (Massacre in Korea)” by Pablo Picasso (Wikimedia)

Notes: [1] Jeremy Black. A Short History of War, (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2022) 5.

[2] For instance: Margaret Macmillan have recently offered interesting reflections on modern war. Margaret Macmillan, War. How Conflict Shaped US, (NY: Random House, 2020).

[3] Bruno Cabanes (dir.), Thomas Dodman, Hervé Mazurel and Gene Tempest (coor.). Une Histoire de la Guerre, du XIXe siècle à nos jours, (Paris: Seuil, 2018).

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Air Power in the Falklands Conflict: An Operational Level Insight into Air Warfare in the South Atlantic. John Shields.Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: Air World, 2021.

 Buy on Amazon  The line between celebrating heritage and creating a fully rounded history can be a fine one in many institutional histories. Appreciating this tendency, Royal Air Force-insider John Shields reassesses the 1982 Falklands Conflict, seeking to explode multiple myths while also providing a better assessment of the air campaign by focusing on the operational rather than the tactical level of war. Shields served thousands of hours navigating on the Tornado F3 and earned a Ph.D. from King’s College London. He also has a deep interest in professional military education; he currently teaches at the U.S. Air War College. These areas of expertise and passion shine through in this work, making it particularly valuable to any Western military planner or operator. In short, Shields wrote a case study about the Falklands War that can be read more broadly as enlightening air operators about air campaigns.

Shields contends that previous scholars have placed too much emphasis on the “tactical level outputs of the campaign” such as sorties flown rather than the actual effect of weapons, particularly regarding how weapon employment affected the “ability of each side to strike the decisive blow against their opponent.”[1] As such, he stresses identifying the British centers of gravity and how they changed during the conflict. U.S. Department of Defense doctrine defines a center of gravity as “the source of power that provides moral or physical strength, freedom of action, or will to act."[2] Shields explains how initially the British aircraft carriers served as the center of gravity due to their ability to control the air through their Harriers. However, air control only functions as an enabler; thus, over time the center of gravity shifted, because the key to victory required taking and controlling Stanley, the capital city of the islands. As a result, the second and third centers of gravity were troops on the ground: first the amphibious assault force and finally the British land forces moving toward Stanley.

Shields shows little partiality for his own institution, seeking to provide an objective account. Indeed, he argues the conflict’s “outcome was a function of Argentine failings rather than British successes.”[3] Neither side, importantly, had adequately prepared for this conflict. He even suggests Argentina may have lost the war twenty years before the conflict began by doctrinally deciding to prioritize air support for the ground, thereby choosing to fund immediate needs over the pursuit of a more balanced long-term strategy to develop a force for an unknown future.[4] Of course the U.S. and multiple other nations have done the same, such as in the Global War on Terror, when Secretary of Defense Robert Gates cut F-22 production to focus on capabilities needed for counterinsurgency.

Despite inadequate preparation, both forces had an opportunity to adapt.[5] Shields notes, however, that interservice rivalry significantly undermined the air campaigns of both sides.[6] The Argentinian Air Force also made critical apportionment errors, increasingly using its aircraft for ground attack when it had yet to secure enough control of the air.[7]

As a result, Shields repeatedly shows how Argentinian aircraft struggled to employ their weapons effectively. In the first phase of the war, between May 1 and May 19, in which airpower predominated, for example, they planned to employ 206 weapons. Aircraft carrying 170 weapons managed to reach the Falkland islands, with aircraft carrying 107 weapons subsequently evading British combat air patrols. Aircraft, however, only managed to employ 15 weapons against the British fleet. With only one weapon detonating successfully, Argentina had a success rate of .005 percent. This low rate owes much to the challenge that the Argentine Air Force had in locating the British, having not adequately organized and developed its intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities prior to the conflict to support joint operations. Shields effectively supports this information with helpful and clear infographics.[8]

The second phase of the war was Operation Sutton, in which the British offered up a decisive target for the Argentines as its amphibious force approached and landed on the Falklands. Because Argentina lacked effective intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities, however, the British successfully approached the islands and began landing their troops and equipment 28 hours before Argentina detected the landing.[9] As a result, they “doomed themselves to a reactive strategy dictated by British decisions for the remainder of the campaign—all for the sake of a useful intelligence gathering capability.”[10]

They also failed to adapt mentally, not realizing that focusing on striking British carriers was not the most effective use of their weapons at this phase in the war, or so Shields asserts.[11] Whether he is correct is unknowable, however, given that human behavior is unpredictable; the sinking of a British carrier at any phase in the war could possibly have caused British civilian leadership to disengage from the conflict.

*Flight deck operations on board HMS HERMES. A Sea Harrier takes off from the ski-jump while various missiles, helicopters and vehicles crowd the flight deck of the carrier. (Imperial War Museums)*

Shields also asserts the Argentine Air Force continued to be its own worst enemy. Of its overall weapon employment in particular, two causal factors explain 46 percent of failed missions: canceled missions and weapons missing their targets.[12] By contrast, the defensive effect of the Harriers fell far lower on the list during this phase, only impeding six percent of Argentine sorties.[13] Shields thus consistently seeks to undercut the myth of the British Sea Harrier’s success in this conflict.

The third phase of the war consisted of moving the 5500 troops from their landing area at San Carlos to Stanley, a task made more difficult by the sinking of the MV Atlantic Conveyor, which contained helicopters needed to provide mobility. Now those troops would have to travel on foot.[14] Despite being presented with vulnerable ground targets, Argentine air forces failed to identify or mass sufficient combat power to stop advancing British troops during this phase.[15] Despite outnumbering the Royal Air Force, the Argentines also began to struggle to sustain their campaign, such as in replacing aircraft and crews.[16]

*3 Battalion, Parachute Regiment disembark from a landing craft during the landings at San Carlos. (Imperial War Museums)*

The Argentine Air Force did adapt during this phase by using about 62 percent of their assets for counterland operations while reducing their maritime focus to 38 percent.[17] Still, in this phase the Argentines continued to be their own worst enemy, with 74 percent of allocated weapons not striking their targets successfully, either because they increasingly sought to avoid risk and aborted their sorties or because those continuing to engage simply could not successfully hit their targets.[18] Shields does note the increased Harriers’ contributions during this phase, although pointing out they still did far less than commonly asserted.[19]

Throughout the campaign, Shields continues to stress how Britain did not so much successfully defend its centers of gravity as Argentina failed to identify, find, and successfully target those assets of Britain’s continuously shifting centers of gravity.[20] On the other side, though, Shields contends that British air planners’ seeming obsession with attacking Stanley Airport was a wasted effort. Instead, he suggests British airpower would have been more effectively used targeting Argentina’s center of gravity: the troops surrounding and protecting Stanley. Such an approach, he argues, would have been more joint minded instead of the seeming dogmatic insistence of British airmen on gaining control of the air. This point, however, somewhat conflates the rationale for seeking control of the air with the benefit of attacking the airport because it served as the island’s logistics hub.[21]

The better question may have been: how much would attacks on this logistics hub have affected the Argentine center of gravity in the short, medium, and long terms? Moreover, it is not entirely clear how British aircraft could have more effectively targeted Argentinian land forces. Overall, the British employed a total of 493 weapons, of which only 15 were precision weapons. If the British struggled to put an airport out of operation, it is difficult to envision how much damage they could have done to dispersed and dug in soldiers given British aircraft, sensor, and weapon limitations.[22] Even seventeen years later in Operation Allied Force in similarly challenging weather and terrain against dug-in and dispersed troops, NATO struggled to have a significant effect on Serbian troops.

In another similarly revisionist point, Shields interestingly undercuts the utility of the Exocet anti-ship missile. He contends:

[t]here is no point in having a highly advanced and expensive capability if it cannot sustain the required campaign effects throughout the campaign. The Argentine Super-Etendard force is an excellent example of this dilemma; once the Argentines had expended their limited Exocet stockpile, the Super Etendards became an ineffective force and retired from the battle two weeks prior to the culmination of the campaign.[23]

On the flip side of this intriguing claim, however, is a counterfactual: had the Argentine air force been able to find and effectively target the aircraft carriers, such a limited asset may have successfully struck at the British center of gravity early in the war.

*The aircraft carrier HMS Invincible silhouetted against the horizon as she sails towards the South Atlantic. (Imperial War Museums)*

As these discussions hopefully indicate, Shields’ book provides much for the airpower practitioner to ponder. For students new to the Falklands War, however, this book may be tough due to the lack of an overview of the conflict. Instructors assigning the book might consider an introductory lecture on the conflict or a short supplemental reading. More helpful are the many helpful maps and, in particular, charts. Despite being a challenging read at times, Shield’s work is a wonderful addition to the historiography of the Falklands Conflict.

Heather Venable is an associate professor of military and security studies at the U.S. Air Command and Staff College where she teaches in the Department of Airpower. She is the author of How the Few Became the Proud: Crafting the Marine Corps Mystique, 1874–1918. She is a Managing Editor for The Strategy Bridge and a non-resident fellow at Marine Corps University’s Brute Krulak Center for Innovation and Creativity. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not represent the official position of the U.S. Air Force, Department of Defense, or U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

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Header Image: Super Etendard (SUE) of the Argentine Navy, 1982 (Author Unknown).

Notes: [1] John Shields, Air Power in the Falklands Conflict: An Operational Level Insight into Air Warfare in the South Atlantic (Philadelphia, PA: Air World, 2021), 5.

[2] Department of Defense, Joint Publication 3-0: Joint Operations, 11 Aug 2011, GL-06; www.benning.army.mil/mssp/security%20topics/Global%20and%20Regional%20Security/content/pdf/jp3_0.pdf#:~:text=Joint%20Publication%20%28JP%29%203-0%20is%20the%20keystone%20document,%2C%20preparing%2C%20executing%2C%20and%20assessing%20joint%20military%20operations.

[3] Shields, 3.

[4] Shields, 40.

[5] Shields, 16.

[6] Shields, 186.

[7] Shields, 64-65.

[8] Shields, 81.

[9] Shields, 85-86.

[10] Shields, 85.

[11] Shields, 95.

[12] Shields, 93.

[13] Shields, 94.

[14] Shields, 100.

[15] Shields, 103-4 and 117.

[16] Shields, 108.

[17] Shields, 115.

[18] Shields, 123.

[19] Shields, 122-3.

[20] Shields, 150.

[21] Shields, 166, 170, 176, 181.

[22] Shields, 175.

[23] Shields, 194.

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Rise of the Rocket Girls: The Women Who Propelled Us, From Missiles to the Moon to Mars. Nathalia Holt. New York, NY: Back Bay Books, 2017.

 Buy on Amazon  After the release of the 2017 movie *Hidden Figures*, based on Margot Lee Shetterly’s book of the same title, Americans are more aware of the role women have played in the successful NASA missions that put humans into space and on the Moon. The women in that story were African American and worked at the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (the NACA—the precursor to NASA) and eventually NASA’s center in Langley, Virginia. The women discussed in Nathalia Holt’s *Rise of the Rocket Girls* worked on the other side of the country in Pasadena, California, at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). Instead of highlighting racial distinctions—although those issues are discussed—Holt introduces her readers to the female world of computing beginning in the early twentieth century and into the twenty-first century. What all these women had in common were their skills in mathematics that made their work an essential component of NASA’s human and robotic spaceflight endeavors.

Holt’s work documents the decades of contributions made by women at JPL. These women were originally called “computers” because they were the ones responsible for the complex calculations used for such maneuvers as tracking a rocket or satellite’s trajectory. The history of JPL goes back to the earliest days of the so-called Suicide Squad of experimenters at Caltech University—an arguably brilliant, but reckless band of proteges of aerodynamicist Theodore von Kármán.[1] Barbara “Barby” Canright, the wife of a Suicide Squad member Richard Canright, joined the group as their mathematician. This Caltech group got funding in 1939 from the U.S. government to work on rocket development, which provided the foundation for JPL.[2] Holt’s story follows the work and the lives of the women who shaped the lab and its role in the space program.

While the story Holt tells is very much about the women as professionals, she also tries to emphasize how the women’s lives were a constant battle trying to balance their work and home lives. Many of the women married and had children, but before the Equal Employment Opportunity Act of 1972, these women often were given no choice but to leave their jobs once they became pregnant or at least once they got close to delivery. The book is as much a commentary on the culture of JPL and wider American society in the 1940s, ‘50s, ’60s, and beyond. One example Holt uses to highlight how JPL’s culture mimicked the American image of womens’ place in society was the “Miss Guided Missile” contest, essentially a beauty or popularity contest held at JPL every year. In the 1950s, the women of JPL saw it as a sign of the institute’s forward-thinking hiring process. According to Holt, the women at JPL saw the contest as an impossibility at other labs for the simple reason that other laboratories did not have enough women to hold such a contest. After JPL became a part of NASA—created in 1958—the contest’s name was changed to the Queen of Outer Space contest. But by 1970, increasing discussion of women’s rights meant that the contest seemed dismissive of their mathematical and professional talents and their overall value to the lab’s work and was discontinued.

 Buy on Amazon  Holt organized the book’s twelve chapters by decade, starting with the 1940s and coming up to the present. While describing the work the women mathematicians were doing for the different missions JPL conducted, Holt also explores how changing technology shaped the computers’ work. In particular, when JPL introduced manual calculators and bulky IBM computers, the women had to learn new skills. By the time NASA started work on the Apollo Moon program, the women were keeping pace by taking classes at nearby Caltech to learn the newest programming languages, like FORTRAN. Holt notes that as the space program grew more sophisticated, so did the skills of the women whose stories she tells. Although they were hired as computers, the arrival of electronic computing technology did not diminish their value to JPL. In fact, women computers became the programmers for these new machines (as seen in *Hidden Figures* when Dorothy Vaughn programmed the Langley computers). These women were essential in making sure the male engineers’ designs were successful. Holt points out that by the 1960s, the women’s titles changed as well—from computers to engineers.

Holt is breaking relatively new ground in The Rise of the Rocket Girls. While the history of women scientists (including those in mathematics) is not new, it seems that part of the reason the computers at JPL are still less well-known lies in the nature of the laboratory’s work. Historically, JPL’s mission has largely focused on the development and launch of probes and satellites, such as the Ranger and Pioneer programs that sent robotic vehicles to the Moon so NASA could scout possible safe landing sites for the Apollo crews. While their work was essential to the success of the human spaceflight program, it was neither sexy nor patriotic in the same way that putting astronauts into space was for the American public. JPL’s mission and its computers have historically been more focused on exploration of the Solar System than on human spaceflight. Consequently, their stories have remained largely unknown even though they have one of the longest histories, going back to the 1930s. Holt’s book makes an important contribution to changing that narrative.

One of the valuable contributions that Holt’s book makes is that the narrative was built upon oral histories with many of the women highlighted in the book. While still grounded in archival research, Holt’s book includes the personal stories and experiences of these women that cannot be found in an archive. Holt’s book creates tension when launches or missions went awry; readers will feel the joy and excitement when the women witnessed the culmination of their work end in a successful mission. But readers will also see the ups and downs of working women in this era: weddings, births, the death of a newborn, and divorces. Holt constantly reminds the readers that these women, while talented and highly skilled in their jobs, were living regular lives when they left the office.

If the book has a weakness, it is that the science behind the missions these women helped make possible is often only given a cursory explanation, is not always clear, and, occasionally, is inaccurate. For example, the Galileo mission, which sent a spacecraft into orbit around Jupiter, had to be reworked after the space shuttle Challenger disaster because the original trajectory calculations were for a launch date that fell to the wayside as NASA recovered from the accident. In discussing the changes, Holt said, “The original upper-stage rocket selected to carry Galileo and the space shuttle crew into space was now deemed too dangerous.”[3] But that is not how the system worked. The Galileo spacecraft was launched from Kennedy Space Center in the cargo bay of the space shuttle Atlantis. Once in orbit, the shuttle crew deployed the Galileo spacecraft. It was only then that the upper-stage rocket sent Galileo on its way toward Jupiter; the space shuttle crew was not directly affected nor transported by Galileo’s upper-stage rocket. Admittedly, these are minor issues and do not affect the significance of the story Holt is telling. The limited scientific discussion does mean that the book as a whole is accessible to a large audience since a deeper familiarity of scientific and aerospace terminology and understanding is not necessary.

In short, Nathalia Holt’s book on the women of JPL and their contributions to the United States’ history in space is a welcome addition. JPL is only one of twenty NASA centers. The women and their contributions at each NASA center deserve attention and recognition. What Nathalia Holt has done with this book is remind readers that women’s work for NASA did propel us to the Moon and Mars.

Amy E. Foster is an Associate Professor of History at the University of Central Florida. She teaches courses on the history of the US space program, and the history of science, technology, and medicine.

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Header Image: Earth, Moon, and Mars (Lockheed Martin)

Notes: [1] Nathalia Holt, Rise of the Rocket Girls: The Women Who Propelled Us, From Missiles to the Moon to Mars (New York: Back Bay Books, 2017), 12-15.

[2] Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Timeline, https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/timeline/.

[3] Holt, Rise of the Rocket Girls, 263.

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Tales from the Cold War: The U.S. Army in West Germany 1960-1975. Michael D. Mahler. Dahlonega, Georgia: University Press of North Georgia, 2021.

 Buy on Amazon  Nuclear missiles, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War are the best-remembered among the martial past of the Cold War.[1] However, retired U.S. Army Colonel Michael D. Mahler recounts stories of the U.S. Army in West Germany from 1960 to 1975 in his recently published memoir, *Tales from the Cold War**.* First-hand narratives of the organizational insiders reveal the past occurrence and understandings that otherwise might be unknown or unintelligible for historians in the ivory tower. Mahler's anecdotes reflect this throughout the book. Like all memoirs from military leaders, writing decades after their experiences, accurate recollection is often difficult but incredibly crucial.[2]

Knowing the Cold War historical context, namely the necessity of, and the paradoxical relations between the deterrence mission in Europe and the mission of fighting limited wars around the globe is indispensable for understanding Mahler and his comrades’ experiences in U.S. Army Europe (USAREUR). USAREUR was a designated part of the deterrent; however, limited wars inevitably contributed to the rise and fall of this fighting force.[3] Putting Mahler’s service into the broader context of the evolution of the Cold War-era U.S. Army, he graduated from the US Military Academy at West Point during the height of the Pentomic Army in 1959, as the Department of Defense was modernizing for an imagined nuclear battlefield.[4] When Mahler finished his final command in 1975, the Army was in transition from the Reorganization Objective Army Division (ROAD) era to the Army of Excellence, driven by Training and Doctrinal Command.[5] It was in this “ROAD era” when limited wars first became more necessary because of Khrushchev’s nuclear buildup, then became more viable after Kennedy’s conventional reassessment, buildup, and reforms, but eventually exacerbated the tension between deterrence and limited war due to American quagmire in Vietnam.[6] This tension is reflected in one of the three major themes I distilled from Mahler's account.

The first major theme that I identified from Tales from the Cold War is a rise-decline-revival trajectory.To make historical understanding out of what historian Bruce Kuklick called “actor’s knowledge” in primary sources like this memoir, a historian must distill major themes from those primary sources to construct a structure of history.[7] The first major theme that I identified from Tales from the Cold War is a rise-decline-revival trajectory. At the beginning of this trajectory in Mahler’s story, “President Eisenhower was intent on reducing the size and the budget of the Army, and fuel was at a premium.”[8] In one anecdotal account, Mahler's entire scout platoon practiced “walking in the positions they would be sitting in if they were in their scout jeeps while we practiced moving our pretend vehicles into various tactical formations.”[9] With the 1961 Berlin Crisis, a buildup was initiated. In Mahler’s personal experiences, he notes that soldiers “found themselves on order back to USAREUR...and limitations on tracked vehicle movement that had been based on funding for fuel and repair parts were lifted.”[10] “The bad years” followed the burgeoning years: “I quickly came to see how degraded USAREUR had become in the eight years that I had been away because of the drain of Vietnam.”[11] Then the trajectory of history bends toward revival as “stability of tour increased, problems decreased, and our effectiveness and skills continue to improve...I have gotten to play a part in its resurgence.”[12] Although this rise-decline-revival grand historical narrative is often negatively viewed by professional historians as a classic teleological and cyclical trope in the field of history, Mahler’s rise-decline-revival experiences are credible and sensible according to historian Ingo Trauschweizer’s authoritative scholarly account of the evolution of the Cold War U.S. Army.[13]

The second theme in Tales from the Cold War intrigues me the most, the complex management of readiness and endurance. Deterrence is a never-ending mission that requires high endurance, defined by the recently updated Army field manual on operations as “the ability to persevere over time throughout the depth of an operational environment.”[14] Mahler draws parallels between the Cold War USAREUR performing forward deterrence to the “old frontier Army” in the 19th century. The old frontier Army and their families “manned those remote garrisons before the western frontier passed into history.” Similarly, roughly three generations of American soldiers manned those small kasernes four thousand miles away from their hometown until "the wall separating East and West had finally fallen of its own weight.”[15] However, both deterrence and limited war require a high degree of military readiness to signal resolve and respond to multi-theater contingencies. In this sense, the Cold War was much more demanding on organizational management than Westward Expansion in the United States, although Mahler seems to ignore this in his historical analogy. Mahler devotes a bulk of the book to the training of personnel and maintenance of machines, the two pillars of readiness. The remainder of the book focuses on the elements of military cohesion, a critical source of endurance. Mahler laments that the extraordinary demand for readiness during the Vietnam war eroded the cohesiveness of not only USAREUR but also the broader American population.[16]

The second theme in Tales from the Cold War intrigues me the most, the complex management of readiness and endurance.On the small unit and individual levels, Mahler notes that readiness could contribute to cohesion through non-commissioned officers’ (NCO) initiatives in training. He complained about Project VOLAR (Volunteer Army) which intended to make the service more attractive to young Americans after the termination of the draft in 1973, claiming that recruits lacked motivation, which often led to disciplinary actions. The NCOs felt VOLAR gave more power to the soldiers to act on their own, impacting their ability to train and lead soldiers. Mahler comments that “if you leave your group to their own devices in cold weather, you will find over a half of them in the PX cafeteria in short order.”[17] According to Mahler, it was in those places like the mess hall and the enlisted club where the divisive and destabilizing factors including alcohol, race, and drugs played themselves out in knife fights and near-riots.[18] My research tells me that the relations between training, small unit leadership, and military cohesion are well-surveyed in the existing scholarly literature on military effectiveness.[19] Mahler's accounts contribute to the understanding of this issue by taking into account the impact of military families on cohesion and readiness: “My wife and I believed that the social side of our squadron was as important to the morale and cohesiveness as the other purely military aspects.”[20] Mahler recounts both positive and negative experiences with families, spouses, and absent garrison services during his command of the 3-12 Armored Cavalry Regiment. Highlighting the ad hoc nature of family support services at the time, typically provided by a network of spouse volunteers, he highlights how families directly impacted cohesion and readiness in the Cold War-era Army in Germany.[21] Fortunately, a robust Army wives’ volunteer support system led by Mrs. Mahler “generated a sense of community” and “held together the social fabric” for the roughly 2000 service personnel and their families in Mahler’s post.[22]

*Leadership assigned to 2nd Cavalry Regiment during the opening ceremony of the 57th German-American Volksfest in Grafenwoehr Training Area, July 31, 2015. (Sgt. William A. Tanner/U.S. Army Photo/DVIDS)*

The third major theme in the book is the stable but complicated relationship between the American forces and their West German hosts. In 1960, CINCUSAREUR, General Bruce Clarke, announced the requirement that “all United States soldiers behave as Good Neighbors to their German neighbors.” USAREUR instituted many civic and cultural programs in local communities across Western Europe.[23] Mahler recalls that one of the most popular activities that the USASEUR Headquarters sponsored was the American Volkfest, or county fair: “Many, including our family, made life-long friends as a result of sitting next to a German family with whom you just hit it off [on Volkfest benches].”[24] Even the legendary General Creighton Abrams vividly remembered and was deeply concerned about maintaining positive local relationships, specifically correcting the maneuver damages caused by Army units to local roads and lands. In early 1974, when Abrams visited Mahler's garrison, having “good neighbor” in mind, he asked Mahler if the factory personnel were still complaining about Army trucks leaving mud on the road in front of their factory.[25]

The third major theme in the book is the stable but complicated relationship between the American forces and their West German hosts.However, the good neighbor policy and practices did not prevent anti-American sentiments which were increasingly salient in the late 1960s. The Baader-Meinhof (Red Army Faction) gang, linked to countless bomb threats and several deadly bombings across USAREUR's footprint, was active throughout Mahler's assignment in Germany. Mahler notes discovering close connections between his “good neighbors” and radical student groups following one such bombing.[26] Nor was Mahler blind about the legacies of the Nazi past of Germany. Mahler grapples with Germany’s past in concentration camp sites he visited at Bergen-Belsen. Meeting fellow NATO comrades who cherished their services in Wehrmacht and watching the exercises commanded by the son of Colonel Clause von Staffenberg at the Bundeswehr Tank Training Center, Mahler struggled to come to terms with the endurance of Nazi legacies among the “good neighbors” he met throughout his assignments[27]

Not all the claims Mahler makes in the book are consistent with credible accounts of the Army of this period. For example, Mahler recounts his experience in the early 1960s of “a close-knit, very professional non-commissioned officer corps.”[28] The actual record may be mixed. Historian Brian McAllister Linn writes regarding the same period that “the best had experience, impressive leadership skills, and an encyclopedic knowledge of the soldier’s trade. But, like their prewar counterparts, these craftsmen served alongside other noncoms who were poorly educated, brutal, unimaginative, and resistant to change.”[29]

Tales from the Cold War has a fair place in general military history and Cold War American military history in particular. From the perspective of general military histories, the “old military histories” are often battle-centric works written by professional soldiers, while “new military histories” focus more on organizational and societal aspects of military affairs are now written by detached, professional historians.[30] Mahler's book on the Cold War NATO Central Front, where battles didn’t happen, complements the missing part in the organizational and societal military histories: the perspective of professional soldiers with first-hand experiences. From the perspective of Cold War American military history, this book reveals an insider episode, unknown in the previous works on the 1961 Berlin Crisis. The revelation is that the Commander in Chief of USAREUR directly issued the top-secret order to the 1st Battlegroup, 18th Infantry to reinforce the Berlin garrison as a direct response to the construction of the Berlin Wall, which caused a massive communication breakdown that left the Seventh Army, V Corps, and 8th Division totally out of the loop.[31]

Engaging and informative, Mahler puts together a memoir telling the insider stories of the Cold War USAREUR and its soldiers. I would recommend it to everyone interested in Cold War military affairs.

Kevin Deye Li is an undergraduate student at The George Washington University, he has two previous publications on Cold War military history and has completed an honor thesis for the history major titled “Soldiers, The City, and The State: The Berlin Problem and The US Military, 1960-1965.”

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Header Image: Berlin Wall Potsdamer Platz November 1975 Looking East, Berlin, Germany 1975 (Edward Valachovic).

Notes: [1] Even professional historians often could not escape this intellectual paradigm, see: Jonathan M House, A Military History of the Cold War, 1944–1962 (University of Oklahoma Press, 2014). Jonathan M House, A Military History of the Cold War, 1962–1991 (University of Oklahoma Press, 2020).

[2] Michael D Mahler, Tales from the Cold War: The U.S. Army in West Germany 1960-1975 (Dahlonega, Georgia: University Press of North Georgia, 2021), Table of Contents.

[3] Ingo Trauschweizer, The Cold War U.S. Army: Building Deterrence for Limited War, Modern War Studies (Lawrence, Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 2008).

[4] Mahler, Tales from the Cold War, xiii. Andrew J Bacevich, The Pentomic Era: The U. S. Army between Korea and Vietnam (Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 1986).

[5] Mahler, Tales from the Cold War, chapter 13. John Romjue, The Army of Excellence: The Development of the 1980s Army (Washington D.C.: Office of the Command Historian, United States Army Training and Doctrine Command, 1997).

[6] Deye Li, “Soldiers, the City, and the State: The Berlin Problem and the US Military, 1960-1965” (Undergraduate Honor Thesis, 2022). For a glimpse of the surging tension between deterrence and limited war following the Vietnam War, see: Eric Michael Burke, “Ignoring Failure General DePuy and the Dangers of Interwar Escapism,” Military Review, 2023, 42-57.

[7] The consensus in contemporary philosophy of history is that historical understanding is impossible without a process of creative interpretation. Hayden V White, Metahistory: The Historical Imagination in Nineteenth-Century Europe (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2015). Bruce Kuklick, Blind Oracles: Intellectuals and War from Kennan to Kissinger (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2007), 156-9. Marc Trachtenberg, The Craft of International History: A Guide to Method (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006), chapter 1, 3.

[8] Mahler, Tales from the Cold War, 45.

[9] Ibid.

[10] Ibid, 72.

[11] Ibid, 88.

[12] Ibid, 155.

[13] Ingo Trauschweizer, The Cold War U.S. Army.

[14] FM 3-0 Operations (Washington, DC: Headquarters, Department of the Army, 2022), 3–6.

[15] Mahler, Tales from the Cold War, x, 157.

[16] Ibid, 87-96.

[17] Ibid, 132-33.

[18] Ibid, 133, 144-45.

[19] Jasen J Castillo, Endurance and War: The National Sources of Military Cohesion (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2014), chapter 2. Edward A. Shils and Morris Janowitz, “Cohesion and Disintegration in the Wehrmacht in World War II,” Public Opinion Quarterly 12, no. 2 (1948): 280, https://doi.org/10.1086/265951.

[20] Mahler, Tales from the Cold War, 149. This also contributes to the study of gender equality and military effectiveness from the lens of familial relations.

[21] Ibid.

[22] Ibid, 139.

[23] Rex Childers, “Cold Warriors, Good Neighbors, Smart Power: US Army, Berlin, 1961-1994” (Ph.D. dissertation, 2015), 6.

[24] Mahler, Tales from the Cold War, 97-98.

[25] Ibid, 153.

[26] Ibid, 118-20.

[27] Ibid, 116.

[28] Ibid, xii.

[29] Brian McAllister Linn, Elvis’s Army: Cold War GIs and the Atomic Battlefield (Harvard University Press, 2016), 158-59.

[30] Stephen Morillo and Michael F Pavkovic, What Is Military History?, Third Edition (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Polity Press, 2018), 39–44.

[31] Mahler, Tales from the Cold War, 64-8.

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Heat + Pressure: Poems from War. Ben Weakly. Johnston, Iowa: Middle West Press, 2022.

 Buy on Amazon  Sometimes you go against the advice of the well-known saying and choose a book by its cover. A design draws you in through color or shock; a title intrigues you. *Heat + Pressure: Poems from War* by Ben Weakley delivers on the initial interest brought about by its unique title that sits in bold letters over the melted green army figure on the cover. *Heat + Pressure* shows how today’s warriors can become poets and help veterans synthesize war and their reintegration into society. As this review argues, reintegration after war is a formative process fraught with difficult acknowledgements, depths of disillusionment, and realizing one’s own strength for creating something instead of destroying it. It also provides welcome space for reflection amongst the veteran community.

Consider the title for a moment: Heat + Pressure. Two words that cause reflection. Does one read them as “heat and pressure” or as “heat plus pressure”? The title could be the first poem of the book. This wordplay sets the tone for the rest of the collection, including the section titles. Five sections divide the book: “Heat,” “Pressure,” “Blast,” “Debris,” and “Fragmentation.” Peruse the section titles and the poems seem to tell a story of a soldier shaped, formed, and fractured—in the literal sense—by an improvised explosive device. But that’s not the whole story. Instead, a retired soldier grapples with the war-games of his youth, the boredom and chaos of his service, and the struggle to find common ground with angry citizens bent on destruction.

The first section, “Heat,” seems to be an autobiographical account of the author’s journey from child to soldier. Part of this journey involves poems about his grandparents who never talked about their wars, his own shenanigan-filled childhood, and what seems to be his father’s disappointment with his son’s immaturity. The first section ends with a familiar notion: that young people take on the narratives of their citizens calling for war and vengeance. After reading “America Calls Him,” the reader may think back to the exhortations of Paul Baumer’s schoolmaster in All Quiet on the Western Front.[1] That might be the point.

The second, third, and fourth chapters—”Pressure,” “Blast,” and “Debris”—toss away glamorous views of war. These chapters capture the boredom of 4 a.m. range days and the shock of having the meaning of the word obliterated when bombs destroy lives and material alike. Sometimes the dead are soldiers, and other times the dead are children; all are tragic and wasteful. It is in these sections that the poems introduce Musar Afghanistan, an imaginary Afghan warlord and elder who torments the poet with doublespeak during war and peace. The boring and mundane intermix with chaos and insanity. A busy nighttime patrol encounters gunshots and an opportunity for voyeurism on an Iraqi couple. A war wound turns out to be from a fall into a hole while walking with night vision devices. Such embarrassing moments are the unspoken anecdotes of combat, and convey the absurdity and vulnerability of such moments.

“Fragmentation” is perhaps the most difficult chapter. The poems speak of U.S. callousness towards migrants, the moral injury caused by the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol Building, and the destabilizing feelings of re-integration. The latter feelings are a constant theme in war poetry. Veterans have struggled to come back to their homes and find everything changed. What is unique about Weakley’s work is his social commentary on the lack of humanity from our fellow citizens, when he was the one supposedly managing violence on our behalf. He finds the behavior of angry insurrectionists reprehensible and sees parallels to his nemesis Musar Afghanistan, who has followed him to create battlefields on the homefront.[2]

Which brings us back to the cover of the book. The green army figurine on the front at first looks to be melted into pavement. An alternative perspective shows itself after reading Weakley’s poems; the figurine was softened by the heat of war, thrown amongst debris by many blasts, and trampled by his fellow citizens after his return home. I could not help but think of the assumptions civilians make about veterans, whether by carelessness, ignorance, or anger.

 Buy on Amazon  Warrior poets have existed for as long as there have been wars to write about. Homer and Virgil chronicled the fall of Troy and the founding of Rome, respectively. The Civil War gave us Ambrose Bierce and Walt Whitman. Wilfred Owen, Siegfried Sassoon, and John McCrae warned us away from lies about the romantic notions of war. Veterans of the global war on terrorism—Ben Weakley, Leo Jenkins, Amy Sexauer, and Mason Rodrigue—carry the paradox of the warrior–poet; they harmonize their experiences of destruction with the ability to bring their creative spirit into the world. Society has a role in reintegrating its warriors back into society, however Weakley bemoans his fellow citizens’ willingness to forget the wars and get on with life. The loss of connection seems acutely felt as here in “A Soldier’s Lament.”

“A Soldier’s Lament”

And who remains to listen
When we tell our stories?

In the land without memory,
In the country of words
that have no meaning,

who remains to hear us
when we speak of our war?[3]

It is a clarion call for reflection; a challenge to readers to be courageous and to disown ignorance in their search for answers. Questions such as the ones above are dotted throughout the book. For example, in the poem “In Some Distant Country” about the January 6, 2021, insurrection, the author poses this question:

Who can show us how to rescue
our would-be executioners
from the gallows they built?[4]

After reading poems about 9-line MEDEVACs, incoming artillery rounds, vehicle-borne explosive devices, and night patrols, reflection on the divides between society and its veterans is a tough task. Nonetheless, it is a welcome and needed one. Ben Weakley’s Heat + Pressure: Poems From War is a vital addition to the creative arts that asks veterans and society to acknowledge our collective humanity and the price we pay when we bring war upon our young people.

Marshall McGurk is an Army officer and a student at the School for Advanced Military Studies. His poetry has been published by The Havok Journal and in Savage Wonder, the literary blog of the Veterans Repertory Theater. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

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Header Image: Untitled, 2021 (Simon Lee).

Notes: [1] Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet On The Western Front (New York, NY: Random House, 1996), https://www.britannica.com/topic/All-Quiet-on-the-Western-Front-novel.

[2] Ben Weakley,Heat + Pressure: Poems From War (Johnston, IA: Middle West Press, 2022).

[3] Ben Weakley,Heat + Pressure: Poems From War (Johnston, IA: Middle West Press, 2022), 73.

[4] Ben Weakley, 65.

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Cinema and the Cultural Cold War: U.S. Diplomacy and the Origins of the Asian Cinema Network. Sangjoon Lee. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2020.

 Buy on Amazon  The existential stakes of the Cold War provided movie screenwriters with ample material to draw in audiences. Major T.J. “King” Kong rides an atomic bomb down towards a Soviet target as he gleefully waves his cowboy hat.[1] During a period of *détente*, James Bond works with KGB agent Triple X to prevent Karl Stromberg from starting a nuclear war.[2] Jed and Matt Eckert and their “Wolverines” fight to liberate their small Colorado town after a shock communist invasion.[3] David Lightman teaches a computer that the only way to win a game is not to play and saves the world.[4] The high stakes of the Cold War put the real and imagined battlefields of the period on the silver screen for mass consumption. However the battlefield extended beyond the screen, as the Cold War also touched every aspect of film production from the funding and writing to the theaters they played at.

Sangjoon Lee explores this battlefield in Cinema and the Cultural Cold War: U.S. Diplomacy and the Origins of the Asian Cinema Network. The book primarily examines how during the first two decades of the Cold War, the Asia Foundation utilized funding from the Central Intelligence Agency to support the work of, and establish connections between, anti-communist filmmakers throughout East Asia. Program directors sought to model the Asia Foundation’s work on that of the Committee for a Free Europe which achieved success with Radio Free Europe and the “Crusade for Freedom.”[5] Unlike its European counterpart though, the Asian Foundation would find success elusive, and its cultural programs would not find large audiences or become an effective ideological weapon in the Cold War in Asia.

Cinema and the Cultural Cold War shows how the Asia Foundation invested heavily in the movie industry in several east Asian nations, including Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, the Philippines, as well as the British colony of Hong Kong. Its initial efforts included providing the budget for locally produced films that emphasized traditional stories and anti-communist messages. Its first film, The People Win Through, was written by Burma’s prime minister and its low production values, poor editing, and bad acting unsurprisingly led to the movie failing at the box office.[6] Productions with Hong Kong’s Asia Pictures similarly failed to find mass audiences and the studio failed to become a large counterweight to communist-friendly rivals.[7] Lee then follows how the Asia Foundation ceased directly funding individual movie projects and instead sought to support friendly producers in other ways. Support included initiatives to bring in Hollywood screenwriting and technical expertise, sponsorship of film festivals, and providing access to modern filmmaking equipment. These initiatives also failed to garner preferred movies a popular reception and the Asia Foundation’s favored directors and producers were often surpassed by peers who received no support from the group.[8]

The book shines in exploring the reasons behind these failures. Lee argues the Asia Foundation’s managers lacked the regional expertise to match their anti-communist zeal. This lack of understanding manifested in several ways. The “political instability [and] an intensifying nationalism” in the region led to an underestimation of how historic rivalries between nations would prevent success for a country’s films outside its home market.[9] Japan stands out, and Lee shows how other nations viewed its films as a continuation of “Japan’s unfulfilled imperial adventure” rather than coming from a “reformed colonizer” as Japanese producers hoped.[10] At other moments, film festivals became inextricable from local political concerns, as when the South Korean members of the awards jury for the 1966 Asian Film Festival had to appear in court for violating the nation’s anticommunist laws after awarding the best director prize to a Japanese director with communist sympathies.[11] The Asia Foundation also failed to recognize the difficulties inherent in operating with multiple currencies and navigating different national frameworks surrounding import and export. This made the purchase of raw materials and equipment difficult and contributed to cost overruns.[12]

Perhaps most importantly, Lee shows how the foundation’s partners were poorly chosen. Local producers’ “blatant ideological stances often compromised the commercial values necessary to attract local audiences” ensuring the anti-communist films played to empty seats.[13] The Asia Foundation’s lack of local expertise and desire to subsume local issues into a broader Cold War story left it pushing stories that did not resonate. In this regard its partnership with figures like Chang Kuo-Sin in Hong Kong and Masaichi Nagata in Japan resembles U.S. policy makers favoring leaders like South Vietnam’s Ngo Dinh Diem and South Korea’s Syngman Rhee. Both the producers and dictators benefitted by ingratiating themselves with like-minded Americans but had little to offer their domestic audiences.

The book could do more to exploit those similarities and tie Lee’s “Asian Cinematic Network” more clearly into the broader Cold War. McCarthyism in Hollywood elicits an occasional reference, but more direct examination would be useful. Doing so would help Lee better demonstrate that the ideological battle over cinema was a global concern and something seen by many policymakers as critical to the broader Cold War. One example is the presence of formerly blacklisted director Edward Dmytryk as a juror at the San Francisco International Film Festival.[14] Lee notes it was an unimportant regional event, but one supported by the Asia Foundation, which suggests his attendance was part of Dmytryk showing he remained reformed after his Saturday Evening Post confessional of being a communist and Ronald Reagan’s declaration it showed others that they “too can be free men again.”[15]

*Japanese poster for Pulgasari (Wikimedia)*

More on the use of cinema by communist nations in the region would also strengthen Lee’s narrative. He highlights Hong Kong’s Great Wall Pictures as the communist backed target of the Asia Foundation supported Asia Pictures, but more on the nature of Great Wall’s backing, the films it produced, and their reach would be a useful contrast to the failures of the Asia Foundation’s efforts. Similarly, North Korea’s kidnapping of South Korean director Sang-ok Shin and his wife, actress Ch’oe Un-hui, so they could make films for Pyongyang, including the infamous kaiju film Pulgasari, only receives a passing mention at a chapter’s closing. Further exploration of this incident would reinforce the seriousness with which nations in the Cold War took cinema and its ability to bolster ideological messaging. So too would further exploration of the epilogue of the burgeoning war over cinematic content in Asia sparked by China’s explosive growth as both a market for and producer of movies.

 Buy on Amazon  *Cinema and the Cultural Cold War* is a welcome addition to the growing historiography on how Cold War belligerents actively sought to influence popular culture both domestically and abroad. Much like Duncan White’s *Cold Warriors* and Christina Klein’s *Cold War Orientalism*, Lee’s book shows the importance of popular culture as a battlefield each side viewed as critical to their success. Impressively, unlike the former two works, *Cinema and the Cultural Cold War* is able to do this without the benefit of featuring works immediately recognizable to most readers. While this does create a potential challenge of accessibility, Lee largely overcomes it by supplying local context in a brief and clear manner, making the book an excellent one for those interested in the Cold War in Asia or the use of information as an element of national power. With *Cinema and the Cold War*, Lee deftly demonstrates that the efforts of the Asia Foundation to push U.S. interests through film failed for many of the same reasons attempts by U.S. military and aid organizations did. The characters were new, but the story remained the same.

Ben Griffin is the Chief of the Military History Division in the History Department of the United States Military Academy and the author of Reagan’s War Stories: A Cold War Presidency from the Naval Institute Press. This review reflects his own views and not necessarily those of the Department of the Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

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Header Image: Cinema (AchDaily/Visual Hunt)

Notes: [1] Dr Strangelove or How I learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, film, directed by Stanley Kubrick, Hawk Films, 1964.

[2] The Spy Who Loved Me, film, directed by Lewis Gilbert, Eon Productions, 1977.

[3] Red Dawn, film, directed by John Milius, United Artists, 1984.

[4] Wargames, film, directed by John Badham, United Artists, 1983.

[5] Sangjoon Lee, Cinema and the Cultural Cold War: U.S. Diplomacy and the Origins of the Asian Cinematic Network, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2020), 22.

[6] Ibid, 36.

[7] Ibid, 11.

[8] Ibid.

[9] Ibid, 132.

[10] Ibid 57-58.

[11] Ibid, 160.

[12] Ibid, 132.

[13] Ibid.

[14] Ibid, 120.

[15] Richard English, “What Makes a Hollywood Communist?” Saturday Evening Post, May 19, 1951; Lee Zhito, “Picture Business,” Billboard, June 16, 1951

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Autumn of Our Discontent: Fall 1949 and the Crises in American National Security. John Curatola. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2022.

 Buy on Amazon  In *Autumn of Our Discontent*, John Curatola contends the Soviet creation of an atomic bomb was not the single determinant for the United State’s 1949 decision to establish a large defense structure. Rather, the almost simultaneous confluence of several events during Autumn of 1949 “sowed the seeds for a review of national security policy.”[1] A principal military historian at the National World War II Museum, Curatola highlights the key game changers as the implementation of George Kennan’s containment policy, the loss of mainland China to communism, the release of the *China White Paper*, arguments on the ethics of creating a thermonuclear bomb, and the very public rivalry between the U.S. military services. Because each occurred so closely in time, he skillfully asserts, the effect they had on the country’s perspective toward national security “was greater than the sum of their parts.”[2]

Curatola’s title appears to be a salute to the opening speech in William Shakespeare’s Richard III,where Richard of Gloucester declares, “Now is the winter of our discontent, made glorious summer by this sun of York,” revealing the victory of the House of York after years of conflict.[3] Similarly, Curatola reflects on the time of bleak discouragement in U.S. foreign affairs during the autumn of 1949 that led to NSC-68 and its recommended creation of a national security state to defend against the threat of communism.

The book is divided chronologically. Curatola begins his tome with the riveting story of U.S. Air Force intelligence crews uncovering evidence of the first Soviet nuclear test. The rest of the introduction examines other key defense and foreign policy events that occurred immediately following World War II. The essential core of the book, however, the critical events of 1949, are separately explored in two long chapters of 78 and 99 pages, respectively titled “Summer” and “Autumn.” These are followed by a 29-page conclusion, appropriately named “Winter,” covering the related changes in national policy and illuminating the legacy of those changes.

Curatola brilliantly guides the reader through detailed accounts of lesser-known conflicts and debates of the time. He delves into the bitter fight between the Air Force and Navy over roles and missions, revealing the political drama that ensued both publicly and in Congressional hearings. He unveils the muted debates over how to best help the anti-Communist Kuomintang fight in China without supporting their corruption and exploitation of peasants. He also highlights the disconnect between the Atomic Energy Commission and Strategic Air Command over atomic weapon requirements. He reveals the ethical and moral struggles over whether to create a super nuclear fusion bomb or to rely solely on the fission weapons developed at the time.

*Joseph Stalin, left, meets with Mao Zedong in Moscow in December 1949. (Sovfoto/Universal Images Group/Getty)*

Curatola focuses on obscure debates to show how they influenced public opinion and the perceptions of national leaders toward national defense strategy. By tying events into one narrative, he also highlights how closely bound each event was to the others and how their cumulative influence on the nation’s perspective toward national defense was greater than any single part taken separately. He supports these accounts with precise and comprehensive citations and a comprehensive bibliography to guide researchers on the less familiar debates.

However, Curatola’s most important accomplishment is creating a comprehensive look at how the United States changed its perspective on national security policy during 1949 by identifying and highlighting the importance of the lesser known national security issues that may have been hidden by the creation of the nuclear bomb. While his focus on 1949 may be too narrow, Curatola acknowledges that events outside of this year also had a significant impact on the creation and/or approval of NSC-68. Thus, his discussion of Cold War events beyond 1949 complement his central thesis that a critical convergence of events that appeared to present an existential threat ultimately convinced both the American people and their leaders to discard their fears of a standing army and served as the catalyst to create a strong defense structure.

Although a solid contribution to Cold War scholarship, the book suffers slightly from the drawbacks of its format. Composing two extremely large chapters bookended by a shorter introduction and final chapter was a bit off-putting. Curatola could have better presented the historical facts and his analysis by developing them through shorter, focused chapters on each topic, highlighting critical points or themes from the timeline in the chapter titles. However, this is a minor critique that does not negate the research or insights provided by the author.

*In August 1949, President Harry Truman signed the North Atlantic Treaty, which marked the beginning of NATO. (Getty)*

Today’s foreign policy events make Curatola’s book even more intriguing. In the near future, a similar book could be written about events occurring under the radar of the Russia-Ukraine conflict that are currently changing the look and mission of NATO. Overall, Curatola’s book is a welcome addition to the historiography of the early Cold War, identifying how key events worked together to reframe the U.S. perspective toward a standing army and a strong military deterrent. Students and scholars of the early Cold War, NSC-68, the development of thermonuclear weapons, the Navy-Air Force rivalry, and the loss of China will all find value in this work.

David W. Bath is an Assistant Professor of Military History at Rogers State University and a former U.S. Air Force officer. He is the author of Assured Destruction: Building the Ballistic Missile Culture of the U.S. Air Force.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

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Header Image: Autumn (Shairaa/Shutterstock)

Notes: [1] Curatola, 160.

[2] Curatola, 7.

[3] William Shakespeare, Richard III: Entire play, accessed January 30, 2023, http://shakespeare.mit.edu/richardiii/full.html.

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Inheriting the Bomb: The Collapse of the USSR and the Nuclear Disarmament of Ukraine. Mariana Budjeryn. Baltimore, Maryland: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2023.

Mariana Budjeryn’s Inheriting the Bomb: The Collapse of the USSR and the Nuclear Disarmament of Ukrainelooks at the diplomatic process that led to the removal of nuclear weapons on the territories of newly independent Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine, with a focus on the latter. She argues Ukraine’s efforts to alter the terms and conditions of denuclearization failed because the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) was “too comprehensive a regime” for a nascent state to challenge amid substantial diplomatic pressure.[1] Inheriting the Bomb contributes to a resurgence of interest in Ukraine’s denuclearization in the wake of Russia’s first invasion of Ukraine in 2014. This discussion has spurred speculation on an alternative history where Ukraine never denuclearized. With her book, Budjeryn provides an “evidence-based account of Ukraine’s nuclear disarmament to the debates that are often more mired in myth than grounded in fact.”[2]

Budjeryn highlights the complexity (a myriad of factors) rather than contingency (one factor) that affected Ukraine’s denuclearization. The normative framework of international arms treaties, as well as contemporary domestic and international developments, restricted the number of options available to Ukraine. Ukraine had hoped that, in asserting its ownership over the nuclear warheads on its territory as a successor state to the Soviet Union, it could have secured international recognition, economic aid, and security guarantees prior to denuclearization. However, the Non-Proliferation Treaty had no category for a temporary nuclear state. The treaty only stipulated the existence of nuclear-weapon states (NWSs) and non-nuclear weapon states (NNWSs). Because the United States and Russia shared the view that Russia should inherit the Soviet Union’s spot as a nuclear-weapon state, they managed to combine their political, diplomatic, and economic influence to pressure Ukraine to abide by the provisions of the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Responding to counterfactuals on Ukraine’s denuclearization, Budjeryn emphasizes that Ukraine’s lack of time and resources made rapid denuclearization the best option at that moment.[3] Economically, Ukraine desperately needed American financial aid that the U.S. made contingent on Ukraine’s implementation of a swift and complete denuclearization. In international politics, Ukraine’s greenhorn-diplomats faced an alliance of seasoned American and Russian diplomats adamant that Ukraine follow the letter of existing treaties. In domestic Ukrainian politics, the lack of consensus on an alternative denuclearization plan prevented the formation of a unified Ukrainian front against the Americans and Russians.

*U.S. President Clinton, Russian President Yeltsin, and Ukrainian President Kravchuk after signing the Trilateral Statement in Moscow on 14 January 1994. (William J. Clinton Presidential Library/Wikimedia)*

Arms control treaties such as the Non-Proliferation Treaty and the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) play central roles in the author’s analysis of the denuclearization process. Through their “web of institutions, relationships, practices, norms, and shared understandings,” these treaties informed interactions between the international players in Ukraine’s denuclearization.[4] The Non-Proliferation Treaty’s clear categories and definitions on nuclear possession proved the major stumbling block to Ukraine’s claim to temporary ownership. The U.S. and Russia, both wanting Ukraine to denuclearize quickly, justified their position to the international community as integral to the survival of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which would require renewal in 1995.

Budjeryn convincingly juxtaposes Ukraine’s denuclearization with those of Kazakhstan and Belarus to stress that these states’ contemporary historical context shaped their denuclearization process. Belarus was first to denuclearize because its parliament was unified and in agreement with Russia’s views on the process. Kazakhstan completed its denuclearization later than Belarus because Kazakhstan had a credible claim to nuclear ownership vis-à-vis the Non-Proliferation Treaty and was willing to make that argument to secure international financial assistance.[5] However, once President Nazarbayev decided to sign the NPT, there was no opposition in Kazakhstan’s parliament to oppose him. Of the three states, Ukraine held onto its nuclear warheads the longest because it faced persistent Russian threats to its national security and had a strong nationalist group in parliament to lobby for a better denuclearization deal with security guarantees.

Though a political scientist by training, Budjeryn’s extensive use of historical primary sources also makes her work an important contribution to historical scholarship. The book includes memoirs and interviews from key officials involved in the diplomatic process, state archives, and the texts of relevant arms control treaties. Ukraine’s Declaration of State Sovereignty (1990) and the Budapest Memorandum (1994) provide convenient bookends to the analysis.

Overall, Budjeryn is convincing in her argument. She points out the substantial hurdles that prevented Ukraine from retaining its nuclear arms while still acknowledging Ukrainian officials’ agency in influencing the course of denuclearization. This book should help bridge the gap between the two extremes of the ongoing debate on Ukraine’s denuclearization. Those who believe that Ukraine missed an historic opportunity to build an effective deterrent against Russia will find some hard truths here. At the same time, those who lament yet another chapter in Ukraine’s saga of victimization at the hands of bigger powers will find some counterevidence showing that, historically, Ukraine has been able to punch above its weight.

Scholars and policymakers will find this work most relevant. Scholars will appreciate the diplomatic history and interpretation of treaty provisions. Policymakers should take note of Russia’s history of aggression towards Ukraine and how Russia has used diplomacy as part of a multi-pronged strategy to reassert its control over its neighbors. Russia’s empty gestures towards a diplomatic solution of the war it instigated against Ukraine is evidence this strategy remains one of Moscow’s favorites.[6]

Shawn Conroy is a PhD candidate in Russian, Eastern European, and Eurasian history at the Ohio State University. His research interests include the collapse of the Soviet Union and regionalism in eastern Europe. His dissertation looks at how Dnipropetrovsk managed the transition from the Soviet Union to independent Ukraine.

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Header Image: Missile Transport Truck MAZ-537 With a Special Missile Container, Strategic Missile Forces Museum, Ukraine 2008 (Vladimir Zinin).

Notes: [1] Mariana Budjeryn, Inheriting the Bomb: The Collapse of the USSR and the Nuclear Disarmament of Ukraine (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 2023), 186.

[2] Budjeryn 7-8.

[3] See Yuri Kostenko, Ukraine’s Nuclear Disarmament: A History (Cambridge: Ukrainian Research Institute, 2020) for a robust argument that Ukraine could have secured a better denuclearization deal.

[4] Budjeryn 13.

[5] The NPT stipulates that only those powers that tested a nuclear weapon on their territory prior to 1967 could be considered nuclear-weapon states. The Soviet Union started testing nuclear weapons on the territory of the Kazakh SSR in 1949. Independent Kazakhstan argued that this was evidence that it deserved the status of a temporary nuclear state.

[6] Minor correction: on page 213, the author writes that Leonid Kuchma became director of Pivdenmash in 1982. He actually became director in 1986.

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Mastering the Art of Command: Admiral Chester W. Nimitz and Victory in the Pacific. Trent Hone. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 2022.

Scholars and practitioners have been examining the art of command since organized warfare began and have identified two models: centralized and decentralized.[1] Commanders should rely on capable, well-trained, well indoctrinated subordinates’ talents, judgments, and initiative to gain victory. War is a human endeavor and technology alone does not win wars. Because people fight wars, finding the best ways to exploit their talents is central to attaining victory. Therefore, a commander’s greatest attribute is an ability to place the right people in the right jobs and his effect on morale. Leadership is an intangible, composed of personality and vision and its practice an art. Good leaders stress clarity of intent—state the goal but never tell people how to do things. This fosters a collaborative organizational culture that avoids blame by encouraging learning from mistakes to take bold but calculated risks. A good commander is accessible and promotes subordinates sharing their stories as a way to learn and communicate, creating an adaptable, innovative, and flexible organization based on mutual trust and confidence. Those in formal leadership positions must be cognizant of the welfare of those they lead: their well-being must be encouraged as this is one way a leader ensures organizational effectiveness. All leaders must also set aside time for self-reflection to remind themselves all success includes other people.

Trent Hone presents a study showing how Admiral Chester W. Nimitz initially organized and then modified his staff organization to meet a changing military environment.Following these general ideas, Trent Hone presents a study showing how Admiral Chester W. Nimitz initially organized and then modified his staff organization to meet a changing military environment. To aid those unfamiliar with the course of events, Hone includes lists of operational code names, abbreviations, maps, figures, and tables as well as an extensive bibliography to enlighten readers. The tables, in particular, show how Nimitz and his staff were able to adjust their plans to reflect changed circumstances. He uses the way General MacArthur organized his theater-level staff to examine the efficacy of these two models (Army and Navy) through the lens of organizational behavior theory. Further, he shows how Nimitz created opportunities for offensive action by asking his staff to consider various strategic options as situations in the theater of war evolved.

Many narrative histories of the Pacific War present events as occurring in a set pattern with little chance for variation, eliminating much human agency. The area of conflict was vast and consisted of oceans dotted with islands which were home to various ethnic groups. The United States divided this theater of war into several sub-theaters: the North Pacific, the Central Pacific, the South Pacific, and the Southwest Pacific. The latter was divided between two commanders-in-chief—Admiral Chester Nimitz, Commander in Chief Pacific Fleet (CINCPAC) and Commander in Chief Pacific Ocean Area (CINCPOA) and General Douglas MacArthur, Commander in Chief Southwest Pacific.

The most important lessons drawn from any war are usually found in the events preceding hostilities and at its beginning when there are no abundant resources. In the first campaigns nations fight for survival with inadequate resources, and often with unsuitable commanders—handicaps of fighting on terms dictated by the enemy. As a war continues and a nation fully mobilizes its resources, it can choose options and, as final victory appears certain, debate how to secure it quickly and cheaply. Admiral Nimitz and his staff experienced all these phases.

Important decisions are made before the first shots are fired, when the nature of the war to be fought is determined. When fighting in a coalition engaged in a global war, conferences decided strategy based on plans and statistics concerning matériel, shipping, and personnel. The main subjects of a conference were high level strategy and policy, encompassing war aims, choosing allies and operational theaters, as well as creating organizations to distribute men and matériel. Hone’s book deals with the ways theater-level activities are decided and the way these commanders use their staffs. They discussed, among other topics, theater-level strategy and personnel matters. These meetings allowed them to work through their disagreements. While Nimitz did not participate in inter-allied conferences and decision making, he met regularly with Admiral Ernest J. King, who did participate in these meetings as a member of the American Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Anglo-American Combined Chiefs of Staff.

In terms of structure, Hone divides his work of ten chapters into three parts. The first three chapters concern the initial phase of the Pacific War, from December 1941 through June 1942. Hone describes this as a period of disequilibrium, of material disadvantage and defense. The next three chapters cover a phase of equilibrium, from July 1942 through October 1943, as the United States transformed its economic power into military power. The final four chapters cover a period of advantage from November 1943 through August 1945, when American forces took the offensive in the Central and South Pacific bringing their overwhelming matériel superiority to bear against Japan.

Hone begins with Nimitz assuming command of the Pacific Fleet on Christmas Day 1941, finding it stunned by the Japanese attack and doubting its own expertise. At that time, the Japanese Navy that carried out the Pearl Harbor raid was the only force capable of assembling and operating a fleet of six aircraft carriers. Nimitz had three initial tasks: (1) assemble a staff, (2) restore the staff’s and the fleet’s self-confidence following the sneak attack, and (3) deal with serial crises in the first months of the war. He earned the confidence of his superiors and subordinates by not replacing the staff and having the fleet demonstrate it could strike the Japanese in battle through a series of raids and to defeat them at the Battles of the Coral Sea and Midway. He listened to his advisors but over-ruled their defensive preferences, opting for taking the offensive. Throughout this initial period, Nimitz emphasized that plans and operations would be governed by the principle of calculated risk. We see this principle in operation in planning the initial carrier raids (betting the Japanese were more interested in Malaya, the Philippines and the Netherlands East Indies), and in the instructions given to the admirals in tactical command at Coral Sea and Midway. At the same time, he was able to replace certain commanders by placing them in jobs more suited to their talents.

The second phase, a period of equilibrium, deals with Nimitz’s role in the campaigns in the Southwest Pacific. His meetings with Admiral King and General MacArthur’s surrogates governed an American opportunistic strategy, a reaction to Japanese moves in the Solomons and New Guinea. Nimitz’s two main tasks were to find commanders who could cooperate fully with General MacArthur’s staff, exercise initiative on their own behalf, and prepare the Navy for the battle of attrition that was the Guadalcanal campaign.

During this period, he also changed the staff structure and, despite Army objections, retained both fleet and area command. The victory at Guadalcanal allowed the US to seize the initiative in the Pacific War. While Admiral Halsey and Admiral Kincaid undertook opportunistic offensives (in the Southwest Pacific to support MacArthur and in the North Pacific to seize Attu and Kiska, respectively), Nimitz’s staff prepared to use the fleet to take the offensive in the Central Pacific. Through 1943, Nimitz, his staff, and their subordinates improved tactics, doctrine, and force structure by incorporating lessons learned since December 1941. Logistics, an on-going issue, was solved by fully integrating the Army into Nimitz's joint staff planning and operations sections, which resulted in increased attention to a logistical organization and planning capability that could concentrate power at the right time and the right place. This happened only when Nimitz abandoned prewar assumptions concerning ways to organize a Pacific campaign.

The third phase began with the amphibious assault on Tarawa Atoll in the Gilbert Islands and ended with Japan’s formal surrender in September 1945. At the beginning of this phase the Allies could choose options and engage in a debate on ways to achieve final victory at the cheapest cost in the shortest time. After Tarawa, Nimitz again decided to strike directly at Kwajalein against the staff’s advice; taking a calculated risk that the Japanese were too weak after the actions in the Southwest Pacific to mount a coordinated defense of the Marshall Islands. The successful invasion of Kwajalein and Eniwetok threw the Japanese off balance and advanced the projected timetable for invading the Marianas by six months. All through 1944, the campaigns in the Central and the South Pacific worked in tandem, each reinforcing the other.

*Pacific Strategy Conference, July 1944, including General MacArthur, President Roosevelt, and Admirals Nimitz and Leahy (Alamy)*

The Army-Navy debate over whether to invade the Philippines or Taiwan (Formosa) is outlined, with MacArthur’s plan winning approval for both political and military reasons. The initial Navy plan was modified to seize Iwo Jima and Okinawa to assist the air and sea blockade of Japan and prepare for the ultimate invasion. However, beginning in April 1945 Nimitz began to doubt the efficacy of invasion as staff studies of the Japanese fortifications on Peleliu and intelligence estimates of Japanese strength on Kyushu convinced him the enemy had become smarter and deadlier and led him to question the Army’s optimistic invasion scenario. Both King and Nimitz favored an air and sea blockade and would have expressed doubts about the invasion’s feasibility. However, the use of atomic bombs, the Soviet Union’s movement east, and the modification of unconditional surrender terms caused the Emperor to lose faith in the military’s ability to continue fighting. With the Japanese surrender, Nimitz returned his forces to a peacetime footing.

Unlike some other admired military leaders from World War II who were larger than life figures and whose leadership featured impatience, self-assurance, and stubbornness—leaders like Generals George Patton and Douglas MacArthur and Admirals Ernest J. King and William Halsey—Nimitz resembled leaders who were quieter—leaders like Generals George Marshall and Dwight Eisenhower. They depended upon intelligent listening and patience. Hone’s study shows Nimitz understood command is an art based on collaboration that relies on effective personal relationships to extract ideas and understand new opportunities. He adopted his subordinates’ ideas and made them part of his own plans. Nimitz never backed away from difficult decisions and when appropriate was as bold as any commander. He relied on unified command with decentralized execution combined with the continual consideration of options; the figures and tables Hone provides show this in operation.

Nimitz resembled leaders who were quieter—leaders like Generals George Marshall and Dwight Eisenhower.I found Hone's integrating organizational theory a distraction, but using it allows the reader to see its utility in analyzing organizational successes and failures. The reader should also understand how Nimitz's earlier command experiences influenced him and how his service in the Navy's personnel office (Bureau of Navigation) broadened his familiarity with the Navy's senior officers. An organization's leader should be familiar with it and its people. Nimitz's art of command reinforced democratic norms. Hone has written a book of applied history for all who are interested in a democratic process of strategic decision making. I also think he overlooks how Nimitz’s earlier command experiences influenced him and how his service in the Bureau of Navigation (the Navy’s personnel office) allowed him to become acquainted with the Navy’s senior officers. Nimitz’s art of command reinforced rather than challenged democratic norms. Hone wrote a book of applied history for those interested in a democratic process of strategic decision making.

Lewis Bernstein holds a PhD in history from The University of Kansas. He has been a Fulbright Scholar and has taught East Asian History at Emporia State University, Brigham Young University, and Boise State University. He has also worked for the Department of the Army as Command Historian for the UN Command/US/ROK Combined Forces Command/US Forces Korea, Seoul, Korea and as Branch Chief, Force Structure and Unit History, U.S. Army Center of Military History, Fort McNair, DC.

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Header Image: Fleet Admiral Nimitz, USN, in the Conning Tower of USS NAUTILUS (SSN-571), San Francisco, California 1957 (U.S. Navy).

Notes: [1] Centralizers believe the course of a battle can be controlled by a commander who could issue detailed operational orders while decentralizers believe the key to success is issuing a clear commander’s intent based on sound doctrine that leaves room for subordinates to improvise at appropriate moments to achieve a common end. See Michael A. Palmer, Command at Sea: Naval Command and Control since the Sixteenth Century (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2005) as well as Field Marshal Viscount William Slim, Defeat Into Victory (paperback ed., London: Macmillan, 1986), pp. 182-183 and another study of Admiral Nimitz, Craig L. Symonds, Nimitz at War: Command Leadership from Pearl Harbor to Tokyo Bay (New York: Oxford University Press, 2022).

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The Strategy Bridge’s Student Writing Competition is back for 2023!

The competition is open to students attending civilian universities and military war or staff colleges at every level—including distance learning, correspondence, and fellowship programs—between 1 Jun 2022 and 31 May 2023. The competition deadline is 4 Jun 2023. Winning articles will be announced in August 2023 and published on The Strategy Bridge thereafter.

Original submissions are highly encouraged, though unpublished, revised, and reformatted professional military education papers that meet the standards of a professional journal and our submission guidelines will be considered. Suggested topics include, but are not limited to:

• Theory of strategy
• Strategy development (within the military or between civilian and military actors/organizations)
• Strategic history
• Factors influencing strategy (technology, politics, geography, etc.)
• Educating strategists
• Strategy and the public
• The impact of information operations on strategy
• The future of strategy
• Ethics and strategy

AwardsA panel of judges gathered by The Strategy Bridge will evaluate entries based on originality, substance of argument, style, and contribution to advancing the understanding and practice of strategy.

First Place – Award of $500, publication in a special series in The Strategy Bridge journal, and consideration for a chapter in an edited volume published by a university press.

Second Place – Award of $300, publication in a special series in The Strategy Bridge journal, and consideration for a chapter in an edited volume published by a university press.

Third Place – Award of $100, publication in a special series in The Strategy Bridge journal, and consideration for a chapter in an edited volume published by a university press.

How to Enter The Strategy Bridge will entertain articles with a tie to strategy that are between 2,000 and 5,000 words in length; notes and author biography are not considered in the word count. Submissions in excess of 5000 words will not be considered. Articles must include a short biography of the author or authors. * Given our broad audience in the national security profession, we require that submissions be free of jargon, acronyms, and idiosyncratic style; articles should be written for a general audience rather than a service- or national military-specific one. For more guidance, see our submission guidelines. * All citations must be provided as footnotes in Chicago style. (See links here, here, and here for online guidance/assistance in formatting.) * All graphs, charts, and tables should be submitted as separate files in the format they were created; please include appropriate attribution information. * Previously published articles are ineligible. * Articles pending consideration elsewhere for publication, or articles submitted to other competitions still pending announced decisions are eligible for this competition, but if the article is accepted elsewhere the author must inform The Strategy Bridge immediately. * Please send submissions in a Word document or Google Doc* format to submissions@thestrategybridge.org.

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The innovation of the smokeless rifle may not be as flashy as that of the aircraft and armored vehicles, but describing its impacts on the future of war required more than four-hundred pages of technical analysis in Jean de Bloch’s The Future of War.[1] The difficulty in forecasting the effects of new weapon systems stems from the fact that technology is not additive. A smokeless rifle not only increases visibility on the battlefield, but it also opens new possibilities for tactics and strategy. With smokeless rifles, soldiers could fire upon their enemies without giving away their exact location while large formations could no longer hide under a cloud of smoke as they sent volleys across the battlefield. These changes required armies to reorganize their units to become nimbler and more maneuverable leading to deadlier clashes between opposing forces. States had to contend with deadlier conflicts by increasing their investments in new technologies while taking political stances that would maintain the will of the people in the face of high casualties.

Leaders across the world are seeing the early effects of another transformational technology: widely available large-language models.The example of the smokeless rifle shows that relatively unexciting technologies can have transformational effects on warfare and society. Today, leaders across the world are seeing the early effects of another transformational technology: widely available large-language models. Viewed as the first step in true artificial general intelligence, large-language models incorporate massive amounts of data from books and articles into training sets that allow them to recognize patterns between words and images. These models appear to be able to answer many questions by generating coherent responses in seconds and can perform menial tasks like summarizing articles or cleaning unstructured data. Across the internet, early adopters have demonstrated novel uses for OpenAI’s chatbot, ChatGPT, that range from editing code to writing essays for college courses.[2] These models are well regarded in the private sector, but they have not received much attention in military circles largely because they do not appear to have direct applications for combat. Large-language models will likely have a larger impact on the battlefield than autonomous drones due to their ability to automate the many aspects of staff work that prevent military leaders from focusing on tactics and strategy.

Large-language models will likely have a larger impact on the battlefield than autonomous drones due to their ability to automate the many aspects of staff work that prevent military leaders from focusing on tactics and strategy. As with all technologies, understanding the true effects of these models is difficult, but there are some techniques analysts could use to describe how war may change once these tools become widespread. Among science fiction authors, William Gibson stands out for his ability to determine which “boring” technologies today will have huge effects on society. The prolific writer coined the term cyberspace years before the internet became a cultural phenomenon and foresaw how the rise of microcelebrities online would shape the world.[3] Gibson owes his predictive ability to his outlook on the world: “The future is already here — it’s just not very evenly distributed.” Gibson’s statement is not just about technological trends, but their effects on society.

 Buy on Amazon  Over half a century before Gibson’s seminal work *Neuromancer* described the future of the internet, Bloch took a similar approach when evaluating technologies such as the smokeless rifle. He argued that further adoption of industrial technologies would make war so destructive as to be impractical. Likewise, Gibson saw that early hacker culture would come to shape society at large in the near future. Both men recognized that they stood at the precipice of a new world shaped by advancing technologies.

Gibson’s technique should be familiar to most military analysts. Analysts observe a localized conflict and attempt to generalize lessons based on their use of new tactics and weapon systems. Though decades apart, military professionals have viewed the armored warfare of the Spanish Civil War or the drone fights over Nagorno-Karabakh as pockets of the future that could be used to understand the next iteration of warfighting.[4] This technique takes an immense amount of creativity, which is why many modern attempts at conducting these same predictions come in the form of speculative fiction written by military analysts.

I attempted this same methodology with Dr. Oscar Jonsson in a paper last year. Using examples from the private sector, we conducted a technical analysis of how AI might revolutionize Russian intelligence.[5] While we are several years out from knowing if our analysis is correct, some of our predictions have already been undermined by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the release of commercially available large language models. Even Gibson admits the limits of his method, stating that the internet turned out to be nothing like he imagined.[6]

These events show that technology does not exist in a vacuum. Instead, it affects and is affected by the society around it. Gibson’s technique can provide insights into the broad strokes of the impact of new technologies on society, but it is not meant as a precise instrument for understanding the future. Bloch attempted to get around this by quantifying society as much as he could given the limited data at the time.

The strengths and weaknesses of this method are best exemplified in his work The Future of War: In Its Technical, Economic, and Political Relations. Published in 1899, Bloch believed that history alone did not provide an accurate way to assess the future. He argued that any judgment on the future of war must account for technological advancements as well as the economic and political effects of the conflict.[7] By applying this technique to lessons from the regional conflicts in the 19th century, he sought to determine the possibility of warfare between the great powers of Europe given such significant advances.

Any precise cost estimation of a future conflict is bound to be incorrect, but the magnitude of the difference between Bloch’s prediction and reality displays the weakness with all forecasts. Buy on Amazon Bloch displayed an impressive knowledge of the weapons’ technical capabilities that the great powers employed on land and sea. He applied this knowledge to data from recent battles to predict the cost of human life in the next major conflict between European powers, predicting catastrophic losses for all sides in the conflict due mainly to the introduction of more accurate rifles that did not emit smoke when fired. The introduction of these weapons would disrupt the typical use of large formations and give an advantage to riflemen hidden in the terrain or dug into protected positions. For this reason, he proclaimed that future wars would be long struggles for fortified positions where whole nations would be called to arms. The result, he predicted, would impose an economic and human cost that would make war prohibitively expensive.

The most interesting aspect of Bloch’s work is that his theories were tested fifteen years later during World War I. The grand strokes of his predictions hold up well. The Great War was a defensive slog that required the participants to mobilize the whole of their economies. Interestingly, Bloch’s weakness was that he did not go far enough in his predictions. He underestimated the cost of a great war, projecting that France would need to spend $1.8 billion annually to finance a conflict between Germany and Austria. The actual cost was more than $6 billion a year.

Any precise cost estimation of a future conflict is bound to be incorrect, but the magnitude of the difference between his prediction and reality displays the weakness with all forecasts.

Despite his attempt to update the lessons from regional conflicts with technical and economic data, his model could not account for all the political factors that would lead countries to go to war even when the decision guaranteed mass destruction. His assessment also failed to leave room for the possibility of further evolutions in military technology. Two years after his death, the Wright Brothers successfully launched the first heavier-than-air flight. Airplanes would not be used in conflict until the Italo-Turkish in 1911, which would have made it difficult for Bloch to recognize their importance even if he had lived to see them fly. Even with these weaknesses, Bloch showed that something as simple as a smokeless rifle can have enormous effects on how states finance future conflicts.

Leaders in the defense realm should take a page from Gibson and Bloch by studying early adopters of this technology to see how political and economic considerations may change to support AI-augmented military staff sections.Bloch’s assessment shows the limits of trying to quantify the future. The purpose of his book, however, was not to accurately predict the future of warfare but to convince others to abandon the idea of war altogether to avoid such harmful new technologies. On that accord, he failed miserably, but his effort still shows that examining history for lessons on future warfare best reveals how the introduction of a technology can affect the entire system of warfare.

Leaders today are in need of this kind of direction. The release of large-language models to the public have brought the world to a new precipice. These technologies have enraptured the public and the media alike. The interfaces released to the general population feel like a form of magic, but the large-language models that drive them are more like the steam engine or electricity. The large-language model is a general purpose technology that will automate many of the rote tasks performed by office employees. While military leaders could be content in knowing that their staffs will run more efficiently once they integrate these models into their workflow, they should look beyond this effect to understand how greater efficiency in staff work may affect the economic and political calculations behind the next war.

Much of today’s strategy is formed by large staffs that function like any other modern office place. The introduction of ubiquitous AI will have far-reaching consequences. Talk of AI in defense circles has been rooted in the dream of fully autonomous robots, but the real transformation will occur in the offices that litter the headquarters of every echelon of the military.

While tools to increase staff productivity are not as flashy as pilotless helicopters, they will likely contribute more to the transformation of warfare by decreasing the amount of time it takes leaders to generate and analyze courses of action. The general trends of AI integration into staff functions like intelligence is inevitable. In looking at current uses for large-language models, it seems that these models will help automate many of the bureaucratic tasks that bog down staff sections during the planning process and provide prompts for common battlefield problems. The fear that these models will completely pull humans out of the loop are unfounded; rather, they will create decision-making space by lessening the load of other tasks. These models will automatically create a common operating picture that will keep different staff sections synched even when they are not in face-to-face meetings. The timeline for this integration may be shorter than most analysts may think. Microsoft, who owns a large share of OpenAI, has already started integrating it into Microsoft Teams, the main program that staff sections in the United States use to synchronize their files.[8]

While the immediate effects are clear, the second and third order effects will take time to forecast. Leaders in the defense realm should take a page from Gibson and Bloch by studying early adopters of this technology to see how political and economic considerations may change to support AI-augmented military staff sections. While tools to increase staff productivity are not as flashy as pilotless helicopters, they will likely contribute more to the transformation of warfare by decreasing the amount of time it takes leaders to generate and analyze courses of action. Like Bloch’s smokeless rifle, it seems likely that the adoption of large-language models by military staff will make war more deadly in ways that may be hard to predict. Yet despite this difficulty, it is necessary to take the time to try to describe the second-order effects of a technology that the world does not quite understand yet.

Bryce Johnston is an officer in the U.S. Army officer. He is a West Point graduate and Fulbright scholar. He holds an MSc in International Development from the IE School of Global and Public Affairs and a BS from the United States Military Academy. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Silhouette, Spiral Jetty, Utah, 2015 (Greg Rakozy).

Notes: [1] Jean de Bloch, The Future of War in Its Technical, Economic, and Political Relations (Ginn, 1899).

[2] Kevin Roose, “The Brilliance and Weirdness of ChatGPT.” The New York Times, December 5, 2022.

[3] Zach Baron, “William Gibson Writes the Future,” GQ, October 22, 2014.

[4] Hal Brands, “Little War in the Caucasus Has Big Lessons for US and Russia,” Bloomberg, October 8, 2020.

[5] Oscar Jonsson and Bryce Johnston, “Russia’s Revolution in Intelligence Affairs,” Russian Concept of War, Management and Use of Military Power (Helsinki: National Defence University, 2022).

[6] Tom Vital,. “William Gibson Says Today’s Internet Is Nothing Like What He Envisioned.” NPR’s All Things Considered (blog), March 19, 2020.

[7] Jean de Bloch, The Future of War in Its Technical, Economic, and Political Relations (Ginn, 1899).

[8] Chavi Mehta in Bengaluru, “Microsoft rolls out ChatGPT-powered Teams Premium.” Reuters, February 1 2023.

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Predicting the future of warfare is at best a speculative affair. Any forecast can never be proposed with absolute certainty, no matter how robust the underlying analysis. The future is always somewhat uncertain. In fact, history is replete with examples of visionaries who have tried but failed to accurately divine the nature of change. Nonetheless, it is a necessary endeavour, because such is the cost of war today that the implications of failure can be far-reaching, even existential. From the Oracle of Delphi to the modern application of data analytics, military planners over the ages have sought greater clarity regarding the future conduct of war.[1] However, there is no crystal ball for future warfare. Instead, this essay argues that historical lessons provide the best means of determining its form, but only if they are used correctly. The context behind each case study must be carefully considered by military planners who seek to learn from the past so that the observations gathered can be accurately extrapolated onto the present situation, and the resulting lessons meaningfully applied.

*“Lycurgus Consulting the Pythia” by Eugène Delacroix (Wikimedia)*

Learning from the PastThe value of history as a means of informing the future conduct of war is not new. James Mattis holds that “a real understanding of history means that we face nothing new under the sun.”[2] The fundamental reason for this lies in the Clausewitzian adage that no matter the age, all wars conform to a set of universal principles that constitute its nature.[3] The great captains of the past would therefore not find the conflicts of today any more foreign conceptually than those they themselves experienced. The struggle they would have to overcome would rather be in adapting to the new means available with which to wage them.[4]

Another reason why learning from history is essential comes from the practical reality that many militaries do not engage in wars frequently. Whether due to resource constraints or an inward focus on security, such militaries go to war only as a matter of last resort. As a result, it is possible that most of their members, including the regular officer corps, would have no personal experience of war throughout their entire professional careers. History then, as argued by the influential military historian Sir Michael Howard, represents the best alternative to actual experience for the military institution to hone its craft, and by extension, to prepare for the next war.[5] The degree to which this is successful may in turn be the difference between victory and defeat

For example, while the tank was an entirely new invention that had been introduced during the First World War, the development of German armoured warfare in the interwar period saw it employed in a manner that reflected the army’s basic doctrine which had itself been refined through an objective study of Germany’s wartime experience, centering around the principles of initiative, exploitation, and manoeuvre.[6] In contrast, the French adopted a more limited study of their own experiences, influenced in part by the failure of their more offensive-minded doctrine in the war’s earlier years, and the subsequent success of a more controlled operational approach in 1918 that emphasised firepower over manoeuvre.[7] As a result, French armoured warfare developed under more narrow parameters, preventing it from being utilised to its full potential. This divergence in learning would ultimately culminate in Germany’s stunning successes against France in the early stages of the Second World War using its armour-enabled brand of manoeuvre warfare that has come to be popularly known as blitzkrieg.[8]

Yet, it should be noted that the Germans were not the pioneers on the subject of armoured warfare. That honour should go to the British, who had first employed the tank on the Somme. Unsurprisingly, they were for a time at the forefront of armoured warfare development, and their ideas would help to further refine German armoured warfare doctrine.[9] While the reasons why the British failed to hold on to their advantage go beyond the scope of this essay, it does highlight the point that learning from history is not as straightforward as it would seem. Indeed, two main pitfalls hamper the objective study of history in the conduct of war: the failure to understand context, and to extrapolate correctly.

The Importance of ContextOne of the common mistakes made when drawing lessons about war from history is a failure to fully appreciate the context of the case being studied. As suggested by Clausewitz, every age has “its own kind of war, its own limiting conditions, and its own peculiar preconceptions.”[10] As a result, every period has its own corresponding theory of war, derived from the conditions specific to the day. This means that while it remains true the universal principles of war lend to history’s evergreen value as a tool of instruction, there is still a need to discern the unique factors that define each conflict.

For example, while France’s building of the Maginot Line has since come to be a byword for failure, one of the key factors behind its construction was France’s declining birth rate in the interwar period, a strategic weakness that had to be considered against the relative population strength of its most likely enemy, Germany.[11] This made the construction of a system of fortifications a practical necessity to offset Germany’s numerical advantage in the event of a future conflict—France simply could not afford to match Germany’s growth in military power quantitatively.

Thus, putting aside any assessment of the Maginot Line’s ultimate utility, the decision to build it can only be fully understood when both military and non-military factors are considered. Ignoring either would result in a problematically narrow appreciation of France’s strategic conundrum at the time. And while it does not excuse France’s other strategic failings, it is necessary to prevent overly simplistic and frequently erroneous conclusions from being drawn, such as being too dismissive of the use of static fortifications, which continue to feature heavily in the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war.[12]

*Ukrainian Fixed Fortifications to Defend Kyiv (Ukrinform)*

The need for a more holistic perspective is especially pertinent today given how deeply war and its causal factors have become intertwined with the social. A military cannot function outside of the structures and constraints imposed by the society in which it is embedded.[13] A study of past conflicts therefore cannot be divorced from the social forces that shaped them. Furthermore, the subjective way military success or failure is increasingly being defined requires deeper introspection into the context of victory itself to proximate how success can be achieved in future war.[14] Weapon platforms do not win wars on their own. They need to be employed in alignment with the prevailing social forces of the day.

A military cannot function outside of the structures and constraints imposed by the society in which it is embedded. A study of past conflicts therefore cannot be divorced from the social forces that shaped it.The Risks of ExtrapolationBecause no two events are identical, extrapolation is inherent when attempting to apply the lessons of past wars. The military planner must therefore discern what is useful from the case being studied, and project its relevance into the future. Paradoxically however, because the future is so filled with uncertainty, the extrapolated and actual results are prone to deviate from each other. The probability and degree of deviation is further increased when the time distance between the case study and the future point of reference is great.

Take, for example, the early airpower theorist Giulio Douhet. He drew from his experiences in the First World War and his observations of how airpower had been utilised to compose his treatise on airpower.[15] Yet, while many of his ideas remain relevant today, contemporary airpower has never fully lived up to the promise he saw in it. Unlike the more measured predictions of his intellectual peers such as William “Billy” Mitchell and Hugh Trenchard, Douhet saw airpower as the ultimate war-winning tool of the future, espousing its strategic potential. However, his conclusions were made at a time when airpower was in its infancy and assumed the inexorable progress of its supporting technologies. Advances in air defence systems which he had not foreseen ensured that the famous maxim ‘the bomber will always get through’ would not be realised in the Second World War, moderating the decisive impact he predicted airpower would have.[16] Time has also not been kind to Douhet’s ideas, with the targeting of civilian centres that he believed would bring a swift resolution to war increasingly being frowned upon by the international community.[17]

The true risk in extrapolation lies in taking expectations to the extremes. When the value of an object is overestimated, more emphasis may be accorded it than it deserves, resulting in a waste of valuable resources. The converse results in a slow adoption of what may be essential military reform. This has a flow down effect on a military’s ability to win in a future conflict as doctrine, training, and asset acquisition become locked to the extrapolated vision. Extrapolation is not made easier by the accelerated pace of technological change today. The present rate of technological advancement means that it is likely that a military professional will have to adapt to several weapon systems throughout his career.[18] Because of this, the military planner has a smaller range of historical examples to call upon, and his projection will only be valid for a decade at best, requiring constant review. There will also be a need to extrapolate across domains, as some emerging vectors of conflict, like cyber and space, have no precedent in history. For this, an appreciation of the connecting threads that hark back to war’s immutable nature is critical.

Looking into the FutureThe discourse on future warfare today revolves around issues such as the threat of hybrid warfare, cyber attacks, the use of autonomous weapon systems, the militarisation of space, among many other emerging trends. And just like Douhet did in the early days of airpower, military planners today must assess the potential impact of these developments and draw the appropriate lessons, using observations from both the near and distant past to validate their findings. There are already examples of actors who have made bold predictions. For example, despite cyber power being in its relative infancy, Singapore’s establishment of the Digital and Intelligence Service has made it one of the first militaries in the world to establish an independent cyber force to operate alongside its more traditional counterparts from the domains of air, land, and sea, suggesting that it has own inherent strategic potential.[19]

While there is no single approach to how we should draw historical lessons, the above pitfalls suggest two points of caution. First, history should not be treated as a mirror for the future. While there is much it can teach, there is a danger in assuming that historical events repeat themselves in a cyclical manner. For example, many comparisons have been made between the current U.S.-China rivalry and the Cold War, but viewing the former merely as a repeat of the latter ignores the many contextual differences that require a varying set of responses.[20] Discernment must be exercised when extrapolating historical lessons into the future, taking note of unique contextual factors.[21]

  Second, history must be studied in depth.[22] Studying the latest conflict is often attractive because its recency might suggest greater future relevance and there is more familiarity with the means used. However, the recency of the event also means a scarcity of available data with official sources often becoming available only years, or even decades, after its conclusion. While open-source data may be consulted as an alternative, the pervasiveness of disinformation makes it a less than reliable source, with care needed to discern fact from fiction.[23] Furthermore, if the conflict is still ongoing, drawing conclusions may be premature as events continue to unfold, sometimes with unexpected twists and turns.

The Russia-Ukraine War is a good example of this, already bearing witness to drastic fluctuations in the fortunes of both combatants in just less than a year.[24] It is therefore likely that any meaningful lessons from the Russia-Ukraine War can only be drawn postbellum as a more nuanced picture emerges following careful analysis.[25] Even better would be to compare the observations taken from the conflict with those drawn from samples across a wider timeframe, allowing for a fuller appreciation of the relevant trends and their impact. Patience and humility are therefore requisite traits for those who seek to scry the secrets of the future from the past. Nothing to come is inevitable and while history can help illuminate future pathways, the wise consult it with prudence.

Ian Li is an Associate Research Fellow with the Military Studies Programme at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, NTU, Singapore.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Sunny Night, 2018 (Hasan Almasi).

Notes: [1] Jane Butler, Ross Coffey, Kathryn Pegues, and John Salvador, “Data Analytics in the Combatant Command: Improving the Approach to Decision-Making,” Strategy Bridge, September 6, 2021, https://thestrategybridge.org/the-bridge/2021/9/6/data-analytics-in-the-combatant-command-improving-the-approach-to-decision-making.

[2] Jill R. Russell, “With rifle and bibliography: General Mattis on professional reading,” Strife, May 7, 2013,

http://www.strifeblog.org/2013/05/07/with-rifle-and-bibliography-general-mattis-on-professional-reading/.

[3] Carl Von Clausewitz, On War, eds. and trans. Michael Howard and Peter Paret (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989), 85-89.

[4] Alex Roland, “War and Technology,” Foreign Policy Research Institute, February 27, 2009, https://www.fpri.org/article/2009/02/war-and-technology/.

[5] Michael Howard, “The Use and Abuse of Military History,” Parameters, Journal of the US Army War College 11, No. 1 (1981): 14.

[6] Williamson Murray, “Armored warfare: The British, French, and German experiences,” in Military Innovation in the Interwar Period, eds. Williamson Murray and Allan R. Millett (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 37–39.

[7] Ibid., 29–32.

[8] “The German ‘Lightning War’ Strategy Of The Second World War,” Imperial War Museums, accessed December 15, 2022, https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/the-german-lightning-war-strategy-of-the-second-world-war.

[9] Azar Gat, “British Influence and the Evolution of the Panzer Arm: Myth or Reality? Part I,” War in History 4, No. 2 (April 1997); Azar Gat, “British Influence and the Evolution of the Panzer Arm: Myth or Reality? Part II,” War in History 4, No. 3 (July 1997).

[10] Von Clausewitz, On War, 593.

[11] Indeed, the Merriam-Webster dictionary defines it as “a defensive barrier or strategy that inspires a false sense of security”; Enno Kraehe, “The Motives behind the Maginot Line,” Military Affairs 8, No. 2 (Summer 1944): 112-113.

[12] Stephen Biddle, “Ukraine and the Future of Offensive Maneuver,” War on the Rocks, November 22, 2022, https://warontherocks.com/2022/11/ukraine-and-the-future-of-offensive-maneuver/.

[13] Ian Li, “The Importance of Context for Military History and Education,” POINTER: Journal of the SAF 46, No. 2 (2020): 57-58.

[14] J. Boone Bartholomees, “Theory of Victory,” Parameters 38, No. 2 (Summer 2008): 31-33.

[15] Giulio Douhet, The Command of the Air, trans. Dino Ferrari (Washington, D.C.: Air Force History and Museums Program, 1998).

[16] David Berkland, “Douhet, Trenchard, Mitchell, and the Future of Airpower,” Defense & Security Analysis 27, No. 4 (December 2011): 389-390.

[17] Neta C. Crawford, “Targeting Civilians and U.S. Strategic Bombing Norms: Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose?,” in The American Way of Bombing: Changing Ethical and Legal Norms, from B-17s to Drones, eds. Matthew Evangelista and Henry Shue (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2014), 64–68.

[18] Roland, “War and Technology.”

[19] “Fact Sheet: The Digital and Intelligence Service,” MINDEF Singapore, last modified October 28, 2022,

https://www.mindef.gov.sg/web/portal/mindef/news-and-events/latest-releases/article-detail/2022/October/28oct22_fs.

[20] Ian Li, “The U.S.-China Rivalry as Seen in the Cold War’s Rear-View Mirror,” Strategy Bridge, October 1, 2019, https://thestrategybridge.org/the-bridge/2019/10/1/the-us-china-rivalry-as-seen-in-the-cold-wars-rear-view-mirror.

[21] Frank Hoffman, “Learning Large Lessons from Small Wars,” War on the Rocks, February 5, 2014, https://warontherocks.com/2014/02/learning-large-lessons-from-small-wars/.

[22] Howard, “The Use and Abuse of Military History,” 14.

[23] Julie Jargon, “How to Tell News Fact from Fiction, Even During a War,” The Wall Street Journal, March 5, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-to-spot-fake-news-even-during-a-war-11646434626.

[24] Biddle, “Ukraine and the Future of Offensive Maneuver.”

[25] William Leben, “Let’s hold our horses on drawing lessons from war in Ukraine,” The Strategist,Australian Strategic Policy Institute, May 19, 2022, https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/lets-hold-our-horses-on-drawing-lessons-from-war-in-ukraine/.

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In 1960, British physicist and novelist C. P. Snow famously stated that it was a mathematical certainty that nuclear war would occur within the decade. Thankfully, despite his confident pronouncements about it being a scientific fact and something scientists knew “with the certainty of established truth,” nuclear weapons were never used in anger.[1] While Snow’s convictions seem silly today, he is by no means an aberration in his failure to foresee the future. After the Boston Tea Party, British Prime Minister Lord North assured the House of Commons that London could bring Boston back into compliance with four or five frigates and that military force was unnecessary.[2] French General Ferdinand Foch reportedly declared in 1904 that “airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value.”[3] Dick Cheney believed Iraqis would welcome Americans as liberators in Operation Iraqi Freedom. He also stated, “The Gulf War in the 1990s lasted five days on the ground. I can’t tell you if the use of force in Iraq today would last five days, or five weeks or five months. But it certainly isn’t going to last any longer than that.”[4] While all of these seem foolish in hindsight, they came from knowledgeable and intelligent people and were entirely reasonable in their context. And yet, they proved to be fundamentally wrong.

*“Frederick North, 2nd Earl of Guilford” painted by Nathaniel Dance-Holland (Wikimedia)*

Leaders and strategists would do well to remind themselves of past failures to predict the future, as they are just as fallible as their predecessors and equally susceptible to adopting visions of what is to come that later prove erroneous. Consequently, they should assume a more modest and skeptical approach to future projections and focus more on improving flexibility and critical thinking than correctly predicting what lies around the corner. Doing so offers the best chance to successfully navigate the unforeseen twists ahead.

Unfortunately, while it seems to be a natural tendency of humans to believe they can predict some things about the future, Americans’ faith in the idea of progress can unintentionally give leaders greater confidence in their predictions than those who came before them. The belief that humanity will only increase its collective knowledge and understanding about the world can give the impression that the mistakes of the past were simply due to the ignorance of the age, and that further advancements can enable leaders and strategists today to avoid the errors of their forebears. It is easy to believe that, given all that humanity has discovered and learned, the uncertainty of the future will be one more challenge of the human condition that we will be able to overcome. Interestingly, this is not a new phenomenon—Bernard Brodie noted over 60 years ago how faith in science as a source of progress can produce unwarranted confidence in predictions about the future of war.[5]

The rise of big data analytics is a specific and more recent manifestation of that broader trend. The explosion of information about what has happened can give the illusion that we can predict what will happen, especially since analytics are seemingly able to do so in other venues. However, despite the promise of predictive analytics, researchers are far from able to predict interstate conflict, and no system of early warning has proven to be a reliable tool for policy-making.[6] The most pernicious problem is the fundamental complexity regarding processes of peace and conflict.[7] As two researchers in Science write:

“It is futile to pin one’s hopes of future predictive performance on extrapolations from previous successes in much less complex areas, such as billiards, planetary movements, or traffic systems, or for that matter in simpler political settings such as electoral competition, where both the theoretical principles are well known and events of interest occur with high frequency.”[8]

While analysts can provide insights into local regions or states that may be ripe for violence, it remains impossible to know when the fighting will occur, what will set it in motion, or what course it will take after it begins. Interstate conflict is even more difficult given that it typically encompasses an unwieldy set of actors that act, by definition, in rule-breaking ways.[9] Of course, data analytics may overcome those obstacles one day—it would be contrary to the central ideas of this essay to boldly claim it could not. But in its current state, it should not warrant significant boosts to a leader’s confidence about predictions of the future.

 Buy on Amazon  The simple fact is that the future remains unknown and spurns prediction. Although this realization is obvious once stated, leaders and strategists often talk and act as if they can see beyond the horizon. National security discourse is replete with confident declarations about what the next war will be fought over and what it will look like in terms of character and intensity. Those predictions can also appear more inevitable the more effort is devoted to preparing for them. The current dialogue about the possibility of future conflict with China over Taiwan serves as a poignant example. Yet, history suggests the need for more skepticism in strategic thought. In his book *Why Nations Go to War,* John Stoessinger maintains that leaders often possess significant misperceptions about their adversaries and how wars will unfold prior to hostilities.[10] Bernard Brodie similarly argues that “in wars throughout history, future events have generally proved the pre-hostilities calculations of both sides, victor as well as loser, to have been seriously wrong. ‘Wars…are the graveyards of the predictions concerning them.’”[11] Leaders must remember that all outlooks on future wars are works of imagination, regardless of how informed they are by the present situation or historical data. As Lawrence Freedman notes, “They cannot be anything else because the future is not preordained.”[12]

While leaders and strategists need to be reminded of the hidden nature of the future, it does not mean that they should abandon any attempt to penetrate the fog.All is not hopeless though. While leaders and strategists need to be reminded of the hidden nature of the future, it does not mean that they should abandon any attempt to penetrate the fog. The future of America’s security requires them to make decisions today about where to invest time, treasure, and talent based on some vision of the future, regardless of how wrong it may be. However, the shrouded character of the future does suggest that leaders should approach it with the understanding that there is a decent chance they will get it wrong. Intellectual humility and a healthy skepticism toward their prophetic abilities should serve as the starting point when approaching decisions about the future. From there, two other broad recommendations follow.

 Buy on Amazon  First, there should be a greater emphasis on flexibility—flexibility in strategy, training, and acquisition. As Freedman highlights, the extensive destruction and costs of modern war have led to an overemphasis on the first blow of future wars in hopes of achieving a quick victory. Consequently, strategists have devoted less thought to what comes with the second and third blows, much less to what comes when the war reaches an impasse after years of fighting.[13] While strategists cannot predict what will come after the first blows, they can at least devote more thought to those possibilities and build in elasticity to help them adapt when needed. Robert Jervis wisely advised that instead of pursuing a dominant strategy, “the policy advocate should try to reach the more modest goal of developing policies that have high payoffs if the assumptions about the adversary that underlie them are correct, yet have tolerable costs if these premises are wrong.”[14] Flexibility and resiliency in strategy and planning can help posture forces for the surprises that will inevitably come. Of course, leaders should not neglect other factors in their pursuit of flexibility. They cannot, for example, wholly sacrifice the need to concentrate forces and effort for the sake of increased flexibility. However, the current balance calls for an increased emphasis on the latter.

By creating forces better prepared to operate in the unknown, the military can posture itself for a future full of uncertainty.The same goes for training. More attention should be devoted to preparing forces to operate in the unanticipated situations. The American military underwent significant training overhauls to make it more realistic in the aftermath of its failures in Vietnam.[15] The Army’s National Training Center, the Navy’s Top Gun, and the Air Force’s Red Flag were all products of a desire to prepare warfighters for the intensity and challenges of war. While those reforms have been crucial toward producing a more capable force, there needs to be an increased focus on adapting to unexpected situations and scenarios. The current approach of practicing against adversary tactics and capabilities that are informed by current intelligence is necessary, but red teams should also attempt to introduce unforeseen tactics and capabilities. Exercises should also avoid shying away from impacts from other domains. For example, they could simulate a network outage at an operations center, a disrupted logistic flow for maintenance, or the loss of a satellite communication capability. By creating forces better prepared to operate in the unknown, the military can posture itself for a future full of uncertainty.

Thankfully, leaders have already begun emphasizing flexibility in acquisitions, though much work remains to be done.[16] Investments in long-term breakthrough technologies are still necessary, but America also needs the ability to rapidly iterate in order to respond to developments in the field as they arise. The wars in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan have all shown that the United States rarely enters a war with capabilities tailor-made for the fighting it encounters. The defense acquisition system must be able to adapt to those requirements at a quicker pace than its adversaries.

Second, leaders and strategists need to think more seriously about their own thinking. Brodie perceptively noted, “It is characteristic of our convictions, in strategy as in all affairs of life, that we tend to regard them as natural and inevitable.”[17] However, once examined, it becomes clear that the ideas evolved in a traceable way based on experiences, personality, cognitive functions, and context. Leaders and strategists need to consider those influences as they can prove useful in exposing unfounded confidence.

*Bernard Brodie Lecturing (Walter Sanders/Life Magazine, 1946)*

Some of the influences on thinking come at the level of perception and cognition. Jervis’ seminal work on political psychology brought critical insights about thinking and rationality into the realm of national security. He highlights how an understanding of the influence of cognitive biases as well as the challenges that come from the use of historical analogies can enable leaders to work toward countering the negative impacts of those biases and improve their perceptions and decisions.[18] They can consult with people detached from the issue to ensure they are not becoming trapped by their experiences and position. They can consider how evidence may support multiple explanations and not simply their own, as well as seek out information that could disprove their beliefs.[19] Taking steps to counteract the ways that certain cognitive functions that can lead them astray will not guarantee success, but it can help leaders avoid common traps. If nothing else, thinking through those influences can introduce more humility by reminding leaders of their own fallibility.

Leaders can also use the common distortions that result from those cognitive processes, along with the tendencies of past leaders, as indicators for when more careful thought may be needed. If cognitive functions commonly lead to beliefs that the other side is highly centralized and carefully orchestrates its moves, then leaders should at least pause when they find themselves thinking along those lines.[20] If American leadership tends to underappreciate a nation’s resilience and willingness to fight, as well as its resourcefulness and ability to find allies, perhaps current strategists should make it a point to begin planning from the opposite perspective.[21] If previous generations regularly assumed success would result from some technological advancement, even though technologies are rarely monopolized and adversaries often find ways to limit their effectiveness, then leaders should guard against ideas that suggest complex international conflicts can be solved by a silver bullet. [22] By making the effort to think more seriously about their own thinking, leaders and strategists can work to avoid common missteps and better prepare themselves to capitalize on the surprises that await them.

As much as leaders believe they can discern what is to come, the fact is the future remains unknown. Consequently, they should adopt a posture of humility regarding the future, and devote more time to their own thinking and to the pursuit of flexibility than to guessing correctly about what may come. Doing so will help minimize the impact of surprises and best posture them to pursue American interests whatever the future brings.

Cameron Ross is an officer in the United States Space Force and is currently a student at the School for Advanced Air and Space Studies at Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Space Force, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Soldiers Beach, Norah Head NSW, Australia, 2021 (Nicole Avagliano)

Notes: [1] C.P. Snow. "Risk of Disaster or a Certainty." New York Times (1923-), Aug 17, 1981.

[2] John Phillip Reid, Constitutional History of the American Revolution (Madison, WI: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1993), 10.

[3] John Andreas Olsen, Airpower Reborn: The Strategic Concepts of John Warden and John Boyd (Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 2014), 94.

[4] Reuters Staff, “Factbox: Iraq War, The Notable Quotes,” Reuters, Mar 11, 2008. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iraq-war-quotes-idUSL212762520080311

[5] Brodie, Strategy in the Missile Age, 406.

[6] Lars-Erik Cederman and Nils B. Weidmann. 2017. “Predicting Armed Conflict: Time to Adjust Our Expectations?” Science 355 (6324): 474–75. doi:10.1126/science.aal4483.

[7] Cederman and Weidmann, 475.

[8] Cederman and Weidmann, 475.

[9] Cederman and Weidmann, 475.

[10] John George Stoessinger, Why Nations Go to War, 11th ed (Boston, MA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2010), 315–24.

[11] Bernard Brodie, Strategy in the Missile Age, New RAND ed (Santa Monica, CA: Rand Corp, 2007), 406.

[12] Lawrence Freedman, The Future of War (New York, N.Y: Hachette Books Group, 2018), 287.

[13] Freedman, 277–78.

[14] Robert Jervis, Perception and Misperception in International Politics, New edition. (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Pres, 2017), 111.

[15] James Kitfield, Prodigal Soldiers (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1995), 155–73.

[16] David Vergun, “New DoD Directive Will Improve Acquisition Reform, Officials Say,” DoD News, Dec 4, 2020. https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/2434691/new-dod-directive-will-improve-acquisition-reform-officials-say/

[17] Brodie, Strategy in the Missile Age, 19.

[18] Jervis, Perception and Misperception in International Politics, xc.

[19] Jervis, 423–24.

[20] Jervis, 423–24.

[21] Freedman, 286.

[22] Freedman, The Future of War, 279.

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States have frequently embarked on military campaigns that failed to achieve their objectives as quickly—and cheaply—as expected. For every Spanish-American or Austro-Prussian War that seems in retrospect to be a short, sharp success for the victors, there is a Crimean, Boer, or Afghan War that those of us with the benefit of hindsight know grinds on longer and presents a butcher's bill greater than planners and politicians anticipated. In fact, history suggests that quick, decisive victories are the exception rather than the norm. Yet, states continue to plan and initiate wars with the expectation that they can achieve decisive victories unreasonably swiftly. All too often, disaster results. This pattern indicates a failure mode of strategic decision making. Understanding the mechanism by which this failure mode operates may help states avoid future catastrophe—whether by choosing alternate means to pursue their national goals, or by investing in appropriate preparations for the protracted war they are likely to fight, not just the short, sharp war they want to fight.

War is naturally characterized by uncertainty, and humans are known to exhibit an in-built optimism bias that frequently causes them to overestimate the likelihood of positive outcomes. This bias may have evolutionarily adaptive advantages in many situations.[1] Yet in the dialectic between military planners generating coercive options within available means and national cabinets seeking solutions to intractable diplomatic or geostrategic problems within acceptable costs, optimism bias can lead to tragic and avoidable outcomes. Indeed, the historical record shows that optimism bias contributes to misunderstandings between military planners and the politicians who employ them in ways that increase the likelihood of war being selected as the best option to achieve national imperatives—even in the face of clear evidence to the contrary.

The failure mode functions as follows. In order to avoid protracted conflict, military plans are developed with the objective of achieving a quick and decisive victory at minimum cost. These plans typically assume that the forces assigned can achieve tactical success with available resources and that the opponent will accept the results of the tactical action as decisive. Often these assumptions are undergirded by reference to prior victories as historical analogies. During a subsequent diplomatic crisis, national leaders initiate wars based on these plans, discounting the risk of escalation or protracted conflict and rationalizing the choice through selective misreadings of history or overly optimistic application of historical analogies. This article will explore this failure mode through three historical case studies involving large scale conflict with major powers, and which therefore have resonance in today’s global strategic environment: Imperial Germany’s initiation of World War I, Japan’s decision to attack the United States in World War II, and the United States’ invasion of Iraq in 2003. It will conclude by considering implications for modern major power rivalries, particularly that between the United States and the People’s Republic of China.

1914: The Schlieffen Plan and the Shadow of 1870 “Battle Scene from the Franco-Prussian War” by Wilfrid Constant Beauquesne (Wikimedia)

Imperial Germany’s path into World War I illustrates how optimism bias and appeals to history can lead to optimistic assumptions that skew military planning and warp national decision-making. Germany at the beginning of the 20th century was a rising power surrounded by and competing for space with established empires. Its most recent experience with large-scale warfare had been a stunning victory against France in 1870-1871. This victory became intertwined with Germany’s mythos of national origin and left a strong impression on those who would take the country into war once again in 1914.

War was not seen at that time as something to be avoided per se, but thoughtful military figures such as Helmuth von Moltke the Younger correctly predicted that the next European war would be a long, bloody struggle to national exhaustion due to the network of alliances, the institution of conscription, and technological improvements in artillery.[2] Others believed such a war could not possibly run long because the titanic resource costs would be financially ruinous.[3] These opposed perspectives notwithstanding, German military planners recognized they were at a strategic disadvantage, facing numerically superior opponents on multiple fronts. They rightly concluded that a long war would bode ill for Germany.

Thus the infamous Schlieffen Plan devised by Alfred von Schlieffen as chief of the German general staff strove to avoid extended conflict by aiming to quickly subdue France through a rapid maneuver campaign.[4] From the military perspective, this was an act of desperation—the best of bad options. It was at root an attempt to reenact the spectacular victory of 1870-71 despite very different extant conditions, buoyed by a poorly-founded assumption that even if it failed tactically, economic forces would limit the war’s scope as if by an invisible hand. From the political perspective however, the military implications of the new environment were less clear. The German chancellor, Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg, expected a war of three to four months, based on the precedent of 1870-71 and the timeline Schlieffen’s plan seemed to offer, which he assumed it could deliver. These mistaken assumptions were never interrogated and enabled optimism bias to influence decision making towards bellicosity as the diplomatic crisis that led to war played out.[5]

1941: Pearl Harbor and the Memory of 1905 Illustration of the Great Naval Battle at the Harbor Entrance to Port Arthur in the Russo-Japanese War (Nichiro Ryojunkô daikaisen no zu)

One might forgive German civilian leadership for failing to recognize and act on the likely result of changes in warfare since 1870-71 following such a long period of relative peace, and perhaps German military planners should have made their risk assumptions more explicit. However, Japan’s path to war with the United States illustrates how the same mechanism enabled by optimism bias can play out even in a society with military leadership integrated into the highest levels of government and significant recent experience of major war.

Japan was a rising imperial power that had fought a series of victorious wars in Asia—mostly against China and Russia—throughout the first half of the 20th century. But it was Japan’s spectacular naval victories over Russia in 1904 and 1905 that captured its national imagination. By 1941, Japan’s fear of American hegemonic designs, its inability—or unwillingness—to disentangle itself from its imperial adventure in China, and its national pride brought it to the brink of war with the United States. Neither side wanted war, but Japan couldn’t seem to find a way to avoid it. Once again, recognition that a protracted conflict would be ruinous for Japan failed to spark a renewed emphasis on diplomacy, instead driving Japan’s cabinet to accept a high-risk offensive plan in the vain hope of high-payoff success.

Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto planned the attack on Pearl Harbor as an attempt to force the United States to accept Japanese hegemony in the western Pacific as a fait accompli. He also predicted that it wouldn’t work, anticipating that even if the attack were successful, the U.S. would refuse to accept a tactical defeat as decisive and continue fighting.[6] He knew the U.S. was a very different opponent than Russia, and personally opposed the war because he considered Japan’s chances for victory slim. However, he considered it his duty to keep his reservations to himself and focus his efforts on maximizing those chances. His plan for the Pearl Harbor attack and subsequent operations was explicitly designed to recreate—against all odds—the successes of Japan’s naval victories over Russia in 1904-1905.[7]

Within the cabinet, bureaucratic politics, inter-service rivalry and unique characteristics of Japanese culture and language clouded the cabinet debate throughout 1941 and increasingly made war seem unavoidable.[8] The integration of senior military officers into the highest levels of government did not prevent optimism bias from influencing the decision-making process. Japanese leaders had been closely watching German successes in France in 1940 and against the USSR in 1941. Despite clear evidence that war with the U.S. would be ruinous for Japan, lurking always in the backs of their minds was their own unlikely success against Russia in 1905. They had done it once; perhaps they could do it again?[9] Yamamoto’s bold plan made it easier to take what seemed their only chance of success, or as wartime prime minister General Hideki Tojo put it, “to close one’s eyes, and jump.”[10]

2003: Shock and Awe after the End of HistoryBoth Germany in 1914 and Japan in 1941 felt forced into war by circumstances, grasping at overly optimistic war plans to stave off what they considered the unacceptable consequences of other options. In both cases their attempts to recreate historical successes failed. Germany’s 1914 offensive stalled before it could achieve a meaningful tactical result. Japan’s initial attacks in 1941 were more successful, but the U.S refused to accept the fait accompli. When the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003 for the second time in twenty years, it didn’t do so out of desperation. Yet the same optimism bias was at work. This time, instead of offering a false hope of escape from disaster, it resulted in an overconfident assumption that the U.S. could control outcomes through military force. Instead of attempting to recreate past victories, American decision makers convinced themselves that history was no longer relevant, thanks to a transformative approach to warfare developed by a cadre of pentagon military theorists—what was called at the time the Revolution in Military Affairs or RMA.

Saddam Hussein had been a thorn in America’s side since the first Gulf War. In the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, a mix of neoconservative ideology, reputational anxiety and a sense of unfinished business combined to create a strong consensus within the George W. Bush administration that Hussein had to go.[11] Donald Rumsfeld, Bush’s Secretary of Defense, was enamoured with the RMA, which relied on lighter, leaner forces employing precision weapons to achieve decisive effects through speed and maneuver. Rumsfeld saw the unconventional and unexpectedly quick victory over the Taliban in Afghanistan in 2001 as evidence that this approach represented a whole new paradigm for American military power.[12] Rumsfeld’s new paradigm promised a quick victory, and optimistic neoconservative theories about the flourishing of democracy suggested a newly liberated Iraqi society would take care of itself. Concerns about what would come after Hussein’s regime was toppled were waved away. Administration officials ignored historical lessons about the critical importance of post-war stability and reconstruction.[13]

*M1A1 Abrams pose for a photo under the "Hands of Victory" in Ceremony Square, Baghdad, Iraq (TSgt John L. Houghton, Jr./U.S. Air Force Photo/Wikimedia)*

In the event, while the RMA’s cocktail of tactics and technologies proved effective at quickly destroying the Iraqi Army, the neoconservative theories failed to deliver the expected results. While the major combat phase of the war was short and sharp, leading to the removal of Saddam Hussein from power and the liquidation of the organs of the Iraqi state, this tactical result was effectively rejected by the Iraqi people. The Bush administration soon found itself mired in Iraqi sectarian conflict. Even the apparently easy victory in Afghanistan was short-lived, resulting in twenty years of counter-insurgency and nation-building that ended in humiliating failure in the summer of 2021, when a resurgent Taliban regained control of Afghanistan mere weeks after the U.S. finally withdrew its remaining combat forces.

In Conclusion: Takeaways for the U.S. and ChinaWars are launched for many reasons. States are subject to innumerable structural forces and many have wars thrust upon them by the aggression of others. This article is not arguing that the pattern of optimism bias and abuse of history is the sole cause of conflict. Yet this failure mode has clearly contributed to disastrous decision-making by states in the past. This suggests that states considering war as a mechanism to achieve national goals should assume that their opponents will fight to the end of their strength and weigh the risks accordingly.

In 2014, international headlines were briefly splashed with reports that the People’s Republic of China (PRC) may have been planning a “short, sharp war” against Japan over the Ryukyu islands, an East China Sea flashpoint between the two countries.[14] It could have simply been a feint to test the resolve of the United States, which has a mutual-defense treaty with Japan and would be obliged under its terms to come to Japan’s aid.[15] However, the U.S. and the PRC have plenty of potential flashpoints of their own—perhaps the most concerning being Taiwan. While the U.S. has no treaty obligation to defend Taiwan from attack, U.S. domestic law requires the Department of Defense to maintain the capability to do so, thus the possibility of a U.S. military response is a factor the PRC must consider.

Should the PRC attempt to achieve reunification with Taiwan through a cross-strait invasion, one tempting strategy would be to plan to complete the conquest suddenly and decisively before the U.S. could react, thereby presenting the world with a fait accompli. U.S. military planners working on the other side of this equation may feel compelled to develop plans to prevent such a fait accompli by achieving a decisive victory on an even shorter timetable.[16]

The history of planning for quick victories therefore contains warnings for both sides, and indeed for any state considering military options for quick solutions to intractable problems. Military planners under pressure to achieve objectives quickly may develop unrealistic plans. Political decision-makers may not fully grasp the risks masked by assumptions inherent in those plans. A sense of inevitability, desperation, or constrained choices can drive planners and politicians towards what may seem the best of bad options. Conversely, overestimation of the impact of new tactics and technologies may result in overconfidence. Both planners and politicians may be susceptible to optimism bias, but they should remember that war is inherently unpredictable and the enemy gets a vote.

In a world of renewed great power competition and open interstate conflict, states should resist the optimism bias that incentivizes them to plan for short, sharp wars, discounting the true costs and risks of conflict. They should resist the temptation to apply simplistic historical analogies or discount history completely when considering military options. Planning for a short, sharp war without preparing for the possibility of a protracted, attritional one usually indicates either desperation or overconfidence. In either case, it is a loser’s gambit.

Ryan T. Easterday is an officer in the U.S. Navy and is currently a visiting research fellow with the Changing Character of War Centre at the University of Oxford. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Navy, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Destroyed Building, Mosul, Iraq, 2020 (Levi Meir Clancy).

Notes: [1] Tali Sharot, “The Optimism Bias,” Current Biology 21, no. 23 (December 6, 2011): R941–45, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2011.10.030.

[2] Hew Strachan, The First World War: Volume I: To Arms (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), 1005-1008.

[3] Stuart Hallifax, “‘Over by Christmas’: British Popular Opinion and the Short War in 1914,” First World War Studies 1, no. 2 (October 1, 2010), 109, https://doi.org/10.1080/19475020.2010.517429.

[4] Strachan, 1008-1009.

[5] Ibid., 1013.

[6] Eri Hotta, Japan 1941: Countdown to Infamy (New York: Vintage Books, 2014), 191-192.

[7] Tsunoda Jun and Kazutomi Uchida. “The Pearl Harbor Attack: Admiral Yamamoto’s Fundamental Concept with reference to Paul S. Dull’s A Battle History of the Imperial Japanese Navy (1941-1945), by Paul S. Dull.” Naval War College Review 31, no. 1 (1978), 85.

[8] Hotta, 14-16.

[9] Ibid.,167.

[10] Ibid., 10.

[11] Ahsan I. Butt, “Why Did the United States Invade Iraq in 2003?,” Security Studies 28, no. 2 (March 15, 2019), 250-285, https://doi.org/10.1080/09636412.2019.1551567. Martin A. Smith, “US Bureaucratic Politics and the Decision to Invade Iraq,” Contemporary Politics 14, no. 1 (March 1, 2008), 99–101, https://doi.org/10.1080/13569770801913314.

[12] Fred M. Kaplan, Daydream Believers: How a Few Grand Ideas Wrecked American Power (Hoboken, N.J.: John Wiley & Sons, 2008), 39.

[13] Ibid., 41-50.

[14] Julian Ryall, “China ‘Plans War for Japanese Isles,’” The Daily Telegraph, February 22, 2014.https://www.gale.com/intl/c/the-telegraph-historical-archive (accessed Dec 18, 2022).

[15] Congressional Research Service, “The Senkakus (Diaoyu/Diaoyutai) Dispute: U.S. Treaty Obligations,” March 1, 2021, https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R42761/23.

[16] Hal Brands, “Getting Ready for a Long War with China” (Washington, D.C.: American Enterprise Institute, July 25, 2022), 4-5. https://www.aei.org/research-products/report/getting-ready-for-a-long-war-with-china-dynamics-of-protracted-conflict-in-the-western-pacific/.

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“Throughout our history, we’ve learned this lesson: When dictators do not pay a price for their aggression, they cause more chaos; they keep moving; and the costs, the threats to [America and the world keep] rising.”—President Joseph Biden, 2022 State of the Union Address[1]

*President Biden at the 2022 State of the Union address (Reuters)*

Why did Vladimir Putin risk a full-blown war in Ukraine? Why did he believe he could get away with invasion and aggression? We do not need to see into the Kremlin to appreciate the West’s role in encouraging Putin’s confidence by its response to the attack on Armenian separatists in Azerbaijan by the Azerbaijani Army in September 2020, the first outbreak of war in Europe since the 1999 Kosovo war. The West’s failure to respond to this war in ways established during and post-Cold War was a new precedent for resolving territorial disputes in Europe.

The surprise attack that launched the 44-day Nagorno-Karabakh War in 2020 was, in the words of U.S. Senators Bob Menendez and Marco Rubio, “an attack by Azerbaijani forces [that] ignited a conflict that killed more than 6,500 people and displaced almost 100,000 ethnic Armenians.”[2] The territories populated by ethnic Armenians at issue in the 2020 war were within a separatist region of Azerbaijan proper, a region Azerbaijan lost control over to local Armenians in the early 1990s in a brutal ethnic war as the Soviet Union collapsed.[3]

The U.S. and most of its allies remained neutral in this unprovoked war waged by oil-rich Azerbaijan to settle a complex post-Soviet territorial and ethnic dispute that had been frozen for nearly 30 years. This neutrality was a clear change in policy since the U.S., Russia, and France had already invested nearly 30 years in mediating the conflict under the Organization for Security Cooperation in Europe’s (OSCE) Minsk Group.[4] None of the countries involved in mediation had a clear policy opinion as one of the sides in the conflict (Azerbaijan) broke the mediation format and decided to settle the conflict through war. This clear signal of neutrality as a European country decided to use war to settle a territory dispute was impossible to miss. With such a clear change in policy in post-war Europe, Russia could be forgiven for taking this as a signal that democracies and traditional institutions like the United Nations, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the European Union, and the OSCE would not interfere in Russia’s near-abroad even to restore international norms.

In spite of the West’s much stronger reaction to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Azerbaijan has continued to test those limits. Its willingness to do so is a sign that Western policy is still undecided about what international norm it is trying to establish with the Ukraine response. This leaves open questions. What is the new international norm? Is there a level or conditions under which war will be permitted by the international community to settle disputes?

*Soldiers walk in a trench at a border checkpoint between Armenia and Azerbaijan near the village of Sotk, Armenia, where clashes between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces took place in September 2022. (Karen Minaysan/AFP)*

The most severe test of the West’s reaction since the 2020 war began on September 12, 2022, when Azerbaijan launched an unprovoked invasion of neighboring sovereign Republic of Armenia, killing hundreds, displacing over 7,000 people, and occupying positions inside Armenia’s borders in a few days of action.[5] Unlike the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War, which many observers saw as an internal matter in Azerbaijan, this test involved an international border. That Azerbaijan saw this as a worthwhile escalation in spite of the Ukraine response makes clear that the norm, whatever it is, is not clear.

Azerbaijan’s invasion of Armenia is a case study of dictatorships targeting democratic neighbors when those dictatorships see democratic neighbors as direct threats to their regional influence. The differences between the two countries in terms of democratization and economics are critical to understanding how an autocracy could perceive democratization as a threat to its position.

Azerbaijan ranks 190th out of 210 nations on Freedom House’s Global Freedom Index, classified as a “consolidated authoritarian regime.” In sharp contrast, Armenia has repeatedly held competitive elections and expanded civil liberties and the rule of law, classified by Freedom House as a “transitional regime.”[6] Azerbaijan is also larger and wealthier than its democratizing neighbor, Armenia.

Compounding its general democratization trend, Armenia went through a revolution in spring 2018 that replaced a weakening post-Soviet oligarchic government with a popular government.[7] This change, the culmination of a growing democratic movement, received support and significant attention from the west.[8] From Azerbaijan’s point of view it would not be a stretch to think that a more popular Armenia might lead to a change in the stalemate of the Minsk Group process over the status in Nagorno-Karabakh. In other words, Azerbaijan, a totalitarian autocracy, could fear that the West may be more sympathetic to the Armenian position as Armenia drifted closer to Western norms, making the choice of war to change the status quo on the ground in the frozen conflict more attractive.

Unlike the response to Azerbaijani aggression, the response of the U.S. and European partners to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine fundamentally changed the expected outcome of that war. What was originally predicted to be a quick victory for Russia, has turned into a drawn-out bloodbath. The damage to the Russian army, economy, and influence is orders of magnitude higher than what Putin must have expected the cost to be. All of these effects were achieved not only by direct U.S. and E.U. military aid, but also by the application of Western power against the diplomatic and economic resources Russia would need to fight the war. None of these effects were attempted in the case of Azerbaijan, leaving the international community with two completely different responses to two scenarios of war being used to resolve ethnic-territorial disputes between early democracies and autocratic neighbors.

Azerbaijan has not yet paid a price for its illegal attacks. While the U.S. has significantly shifted away from its traditionally neutral position in the Caucasus region—marked by the introduction of Congressional Resolutions, a change in rhetoric condemning Azerbaijan’s aggression, and U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Armenia in the aftermath of the September 2022 invasion—the overall response has still hedged toward a diplomatic solution without parallel soft-power policy changes to raise the stakes of aggression.[9]

Yet the history of the 30-year-old conflict, including the unprovoked attacks in 2020 and 2022, demonstrates that Azerbaijan does not prefer normalization, but pursues an opportunistic policy of maximalist gains through force when it believes the West will not respond. Absent a consequential response to Azerbaijan’s aggressions, it is incentivized to make such gambles even as it feigns diplomatic willingness in international forums.[10]

Thus, the U.S. and international institutions have struggled with how to respond to Azerbaijan’s overt flaunting of norms around the use of force to settle territorial disputes. U.S. policymakers have condemned Azerbaijan’s aggression without any meaningful policy changes following the condemnations. In part, this is likely driven by the fact that Azerbaijan has an abundance of oil and gas, making it an attractive energy partner alternative to Russia.[11] In addition, Azerbaijan has an aggressive ally in Turkey, a NATO member, and is a willing partner to Western powers in countering Iran.[12] However, absent effective U.S.-led sanctions, Azerbaijan has been emboldened to continue its pattern of violence against Armenia and the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh. It is a pattern that endangers the very system the U.S. claims to be preserving with its aid to Ukraine.

Like the powder keg that led to the outbreak of World War I, military adventurism by autocracies endanger more than just the people caught in the crosshairs of dictators. Such aggression endangers all of us. Beyond the issue of an autocracy attacking a democracy, there is a humanitarian aspect to this conflict that the Western response has not addressed. Azerbaijan is overt in its racism towards Armenians, publicly celebrated brutality, documented war crimes, and clear genocidal intent against all Armenians, those in the Republic of Armenia as well as the minority Armenian population besieged in the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region.[13] The Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention updated an existing “Red Flag Alert” warning on September 16th, 2022, stating:

“Given the extreme racialized othering of Armenians by the Azerbaijani government, military, press, and educational system, any Azerbaijani incursions into territories that include ethnic Armenians can be expected to be characterized by genocidal atrocities.”[14]

Setting and enforcing an international norm that makes such things extremely costly for those considering them is essential to mitigating risk of a wider conflagration. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine proved what can happen when such norms break down. The Western response to that invasion showed what the international community is able to do to enforce those norms. Reversing it in one place while allowing the norm to be violated in another sets a dangerous precedent that will lead to more adventurism and testing of what a regime can get away with when it chooses war to advance its policies.

Timur R. Nersesov is an officer in the U.S. Army Reserve and Iraq War veteran, with 17 years in uniform and over 12 years as a consultant to U.S. national security agencies (US Departments of Defense, State, and Homeland Security). He is also a member of the Truman National Security Project. He holds a MS degree in Analytics, and his current work centers on cloud technologies and Artificial Intelligence applications in defense and civil government. The views expressed in this article are the author’s and do not represent the views of the U.S. Army, Department of Defense, the U.S. Government or any company.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: An ethnic Armenian soldier stands guard next to Nagorno-Karabakh's flag atop a hill in the separatist region in Azerbaijan in November 2020. (Sergei Grits/AP)

Notes: [1] “Remarks of President Joe Biden – State of the Union Address As Prepared for Delivery”, The White House, Washington, DC https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2022/03/01/remarks-of-president-joe-biden-state-of-the-union-address-as-delivered/

[2]“Senate Resolution 797”, Congress.gov, 2022, Washington, DC, https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-resolution/797/text

[3] “The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict: A Visual Explainer”, International Crisis Group, 19 Dec 2022, https://www.crisisgroup.org/content/nagorno-karabakh-conflict-visual-explainer

[4] OSCE Minsk Group, https://www.osce.org/mg

[5] Laurence Broers, “Is Azerbaijan planning a long-term presence in Armenia?”, Chatham House, 26 Sept 2022, https://www.chathamhouse.org/2022/09/azerbaijan-planning-long-term-presence-armenia

[6]“Countries and Territories”, Freedom House, accessed 08 Jan 2023, https://freedomhouse.org/countries/freedom-world/scores

[7] Rayhan Demytrie, “Why Armenia 'Velvet Revolution' won without a bullet fired”, BBC News, 1 May 2018, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-43948181

[8] Kendrick Foster, “Armenia's Velvet Revolution: Lessons from the Caucasus”, Harvard International Review, 29 May 2019, https://hir.harvard.edu/armenias-velvet-revolution/

[9] Alexander Ward, “Pelosi going to Armenia amid renewed clashes with Azerbaijan”, Politico, 15 Sept 2022

[10] Thomas De Waal, “More Storm Clouds Gather Over Armenia, Azerbaijan”, Carnegie Europe, 22 Sept 2022, https://carnegieeurope.eu/strategiceurope/87976

[11]“EU signs deal with Azerbaijan to double gas imports by 2027”, Reuters, 18 Jul 2022, https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/eu-signs-deal-with-azerbaijan-double-gas-imports-by-2027-2022-07-18/

[12]Arie Egozi, “Israel may be looking to strengthen ties to Azerbaijan as an Iran counter”, Breaking Defense, 31 Aug 2022, https://breakingdefense.com/2022/08/israel-may-be-looking-to-strengthen-ties-to-azerbaijan-as-an-iran-counter/

[13] Joshua Kucera, et al., “Evidence emerges of Azerbaijani executions of Armenian captives”, Eurasianet.org, 03 Oct 2022, https://eurasianet.org/evidence-emerges-of-azerbaijani-executions-of-armenian-captives; Simon Maghakyan, “Cultural Desecration is Racial Discrimination”, Foreign Policy Magazine, 13 Jan 2022, https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/01/13/armenia-azerbaijan-nagorno-karabakh-cultural-desecration-is-racial-discrimination/; Ram Eachambadi, “ICJ examines allegations of racial hatred and abuse of Armenian POWs against Azerbaijan”, Jurist, 8 Dec 2021, https://www.jurist.org/news/2021/12/icj-examines-allegations-of-racial-hatred-and-abuse-of-armenian-pows-against-azerbaijan/.

[14] “Red Flag Alert for Genocide - Azerbaijan” Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention, 16 Sept 2022, https://www.lemkininstitute.com/red-flag-alerts-1/red-flag-alert-for-genocide---azerbaijan

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In the summer of 2019, I arrived at Fort Lee to start my Basic Officer Leadership Course for Quartermaster officers. At Fort Lee, I began to see the U.S. Army transition from the counterinsurgency wars to focus on the near-peer threat. Logistics officers were to move on from Forward Operating Base (FOB) procedures to learn how to conduct supply trains moving through the different fronts of a battlefield. The only problem with this was that we, a group of brand new officers, were told that we would no longer fight a counterinsurgency. This rush to move on seemed to ignore the basic understanding of learning from the past that the Army preaches.

In the headlong rush to move past Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army's preparation for near-peer conflict means failing to institutionalize the strategic lessons learned. For example, the latest update to Field Manual (FM) 3-0 mentions Ukraine 18 times while mentioning Iraq only eight times and not discussing Afghanistan at all. In the eight times Iraq is discussed in FM 3-0, none examine counterinsurgency or nation building operations. Most of the conversation in these sections is about the 2003 invasion or the support of Iraqi forces in their fight against the Islamic State (IS) in northern Iraq. By ignoring the last 20 years of fighting, the Army is failing to prepare appropriately for the more ambiguous battlefields of today. As seen by the Russian invasion of Ukraine (i.e., the failure of Russia to achieve its objectives and the way Ukraine is arming its population) unlimited and limited war definitions should be fluid. The Army has failed to fully develop a strategic understanding of counterinsurgency wars in its rush to fight the conventional war, instead focusing on tactical improvements.

 Buy on Amazon  The American military is exceptionally competent at learning tactical lessons, developing new ways to fight on the ground while producing better equipment. However, the American military consistently fails to maintain lessons learned past the tactical level of command. The current rush of the military to move past its failures of the last 20 years is reminiscent of the rush to do so post-Vietnam. American military strategic culture has consistently lacked the connection with the formulation of policy. This culture, discussed in depth in works such as Russell Weigley’s *The American Way of War* and Donald Stoker’s *Why America Loses Wars*, maintains its stranglehold on American strategists today.[1]

To understand this strategic amnesia and rushing to the next war, this paper will briefly examine the war with the largest impression on the military, World War II. It will continue from there to the Afghanistan withdrawal. This article suggests a continuity in how quickly the Army moves towards the next fight. This paper then explores the reasons behind the loss of institutional knowledge, building off the historical analysis to show how the Army fails to adapt and reassess.

Historical BackgroundWorld War II

World War II began when the imperial Japanese Army invaded Manchuria in 1931, and Nazi Germany invaded Poland in 1939.[2] America remained a non-combatant until the 7 Dec 1941 Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor. The American military mobilized more force than ever before, fighting from the deserts of North Africa to the island of Okinawa. The trials and tribulations of World War II are remembered fondly; every Army cadet reads Band of Brothers at least once before commissioning. However, the victory disease from the war continues to infect today.[3]

The history of World War II continues to dominate the learning institutions of the Army because it was so clearly won, in myth.[4] Large tank battles, control of the air, domination of the sea, movie-worthy airborne drops, and daring amphibious assaults are the highlighted stories of the war. While the war does deserve a place in the U.S. Army’s institutional memory, it is also important to remember what has changed. What followed the victories of WWII should have diminished the impact it had on the U.S. Army, yet it has remained on a pedestal. The stalemate and failure of the next two major wars are direct consequences of the victory disease brought on by WWII.

The Korean War

As World War II ended and relations between the communist Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) and the United States soured, the Cold War began. Soon China fell into the grip of communism. As the world spiraled closer to the possibility of all-out nuclear war, North Korea crossed the 38th parallel into South Korea, setting off the Korean War.[5] North Korea's initial push was explosive and might have culminated in the desired quick decisive victory if not for the quick deployment of U.S. and United Nations troops. In the seesaw events of the Korean War, the U.S. and North Korean/Chinese troops launched massive offensives. These culminated when U.S. troops regrouped and methodically pushed back the combined Chinese/North Korean forces and halted at the 38th parallel.

This was America’s first true lesson on limited war in the post-war period. American forces had to deal with hostile locals as they moved past the 38th parallel. The U.S. oversimplified the Chinese attack as hordes of Chinese soldiers, yet the attacks against U.S. lines were organized and pointed at breaking the defense at multiple spots. The U.S. also failed to understand how important cultural understanding was, it did not know that the occupation of U.S. troops had a negative impact on the newly formed South Korean government.[6] In continuing to rush to the next war, the Army never institutionalized the lessons learned.

The American War in Vietnam

The decolonization struggle between the Vietnamese and the French colonial government took on a Cold War framing. Once the French failed in Vietnam, the U.S. supported South Vietnam. The U.S. slowly escalated involvement until the Gulf of Tonkin incident in 1964, which led to the United States committing full combat troops to South Vietnam. The U.S. military failed to ever realize its nation building and counterinsurgent mission in South Vietnam. The military overused its firepower, failed to pacify the countryside, and failed to understand the culture. Under General William Westmoreland and General Creighton Abrams, the military emphasized the statistical measurement of body counts and other arbitrary statistics.[7] It was a war that held an elusive enemy that fought in unconventional ways, sometimes as conventional units from the North and sometimes as communist insurgents from the South. After many years of failing to pacify South Vietnam, the U.S. pulled out its combat forces in 1973, and in 1975 the Saigon Government fell.

The American war in Vietnam has had resounding implications on the wars that followed; however, the U.S. Army failed to learn lessons from Vietnam. As seen above, the U.S. Army failed to fully institutionalize lessons learned because it is always in a rush to move on. The Army did not believe it could learn much from a war it lost and predicted that it still needed to only face the Russian Army in large-scale combat. The Army failed to come to terms with its shortcomings, instead pretending that Vietnam was a one-off. The idea of the Vietnam Syndrome shows that the Army thought of the war only as its loss and not as a way to develop better counterinsurgency doctrine.

The End of the Cold War, Desert Storm, and GWOT

In the aftermath of Vietnam, the Army was disgraced by its loss in Vietnam, failed further during the botched Desert One rescue attempt, and fell into a malaise. However, under President Ronald Reagan, the military worked towards ending the malaise of failure. As it participated in small operations, such as Operation Just Cause, it began to feel its might again. Two major events occurred that imparted the Army with victory disease so rancid that it contributed to the failure of the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.

The first major event was the success of the U.S. mission during Operation Desert Storm from August 1990 to February 1991. In repelling, routing, and utterly demoralizing the Iraqi Army, the U.S. Army felt it had finally kicked the Vietnam War syndrome. Unfortunately, America was drunk on its military victory and forgot the loss of Vietnam. The second event was the dissolution of the USSR and the end of the Cold War in 1991. America, so it seemed, was now the invincible superpower. Intoxicated by these two victories, the 21st century crashed into America.

This jubilation did not last long; on 11 Sept 2001, terrorists attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Beginning in October of 2001, the Global War on Terror commenced with the invasion of Afghanistan.[8] The war in Afghanistan was eerily similar to that of Vietnam. Yet, the U.S. had not learned its lessons fully and was unprepared for the pacifying mission in Afghanistan following the fall of the Taliban. The United States also failed to follow the warning of Clausewitz against opening a second front, and started a second war in Iraq in 2003. The ensuing occupation of Iraq led to the creation of ISIS and other terrorist organizations, and in Afghanistan, the government made no headway into the rural areas. In the fallout of the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, it looks like the Army is preparing to continue the mistake of failing to learn.

*U.S. Air Force C-17 over Afghanistan (Marcus Yam/Shutterstock)*

Losing Institutional Knowledge and Forcing a PathIn providing a quick breakdown of over a century of warfare, this paper has highlighted one of the biggest shortcomings of the U.S. Army. It fails, time and again, to fully develop and digest the lessons from previous conflicts beyond the tactical level of war. In Vietnam, the Army failed to fully adapt to the war it was waging and continually tried to look for the war it wanted to fight. American combat commanders failed to embrace pacification in large numbers. In Vietnam, many tactical-level leaders found it impossible to engage and directly fight the North Vietnamese Army or South Vietnamese insurgents. While giving nothing more than lip service to winning the hearts-and-minds, the Army failed to win the American war in Vietnam.

In losing the war in Vietnam, the Army failed to learn from it. The Army never fully maintained any knowledge from the war, instead choosing to forget the loss. Due to this desire to distance itself from the failure in Vietnam, the Army failed to provide the generation that invaded and then occupied Iraq and Afghanistan with proper strategic understanding. Choosing to forget lessons learned from war, the Army failed to interact with, adapt to, and reassess strategy. Adapting strategy is vastly important to winning a war, and in the case of the Army, it fails to reassess the failures of the past.[9]

 Buy on Amazon  The ability to adapt and learn are key parts of strategic planning. Without the willingness to create a profound set of lessons learned at the strategic level, the Army is doomed to repeat its failures. In Colin Gray’s *Fighting Talk*, he discusses in Maxim 37 that American strategists fail to develop a fuller sense of history.[10] Instead, they live in the present, and while history is not the end all be all of predicting the next fight, it can help one understand the fight better. In *On War*, Clausewitz uses historical analysis, from the Second Persian War to the final battle of Napoleon at Waterloo, to illustrate his theoretical ideas.[11] This is not an argument that every Army general needs to be a classically trained historian; however, this argues that every Army officer should have a grasp of history.[12]

The reason for discussing history is that the Army fails to remember its unpleasant history. Choosing instead to move on quickly, pretending that the defeat was outside of their control. The Army fails to actively collect its history at the strategic level, instead blaming outside issues. In Vietnam, the media and politicians were blamed; in Afghanistan, just choose one of the four presidents who were in office during the conflict. While shifting to project strength into INDOPACOM makes sense, ignoring Iraq and Afghanistan to do so puts the Army at a disadvantage.

Why did the Army actively ignore the lessons from Vietnam and fail to implement them in Afghanistan and Iraq? It can be pointed to the last conflicts discussed in the above section: the end of the Cold War and the success of Desert Storm. The victory disease of winning these two conflicts infected the Army. With the end of the Cold War, America saw itself as the only dominant force in the world. However, the Army rested on the presumption that the next conflict would be with a near-peer in the late 1990s, just to spend the next two decades fighting counterinsurgencies. In failing to fully develop the lessons from Vietnam, the Army failed to allow officers and planners to be better prepared. Having failed to properly create lessons learned, the Army led itself into another failure. It is again attempting to do this; in moving as quickly as it can in structure and memory from Afghanistan and Iraq, it is dooming younger officers and leaders to the same fate. Clausewitz says that each war does have something different about it, but that the theory of strategy and war has a general and universal element— and thus, studying the most current conflict without rushing to the next is important in developing strategy.[13]

 Buy on Amazon  This rush to fight the near-peer threat is symptomatic of the preferred American way to fight. Andrew Krepinevich’s *The Army and Vietnam* discusses the desire of the Army officers in Vietnam to fight large-scale battles, not the war in front of them. This obsession with fighting large-scale battles has continued in the American psyche today. The Army needs to give up on rushing to war and instead focus part of its institutional strength on remembering war, on facilitating a proper understanding of the strategic and policy history. The problem is that the Army fails to learn strategic lessons and only pays lip service to teaching strategy to its officers, instead choosing to focus on operational art. It fails to teach younger officers how to be strategic leaders.

ConclusionOn 30 Aug 2021, the last United States forces left the ground at the Kabul airport; the concurrent fall and total collapse of the Afghan government spelled the final blow to the American mission in Afghanistan. In scenes reminiscent of the fall of Saigon in 1975, America's military once again failed to achieve total pacification. A cycle of rushing to forget the implications of the defeat began—revisionist generals went on talk shows to proclaim that all they needed was more time, treasure, and blood. Instead of truly searching for the lessons in the loss of the U.S. mission in Afghanistan, the Army has shifted the blame and rushed to look for a war it could win.

This spells a disaster for the Army and seems to be the only path known to today's leaders. It has been almost 50 years since the fall of Saigon, and the Army as an institution repeated the same mistakes in Afghanistan. They are poised to fail to learn and hope not to have to fight that type of war anymore. When I heard that explained at my Basic Officer Leader Course, I was lost; how could they know?

In exploring the last century or so of American military history, it is easy to see the pitfalls that the Army has hit. It managed to fail to remember Vietnam comprehensively, as America occupied Afghanistan and Iraq. In each case, the wars are separated by victories on the part of the United States. In each case, the Army suffered from victory disease and pushed the losses to the outside.

Not only does the Army need to better institutionalize learning from more current conflicts and not rush to its next war, but it also needs to revamp its education system to better prepare officers for this education. The current system fails to introduce young officers to strategic thought and theory, instead ignoring any talent and relegating them from learning. Demanding memorization of FM 3-0 does not make for better planners. As Clausewitz indicates, doctrine is more of a guide than a rule, and strict adherence to doctrine does not make one a military genius.[14]

In the rush to shift towards INDOPACOM, the Army is failing to better itself. As can be seen in Russia's failure to achieve any strategic success in Ukraine, the definition of war is changing. Fighting is becoming more fluid and complex, even without the cyber realm. The Army would do better if it focused on learning while reconfiguring its force stance. Developing a better critical lesson from the past conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan while watching Russia's invasion of Ukraine might give the U.S. Army the edge it needs in the next fight.

This is bold and counters the prevailing winds in the Army, but as Clausewitz describes boldness in his military genius: “In other words, a distinguished commander without boldness is unthinkable. No man who is not bold can play such a role, and therefore we consider this quality the first prerequisite of the great military leaders.”[15] In changing the learning structure of the Army, one would be bold.

Kyle Rable is an officer in the U.S. Army and is currently a Ph.D. Student at Texas Tech University studying military history. He received his BA from the University of Toledo and his MA from Bowling Green State University. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of Texas Tech University, the U.S. Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: U.S. Marines conduct vehicle recovery drills, Camp Pendleton, California, 2021 (Joel Rivera-Camacho)

Notes: [1] Russell Weigley, The American Way of Way: A History of United States Military Strategy and Policy (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1973.) and Donald Stoked, Why America Loses Wars: Limited War and U.S. Strategy from the Korean War to the Present(Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2019).

[2] Fuller, A Military History of the Western World, Volume II,364-451.

[3] See: Elizabeth Same, Looking For The Good War: American Amnesia and the Violent Pursuit of Happiness (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux,2021).

[4] See: Samet, Looking For The Good War: American Amnesia and the Violent Pursuit of Happiness.

[5] William Stueck, Rethinking The Korean War: A New Diplomatic and Strategic History (Princeton: Princeton University Press,2002).

[6] Stueck, Rethinking The Korean War: A New Diplomatic and Strategic History, 185-206.

[7] See Greg Daddis No Sure Victory and Andrew Krepinevich The Army and Vietnam.

[8] Andrew Bacevich, America’s War For The Greater Middle East: A Military History (New York: Random House, 2017)227-228.

[9] George C. Herring, America’s Longest War: The United States and Vietnam, 1950-1975 (New York: McGraw-Hill Education, 2014),363-380. See also, Krepinevich The Army and Vietnam.

[10] Colin Gray, Fighting Talk: Forty Maxims on War, Peace, and Strategy (New York: Potomac Books, 2009) 151-154.

[11] Carl Von Clausewitz, Howard, Paret, Brodie On War, 867-870.

[12] Carl Von Clausewitz, Howard, Paret, Brodie On War (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984) 168-169.

[13] Carl Von Clausewitz, Howard, Paret, Brodie On War, 717-718.

[14] Carl Von Clausewitz, Howard, Paret, Brodie On War, 162-164.

[15] Carl Von Clausewitz, Howard, Paret, Brodie On War,223-227.

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Preparing for future warfare based on historical lessons has long been fundamental to military leadership and strategy. Field Marshal Montgomery’s observation that “rule one on page one of the book of war, is: ‘Do not march on Moscow’” belies the fact that one of the most famous marchers on Moscow rigorously studied history and yet marched on Moscow.[1] Whatever the book of war may say, Napoleon Bonaparte understood that “in war, chance is half of everything.”[2] Napoleon’s study of history and march on Moscow illustrate why even the most assiduous students of history often follow their predecessors into disaster.

In June of 1812 Napoleon’s efforts to avoid another war with Tsar Alexander of Russia had failed. As Napoleon and his Grande Armée crossed the Niemen River into Russia, Napoleon requested and studied written accounts of Charles XII of Sweden’s ill-fated invasion of Peter the Great’s Russia in 1709.[3] Charles, like Napoleon, relied on speed to force a rapid decision. Yet Peter the Great’s Russian armies continuously withdrew into the interior, employing a scorched earth approach that ensured Charles would find no support for his army from the land. In extended pursuit, Charles was exposed to the Great Frost of 1708/09 while isolated on inhospitable Russian territory.[4] Voltaire vividly describes 2,000 men freezing to death before Charles’s “very eyes.”[5] Terribly weakened by the ravages of the Russian winter, Charles was defeated at the Battle of Poltava, and the tide turned. Charles fled, and the war ended Sweden’s dominance in Europe.

*“Karl (Charles) XII and Ivan Mazepa after The Poltava Battle 1709” by Gustaf Cederström (Wikimedia)*

Napoleon’s study of Charles XII’s disastrous campaign should have warned him of the danger he would face, but he also had his own two previous victories over Russia to consider. In the first victory, Napoleon famously defeated the Russian army at Austerlitz in 1805 through a bold ruse. Far more interesting is Napoleon’s 1807 pursuit of a withdrawing Russian army led by Count Levin von Bennigsen during the War of the Fourth Coalition. A full five years before the disastrous invasion of 1812, Prussian winter weather menaced Napoleon’s army and by December 1807 40% of his army was out of commission at any time with disease, hunger, and exhaustion.[6] Bennigsen intended to remain out of Napoleon’s reach and avoid a potentially decisive battle while the effects of over extension took their toll. However, Bennigsen briefly crossed the Alle River at Friedland to crush a small French contingent and was quickly trapped by Napoleon and the Russian army was destroyed. Shortly thereafter Tsar Alexander sought an armistice.[7] Napoleon’s dogged pursuit of a withdrawing Russian army, through winter, ended in a great victory.

Napoleon’s 1812 campaign repeated Charles’s experience in many important respects. The heat and rains of early summer left sodden, unripe forage in their wake, killing 10,000 horses in the first week of the campaign.[8] Lack of water and cramped campaign conditions led to an outbreak of typhus, which cost 80,000 casualties by the third week in July and ultimately killed as many as 140,000 troops.[9] Marching across eastern Russia in the heat, many of Napoleon’s soldiers discarded the winter clothing they did not expect to need on a short Russian campaign.[10] Napoleon won the battles of Smolensk and Borodino, but even when he occupied Moscow, which was much farther than he intended to pursue Alexander’s forces, the Russians did not sue for peace. Instead, they burned their own ancient city, which Napoleon described as “an event on which I could not calculate, as there is not, I believe, a precedent for it in the history of the world.”[11] By the time Napoleon returned west for winter quarters bad weather struck and his withdrawal devolved into a chaotic flight. Having thoroughly studied several histories of Charles XII’s defeat and downfall, Napoleon’s invasion of Russia in 1812 largely repeated them and in little more than a year Napoleon was deposed and in exile on Elbe.

*“The Fire of Moscow (1812)” by Viktor Mazurovsky (Wikimedia)*

Napoleon’s failure in 1812 suggests that he did not learn the correct lessons from the history he studied. Yet 21st century students of history share the same challenge that Napoleon faced as he studied recent and distant historical examples. Students of history often have a perspective that is thickly clouded with outcome and hindsight biases.[12] Outcome bias leads to errors of analysis when outcomes are already known. For example, outcome bias suggests that where there is defeat, mistakes must have been made. Once mistakes have been identified by an observer, hindsight bias suggests that the likely consequences of these mistakes were discernible at the time, if correctly analyzed by a skilled and dispassionate eye. These biases combine to suggest that the true challenge for practitioners is to learn from history to correctly assess future circumstances and make decisions that lead to victory rather than defeat.

Yet some of the greatest strategic thinkers in history, including Napoleon, argue otherwise. Though Machiavelli is often read as a champion of unalloyed realpolitik his discussion of the relationship between skill (virtu) and fortune (fortuna) emphasizes the predominant role of fortune or chance in determining the fates of princes and their armies. Machiavelli likens fortune to a torrential river that overflows its banks, and only those who have prepared for the flood in advance may mitigate its impacts and flourish.[13] Yet “two men, behaving differently, achieve the same result, and of two other men, who behave in the same way, one will attain his objective and the other will not.”[14] Machiavelli writes that “a ruler will flourish if he adjusts his policies as the character of the times changes,” and they will likely fail if they do not, regardless of skill. [15] This is because “fortune determines one half of our actions” and “leaves us to control the other half.”[16]

Clausewitz likewise believes that it is “absolutely useless” to develop rules from past experience that can reliably overcome the power of chance in the practice of strategy.[17] Clausewitz wrote that the difficulties of accurately knowing the past, present, and future set the realm of strategy apart from tactics. For Clausewitz, “tactics will present far fewer difficulties to the theorist than will strategy” because tactics are concerned with material factors such as force ratios, required supplies, interior lines, and other logistical issues.[18] These material challenges are more amenable to the scientific synthesis of rules, principles, and systems from historical lessons to improve performance and efficiency.[19] For tactics, the challenge is simply interpreting the past well enough to derive accurate lessons learned that will enable an accurate understanding of the present and accurate prediction of the future.

Strategy takes for its object the political conditions beyond the military instrument that are utterly unique, unbounded, and rarely conform to previous experience.However, Clausewitz argues that at the level of national strategy, “the conduct of war branches out in almost all directions and has no definite limits; while any system, any model, has the finite nature of a synthesis.”[20] Synthetic principles derived from historical lessons always involve the falsification of reality through abstraction.[21] Though abstraction is tolerable for tactics, falsity undermines the strategic art of “quickly and accurately grasping the topography of any area.”[22] Abstraction prevents the strategist from discerning “the kind of war on which they are embarking; neither mistaking it for nor trying to turn into, something that is alien to its nature.”[23] Strategy takes for its object the political conditions beyond the military instrument that are utterly unique, unbounded, and rarely conform to previous experience. Therefore, talent and genius are required to guide the strategist because “talent and genius operate outside the rules.”[24] For strategists, the lessons of history provide only a heuristic value through reflection and study; according to Clausewitz, “the knowledge needed by a senior commander is distinguished by the fact that it can only be attained by a special talent, through the medium of reflection, study, and thought.”[25] Yet this study never provides more than the ability to think and react to the chance circumstances, the fog and friction of war.

Napoleon’s 1812 march on Moscow can best be understood not in terms of historical lessons drawn from the “book of war.” Napoleon was far more familiar with the simple if discomforting notion that “in war, chance is half of everything.”[26] By the time Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon, “the die is cast” was already a common phrase for describing the dominant role of chance in determining fate. In the case of Charles in 1708, the historically bad winter could not have been anticipated; it was a chance occurrence that favored the Russians. Likewise, the failure to detect Napoleon’s ruse, the weakening of their lines on Pratzen Heights, and the timely arrival of Marshal Davout at Austerlitz enabled Napoleon’s victory in 1805. Bennigsen’s mistake at Friedland in 1807 was likewise a chance occurrence that enabled Napoleon’s victory and ended the war.

Outcome bias often leads modern observers to start with the fact of defeat and then search for the mistakes that inevitably led to it. But the military decisions made by Charles in 1709 and Napoleon in 1805, 1807, and 1812 should not be judged based on the chance occurrences that delivered their catastrophic defeats or spectacular victories. These decision makers ought to be judged based on the decisions made at the time with the information available to those who must act, and later observers must fundamentally appreciate the role of chance in strategy. Neither Napoleon nor Machiavelli nor Clausewitz offer any easy resolution to the troubling role of chance in the extraordinarily high stakes arts of strategy and war. Machiavelli simply leaves his readers with the advice that “it is better to be headstrong than cautious” which is succinctly captured by the Latin proverb “fortune favors the bold.”[27]

*Napoleon's retreat from Moscow” by Adolph Northen (Wikimedia)*

As today’s strategists gaze across the Pacific and contemplate possible future conflicts, we would do well to reflect on the role of chance in determining strategic outcomes. Napoleon, Machiavelli, and Clausewitz suggest the study of history is invaluable in preparation for future conflict. Yet they assign a specific educational role to history that does not afford the practitioner with reliable tools to control the capricious forces of chance. Instead, today’s strategists should emulate Machiavelli’s barrier builders who embrace the torrents of fortune and boldly channel their forces. While there are no guarantees of fortune’s unending favor, “talent and genius operate outside the rules” including even “rule one on page one of the book of war.”[28]

As today’s strategists gaze across the Pacific and contemplate possible future conflicts, we would do well to reflect on the role of chance in determining strategic outcomes.

Peter L. Hickman has a PhD from Arizona State University in International Relations and a Master of Philosophy in Military Strategy from the U.S. Air Force School of Advanced Air and Space Studies (SAASS). He has served on Active Duty and in the Air National Guard including assignments to the US Department of State and the staff of a member of the House Armed Services Committee. The perspectives presented here are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect those of the U.S. Air Force, the Air National Guard, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Crossing the Berezina. The Flight of Napoleon’s Army from Russia in 1812 (Bogdan Willewalde)

Notes: [1] Andrew Roberts, Napoleon: A Life (New York: Penguin Books, 2014), 580.

[2] Andrew Roberts, Napoleon: A Life (New York: Penguin Books, 2014), 595.

[3] During the Great Northern War from 1700 to 1721, Charles XII’s Swedish Empire confronted an anti-Swedish Coalition, led by Russia’s Peter the Great, determined to roll back Sweden’s domination of Europe. Enjoying early success against coalition members in the west, Charles invaded Russia in early 1708. Roberts, 569.

[4] Stephanie Pain, “1709: The Year That Europe Froze,” New Scientist, accessed December 30, 2022, https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20126942-100-1709-the-year-that-europe-froze/.

[5] 1694-1778 Voltaire and Winifred Todhunter, Voltaire’s History of Charles XII, King of Sweden (London : J.M. Dent, 1908), http://archive.org/details/voltaireshistory00voltuoft.

[6] Roberts, Napoleon, 434.

[7] Roberts, 451–56.

[8] Roberts, 578.

[9] Roberts, 590.

[10] Roberts, 615.

[11] Roberts, 612.

[12] Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow, 1st edition (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2011), 207.

[13] Niccolò Machiavelli, Selected Political Writings, ed. David Wootton (Hackett Publishing, 1994), 74–75.

[14] Machiavelli, 75.

[15] Machiavelli, 75.

[16] Machiavelli, 74.

[17] Carl von Clausewitz, On War, Indexed Edition, trans. Michael Eliot Howard and Peter Paret, Reprint edition (Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press, 1989), 136.

[18] Clausewitz, 141.

[19] Clausewitz, 134.

[20] Clausewitz, 134.

[21] Clausewitz, 6.

[22] Clausewitz, 109.

[23] Clausewitz, 88–89.

[24] Clausewitz, 140.

[25] Clausewitz, 146.

[26] Roberts, Napoleon, 595.

[27] Machiavelli, Selected Political Writings, 76.

[28] Clausewitz, On War, Indexed Edition, 140.

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“‘Fools,’ said Bismarck, ‘say they learn by experience. I prefer to profit by other people’s experience.'”[1] Despite the historical consensus concluding the utility of history when considering future warfare, leaders’ track record of leveraging it to a nation’s benefit is, to paraphrase some U.S. officials, terribly poor.[2] We should not however seek to resolve this beyond acknowledging nations inevitably fight future wars with a force designed and constructed for a different conflict than what was inevitably unveiled.

This piece examines recent thinking and planning examples to better understand how states effectively envision future warfare by examining their performance in past and present conflict to include how lessons learned were applied by the countries in focus, or not. Buy on Amazon A nation’s political and military leaders must objectively seek out and use history's lessons as guideposts, capturing and applying lessons learned from the most repeated, catastrophic missteps of others to remain adaptable to future warfare's most probable scenarios. History matters more in avoiding past catastrophes than predicting specific events years into the future. As British soldier and military historian B.H. Liddell Hart concludes, “the value of history is in the countless repeated ways things can go wrong.”[3] This piece examines recent thinking and planning examples to better understand how states effectively envision future warfare by examining their performance in past and present conflict to include how lessons learned were applied by the countries in focus, or not.

The Curious Case of Azerbaijan The world’s attention in 2020 was dominated by the COVID-19 pandemic leaving many unaware of another war raging in the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region between Armenia and Azerbaijan. The region’s cultural significance to both countries is a long-standing dispute pitting an Armenian ethnic majority seeking unification against the will of a minority Azerbaijani population. The Soviet Union historically kept the two sides from engaging in all-out conflict. Armenia would eventually escalate their calls for unification as the Soviet Union’s disintegration became clearer and Azerbaijani ethnic cleansing claims began to emerge. Azerbaijan’s declaration of independence from the Soviet Union would be the final hurdle to full-scale war as Armenian secession claims in the region became official. The war would rage for six years exhausting both sides with Armenia emerging as the de facto victor. This victory in the First Nagorno-Karabakh War from 1988 until 1994 never sat well in Azerbaijan, a country whose capacity to field and develop armed forces rose sharply in the 2000s alongside a sympathetic and emerging regional player in Turkey coupled with the development of a robust energy sector.

Azerbaijan recognized a future conflict would not look the same as the First Nagorno-Karabakh War and took steps to ensure lessons from their previous defeat would be integrated into a future war. Azerbaijan recognized a future conflict would not look the same as the First Nagorno-Karabakh War and took steps to ensure lessons from their previous defeat would be integrated into a future war. Their preparations were multi-faceted with heavy reliance on their Turkish sponsor, but the key was how they were able to professionalize traditional forces while leveraging modern advances in Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) technology and information operations to pre-emptively defeat the numerically superior Armenians.[4] Azerbaijan successfully applied historical lessons learned from their missteps while envisioning the importance of new technologies altering the methods of modern war.

The Second Nagorno-Karabakh War, like the first act, was full of new lessons and questions for nations around the world to pay close attention to, especially Russia who had been a historic Armenian ally vis-à-vis Azerbaijan. Russian media and military sources alike publicly acknowledged core lessons from the war by the end of 2020 concluding Armenia’s downfall lay primarily in both traditional and non-traditional categories. These categories included ineffective military leadership, substandard soldiers without the will to fight, inability to integrate new technology into operations, and an overall arrogance to the changing methods of warfare.[5] This analysis confirms at least some of the Russian military leadership understood the necessity to still field traditional, capable forces integrated with the latest military technology.

Russia today is failing to achieve its strategic objectives thus far much like Armenia. Their shortcomings are due to a failure in application of key lessons learned as their assumptions of another Crimea operation crumbled in the initial days and weeks of the 2022 invasion. Russian failures in Ukraine today may stem from arrogance via its misapplication of an invalid template from recent non-traditional operations.[6] As Kissinger said, “the Gods are offended by hubris.”[7]

Russia and Ukraine – Lessons Captured vs Lessons LearnedRussia’s hybrid and gray zone operations in former Soviet states during the latter part of the 2000s caught the attention of many around the world.[8] Russia also began reflecting on lessons from the Arab Spring uprisings of the 2010s as those lessons relate to the changing methods of warfare. Russia’s Chief of Defense General Valery Gerasimov even penned a paper as a result many at the time saw as confirmation of Russia’s prioritization of characterizing war in non-traditional ways as a prelude to Crimea and eastern Ukraine 2014 – little green men speaking Russian quickly and decisively occupying Ukrainian territory with minimal resistance.[9] However, the 2014 annexation of Crimea incursions into eastern Ukraine were not updated with applicable lessons from the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War. Russian assumptions and methods were not adapted in the face of new evidence to the contrary, capturing vital lessons, but absent actually learning from them.[10] Russian plans for another Crimea-type operation in the 2022 invasion of Ukraine were built on difficult-to-replicate circumstances in Crimea absent a clear-eyed, factual analysis of what had transpired since The Second Nagorno-Karabakh War.[11] Their overreliance on non-traditional methods to force Ukraine to capitulate early on were not effectively combined with a plan to leverage their superior numbers in troops and modern weaponry when presented with more classical military resistance from Ukraine.

Ukraine offers various insights when considering future warfare, finding value in the traditional lesson of maintaining an effective fighting force while recognizing the imperative to integrate technologically advanced, combat-tested weapon systems.Conversely in 2014, Ukraine shifted its vision of future warfare based on the persistent existential threat of Russian aggression due to the absence of formal defense alliances albeit with assistance from NATO nations.[12] Ukraine quickly and effectively began restructuring a Soviet-era, atrophied force with a view to attain a NATO standard within their ranks.[13] In coupling urgency based on necessity with deepening partnerships, Ukraine’s preparation for national defense against a full-scale Russian invasion in 2022 would be formidable and surprising to many. It also would have likely not been possible had Russia’s 2014 operation been on the scope and scale of their 2022 invasion given the depth of Ukraine’s military shortcomings. Nevertheless, the example of Ukraine offers various insights when considering future warfare, finding value in the traditional lesson of maintaining an effective fighting force while recognizing the imperative to integrate technologically advanced, combat-tested weapon systems. Below are two salient points relating to Ukraine’s use of lessons learned since 2014 offering asymmetrical insights for nations pursuing future strategic options to confront a superior adversary.

Channel National Momentum Against an Existential ThreatUkraine’s adoption of a more Western-style armed forces system led by combat-tested officers and NCOs was a clear-eyed recognition by Ukrainian political and military leadership of their nation’s existential reality. This reality was communicated to the population. This shift effectively harnessed an existing will to fight, solidifying a near-consensus of support at the national level with nearly eight years to germinate. The lack of an official cessation of hostilities in the east over this time also provided Ukraine with ample operational repetitions enabling newly formed units relevant battlefield experiences over this timeframe. These opportunities would also begin to include more and more advanced tactics and equipment from partners seeking to capitalize geopolitically.

Statecraft Enabling Technological Military Advances and Integration Buy on Amazon Russian advantages in numbers and technologically superior weaponry were well known to Ukraine. Thus, their early recognition of the need to improve the quality of their forces through training and acquire modern, asymmetrically advantageous weapon systems from NATO countries such as Turkey and the United States became imperative to national defense. And Turkey, given their regional ambitions and NATO protections, offered an excellent source for acquiring the same UAV technology Azerbaijan successfully leveraged against Russian-trained, numerically superior Armenian formations.[14] The U.S., which labels Russia a strategic competitor and an acute threat, provided Ukraine with over $20 billion in military aid since 2014. This aid encompassed training, equipment, intelligence, and logistics support well before the 2022 invasion.[15] Thus, deepening relationships with willing partners who are already in direct geopolitical competition with their adversary were key to initial Ukrainian resistance efforts in 2022 and will likely prolong the conflict indefinitely, eroding Russia’s ability to negotiate terms of peace from a position of strength politically and militarily.

ConclusionHistorical guideposts illuminating lessons learned from others’ missteps remain a foundational tool for understanding future warfare. This understanding, however imperative, must also include proper follow through via adaptation and implementation discerning which historical and emergent methods of war are relevant to the specific case. Azerbaijan and Ukraine represent recent examples of nations effectively grasping their future of warfare clearly by ensuring past strategic errors applicable to their circumstances are not repeated and are applicable for all nations seeking to effectively envision the future of warfare. Armenia and Russia by contrast demonstrate how nations can be cognitively blinded by historical precedence, over relying on either traditional or non-traditional methods of war based on most recent successes. In this sense, past success can be the biggest risk of all when predicting a future war and developing a plan to emerge victorious.

Nathan Bump is an officer in the U.S. Air Force. Nathan is a Foreign Area Officer who focuses on the European region. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Air Force, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: A Succession of Choices, A Coruña, Spain, 2018 (Javier Allegue Barros).

Notes: [1] B.H. Liddell Hart, Why Don’t We Learn From History? (London: Allen and Unwin, 1944).

[2] Micah Zenko, “100% Right 0% of the Time,” Foreign Policy, October 16, 2012, https://foreignpolicy.com/2012/10/16/100-right-0-of-the-time/ and Robert Scales, “Forecasting the Future of Warfare,” War on the Rocks, April 9, 2018, https://warontherocks.com/2018/04/forecasting-the-future-of-warfare/.

[3] B.H. Liddell Hart, Why Don’t We Learn From History?

[4] John Antal, 7 Seconds to Die (Casemate, 2022).

[5] Alexander Stronell, “Learning the Lessons of Nagorno-Karabakh the Russian Way,” Analysis, International Institute for Strategic Studies (blog), March 21, 2021, https://www.iiss.org/blogs/analysis/2021/03/lessons-of-nagorno-karabakh.

[6] Michael Kofman, Katya Migacheva, Brian Nichiporuk, Andrew Radin, Olesya Tkacheva, and Jenny Oberholtzer, Lessons from Russia's Operations in Crimea and Eastern Ukraine. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2017. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR1498.html.

[7] Cited in Hal Brands, What Good Is Grand Strategy? Power and Purpose in American Statecraft

from Harry S. Truman to George W. Bush (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2014), 100.

[8] Examples before Ukraine include Georgia and Estonia.

[9] Valery Gerasimov, “The Value of Science Is in the Foresight,” Military Review, February 2016, https://www.armyupress.army.mil/portals/7/military-review/archives/english/militaryreview_20160228_art008.pdf.

[10] Credit to U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel Luiz Vega for introducing the author to lessons learned versus lessons captured.

[11] Michael Kofman, Lessons from Russia's Operations in Crimea and Eastern Ukraine.

[12] Adrlan Bonenberger, “Ukraine’s Military Pulled Itself Out of the Ruins of 2014,” Foreign Policy, May 9, 2022, Ukraine's Military Pulled Itself Out of the Ruins of 2014 https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/05/09/ukraine-military-2014-russia-us-training/.

[13] Valery Zaluzhny, “Restraint Under Fire,” The Economist, December 15, 2022, https://www.economist.com/zaluzhny-transcript.

[14] John Antal, 7 Seconds to Die.

[15] Figures sourced from Department of State and do not include post-2022 invasion aid from the U.S. https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF12040#:~:text=According%20to%20DOD%2C%20USAI%20packages,UAS)%2C%20air%20surveillance%20systems%2C.

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American news outlets announced that the Taliban would take months to roll back the Afghan government following coalition departure in 2021, and it took days. The Russians intended to take Kyiv in days, and Ukrainians continue to fight and win a year later. Both instances highlight the difficulty in predicting outcomes. History is littered with these strategic blunders where states misjudged the future. States may struggle to envision future warfare because they draw too much from history. This is not an anti-history article. History feeds theory. Theory, when tested, drives doctrine. Yet states, specifically the planners and decision-makers within those states, must learn to take historical knowledge a step further.

The art of trying to envision the future is not a cure-all; foresight-driven warfare is what we seek. The goal of any nation should be to prepare for various plausible futures or outcomes, which drives down strategic risk, enables a state to become operationally flexible, and positions a state with the means necessary to fight the next fight. Achieving foresight driven national strategy, defense policy, and modernization begins with finding an effective model for planners, which might include Scenario Planning. Scenario Planning methodologies provide prognosticators a way to envision multiple plausible futures versus a singular outcome for a complex, adaptive global system.

Scenario planning is an art. When done correctly, the process opens minds, enhancing strategic thought and exploration of the future.[1] As a result, planners can prepare for a wider range of futures by testing current plans against the unveiled futures. In today’s complex environment, the process is invaluable. During this process, planners must seek to anticipate the future, not attempt to predict it. According to Conway, strategy's importance lies in positioning correctly for the future, but historical information and the present operating environment drive strategic decision-making.[2]

Achieving foresight driven national strategy, defense policy, and modernization begins with finding an effective model for planners, which might include Scenario Planning. Scenario Planning methodologies provide prognosticators a way to envision multiple plausible futures versus a singular outcome for a complex, adaptive global system.The Pitfalls of Utilizing History to Prepare for the FutureTwo fundamental problems occur when examining history. First, the lessons learned are generally stale, and only portions of the lessons learned apply to the next conflict. The lessons learned are also generally written without utilizing the full context. Strategists must understand the why behind a successful campaign, maneuver, etc., and be able to apply that to a future scenario.

Planners can appear to move at cumbersome speeds. History informs plans, but the intelligence that drives this information is stale even before the plan is generally finalized. Planners may struggle to think about what the enemy could do long term and iterate on this process. A plan may appear to be completed after just a few explorations of the future, and lack branch or sequel plans to accompany them.

Themes in Current Planning Through strategic lenses, states have envisioned future warfare. In American military schools, there is an apparent shift from insurgency or guerrilla fighting back to a large-scale combat operations (LSCO) mindset. LSCO preparation has advantages. The military can demonstrate a need for modernized weapons to fight peer adversaries or to gain an asymmetric advantage against a more significant force, reflecting changes in service and joint doctrine. The current doctrinal trends also reflect the emergence of service and joint views on an extended battlefield, information's importance, space dominance, and offensive and defensive cyber. The next war will be truly global, with forces able to disrupt each other's homelands.

Moreover, the shift has reflected changes in the recently published 2023 National Defense Authorization Act, focused on the People's Republic of China as a pacing threat. With a new Cold War appearing to erupt, the emphasis remains on building competitive edges in all domains against adversaries. In some areas, the Western world is trying to catch up. Elsewhere, it fights to maintain its advantage.

A common discussion in a counter-PRC fight remains the defense of Taiwan; yet, this is only one future scenario. For America’s more immediate threat, Russia, Ukrainian forces continue to maim the Russian military. If we are not careful, this might accidentally cause a myopic approach in preparing for future military operations. The question to be asked, though, is this: What other scenarios create threats to the U.S. that are not given enough consideration and how does it prepare for them?

*A Russian Su-35 aircraft unsafely intercepts a P-8A Poseidon patrol aircraft assigned to U.S. 6th Fleet over the Mediterranean Sea, May 26, 2020. (U.S. Navy Photo)*

Why We Fail to Prepare for the Future: An Example From Korea From all staff perspectives, planners need to prepare for the future of warfare at all echelons. A theater-specific operational plan might be updated every 5-8 years, depending on its relevance to current events or significant changes to the operational environment. In most cases, planners may appear to only focus on plan creation, depending on the size or capability of the staff. More time is needed to run scenario development and build branch plans that tackle alternate futures outside the plan's scope. Again, the process is cumbersome.

The various operational plans addressing military actions by the Democratic People’s Republic of North Korea highlight some of these shortcomings. At some echelons, the base plan is nearly a decade old when considering the initial mission analysis inputs for the planning and refinement processes. In those various echelons, military planners in the theater could be planning against outdated intelligence products and planning assessments, refining their products against an enemy that has had a decade to morph. Yet, forces still appear to exercise against the plan as if it were realistic.

The future of warfare demands that we start doing more scenario-planning exercises and training to overcome these shortcomings. Given the ephemeral nature of operational environments and a constant rotation of experienced planners in a region or unit, the United States military needs to improve their approach to comprehensive scenario-based exercises. It requires experts. It takes time. Most importantly, it requires a concerted effort to visualize plausible futures.

So, What Can We Do? At the beginning of this article, it was stated that the “goal of any nation should be to prepare for various plausible futures or outcomes, which drives down strategic risk, enables a state to become operationally flexible, and positions a state with the means necessary to fight the next fight.” Scenario-focused planning produces this end-state, but planners must run the process thoroughly. Most importantly, like all planning efforts, leadership must champion the scenario-focused planning process. It must build a dynamic group of experts to include economists, environmentalists, military planners from the joint force, members of government organizations, etc. Once leaders finalize the team, they must explore with the opportune time afforded to their effort. Finally, strategic planners must act on the plausible futures, informed by the planning teams to gain the full benefit of the process.

The recommendation above takes work. There is no excess of military planners at all strategic and theater-strategic echelons capable of performing these functions. At tactical echelons, assignments may only be one person deep. An understaffed echelon may limit a planner's focus on preparing for the next operational plan instead of iterating on branches or sequels for numerous plans, but scenario planning could provide some key benefits.

One such benefit is through balancing the principle of surprise and the element of tempo. Given the United States's current posture in many areas of operation, the nation may choose to cede the initiative to some enemies. Being unprepared for the type of warfare presented only exacerbates the situation, and it will take longer to generate the military means to win. Scenarios help nations like the United States better prepare and resource itself against enemy surprises by aiding planners in engaging in series “if/then” thought exercises. Most importantly, planners can build and recommend appropriate indicators for potential adversary or enemy actions.

Developing and refining indicators and warnings can be one of the most important by-products of scenario planning. Imagine a future scenario as a maze. These indicators are like breadcrumbs placed along the way; they are signals to watch for in scenario development. The development of leading indicators is how states can fully harness the information and make it worthwhile. Similar to how a military uses indicators and warnings to understand an enemy's next action, states can utilize indicators to forewarn that a plausible scenario is becoming a reality.

 Buy on Amazon  Finally, scenario-focused planning can move strategic decision makers away from short-term thinking regarding resourcing or policies. The process encourages users to look at trends and project those ideas forward into the future. In this process, more significant uncertainty leads to a broader range of plausible outcomes, requiring a constant need to revisit scenarios and possible solutions. Regarding methodology, Peter Schwartz offers one possible step-by-step recommendation.[3]

1. ID Focal Issue
2. Forces in the Environment
3. Driving Forces
4. Importance and Uncertainty
5. Selecting Scenario Logics
6. Fleshing Out Scenarios
7. Implications
8. Leading Indicators

ConclusionA historical examination is essential, but states must ensure they do not prepare for the last war. States must make the proactive choice to plan for the future utilizing scenario planning, or they risk being surprised by the future. This article sought to highlight some of the pitfalls in the current planning construct and advocate for a more proactive approach. In doing so, states can work towards foresight-driven warfare.

In a complex system, looking at a problem begins to shape it in the future. Similarly, choices and decisions now affect future outcomes. States should use this knowledge to shape futures most detrimental to their existence. History helps in this effort, but the full utilization of scenarios can shape a safer future.

Samuel Shamburg is an Air Force officer and operational planner. This review essay reflects his own views and not necessarily those of the U.S. Air Force, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Agile Combat Employment C2, Hurlburt Field, Florida, 2022 (Shelton Keel).

Notes: [1] Brook Mitchell, “Scenario Planning for the Twenty-first-Century Military Strategist,” Air University, April 27, 2020, accessed November 20, 2020, https://www.airuniversity.af.edu/Wild-Blue-Yonder/Article-Display/Article/2161592/scenario-planning-for-the-twenty-first-century-military-strategist/.

[2] Maree Conway, Foresight Infused Strategy: A How-To Guide for Using Foresight in Practice (Melbourne, Australia: Thinking Futures, 2019), 56.

[3] Peter Schwartz, The Art of the Long View (New York: Currency Doubleday, 1991), 241-246.

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The future of armed conflict is a divisive topic in which competing camps and actors grapple to control the narrative.[1] Not formalized in existing literature, four basic schools of thought exist in the conflict and defense studies fields.[2] These camps include the Futurist, Traditionalist, Institutionalist, and Conflict Realism. Each of these camps provides value to the study of armed conflict. Yet, the over-reliance on one camp over others creates unhelpful distortions and implications that can impede the student and practitioner of war’s ability to think clearly about war and warfare. A holistic view of armed conflict, which takes into consideration all four camps, is needed to help overcome unhelpful distortions and find the essence of the problems in armed conflict.

The Futurist camp, for instance, asserts that drones, artificial intelligence, and cyber are the future of armed conflict.[3] Meanwhile, the Traditionalist camp does not drift far from the musings of Prussian theorist Carl von Clausewitz and they often serve as a regulating force on those making bold assertions that are out of step with historical precedent. Institutionalists, or those who are socialized to think and speak in their professional organizations’ respective language, tend toward reinforcing their professional institution’s thinking.[4] As a result, Institutionalist thought in Western militaries stays close to maneuver, precision, and technology-centric advocacy.

These three camps are the leading voices in today’s conflict and defense studies communities, despite dubious records of success. They are the leaders not because they are more right than wrong, but because they reinforce institutional and cultural values, and because they are more comfortable than the alternative—Conflict Realism.

This article asserts that Conflict Realism is a marginalized field regarding the future of armed conflict and that Conflict Realists are one of the most overlooked actors when it comes to the study of war. Nonetheless, Conflict Realists provide a useful and pragmatic alternative to the Futurists, Traditionalists, and Institutionalists that dominate the study of war today.

The primary problem with these camps is that they generally represent modern, and future, war through the gilded lens of aspiration and how armed conflict should be, instead of viewing war and warfare through the blood-red lens of how things are, and arguably, how armed conflict will be in the future. Futurists, Institutionalists, and Traditionalists thinking on armed conflict fails to appropriately account for realistic deductions from modern war and how those deductions factor into future armed conflict.

Moreover, all three camps reflect a view of war which is idealistic, optimistic, and self-centered. This gilded and bureaucratic outlook on armed conflict overlooks or discredits many disquieting realities of war and warfare. The impact of these omissions and rejections of reality tends to not be felt in the moment, but down the road when the truth of armed conflict again overturns rosy assertions of how wars should be fought. The U.S. government provided Ukraine dire warnings of a pending Russian invasion ahead of February 2022.[5] Nonetheless, The mea culpas emanating from theorists, academics, and practitioners in the wake of Russia’s February 2022 re-invasion of Ukraine, and the horrendous combat that has ensued, make this point self-evident.[6] Conflict Realism, not so much a coherent body of knowledge, but a generalized grouping of thoughts by critically minded analysts, offers a more useful alternative to the study of war and warfare.

To think strategically about the future of armed conflict requires embracing a holistic view of war, as opposed to a preferential view, and must not operate in a zero-sum manner, which is a problematic undercurrent stifling military thought today. States and Western militaries must more fully embrace Conflict Realism as a viable school of thought when examining future armed conflict. Conflict Realism, which emphasizes the importance of causal mechanisms in armed conflict, as opposed to preference, narrative, procurement strategies, and centuries-old logic, provides a useful tool for policymakers, academics, and practitioners preparing for future armed conflict.

The Conflict Realism taxonomy is offered with a degree of reservation because detractors will quickly find flaws with the schools of thought set forth in this paper. Nonetheless, the schools of thought are not intended to be a scientific classification, but an ontological frame to illuminate an overlooked and underappreciated element in the study of armed conflict. Further, to think strategically about the future of armed conflict requires embracing a holistic view of war, as opposed to a preferential view, and must not operate in a zero-sum manner, which is a problematic undercurrent stifling military thought today.

Schools of Thought The conflict and defense studies communities can be classified along various lines. Aligning participants into three primary interest groups—theorists, academics, and practitioners—is a useful taxonomy. These groupings are the large pots in which the conflict and defense studies’ schools of thought socialize their respective ideas. Individuals can easily fit into more than one classification. For instance, a practitioner can also be an academic, or an academic can also be a theorist. This degree of fidelity, however, is not required to continue discussing the schools of thought.

A 2021 paper by John Myers and David Jackson makes a good attempt to further classify military thought by aligning it into Futurist and Traditionalist camps.[7] These groups are useful, but simultaneously insufficient. Four basic schools of military thinking—Futurists, Traditionalists, Institutionalists, and the Conflict Realists—provide the community of interest a more nuanced understanding of contemporary military thought.

A holistic view of armed conflict, which takes into consideration all four camps, is needed to help overcome unhelpful distortions and find the essence of the problems in armed conflict. Futurists

Futurists—the prophets of technology—promise that applied science will make future armed conflict more precise, less expensive, more indirect, and less destructive.[8] As a result, the Futurist prospectus commands attention today. The U.S.’s fascination with technological advancement and technology-based problem-solving results in the Futurists being the camp de jure, and at the front of nearly all contemporary discussion on future armed conflict. Recent Western investment in futures commands in both the U.S. and the U.K. make this fact readily apparent.[9]

Futurists are often the leading proponents for so-called revolutions in military affairs, and the assertions that game-changing technology has, or will, fundamentally alter the nature of war.[10] Futurist thought thumbs its nose at analysis which posits that technology is more often evolutionary instead of revolutionary, and that technological advancement just contributes to the morass of wars of attrition.[11] Further, Futurists brush aside inconvenient truths about armed conflict, such as the fact that neither drones, precision targeting, nor precision munitions have made modern armed conflict any less destructive, less expensive, or less resource-intensive than war from a generation ago.[12] To be sure, billionaire Futurist Elon Musk recently, and incorrectly, argued that the side in war which possesses the best technology wins, and does so quickly.[13]

*Ukrainian HIMARS in Zaporizhya Oblast (**Wikimedia Commons**)*

As of the time of this writing, Russia’s detestable war against Ukraine is closing in on twelve months of vicious combat in which over 100,000 Russian soldiers have been killed or injured, numerous Ukrainian cities have been flattened, thousands of Ukrainians have fled their homes, and an unpublished number of Ukrainian soldiers have been killed.[14] Throughout the conflict, U.S. and other partners have provided Ukraine invaluable security assistance through provisioning Ukraine with the latest military technology, yet no swift political victory, nor any decisive battle have materialized.[15] Instead, the ongoing war in Ukraine clearly demonstrates that the latest warfighting technology, such as drones, cyber capabilities, HIMARS (High Mobility Artillery Rocket System), fuel destructive battles of attrition, and do not necessarily bring war any closer to a quick conclusion.[16]

Traditionalists

 Buy on Amazon  Traditionalists are the inverse of Futurists. Traditionalists are often well-versed in history, military theory, and military doctrine, and in gazing towards the future they look to the past for precedent.[17] As a result, Traditionalists repeatedly conflict with Futurists because of the former’s view that the nature of armed conflict is unflinching and immutable, which clashes with the latter’s aggrandizement of the impact of nascent technology on armed conflict.[18]

Traditionalists are helpful to the study of armed conflict because they provide ballast to the Futurists through the provision of historical and theoretical context.Traditionalists are readily identifiable because of their belief in the idea that, despite technological advancement, war remains fundamentally the same as it has always been—a contest of wills, a human endeavor, and bound with friction and chance.[19] The interposition of Clausewitz’s thoughts into nearly every conceivable situation, such as the Russo-Ukrainian War or cyber warfare, at the expense of potentially more relevant analytical tools, is a clear indication of a Traditionalist.[20]

Nonetheless, Traditionalists are helpful to the study of armed conflict because they provide ballast to the Futurists through the provision of historical and theoretical context. Left unchecked, however, Traditionalists can create an anchor bias around any number of historical or theoretical examples, which can impede pragmatic thinking about the future of war.

Institutionalists

Institutionalists are usually heard echoing the talking points and narratives of their organization. Institutionalist thought tends to reflect both political and domestic idealism, as well as organizational capital investment strategies. In terms of military thought, Institutionalists fall into advocating for ideas and tools that reinforce service, or organizational, priorities, and not venturing far from their existing doctrines and cultural myths. Because of their self-referential character, Institutionalists place little value on ideas that do not align with their organization’s narratives and cultural prerogatives. Further, Institutionalists tend to classify those inside their organizations who possess non-Institutionalist views as disloyal. The U.S. Army’s court martial of Billy Mitchell, although dated, is a classic example of this situation.[21]

Institutionalists can embody a “not invented here” attitude and hinder growth through an recalcitrant position toward those that they feel do not align with their organization’s priorities. Gen. William "Billy" Mitchell's Court-Martial (U.S. Air Force).

An Institutionalist’s value resides in their bureaucratic approach to modernization which helps ensure that their respective organizations do not invest too much in nascent material solutions. On the other side of the coin, Institutionalists can embody a “not invented here” attitude and hinder growth through an recalcitrant position toward those that they feel do not align with their organization’s priorities. Institutionalists can also be the biggest killers of organizational change and drivers of organizational “brain drain” because of their status as defenders of the status quo.

Conflict Realism and the Future of Armed ConflictConflict Realists—not to be confused with Realist political theory—scrutinize armed conflict through reality’s blood-red lens in search of the causal mechanisms in war. Conflict Realists then determine whether those events are unique to a certain set of environmental considerations, or if they are universally applicable in armed conflict. If the assessment indicates that an event is situational, the Conflict Realist pockets those events as either a passing fad or white noise in armed conflict. If the Conflict Realist determines that those events or situations are universally applicable, however, then those features are salient threads which warrant inclusion in conversations of future armed conflict.

Conflict Realists accept that political and military proxies, and proxy wars as a whole, reflect a cynical attitude towards the idealism of Western liberalism and an international rules-based order.The Conflict Realist position, which is a less unified camp than the Futurists, Traditionalists, and Institutionalists, contends that future armed conflicts will be long, bloody, and destructive affairs of attrition.[22] When viewed as a collective cohort, Conflict Realism posits that war in the post-Cold War and post-9/11 eras is decidedly urban.[23] From the Bosnian War’s Siege of Sarajevo to the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War’s siege of Mariupol, urban operations sit atop modern armed conflict. Moreover, Conflict Realists accept that political and military proxies, and proxy wars as a whole, reflect a cynical attitude towards the idealism of Western liberalism and an international rules-based order. Lastly, Conflict Realists contend that military victory in armed conflict is predicated on the longitudinal fracture, and exhaustion, of an opposing actor’s political, military, and economic system.[24]

Because of its pessimistic assessment of current and future armed conflict, Conflict Realism is not the preferred school of thought amongst most policymakers, practitioners, academics, and theorists. The Conflict Realist camp asserts that military victory sides with the combatant best disposed to weather war’s attritional storm.[25] As a result, Conflict Realism asserts that strategic depth is the currency of modern, as well as future, armed conflict and thus shrugs aside arguments supporting short wars and decisive battle as delusional.[26]

Because of its pessimistic assessment of current and future armed conflict, Conflict Realism is not the preferred school of thought amongst most policymakers, practitioners, academics, and theorists. Nevertheless, preferential views of war and warfare are of little value when crisis tips into conflict, because realistic and pragmatic assessments and solutions are required.

ConclusionThe praxis of Futurists theory, as the shortcomings of drones and precision strike to deliver on their professed benefits in the post-9/11 era demonstrates, readily contribute to the Conflict Realist’s interpretation of armed conflict. Institutionalists, the product of idealistic organizations, which are rooted in Western liberalism, and bent on mirror-imaging and self-replication, often find themselves unprepared for pragmatic actors and quickly turn to Conflict Realism when they stumble out the gate to understand an unfolding conflict. Traditionalists provide cautionary tales to the overzealous Futurists and the Institutionalist hankering for quick, decisive victory in war.

The study of future armed conflict must not be approached as a zero-sum game. To that end, Conflict Realism must not be viewed as the product of a small band of pariahs that “don’t get it.” Instead, Conflict Realism must be considered germane to discourse on the future of armed conflict. Conflict Realists are gaining more relevance as the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War continues down the terrible path forecasted by the Conflict Realist school of thought. Policymakers, academics, and theorists must accept the fact that Conflict Realism, despite its grotesque assessments and forecasts, is a force of nature that must be accounted for when thinking about the future of armed conflict.

Amos Fox is a PhD Candidate at the University of Reading, an associate editor at the Wavell Room, and the Deputy Director for Development for the Irregular Warfare Initiative. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Les Bassins des Lumières, Impasse Brown de Colstoun, Bordeaux, France, 2022 (Manh LE).

Notes: [1] Alex Pascal and Tim Hwang, “War is as War Does: World Order and the Future of Conflict,” Just Security, 26 August 2019, accessed 11 December 2022, https://www.justsecurity.org/65959/war-is-as-war-does-world-order-and-the-future-of-conflict/.

[2] Roberts, Peter. 2021. Interview with Amos Fox. March 4, 2021. Western Way of War. Podcast. https://westernwayofwar.libsyn.com/fighting-for-the-soul-of-western-militaries.

[3] National Science and Technology Council, “The National Artificial Intelligence Research and Development Strategic Plan,” Network and Information Technology Research and Development Subcommittee, October 2016, accessed 11 December 2022, https://www.nitrd.gov/PUBS/national_ai_rd_strategic_plan.pdf.

[4] Valerjis Bodnieks, “The New Institutionalism: a Tool for Analysing Defence and Security Institutions,” Security and Defense Quarterly 32, (2020): 84-85. DOI: 10.35467/sqd/130903.

[5] David Sanger, “The United States’ Message to Russia: Prove Us Wrong,” New York Times, 17 February 2022, accessed 21 January 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/17/us/politics/blinken-russia-ukraine-predictions.html.

[6] Hans von der Burchard, “We Failed on Russia: Top German Social Democrat Offers Mea Culpa,” Politico, 25 October 2022, accessed 11 December 2022, https://www.politico.eu/article/we-failed-germany-depended-on-russia-social-democrat-said/.

[7] John Myers and David Jackson, “The Fault Line Between Futurists and Traditionalists in National Security,” War on the Rocks, 18 January 2021, accessed 8 December 2022. https://warontherocks.com/2021/01/the-faultline-between-futurists-and-traditionalists-in-national-security/.

[8] Mark Gunzinger and Bryan Clark, Sustaining America’s Precision Strike Advantage (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, 2015), 8-11.

[9] “British Army Modernizes, Transforms for the Future,” Association of the United States Army, 7 May 2021, accessed 10 December 2022, https://www.ausa.org/news/british-army-modernizes-transforms-future.

[10] Assassination Drones and Bioweapons: The Future of Warfare?” Al Jazeera, 15 September 2022, accessed 8 December 2022, https://www.aljazeera.com/program/the-bottom-line/2022/9/15/assassination-drones-and-bioweapons-the-future-of-warfare.

[11] Anthony Cordesmam, “The Real Revolution in Military Affairs,” Center for Strategic and International Studies, 5 April 2014, accessed 8 December 2022, https://www.csis.org/analysis/real-revolution-military-affairs.

[12] “Drone Warfare Just Got Deadlier: System Error,” Vice News, 8 March 2022, accessed 11 December, https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PsQr2nL3RjA.

[13] Dan Carlin. 2021. Interview with Elon Musk. 13 December. Hardcore History: Addendum. Podcast. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/engineering-victory-with-elon/id1326393257?i=1000544785111.

[14] “Situation Ukraine Refugee Situation,” United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, accessed 21 January 2023, https://data.unhcr.org/en/situations/ukraine; “Ukraine: Civilian Casualty Update 26 December 2022,” United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner, 26 December 2022, accessed 21 January 2023, https://www.ohchr.org/en/news/2022/12/ukraine-civilian-casualty-update-26-december-2022.

[15] “Biden Administration Announces Additional Security Assistance for Ukraine,” US Department of Defense, 19 January 2023, accessed 21 January 2023, https://www.defense.gov/News/Releases/Release/Article/3272866/biden-administration-announces-additional-security-assistance-for-ukraine/.

[16] Pavel Baev, “Time for the West to Think About How to Engage with Defeated Russia,” Brookings Institute, 15 November 2022, accessed 15 December 2022, https://www.brookings.edu/articles/time-for-the-west-to-think-about-how-to-engage-with-defeated-russia/.

[17] Michael Howard, The Causes of Wars (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1983), 190-197.

[18] Rosa Brooks, “Fighting Words,” Foreign Policy, 14 February 2014, accessed 8 December 2022, https://foreignpolicy.com/2014/02/04/fighting-words/#:~:text=According%20to%20the%20Prussian%2C%20war's,%2C%20interactive%2C%20and%20fundamentally%20political.

[19] Mike Martin, “Strategy, Logistics, and Morale: Why the Fundamentals of War Haven’t Changed,” Telegraph, 25 September 2022, accessed 8 December 2022, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/09/25/strategy-logistics-morale-why-fundamentals-war-havent-changed/.

[20] Olivia Garard, “Some Clausewitzian Thoughts on the Ukrainian Defense,” Modern War Institute, 25 April 2022, accessed 9 December 2022, https://mwi.usma.edu/some-clausewitzian-thoughts-on-the-ukrainian-defense/.

[21] Lawrence Freedman, Strategy: A History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 125.

[22] Stephen Walt, “The Ukraine War Doesn’t Change Everything,” Belfer Center, 13 April 2022, accessed 8 December 2022, https://www.belfercenter.org/publication/ukraine-war-doesnt-change-everything.

[23] Anthony King, “Will Inter-State War Take Place in Cities?” Journal of Strategic Studies 45, no. 1 (2022): 90-91. DOI: https://www.tandfonline.com/action/showCitFormats?doi=10.1080/01402390.2021.1991797.

[24] Amos Fox, “On the Principles of War: Reorganizing Thought and Practice for Large-Scale Combat Operations,” Association of the United States Army, Land Warfare Paper 138 (June 2021): 7-15.

[25] Cathal Nolan, The Allure of Battle: A History of How Wars Have Been Won and Lost (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017): 577.

[26] Nolan, The Allure of Battle, 577.

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History remains the best guide to predicting the future — but such predictions are still more likely than not to be wrong. Those who postulate and prognosticate on the future of warfare, and those consuming their output, would be well served by keeping this in mind. Such is the nature of predicting the future writ large, and this applies in the realm of warfare. The future is inherently unknowable as will be demonstrated through reviewing the general experience of prediction and then confirming this phenomenon applies to predicting future warfare. Acceptance of the unlikelihood of successful prediction should be cause for introspection; whilst several measures are offered, it is humility which is paramount.

the surest predictions tend to be those that are the most conservative, but their conservativeness lends those predictions to being less empowering for leaders.A desire to know the future is an innately human need. The methods may have evolved over time, with examination of entrails now less common and the use of computational power on the rise. Alongside the more structured disciplines of the modern era such as technology foresight, there remains adherence to less robust approaches such as that of astrology, which has seen a rise in interest over the last few years though this may be attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic.[1] While some approaches may be more successful than others, the surest predictions tend to be those that are the most conservative, but their conservativeness lends those predictions to being less empowering for leaders.

Predicting the future of war is a compelling need for security institutions. The difficulty of anticipating the trends of future warfare are well commented on, from Clausewitz’s characterisation of war as a chameleon to Lawrence Freedman’s acknowledgement that such “prediction is difficult and likely to be wrong.”[2] Driven by institutional necessity as well as intellectual curiosity, scholars and military professionals have relied upon the study of history to inform societies, states, and their institutions about how they might prepare for and conceptualise future warfare. The episodic nature of war precludes military professionals from benefiting from the kind of experiential learning that doctors and lawyers rely on to mature and adapt their professions and associated institutions.[3] Thus, history provides the necessary and proper substitute for security institutions and their professionals to broaden their understanding of war and the most useful basis for extrapolating about its future character.

More specifically, predictions exist within a larger theory of causation.History may be the best foundation for predicting the future of war, but the reality that prediction is likely to be wrong remains valid. More specifically, predictions exist within a larger theory of causation. Thus discrete, erroneous prediction by a theorist can invalidate their larger theory of future war. Giulio Douhet’s enthusiastic advocacy for the coming dominance of the air domain in 1921 was, he asserted, based on historical analysis. He stated that the lesson to be learnt from World War I was that war on land would inevitably devolve into attritional stalemate owing to the primacy of the defensive means.[4] It was the unlikelihood of decision on land that made Douhet assert that air would be the decisive domain in future conflict due to offensive primacy of aircraft. Bernard Brodie offered that Douhet was not alone in this misreading of the historical lessons of World War I and overlooking the return to manoeuvre demonstrated by both sides of the conflict on the Western Front in the final campaigns of 1918.[5]

*Giulio Douhet (* *Wikipedia**)*

Where Douhet made a mistake in his reading of history, there can also be risks associated with wilful misreading or misrepresentation of history. John Mearsheimer in his acerbic Liddell Hart and the Weight of History asserts that Liddell Hart wilfully misrepresented history to create the impression that he had a decisive influence over the German Army in the lead up to and during World War II, amongst other transgressions such as retroactively changing his commentary on contemporary events.[6] Mearsheimer accused Liddell Hart of deliberate deception and considered the case an example of “the fragility of history and the importance of being alert to the danger of its manipulation for selfish purposes.”[7] Noting there are several rebuttals to Mearsheimer’s work, John Harris characterises the core critique of Liddell Hart was that while he was an admirable historian, he was unreliable as a historian of his own times and “especially with regard to issues in which he was personally involved.”[8] In predicting the future on the basis of history it is natural to use the most recent history as the basis for extrapolation, however proximity to events can cloud the effectiveness of historical analysis.

 Buy on Amazon  Mistakes in interpretation and misrepresentation of history are also susceptible to the bias, whether individual or institutional, of predetermined outcomes. A purist approach might be to suggest that one could discretely examine the historical event or period, with lessons or trends identified being derived from an objective assessment in isolation. However, this approach opens the door to interminable disputes over particular factors, technologies or military institutions that were decisive in an isolated instance.[9] Such varied debate should be welcomed. Even so, deriving insights for the future from history in isolation should be guarded against to avoid being misled by oversimplifying history through analogy. Neustadt and May in their work on applied history in the 1970s and 80s identified cases of policymakers making false equivalences between North Korean aggression in 1950 to Nazi Germany in the 1930s as well as flawed comparisons made between the French and American challenges in Vietnam.[10]

Whilst a single prediction can be accurate, this does not imply the predictor will always be accurate. A twenty year study of forecasting conducted by Philip Tetlock found that the average results for 28,000 predictions failed to exceed the performance of blind or uninformed choice.[11] Daniel Kahneman’s work on cognitive bias further confirms the pervasive influence of biases as observed by others on Strategy Bridge in the context of decision making.[12] Kahneman corroborates Tetlock’s findings that biases overly influence forecasts.[13] To counteract the effect of bias, he also offers advice about how we should treat outliers, i.e., those who have successfully made accurate predictions about the future in opposition to the trend of mostly being wrong. Kahneman asserts that prediction is subject to the rule of ‘regression to the mean’ where performance that is outside the expected average is unlikely to be sustained or enduring.[14] Using the example of a stock trader picking a well performing stock, he argues that it is likely that any individual trader will be outperformed by a market index over a series of picks over time.[15]

So what do we do if we’re going to be wrong?While there may be reason to doubt the accuracy of prediction, thinking about the future of conflict remains an important element of preparing for war, and military institutions have largely recognized its necessity. Acknowledgement that predictions are likely wrong should change behaviour.

If one accepts that the character of future warfare cannot be entirely anticipated, one can then aim closer to the mark that is both more useful and accurate. Humility in the practice and presentation of prediction should be the first response. Introspection may also facilitate a more ruthless examination of the assumptions which underlie one’s thesis — overconfidence and conviction can blind an author. While any author will naturally favour their position, having a firm awareness of bias and contingency and the concomitant humility are fundamental to a more authentic engagement with alternate views. If one accepts that the character of future warfare cannot be entirely anticipated, one can then aim closer to the mark that is both more useful and accurate.

The most consequential objective a force can pursue is maintaining the capacity for adaptation.Hedging is an appropriate response to uncertainty; maintaining a balanced approach which can react to a number of alternate futures. Douhet was so convinced that the air domain would be dominant in future conflict that he advocated for massive reallocation from the navy and army to fund an “Independent Air Force.”[16] Following his exhortations would have resulted in an unbalanced force of limited utility in the realised character of conflict that did not reflect his predictions. After avoiding the force design equivalent of placing all your money on a single horse, the most consequential objective a force can pursue is maintaining the capacity for adaptation. Adaptation capitalises on a hedging approach to predictions, and indeed it is premised on the fact that anticipating the exact character of future conflict is near impossible.[17] The aim of prediction could change to being least wrong when compared to potential adversaries, in order to reduce the adaptation required.

The nature of predicting the future is that the majority of predictions will be wrong. The nature of predicting the future is that the majority of predictions will be wrong. This has been demonstrated in the case of generic predictions and predictions relating to the future of warfare. History is recognised as the best foundation for predicting the future of warfare yet the use, or claimed use, of history as the basis for prediction does not offer a panacea. When practitioners and audiences for predictions of future warfare accept that any individual predictions is likely to be wrong, several conclusions naturally follow such as maintaining a sense of humility and hedging force design so as not to overcommit to any one future vision. Maintaining awareness that predictions of warfare are likely wrong should lead to maintaining a broader aperture and openness to contrary views.

 Buy on Amazon  History has also demonstrated periods where predictions of warfare have coalesced and when proven wrong have had devastating results. This is exemplified by Ivan Bloch in 1899 who presciently identified many, though not all, of the characteristics of warfare encountered in World War I.[18] Largely dismissed at the time, the accuracy of his prediction was only realised in hindsight in large part owing to its divergence from the accepted orthodoxy.[19] Given any single prediction is likely to be wrong, those interested in the future character of warfare would be well served by entertaining non-conformist predictions of the future, lest they miss the next Bloch.

Will Hitchen is an officer in the Australian Army. The views expressed are the author's and do not reflect the official position of the Australian Army, the Australian Department of Defence, or the Australian Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: First World War Fortress Chiusaforte, 2019 (Austrian National Library).

Notes: [1] Ian Miles, "The development of technology foresight: A review," Technological Forecasting and Social Change 77, no. 9 (2010), 1448-1450; Kristoffer Lopez et al., "Social contagion of astrology in the social media amid COVID-19 pandemic," International Journal of Multidisciplinary: Applied Business and Education Research 2, no. 4 (2021), 350-351; Abhilasha Das et al., "Fixating on the future: An overview of increased astrology use," International Journal of Social Psychiatry 68, no. 5 (2022), 931.

[2] Carl von Clausewitz, On War, ed. and trans. Michael Howard and Peter Paret (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984), 89; Lawrence Freedman, The Future of War: A History (New York: Public Affairs, 2017), xvi.

[3] Michael Howard, "The Use and Abuse of Military History," Parameters XI, no. 1 (1981): 13.

[4] Giulio Douhet, The Command of the Air, trans. Dino Ferrari (Washington, D.C.: Office of Air Force History, 1983), 35.

[5] Bernard Brodie would note that Douhet “was not the only student of World War One, either lay or professional, who deduced the same lesson from the experience of that war without somehow taking into account such events as the German offensive of March 1918.” Bernard Brodie, Strategy in the Missile Age (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1959), 80.

[6] John Mearsheimer, Liddell Hart and the Weight of History (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1988).

[7] John Mearsheimer, Liddell Hart and the Weight of History, 13.

[8] Paul Harris, Men, ideas and tanks: British military thought and armoured forces, 1903-1939 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995).

[9] Daryl Press, "The Myth of Air Power in the Persian Gulf War and the Future of Warfare," International Security 26, no. 2 (2001).

[10] Richard Neustadt and Ernest May, Thinking in Time: The Uses of History for Decision Makers (New York: The Free Press, 1986), 34-46, 157-171.

[11] Philp E Tetlock, Expert Political Judgment: How Good Is It? How Can We Know? (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005).

[12] James Davitch, "Do Not Trust Your Gut: How to Improve Strategists' Decision Making," The Strategy Bridge (2022), https://thestrategybridge.org/the-bridge/2022/8/31/do-not-trust-your-gut-how-to-improve-strategists-decision-making.

[13] Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow (Great Britain: Allen Lane, 2011), 209-221.

[14] Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow, 175-184

[15] Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow, 220-221. Warren Buffett is considered the champion of the argument that individual stock picking is outmatched by following indexes. See Warren Buffett, "Berkshire's Performance vs the S&P 500," Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (25 Feb 2017 2017), https://www.berkshirehathaway.com/letters/2016ltr.pdf.

[16] Douhet, The Command of the Air, 24, 30, 187, 199-200, 228-234.

[17] An important topic, but unable to be discussed in any detail in this paper. See: Williamson Murray, Military Adaptation in War (Alexandria, VA: Institute for Defence Analyses, 2009); Frank Hoffman, Mars Adapting: Military Change During War (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2021).

[18] Ivan Bloch, Is War Now Impossible? (London: Grant Richards, 1899).

[19] Michael Welch, "The Centenary of the British Publication of Jean de Bloch's Is War Now Impossible? (1899-1999)," War in History 7, no. 3 (2000): 275-278.

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In 2022, we considered questions ranging from identifying the greatest weakness of the U.S. in the national security arena to considering how to de-center the U.S. in discussions, expand the array of perspectives, and bring together fresh solutions and new ideas.

To begin 2023, we wanted to explore the relationship between historical lessons and preparation for an unknown future. A wide array of thinkers have inspired this theme, including Lawrence Freedman. In The Future of War: A History, Freedman explainsthat the future is so difficult to predict because “it depends on choices that have yet to be made, including by our own governments, in circumstances that remain uncertain.” Freedman continues to unpack this notion, stating:

History is made by people who do not know what is going to happen next. Many developments that were awaited, either fearfully or eagerly, never happened. Those things that did happen were sometimes seen to be inevitable in retrospect but they were rarely identified as inevitable in prospect.[1]

This quarterly thus examines preparation for future warfare based on historical lessons, learned or not. How have states and other actors envisioned future warfare? How did they prepare, or fail to prepare, for future warfare? Are these lessons of use to states and other actors as they prepare for future conflict?

First, Will Hitchen begins this quarter by reminding us that most forward-leaning predictions are just wrong. The author explores prediction in general before honing in on how often past predictions about future warfare have been erroneous. Predictions fail for a number of reasons, including misapplying history or even misrepresenting it. One solution to best preparing for future warfare includes hedging to prepare for a variety of different potential developments.

Next, Amos Fox identifies four different schools of thought to understand how institutions and individuals view future conflict: the futurist, the traditionalist, the institutionalist, and the conflict realist. Only by blending each camp, Fox contends, can militaries best prepare for future warfare.

Samuel Shamburg acknowledges how much history shapes theory and doctrine, but argues that military leaders often fail to use history appropriately. Planners can help resolve this challenge by engaging in better scenario planning, especially looking for leading indicators that so often result due to scenario planning. If one considers a future scenario as akin to a maze, then these indicators are like breadcrumbs that provide “signals to watch for,” helping create mindsets that allow leaders to respond better when tomorrow becomes today.

Nate Bump then suggests that story matters more in avoiding past catastrophes than predicting specific events years into the future. As British soldier and military historian B.H. Liddell Hart concludes, “the value of history is in the countless repeated ways things can go wrong.”[2] This piece examines recent thinking and planning examples to better understand how states effectively envision future warfare by examining their performance in past and present conflict to include how lessons learned were applied by the countries in focus, or not.

Next, Peter Hickman highlights how even the most studious military professionals can often repeat previous military predecessors by exploring Napoleon’s disastrous invasion into Russia. The author argues that because politics shapes strategy, situations that may superficially appear to be similar are in reality “utterly unique, unbounded, and rarely conform to previous experience.”

Then Kyle Rable highlights the US Army’s “amnesia” regarding unconventional wars, arguing that the institution stubbornly refuses to use history correctly. Rather than learning lessons from conflicts in Vietnam and Afghanistan, the Army instead pushes learning opportunities aside and rushes headlong into developing new doctrine for high-intensity conflict.

Timur Nersesov then walks us backward before Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine to argue that the US failed the international world order regarding the Armenia and Azerbaijan conflict, thereby helping to precipitate the Russian invasion of Ukraine. That the US did not respond is even more surprising in light of the past 30 years of US involvement seeking to mediate between the two warring nations. The international community has taken a Jekyll and Hyde approach to these recent conflicts although both overlap in being “ ethnic-territorial disputes between early democracies and autocratic neighbors.”

Ryan Easterday then returns to a more macro-level discussion of the tendency of nations to forget one of the recurring lessons of history: that wars rarely turn out to be as short as expected or hoped. An enduring historical lesson is the need to resist such overoptimism and plan for a potentially long and highly attritional conflict.

In keeping with Lawrence Freedman’s warning as to how often predictions fail, Cameron Ross next advises leaders to be humble regarding future anticipations. In the face of an unknown future, the best course of action involves pursuing flexibility in shaping strategy, training, and acquisition to best hedge against the impact of unexpected developments.

In a similar vein, Ian Li highlights two cautionary themes for military professionals. There can be a danger in looking backwards for historical parallels, such as reflexively viewing tensions between the US and China as another Cold War running the risk of ignoring significant contextual differences. Additionally, it is not enough to study recent history out of the assumption that it has more relevance for future warfare.

Finally, Bryce Johnston looks to the past to forecast the future with the warning that technology has not simply had an additive effect historically; rather, it has been fundamentally transformative, albeit not in the way that proponents of the revolution in military affairs have argued. Johnston points to how it is not always the flashy technologies like hypersonics and drones that have the greatest effects on warfare and society. This point is important because of the sweeping changes that have begun occurring to warfare because of large-language models and the impact they will have on automating staff work, thereby transforming warfare by greatly speeding up decision making.

This collection of essays represents a varied set of ideas and arguments from our community. Considered together, they give us a point from which to continue the conversation about what history can, or cannot, tell us about the future of conflict.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Vintage portrait photography collection, Paris France, 2016 (Fabien Barral).

Notes: [1] Lawrence Freedman, The Future of War: A History (New York: Public Affairs, 2017), xviii-xix.

[2] B.H. Liddell Hart, Why Don’t We Learn From History?

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The Lone Leopard. Sharifullah Dorani. Bedford, England: S&M Publishing House, 2022.

In his novel The Lone Leopard, Sharifullah Dorani provides a sweeping view of the struggle that Afghans endured under the burden of foreign influence, ethnic and religious seams, and the clash between traditional conservative cultural norms versus more modern liberal western ideals. The book does an excellent job of bringing the reader into the complicated societal mosaic that makes Afghanistan so unique. Dorani provides enough historical context through his narrative and characters, without excruciating detail, that even those unfamiliar with the region can follow the plot through its twists and turns. Ultimately, The Lone Leopard captivates and brings to life the determination and humanity of the Afghan people as they face obstacles in their struggle to survive and maintain their dignity.

The book’s lengthy 400 pages are divided into two parts covering separate time periods. The story begins in Part 1 with its main protagonist, Ahmad Azizi, a 15-year-old seeing his normal life in 1992 Kabul rapidly destabilizing as competing rebel Mujahideen factions fight for control of Afghanistan. In Part 2, the saga fast-forwards to 2013, as Ahmad has just graduated from medical school and returned to Afghanistan to find a wife after a 20-year exile in England.

 Buy on Amazon  Dorani describes Kabul, and Afghanistan more broadly, as a melting pot of different ethnicities and religious factions that exist in the region. The Soviet Invasion and 10-year period of control dumped a new secular set of values and institutions into the bubbling ethnic cauldron. It is after the Soviet withdrawal, and near the end of the Soviet-backed government of Mohammad Najibullah, that Part 1 describes the ethnic and religious friction affecting Ahmad’s friends and family, fueling the instability that tears his world apart. Dorani details several instances where Ahmad’s conservative Sunni Pashtun neighbors ostracize Shia and non-Pashtun Afghans. Ahmad is a proud Pashtun who embraces his Sunni roots, yet embraces the ethnic diversity of his friends, school, and neighborhood. When asked, Ahmad defines Pashtunwali, the code-of-conduct for the Pashtun populations of Afghanistan, as standing for “independence, bravery, loyalty, justice, revenge, self-respect, righteousness, pride, honour, chastity, hospitality, love, forgiveness, tolerance, faith and respect of elders.”[1] The hardline mujahadeen in Part I, and the Taliban from the latter time-period, are more focused on the first 10 attributes from the code, and less on the last five. Those vying for control of Kabul in the book’s first half hold their highest level of disdain and seek the severest “justice” and “revenge” against the Afghans that cooperated with the Soviets and the Najibullah regime. Throughout the book, Dorani effectively reveals this resentment against non-Muslim foreign powers in Afghanistan, most specifically the Soviet Union and the United States.

Makroryan may have been an ideal neighborhood for elites living there, it showcased unfair advantages, drawing envy and bitterness from those living elsewhere in Kabul, and fueling the growing insurgency against the soon-to-be-deposed government. Following the Soviet withdrawal, Dorani reveals the tension between the secularized Afghan government and Afghan society and highlights how Afghans that cooperated were granted favors. Makroryan, the nice area of town where government bureaucrats and their families lived, including Ahmad, symbolized the new decadence that many conservative Afghans believed soiled their country. Early in the book, Ahmad describes his neighborhood.

The Central Heating kept our apartments warm as a sauna. The Mirror Show on television broadcast Kabulis queuing up with their coupons and complaining that their Soviet-subsidized cooperatives had run out of this or that. Supplies were never exhausted in Makroryan.[2]

Dorani shows us that while Makroryan may have been an ideal neighborhood for elites living there, it showcased unfair advantages, drawing envy and bitterness from those living elsewhere in Kabul, and fueling the growing insurgency against the soon-to-be-deposed government.

Ahmad’s return to Kabul in 2013 in Part 2 witnesses the attitude of Afghans towards American involvement, and the resentment from the population. Many in Kabul appreciate the American presence and protection and enjoy the more Western way-of-life, while others, particularly the more conservative Pashtuns, resent the United States for their promotion of un-Islamic values and rampant corruption and incompetence of the leaders backed by American diplomats and soldiers. One of the book’s positive examples of Afghanistan’s pro-American faction rests in one of its main characters, Dorani’s heroic Frishta, “the lone leopard.” Frishta becomes Ahmad’s love interest, and is fervently pro-women’s rights. She perseveres through persecution and imprisonment by the Taliban only to flourish after the Americans arrive, ultimately becoming a powerful Member of Parliament (MP) by the time Ahmad returns to Kabul. As a teen, Frishta tells Ahmad, “If I lock you up and deprive you of an education, you’d equally become ‘stupid, frail, and a sex object.’”[3] She adds, “Educate us, and we’d be neither stupid nor a sex object.”[4] Later MP Frishta tells her American mentors, “Afghanistan’s women today aren’t the women of ten years ago. Our rights are now enshrined in the Constitution. We enter education and the workplace. We freely express our views.”[5] Frishta’s character is a prime example and composite of those in Afghanistan who supported America’s presence and the changes that followed, but there were many who opposed it.

In contrast to Frishta, Dorani vividly portrays the bitterness and anger against United States involvement, not just through the eyes of the Taliban, but also ordinary Afghans as well. Near the end of the book, a Taliban leader angrily sums up the general feeling, stating that the Americans and the British have “Oppressed our brothers and sisters. Insulted our religion. Stained our honour. Snatched our independence. Undermined our dignity.”[6] Ahmad’s own mother praises the Taliban for “bringing back Pashtunwali,” and believed the Americans had “ulterior motives.”[7] Even Ahmad himself, having spent virtually all of his adult life in England, and who shared many Western beliefs on the place of women in society, believes that “Americans were culturally insensitive by inspecting private areas on people” and agreed with his mother that war against Western occupation was “as much about ‘protecting Pashtunwali’ as it was about Islam.”[8]

Sharifullah Dorani provides an interesting, suspenseful, and impactful story that should especially appeal to those who want to learn more about Afghanistan’s complex culture and recent tumultuous history. The Lone Leopard is Dorani’s second book and first novel, and it follows the release of his historical analysis, America in Afghanistan.[9] In this novel, Dorani does a decent job providing an interesting storyline that gradually rises in intensity and drama, holding the reader’s interest through the slightly too-long 400 pages. Yet this reviewer was mildly disappointed in two areas. First, both Ahmad and Frishta develop a deep love for each other during the chaotic collapse in 1992, sharing very intimate details of family backgrounds and tragedy with each other. Yet, as Ahmad’s family flees Kabul, they part without either verbalizing their feelings for the other. This avoidant behavior continues after they reunite in Part 2, and lasts all the way through to the last chapter, where the reader suddenly finds the whole situation resolved without getting to share in its climax.

Secondly, through its depiction of several major violent attacks occurring in short order, the book makes 2013 Kabul seem far less safe than it really was, reinforcing the stereotype of the Afghan capital as an extremely dangerous city during this timeframe. This false narrative, fueled by the “if it bleeds, it leads” nature of western news stories, belies the truth. The Kabul of 2013 was the 5th fastest growing city in the world, with the causes of its growth “the toppling of the Taliban…the hope of increased security and economic possibilities…people displaced by fighting in the countryside, refugees returning from Pakistan and Iran, and hordes of labourers simply looking for a better life.”[10] This rapid rise in population did lead to “criminality and economic malaise.”[11] However, Dorani’s 2013 Kabul is a place civilians seemingly cannot walk down the street without risking their lives, which was not the case.[12] While he should be allowed artistic license to add to the excitement of the storyline, the unfortunate side effect is that readers not familiar with Afghanistan may be unintentionally misled as to the extent the Taliban insurgency negatively affected the Afghan capital.

With his novel, The Lone Leopard, Sharifullah Dorani provides an interesting, suspenseful, and impactful story that should especially appeal to those who want to learn more about Afghanistan’s complex culture and recent tumultuous history. Although the ending was abrupt, the work offers a unique understanding of the complex cultural web that defined Afghanistan in general and Kabul in particular. Those only familiar with Afghanistan’s tumultuous 20 year period following the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001 will be particularly enlightened by the look at Kabul and its residents as they were caught in the middle of the turbulent 10-year transition between Moscow’s control and the eventual takeover by the Taliban in 1996. Readers of this book will no doubt reflect on the fact that Afghanistan has cycled back to Taliban control. Further, one cannot help being saddened by the fact that there are real-world “Frishtas” suffering under this new regime. Hopefully, Afghanistan’s history will continue to repeat itself, and the Taliban will be thrown off at some point in the not-so-distant future, and “lone leopards” can once again roam freely in this proud graveyard of empires.

Matthew C. Brand, is currently the Course Director for three Airpower courses at Air University’s Global College of PME. He previously served as the Director, Air University’s Spaatz Academic Centers, and a faculty member of Air War College where he taught Strategy and International Security Studies. He is the author of Resourcing General McChrystal’s Counterinsurgency Campaign; The 2009 “Troop-to-Task” Planning Effort to Determine the Right Force Package Necessary to Defeat the Insurgency in AfghanistanandGeneral McChrystal’s Strategic Assessment; Evaluating the Operating Environment in Afghanistan in the Summer of 2009, both published by Air University Press. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Air Force, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: View of Bibi Mahru, Kabul, Afghanistan, 2017 (Tyrell Mayfield).

Notes: [1] Sharifullah Dorani, The Lone Leopard (Bedford, England, The UK: S&M Publishing House, 2022), 68.

[2] Dorani, The Lone Leopard, 4.

[3] Dorani, The Lone Leopard, 69.

[4] Dorani, The Lone Leopard, 69.

[5] Dorani, The Lone Leopard, 298.

[6] Dorani, The Lone Leopard, 259.

[7] Dorani, The Lone Leopard, 247.

[8] Dorani, The Lone Leopard, 360.

[9] Sharifullah Dorani, America in Afghanistan: Foreign Policy and Decision Making from Bush to Obama to Trump. (London, England, The UK: I.B. Tauris, 2019).

[10] Sune Engel Rasmussen, “Kabul - The Fifth Fastest Growing City in the World - is Bursting at the Seams,” The Guardian, December 11, 2014, Guardian News & Media Limited, US Edition New York, NY, https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2014/dec/11/kabul-afghanistan-fifth-fastest-growning-city-world-rapid-urbanization.

[11] Rasmussen, “Kabul - The Fifth Fastest Growing City in the World - is Bursting at the Seams.”

[12] Dr. Antonio Giustozzi testimony and United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan report as part of testimony and evidence for the Immigration and Asylum Chamber, United Kingdom, 14, 15 March 2012, Background Evidence, Sections 15 and 51-55, Levels of Violence: Targeting of civilians; Levels of Violence: Targeted categories of civilians, bailii.org/uk/cases/UKUT/IAC/2012/163.html .

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Against All Tides: The Untold Story of the USS Kitty Hawk Race Riot. Marv Truhe. Chicago, IL: Lawrence Hill Books, 2022.

Looking forward to the calendar year 1972, Chief of Naval Operations Elmo Zumwalt saw continuing challenges facing the United States Navy. In his Z-gram No. 104, entitled “Challenge of 1972,” he looked at all that had been accomplished during his roughly eighteen months on the job as the head of the U.S. Navy.[1] He was a reformer, pushing the Navy in several directions simultaneously. He was liberalizing the living standards of sailors, adjusting liberty and grooming standards, and moving toward a more equitable fleet for the service of women and minorities. Simultaneously, the service was dealing with the “Vietnamization challenge,” as he called it in Z-gram 65, with the closing year of U.S. involvement in the conflict in Indochina approaching.[2]

Amidst the numerous issues Zumwalt said naval leaders needed to deal with were “understanding the people they lead” and the “the challenge of sociological change.” He continued, “We must continue to work within and without the Navy in seeking solutions to such problems as drug abuse, racial discrimination and bias, and the improving of our environment.”[3] Ten months later, the lack of progress on this challenge made its dramatic appearance when violence broke out on the night of 12 October 1972 aboard USS Kitty Hawk, a U.S. carrier on Yankee Station off the coast of Vietnam.

The “Kitty Hawk Race Riot'' holds an important place in American naval history. An illustration of the deep and unavoidable connections between the sailors and officers of the Navy and the society they served during the Civil Rights era, it is often mentioned in passing but rarely examined in detail.The “Kitty Hawk Race Riot'' holds an important place in American naval history. An illustration of the deep and unavoidable connections between the sailors and officers of the Navy and the society they served during the Civil Rights era, it is often mentioned in passing but rarely examined in detail. Marv Truhe’s new book Against All Tides: The Untold Story of the USS Kitty Hawk Race Riot sets out to rectify that oversight and to help readers dive deeply into both the details of the history and the important questions it raises about the Navy of the 1970s as well as the Navy of the 21st century.

Over the years, the importance of those events and the injustices involved stayed with him, leading him to return to his case files after nearly fifty years to write what he describes as the first telling of the history from the sailor’s point of view. Buy on Amazon Truhe came to the topic with a unique background. As part of his later career, he served as the Assistant Attorney General of South Dakota, running the trial division of the Attorney General's Office, before moving to a career in private practice in Rapid City, South Dakota, and eventually retiring to Colorado. However, in 1972 Truhe was a Navy Lieutenant a year and a half out of Northwestern University Law School and the Naval Justice School, serving in his first duty station as a Judge Advocate General (JAG) at the U.S. Naval Station Law Center in San Diego. Working as trial counsel at the Law Center, Lieutenant Truhe was assigned as defense counsel to five of the twenty-five African American sailors who were charged with several crimes, including rioting, following the incidents of 12 October 1972. Over the years, the importance of those events and the injustices involved stayed with him, leading him to return to his case files after nearly fifty years to write what he describes as the first telling of the history from the sailor’s point of view.

On the night of 12 October 1972, as Kitty Hawk secured from operations and prepared to rest before the next day’s flight operations, violence broke out below decks. It was the culmination of a perfect storm of events. The exhaustion of a crew working hard at the mission after a record 155 days on Yankee Station played a role. Inconsistent adjudication by the Captain during nonjudicial punishment proceedings—or “Captain’s Mast”—that seemed to punish African Americans more harshly than White sailors played a role. Aggressive and inconsistent action by the Marine detachment on board the ship played a role. And a confused night of orders and countermanding orders by leaders aboard the ship played a role. These are just a handful of the causes for the violence that seemed to break out in individual cases and in small groups in numerous parts of the ship.

Truhe offers a new and different view, constructed from contemporary records and the memories of African-American sailors.From his case records and interaction with the sailors involved in the incidents, Truhe reconstructs events from the deck plate level. We learn the official statistics of the incident, showing that only White sailors were injured and that no White sailors committed violent acts, are likely the result of poor record keeping. Later testimony showed that in the ship’s medical office records were not created for all of the sailors treated and choices made by the all-white master-at-arms shop (the ship’s police force) in recording accusations and incidents. We learn that White sailors also joined in on the violence and sought out Black sailors to assault. We learn of the racial epithets that were commonplace and which the Captain himself heard used repeatedly and did nothing to correct. We learn that much of the crew, perhaps even a majority, had no idea that these small and isolated brawls were happening and that the events had no operational impact: missions were launched on time the next day.

Prior authors have relied on the misleading, or at least incomplete, records and the decades-old memories of White sailors to make the “riot” label for events on Kitty Hawk stick, and some even went further to construct a narrative of an aggressive “Black Power” mutiny.[4] However, with no organization, no political goals or intent, and only a small number of the crew even aware it was happening, whether or not it was a riot at all is certainly questionable. Truhe offers a new and different view, constructed from contemporary records and the memories of African-American sailors. Readers come away from Truhe’s narrative with a more balanced and well sourced grasp of the events and contributing factors than the Navy’s official report and the congressional hearings that followed, or from other histories written by journalists with a flair for dramatic exaggeration.[5]

As much as it is a book of history, the strength of Against all Tides is its form as a legal memoir.As much as it is a book of history, the strength of Against all Tides is its form as a legal memoir. Besides the events of October 1972, Truhe also tells the story of the legal battles that would follow. It is a story backed up by his own memories, his personal involvement in key decisions and courtroom drama, and the voluminous case files. In addition to a flawed investigation and questionable charges brought against more than two dozen Black sailors, the reader sees the complexities of the military justice system, including what happens when convening authorities make questionable decisions that tip the scales of justice toward their desired results. Throughout, we see Navy JAGs working alongside lawyers from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) retained by the defendants, leaders from Washington, D.C., with unclear understanding of the events, and documented perjury and racism from accusers.

This book gives readers a new perspective on an event described as “a big deal” by many senior leaders both in the era of the incident as well as today.[6] But it also gives a sailor’s-eye view that in many cases reveals what can only be described as injustice. This reviewer often found himself with a clenched jaw after reading portions of the story, portions that included the questionable behavior of senior officers and the structure of a system that seemed intent on letting them tip the scales. Truhe’s book raises important questions about unconscious bias, the racism of the 1960s and 1970s, and Zumwalt’s call for leaders to make an effort towards “understanding the people they lead,” not only in the 1970s but also today. And it illustrated the vagaries of the military justice system, reinforcing the wisdom of recent policy that removed much of the power of convening authorities from cases of sexual assault.

Just as the history of the U.S. Navy is more than a mere history of ships, bombs, and battles, Marvin Truhe’s Against All Tides is more than simply Black History or legal memoir. It is an important contribution to our understanding of American naval and maritime history. The social history of African Americans in the Navy—from the volunteer enlisted Black sailors of the age of sail, through the “contraband” heroes of the Civil War like Robert Smalls, to President Truman’s executive order to desegregate the military, and Zumwalt’s efforts at greater inclusion—is important to understanding the fleet of the 21st century. The bottom-up approach of Truhe’s book, from the deck plates as we might say in the naval service, offers important insights and a valuable addition to our understanding of the experiences of our naval past.

BJ Armstrong is a historian and Principal Associate of the Forum on Integrated Naval History and Seapower Studies. He is the co-author of Developing the Naval Mind and editor of the forthcoming revised and expanded second edition of 21st Century Mahan: Sound Military Conclusions for the Modern Era. Opinions expressed here are offered in his personal and academic capacity and do not reflect the policies or views of the U.S. Navy, the Department of Defense or any government organization.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

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Header Image: Ex-USS Kitty Hawk Departs Bremerton, Bremerton, Washington 2022 (Petty Officer 1st Class Heather Wamsley).

Notes: [1] Elmo Zumwalt, “Z-Gram No. 104,” https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/z/list-z-grams/z-gram-104.html.

[2] Elmo Zumwalt, “Z-Gram No. 65,” https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/z/list-z-grams/z-gram-65.html.

[3] Zumwalt, “Z-Gram No. 104.”

[4] Gregory A. Freeman, Troubled Water: Race, Mutiny, and Bravery on the USS Kitty Hawk (New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 2010).

[5] “Report by the Special Subcommittee on Disciplinary Problems in the US Navy,” Pub. L. No. H.A.S.C. 92-81, § House Committee on Armed Forces (1973). The most even handed prior treatment of the events on Kitty Hawk can be found in John Sherwood, Black Sailor, White Navy: Racial Unrest in the Fleet during the Vietnam War Era (New York and London: New York University Press, 2007)

[6] “Episode 163: Admiral Mike Mullen, Part II,” Preble Hall Podcast, https://naval-history-lyceum.simplecast.com/episodes/admiral-mike-mullen-part-ii-q3FzfOfD.

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On the 24th of February 2022, Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Within weeks, U.S. generals began pointing to examples of lessons learned from the early days of the conflict that reinforced preexisting beliefs. For example, Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army, General James McConville, repeated the maxim that amateurs study tactics and professionals study logistics; General Mark Kelly, Commander of Air Combat Command, pointed to a lack of air superiority as Russia’s problem; while General Berger, Commandant of the Marine Corps, used the conflict to argue that “winning the reconnaissance/counter-reconnaissance fight early on [is] critical.”[1] As the war approached the six-month mark, the conversation increasingly turned to the familiar question of what allies and potential adversaries might be learning tactically, operationally, strategically, and geopolitically.[2]

The challenge here is twofold. First, the desire to collect lessons learned often drives analysis to the tactical or, at best, operational level where information is more granular and events and actions are easier to measure or quantify. Second, these analyses look to apply these lessons to preparation for the next conflict–though we cannot know how, when, or where it will take place. Militaries are notoriously bad at predicting future conflicts, an argument Lawrence Freedman makes in his book The Future of War.[3]

How then should we reflect on this experience? For 2Q23 we want to look back instead of to the future, and ask: What happens to previously held assumptions in the wake of Russia's naked aggression? Which are challenged and which are validated?

Submissions should conform to our submission guidelines. They should be concisely written, 1000-2000 words in length (excluding citations), and must include appropriate footnotes formatted consistent with the Chicago Manual of Style.

Submissions should be scoped narrowly enough to make a complete and meaningful argument that is backed up by evidence. All submissions must be received no later than 3 April 2023. Those submissions selected for publication will be published beginning in early May 2023. We highly encourage writers to download our submissions template to save you time and to ensure that your submission comports with our editorial requirements.

We know our community will have ideas to add to this conversation and we look forward to reading your writing.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Operation in Eastern Ukraine, 2022 (Ministry of Defense of Ukraine).

Notes: [1] Valerie Insinna, “Top American Generals on Three Key Lessons Learned from Ukraine,” Breaking Defense, March 12, 2022, https://breakingdefense.com/2022/03/top-american-generals-on-three-key-lessons-learned-from-ukraine/.

[2] Evan A. Feigenbaum and Charles Hooper, “What the Chinese Army Is Learning From Russia’s Ukraine War,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, July 21, 2011, https://carnegieendowment.org/2022/07/21/what-chinese-army-is-learning-from-russia-s-ukraine-war-pub-87552; Franz-Stephan Gady, “6 Wrong Lessons for Taiwan From the War in Ukraine,” Foreign Policy, November 2, 2022, https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/11/02/lessons-ukraine-russia-war-taiwan-china-military-weapons-strategy-tactics/.

[3] Lawrence Freedman, The Future of War (New York, NY: Hachette Book Group, 2017).

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The Digital Silk Road: China’s Quest to Wire the World and Win the Future. Jonathan E. Hillman. New York, NY: Harper Business, 2021.

China’s “Digital Silk Road” is an amorphous program spanning, among other things, surveillance technology, telecommunications, sea-based sub-surface data cables and landing stations, the BeiDou satellite navigation system, and, of course, China’s internet guarded by the so-called “Great Firewall.” The Digital Silk Road was first described in 2015 as part of Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s Belt and Road Initiative. In The Digital Silk Road: China’s Quest to Wire the World and Win the Future, Jonathan Hillman describes what he found after exploring various aspects of the project by, among other things, attending academic conferences, taking online sales training programs, and even visiting Huawei switches installed in a rural Montana network provider. In the late 1990s, former Chinese General Secretary Jiang Zemin directed that the primary purpose of the tech industry in the People’s Republic was to support the Chinese military. Hillman illustrates how at this time Western political and business leaders speciously believed that opening global markets to the People’s Republic of China, admitting it to the World Trade Organization, and exporting technology to China, would liberalize the communist state. His book repeatedly demonstrates how these policies (in combination with Chinese intellectual property theft, cyber-attacks, and reverse engineering), in the words of former Director of the National Security Agency, General Keith Alexander, led to the “single greatest transfer of wealth in history.”[1] While many are now aware of the problem, the book documents how disjointed and scattershot any response to the threat has been.

 Buy on Amazon  This short, yet comprehensive, and extensively documented examination of the Digital Silk Road and the Chinese Communist Party’s efforts to develop world-dominating technology (through collaboration between the military, state-owned enterprises, and closely associated parastatal private companies), will be of interest to policymakers, national security professionals, and hopefully U.S. and Western business leaders. That said, the book regularly engenders feelings of disgust, disappointment, and anger as Hillman recounts episode after episode of short-sighted, wrong-headed, and greed-fueled decision-making carried out by Western companies and governments. Vladimir Lenin’s taunt that “the capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang them,” seems as accurate pronounced with a Chinese accent as it did when the Russian communist made the statement a century ago. IBM’s 17-year consulting project with Huawei, in which it billed more than $1.6 billion in fees to teach the Chinese how to challenge and surpass its U.S. competitors, is one example of the short-term thinking that has provided China with potentially ruinous long-term strategic advantages.

Some of the most alarming anecdotes documented in the book are those in which customers and partners of Chinese tech companies believe they are engaged in above-board business transactions, when in reality they are being set up to be robbed and exploited. Examples abound. One of the Netherlands’ largest mobile phone providers—using Huawei switches—found that by 2010 Chinese intelligence could listen in on all calls carried by the service including those of the prime minister. Additionally they learned that Chinese authorities could see all numbers monitored by Dutch police and security services. The African Union (AU) had its headquarters financed and built by the PRC, and in 2018 it was discovered that for the previous five years the data from its servers was being sent nightly to China. In 2020, the African Union learned that its surveillance cameras were sending their footage there as well. Nortel Networks Corporation—once Canada’s largest and wealthiest company—went bankrupt after partnering with and then being victimized by its Chinese telecom partners. The Canadian ministry of defense purchased the defunct headquarters for $200 million, only to find it extensively penetrated with spy-gear. After spending an additional $790 million in remediation efforts it was still unable to certify the space as secure.

Hillman demonstrates the disconnect between American government policy and private industry’s goals. He makes a convincing case for the importance of government intervention in markets as part of a national security policy for critical topics such as rural broadband, given private industry’s lack of profit incentive to do so.

Where the book is perhaps less persuasive is in the final section, in which it proposes greater Western collaboration and cohesion. My enjoyment in reading The Digital Silk Road, was enhanced by serendipitously finding it in the small English-language section of a European bookstore. Unfortunately, the European Union and major economies such as Germany and France have their own stakeholders, and appear to be seeking their own path rather than siding too closely with the United States. The early November 2022 visit to Beijing of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and the heads of 12 major companies (including Siemens, BASF, and Volkswagen) demonstrates Berlin’s interest in ever greater business ties with the People’s Republic.

Hillman’s work deserves to be discovered and read by a wide audience. Throughout the book, he documents how the Digital Silk Road poses a threat not only to U.S. economic interests, but potentially to wider national security interests as well. As an example, China’s undersea cable system, and access to the trunk-line landing stations, potentially provides them access to U.S. fiber-optic cables carrying trans-continental data, which may introduce questions of the reliability and security of U.S. communications. Similarly, the work focuses on how China intends for the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS) to compete to replace the lead position occupied by the U.S. Global Positioning System (GPS). In a war, BDS could provide the Chinese military with an alternative method to employ precision guided weapons, while at the same time using their well-known counter-space systems to blind U.S. GPS. This eye-opening and disturbing book is a welcome addition to the literature on the rising multi-spectrum threat posed by China, and deserves attention by the military, diplomats, and anyone considering doing business with entities engaged in China’s Digital Silk Road.

Christopher D. Booth is a national security professional, served on active duty as a U.S. Army armor and cavalry officer, and was a fellow in the General Robert H. Barrow Fellowship for Strategic Competition and the Brute Krulak Center for Innovation & Creativity. He is a distinguished graduate of Command and Staff College at Marine Corps University, and graduated from Vanderbilt University Law School and the College of William and Mary. The views expressed are the author’s and do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Army, the Department of Defense or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Oriental Pearl Tower in Shanghai (Daniel Cheong/Flickr)

Notes: [1] Josh Rogin, “NSA Chief: Cybercrime constitutes the ‘greatest transfer of wealth in history,’” Foreign Policy, https://foreignpolicy.com/2012/07/09/nsa-chief-cybercrime-constitutes-the-greatest-transfer-of-wealth-in-history/.

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Backfire: How Sanctions Reshape the World Against U.S. Interests. Agathe Demarais. New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2022.

“A nation that is boycotted,” declared President Woodrow Wilson in 1919, “is a nation that is in sight of surrender.”[1] As Wilson saw it, the application of economic pressure through export controls—generally referred to as economic sanctions—was preferable to open warfare.

 Buy on Amazon  Sanctions, as described in Agathe Demarais’ timely new book *Backfire: How Sanctions Reshape the World Against U.S. Interests**,* have become the policy *de jure* for multiple presidential administrations, with more than 9,000 individuals, companies, and economic sectors targeted through 70 different sanctions programs.[2]

Even as the U.S. expanded its military profile overseas through a string of bases and foreign deployments, it has doubled-down on what historian Nicholas Mulder calls “the economic weapon,” deploying export controls and other measures against states it views as potential threats or violators of international norms.[3] Yet, as Demarais argues, the sanctions tool has served as a cudgel, rather than a scalpel, and changes in the international economic system and shifts in global geopolitics may bring the age of sanctions’ efficacy to an end.

Demarais, currently the global forecasting director at the Economist Intelligence Unit and formerly a policy advisor to the French Treasury, has worked at the forefront of sanctions policy for the last decade. This gives her unique insight into how U.S. sanctions have reshaped the global economic order. In a series of short, engaging, and clearly written chapters, Demarais breaks down why the U.S. found sanctions such an appealing policy instrument; how their widespread use in the 1990s and 2000s triggered changes and upheavals, as countries around the world coped with the issues of challenges of compliance; and, finally, how sanctions implementation has generally backfired, imposing costs on the U.S. and its allies while encouraging targeted states towards policies and strategies designed to insulate their governments and economies from U.S. pressure.

The main actor in Demarais’ story is the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), the division of the U.S. Treasury Department that oversees sanctions policy. Demarais details how early sanctions, operated through trade embargoes, were ineffective. An experiment at imposing financial constraints on a bank in Macau used by North Korea in the early 2000s formed the basis of future sanctions policy. Rather than restrict traded goods into or out of targeted countries like North Korea, Iran, Russia, or Cuba, the United States would target the country’s access to the dollar-based global financial system and go after specific actors tied to distinct economic sectors or industries.

The immediate purpose of sanctions is to limit the target’s access to dollar banking, which in turn limits their ability to access international credit or make deals with other entities. As Demarais explains, the key to the power of sanctions is the risk associated with non-compliance. It is easier for companies and governments to shun sanctioned targets rather than running afoul of OFAC. International financial institutions “could either stop conducting business” with Pyongyang, Moscow, or Tehran, “or be kicked out of the US financial system...for banks, this amounts to a death sentence, given the greenback’s global clout.”[4]

Sanctions are often effective at pushing actors out of the global financial system. But the long-term goal of sanctions policy—changing the behavior of states or punishing actors perceived to be damaging U.S. interests—is where things get complicated. As Demarais illustrates, the power of sanctions is often deployed unevenly, with unpredictable consequences. Bestriding the world like a colossus, the United States has angered or alienated allies while pushing competitors and enemies toward policies designed to avoid sanctions, all while damaging its own economic interests.

Sanctions are often effective at pushing actors out of the global financial system. But the long-term goal of sanctions policy—changing the behavior of states or punishing actors perceived to be damaging U.S. interests—is where things get complicated.Demarais deploys countless examples to support her argument. In the case of sanctions against Iran, she notes first how the imposition of heavy sanctions in 2012-2014 seemed to yield a positive result. The Iranian people facilitated a response to sanctions policy, through the election of relative moderate Hasan Rouhani in 2013. Rouhani made a nuclear deal designed to reduce the sanctions burden a top priority of his government.

Yet even after the nuclear deal was reached in 2015, foreign companies were wary of signing agreements with Iran—both because they worried the deal would not last and because they feared running afoul of OFAC’s secondary sanctions and the penalties of non-compliance. Such fears proved well-founded, as the sanctions window closed again following the U.S. exit from the nuclear deal in 2018.

*Former U.S. President Donald Trump reinstating sanctions on Iran (AFP)*

The outcome of U.S. sanctions on Iran have been deleterious to U.S. interests. Iran’s government now appears disinterested in diplomacy, because any sanctions relief the U.S. offers may be terminated in the future, as it was in 2018. The goal of US policy—a nuclear deal in Iran—recedes from view while U.S. competitors like Russia and China, who have both pursued closer ties with Tehran, appear to benefit.

OFAC’s sanctions attempt to be surgical, targeting specific actors, but often have unintended consequences. In 2017, attempts to sanction Oleg Deripaska, who has ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, spiraled out of control when they interfered with the operations of Rusal, a major aluminum manufacturer owned by Deripaska. Sanctions on Rusal sent prices for aluminum skyrocketing, jolting global supply chains.[5]

Other elements of sanctions policy present problems for analysts of international relations. Whereas the ability to impose sanctions is managed by the president, Congress frequently pushes for tougher and more indiscriminate sanctions regimes. This is a result of factors within the American political system. “Lawmakers are often under intense pressure from their constituents and from NGOs to act decisively,” writes Demarais.[6]

While the administration of President Donald Trump took sanctions policy to new heights, expanding or imposing new measures on Venezuela, Iran, North Korea, and Russia, Demarais argues the sanctions template had already been in place prior to Trump’s election. Moreover, the Biden administration has shown little inclination to change the sanctions policies of its predecessor. Adding to allies’ consternation is the apparent bias in sanctions policies. While foreign companies can be hit with large fees, when domestic firms like ExxonMobil violate sanctions the punishments are relatively benign.[7]

Demarais’ final chapters consider the use of sanctions in the context of the return of great power competition. As the United States uses economic leverage over China, including tariffs and export controls on semiconductors and other specialized technologies, Beijing counters by expanding its own semiconductor industry and exploring alternative financial channels and sanctions-proof financial practices. True decoupling is both unrealistic and immensely expensive, she argues, chiefly due to the impact it would have on American companies, which depend on China for their revenues. Nevertheless, the growing use of export controls and mounting tensions between the United States and China will create a bifurcated global economy, “one for the United States and other Western countries, and another one for China and emerging countries.”[8] Such a system would render China effectively immune from U.S. sanctions, potentially increasing the risks of open conflict breaking out. “Instead of protecting US national security,” Demarais concludes, efforts to decouple from China “may well make the world a less safe place.”[9]

Demarais’ astute analysis is both compelling and persuasive. Within its broad and ambitious scope, some elements do go unrecognized. While her attention to the role of Congress in crafting sanctions policy reflects a nuanced understanding of how foreign policy and domestic politics intersect, she neglects to mention how foreign actors—U.S. allies, clients, or other states—also intervene to influence sanctions policy. In the case of Iran, for instance, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Israel exert influence over U.S. policy and press for tougher sanctions, despite evidence that they are ineffective.

While the book is exceptionally timely, its timing and concluding arguments serve to undercut its impact somewhat. Demarais finished Backfire prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, and while she accurately concludes the threat of sanctions did little to prevent Russia from threatening Ukraine, the book is necessarily silent on whether the post-invasion sanctions—including the historic G7 price cap on Russian oil exports—will prove more effective. This might serve to undercut Demarais’ general point that sanctions are fast becoming obsolete. Perhaps an updated second edition could consider these questions, which any reader will naturally have in mind as they read the book against the backdrop of Putin’s disastrous war and its rippling effects on the global economic order. Overall, however, Backfire is an engaging and enlightening read on a crucially important subject.

Gregory Brew is a historian of international oil and US-Iran relations. He is currently a postdoctoral fellow at the Jackson School of Global Affairs at Yale University, and the author of Petroleum and Progress in Iran: Oil, Development, and the Cold Warand co-author of The Struggle for Iran: Oil, Autocracy, and the Cold War, 1951-1954.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Sanctions (World Economic Forum)

Notes: [1] Woodrow Wilson, “Address at the Coliseum at the State Fair Grounds in Indianapolis, Indiana, September 04, 1919,” The American Presidency Project, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/address-the-coliseum-the-state-fair-grounds-indianapolis-indiana.

[2] Agathe Demarais, Backfire: How Sanctions Reshape the World Against US Interests (New York: Columbia University Press, 2022), 3.

[3] Nicholas Mulder, The Economic Weapon: The Rise of Sanctions as a Tool of Modern War (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2022), 1-26.

[4] Demarais, Backfire, 15.

[5] Demarais, Backfire, 89-95.

[6] Demarais, Backfire, 72.

[7] Demarais, Backfire, 84-85.

[8] Demarais, Backfire, 175.

[9] Demarais, Backfire, 196.

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Military Alliances in the Twenty-First Century. Alexander Lanoszka. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2022.

In this welcome addition to the literature on alliances, international relations scholar Alexander Lanoszka makes an optimistic case for the continued salience of the U.S.-led alliance system. In his two-hundred-page study, he reviews the most common areas that past studies have focused on: alliance formation, fears of entrapment and abandonment, burden-sharing, warfare, and alliance termination.

Accessible to both graduate students and seasoned authors on alliances, the book provides a compendium of theoretical support and criticism for alliances from international relations scholars. The most useful element of the book is its detailed survey of the theoretical literature of the international relations sub-field. Evincing no preference for a single model, he approaches the broad range of arguments in each of the five areas and weighs the respective strengths and weaknesses, most often finding weakness in traditional international relations school models. Such criticism is as applicable to Stephen Walt’s theory on the origins of alliances[1] as it is to Christopher Hemmer and Peter Katzenstein’s use of constructivism.[2] Accessible to both graduate students and seasoned authors on alliances, the book provides a compendium of theoretical support and criticism for alliances from international relations scholars.

Lanoszka takes a broad historicist approach, wherein it is stressed that each individual case should be studied on its own merits; this is quite helpful. This view is put most succinctly in the chapter on termination, where Lanoszka targets monocausal explanations and instead argues, “Each type of alliance [termination] has its own logic, thereby complicating any effort to provide a unified account of why or how any one alliance begins, endures, and ends.”[3] Much commentary on alliances offers less of an objective review of history, but rather a theory-driven philosophy of history. Former Czech President Václav Havel was a particularly apt example, in the case of NATO, of placing it not as a military alliance but as part of the broader, Western liberal international project, “one of the guarantors of human and civic freedom in the whole sphere of Euro-Atlantic civilisation.”[4]

Political scientist Francis Fukuyama and former U.S. ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul continue in this vein in arguing NATO expansion was not so much about the expansion of a security umbrella, but rather that the alliance “offered Western multilateral connectivity to the new democracies in eastern and central Europe and served as a bridge as they prepared bids to join the EU.”[5] Other authors take the converse view. The offensive realist scholar John Mearsheimer is perhaps the archetype of alliance criticism in the modern era, predicting both the disintegration of NATO in 1990[6] and pinning the Russian invasion of Ukraine on the alliance’s expansion.[7] Lanoszka avoids this ideological philosophizing, and instead pursues his assessment of what makes alliances form, continue, and terminate.

Lanoszka begins with an exacting definition for an alliance: “arrangements made between two or more sovereign states on the basis of a written treaty that serves to coordinate military policy toward at least one common goal.”[8] With a political scientist’s desire for precision, this definition strictly limits the study to formal treaty allies.

Over the course of the book, a specific difference is made between those allies with firm security guarantees, such as NATO or Japan, and those without such a guarantee, such as Israel and Taiwan. Buy on Amazon This definition offers points with which to contend. Firstly, Lanoszka’s focus on formal treaty alliances, expressed through a metaphor of alliances as a marriage and security partnerships as just dating, overstates the line between alliances and partnerships. Lanoszka’s metaphor that “we distinguish between dating and marriage when we discuss romantic relations because they entail different expectations and obligations. We should make similar distinctions with respect to international security cooperation.”[9] However, and in keeping with this metaphor, if an individual is known for abandoning or cheating on each of their previous dating partners, would others not be worried about the same behavior within the marriage? The salience of this problem can be seen following the withdrawal of U.S. forces from northern Syria in 2019, leaving behind their Kurdish partners. In the aftermath, other allies and partners in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia expressed concerns that this could signal a broader trend of unreliable security commitments.[10]

Secondly, the author does not hold strictly to his own definition. Over the course of the book, a specific difference is made between those allies with firm security guarantees, such as NATO or Japan, and those without such a guarantee, such as Israel and Taiwan. This definition however only broadly refers to coordinating military policy, which does not necessarily delimit less firm partnerships. This difference goes beyond pedantry about definitions but impacts the case selection of the remainder of the book.

There are also some notable exclusions from the book, particularly for a work with an analytical focus on the twenty-first century. First and foremost, is Afghanistan. Declared a Major Non-NATO ally (MNNA) by the United States in 2012, there is little mention outside of the combat aspects of the International Security Assistance Force. It is notable that arguably one of the West’s most resource intensive and high-intensity efforts in the past thirty years receives so little attention. This is the case for each of the nineteen MNNAs. This designation, which does not necessarily entail an explicitly written security commitment (for example Israel and Taiwan are MNNAs), would add a layer of complexity to the analysis. Consider also that the U.S. Arms Export Control Act does not make an explicit difference between NATO and MNNA states.[11] For example, why would a treaty ally such as Japan or South Korea seek MNNA status when they already have an existing treaty? Might extending MNNA status create expectations of a security commitment even if one is not written explicitly? What is the reputational cost of not meeting this expectation?

This study is also limited by its meager engagement with the bureaucratic elements of alliances. While there is some mention of bureaucracy in relation to Wallander’s theories explaining NATO’s persistence after the Cold War, it is overly limited to the area of curbs on alliance termination.[12] Each of the five theoretical areas identified by Lanoszka are impacted by bureaucratic dynamics. International and military secretariats play significant internal roles in assuring allies against fears of abandonment or entrapment, play an administrative role in burden-sharing, and are often instrumental in the conduct of warfare.

Lanoszka places himself among the modern optimists about alliances, most particularly NATO. The bureaucratic lens offers an angle for a more rigorous comparative studies approach that Military Alliances lacks. An underutilized set of cases for comparison are the three U.S.-led regional security pacts of the Cold War, NATO, the Southeast Asian Treaty Organization (SEATO), and the Central Treaty Organization (CENTO, also known as the Baghdad Pact). There has been some study, though dedicated efforts of comparison are quite scarce and generally limited. Lanoszka’s five areas of focus would provide an interesting frame for such a comparison, particularly as only one, NATO, survived the Cold War. Intriguingly, there is an existing entry point for scholarship. Part IV.A.1 of United States-Vietnam Relations, 1945-1967, otherwise known as the Pentagon Papers, is a detailed, 51-page comparison of SEATO with NATO.[13] This study provides insight into the role of structured secretariats in alliance outcomes. SEATO, unlike NATO, included only a small secretariat based in Bangkok, which left SEATO with fewer resources than the North Atlantic alliance. Additionally, it was unable to manage the divergence of member differences related to Vietnam, perhaps unsurprising in an alliance with members as varied as the United States, France, South Korea and Pakistan. The report itself notes, “The conflict in Vietnam is a crucible for SEATO; the future of the alliance will be profoundly affected by the outcome of the war.” Given its failure in the Vietnam War, this is an interesting comparative case, not only in the Cold War context, but also when considered alongside the more recent alliance experience of NATO in Afghanistan.

This work provides a frame to consider other puzzles in strategic studies. Buy on Amazon In his final conclusions, Lanoszka places himself among the modern optimists about alliances, most particularly NATO. Recent books on the alliance can be neatly summarized by one of Lanoszka’s concluding remarks, “Dysfunction is a permanent feature of alliance politics, not a temporary bug.”[14] Mark Webber, James Sperling, and Martin A. Smith in their 2021 work What’s Wrong with NATO and How to Fix It[15] centers around a similar argument, as do Jussi Hanhimäki’s[16] and Timothy Sayle’s recent books on NATO.[17] That dysfunction is a feature rather than a bug is often the core logic of the optimists. This is in stark contrast to other recent works from the more pessimistic school, including Ted Galen Carpenter’s NATO: Dangerous Dinosaur[18] and Walt’s broader work targeting liberalism’s failings.[19]

 Buy on Amazon  This work provides a frame to consider other puzzles in strategic studies. Why might Russia and China develop a formalized treaty relationship? Why not? Fears of entrapment or abandonment and expected issues related to burden-sharing or warfare could be central to this puzzle. This is only one question going into the future. There are myriad questions related to how states may organize themselves in the face of shared challenges.

Newly developing research can find itself at a loss for objective scholarship to ground further study of the U.S.-led alliance system. It must consider Lord Palmerston’s speech in the House of Commons to ground them: “We have no eternal allies, and we have no perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual, and those interests it is our duty to follow.”[20] Whichever side of the divide scholarship may find itself on, that is not the point of Lanoszka’s contribution. In the end, and despite its shortcomings, the book reminds us to be wary of universalistic theories and to judge cases based on their individual merits and to be mindful of the salience of national interests in even the closest alliances.

Davis Ellison is a Strategic Analyst at The Hague Centre for Strategic Studies and a PhD Candidate in the King’s College London Department of War Studies. His research is on civil-military relations within and between NATO’s institutions. This review essay reflects the views of the author alone and not those of any institution referred to within this article.

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Header Image: Opening ceremony for Exercise Saber Strike at the Pabrade Training Area, Lithuania, June 8, 2015. (Sgt Paul Peterson/USMC Photo)

Notes: [1] Stephen M. Walt, The Origins of Alliances (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990).

[2] Christopher Hemmer and Peter J. Katzenstein, “Why Is There No NATO in Asia? Collective Identity, Regionalism, and the Origins of Multilateralism,” International Organization 56, no. 3 (Summer 2002): 575-607.

[3] Alexander Lanoszka, Military Alliances in the Twenty-First Century (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2022), 166.

[4] Václav Havel, To the Castle and Back (New York: Random House Publishing, 2008), 303.

[5] Francis Fukuyama and Michael McFaul, “Should Democracy Be Promoted or Demoted?” The Washington Quarterly 31, no. 1 (Winter 2007-08): 23-45.

[6] John J. Mearsheimer, “Back to the Future: Instability in Europe After the Cold War, International Security 15, no. 1 (Summer 1990): 5-56.

[7] John J. Mearsheimer, “Why the Ukraine Crisis Is the West’s Fault: The Liberal Delusions That Provoked Putin,” Foreign Affairs 93, no. 5 (September/October 2014): 77-89.

[8] Lanoszka, 13-14.

[9] Lanoszka, 15.

[10] Layla Quran and Bryan Wood, “Why the U.S. decision in Syria has left some allies anxious,” PBS Newshour, October 25, 2019, https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/why-the-u-s-decision-in-syria-has-left-some-of-their-allies-anxious.

[11] Arms Control Export Act, Public Law 90-629 (2021), https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/COMPS-1061/pdf/COMPS-1061.pdf.

[12] Celeste A. Wallander, “Institutional Assets and Adaptability: NATO After the Cold War,” International Organization 54, no. 4 (2000): 705-735.

[13] “NATO and SEATO: A Comparison,” in United States-Vietnam Relations, 1945-1967, Part IV.A.1, ed. Leslie Gelb (Washington, DC: Office of the Secretary of Defense, 1969).

[14] Lanoszka, 198.

[15] Mark Webber, James Sperling, and Martin A. Smith, What’s Wrong with NATO and How to Fix It (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2021).

[16] Jussi M. Hanhimäki, Pax Transatlantica: America and Europe in the Post-Cold War Era (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021).

[17] Timothy Andrews Sayle, Enduring Alliance: A History of NATO and the Postwar Global Order (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2019).

[18] Ted Galen Carpenter, NATO: Dangerous Dinosaur (Washington, DC: Cato Institute, 2019).

[19] Stephen M. Walt, The Hell of Good Intentions: America's Foreign Policy Elite and the Decline of U.S. Primacy (New York: Macmillan, 2018).

[20] “Lord Palmerston 1784–1865,” in Oxford Essential Quotations Fourth Edition, ed. Susan Ratcliffe (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016).

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Master Negotiator: The Role of James A. Baker, III at the End of the Cold War. Diana Villiers Negroponte. Bloomington, IN: Archway Publishing, 2020.

 Buy on Amazon  Unlike *The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III* from Peter Baker and Susan Glasser, Diana Villiers Negroponte’s *Master Negotiator: The Role of James A. Baker, III at the End of the Cold War* focuses on James Baker’s time as secretary of state rather than his entire career in Washington. By focusing on this phase of Baker’s career, Negroponte still presents a thorough and rigorous analysis.

The title of Negroponte’s book nicely sums up her work. Her first four segments explore questions and themes related to James Baker’s overall time as secretary of state. She explores the real goal for the foreign policy review initiated by the National Security Council and how it affected all aspects of President George H.W. Bush’s administration; the challenges of German reunification and Germany’s admission to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO); the response of the United States to the June 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre; and the aftermath of Saddam Hussein’s August 1990 invasion of Kuwait.

Negroponte focuses her three remaining themes on issues about the Soviet Union and the end of communism in Europe. She analyzes the challenges and issues the Baltics, Yugoslavia, and Ukraine presented; the Bush administration’s reaction to the failed coup against President Mikhail Gorbachev; and the tense negotiations with the Soviet Union, and later Russia, over American loans and credits.

Throughout the book, Negroponte depicts Baker as a secretary of state who negotiated strong and impressive deals with a variety of nations regarding security, loans, and other issues of international and national security. Through the title and her methodology, the author tries to show Baker as a master negotiator. One of the best examples is through his support for the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Yet, Baker was not able to successfully negotiate a settlement of issues related to Israel and Palestine, to prevent the disintegration of Yugoslavia into ethnic warfare, or to avoid problems concerning Iraq after the Gulf War or those connected to the Tiananmen Square massacre. For some incidents, like Tiananmen Square, Baker deferred to President Bush to address the crisis. For the others mentioned, Baker made attempts, but crises in these regions continued for years or even decades afterward. The author attempts to show that Baker did all in his power to resolve or prevent these crises; his inability to solve them, however, undermines the depiction of him as a master negotiator.

*President George H. W. Bush with James Baker in 1990 (George H.W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum/Wikimedia)*

The narrative that Negroponte depicts of Baker’s time as secretary of state resembles not so much a master negotiator, but rather a master crisis manager. The author depicts the numerous challenges Baker and the United States faced between 1989 and August 1992 when Baker left the State Department to become Chief of Staff to George H.W. Bush. The Gulf War, Tiananmen Square, the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of communism in Europe, the Middle East peace process, and the ethnic fighting that erupted in Yugoslavia were just some of the challenges that Baker faced. With these, and other challenges, the author presents Baker as a capable and able secretary of state. Yet, the limitations Baker sometimes faced in trying to get parties to negotiate—in Yugoslavia and in the Middle East, for example—are expertly described by the author and illustrate how it was sometimes not possible for Baker to juggle and balance the interests of the parties involved to achieve a negotiated settlement. Negroponte, rather than depicting a master negotiator, presents an able member of Bush’s administration working to implement his policies, but facing limits, even at the height of America’s power and prestige at the end of the Cold War and America’s victory in the first Gulf War.

Negroponte conducted significant research in writing this book, with ample sources cited that include interviews, newspapers, books, articles, and other sources. The book would be a stronger asset for researchers, however, if it included an index. The organization of the book via seven main themes works to focus the reader on some key issues Baker faced as secretary of state. The drawback to this thematic approach, however, is that the chronology of events sometimes gets lost. Baker faced multiple challenges at the same time. A thematic approach, rather than a chronological one, does not illustrate just how many international issues Baker managed concurrently. If such a chronological approach had been offered, readers would have a better appreciation for the complex issues and negotiations that Baker had to manage.

The style and focus of this book make it a good source for readers wanting an introduction to either the foreign policy of the Bush administration or events leading to the end of the Cold War. Stylistically, the book flows in a more journalistic fashion than scholarly. This is not to say the work is not rigorous in its sources. It is, but it does not read like a typical scholarly work of history. Negroponte’s narration of events is suitable for this work that is covering several major events over four years. If, however, readers want more in-depth analysis or detail on a particular event, like Yugoslavia, they should consult other sources. Even so, the amount of information provided by the author is enough to whet readers’ appetites for more.

 Buy on Amazon  By focusing this book on Baker’s work as secretary of state, the reader gets an in-depth and intense study of one of Baker’s most public works in government service. The author does provide some interesting personal vignettes, especially between Baker and Soviet Foreign Minister Edward Shevardnadze, and how Baker organized the State Department when he became secretary. The focus of this work, however, is his public, foreign policy contributions. This is not a book that focuses on Baker’s private life or life before or after becoming secretary of state. This is not meant as a criticism, but if a reader wishes a more fully biographical study on James Baker, they should consult other sources. This study is a solid work into the accomplishments and events faced by secretary of state James Baker during a complicated and tumultuous time in history.

Javan David Frazier is Professor of History at Middle Georgia State University-Cochran Campus. Dr. Frazier’s academic interests are in the Cold War and particularly U.S.-South African nuclear relations. He has written several reviews for H-War and this is his first for The Strategy Bridge.

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Header Image: Secretary of State James A. Baker at the United Nations, 1990. (Chester Higgins Jr./The New York Times)

Notes: In format “normal”

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Reagan’s War Stories: A Cold War Presidency. Benjamin Griffin. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2022.

 Buy on Amazon  While many aspects of Ronald Reagan’s legacy continue to be hotly debated in the more than thirty years since he left the White House as President of the United States, one facet that is widely agreed upon is that the vast majority of his time and attention during his tenure was focused on strengthening U.S. forces *vis-à-vis* theirparamount Cold War enemy, the Soviet Union. In *Reagan’s War Stories: A Cold War Presidency*, Benjamin Griffin deftly analyzes the impact of popular culture on the decisions Reagan made that directly impacted upon the course of the Cold War. Griffin uses a plethora of primary and secondary sources to craft a convincing argument that Reagan, who has been considered by some contemporaries and historians alike as an “intellectual lightweight,” was, in actuality, laser focused on improving the U.S. position against the Soviet Union, effectively using popular culture, especially as conveyed through novels in the current zeitgeist, to help his platform resonate with the general public.[1]

Reagan was infamous for boiling down a complex argument into an easily digestible, if not always accurate, summation. Griffin argues throughout the book that Reagan was highly impressionable, particularly through novels and movies, and that he leaned on these resources to help him make decisions over the course of his life. Reagan’s War Stories can essentially be broken down into three main areas, all of which are novels, movies, or genres of fiction Griffin argues shaped Reagan’s perception and would weigh heavily in his decision-making during his time in public office, at times even more so than formal reports or briefings.

The first novels in question were the books Reagan enjoyed as a youth, particularly the John Carter books by Edgar Burroughs, a science fiction series incredibly popular during Reagan’s childhood, along with other significant books such as That Printer of Udell’sby Harold Bell Wright. Griffin argues that the strong characters, virtuous plot lines, and prevailing savior tropes resonated with Reagan, who lacked a reliable father figure in his life. This is not a groundbreaking or earth shattering observation, and it is a link that any amateur psychologist could make. However, what makes this book special and worthwhile is how Griffin ties the impact of these novels on a young Reagan’s psyche to his actions as president. An example of how these novels led to Reagan’s decisions later in life is when Griffin ascribes Reagan’s continued support of futuristic technology to the initial exposure he received on the subject from his reading of Burroughs as a youth. Griffin argues these works would play a major role in the eventual culmination of the Cold War, when Reagan would announce his support for the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI); science fiction novels from his childhood would “help Reagan conceptualize the impact of technology, a technique he saw as perfectly reasonable.”[2]

*Gary Cooper in High Noon (IMDB)*

The second focus area is an entire genre that profoundly formed Reagan’s vision of the world: the western. Reagan’s love for western movies such as Stanley Kramer’s High Noon and books by the former president’s favorite author, the award winning Louis L’Amour, was well known and documented.[3] Griffin argues authors such as L’Amour were able to create an engaging story where the “good guys” were easily identifiable through their virtues and actions and were always pitted in a battle with “bad guys,” who were inherently and obviously villainous and evil. These tendencies would replicate themselves in Reagan’s actions as president, often through his misguided attempts at over-simplifying complex and nuanced situations that in reality required skillful diplomatic resolution.

Griffin illustrates how instead of such a thoughtful approach, Reagan viewed such situations as America being right (in the manner of the heroes of his favorite western novels) and countries such as El Salvador and Nicaragua being wrong.[4] Griffin also ties these decisions into Reagan’s admiration of heroes such as the eponymous John Carter from the previous section, and his efforts time and again to replicate virtuous efforts to “save” countries with less economic or political stability in regions throughout Latin America and Africa instead of collaborating on collective security programs. Through this overly simplistic lens, Reagan would make decisions as president that would negatively impact relations with developing countries for the sake of strengthening U.S. Cold War security in a region, paying little if any heed for the nuanced and complicated societies impacted by his policies. A perfect example of this can be seen in the Iran-Contra debacle, as Reagan’s “single-minded focus on the Soviet Union would lead to policy in Africa and Latin America that ranged from tone-deaf to disastrous.”[5] Reagan saw the conflict in Nicaragua between the Contras and Sandinistas through his Cold War prism, and in doing so escalated a regional issue into one that almost destroyed his administration in part due to his desire to simplify complicated problems into an easily digestible right-against-wrong concept, which in this case meant the Contras were right since they were opposing the socialist Sandinista government.

 Buy on Amazon  The final section of *Reagan’s Cold War Stories* focuses on the initial works by author Tom Clancy: *The Hunt for Red October*, *Red Storm Rising**,* and*The Cardinal of the Kremlin*. Griffin not only highlights how Clancy’s techno-thrillers proved irresistible to Reagan, so much so that his staff and advisors made them mandatory reading to clarify Reagan’s many references, but also how Clancy would rise from a non-descript insurance agent to a national bestselling author with ringing endorsements from the President of the United States. Griffin explains that Clancy’s portrayals of American heroism and democratic virtue spoke directly to Reagan’s favored traits in a novel, and that the United States always won at the end of a Clancy novel sealed the deal for his support and readership. Reagan would often quote or reference Clancy novels, and Griffin argues the book *Red Storm Rising* even helped Reagan visualize the force laydown in Europe at that time and how a conventional war with the Soviet Union could play out. While largely inconceivable that a novel could impact a president so directly, Griffin argues convincingly that the plot influenced Reagan’s stunning offer to Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev in 1986 for both countries to abolish nuclear weapons.[6] Reagan and Clancy would go on to have a mutually beneficial relationship, the former with a staunch supporter churning out popular novels that ran parallel to the president’s desired goals and the latter with glowing reviews from the president and increased access to Department of Defense research and resources.

While the reviewer thinks this book is already a valuable contribution, it is worth noting that an increase in overall depth would have made it even more significant. At fewer than 180 pages, this book had plenty of space to expand on areas left uncovered. While the works Griffin explores are, indeed, pivotal to Reagan’s psyche and decision making, one is left wondering how other popular novels and movies—like the massively popular Star Wars films—impacted his mindset. There are also other events that occurred during Reagan’s presidency not featured in this book, such as the invasion of Grenada in Operation Urgent Fury, a decision Reagan made which was inherently Cold War centric and whose analysis by Griffin would have added value to the book. These small notes aside, overall Griffin’s thesis is interesting, well defended, and leaves the reader intrigued with the topic and desirous of more stimulating research from the author on this subject.[7]

Highly engaging and thought-provoking, Griffin has put together an insightful book that leaves the reader with an improved understanding of pop culture’s impact on Reagan in not only leading the nation through the Cold War, but in the totality of his life as well.

Chris Booth is an officer in the U/S/ Coast Guard. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Coast Guard or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: President Ronald Reagan at a Reagan-Bush Rally, Endicott, New York 1984 (White House Photographic Collection).

Notes: [1] Benjamin Griffin, Reagan’s War Stories: A Cold War Presidency (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2022), 4.

[2] Griffin, Reagan’s War Stories, 146.

[3] Griffin, Reagan’s War Stories, 63.

[4] Griffin, Reagan’s War Stories, 10-11.

[5] Griffin, Reagan’s War Stories, 11.

[6] Griffin, Reagan’s War Stories, 108.

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Paths of Dissent: Soldiers Speak Out Against America's Misguided Wars. Edited by Andrew Bacevich and Daniel A. Sjursen. New York, NY: Metropolitan Books, 2022.

As I read this book here in Washington, the Magnolia, Elm, and Catalpa trees that line the National Mall are beginning to drop their leaves. The temperatures seemingly resist the notion that winter is around the corner. And at the numerous war memorials across the city, final preparations are being made in the run up to what will be the second Veterans Day since the last American troops left Afghanistan.

 Buy on Amazon  Yet, while the nation may be ready to move on from war, many American veterans are still scrambling to help Afghan asylum seekers find safe passage and find adoptive communities. The rapid collapse of the U.S.-backed government in Afghanistan and frantic non-combatant evacuation operation (NEO) in its wake have stoked emotional traumas for those veterans that continue to smolder.

The inglorious withdrawal marked a dramatic ending to one of the longest chapters of America’s Global War on Terror and a war that Andrew Bacevich describes as an unambiguous strategic failure.[1] In a new book, Paths of Dissent: Soldiers Speak Out Against America's Misguided Wars, Bacevich joins Daniel A. Sjursen as co-editor of a compendium of reflective essays by American veterans who have borne the brunt of America’s post-9/11 generational campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan. Paths of Dissent puts those veterans’ voices at the center of the discourse—veterans whose journeys led them into dissenting openly with the ways in which American power has been exercised abroad.

The text features fifteen intimate essays from veterans who served in the U.S. Army, Navy, and Marine Corps. Their unifying argument, set forth by Bacevich and Sjursen, is that America’s military campaigns during the Global War on Terror amounted to “flagrant malpractice.” Among the many transgressions the book’s author’s allege are the irresponsible expenditure of lives and treasure and the wreaking of havoc on our troops, the people we sought to liberate, and the foundations of our own democracy—all justified under the rationalizations of senior leaders professing self-exculpatory versions of history.[2]

Bacevich and Sjursen are careful to differentiate the authors’ dissent from a general opposition to war. The authors in Paths of Dissent are neither pacifists nor were they naturally inclined to be anti-war when they entered the military. Instead, their stories are those of men and women who were “serving soldiers or combat veterans who actively oppose[d] military policies that they deem ill-advised, illegal, or morally unconscionable.”[3] While there is some diversity of perspective, readers experience a common journey that unites each voice: the initial pride and moral clarity of duty giving way to moral ambiguity and ultimately culminating with a new moral clarity where each was moved to preach their own truth on the wars they fought in. What is at stake, according to Bacevich, is no less than the soul of our nation.

What WorksWhat Paths of Dissent does well is its intimate, diverse portrayals of courage across the ranks, from field grade officers to junior enlisted service members—all following a moral imperative to correct the narrative.

Jason Dempsey explores the political and institutional dysfunctions of the war. Dempsey deployed as an infantry officer to both Iraq and Afghanistan and found himself working in assignments that highlighted major impediments to basic coordination between the Department of Defense, Department of State, and ultimately with Congress. Those hindrances to effective coordination frequently lead to large projects operating at cross purposes, wasting exorbitant amounts of taxpayer money. Dempsey labeled the dysfunction as “the Accountability-Avoidance Two-Step,” which he defined as a civil-military dynamic that enabled both politicians and generals to bask in the public adoration of the military without being held to any account for military failures.[4]

Erik Edstrom dives into the inner life of a former idealist. In his essay, Edstrom laments the disconnect between the advertised principles of the U.S. military and the reality in combat where he “saw the systematic dehumanization and devaluation of Afghan lives on a regular basis.” He says, “We searched homes, people, and cars unilaterally and without warning…we regularly violated Karzai’s Twelve, a series of principles intended to protect civilian lives and safeguard Afghan citizens against the deep indignities of a foreign military occupation.”[5] Like many of his fellow authors, Edstrom notes that his reasons for joining the military were “a conflated mix of economic necessity and idealistic do-goodery.”[6] His observation is reminiscent of comedian George Carlin, who said that “inside every cynical person, there is a disappointed idealist.”[7] Channeling the jaded idealism common across all of these essays, Dempsey puts it another way, quoting World War II veteran Paul Fussell: “To become disillusioned, you must earlier have been illusioned.”[8]

Other voices raise qualms with the military institution itself. Jonathan W. Hutto, Sr., shines light on the endemic history of institutional racism in the military. Hutto, a U.S. Navy veteran, details how he overcame an oppressive disciplinary board convened on the USS Theodore Roosevelt. Under the auspices of the Military Whistleblower Protection Act and related DoD guidance, he organized the “Appeal for Redress” in 2006 which saw over two thousand service members petition Congress for an end to the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars.[9] Hutto lauds the power of the enlisted corps as one that “if organized, can potentially help change the course of history.” He raises the class nature of the rank structured military where “[b]y and large, enlisted members hail from the margins of American society, rural towns and blighted urban centers all but abandoned by the elites.”[10]

What’s Missing Q-9 Reaper (SrA Haley Stevens/U.S. Air Force Photo)

Paths of Dissent offers a compelling testimony against America’s blind hubris over the last twenty years. However, missing entirely from this collection are the voices of the men and women of the U.S. Air Force. Most profound may be the omission of airmen steeped in the detached intimacy of remote combat, a 9/11 era innovation Bacevich and Sjursen overlook completely, perhaps due to the ongoing debate as to whether or not drone operators are indeed combat veterans.

Few individual weapons epitomize the conventional-quasi-cloak-and-dagger sentiment of the Global War on Terror than the MQ-1 Predator and the MQ-9 Reaper. Since at least the Vietnam War, airpower has been the default instrument for wicked security problems favored by risk-averse policymakers.

My own realization that we were over our heads in Afghanistan came when I interviewed farmers who pretended to set up Taliban camps that the US would then bomb. The farmers would collect the remnants of millions of dollars worth of bombs and sell them for $100 as scrap metal.

— Nicholas Kristof (@NickKristof) December 9, 2019

Renowned journalist Nicholas Kristof observed the absurdity of the air campaign in a 2019 newsletter where he observed that farmers would pretend “to set up Taliban camps that the U.S. would then bomb” in order to “collect the remnants of millions of dollars worth [sic] of bombs and sell them for $100 as scrap metal.”[11] I noted a similar sense of futility among officers in the fighter squadrons I debriefed upon their return from their combat rotations. Thus, the absence of airpower perspectives from the book is an odd and glaring omission.

Conclusion

Despite its omissions, Paths of Dissent is an exceptionally substantive and moving book for anyone interested in personal accounts at the intersection of ethics and military service. The book follows in a proud tradition of anti-war critiques, such as Neil Sheehan’s A Bright Shining Lie, H.R. McMaster’s Dereliction of Duty, and even John F. Kennedy’s Profiles in Courage. Indeed, it was Kennedy who noted in his masterpiece that “the path of the conscientious insurgent must frequently be a lonely one.”[12]

As America exits another costly decades-long counterinsurgency era into an uncertain future, it requires courageous dissenters, such the authors of Paths of Dissent, to avoid national security malpractice. It is only by capturing the perspectives of those who are willing to make personal sacrifices in informing the public’s understanding of war that principled countries can avoid waste and hypocrisy in its conduct.

Tim Bettis is an officer in the U.S. Air Force with over a decade of experience in counterterrorism, military planning, and security assistance efforts. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Air Force, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Evacuees wait to board a Boeing C-17 Globemaster III, Kabul International Airport, Afghanistan, 2021 (Sgt. Isaiah Campbell)

Notes: [1] Andrew Bacevich and Daniel A. Sjursen, eds., Paths of Dissent: Soldiers Speak Out Against America’s Misguided Wars (New York: Metropolitan Books, 2022), 1.

[2] Bacevich and Sjursen, 2.

[3] Bacevich and Sjursen, 7.

[4] Bacevich and Sjursen, 143.

[5] Bacevich and Sjursen, 39.

[6] Bacevich and Sjursen, 23.

[7] George Carlin, “George Carlin Quotes,” BrainyQuote, accessed November 1, 2022, https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/george_carlin_383122.

[8] Bacevich and Sjursen, Paths of Dissent, 130.

[9] Bacevich and Sjursen, 289.

[10] Bacevich and Sjursen, 194.

[11] Nicholas Kristof @NickKristof, Tweet, Twitter, December 9, 2019, https://twitter.com/nickkristof/status/1204167750396108800?lang=en.

[12] John F. Kennedy, Profiles in Courage (New York: HarperCollins, 2003), 4.

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The American Way of Irregular Warfare: An Analytical Memoir. Charles T. Cleveland and Daniel Egal. Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 2020.

The American Way of Irregular Warfare is a memoir co-authored by retired U.S. Army Lieutenant General Charles T. Cleveland with Daniel Egal that explores how the United States military has employed the concept of irregular warfare.[1] The authors draw on Cleveland’s observations from his 37-year military career to argue the U.S. should restructure its military with doctrine, authorities, and education conducive to proper understanding and the proper employment of irregular warfare. Cleveland commanded the United States Army Special Operations Command and served in special operations through the unique historical period spanning the 1980s and the U.S. Global War on Terror. He asserts that operational and strategic level leadership must learn to better employ tactical irregular warfare units to solve people-centric campaigns.

  He defines irregular warfare as conflict below the threshold of conventional warfare waged in the minds and wills of the population with limited support.[2] His theme throughout is that warfare is a human endeavor and the U.S. military must retool its understanding of how it affects human behavior through psychological, relational, economic, and military means. Humans are the key to successfully influencing local politics and culture, in Cleveland’s mind. Thus, leaving a competent partner force in place is the only way the US can avoid future indefinite commitments of Americans to stay and fight.

While satisfied with the U.S. military’s tactical performance in irregular warfare, Cleveland rejects the argument that special operations can raid their way to victory or capture enough terrain. Cleveland uses the strategic failures of the U.S. in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan to argue the U.S. military must focus on its failure to structurally, doctrinally, and militarily invest in irregular warfare to succeed.

In practice, Cleveland sees leveraging of a partner force interspersed with American Special Operations Forces advisors as the ideal model. Advisors serve as a connecting sinew between fighters and external assets as a partner nation gains military competence and political legitimacy. He wants the U.S. to eliminate the grey-zone gaps that nation-states and non-state actors exploit in competing against a nuclear and conventionally dominant U.S. military. He argues the United States military is designed to dominate in the land, sea, air, space, and cyberspace domains but has failed to understand or appreciate the necessity of influencing populations.

Cleveland asserts locals must be empowered to retain legitimacy, or operations and U.S. personnel will foster resentment and insurgency against an occupying force. He offers a vignette from his experience removing Manuel Noriega from power in Panama. Panamanians approached U.S. soldiers with a report of a homicide. In response, the American leaders armed and empowered the local police detective. Cleveland observes that the Panamanian detective solved the case better than any platoon of U.S. soldiers could have.[3]

He contrasts U.S. relative success in Panama to the dissolving of the Iraq Ba’ath Party and the costly insurgency that followed. Cleveland warns that the U.S. military cannot afford to ignore its operational and strategic inadequacies in irregular warfare operations to focus on conventional warfare.

Cleveland concludes with a structured call to action. He recommends starting with a bipartisan congressional investigation into the employment of U.S. irregular warfare capability with a focus on policies, strategies, and campaigns in irregular conflict. Beyond a broad reassessment, he offers a range of proposals for institutionalizing the investigation’s conclusions.

Cleveland makes a number of recommendations. First, he recommends a restructuring of the Department of Defense to create a hybrid combined department with expertise from the military, State Department, intelligence, and private enterprise to focus on irregular warfare campaigns. He also suggests establishing a second four-star Special Operations headquarters dedicated to irregular warfare, separate and different from current special operations commands. He suggests the new command could be component under one of the military service departments similar to that of the Department of the Navy’s relationship with the US Marine Corps.

To support the restructuring initiatives he proposes, Cleveland suggests creating civilian educational institutions independent of professional military education to continue the academic study of irregular warfare. These outside educational institutions would critique military capability, policies, and strategies while capturing and analyzing irregular warfare actions for American public scrutiny. Lastly, he suggests creating professional military education outside the conventionally minded service-specific professional military education system. He points to the Naval Postgraduate School’s master’s degree focused on irregular warfare as a positive example worth emulation.

While thoughtful, Cleveland’s proposals are ripe for critique. He applies irregular warfare to every scenario as the golden key while ignoring factors that seem to preclude any reasonable likelihood of fostering local legitimacy in places such as Afghanistan.

Cleveland and his co-author also use exhaustive half-page footnotes that merely amplify the message in the original paragraph. They discuss the concept of an American way of irregular warfare, but Cleveland fails to provide a succinct definition that works across the instruments of national power. However, he does reference several different current military definitions in his footnotes.

Cleveland rightly observes decisive victories are unlikely in the nuclear and information age. Anyone seeking to understand irregular warfare as integral to the entire continuum of warfare should read this book.

M.T. Mitchell is a Marine Corps Officer studying at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, CA. He holds a bachelors of political science and a graduate certificate from Texas A&M University and a Masters of Art and Science from the U.S. Air Force University. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect the official position of the U.S. Marine Corps, Department of the Navy, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

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Header Image: U.S. personnel in Iraq in 2009 (DVIDS)

Notes: [1] Charles T. Cleveland and Daniel Egel, The American Way of Irregular War: An Analytical Memoir (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2020), https://www.rand.org/pubs/perspectives/PEA301-1.html.

[2] Cleveland and Egel, The American Way of Irregular War, 4–9, 102–3, 133,150-51, 165–68, 217.

[3] Cleveland and Egel, The American Way of Irregular War, 72.

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Our Best War Stories: Prize-winning Poetry & Prose from the Col. Darron L. Wright Memorial Awards. Edited by Christopher Lyke. Johnston, Iowa: Middle West Press, 2020.

“And in the end, of course, a true war story is never about war. It's about sunlight. It's about the special way that dawn spreads out on a river when you know you must cross the river and march into the mountains and do things you are afraid to do.”
—Tim O’Brien, “How to Tell a True War Story”[1]

 Buy on Amazon  *Our Best War Stories* from Middle West Press is a collection of war stories from veterans, service members, and their families. This collection is remarkable because, whether or not everything in each story is strictly speaking factual, everything is true.

It perfectly navigates the reality that telling war stories is a tricky thing—for the audience as much as for the storyteller. By its very nature, military fiction by veterans inherently raises the issue of what’s factual. There is always the possibility that this story, these particular circumstances, are documentary. They’re the actual facts on the ground, some set of events that occurred on a specific day. Many war stories stake out precisely this epistemic territory and survive off the pedigree of merely being factual.

Our Best War Stories, to its great benefit, does not trade on the sensationalism of merely being factual. There are thousands of books of military history and dry memoirs that list dates, the units involved, the territory won or lost, and the casualties that resulted from a given engagement. These stories are true, but they sometimes lack truth.

Tim O’Brien, one of the preeminent figures in military fiction and memoir, often muses on this. His concept of a “true war story”—the idea that we must lie and embellish to tell the truth—treads the line between fact and fiction. O’Brien believed that fiction was necessary for the author to convey truth. How can mere facts relay the staccato hell of adrenaline surging and subsiding, or capture the sound of hot metal passing through the atmosphere in a way you can feel? Can facts capture how harmless a human being can look after death or how hot the sun can be as it cooks you into the earth? How beautiful the night sky is when you are bored and reliving innocuous high-school memories while thousands of miles from home?

How can mere facts relay the staccato hell of adrenaline surging and subsiding, or capture the sound of hot metal passing through the atmosphere in a way you can feel? Can facts capture how harmless a human being can look after death or how hot the sun can be as it cooks you into the earth?O’Brien argues that the only way to tell a true war story is to merge moments across time, to invent, to exaggerate—to make things up. The reader gets, O’Brien says, empathy from these stories.

Our Best War Stories is a collection that embodies the “True War Story” concept and uses it to inspire empathy. These authors tell the truth even in the stories that are clearly invented. This is a collection that helps readers to understand how mutable actual experiences are. The reader’s certainty is undermined so that they can view the world with less biased eyes.

This notion of truth has become something that I, a civilian academic who teaches classes on war fiction and conflict literature, have come to rely upon. This is the kind of truth this collection conveys. It’s more honest than the numbers, more important than whether this particular gunshot happened on this particular day. Stories like those found in Our Best War Stories are the kind of stories that lead my students to see the truth of warfare alongside the facts. The abstract of casualties, cost, or achieved objectives are something very different from the actuality of truth.

Our Best War Stories from Midwest Press is a collection full of the most important kind of truth, the kind O’Brien extolls. It’s a collection of short stories and poetry (written by American veterans—from the Vietnam conflict to the present day—and their families) that have been selected or have received honorable mentions in the Darren L. Wright Memorial Awards.

This collection of prize winners, of course, features a number of stories and narrative poems that almost have to be factual. They’re filled with details that could not be imagined and minutiae that would escape someone outside of the military. More importantly, however, this collection is filled with writing that is true. And this truth comes by way of many different perspectives, writing styles, and experiences within the armed forces. These truths are what makes the book stand out amongst its peers.

…adhering to their task of relaying the experience of war while staying firmly in the realm of art. Truth never gets thrown out in favor of style, and art never seems to be discarded in favor of the dull facts.It’s fitting, then, that the book begins with a story laced with magical realism. David R. Dixon’s “The Stay” is the tale of a man who can touch other people and delay their deaths. But not forever. It’s fantasy (or perhaps magical realism), but it captures the true pressure of someone who understands why and how death comes, but who cannot delay it. The story kicks off a string of extremely memorable and gripping stories that run the gamut of subject matter, ranging from time in theaters of war to the feelings of rotating home or deploying.

On the more realistic (but not more true) end of the spectrum is Brian L. Braden’s “Green,” a stark, quiet recounting of a mid-flight refueling taking place in the night sky. The author manages to make such a process seem both routine and dangerous, both dreamlike and incredibly real. The reader is entangled in the moment-to-moment dance of a delicate operation while simultaneously being uplifted by the gorgeous prose describing the milky spray of jet fuel parting like a veil, or afterburners lengthening in the night. Many of the stories in this volume are characterized by this adroit double-duty—adhering to their task of relaying the experience of war while staying firmly in the realm of art. Truth never gets thrown out in favor of style, and art never seems to be discarded in favor of the dull facts.

“Farragut Square” by Jillian Danback-McGhan is a tight mystery that deals with sexual assault in the military, houselessness, and a number of heavy, important subjects that are usually unaddressed in military fiction. Her story unfolds through a charming, unsteady narrator who has remade her life outside of the armed forces even as she struggles with a sexual assault that occurred inside her branch. As she attempts to live her life, a chance encounter gradually draws her into a bracingly-paced, noir-esque plot that makes her question everything around her.

On top of the excellent content in this collection, this book yields some significant insights when analyzed from a sociological perspective. The stories were published from 2016-2020, and it’s fascinating to see how the subject matter changes alongside the culture of the armed forces in any given year. The stories and poems in 2016 differ greatly from those in 2020. Social issues, the hierarchy of the armed forces, and gender politics are much more evident in the later stories in the collection. We can see how writers in different eras feel empowered to tackle subject matter that is important to them.

If you’re interested in military culture, the ongoing cultural change in the armed forces, or just looking for excellent writing from veterans and their families, this is a book that belongs on your shelf. I know I’ll revisit the short stories in this collection in years to come and that they’ll find their way in my coursework in the future.

Scott Noon Creley is the Director of the Whittier Scholars Program at Whittier College. Creley lives and writes in Los Feliz with his wife, painter and photographer Carly Creley.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: U.S. Marines with Beach and Terminal Operations Company, 1st Landing Support Battalion, 1st Marine Logistics Group, I Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Pendleton, California, 2021 (Joel Rivera-Camacho)

Notes: [1] Tim O'Brien, “How to Tell a True War Story,” The Things They Carried (New York, NY: Houghton Mifflin), 1990.

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Waging a Good War: A Military History of the Civil Rights Movement, 1954-1968. Thomas E. Ricks.New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2022.

Ninety years after the abolition of slavery in the United States, Blacks faced a dominant caste system in the 1950s that used the violence and power of the state to deny equal treatment or opportunity across the deep south. In more general terms, when confronting an imbalance of power, a subjugated people faces a choice between submission or finding a way to alter the nature of the fight. To overcome this disparity, the Civil Rights Movement developed a strategy that aligned their actions to their desired change.

 Buy on Amazon  Thomas E. Ricks’ *Waging a Good War* applies the lens of military considerations to explain the success of the Civil Rights Movement from 1954-1968. Not unlike his writings on the U.S. military from World War II to Iraq, Ricks’ account of the Civil Rights Movement focuses on senior leadership, their strategy, planning, and tactics. However, *Waging a Good War* provides an account of how a protracted struggle found success by aligning tactics to strategy.

Finding a Leader and a DoctrineThis effective campaign was born out of the Montgomery Bus Boycotts of 1955. Ricks highlights the intensity of training, planning, and sustainment required to execute the city-wide protest sparked by Rosa Parks’ defiant act. Counter to the popular image, Rosa Parks was more than a tired Sunday school teacher who refused to give up her seat on a public bus. Parks was an activist who spent several weeks training on nonviolent direct action[1] at the Highlander Folk School in eastern Tennessee.[2]

Four days after Parks’ arrest, a 26-year-old preacher who had just arrived in Montgomery, spoke to the gathered crowd at Holt Baptist Church and called for nonviolent protest, declaring “not only are we using the tools of persuasion, but we’ve come to see we’ve got to use the tools of coercion.” Over the following year, an elaborate system of dispatchers managed carpool routes, providing free transportation to participants while churches served as command posts and countered mis-information efforts.[3] The protracted protest and the violent response of bombing the preacher’s home attracted international attention, and the Supreme Court ruled an end to Montgomery’s segregation of public transportation. From this debut, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. emerged as the new strategic leader of the Civil Rights Movement.

Through careful study of Mohandas Gandhi's social movement in India, King found an approach that aligned with his desire to avoid “using immoral means to achieve moral ends.”[4] King and his circle of advisors bridged tactics to their political objective and adapted to shifting dynamics over time. In his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” King explained that “nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and establish such creative tension that a community that has consistently refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue.”[5] The Movement’s new strategy centered on nonviolent direct action to challenge unjust laws by employing “creative tension” that overwhelmed the system of segregation.

*Mohandas Gandhi circa 1935. (Hulton Archive/Getty Images)*

Movement leaders knew from “painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”[6] Waging a Good War describes how, after a defensive action in Montgomery, King chose a series of battles over the next decade that presented southern whites with a dilemma between a loss of political power or resorting to increased violence to maintain a system of segregation. This escalation of violence, and the growing attention it received outside the South, forced a reluctant federal government to intervene to enforce equal treatment.[7]

The Movement’s new strategy centered on nonviolent direct action to challenge unjust laws by employing “creative tension” that overwhelmed the system of segregation.Adapting the Campaign to the EnvironmentIn Nashville, the Movement transitioned from the defensive act of denying patronage to the offensive approach of demanding service at the city’s downtown lunch counters. As in Montgomery, leaders thoroughly planned these defiant actions and demonstrators displayed remarkable discipline. Waging a Good War describes how, drawing inspiration from Gandhi, James Lawson and Diane Nash led workshops in church basements for several months. In squads of twelve, they taught Nashville students about nonviolent action and executed realistic rehearsals that included name-calling and spitting to simulate the violent reactions expected from angry crowds. Lawson observed that “a protest cannot be spontaneous. It has to be systematic. There must be planning, strategy,” what he called “a common discipline.”[8]

As in any campaign, the Movement faced setbacks. The strategy devised by King relied on two external components—violent reaction from opponents of integration and outrage from a broader public—to force the federal government to act. King argued, “In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices are alive, negotiation, self-purification, and direct action.”

King focused on identifying locations where the most likely reaction would be violence. The strongholds of racism became ideal targets for the Movement—Montgomery, Nashville, Mississippi, and eventually Selma. However, their efforts stalled when the Movement faced an adaptive adversary in Albany, Georgia. The segregationist Albany Police Chief understood his enemy, planned well in advance for mass detentions, made arrests on charges that couldn’t be challenged as segregation, maintained police discipline during arrests, and engaged directly with the Movement in negotiations. In Albany, the Movement leadership culminated, withdrew, and learned to better choose its adversaries and to adapt its tactics.

In Birmingham’s Public Safety Commissioner, “Bull” Connor, King found an adversary he could rely on to escalate violence in ways that could enable the campaign to achieve progress. Thomas Ricks describes a training center set up in Dorchester, Georgia, to prepare demonstrators as a “school for noncommissioned officers of the civil rights movement.” However, Birmingham was so oppressive that, in the early days of protest, only a handful of demonstrators volunteered to march, knowing it would result in beatings and jail time. Sensing a faltering initiative, King volunteered to march and face arrest. This act, and the publicity generated by publishing his “Letter from The Birmingham Jail,” brought journalists to the city, but the Movement still needed demonstrators.

*A young demonstrator is attacked by a police dog in Birmingham, Alabama, in May 1963. (Bill Hudson/AP)*

James Bevel, an advisor that Ricks compares to General William Tecumseh Sherman, introduced a new approach in Birmingham.[9] Through local radio station disk jockeys, Bevel recruited a new army of protestors—children. This was a risky gambit, with profound ethical implications, but King agreed, and every child received training in nonviolent tactics. The beating and arrest of Blacks had not sparked the outrage King’s strategy required, but when “Bull” Connor unleashed dogs and fire hoses on children, the nation noticed. President Kennedy declared “the ugly situation in Birmingham” was damaging the nation’s image, white business leaders forced the city to acquiesce to the Movement’s demands, and for the first time the Gallup Poll reported Americans considered civil rights “the most important problem facing the country.”[10] The Movement adapted its tactics to the requirements of its strategy and seized the initiative.

The Civil Rights Movement offers, to a military that has repeatedly struggled against insurgencies and faces a future where the global balance of power is shifting, an invaluable case study of a political conflict with its own share of violent means. Leaders of the movement, like James Lawson, recognized this parallel, noting “protracted struggle is a moral struggle, like warfare, moral warfare.”[11] From strategy and planning to training and tactics, Ricks demonstrates the similarities between these two forms of warfare.

The Movement adapted its tactics to the requirements of its strategy and seized the initiative.Applying the Movement to the MilitaryWaging a Good War provides students of both social movements and military strategy a new perspective on developing an effective campaign that aligns tactics to strategy. From decision-making and planning to training and rehearsals, Waging a Good War delivers an abundance of parallel examples for military audiences to consider. Ricks’ descriptions of post-traumatic stress through quotes from battle-tested participants of the Freedom Summer of 1964 in Mississippi will ring hauntingly familiar to combat veterans.

In the final chapter, Waging a Good War brings the reader forward to consider current social justice challenges. In doing so, Ricks offers military leaders a way to consider and discuss issues of systemic racism, police brutality, ballot access, and democracy in a productive manner that avoids the trap of partisanship. Once again, Ricks provides a broad audience a window into human conflict and the leadership, planning, and unity of effort required to achieve success.

*Martin Luther King Jr., with the Rev. Ralph Abernathy (center) and the Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, defied an injunction against protesting on Good Friday in 1963. They were arrested and held in solitary confinement in the Birmingham jail where King wrote his famous "Letter From Birmingham Jail." (Birmingham Public Library Archives)*

Christopher G. Ingram is a U.S. Army Strategist and President of the Military Writers Guild. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Lunch counter at the old Woolworth's "five and dime" store, Greensboro, North Carolina, 1946 (Carol M. Highsmith).

Notes: [1] “Non-violent direct action” refers to methods of protest or resistance to achieve goals that involve use of personal power, often by removing or denying economic support through boycotts or sit-ins.

[2] Thomas E. Ricks, Waging a Good War: A Military History of the Civil Rights Movement, 1954-1968 (New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2022),14.

[3] Ricks, 23-32.

[4] Ricks, 17, 150.

[5] Martin Luther King, Jr., “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” April 16, 1963, The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute, Stanford University, https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/sites/mlk/files/letterfrombirmingham_wwcw_0.pdf, 2.

[6] King, 2.

[7] Ricks, 227.

[8] Ricks, 42-43.

[9] Ricks, 153.

[10] Ricks, 164-165.

[11] Ricks, xvi.

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Flying Camelot: The F-15, the F-16, and the Weaponization of Fighter Pilot Nostalgia. Michael W. Hankins. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2021.

Michael W. Hankins, in Flying Camelot: The F-15, the F-16, and the Weaponization of Fighter Pilot Nostalgia, argues that starting as early as the 1960s a group of fighter pilots and reformers sought to change the procurement process for aircraft to emphasize the importance of the fighter pilot and air superiority missions. Hankins states that this resulted in the development and acquisition of the F-15 and F-16 fighters by the United States Air Force. Hankins further asserts that these reformers sought to change how fighter pilots were trained to emphasize the importance of dogfighting and air superiority campaigns over other aspects of air combat. As Hankins shows throughout his book, the reformers who sought to emphasize the importance of dogfighting training and aircraft, more commonly known as the Fighter Mafia, were driven by nostalgia of the First World War. As a result, they tried to recreate the aerial duels of the First World War in the aftermath of the Vietnam War.

Hankins shows that fighter pilots have a unique culture where they envision themselves as specialized individual combatants like knights from the medieval period. Buy on Amazon A fascinating aspect of Hankins’ work is the chapters analyzing fighter pilot culture. In many ways these chapters and this book pair well with the research done by Timothy Schultz in The Problem With Pilots, which analyzes the limitations of the pilot, but also examines pilot culture.[1] Like Schultz, Hankins shows that fighter pilots have a unique culture where they envision themselves as specialized individual combatants like knights from the medieval period. As Hankins shows this culture, the allure of aerial combat in the First World War to pilots and the public at large was because it was a new venue for combat. Flying the aircraft required great skill. Also, with ground combat stalled in trench warfare, the public looked to other domains to see progress or the success of the individual combatant. Soon politicians on both sides of the aisle saw the potential of fighter pilots as propaganda and recruiting tools.[2] Hankins does an excellent job at showing how that initial concept of knightly pilots gets passed down from generation to generation and still influences both the culture of fighter pilots today but also the expectations that the public has of fighter pilots in the twenty-first century.

*The Ghost of Kyiv (Andriy Dankovych)*

Hankins argues that fighter pilots believe that the individual in the machine enhances the capabilities of the aircraft. Buy on Amazon Hankins breaks down his discussion of fighter pilot culture quite effectively. He points out there are multiple aspects as to what traits fighter pilots are supposed to have. First, there is the eagerness for combat. Fighter pilots, by their very nature, are supposed to aggressively seek combat. The next aspect of fighter pilot culture is the importance of the individual pilot to the machine. Hankins argues that fighter pilots believe that the individual in the machine enhances the capabilities of the aircraft. Again, this is an area that Schultz touches upon but not in as much detail. Hankins also argues that fighter pilots are viewed more broadly in society as heroic figures and their feats seem almost mythological. A modern-day example of society idolizing the fighter pilot is the “Ghost of Kyiv” in the Russo-Ukrainian War, who with his/her outdated Ukrainian MiG-29 shot down as many as 40 Russian aircraft in the opening weeks of the war. While the story turned out to be more myth than fact, it did inspire Ukrainians at a moment when it was unclear whether their capital, Kyiv, would fall to the forces of the Russian Federation.[3] Hankins also argues that fighter pilots are supporters of technological changes that emphasize the role of the fighter pilot and enhance the ability of the pilot to engage in dogfighting. He also notes the secretive community in which fighter pilots live. Fighter pilots are in sort of a club of their own and the only entrance is to be a fighter pilot. No one else is allowed access. Finally, Hankins argues that fighter pilot culture embraces a hyper masculine attitude. Pilots need to possess many of the traits of an aggressive tough guy, or in other words the film version of John Wayne. Hankins writes, “Whether owing to the stresses of a combat environment, or the pressure of being surrounded by large groups of men who encouraged rowdiness, many performative displays of manhood became what Robertson called ‘hypermasculinity.’”[4] These first two chapters are incredibly important in providing the context for the reforms made by fighter pilots within the Air Force during and after the Vietnam War.

One of the more interesting aspects that Hankins touches upon is the change in leadership of the Air Force during the Vietnam War. Prior to the 1960s and 1970s much of the upper echelons of the officer corps in the Air Force included bomber pilots, who turned the attention of the Air Force towards strategic bombing and bomber production. During the Vietnam War many of these bombing advocates began getting replaced by officers with a fighter pilot background. Hankins argues when the Air Force began developing a new fighter, which eventually became the McDonnell Douglas F-15 “Eagle,” Colonel John Boyd and Pierre Sprey saw this as an opportunity to develop their ideal fighter which would be a pure air superiority fighter.

Hankins shows in these chapters through the acquisition process for the F-15 and F-16 how Boyd and the Fighter Mafia went from being outsiders to playing prominent roles within the Air Force. Hankins argues that the Fighter Mafia, which included Boyd, wanted the new F-15 to be a purely air to air weapons platform rather than a fighter that conducted additional missions including close air support. The result was that the Fighter Mafia were able to change the development of the F-15 to an aircraft whose primary role was air to air combat and secondarily to provide ground support.[5] Hankins points out that this fell far short of what Boyd and Sprey sought in a fighter. They did not want a repurposed fighter but one built specifically for the kind of aerial warfare that they envisioned and romanticized. Hankins argues that the Fighter Mafia found that perfect fighter in the development and procurement of the General Dynamics F-16 “Falcon.” He argues that the Fighter Mafia wanted to create a fast and maneuverable single seat fighter designed to replicate the combat of the First World War. In the end the product that they helped produce created the ideal fighter that they sought and at the same time was more cost effective to the Air Force.[6] Hankins shows in these chapters through the acquisition process for the F-15 and F-16 how Boyd and the Fighter Mafia went from being outsiders to playing prominent roles within the Air Force. Furthermore, he shows how they sought to move the Air Force towards an emphasis on air to air combat missions.

Hankins argues that the military reform movement played a key role in the development of the F-16. More commonly known as the Reformers, they clashed with both the defense industry and those in favor of a more fire power centric doctrine within the Pentagon. They also disagreed with those in the political establishment who viewed new technologies as the means to solving some of the problems from the Vietnam War. In contrast, the Reformers were skeptical of the new complex technologies and stressed the importance of the pilot. They sought to create a cost-effective military with equipment that could be easily produced and molded to the user.[7] They also feared the attritional costs of a high intensity war. Therefore, they were skeptical of those in the Pentagon and weapons development who pushed for an Air Force that emphasized more expensive stealth aircraft and long-range missiles in favor of aircraft that were cheaper, easier to make, and pilot friendly. As Hankins shows, this group played a key role in supporting the F-16 program.

the Persian Gulf War showed to many that the days of dogfighting in visual range of an opponent were over. The big test case for these theories came during the Persian Gulf War from 1990 to 1991. While Boyd, the Fighter Mafia, and the Reformers had created their two ideal jets, the strategy used during the war was influenced by Colonel John Warden, who had a different view of air power. Whereas the Fighter Mafia sought to achieve air superiority through close quarter dogfighting and maneuver warfare, Warden sought to apply warfare at the operational and strategic level. Warden believed that the best method for destroying the enemy was to find the enemy’s center of gravity and knock them off their equilibrium through the use of air power.[8] During the war the Air Force struck hard at operational and strategic targets. Instead of using the F-16 for air superiority missions and dog fighting, the fighter became the most effective fighter-bomber of the war conducting air interdiction and close air support missions. As Hankins points out due to the technology at the fingertips of the pilots, the air-to-air combat during the war was not the kind of fighting that Boyd had envisioned. There were very few dogfights and most occurred at long range beyond the vision of the pilots. As a result, it was the new long-range air to air missiles and radar that played the biggest role in these fights. Most dog fights were over in a few moves. This was not the close in maneuvers of the First World War that Boyd had envisioned.[9] As Hankins argues, the Persian Gulf War showed to many that the days of dogfighting in visual range of an opponent were over. Afterwards different weapon systems were sought such as fighters that used stealth, drones, and more advanced missile systems. He concludes by pointing out that while Boyd, the Fighter Mafia, and the Reformers lost the debate, their ideas still percolate in American society today.

This is a well-researched book. Hankins has brought together a wide variety of sources. These include important culture sources which include films, books, and even comic books to show the cultural attitude that developed in society about the expectations of fighter pilots. At the same time, Haskins also uses archival research and oral histories quite effectively. Hankins has done an excellent job at blending these diverse sources together to shape his arguments throughout the text. It is quite difficult to find a place to criticize him here.

Hankins’s book is an important addition to the historiography of air power during the Second Inter-War Period, which took place between the Vietnam and Persian Gulf Wars. Hankins offers a glimpse into how the culture of the Fighter Mafia affected the doctrinal and weapons procurement debates that the Air Force experienced during this period. Hankins also shows how Vietnam was not the only influencing factor behind the military reforms that took place after the war. In fact, as Hankins argues, the First World War dogfights had the greatest influence on the Fighter Mafia who tried to recreate that type of combat in the aftermath of Vietnam.

As the Fighter Mafia sought to use romanticized views of pilots to advance their agenda, so too is Ukraine tapping into that culture to convince both American politicians and the public to continue backing Ukraine in its war with the Russian Federation.This book is incredibly important outside the academic community. The general public still yearn for fighter pilot culture and dogfights that this work addresses. As Hankins correctly argues the fighter pilot nostalgia played a major role in the development and acquisition of two major fighter systems. Today the public still embraces fighter pilots and their culture. In Ukraine we see the Ghost of Kyiv playing a major role in crafting the culture of these knights of the air. For example, on 7 August 2022, the Ukrainian Defense Ministry posted on their Facebook page a photo about their fighter pilots. The caption stated, “In the photos-Mirgorod aviators. Our guardian angels. Our knights of the sky.”[10] These messages are not just designed to galvanize the support of the Ukrainian public but also to target Americans by embracing fighter pilot culture. As the Fighter Mafia sought to use romanticized views of pilots to advance their agenda, so too is Ukraine tapping into that culture to convince both American politicians and the public to continue backing Ukraine in its war with the Russian Federation. It is not hard to imagine that the discussions Hankins writes about during the Second Inter-War Period will be revived as the United States prepares for potential conflicts with larger rivals such as the Russian Federation and China.

Hankins’ work is an excellent analysis of how the perception of fighter pilots inside and outside of the Air Force affected the evolution of the institution in the 1960s and 1970s. Hankins effectively shows how fighter pilot culture drove the Fighter Mafia to acquire the F-15 and F-16 in the aftermath of the Vietnam War. He argues that the romanticized view of the fighter pilot from the First World War drove reformers like Boyd to try and create the perfect air superiority fighters. While Boyd and the Fighter Mafia were able to acquire their ideal fighters, they were ultimately employed in the Persian Gulf War contrary to their intended use. Hankins’ work is an excellent analysis of how the perception of fighter pilots inside and outside of the Air Force affected the evolution of the institution in the 1960s and 1970s. He uses a wide range of sources to advance his narrative. Hankins work builds on new trends to start analyzing and asking hard questions of pilot culture within the Air Force. This book is incredibly important to the public at large as the United States enters a new age of air power dominated by drones and less by fighter pilots.

Luke Truxal is an adjunct at Columbia State Community College in Tennessee. He completed his PhD in 2018 from the University of North Texas with his dissertation “Command Unity and the Air War Against Germany.” His previous publications include ‘Bombing the Romanian Rail Network,’ in Air Power History. He has also written “The Politics of Operational Planning: Ira Eaker and the Combined Bomber Offensive in 1943” in the Journal of Military Aviation History. He is currently working on his book Uniting Against the Reich: The American Air War in Europe which will be published in late 2023.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: F-15E Strike Eagles assigned to the 48th Fighter Wing, F-16 Fighting Falcons assigned to the 52nd Fighter Wing, Spangdahlem Air Base, Germany, and Polish air force F-16 Fighting Falcons perform an elephant walk at Łask Air Base, Poland, April 21, 2021 (Senior Airman Madeline Herzog).

Notes: [1] Timothy Schultz, The Problem with Pilots: How Physicians, Engineers, and Airpower Enthusiasts Redefined Flight, (Baltimore: John Hopkins Press, 2018).

[2] Michael W. Hankins, Flying Camelot: The F-15, the F-16, and the Weaponization of Fighter Pilot Nostalgia, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2021) 22-23.

[3]Lawrence Peters, “How Ukraine's 'Ghost of Kyiv' legendary pilot was born,” May 1, 2022 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-61285833.

[4] Hankins, Flying Camelot, 50.

[5] Ibid, 92-95.

[6] Ibid, 115-121.

[7] Ibid, 146.

[8] Ibid, 179-181.

[9] Ibid, 182-186.

[10] Міністерство оборони України, “Without days off and full-fledged rest, they "minusu вихідtʹ" the Russians, protecting the Ukrainian sky.” August 5, 2022. https://www.facebook.com/MinistryofDefense.UA.

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War Transformed: The Future of Twenty-First Century Great Power Competition and Conflict. Mick Ryan. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2022.

The character of war is rapidly changing. The increasing availability of evolving technology confounds previous frameworks for military operations. Socioeconomic factors and demographic shifts complicate manpower and force generation models for national defense. Ubiquitous connectivity links individuals to global audiences, expanding the reach of influence activities. And a renewed emphasis on strategic competition enhances the scope of military action below the threshold of violence.

 Buy on Amazon  This is the world that Mick Ryan explores in *War Transformed: The Future of Twenty-First Century Great Power Competition and Conflict*. A retired major-general of the Australian Army, adjunct fellow with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and a frequent writer on topics of modern and future warfare, Ryan is well positioned to develop this study. By deeply examining drivers of change, Ryan aims to offer a solid approach to preparing for modern competition and war. In this he succeeds admirably, offering military practitioners and policy makers alike a sound understanding of war’s changing character, a path of inquiry to understand it, and principles to seek advantage in this new security environment.

Ryan’s central premise is that despite ever expanding technological leaps, relative advantage will not be maintained by the relentless pursuit of the latest tech.[1] Rather, military organizations will gain a decisive edge in the 21st century through a combination of appropriate ideas, adaptive institutions, and well trained and educated people. While Ryan offers that his argument is not particularly groundbreaking, it is still important and must be re-emphasized to guard against the feckless pursuit of new and glamorous technology, and to focus policymakers and leaders instead on their greatest asset—their people.

Military organizations will gain a decisive edge in the 21st century through a combination of appropriate ideas, adaptive institutions, and well trained and educated people. Buy on Amazon This emphasis on an enduring argument is a strength of his case rather than a shortcoming. The focus reveals that while the character of war is changing faster than ever and in an era of extraordinary and novel threats, its enduring nature provides timeless principles for those intent on succeeding in war. In this, Ryan echoes a key argument of Air Force officer and military theorist John Boyd: People, ideas, and things, in that order.[2]

War Transformed reads much like an exploratory discussion, one in which Ryan guides the reader through synthesis, antithesis, and thesis. Thoughtful questions are explored through engagement with foundational texts on the subject at hand. For example, his analysis of the impact of culture on military institutions includes a brief discussion of Peter Mansoor and Williamson Murray’s pivotal text The Culture of Military Organizations, as well as Frank Hoffman’s important work Mars Adapting: Military Change During War.[3] These touchstones of scholarship demonstrate Ryan’s deep expertise on the subject, while offering avenues for further exploration by the military professional.

 Buy on Amazon  One of the book’s shining points is the recurring theme of adaptation. In building a model of a world in constant competition, Ryan provides a theoretical construct for competition that is accessible to the military professional. By identifying historical and modern cases for the importance of adaptation, he connects this to the modern reader by identifying adaptive requirements to the emerging trends in 21st century warfare, such as a new appreciation for the importance of time, new forms of mass, the battle for signatures, and human-machine integration. Strategists and operational planners will find even more utility in Ryan’s concept for counter-adaptation, in which he outlines ways for denying an adversary the ability to adapt to friendly operations.[4]

Leaders should also take note of the linkage of adaptation to institutional culture, which Ryan connects directly to military effectiveness. Ryan argues that without a culture open to self-examination, critique, and adaptation, military effectiveness will not be achieved. As today’s military practitioners find themselves tasked to develop and implement a litany of new operational concepts, they will be well served by Ryan’s argument for nurturing a culture that matches concepts to capacity, maintains a focus on their mission, and aligns their activities with their objectives.

Diagnosing several shortcomings found within most contemporary approaches to military learning, he proposes that a joint, integrated force can be better developed if military leaders are taught to be joint by design, rather than attempting to make officers joint qualified when they are over halfway through their careers.Himself a noted writer on the subject of professional military education, it is no surprise that Ryan dedicates significant attention to the problem of intellectually developing military personnel. He argues for constructing a system of continuous learning, challenging military institutions to strategically design their efforts for training and education. Diagnosing several shortcomings found within most contemporary approaches to military learning, he proposes that a joint, integrated force can be better developed if military leaders are taught to be joint by design, rather than attempting to make officers joint qualified when they are over halfway through their careers. Similarly, Ryan proposes that learning will be enhanced through engagement with non-military institutions, a goal easily achievable through interaction with the interagency and civilian industry.[5]

Additionally, he makes a strong case for the applicability of speculative fiction as a means by which to develop plausible futures, anticipate challenges, and develop solutions. While many readers will be familiar with the genre of fiction intelligence, or FICINT, popularized by August Cole and Peter Singer through their novel Ghost Fleet, Ryan demonstrates that a long and wide-ranging application of science fiction for military education and planning exists and that this is a tool that is both useful and culturally acceptable to military organizations. Finally, Ryan makes the case for military educational institutions to formally repurpose a portion of their syllabi to deliberately study and solve emerging problems. In proposing the educational institution as think tank, Ryan again appeals to history, noting two key precedents: the U.S. Naval War College’s 1930s wargames that informed operations in the Pacific War, and the Marine Corps Schools’ task to its students to develop and write what would become the Tentative Manual for Landing Operations, which provided essential doctrine for amphibious operations conducted by the Allies in multiple theaters in World War II.[6]

Ryan’s boldest and perhaps most important argument is his critique of hyper-war, a type of conflict where there is no human in the loop; instead, military decision-making is entirely automated, provided by combinations of artificial general intelligence and machine learning.[7] Ryan is forthright: “I can think of no human endeavor that would benefit from it—especially war.”[8] To reach this conclusion, he contests that such a form of war is possible, but instead examines whether such an arrangement is desirable. Without skin in the game, such constructs will never be able to fully consider the human implications of their decisions.

War Transformed provides the necessary lens through which military practitioners must consider modern competition and conflict.This, too, is an old argument, one that strikes at the heart of the quantitative versus the qualitative when assessing value. But the debate takes on new meaning when the technology to offload strategic decisions from human beings is rapidly becoming available. This discussion is revisited in the epilogue, where Ryan disputes the argument that technological advances are changing not just the character, but also the nature of war. Weighing different arguments regarding whether the nature of war could ever change, he contends that no such change will occur in the near future, and regardless of the possibilities, that “no AI can inspire humans to cohere, learn, fight, and sacrifice.”[9]

War Transformed provides the necessary lens through which military practitioners must consider modern competition and conflict. It describes the rapidly changing operational environment, frames its defining problems, and provides suitable answers to its many dilemmas. While confirming the importance of technological change, Ryan makes a compelling case to focus instead on people, institutions, and operational concepts in order to be successful. In challenging leaders to embrace adaptation and to build cultures of learning, War Transformed offers a reliable path forward through an increasingly uncertain future.

Brian Kerg is an officer in the U.S. Marine Corps. He is also a nonresident fellow with Marine Corps University’s Brute Krulak Center for Innovation and Future Warfare. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of the U.S. Marine Corps, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Untitled, 2020 (Martin Sanchez).

Notes: [1] Mick Ryan, War Transformed: The Future of Twenty-First Century Great Power Competition and Conflict, (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2022), 7.

[2] Ryan, 158-59.

[3] Ryan, 139-40.

[4] Ryan, 159-60.

[5] Ryan, 187-189.

[6] Ryan, 191-195.

[7] Ryan, 88-89.

[8] Ryan, 108.

[9] Ryan, 231.

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In the realm of Clausewitzian scholarship, the 1820s represent a conundrum. On the one hand, this was when Carl von Clausewitz wrote most of his treatise On War. On the other hand, despite the period's undoubted significance for the military theorist’s legacy, we know relatively little about his life, career, and writing process. For modern national security professionals, this knowledge gap is particularly unfortunate, as it tends to, first, reinforce the mistaken impression that Clausewitz's efforts to write a theory of war were an exoteric process separated from his experience in war or his performance as a senior officer. As a result, it is also easier to brush aside the need for reflection and the continuous study of war, politics, and society Clausewitz thought central for the business of war.

The reasons for this decade-long knowledge gap are manifold. First and foremost is the lack of correspondence between Clausewitz and his wife Marie as they lived together; although other letters are preserved, their number is not as great nor their content as candid and detailed as their correspondence as a couple. Furthermore, the military theorist spent most of this period drafting On War, and the prolonged and secluded nature of that writing process offers a less compelling narrative to scholars and audiences. Following the riveting accounts of the Napoleonic Wars, the realities of peace and the Restoration Era's stifling climate additionally constrain interest in the period. Thus, biographies tend to describe the 1820s in broad strokes, often squeezing the decade Clausewitz dedicated to writing On War into a single chapter.

A newly discovered drawing, now in the collection of the German History Museum in Berlin, promises to shed new light on Clausewitz's life. Furthermore, its connection to real-life events provides a better understanding of the decade’s influence over Clausewitz's thought and the realities surrounding the creation of On War. The find highlights an overlooked memorandum Clausewitz wrote in 1825 that, for its part, reveals Clausewitz as a thoughtful and consummate military professional. In fact, the ideas expressed in this memorandum matured on the pages of his general theory, On War, reinforcing the notion of his theory as a product of complex reflection on the realities military professionals encounter.

A New Image of Clausewitz Johann Jakob Kirchhoff, Carl von Clausewitz, 1825. (Copyright: German Historical Museum/Deutsches Historisches Museum/I. Desnica. All rights reserved.)

The newly discovered drawing comes from the collection of the German Historical Museum in Berlin. Several years ago, the institution acquired the partial estate of the artist Johann Jakob Kirchhoff (1796-1848). Among the sketches and studies found was an aquarelle representing Carl von Clausewitz. The drawing was part of a series of portraits of Prussian officers and statesmen who played a significant role in the 1813-1815 campaigns against Napoleon (or the Wars of German Liberation, as the period is also known in German historiography). The portraits were bundled together with Kirchhoff's work Royal Parade on the Tempelhof Field (Königsparade auf dem Tempelhofer Feld). Also an aquarelle, the Royal Parade represented a gathering of the elite of the Prussian army, with the famous cast iron monument dedicated to the Prussian victories in 1813-1815 as a background. Although the intention and immediate purpose of this work and the additional portraits remain unclear, the iconography evoking the Wars of German Liberation suggests Kirchhoff probably envisioned the sequence as a jubilee celebration of the Allied victories against Napoleon. As the faces on the Royal Parade are hard to distinguish while the individual sketches are rich in detail, it is also possible the artist might have had another, more monumental work in mind; thus, the sequence may have constituted a preliminary study for it. Alternatively, Kirchhoff's illustrator work could also suggest he intended the Royal Parade and the drawings for a book or a luxury album.[1]

Kirchhoff's portrait of Clausewitz unmistakably reminds us of the military theorist's popular image by Wilhelm Wach. There is a possible explanation for that—after Clausewitz's death, Marie wished to commission a portrait of her beloved husband that could be turned into lithograph and then printed and gifted to close friends. She, however, was dissatisfied with a recent official portrait done by the famous German artist Franz Krüger, a work that is now lost. As she shared in a letter, Marie intended to commission another painting, an amalgam of Krüger's work and a drawing she possessed that, according to Marie, truly captured her beloved Carl's facial expression.[2] The similarity between Kirchhoff's image and Wach's famous portrait of Clausewitz suggest the former might have been that drawing. This also implies Wach's work was created posthumously by combining Clausewitz's figure from Krüger's portrait with the facial expression from Kirchhoff's.

*“Carl von Clausewitz” by Wilhelm Wach (Wikimedia)*

Kirchhoff's image emphasizes Clausewitz's penetrating blue eyes, a feature the work shares with another recently discovered drawing of the military theorist, the so-called “young Clausewitz.”[3] Yet compared to that work's confident and energetic look, Clausewitz's gaze in 1825 is solemn. Not only the fifteen-year difference and the burdens of several wars separate the two images. In 1825, Clausewitz's health was at a low point. His letters from that time describe prolonged and severe pain in the throat that made it impossible for him to swallow and enjoy food and drink.[4] Hence the unhealthy complexion and weariness evident in his face.

Kirchhoff's drawing provides one additional insight. The larger aquarelle was called Royal Parade on the Tempelhof Field, but no known source mentions a prodigious parade in 1825. In that year, however, the Prussian army conducted military exercises in Potsdam and Berlin with the additional purpose of creating a modern field manual. The indications in Kirchhoff's papers that the series was made both in Berlin and Potsdam also suggest the maneuvers may have served as the real-life basis for the artist's work.[5]

In his position as a director of the Prussian Military Academy, Clausewitz also performed duties as associate to the General Staff (aggregirtier Officer des General Stabes), occasionally called to support the evaluation of maneuvers and training.[6] However, his particular involvement in the 1825 maneuvers remains unclear. A memorandum he wrote ahead of the event suggests Clausewitz was not included in the committee working on the field manual. Kirchhoff's aquarelle, however, indicates that even if the military theorist did not belong to the Prussian General Staff's leading figures, he still enjoyed recognition for his role in the Napoleonic Wars and, most likely, did observe the maneuvers up close. Otherwise, the artist would have not included him in the series.

*Clausewitz as a General Staff officer, circa 1809-1810, author unknown.(Forschungsgemeinschaft Clausewitz-Burg, Burg bei Magdeburg)*

Clausewitz's Thoughts on Creating Guidelines for Military Conduct Even if the committee working on a new field manualomitted Clausewitz, the short memorandum captured his thoughts on the ways to create guidelines for conduct in the field. Although published in the 1990 volume containing Clausewitz’s manuscripts and correspondence, the document has never been extensively studied, nor translated into English. This article offers its first English translation.

Clausewitz's memorandum was sent to his close friend and former commander, Field Marshall August Neidhardt von Gneisenau.[7] Serving as the chief of staff for Blücher, Gneisenau was largely responsible for the planning of the Allied campaigns against Napoleon in 1813-1815. In the post-1819 period, the so-called Restoration Era, when Prussian politics took a reactionary turn, Gneisenau was awarded many honors but, as a suspected liberal, was kept away from active service. He and Clausewitz continuously exchanged ideas, and Gneisenau encouraged Clausewitz's work on a general theory of war. It remains unclear whether Clausewitz expected that his friend would pass along the 1825 memorandum to other leading features in the Prussian military or used the occasion to simply clarify his thoughts on the subject.

A booklet capturing the conduct of armies in the field, a Feldmanual or field manual, was called to close a gap in Prussia's military documentation. As part of the efforts to restructure and modernize the Prussian army after its disastrous defeat at the hands of Napoleon in the Jena-Auerstedt Campaign (1806), the reform circle led by Gerhard von Scharnhorst created an exercise manual in 1812.[8] The document aimed at introducing contemporary tactics, unifying the Prussian army's conduct, and rebuilding it as a force able to face Napoleon's troops. Following his mentor Scharnhorst's instructions, as a General Staff major, Clausewitz served on the committee that compiled the infantry exercise manual. The booklet was considered a comprehensive guide for training troops that, with some changes, remained in use until 1843.[9]

Yet the realities of prolonged campaigning and mass warfare in the 1813-1815 period also revealed its limits. The exercise manual required extensive periods of training and long and systematic development of officers and non-commissioned officers able to lead troops. However, in the Wars of German Liberation, Prussia increasingly relied on newly drafted soldiers and the Landwehr (territorial reserve). For its officer corps, the Landwehr selected schoolteachers, civil servants, and prominent members of the society; although enthusiastic, they were far from military professionals. In general, the drafted Prussian troops and their leadership arrived at the war theater with four months of service on average. Without extensive training, newly commissioned and non-commissioned officers often lacked knowledge and experience leading to poor performance in the field.[10] They needed practical guidance for their conduct in combat.

As a reaction to this experience in the Wars of German Liberation, Clausewitz considered writing a field manual in 1816. His request for institutional support for the project was met with little enthusiasm from the war ministry; instead, Clausewitz devoted his energy to writing war theory.[11] Nonetheless, the need for a new manual guiding and unifying the army's conduct on the field became hard to overlook, leading the Prussian military to plan the maneuvers of 1825 as the basis for the creation of such document.

Clausewitz's memorandum displays his disdain for habitual committee work. As he stated, the emphasis on consensus from early on and attempts to please every expectation tended to steer the process in the wrong direction: "From the very first moment, everything is taken into account and agreement is sought too early." Instead, Clausewitz suggested a group of experienced and knowledgeable officers with diverse expertise should reflect and write their proposals separately; only after these rough drafts were prepared should the committee meet and discuss which requirements and ideas should be captured in the manual. This process, Clausewitz implied, would "safeguard against one-sidedness" and could produce a valuable product.

This careful reflection on military instructions promised to also bridge the gap between theory and practice. Clausewitz criticized the notion that a field manual should be based on the experience from such a limited event as a fourteen-day exercise: “It seems to me implausible that we will learn in a fourteen-day-long exercise what has not been learned while experiencing a four-year-long war.” Instead, the creation of a manual had to be a deliberate and thoughtful process: "It is more a question of capturing, through careful and persistent reflection, what needs to be prescribed and can be prescribed."

A military manual, Clausewitz argued, should be written in clear language and aim to capture the majority of cases. Arguing that no guide could offer instructions for every occasion—nor should it attempt to do it—Clausewitz emphasized the need for reliance on "common sense." He also took a jab at the military profession and its love for elaborate paperwork, "which some find the service's particular dignity."

The practical field manual, he concluded, had to unify the force's performance. Clausewitz argued further that practical guidance for combat, military education, and war theory ought to be in constant dialog. To describe this theoretical and normative unification of conduct, Clausewitz used the term Methodismus or mode of procedure. The latter, not coincidently, was also a chapter in his treatise On War.

The Consequences for On WarIn the 1990s, the eminent German scholar Werner Hahlweg briefly commented on the similarities between the 1825 Memorandum and the chapter in Book II, Chapter 4 (translated by Peter Paret and Michael Howard as "Method and Routine").[12] Contrary to the popular perception that the entirety of Clausewitz's manuscripts had been lost in World War II, some of the early drafts are preserved in the German archives and provide clues on the development of his thought. The early version of Methodismus is one of those preserved.[13] Famously, as captured in the Note of 1827 published as the preface of On War, Clausewitz envisioned comprehensive revisions in the drafts, a plan never to be fulfilled due to his unexpected death in 1831.[14] The preservation of the earlier manuscripts allow us to study the development of Clausewitz's thought and particularly the influence of the 1825 events and the memorandum on his revisions of On War.

In its early version, the chapter offered a rather short discussion, merely two pages in print, on the place of guidance in the study of war and the role routine and patterns could play in military conduct. As Clausewitz wrote in the draft, with its complex enactment and ever-changing conditions, war may appear as a human activity the least amendable to rules, guidance, and routine. However, when considering that commanders usually worked with imperfect information and without the ability to oversee and control the execution of every order, basing disposition “on the general and probable” was often the case. (The paragraph was partially preserved in the mature version of On War).[15] Thus, the question Clausewitz raised in the early draft—but failed to answer—was how this methodical procedure should be devised to facilitate military performance on the field without becoming a stiff routine that shackled conduct and blinded commanders to the singular challenges they faced in combat.

The 1825 Memorandum helped Clausewitz to refine his thinking on the matter. The chapter in On War we read today is an extended meditation on the role guidance, regulations, and routine should and could play in the conduct of war. Echoing the memorandum, Clausewitz argued that a "method" or "mode of procedure" is a constantly recurring procedure "that has been selected from several possibilities." Despite its seeming uniformity, it could not describe all eventualities but "should be designed to meet the most probable cases. Routine is not based on definite individual premises, but rather on the average probability of analogous cases. Its aim is to postulate an average truth, which, when applied evenly and constantly, will soon acquire some of the nature of a mechanical skill."[16] Clausewitz also found an answer to the question he posed in the early draft, namely, how to create practical but undogmatic guidance for conduct on the field: "As such [routines] may well have a place in the theory of the conduct of war, provided they are not falsely represented as absolute, binding frameworks for action (systems); rather they are the best of the general forms, short cuts, and options that may be substituted for individual decisions."[17] In other words, they had to be understood for what they are—general guidelines and heuristics; thus, if keeping in mind their limitations, modes of procedure had their place. However, if they were seen as rules to be continuously followed, the guidelines would become counterproductive and even dangerous.

Additionally, as in the memorandum, Clausewitz saw procedures and routines in perpetual discourse with war theory; the latter, as he stated in the same chapter, was the "intelligent analysis of conduct of war."[18] While unified methods and routines are typical and acceptable on a tactical level, Clausewitz commented that, at the higher levels of war, some imitation of previously successful approaches, application of ready-made solutions, or preferences dictated by the fashion of the day was also unavoidable. The danger came, however, when people failed to recognize these routines on an operational and strategic level for what they were, a "style, developed out of a single case." As an antidote, war theory and its study, according to Clausewitz, are called to provide context and reveal when a method had outlived its time while simultaneously empowering leaders to seek and develop new approaches.[19]

Understanding Clausewitz's ExperienceThe discovery of the 1825 portrait and an understanding of its larger context reveals how little we still know about the military theorist's life and writing process. Although his war experience is extensively studied, Clausewitz's tangible achievements as a military reformer on the eve of the Wars of German Liberation and afterwards are not yet fully appreciated.[20] The process of creation of On War remains, too, largely unexplored, a circumstance particularly vexing given the treatise's unfinished nature. In fact, due to its complex language, the chapter on Methodismus discussed in this article is seldom read or debated in professional military seminars, despite its valuable insight into the business of war. By studying the roots of Clausewitz's ideas and their gradual development, we can better understand their meaning while broadening our modern interpretation of his thought.

Most of all, for today's national security practitioners exploring Clausewitz's thought process brings reassurance and encouragement. The Prussian general continuously reflected on practical challenges he encountered in war and peace—and strove to capture these reflections in a general theory transcending the constraints of early nineteenth-century warfare. Thus, his treatise is an homage and empowerment of those enlightened professionals who constantly study the business of war and strive to conduct it in an informed and effective manner.

*Royal Parade on the Tempelhof Field" (Königsparade auf dem Tempelhofer Feld)” by Johann Jakob Kirchhoff, (Wikipedia)*

Carl von Clausewitz to August Neidhardt von Gneisenau on Creating a Field Manual, 9 October 1825[21]These days here and in Potsdam small-scale field exercises are starting, carried out mostly by light troops, namely Jäger {light elite infantry}, Schützen {marksmen}, Fusiliers {skirmishers}, hussars {light cavalry}, dragoons {mounted infantry}, and horse artillery, to continue for several weeks. Their purpose is to produce practical suggestions for field-duty regulations. In Potsdam, Colonel {August Wilhelm von} Neumann is going to be the commander, and Colonels {Eugen Maximilian von} Roeder and {Karl Friedrich Adolph von} Malachowski will be the observers and arbitrators. Here {in Berlin}, Lieutenant Colonel {Ulrich Friedrich Johann Gottlieb von} Barner will command and General {Adolf Eduard von} Thiele will be the second observer and arbitrator. I know too little about the matter to be able to judge the practicability of this measure. Still, it seems to me implausible that we will learn in a fourteen-day-long exercise what has not been learned while experiencing a four-year-long war. And it is more a question of capturing, through careful and persistent reflection, what needs to be prescribed and can be prescribed. When such a task is done tenfold in the office, it surely would be more practical than these meditations and observations made with reins in the hand. What I have in mind are five to six individuals with different backgrounds: a couple of capable drill instructors from the infantry and the cavalry, a couple of capable soldiers from the frontline of both branches, a couple of academically educated ones, meaning such who are already acquainted and understand the existing {body of knowledge} and know what a professional handbook should say.[22] They are tasked to create the first draft of a field manual and independently explore in detail their specific areas. These differing and in their biases surely very varying works would then provide the materials, from which a commission could draw ideas. This process would safeguard against one-sidedness and raise all concerns and complexities. However, if we begin, as it always happens, with a commission, then from the onset we will attain an artificial half-baked product {Halbding} divorced from any originality because in such a commission no member has an opportunity to express themself completely. From the very first moment, everyone holds back, and agreement is sought too early. In my opinion, a field manual, just as in war so in peace, should:

1. Capture only the most essential and useful matters, subsequently leaving out all immaterial or impractical forms; for the useful and needed is so much that it is even more unwarranted to clutter military service with paperwork, in which some find the service’s particular dignity.

2. To capture only what covers a majority of cases, for an instruction that includes points that cannot be applied in hundreds of cases, on the one hand, loses influence and gravitas; and on the other ceases to be among the required readings to which a practitioner adheres and, combined with one’s common sense, to belong among what amounts to everything a practitioner needs. If these rules are to be followed, then the regulations would also not be overshadowed by one component (for the whole text must be divided in such), and this is crucial.

3. As the main requirement for field regulations, I believe that the provisions concerning the engagement of the enemy amount to an elementary war study {Kriegslehre}, which covers topics from the whole so-called small war up to the positioning and application of a brigade. This way, a specific mode of procedure {Methodismus} in command of troops is created, which safeguards against too much ignorance and going astray while following some false ingenuity. This methodological procedure, when keeping up with military theory’s {Kriegskunst} development and not too outdated, is the best that an army could receive. The provisions captured in the military regulations should represent it {this methodological procedure}, and these provisions should serve at professional and advanced schools as the base for the curriculum, from which the art of fighting wars will be further developed; thereby, in this aspect too, we are safeguarded from going astray and, at the same time, the teacher can rely on a textbook, which is not divorced of authority.

However, all of this is just wishful thinking, for it is very difficult to implement. I beg Your Excellency all the more for forgiveness for having diverted your attention with it for so long.

Vanya Eftimova Bellinger is the author of Marie von Clausewitz: The Woman Behind the Making of On War. She currently teaches at the U.S. Naval War College. The views expressed are her own and do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Navy, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: “Royal Parade on the Tempelhof Field" (Königsparade auf dem Tempelhofer Feld)” by Johann Jakob Kirchhoff, (Wikipedia)

Notes: [1] See Kirchhoff’s biography in Neuer Nekrolog der Deutschen 1848 (Weimar: Voigt Verlag, 1850),799-803. https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=LEzuCFYkFjsC&pg=GBS.PA536&hl=en

[2] Unpublished letter, Marie von Clausewitz to Karl von der Gröben, 8 December 1831, Prussian Privy State Archives, Berlin, HA VI, NL Karl von der Groeben, Uncatalogued Box Nr.56.

[3] Vanya Eftimova Bellinger, “A Portrait of Clausewitz as a Young Officer,” War on the Rocks, 23 October 2015.https://warontherocks.com/2015/10/a-portrait-of-clausewitz-as-a-young-officer/

[4] Clausewitz to Gneisenau, 9 and 25 October 1825, in Carl von Clausewitz, Schriften-Aufsätze-Studien-Briefe, Dokumente aus dem Clausewitz-, Scharnhorst- und Gneisenau-Nachlaß sowie aus öffentlichen und privaten Sammlungen, ed. by Werner Hahlweg (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1990), Vol. 2-1, 475 and 481.

[5] See the provenance on https://www.deutsche-digitale-bibliothek.de/item/YUNMXRUJPUJWRN5DACFC4FJ5HPZLEPSH.

[6] Peter Paret, Clausewitz and the State: The Man, His Theories, and His Times (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1987), 307.

[7] Clausewitz to Gneisenau, 9 October 1825, in Clausewitz, Schriften-Aufsätze-Briefe, Vol. 2-1, 477-479.

[8] On Scharnhorst and the reform circle, see Vanya Eftimova Bellinger, “Introducing #Scharnhorst: The Vision of an Enlightened Soldier ‘On Experience and Theory’,” The Strategy Bridge, 1 April 2019. https://thestrategybridge.org/the-bridge/2019/4/1/introducing-scharnhorst-the-vision-of-an-enlightened-soldier-on-experience-and-theory

[9] Peter Paret, Yorck and The Era of Prussian Reform, 1807-1815 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1966), 179-181; Jürgen Angelow, Von Wien nach Königgrätz: Die Sicherheitspolitik des Deutschen Bundes im europäischen Gleichgewicht 1815–1866 (München: R. Oldenbourg Verlag, 1996), 76.

[10] Dennis E. Showalter, "The Prussian Landwehr and Its Critics, 1813-1819," Central European History 4, no. 1 (1971): 16-17.

[11] August Neidhardt von Gneisenau to War Minister Boyen, 5 August 1816, in G.H. Pertz and Hans Delbrück, Das Leben des Feldmarschalls Grafen Neithardt von Gneisenau, Vol.5 (Berlin: Reimer Verlag, 1880), 132-133.

[12] Clausewitz, Schriften-Aufsätze-Briefe, Vol. 2-1, 478, n.21.

[13] Clausewitz, Schriften-Aufsätze-Briefe, Vol.2-2, 659-661.

[14] Carl von Clausewitz, On War, ed. and trans. by Peter Paret and Michael Howard (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1984), 69.

[15] Clausewitz, Schriften-Aufsätze-Briefe, Vol. 2-2, 659-660, and Clausewitz, On War, 153.

[16] Clausewitz, On War, 151-152.

[17] Clausewitz, On War, 153.

[18] Clausewitz, On War, 154.

[19] Clausewitz, On War, 154-155.

[20] On Clausewitz's experiences as a soldier, see Donald Stoker, Clausewitz: His Life and Work (New York: Oxford University Press, 2014).

[21] Carl von Clausewitz, Schriften-Aufsätze-Studien-Briefe, Dokumente aus dem Clausewitz-, Scharnhorst- und Gneisenau-Nachlaß sowie aus öffentlichen und privaten Sammlungen, ed. by Werner Hahlweg (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1990), Vol. 2-1, pp.477-479. Translated by Vanya Eftimova Bellinger. Dr. Christopher Bassford provided initial comments and corrections.

[22] Emphasis in the original. In his manuscripts and letters, Clausewitz frequently underlined sentences and key words he thought important. Unfortunately, later editions and English translations do not always reflect Clausewitz’s preferences. This translation reproduces the emphases as published in Clausewitz, Schriften-Aufsätze-Studien-Briefe, 477-479.

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Ralph Waldo Emerson is said to have observed, “I cannot remember the books I've read any more than the meals I have eaten; even so, they have made me.” As we do each year at The Strategy Bridge, we pause to reflect on our #Reviewing series, the books and movies and other work we’ve consumed as a community—the intellectual meal we’ve shared—and consider what they have helped us to make of ourselves, what they’ve helped us become.

Has the intellectual feast of the past year made us more aware of the interaction between changing technologies in war and the psychology of those who fight in war? Has it opened us to a better understanding of why humans fight these things we call wars, a clearer idea of the enduring nature and changing character of what it means to win in war, a sobering reflection on what fighting and not winning wars can do to a military? Has it opened a window through which we can view our own history and the history of others, making us more thoughtful in our approach to war, strategy, and each other? Has it given us a less prosaic language to express who we were, who we are, and who we will become? Perhaps our intellectual feast of the past year has done all this and more.

Looking forward to the coming year, we confront the beautiful reality that who we were and who we are perhaps matter less than who we will be. What matters is not what has been made but what we will make, not having become but becoming. And just as the books we have read made us, so the books we will read will transform us.

We look forward to working with all of you in making ourselves and each other—our Strategy Bridge community—stronger and broader and better in the coming year.

#TheBridgeReads

 Buy on Amazon  *Remote Warfare: New Cultures of Violence*. Edited by Rebecca A. Adelman and David Kieran. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2020.**Read a review from Adrian R. Lewis** **here****:**This book is worth reading. Some of the essays are excellent. However, for those seeking a broader understanding of the conduct of drone warfare, I would recommend some foundational reading on the development and evolution of airpower theory and doctrine before delving into the development and employment of drone technology since 9/11.

 Buy on Amazon  *The British are Coming: The War for America, Lexington to Princeton*, 1775-1777. Rick Atkinson. NY: Henry Holt and Co., 2019.**Read a review from Alexander N. Pickands** **here****:**

A mighty military with a global reach and a warrior tradition bogged down in the complexities of war waged in dispersed battlegrounds upon another continent. A fearsome host unable to achieve its goals despite outclassing the training, discipline, equipment, and resources of its foes. National leaders with every confidence in victory reinforced by a continuing stream of misleading and optimistic reports. Although evocative of a more contemporary conflict and military, war historian Rick Atkinson’s latest work is about the bloody birth of America and masterfully exposes the Revolutionary War in all its confusion, complexity, and discord.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Arab Bulletin**.* R.L. Bidwell, ed. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, Archive Editions, 1986.**Read Michael Barr’s review** **here****:**

In The Arab Bulletin, the origins of many of the region’s current instabilities can be found in the reports about restive tribes, dynasties, and leaders. Even today, the content, methodology, analysis, and writing style of the Arab Bulletin are relevant. In essence the Bulletin is a fourteen volume master class in the use of intelligence and hybrid warfare in immediate and long term strategy. T.E. Lawrence was the only officer who wrote comprehensively about his work with the Arab Bureau, and some of his work is suspect.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Wolves of Helmand: A View from Inside the Den of Modern Warfare**.* Frank “Gus” Biggio. Forefront Books, 2020. **Read Emily Swain’s review** **here****:**

Overall, Biggio conveys a great deal of information in a compact, highly-readable form. He touches lightly, but from the heart, on serious topics which makes this an accessible book for even the least militarily-savvy reader. An informed reader will appreciate the tale, while less-knowledgeable readers will enjoy gaining a broad understanding of the events without having to consult references.

 Buy on Amazon  *Rational Empires: Institutional Incentives and Imperial Expansion**.* Leo Blanken. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 2012.**Read a review from Jason L. Lepore** **here****:**

The literature on international security for the last three decades has primarily focused on the twin problems of terrorism and insurgency as the principal threats to the global status quo, and in doing so has neglected the role of conquest as an instrument within great power competition. The emerging era of bare-knuckled territorial aggrandizement by revisionist great powers, therefore, has largely caught the academy underprepared. Given this, I offer a ten-year anniversary review of a book that could assist in shaping our understanding of the changing nature of the international system today.

 Buy on Amazon  *So Frag & So Bold: Short Poems, Aphorisms & Other Wartime Fun**.* Randy Brown. Johnston, IA: Middle West Press, 2021.**Read a review from Andria Williams** **here****:**

The line between poems and jokes runs thin in Randy Brown’s new collection, So Frag and So Bold—but in the best possible way. Brown, in a series of mostly very-short poems, quips, and aphorisms, brings the gallows humor of military life to the stage in a unique, funny, and moving way all at once. These poems feel both very real and also imaginative, almost like a Greek chorus calling out in intervals from stage left, telling you the real thing you need to know.

 Buy on Amazon  *Just and Unjust Uses of Limited Force*. Daniel Brunstetter. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2021.**Read a review from Paul Vicars** **here****:**

Just and Unjust Uses of Limited Force by Daniel Brunstetter offers an insightful look into the permissions and limits of international force short of war. Brunstetter proposes a theory of justice for limited force (or vim in Latin). The need for such a study is indicated by the fact that most of the terminology used to describe morality in war does not adequately capture contemporary uses of force, which warrants additional vocabulary. This is what Brunstetter provides. Full of contemporary examples and counterfactuals, Brunstetter's work offers a relevant heuristic to aid in understanding the fights of today.

 Buy on Amazon  *Why War?* Christopher Coker. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2021.**Read Wayne Lee’s review** **here****:**

It is no small task to write a book that begins with the evolutionary history of humans and ends with artificial intelligence and the “Skynet” problem, but Coker has a long track record of wide-ranging analyses of war and warfare. Despite being retired from a professorship of International Relations at the London School of Economics (LSE) and Political Science, he continues to direct the LSE’s foreign policy think tank and is a regular participant or consultant in UK and NATO military education and strategic planning circles. Crucial to this book, he has published a number of other works, many of them full length treatments of subjects that are revisited more briefly in this impressive synthesis.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Strategy of Denial: American Defense in an Age of Great Power Conflict*. Elbridge A. Colby. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2021.**Read a review by Kelley Jhong** **here****:**

Elbridge Colby, a former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Strategy and Force Development and a leading official in the development of the 2018 National Defense Strategy, has the curriculum vitae to provide an authoritative reassessment of U.S. defense strategy. Anchored in theory and bolstered by historical references, the book provides valuable nuggets of information, but it stops short of being groundbreaking—particularly for readers who are already well abreast of Chinese affairs and the principles of strategy.

 Buy on Amazon  *Brutality in an Age of Human Rights: Activism and Counterinsurgency at the End of the British Empire*. Brian Drohan. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2017.**Read Heather Venable’s review** **here****:**

Culture and, more specifically, human terrain has not gone away with the returned focus on strategic competition. Drohan’s work highlights the tensions between moral and immoral and legal and illegal ways of seeking to defeat insurgencies as well as how governments shape and disseminate narratives that will be equally important in more conventional conflicts of the future. From winning hearts and minds to large-scale combat operations themselves, morality—indeed the whole expanse of human terrain—is just as important as lethality, not only to strategic narratives but to strategy itself.

 Buy on Amazon  *War of Supply: World War II Allied Logistics in the Mediterranean*. David D. Dworak. Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 2022.**Read Jobie Turner’s review** **here****:**

In the historiography of the Second World War, scholars marvel at the wonders of Normandy and D-Day, followed by the famed Red Ball Express on the drive to Paris. Dworak makes the compelling case that the real support and logistics operation came from wartime experience further south. As a reader, it is delightful to see a simple and straightforward narrative play out. Dworak digs into all facets of logistics and stays on task. The author keeps his chapters fast-paced, focused on the big operations of Torch, Husky, Avalanche, Shingle, and Dragoon, while also describing fascinating tidbits along the way.

 Buy on Amazon  *Time of the Magicians: Wittgenstein, Benjamin, Cassirer, Heidegger, and the Decade that Reinvented Philosophy*. Wolfram Eilenberger, trans. Shaun Whiteside. New York, NY: Penguin Press, 2020.**Read a review from Nathan H. White** **here****:**

The continent-wide desolation of the First World War left its impact on the philosophical landscape of Europe. We cannot yet know what effects the Global War on Terror will have on the philosophy of the future. The philosophical problems and solutions will certainly be different, but the reality of war experiences, although varied, will no doubt precipitate new attempts at unraveling the mysteries of human lived experience. We must give attention to this influence and the diverse ways it may manifest itself in the lives of those both directly and indirectly affected by war…Eilenberger’s able account is necessary reading, for its creativity, its depth of philosophical understanding, and its exploration of the “decade that reinvented philosophy,” whose insights have significant resonances and cautions for our own time.

 Buy on Amazon  *Patents for Power: Intellectual Property Law and The Diffusion of Military Technology*. Robert M. Farley and Davida H. Isaacs. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2020.**Read a review from Jo Brick** **here****:**

Robert M. Farley and Davida H. Isaacs’s contribution to both fields of international relations and intellectual property lies in their ability to explain the legal system that results in the diffusion of military technology in some cases. The diffusion of military technology is explained in the book by the difference in political factors, organizational structures, or protective security frameworks. The legal explanation for the commonality of some military technologies is not well understood but is a significant factor for explaining why some military technologies are more accessible and widespread than others. Further, their work is of contemporary importance noting the monolithic nature of the global defense industry, consisting of public and private partnerships as well as collaborative approaches to high end military technologies that require complex legal frameworks.

 Buy on Amazon  *Promising Young Woman* [Motion Picture].Emerald Fennell (Director). United States: United International Pictures, 2020.**Read Daniel Hulter’s review** **here****:**

We need to be willing to push through the perception of oppression and subsequent defensiveness if we want to have any hope of creating a cultural system of respect and dignity, to combat and dismantle the firmly established and thriving cultural system that keeps women as unsafe as they are. Much of this work lies with us who like to consider ourselves clean-handed simply because we are not overt predators. We need to be in the arena and willing to fail embarrassingly in front of our peers, who will judge us, cast us out, and retaliate against us for violating their cultural system, the system built for us, and from which we benefit.

 Buy on Amazon  *On Operations: Operational Art and Military Disciplines**.* Brett A. Friedman. Annapolis, MD: U.S. Naval Institute Press, 2021.**Read Paul J. Cook’s review** **here****:**

On Operations is both well-written and a solid work of theory supported by strong historical research. One may argue against Friedman’s conclusions on the utility of the operational level of war as a valid concept, and a much smaller and more logical SOT Snowman, but one cannot argue that the arguments are not well constructed. Similarly, his articulation of operational art and its constituent disciplines are both logical and clear. Operational art represents something of a niche topic, but for those studying it, Friedman’s work is the proverbial must read.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Bomber Mafia: A Dream, a Temptation, and the Longest Night of the Second World War*. Malcolm Gladwell. New York, New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2021.**Read Michael L. Miranda’s review** **here****:**Malcolm Gladwell is known for telling stories—stories about success, societal change, underdogs, and how people or groups of people misunderstand each other. In his book, *The Bomber Mafia: A Dream, a Temptation, and the Longest Night of the Second World.* Gladwell brings to life historical figures who were instrumental in developing the United States’ bombing campaigns during World War II.

 Buy on Amazon  *Marine Maxims: Turning Leadership Principles into Practice*. Thomas J. Gordon. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2021.**Read a review from Jim Dietz** **here****:**

Before you finish the author’s introduction of Thomas Gordon’s Marine Maxims, Gordon confronts you with the assertion that there is nothing new in this book, that it is an accumulation of others’ ideas. On the surface, Gordon is correct. The concepts he discusses are not new. But dig a little deeper and Gordon’s assertion is also irrelevant. The value of Marine Maxims is in Gordon’s organization and synthesis of the material; his summation of each section; and the massive bibliography he provides for readers’ personal growth through further reading.

 Buy on Amazon  *Mars Adapting: Military Change During War*. Frank G. Hoffman. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2021.**Read a review from Martijn van der Vorm** **here****:**

In Mars Adapting, Frank Hoffman studies bottom-up adaptation through the lens of organizational learning theory to explain its dynamics. This theory states that business organizations must continuously evaluate their performance in a competitive and shifting environment to prosper and even survive. Hoffman states that this notion applies to militaries during wartime as they seek to gain an advantage over their adversaries.

 Buy on Amazon  *Habits of Highly Effective Maritime Strategists*. James R. Holmes. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2021.**Read a review from Kip DiEugenio** **here****:**Holmes argues the profession of arms requires habits of mind, heart, and deed that are compatible with, though distinct from, Covey’s principles. The thrust of Holmes’ book is elegant in its simplicity: aspirants and practitioners of military strategy alike should learn from the habits of history’s great strategists and understand how to emulate their behaviors in the present.

 Buy on Amazon  *Intelligence and the State: Analysts and Decision Makers**.* Jonathan M. House. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 2022.**Read a Zachary Selden’s review** **here****:**For a relatively short volume, *Intelligence and the State* manages to fill a range of gaps in the existing literature on the intelligence community. First and foremost, it provides a timely look at the issues confronting both policy makers and intelligence analysts that will only grow more relevant as technological advances increase the volume of raw information available to the intelligence community. Second, it offers the reader a condensed history of the European and American experiences with developing intelligence communities that would otherwise require combing through a range of academic literature. Finally, author Jonathan House leverages his decades of experience as a U.S. Army intelligence officer with valuable advice that can alleviate some of the pressures on the intelligence community and help the national security establishment avoid missing warning signs in the current environment.

 Buy on Amazon  *Hoarding Memory: Covering the Wounds of the Algerian War*. Amy L. Hubbell. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 2020.**Read Evan Procknow’s review** **here****:**

Overall, Hubbell’s work illustrates how literature, history, and art refract the memory of the Algerian War. These memories are multiple, varied, and ultimately accretive, which impedes healing and progress for both French and Algerians across both sides of the Mediterranean. Hubbell’s book will be of great interest not only to scholars of France and Algeria, but also to anyone examining memory, trauma, and contested historical narratives.

 Buy on Amazon  *Streets Without Joy: A Political History of Sanctuary and War, 1959–2009**.* Michael A.K.G. Innes. London: Hurst Publishers, 2021.**Read Andrew J. Whitford’s review** **here****:**

Innes’ work is an important starting place for any scholar or practitioner seeking to understand the significance of sanctuary as a guiding concept as well as the evolution of Cold War thinking through the era of globalization and the U.S. Global War on Terror. His book is a superb example of blending real world experience with in-depth research and analysis. Its insightful examination of the shifting definitions and uses of the concept of sanctuary offers important cautions for the present as it reveals the blind spots of the past.

 Buy on Amazon  *First Platoon: A Story of Modern War in the Age of Identity Dominance*. Annie Jacobsen. New York: Dutton, 2021.**Read a review from Aaron Cross** **here****:**

Annie Jacobsen shows the reality of the concept of identity dominance over a population in First Platoon. She weaves together her main themes through four questions—what are the boundaries of a persistent surveillance state enabled by advances in biometrics; who should own and have access to biometric data of a population; how has the face of battle changed in an identity dominance environment; and what is justice in this new environment?

 Buy on Amazon  *Three Dangerous Men: Russia, Iran, China, and the Rise of Irregular Warfare*. Seth G. Jones. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2021.**Read a review from Andrew Webster** **here****:**

Three Dangerous Men is a fast read that is also full of details and insights into the lives of Russian Chief of Staff Valery Gerasimov, the late Iranian Quds Force Commander Major General Qassem Soleimani, and Vice Chair Zhang Youxia of China’s Central Military Commission. Jones presents the reader with formative experiences in the life and professional development of the three military leaders and how they each contributed to shaping the 21st century military and foreign policies of their respective countries.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Immigrant Superpower: How Brains, Brawn, and Bravery Make America Stronger*. Tim Kane. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2022.**Read Gavin Kim’s review** **here****:**

This book is relevant today as Americans constantly disagree on the impact of immigrants. It will also continue to remain relevant as immigrants will always be a point of contention for years to come. The United States may not be perfect, but Kane argues for immigrants making it better, not worse. Any American would benefit from reading this book and educating themselves on the impact immigrants have on the U.S. and why they contribute to making this country a true world superpower.

 Buy on Amazon  *The Inheritance: America’s Military After Two Decades of War**.* Mara E. Karlin. Washington, D.C., Brookings Institution Press, 2022.**Read Amy Rutenberg’s review** **here****:**

Mara E. Karlin’s new book, The Inheritance: America’s Military After Two Decades of War is a sobering yet necessary read. In looking at the effects of the post-9/11 wars on the U.S. military, she asks—and proposes answers to—two questions. First, “[h]ow did the most capable military in U.S. history—indeed in the history of the world—fight to, at best, a draw in its longest contemporary conflict?” And second, “why has this not been the subject of greater reflection and debate.”

 Buy on Amazon  *Victory at Sea: Naval Power and the Transformation of the Global Order in World War II*. Paul Kennedy and Ian Marshall. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2022.**Read a review from Erik Sand** **here****:**

Almost eighty years after that war’s end, it sometimes seems little remains to be written about the war at sea. Is another history needed? Kennedy’s genius has always been his ability to highlight how the shifting tectonic plates of power underlie and help explain the surface history, sometimes represented in a single event. Rather than uncovering new history, Victory at Sea arranges existing history in ways that better reveal the whole.

  Centre for Military Ethics Playing Cards: Military Deck. King’s College London Centre for Military Ethics, 2021.**Read a review from Ray Kimball** **here****:**

The KCME Military Ethics Education Playing Cards Deck is an exceptionally versatile tool that has great utility for both individual reflection and organizational-level ethics education. It should become part of professional military ethics education toolkits across the U.S. Armed Forces and its allies and partners. As more military practitioners use the Deck, they should contribute their own stories and perspectives to KCME to make the tool even better.

 Buy on Amazon  *Hemispheric Alliances: Liberal Democrats and Cold War Latin America*. Andrew J. Kirkendall. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2022.**Read Miles Culpepper’s review** **here****:**

In Hemispheric Alliances: Liberal Democrats and Cold War Latin America, Andrew J. Kirkendall provides a thoughtful analysis of the Latin America policy devised by liberal Democrats in the period running from the 1960s to 1980s. The book’s core argument is that liberals in the Democratic Party attempted to design and implement a foreign policy for Latin America that moved beyond the Cold War strategy of containment. Instead of containment, these policymakers sought to leverage U.S. power to foster economic development, democracy, and human rights in the region.

  *Soldiers of End-Times: Assessing the Military Effectiveness of the Islamic State*. Ido Levy. Washington, DC: The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 2021.**Read a review from Kyle K. Rable** **here****:***Soldiers of End-Times: Assessing the Military Effectiveness of the Islamic State* is a timely study of the effectiveness of the military tactics and strategy of the Islamic State (IS) from 2014 to 2019. Throughout his study, Levy examines how IS fought their form of an effective conventional war. In examining the effectiveness of IS military operations, Levy is one of the first to attempt to create a larger study on IS. Levy is restricted in his study by the novelty of his subject. The fall of IS is still very recent at the time of publication and many of the U.S. defense sources are still restricted to the general public.

  *Slow Burn: The Road to the Iraq War*. Noreen Malone. Podcast Audio, 2021. **Read Katherine Judith Anderson’s review** **here****:**

Telling the story of forever wars requires a long cast list. It is a lot of story—maybe even a forever story—not only because it must communicate an overwhelming amount of information about an event that has not yet ended, but also because it is the story about ourselves that Americans must compulsively return to, retelling it again and again in an effort to make sense of the imbroglio that has defined the United States for the last twenty years.

 Buy on Amazon  *Battle Tested!: Gettysburg Leadership Lessons for 21st Century Leaders*. Jeffrey D. McCausland and Tom Vossler. Brentwood TN: Post Hill, 2020.**Read Leo Li’s review** **here****:** *Battle Tested!* focuses on the three decisive days of battle—July 1 to 3, 1863—between George Meade’s Army of the Potomac and Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia near the sleepy town of Gettysburg. The chapters provide historical and biographical background and then present a “Leadership Moment” for the reader, asking what they would do in a particular commander’s shoes at that point. Then the authors present several leadership qualities at play in the scenario, explain the importance of each, and provide modern examples to supplement their analysis.

 Buy on Amazon  *Sid Meier's Memoir!: A Life in Computer Games*. Sid Meier with Jennifer Lee Noonan. New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company, 2020.**Read a review from Brandon Valeriano** **here****:**

Constructing open worlds and the freedom to develop innovative strategies that incubate strategic minds or threaten authoritarian societies are the unexplored frontiers. The lessons in game design that Civilization offers are important for the developing wargame research community to understand as decision-making games become a critical part of the military education process.

 Buy on Amazon  *Pearl Harbor: Japan’s Attack and America’s Entry into World War II*. Takuma Melber. trans. by Nick Somers. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2020.**Read a review from John Gripentrog** **here****:**

Given the profusion of books, articles, websites, and documentaries about Japan’s surprise attack at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, even someone with a passing interest in this historic event may wonder what another scholarly title could possibly add to the discussion. Japanese-German historian Takuma Melber’s answer in Pearl Harbor: Japan’s Attack and America’s Entry into World War II is two-fold: his book eloquently synthesizes both Japanese and American secondary and primary sources on the attack, and the narrative is told primarily from the perspective of the Japanese.

 Buy on Amazon  *War and Resistance in the Philippines, 1942-1944*. James Kelly Morningstar. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2021.**Read a review from John S. Reed** **here****:**

Morningstar succeeds in his stated intention to “provide a basis for a fuller discussion of resistance during war as experienced in the Philippines during World War II.” As his work makes clear, localized regional insurgencies, both unified and fragmented, can coincide with and fit into larger symmetric conflicts. However, he ignores the evolution of the scholarship in elucidating the nature of asymmetric war. Specifically, he stops short of critically explaining the conflict that he otherwise ably narrates.

 Buy on Amazon  *¡Vamos a Avanzar!*: *The Chaco War and Bolivia’s Political Transformation, 1899-1952**.* Robert Niebuhr. Lincoln, NE:University of Nebraska Press, 2021.**Read John Bawden’s review** **here****:**

In 1932, Bolivia and Paraguay went to war over dry, sparsely populated territories in the Chaco region of South America. Three years of fighting had wide-ranging consequences. National consciousness developed among Bolivia’s disparate peoples and the war increased the importance of public opinion in political life. One postwar rallying cry of veterans, ¡Vamos a avanzar! (Let’s move forward), expressed their desire for reformist modernization.

 Buy on Amazon  *Disruption: Inside the Largest Counterterrorism Investigation in History**.* Aki J. Peritz. Lincoln, NE: Potomac Books, 2021.**Read a review from James Forest** **here****:**

Written in the style of an engaging spy thriller, the story takes the reader through a series of events involving real individuals with capabilities and intentions to harm others. The plot in a nutshell: a handful of individuals inspired–and in some cases trained–by al-Qaeda attempted to smuggle liquid explosives on board U.S.-bound transatlantic flights. If successful, they would have destroyed multiple aircraft, murdered thousands of people, and increased public fear worldwide about aviation travel. The economic toll could have been comparable to that of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. In the end, the most impactful thing these plotters did was provoke a change in aviation security wherein passengers can no longer bring over three ounces of liquids through the airport security checkpoints. This is a story, certainly a compelling one, about the failure of a terrorist plot.

 Buy on Amazon  *Out Standing in the Field: A Memoir by Canada's First Female Infantry Officer*. Sandra Perron. Toronto, Canada: Cormorant Books, 2017.**Read Brandee Leon’s review** **here****:**

Out Standing in the Field gives valuable insight into what women go through in the armed forces. While it is a military-specific memoir, it will also resonate with many women who are in any traditionally male-dominated professions. Perron’s experiences are important to understand for those looking to bring about change, a popular topic in this Me Too era. What Perron endured, and the response of those in leadership roles, highlights what needs to be addressed to put the military on track for improvement.

 Buy on Amazon  *Beyond Blue Skies: the Rocket Plane Programs That Led to the Space Age*. ChrisPetty, with foreword by Dennis R. Jenkins. Lincoln NE: University of Nebraska Press, 2020.**Read Stephanie Smith’s review** **here****:**

In Beyond Blue Skies: the Rocket Plane Programs That Led to the Space Age, Chris Petty provides a basic, thoroughgoing primer on the history of rocket plane programs at Edwards Air Force Base, California, beginning with the X-1. This history connects directly both to the military and national security aims of the United States in the post-World War II world and the dawning of the space race.

 Buy on Amazon  *On Killing Remotely: The Psychology of Killing with Drones*. Wayne Phelps. New York, NY: Hachette Book Group, Inc., 2021.**Read Geoffrey Britzke’s review** **here****:**

While the intense psychological burden borne by the soldier engaged in battle is not in doubt, understanding what specific factors exact the greatest toll, or how the willingness to kill relates to battlefield outcomes, remains ripe for exploration…Wayne Phelps’s addition to this literature seems to be a direct continuation of Grossman’s work, and Phelps pushes the same thesis as Grossman—that warriors do not naturally want to kill—into the field of Remotely Piloted Aircraft (RPAs).

 Buy on Amazon  *The Blind Strategist: John Boyd and the American Way of War*. Stephen Robinson. Dunedin, New Zealand: Exisle Publishing, 2021.**Read a review from Robert Ehlers** **here****:**

The book is bold and provocative. Its ideas deserve serious consideration across the services—particularly in the Marine Corps, where maneuver warfare was most fully adopted. It is nonetheless paradoxical: strong in many respects but not in others, beautifully balanced in several key arguments but also weaker in others, ultimately reducing the strength of Robinson’s central argument that Boyd was a blind strategist whose theories did much more harm than good in the American military establishment. Specifically, while Robinson addresses specific weaknesses in Boyd’s theory and approach effectively, he misses or ignores its strengths.

 Buy on Amazon  *Her Cold War: Women in the US Military, 1945-1980*. Tanya L. Roth. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2021.**Read a review from Marissa Kester** **here****:**

Her Cold War by Tanya Roth offers an insightful explanation of how, contrary to the popular narrative, Cold War era servicewomen were essentially the pioneers of the second wave feminist push for gender equality in the United States. The book focuses on the period between 1945 and 1980—a deceptively small window of time for such an impactful period both for women in the military and in U.S. culture more broadly. In 1945, there was no Department of Defense, separate Air Force, or a permanent place for women in any existing branch of the military. By 1980, only two generations later, the first groups of women were piloting military aircraft and graduating from military service academies.

 Buy on Amazon  *Rough Draft: Cold War Military Manpower Policy and the Origins of Vietnam-Era Draft Resistance*. Amy J. Rutenberg. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2019.**Read William A. Taylor’s review** **here****:**

Rough Draft is the best work on this topic to appear in quite some time. It should be required reading for anyone with an interest in the draft and will likely become the standard work for the foreseeable future. It is lucidly written, tightly argued, and prodigiously researched. Most importantly, it provides an original interpretation of the inner workings of manpower policies during the Cold War and their tremendous—and often unintended—consequences.

 Buy on Amazon  *A Machine-Gunner In France: The Memoirs of Ward Schrantz**, 35th Division, 1917-1919.* Ward Schrantz, Jeffrey L. Patric, ed. Denton, TX: University Of North Texas Press, 2019.**Read a review from David Retherford** **here****:**

Captain Ward Schrantz has written a detailed account of his personal experiences during a 22-month deployment covering his mobilization in the United States, his combat involvement on The Western Front, and his demobilization back to the United States during the First World War. Schrantz’s account was executed with minute details that highlight the sacrifices and hardships endured by the soldiers of Company A, and a general reader with limited knowledge of the 35th Infantry Division’s role in the First World War may not benefit as much from the elaborate detail left by Schrantz or the archival work added by Patrick. But this is ultimately a book about one soldier before, during, and after the First World War.

 Buy on Amazon  *Forces**.* Lisa Stice. Johnston, IA: Middle West Press, 2021.**Read Kate Gaskin’s review** **here****:**

Throughout the collection, the invisible forces that shape the speaker in Stice’s collection move in mysterious and yet predictable ways. The result is a world rich in detail and meaning that is nevertheless captive to the churning rituals of an often faceless and capricious military bureaucracy. Stice captures both the tension and beauty of these unseen forces in poems that celebrate quiet domestic moments and gently interrogate the hardships created by the itinerant lifestyle of a military family.

 Buy on Amazon  *Battleship Commander: The Life of Vice Admiral Willis A. Lee Jr*. Paul Stillwell. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 2021.**Read a review from Hal Friedman** **here****:**

Taking over forty years to complete as Stillwell worked on other projects for the United States Naval Institute, the final result was well worth the wait since it not only demonstrates Lee’s importance to American naval professionalism in his own day, but also his legacy of leadership for today’s Navy. The particular goal for Stillwell was to revive the memory of Lee to illustrate these leadership traits. Whether Stillwell succeeds in bringing Lee to our generation of sailors in the United States Navy—much less general American society—remains to be seen, but the biography is top notch.

 Buy on Amazon  *Winning Wars: The Enduring Nature and Changing Character of Victory from Antiquity to the 21st Century.*Matthias Strohn, ed. Oxford and Philadelphia: Casemate, 2022.**Read a review from B.K. Greener** **here****:**

The contributions in the text are easy to follow and highly interesting to read. The book is also very timely. It contributes a wide range of interesting material to ongoing debates about the future of war, the place of hybrid or grey operations as well as reminding us about the role of narratives, myth, and belief in shaping our understandings of what constitutes a win.

 Buy on Amazon  *Clear, Hold, and Destroy: Pacification in Phú Yên and the American War in Vietnam*. Robert J. Thompson. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 2021.**Read Daniel R. Hart’s review** **here****:**

The American response to the dilemma of creating a democratic society while waging a guerilla war was pacification, a European concept born out of colonization that was relatively new to Americans. In Clear, Hold, and Destroy, Army University Press historian Robert J. Thompson III closely analyzes Phu Yen, a mountainous and agricultural coastal province in Vietnam’s central highlands, to understand the gestation of American pacification, how it was implemented, and why it ultimately failed. In this study of the American commitment in Vietnam, Thompson underscores the centrality of conventional military forces in the implementation of pacification.

 Buy on Amazon  *Liberating Libya: British Diplomacy and War in the Desert**.* Rupert Wieloch. Philadelphia, PA: Casemate Publishers, 2021.**Read Brad W. Gladman’s review** **here****:**Rupert Wieloch’s *Liberating Libya: British Diplomacy and War in the Desert* brings new insights to the story of British military and diplomatic involvement in Libya from the late seventeenth century to the present. The author draws mainly on a vast amount of secondary literature, supplemented with some primary material to tell the long story of British involvement in Libya. His compelling narrative is punctuated by numerous well-developed stories of personal action and sacrifice, and misfortune, which give it vivid depth and detail.

 Buy on Amazon  *Understanding Peacekeeping*, 3rd Edition. Paul D. Williams and Alex J. Bellamy. Medford, MA: Polity Press, 2021.**Read a review from Christina Cliff** **here****:**

In the midst of ongoing armed conflicts in Yemen, Ethiopia, and myriad other locations, understanding potential tools for mitigating these crises is necessary. Paul Williams and Alex Bellamy’s third edition of Understanding Peacekeeping is timely. In this volume, Williams and Bellamy continue to build out their original 2004 release by evaluating and providing in-depth discussions of the changes in the international landscape and the drivers of peace operations over time. This is a textbook of peace operations centered on those endeavors that incorporate military personnel, which provides students and scholars in-depth analysis. For academics and students interested in peace operations, this book is a necessary research edition that could be used as a primary text for advanced undergraduate and graduate courses.

 Buy on Amazon  “Africa and Global Society: Marginality, Conditionality and Conjecture*.”* Stephen Wright. In *Africa in the Post-Cold War International System*. Edited by Sola Akinrinade and Amadu Sesay. London; Washington: Pinter, 1998.**Read a review from Will Turner** **here****:**

Wright’s “Africa in Global Society,” despite being twenty years old, contains a set of timeless lenses for viewing Africa in the contemporary era: Regionality, Continentality, New Issue solutions, and Democracy. When analyzed through this four-pillared framework, strategic and political engagement strategies may be more coherently framed and contextualized to facilitate the elusive whole-of-government approach.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Richard Macksey’s home library. (Will Kirk/Johns Hopkins University)

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Rough Draft: Cold War Military Manpower Policy and the Origins of Vietnam-Era Draft Resistance. Amy J. Rutenberg. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2019.

In Rough Draft, Amy J. Rutenberg, associate professor of history at Iowa State University, provides a comprehensive and compelling account of the shifting context and profound implications of military manpower policy during the Cold War. This innovative book is an exceptionally important addition to the broad literature on the draft, joining earlier works that have proven mainstays for anyone examining the draft.[1] Readers interested in the acute ways that the draft melded service, gender, militarization, socioeconomics, and race during the Cold War will find much to ponder.

  Rutenberg seeks to provide perspective into Vietnam-era draft resistance by deeply delving into the manpower policies that developed beforehand throughout the Cold War, especially manpower channeling. As she explains, “*Rough Draft*, therefore, uses the lens of military manpower policy to shed light on the contested relationships between choice and compulsion, rights and responsibilities in a democracy.”[2] Her purpose is to explore how and why the draft influenced American society, largely through active choices that privileged certain individuals and marginalized others. Rutenberg shows the extent to which such critical decisions arose from the shifting cultural mores of the Cold War, wherein national security increasingly held both international and domestic connotations.

The author employs a valuable war and society approach that interrogates military manpower policies and their broader meanings and wider reverberations throughout American society. Rutenberg supports her analysis with meticulous research. The endnotes—50 full pages—are a remarkable testament to many years of detailed evaluation and provide a most commendable model for scholars and students alike. The author leverages archival material from numerous repositories located across the country and situates them within a plethora of relevant secondary sources in a manner that provides both depth and breadth.

Rutenberg demonstrates that the Selective Service System was not a benign actor, simply delivering personnel necessary for national security, but rather deliberately crafted policies that privileged certain young men with deferments and pursued others for induction. Rutenberg organizes her work into six chapters, bookended by an introduction and conclusion. The chapters proceed generally chronologically, although they understandably overlap somewhat at the transitions. Throughout this incisive study, Rutenberg demonstrates that the Selective Service System was not a benign actor, simply delivering personnel necessary for national security, but rather deliberately crafted policies that privileged certain young men with deferments and pursued others for induction. The former tended to be middle-class white men with means, while the latter were often working-class and minority men. Such prioritization revealed much about American culture during the Cold War and ultimately fractured the draft’s public legitimacy. In the end, Rutenberg concludes that military manpower policy during the Cold War “ironically succeeded in undermining the already tenuous connections between military service and masculine ideals of citizenship.”[3]

Rutenberg admirably achieves her stated goals and much more, providing both a robust exploration of the draft and far-reaching insights on American society during the Cold War.Rough Draft is the best work on this topic to appear in quite some time. It should be required reading for anyone with an interest in the draft and will likely become the standard work for the foreseeable future. It is lucidly written, tightly argued, and prodigiously researched. Most importantly, it provides an original interpretation of the inner workings of manpower policies during the Cold War and their tremendous—and often unintended—consequences. Rutenberg admirably achieves her stated goals and much more, providing both a robust exploration of the draft and far-reaching insights on American society during the Cold War. This fine book joins a host of other highly successful works that shed beneficial light on the military and the myriad intersections between it and gender, militarization, and American culture writ large.[4] Readers interested in the draft, military service, gender, militarization, and American society during the Cold War will find much value in this outstanding book.

William A. Taylor is the Lee Drain Endowed University Professor of Global Security Studies at Angelo State University and editor for two book series, Studies in Civil-Military Relations, with the University Press of Kansas, and Studies in Marine Corps History and Amphibious Warfare, with the Naval Institute Press.

  *The Strategy Bridge* is read, respected, and referenced across the worldwide national security community—in conversation, education, and professional and academic discourse.

  Thank you for being a part of the *The Strategy Bridge* community. Together, we can #BuildTheBridge.

Header Image: Young Soldiers Who Have Just Been Drafted, Fort Jackson, South Carolina May 1967 (Warren K. Leffler).

Notes: [1] See George Q. Flynn, The Draft, 1940–1973 (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1993); John W. Chambers, To Raise an Army: The Draft Comes to Modern America (New York: Free Press, 1987); J. Garry Clifford and Samuel R. Spencer, The First Peacetime Draft (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1986); and James M. Gerhardt, The Draft and Public Policy: Issues in Military Manpower Procurement, 1945–1970 (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1971).

[2] Amy J. Rutenberg, Rough Draft: Cold War Military Manpower Policy and the Origins of Vietnam-Era Draft Resistance (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2019), 8.

[3] Rutenberg, Rough Draft, 195.

[4] See Tanya L. Roth, Her Cold War: Women in the U.S. Military, 1945–1980 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2021); Kara Dixon Vuic, The Girls Next Door: Bringing the Home Front to the Front Lines (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2019); Jennifer Mittelstadt, The Rise of the Military Welfare State (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2015); Heather M. Stur, Beyond Combat: Women and Gender in the Vietnam War Era (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011); and Beth Bailey, America’s Army: Making the All-Volunteer Force (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2009).

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To begin 2023, we want to explore the relationship between historical lessons and preparation for an unknown future. A wide array of thinkers have inspired this theme, including Lawrence Freedman. In The Future of War: A History, Freedman explains that the future is so difficult to predict because “it depends on choices that have yet to be made, including by our own governments, in circumstances that remain uncertain.” Freedman continues to unpack this notion, stating:

“History is made by people who do not know what is going to happen next. Many developments that were awaited, either fearfully or eagerly, never happened. Those things that did happen were sometimes seen to be inevitable in retrospect but they were rarely identified as inevitable in prospect.”

For 1Q23, we want to hear your perspectives on the most useful point Strategy Bridge readers should consider regarding preparation for future warfare based on historical lessons, learned or not. How have states and other actors envisioned future warfare? How did they prepare, or fail to prepare, for their future warfare? Are these lessons of use to states and other actors as they prepare for future conflict?

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To operationalize the concept of strategic empathy, this article argues that strategic leaders must appreciate three critical factors: geography, history, and domestic politics. These three factors are the pillars of the framework employed by U.S. Army Japan, a theater-strategic headquarters in the Indo-Pacific theater.

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Strategic assessments reveal a given nation’s understanding of the security landscape and its relative power position. However, strategic appraisals can also betray the fundamental values and prevailing attitudes of the country generating the assessment. American estimators have shown a propensity to frame questions in a manner reflecting their internal predispositions--a tendency that has often contributed to flawed images of external threats. This was the case during the early Cold War when American analysts routinely transferred judgement to Soviet decision-makers. By projecting their own proclivities onto an adversary whose preferences did not align with the United States, analysts persistently misdiagnosed the threat and concealed opportunities to exploit Soviet vulnerabilities. It was not until American strategic analysis underwent a dramatic transformation in the 1970s that more reliable assessments began to emerge. The Cold War, then, offers a stark warning about the pitfalls of an ethnocentric view of the security landscape. Adversaries, after all, are bounded by distinctive national styles that diverge from American logic.

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The mental model of a unified government “orchestrating” the economic instrument of power is fundamentally misleading. Rather, the more appropriate “mental model” to describe the milieu of the economic instrument is as a network of a variety of entities, and even more specifically to describe that milieu as a complex adaptive system. Behaviors in such a system are inherently decentering– no single node in the system predominates. Understanding how the economic instrument can operate in this system also requires understanding the rest of the elements and their interconnected interdependencies.

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The route to a more authentic understanding of the aims and likely reactions of other states, is through narrative appreciation. When strategists can live in the skin of another through the means of storytelling, they can better calibrate policy that is feasible within the limits of state power. The interests of the state must remain front and center, but informed by a deeply felt understanding of the fears and hopes of one’s friends and foes with a mind towards avoiding unintended provocation and building deeper trust with partner nations.

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In the 1970s, China’s Chinese Communist Party (CCP) deferred resolving the Taiwan question—invading Taiwan to defeat the Kuomintang (KMT) and claim that territory—because it prioritized achieving economic development that required access to and integration with international trade and capital markets. Meanwhile, the U.S’ strategic ambiguity posture sought to stabilize the Taiwan Strait with dual deterrence of both Chinese attack and Taiwanese declaration of independence. This policy rested on two premises—that China would remain committed to peaceful and non-coercive merger, if any, and that Taiwan’s independence was not essential to American foreign policy interests—neither of which holds today.

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All too often countries outside of Europe, or wherever the military fight is currently happening, are absent from discussions of policy in Washington. The Global South especially is too rarely part of the national security conversation. Even among the major emerging economies, colloquially known as the BRICS, Brazil and South Africa often get left out of the discussion compared to their larger and/or more threatening counterparts in Russia, China and India.”

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The continued posturing of the United States as the main geopolitical power represents a grave strategic misstep against the rising power of China. This posture overcommits resources to a narrow conception of warfare that then limits the availability of options. If, however, the U.S. were to strategize as a smaller, less wealthy nation, it may develop the strategic flexibility required to counter China.

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Washington cannot afford a focus on unilateral U.S. perspectives, whether to prevent alienating potential partners or to forestall potential adversarial relations. When strategists center policy from a U.S. perspective, they ignore the real cultural risks that accompany those narrative frames. China is just as centered on their own conventional framing, with equally problematic results. Washington must counter Beijing’s growing influence across the instruments of national power without alienating potential allies and partners.

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The enduring tendency to “center the United States” in foreign affairs analysis—both in the United States (U.S) and, increasingly, in Australia—is limiting real understanding of Southeast Asian strategic perspectives at the staff officer level.

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The implicit bias of ethnocentrism in the decision-making process warps an otherwise effective process of linking ends, ways, and means to achieve political objectives. Without a deliberate effort to control ethnocentric tendencies in its strategic process, the United States will continue to pursue ineffective strategic courses of action given the dual impacts of ethnocentrism on statecraft: misperceiving ourselves and stereotyping others.

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In recent quarterlies published by The Strategy Bridge, many authors have tended to center the United States in discussions about strategic competition. In doing so, they have illuminated perspectives about the national security challenges facing that nation. Such an approach can be limiting, however, because it is narrowly specific in its framing. As a U.S.-based journal—with a majority of our readers historically from the United States—it is perhaps natural that contributors argue from this perspective, but it can be troublesome to view challenges with a too-consistent perspective. And, if alliances are a strength of the United States and Western nations in strategic competition, then it is more important than ever to view strategic competition from the perspective of a variety of nations to better understand their complex positions due to economic, diplomatic, political, military, and other circumstances.

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In the historiography of the Second World War, scholars marvel at the wonders of Normandy and D-Day, followed by the famed Red Ball Express on the drive to Paris. Dworak makes the compelling case that the real support and logistics operation came from wartime experience further south. As a reader, it is delightful to see a simple and straightforward narrative play out. Dworak digs into all facets of logistics and stays on task. The author keeps his chapters fast-paced, focused on the big operations of Torch, Husky, Avalanche, Shingle, and Dragoon, while also describing fascinating tidbits along the way.

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Robert M. Farley and Davida H. Isaacs’s contribution to both fields of international relations and intellectual property lies in their ability to explain the legal system that results in the diffusion of military technology in some cases. The diffusion of military technology is explained in the book by the difference in political factors, organizational structures, or protective security frameworks. The legal explanation for the commonality of some military technologies is not well understood but is a significant factor for explaining why some military technologies are more accessible and widespread than others. Further, their work is of contemporary importance noting the monolithic nature of the global defense industry, consisting of public and private partnerships as well as collaborative approaches to high end military technologies that require complex legal frameworks.

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Almost eighty years after that war’s end, it sometimes seems little remains to be written about the war at sea. Is another history needed? Kennedy’s genius has always been his ability to highlight how the shifting tectonic plates of power underlie and help explain the surface history, sometimes represented in a single event. Rather than uncovering new history, Victory at Sea arranges existing history in ways that better reveal the whole.

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While the intense psychological burden borne by the soldier engaged in battle is not in doubt, understanding what specific factors exact the greatest toll, or how the willingness to kill relates to battlefield outcomes, remains ripe for exploration…Wayne Phelps’s addition to this literature seems to be a direct continuation of Grossman’s work, and Phelps pushes the same thesis as Grossman—that warriors do not naturally want to kill—into the field of Remotely Piloted Aircraft (RPAs).

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In Hemispheric Alliances: Liberal Democrats and Cold War Latin America, Andrew J. Kirkendall provides a thoughtful analysis of the Latin America policy devised by liberal Democrats in the period running from the 1960s to 1980s. The book’s core argument is that liberals in the Democratic Party attempted to design and implement a foreign policy for Latin America that moved beyond the Cold War strategy of containment. Instead of containment, these policymakers sought to leverage U.S. power to foster economic development, democracy, and human rights in the region.

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Mara E. Karlin’s new book, The Inheritance: America’s Military After Two Decades of War is a sobering yet necessary read. In looking at the effects of the post-9/11 wars on the U.S. military, she asks—and proposes answers to—two questions. First, “[h]ow did the most capable military in U.S. history—indeed in the history of the world—fight to, at best, a draw in its longest contemporary conflict?” And second, “why has this not been the subject of greater reflection and debate.”

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The U.S. defense budget is larger than the defense spending of the following eleven countries combined, partly due to the maintenance of aging platforms. At the same time, other countries are winning the race to new capabilities. An expert joint program review and modernization board can help America realign its priorities and regain its technological advantage.

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It will be necessary for the modern strategist and military commander, regardless of which domain in which they operate, to be comfortable with the inherent fallibility of their tools. While sophisticated algorithms can generate convincingly granular models of reality, commanders should always maintain a healthy degree of skepticism regarding the information they receive. There is a natural trade-off between the volume of data and the ability of one’s staff to verify what they are reporting. Information sorted by artificial intelligence at high scales largely operates outside of programmer’s awareness, and is thus well beyond the capabilities of any individual commander to completely understand.

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China’s excessive maritime claims in the SCS destabilize and undermine the balance of power in Southeast Asia. The best way to achieve a free and open SCS is a peaceful strategy that nests the common needs of the SCS Five within U.S. security interests and capabilities, all without requiring modification of Chinese behavior for success. SEA-Merica 2040 does the job.

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In analyzing American and Russian strategic cultures, it is tempting to believe that once one determines how strategic culture shapes each nations’ preferences for decisions, one may also suppose that their strategic culture is somehow fixable. This sentiment is an intellectual dead end and entirely misses the point. Strategic culture is a package of robust variables and traits “not easily amended, let alone overturned, by acts of will.” As Gray points out, “even if you recognize some significant dysfunctionality in your strategic [culture], you may not be able to take effective corrective action.” Strategic culture’s persistence, however, does not mean it cannot or does not evolve.

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Implementing a U.S. strategy for Africa that promotes the sustainable growth of African economies requires an approach focused on employing economic diplomacy at the continent level. Economic diplomacy provides a constructive way for the U.S. to positively influence African regional economic integration, the protection of human security, and African Union progression. Transnational threats, economic prosperity, and upholding a rules-based international order are issues that will continue to link African security with U.S. national security. An overarching strategy requires strong partnerships at the national level and leveraging U.S. strengths to increase pressure on great power rivals. This approach most effectively achieves African and U.S. economic and security objectives and counters the malign influence of China and Russia on the continent.

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Plato’s Republic is endlessly rich. Broadly, it begins when Socrates and his friend Glaucon are compelled to stay at Cephalus’ house in the Piraeus. Remaining just outside Athens, the many—including Polemarchus, Thrasymachus, and Adeimantus, among others—debate questions of justice. When no satisfactory answers emerge, Socrates originates the great thought experiment—to construct a city in speech. Over the course of the dialogue, the imagined city undergoes numerous revisions as the founders identify and fulfill the imagined city’s needs. War, it turns out, is not a need, but a consequence. It is only after Glaucon’s relishes are admitted that Socrates finds cause for war. To what extent does war make the city possible?

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Looking into the future, it is critical to build more typologies for insurgent success in order to understand how states can achieve the upper hand. Most important however is conceptualizing how insurgents successfully relate their strategy of violence to their environment. Had the United States, for example, spent more time analyzing what victory looked like for the Taliban and how they planned on achieving it based on their environment, they may have bolstered America’s own strategy.

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Greek drama was itself embodied in the masks representing Melpomene, the Muse of tragedy, and Thalia, the Muse of comedy. This concept of characterization also provides an allegorical framework through which to consider some of the critical characteristics and skills necessary for strategists. Strategists need to have the ability to reconcile and balance opposing tensions, as represented by Thalia and Melpomene, engage in both reflection of the past and anticipation of the future like the Roman God Janus, emulate the contemplation and discernment of Judeo-Christian cherubim, and seek the aims of the embodiment of Lady Justice.

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In the field of geopolitical analysis and strategy, models and frameworks are crucial. They inform the focus of the analyst, how to measure and evaluate the area of attention, and what to expect in the future. This process can occur consciously as part of a formal analytical procedure, or subconsciously, through the mental models that an analyst internalises. The escalation ladder is one such model. It advises an analyst to focus on how a state escalates and de-escalates against its competitors, and how to measure actions against the different escalation levels, or steps, on the ladder.

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Critical thought can benefit from both patience and intellectual humility. Military strategists should thoughtfully consider their cognitive limitations as well as the range of possible outcomes in pursuit of political goals and in support of civilian leaders. Strategists who devote attention to thinking about thinking and learning from the mistakes of the past may improve their ability to plan for the future.

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Observing civil rights activists through the lens of Cold War national security concerns makes the rise of a federal militarized police force in the United States appear logical, necessary, and socially acceptable. The United States, while engaged in a global ideological conflict with the Soviet Union, could ill afford any stains on its national reputation. America could not claim to stand for global democracy yet consistently deploy its military to suppress domestic civil unrest and constitutionally protected political movements. Nor could the federal government allow individual states to openly dismiss federal mandates or jeopardize American foreign policy objectives…The Cold War emphasis on national security granted law enforcement the license to develop and implement unconventional warfare strategies into the types of extralegal methods of policing used on Americans like James Baldwin. These strategies evolved into future approaches recognizable in counter-terrorism operations, the War on Drugs, and the Global War on Terror.

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The United States has enjoyed decades of influence over the international financial system thanks to the unique role of the U.S. dollar in the international economy. This dollar dominance could even be considered an element of U.S. power, underpinning a range of political and economic tools used by policymakers to advance U.S. strategic interests.

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Perspectives matter. Susan Colbourn pointedly explains, “The scholarly obsession in the United States with centering the United States is stunting our ability to analyse foreign affairs, leading too many of us to assume the United States can influence everything.” How can we escape this tendency? What perspectives are we missing? What should we understand about other influential forces at work? How do the world views of others drive miscalculation? These questions serve to focus the fourth quarter series of 2022 at The Strategy Bridge. We seek submissions that specifically address these questions. We look forward to seeing your submissions!

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Malcolm Gladwell is known for telling stories – stories about success, societal change, underdogs, and how people or groups of people misunderstand each other. In his book, The Bomber Mafia: A Dream, a Temptation, and the Longest Night of the Second World. Gladwell brings to life historical figures who were instrumental in developing the United States’ bombing campaigns during World War II.

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Earlier this year, The Strategy Bridge asked civilian and military students around the world to participate in our sixth annual student writing contest on the subject of strategy. The response was once again amazing. We’ll publish the winners and some additional submissions earning an honorable mention in the coming weeks. In the meantime, congratulations to all the winners!

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For a relatively short volume, Intelligence and the State manages to fill a range of gaps in the existing literature on the intelligence community. First and foremost, it provides a timely look at the issues confronting both policy makers and intelligence analysts that will only grow more relevant as technological advances increase the volume of raw information available to the intelligence community. Second, it offers the reader a condensed history of the European and American experiences with developing intelligence communities that would otherwise require combing through a range of academic literature. Finally, author Jonathan House leverages his decades of experience as a U.S. Army intelligence officer with valuable advice that can alleviate some of the pressures on the intelligence community and help the national security establishment avoid missing warning signs in the current environment.

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Soldiers of End-Times: Assessing the Military Effectiveness of the Islamic State is a timely study of the effectiveness of the military tactics and strategy of the Islamic State (IS) from 2014 to 2019. Throughout his study, Levy examines how IS fought their form of an effective conventional war. In examining the effectiveness of IS military operations, Levy is one of the first to attempt to create a larger study on IS. Levy is restricted in his study by the novelty of his subject. The fall of IS is still very recent at the time of publication and many of the U.S. defense sources are still restricted to the general public.

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Rupert Wieloch’s Liberating Libya: British Diplomacy and War in the Desert brings new insights to the story of British military and diplomatic involvement in Libya from the late seventeenth century to the present. The author draws mainly on a vast amount of secondary literature, supplemented with some primary material to tell the long story of British involvement in Libya. His compelling narrative is punctuated by numerous well-developed stories of personal action and sacrifice, and misfortune, which give it vivid depth and detail.

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This book is worth reading. Some of the essays are excellent. However, for those seeking a broader understanding of the conduct of drone warfare, I would recommend some foundational reading on the development and evolution of airpower theory and doctrine before delving into the development and employment of drone technology since 9/11.

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Throughout the collection, the invisible forces that shape the speaker in Stice’s collection move in mysterious and yet predictable ways. The result is a world rich in detail and meaning that is nevertheless captive to the churning rituals of an often faceless and capricious military bureaucracy. Stice captures both the tension and beauty of these unseen forces in poems that celebrate quiet domestic moments and gently interrogate the hardships created by the itinerant lifestyle of a military family.

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Overall, Biggio conveys a great deal of information in a compact, highly-readable form. He touches lightly, but from the heart, on serious topics which makes this an accessible book for even the least militarily-savvy reader. An informed reader will appreciate the tale, while less-knowledgeable readers will enjoy gaining a broad understanding of the events without having to consult references.

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The line between poems and jokes runs thin in Randy Brown’s new collection, So Frag and So Bold—but in the best possible way. Brown, in a series of mostly very-short poems, quips, and aphorisms, brings the gallows humor of military life to the stage in a unique, funny, and moving way all at once. These poems feel both very real and also imaginative, almost like a Greek chorus calling out in intervals from stage left, telling you the real thing you need to know.

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Holmes argues the profession of arms requires habits of mind, heart, and deed that are compatible with, though distinct from, Covey’s principles. The thrust of Holmes’ book is elegant in its simplicity: aspirants and practitioners of military strategy alike should learn from the habits of history’s great strategists and understand how to emulate their behaviors in the present.

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This book is relevant today as Americans constantly disagree on the impact of immigrants. It will also continue to remain relevant as immigrants will always be a point of contention for years to come. The United States may not be perfect, but Kane argues for immigrants making it better, not worse. Any American would benefit from reading this book and educating themselves on the impact immigrants have on the U.S. and why they contribute to making this country a true world superpower.

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We need to be willing to push through the perception of oppression and subsequent defensiveness if we want to have any hope of creating a cultural system of respect and dignity, to combat and dismantle the firmly established and thriving cultural system that keeps women as unsafe as they are. Much of this work lies with us who like to consider ourselves clean-handed simply because we are not overt predators. We need to be in the arena and willing to fail embarrassingly in front of our peers, who will judge us, cast us out, and retaliate against us for violating their cultural system, the system built for us, and from which we benefit.