One of the greater challenge is to talk with those who don't understand that the Strategic is a response to the Political - as in civilians in control - and the direction and guidance they give.
Well - the folks at 6GW are pondering. I have some issue with them conceptually - but they have a good point - one that comes directly from the inadequacy of the latest Maritime Strategy.
... with the US as the sole superpower for the last 20 some-odd years it has been damn tempting to ignore the need to have a deep and cogent strategy, as we’ve had the one military able to project force into where ever we chose and win in terms never before paralleled in history.Global Maritime Partnerships, Global Commons, and Global Force for Good ain't cutting it. As I mentioned when it came our - 1/3 of The Maritime Strategy is good - but the balance is a muddled bucket of FOD. As a result, the confusion over what our Navy is for and what it should do. If we had what we needed - posts like 6GW just did wouldn't be out there.
29 comments:
OT, but your first sentence made me think of this:
http://www.theonion.com/articles/national-science-foundation-science-hard,1405/
Back to our program. When you base your strategery on rainbow dust and unicorn milk you will have problems. Things like diversity, throwing money to certain military contractors, and budget constraints are not strategies. But that's what we've done. Politics and civilian control largely will set the playing field and strategy so that will give us issues as a military at times. Then again, they have to fund, train and equip the military up or down to their strategy. That said, we don't have to play the cow tow game of fake strategies to prostitute ourselves for budgetary adulation and tummy rubs. Instead of coming forth with a real maritime strategy centered on capabilities, goals and threats, we have come up with the global force for good to garner money from Congress. In the long run that will hurt us from the tactical to the strategic to the budgetary cut of he pie. Very short sighted IMHO.
A textbook example of good strategy was the Anaconda plan of the civil war... It took the North's strength (industry, navy, manpower) and pitted it against Souths defensive strength (patriotism, good morale, short internal LOCs, good army leadership) while using Souths weaknesses (lack of industry, reliance on exports/imports). It prevailed despite numerous battlefield defeats until the right commanders have been found for the Union army, and troops became hardened veterans.
BTW, is the US starting looking more like South nowadays, with less industry and reliance on the "king dollar" instead of "king cotton"?
Sometimes the Civilian Government needs to be gently guided to be shown WHY they need a strategy. That is called influence. I see very little influence from our military.
Global Force for Good is a waste of time and money. the ROI is zero. It is a PR campaign for people at the United Nations who are not power brokers.
So sad. CNO says the IA program is our part of the GWOT, and when we're not sending Sailors ashore with the Army we're sending them ashore to paint some school house. Sigh. And don't get me started on teaching the Nigerian Navy advanced fire fighting techniques with equipment that they'll never be able to afford.
Sal, you hit on the salient shortcoming (oxymoron alert!) of US foreign policy since 1992.
What we doctrinally call National Security Strategy (NSS) and the subordinate National Military Strategy (NMS) is called Grand Strategy in most other places. This is the highest level of strategic planning and execution, and it encompasses the politico-military relationships at a national level.
What is absolutely required for NSS/NMS is a realistic and forward-looking view of the world around us. This, in particular, has been notably absent from every Administration since GHW Bush left office. (His National Security Team had put together a remarkably prescient view of the post-Cold War world that went along with recommendations for the size of our military that would have been highly advisable in light of our situation over the last decade.)
But that world view must take an unvarnished look at allies, and potential allies, adversaries, and potential adversaries, national interests, historical proclivities, global trends, emerging threats, economic, military, and resource rivalries. In this we did not do well during the Clinton years, when an overly optimistic "best case" scenario and a social agenda which advocated massive Defense cuts blurred a realistic picture of the world and our role and place in it.
When war came in 2001, we found ourselves with a high-tech military that was too small and too inflexible at the STRATEGIC level for long-term power projection on a meaningful scale. And when war came, GW Bush carried some of the rosy world view into his NSS/NMS, in which he rightly identified an "axis of evil" of some nations, but failed to see others (China, Russia, perhaps even Venezuela and India) whose pursuit of national interests did not pause while we fought our War on Terror.
Perhaps the biggest reason for this failure of Grand Strategy is that the United States remains extremely self-conscious of itself in the role of superpower, especially lone superpower. Despite occasional periods of unabashed realism (Truman, Reagan) as to the nature and value of American power, we have tried to explain it in softer terms, in fact, inventing feel-good terms like "soft power" and "Global Force for Good", which are so much jabberwocky in the real world. (There is no such thing as "soft power". There is only power. PRC is beginning a tutorial in that very subject.)
Today, we find ourselves with national leadership that has a student union protester's view of the international sphere. Insults and degradation of long-held allies, constant olive branches and "reaching out" to implacable and dangerous enemies, proposals to cut US defense capabilities until any true global presence becomes a near impossibility. SecState Clinton, for all of her many shortcomings in the position (and there are MANY) is actually at odds with her Administration over US foreign policy and NSS because of the Administrations lack of understanding and cohesion in their understanding of the world around them. Sad times.
In such an environ as we find ourselves, answering the questions of the strategic and operational roles of ANY of our Armed Forces, Navy included. We have become the Anti-Teddy Roosevelt, in that we appear to think that speaking softly and occasionally loudly obviates the need for anything but the smallest stick.
<span>Perhaps the biggest reason for this failure of Grand Strategy is that the United States remains extremely self-conscious of itself in the role of superpower, especially lone superpower. Despite occasional periods of unabashed realism (Truman, Reagan) as to the nature and value of American power, we have tried to explain it in softer terms, in fact, inventing feel-good terms like "soft power" and "Global Force for Good", which are so much jabberwocky in the real world. (There is no such thing as "soft power". There is only power. PRC is beginning a tutorial in that very subject.)
Today, we find ourselves with national leadership that has a student union protester's view of the international sphere. Insults and degradation of long-held allies, constant olive branches and "reaching out" to implacable and dangerous enemies, proposals to cut US defense capabilities until any true global presence becomes a near impossibility. SecState Clinton, for all of her many shortcomings in the position (and there are MANY) is actually at odds with her Administration over US foreign policy and NSS because of the Administrations lack of understanding and cohesion in their understanding of the world around them. Sad times.
In such an environ as we find ourselves, answering the questions of the strategic and operational roles of ANY of our Armed Forces, Navy included, becomes all but impossible. We have become the Anti-Teddy Roosevelt, in that we appear to think that speaking softly and occasionally loudly obviates the need for anything but the smallest stick.
</span>
My takeaway on this is it's dangerous to go drinking with URR.
I must say I don't agree with the assertion over at 6GW that defining the operational and strategic is akin to defining love. They can be defined. Their interrelationship can be defined. What it takes, however, is discipline and a willingness to stick to assertions. We lacked much of that discipline during the Clinton Administration, and to a certain extent, also under GWB. We have virtually none of it now.
Admiral Harvey's comment is 100% on target. You cannot do everything, everywhere. Especially in this information age, do not let CNN or BBC or George Clooney shape national security strategy. Hard calls will have to be made on occasion, in both directions.
It just seems to me that leadership hasn't grasped that Strategy is the simple part. It starts with defining the needs and then addressing those needs. The primary mission of the Military of these United States is to protect and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic.
Everything else supports and amplifies that mission.
But alongaside that mission comes the requirement to look ahead and present a vision of where these United States will be in 5, 10, 20 and 50 years from now. What is the "mission" of this nation? Where do we see ourselves in the future. How do we get there, and what threats exist that might affect that journey to the future?
I see this administration as purposely allowing the military to decline, because it sees this nation's future as abandoning the natural position of leadership and relegating itself to "one among equals", a "partner" if you will. That is a dangerous position, for it abandons the natural desire to succeed and compete, leading to all sorts of national malaise and stagnation. It also allows those who would naturally compete with us an advantage.
This administration, by denying American Exceptionalism, places our nation in jeopardy, then reinforces that position by intentionally reducing our military to the point where we CANNOT do anything but be "one among many".
I'd say that our current defense posture, our military capabilities are fully supporting the current administration's view of these United States' position in the world, both currently, and in the future. This group in charge WANTS America to decline from it's position as a superpower, for whatever reason that might be, and is determined to see that we stay in a "humbled" position by degrading our defenses to such a degree as to make them nothing more than a household guard.
Bit of a ramble, I know, and slightly O/T, but that's what I see. In short, our military is being tailored to fit the strategic vivion of current leadership. That strategic vision is, IMHO, NOT in this nation's best interest.
URR,
I think one of the problems that the student protesters have (and by extension the rest of political America) is they don't understand stragetic ideas and only seem to think in sound bites. The why's of into Somalia instead of Rwanda, or into Afghanistan vs Mexico, Noregia vs Pabalo, or even why we are still engaged with Europe to battle the Russians when the cold war has been won. Are argued more often then not in the university by those outside of thier SME and not understanding the larger issues at hand. Most the current generation of people in politics haven't been taught to think strategtic because international politics aren't cool or as in the case of some folks I debated over beers near the U district in Seattle seem to think, all the evils in the world are from our Neo-colonialism from the last fifty years. That if we just shrink from the king of the mountain postion then peace and happiness and the utopia will rule supreme. The other thing I think is hard is the number of people current involving themselves in politics, don't really seem to grasp the reason the two longest stretches of peace in the worlds history (from 1818 till 1870 and then from 1945 till 2001) was cause there were two or more major superpowers staring each other down.
I would think too that a number of the leaders both military and political current in postions of power and influence only seem to think in the realm of sound bites. That the long papers and thought processes of international politicking are "too long; didn't read" area that a number of them feel, but to quote a cousin of mine "boring!" as well. Not only about papers they want being generated inside thier own offices, but the papers and games created by think tanks like RAND and such also don't seem to be on the reading block. As the recent spat of quotes seem to becoming from Mr. Woodward's recent book that the political leadership seems to be all about appeasing thier base and not making the tough and hard decisions once they are able to get all the information from being inside. Anyone that goes contrary to thier rosy view of the world is ostricized and treated as if they didn't drink enough of the kool-aid. I would also like to think there hasn't been a major deep thought book on the realm of stragetic thinking for about fifty years, or at least once that wasn't politicized the minute it hit the printing press. It would help too that the debate would happen whether in the essay/book realm and not being shut down by dirty tricks politics.
Your corollary to this, AW1Tim, would be that a future administration's strategy would have to be a "come from behind" play in order to put us back where our mission is to preserve and defend the Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic. At present and falling levels of military budget we won't be able to do that for long.
A future president will have to pull out the Reagan playbook and reinvent that wheel. Who said history occurs twice... the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce?
How about a cluebat to the side of the head? I thought 9-11 might have accomplished that. Apparently not.
We get to swing that cluebat every November....unfortunately, too many of the folks who could swing away don't educate themselves on the situation and the various options/solutions. Instead they rely on soundbites and friendly ads to not only give them answers, but also to define the problems.
The historian in me says that cannot change without an external force acting - leaders in Republican Rome were complaining of much the same thing 2100 years ago. The result? Caesar...actually Marius, followed by Sulla followed by Caesar (all part of the same train at that point). Read The Roman Revolution by Sir Ronald Syme and tell me we aren't on the same trajectory....
Commander, thank you for commenting on my post from 6gw.
There have been good books written on strategy in the last 50 years. the definition most widely used for the Operational level of war isn't even 50 years old--adopted officially by the US military in the 1980s. Authors like Lind, Hammes, Boyd are all from the last 50 years.
I believe that most comentators of the current state of the world understand the narrative well enough to at least describe where the biggest threats to the US are coming from. This, in essence, allows us to describe the world as something other than 'chaotic'. However, this narrative does not seem to have been able to make its way into the thinking of naval strategists. The Navy deploys its ships in a manor that is not sustainable. Indeed, the fleet seems to be running itself aground. This demonstrates to me that there is no (good) strategy involved in Naval deployments and that presence operations and piracy off the coast of Somalia are not the only reasons why the Navy is deploying--even though that is all you hear from Naval Public Affairs.
If a proper strategy were in place, then there would not be the issues we are seeing today in the Navy. If the Navy were able to define itself and its function for the Combatant Commanders, then I too think there would be adequate funding. This lack of self recognition is made all the more aparent by the fact that ship design changes ad nauseaum and hulls cannot be dedicated to a single purpose.
You have less than 290 ships. Your numbers are probably only going to go down. The seas are getting more crowded with gray hulls ever year. The time for a strategy to deal with this, was 5 years ago.
DB,
To some in our political leadership honestly think that 9/11 is at the same level as FDR knowing the Japanese were going to bomb PH and that Oswald was only a patsy for the CIA/FBI/Space Aliens for killing Kennedy. There are others that don't believe that but rather think it is our come-uppance for being so evil for the last 200+ years.
What I'd like to see, would be a look in the past, and see what has worked-or not, and why, in history .Then apply lessons today.
In the "war on terror", enemy is the militant wing of islam, bent on creating Islamic Caliphate, and then expanding it worldwide. This enemy is hard to confront head-on because it is - Iran aside - dominated by non-state actors hiding amongst the teeming masses of third world and ghettos of immigrants in the first world. Terror is its weapon of choice, because it cant form armies or navies, and even regular guerilla, WW2 Yugoslavia or Vietnam style is beyond its means in most places.It usually takes a totally failed state to form terrorist-controlled enclaves on its territorry.
To combat this menace intelligence work is crucial, to find the targets, then special forces and drone strikes are the weapons of choice. You dont need a flight of B-52s to kill a single bombmaker hiding in urban terrain.
If there is a history of fight against this enemy, it is that of Israel. Study it's sucesses and lossess, and apply the lessons learned.
All the while US must keep an eye on possible peer competitors on the inter-state end of the warfare scale. There must be kept a balance between underestimating them and overestimating and wasting resources in fighting fantoms. Russia is resurgent, it's true, but when entire program of T-50 is scheduled to be some 60 planes until 2020, it is understandable that it is not the power that it was. Add to this Russias internal problems, and demographic implosion, and we see that it is not the threat to the US - it can be dangerous to few countries along its borders, but even then it will be stretching its resources, like in Georgia in 2008, where it was successful only in absorbing runaway enclaves, and stopped short of enacting friendly regime.
China on the other hand is a rising star both economically and militarily. It is the strong eonomy that allows it to modernise armed forces, and US should consider the possibility it will feel strong enough someday to confront US over some issue, from control of the seas to Taiwan, or even invasion of Russias Far East.
What should follow, is assessment of how to best deter China from making agressive moves along its borders, what force stature is needed towards this goal, , and how SE Asian nations can be co-opted into this strategy like Europe was during the cold war into NATO.
All the while we should remeber that probably most spectacular failure of deterrence: Pearl Harbor.
SAP,
You make some good and valid points. Problem is, as I and many others feared, the policy shapers today have little meaningful study in diplomacy or foreign relations. And what they do have is both esoteric and based on fallacious assumptions as to how the world has worked and works now.
From what excerpts I read of the Woodward book, a good deal of the squabbling and disagreement that he notes is perfectly normal in any Administration. The thing that jumps off the page is Jim Jones' comments regarding the "Politburo" of policy makers. This is OBAMA'S NSA. Not Reagan's. Jones despises those people and has likely appropriately labeled them, even if they are too young to understand the full implications of the term. Jones did not take a "Wesley Clark pill" after all. That kind of rift is a massive red flare that there is virtually no statesmanship anywhere in the US Government, least of all the White House.
AW1Tim's comments here also make good points. Obama's vision for the United States excludes American exceptionalism (except when it comes to allowing a radical Muslim Imam to build a mosque at Ground Zero), a dangerous and disappointing condition. He would indeed like to see us be just another country, not really understanding the implications. He and his cabal think they do, but they most certainly do not.
Fox Connor,
Firstly, welcome to the porch. I read your blog quite often and always learn something.
Your analysis of the operational level of war is right on the money. It has only really been defined in the last 50 years, but has existed somewhat longer. its importance has grown as wars became global. The study of the subject is a retrospective attempt to analyze and understand warfare in the aftermath of the Second World War. This is much similar to Jomini and Clausewitz writing their respective treatises in the decades following the Napoleonic Wars.
However, your comment that "<span>most comentators of the current state of the world understand the narrative well enough to at least describe where the biggest threats to the US are coming from" is in error. It is precisely that element in US foreign policy that is missing, and has been for some time. The current cast of characters fail repeatedly to understand the narrative, and often are quick to attempt to substitute their own narratives in place of the one that plays out internationally. </span>
Neither the Army or the Marine Corps will be anchored in any particular role or mission if they wind up being ever shrinking rapid deployment forces whose strategic mobility is constantly reduced. As for the Air Force, they will have their own versions of those struggles as their fighter force ages and their support structure shrinks.
Yes, we are still preeminent everywhere, air, land, and sea. But not as we once were, and the numbers and technological edge vis a vis our likely adversaries are moving quickly in the wrong direction.
Agreed. The major problem is that it only takes a short while to do long-term damage. We, as a nation, CAN restore ourselves to former greatness, but it also takes more than time. It takes the will of the people, and right now, it seems our schools are working overtime to destroy the idea of American Exceptionalism, and indoctrinate our youth that there is something to be embarassed for by being an American, and being a super-power.
URR,
The cabal and its master are educated beyond their intellegence and are in water well above their heads. I think the annointed one put it best once when questioned during the presidential campaign. His response to a question was that it was above his pay grade; I think making any type of decision is above his pay grade. Voting present is not an option when you are supposed to be the president. I am reading McMaster's book on LBJ and the whiz kids; things are eerily familiar...only politics matter.
I am the Guest above.
Aubrey, I think the most dangerous person in all this is our president who is already minimizing what another attack would do to us and telling us the last one made us stronger. It's almost a "surrender before it happens and do the spin now" approach... not a strategy I think I've ever seen before.
<span>UltimaRatioRegis</span><span></span>,
Thank you for the salutations. In regards to narrative, there are many writers from inside Pakistan and fighting (as contractos) in Afghanistan who paint a logical (and methodical) view of the situations there. The motivations and methods of the US's enemies is fairly well published. Sure, it's open to debate, but published and fairly easy to grasp if a casual reader spends some time on it. The thing is though, that those writing these narratives and those drafting strategy don't seem to interact. Further more, and this is especially true with the US Navy, those who write the strategy don't seem to engage much with those who deploy the ships. Operationally the Navy is doing one thing, and there is a strategy written to give those ships something to do when there is a natural disaster.
Fox.
I would guess that we are in loud agreement. One has to look no further than the QDR released in February to find major disconnects between the stated vision of our Armed Forces and the condition they are in or are headed for. The statement about power projection is a prime example. No forcible entry, reduced strategic mobility. Your points about the Navy are also right on. Forward presence and HA/DR can both be done, but not concurrently and not effectively with 287 hulls.
I would comment, though, that the narrative in AFG is the meeting of tactical and operational, and not operational-strategic. It has strategic implications, of course, but unless you are referencing Pakistan and the safe havens, everything else about AFG TO is operational.
URR,
I would like think as well that squabbling and disagreement is an issue behind closed doors in any admin. I have skimmed the book about Lincoln's admin where he had people that hated each other and hated him supporting his admin. Just like some other histories that I have read of nearly all other administrations since FDR seem to say they have a major fight over one or two major issues while in their planning sessions. Whether it is how to debate the removal of a popular General to how to jump start an economy stuck in double digit inflation. Just take a look at most marriages, there are disagreements behind the closed doors and every so often at a party will they pop up. If someone admits they don't have an issue in their marriage then they are lying.
The debate of American exceptional ism has been an interesting one. I say that because it sounds very much like what I have been hearing in our school systems since I left public education in 1998 time frame. That is everyone is a winner and we shouldn't create hurt feelings amongst everyone. If no one has any hurt feelings then there won't be any violence. This seems to failure to understand human psyche that it doesn't matter what people will have hurt feelings even when you try to force not hurt feelings. Also people want to be superior, they want to feel superior and to deny them these feelings causes hurt feelings and hate. By expanding this to the US's role in the world it is how some light weight's on the international politicking feel to explain their guilt about succeeding in the US while they see travel logs of places in Africa, Asia, Pakistan, you name it where people are still living like they did at the dawn of history. Since they feel guilty about this nation success, they need to drag the US down in an attempt to help those succeed.
"<span>I would like think as well that squabbling and disagreement is an issue behind closed doors in any admin. I have skimmed the book about Lincoln's admin where he had people that hated each other and hated him"</span>
True, but Lincoln didn't have to deal with Bob Woodward.
Indeed. It appears that our main option is to bleed our enemies to death through paper cuts inflicted by reams of "strongly worded letters". 8-)
Post a Comment