Turning Away From Strategy
It appears that the Pentagon no longer intends to educate the most talented members of the officer corps to think strategically.
I say this because the status of the premier professional military education institutions – the war colleges and NDU – have been devalued, their leadership slots demoted and their educational mission degraded. As a guest columnist for Tom Ricks noted back in June:
….The new uniformed leadership of the Armed Forces, i.e., General Dempsey and his staff, apparently intend to prune NDU back to where it was a few decades ago. There will be some modest resource savings, but since the entire university budget doesn’t amount to the cost of a single joint strike fighter, one has to wonder what is motivating all of what is happening here. In the cuts that have been discussed, Dempsey’s deputy, Marine Lt. Gen. George J. Flynn has wielded the meat axe, often with the aid of micromanaging action officers. No one here in the rank-and-file is sure if the urbane chairman is on board with the details of all of this. (Ironically, both the chairman and J-7 are NDU graduates with advanced degrees.)
This set of changes took place in stages. First, while very few general or flag officer slots were cut in the armed forces, the three-star president of the university slot was downgraded to two, and the school commandants, downgraded from two to one star. No big deal, one might say, but one would be wrong, very wrong. A three star in Washington can go head-to-head with a principal on the joint staff or a senior OSD bureaucrat to protect the university. To compound the problem, the last three star president was retired in the spring and the university was left for a few months under the command of a senior foreign service officer, a former ambassador, a woman of great diplomatic talent and experience with no clout in the Pentagon. The new commandant — a highly regarded Army two-star — will not report until deep into June, when all or most of the cuts have been set in concrete. (Interesting question: can an employee of the State Department legally or even virtually assume command of a DoD organization?)
….A new “charter” was subsequently published by the Chairman. It focused the university on joint professional military education and training, which in itself, is a good thing. Immediately, however, the research and outreach activities of the university, often more focused on national strategy than military affairs, came under intense scrutiny. These outfits had grown way beyond their original charters and had become effective and highly regarded servants of a wider interagency community. Much of their work was not done for the joint staff but for OSD Policy, and some of that in conjunction with civilian think-tanks. The research arm of the university was productive, even if not always useful in a practical way to the joint staff. It also was helpful to the colleges in a much more proximate and direct fashion than other think tanks, like RAND.
….The research, gaming, and publications arms of the university — a major part of the big-think, future concepts and policy business here — will be cut to somewhere between half and a third of their original sizes. To make things worse, many of the specific cuts appear to have been crafted in the Pentagon, and nasty emails have come down from on high, about how the university is bankrupt and going into receivership, which was never the judgment of the military and civilian accrediting officials, who inspect us regularly and have generally given the university high marks.
If it would be impressive if some of our senior generals had been as effective on the battlefield as they are in the bureaucracy.
Uncreative destruction of intellectual seed corn is a bureaucrat’s way of telling everyone to shut up, don’t question and get in line. There’s nothing wrong with having excellence at joint operations as an educational goal for most future brigadiers and major generals but our future theater commanders, combatant commanders, service chiefs and their respective staff officers need something more – they need strategy. More importantly, the Secretary of Defense, the President, the Congress and the American people need the DoD to have an in-house capacity to generate deeply thought strategic alternatives, question assumptions and red-team any self-aggrandizing options the services or bureaucracy feel like offering up in a crisis.
The motivation here is simple, really. If you put out all the strategic eyes of the Pentagon, then the one-eyed men can be King. Or he can always contract out his strategic thinking to highly paid friends to tell him what he wishes to hear.
Naturally, this will have bad effects downstream in a superpower whose civilian leadership seldom has as good a grasp of geopolitics and the fundamentals of classical strategy as they do of law or the partisan politics of running for office. They will be in need of sound strategic advice from uniformed military leaders and they will be much less likely to get it. Instead, they will have senior officers who are less likely to balk when the President’s back-home fixer turned “adviser” or superstar academic with delusions of grandeur pushes a half-baked plan at an NSC meeting to “do something”. When that happens, the jackasses kicking down this particular barn will have long-since retired and cashed out with consultancies and sinecures on boards of directors.
While a lack of strategic thinking can undermine even a lavishly funded and well-trained military, the reverse is also true; strategic leadership can revive an army that is but a half-dead corpse.
A brief illustration:
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August 23rd, 2012 at 3:46 pm
“..it would be impressive if some of our senior generals had been as effective on the battlefield as they are in the bureaucracy.”
Flag officers are products of politics and bureaucracy—particularly the three and four stars, and their general proclivity is to protect the bureaucracy first—the system that promoted them. No incentive exists for them to buck the system. If one of these officers “bucks the system,” they can be replaced by someone who will conform to the status quo.
Of the current group of four stars, Mattis stands out for the USMC and Richardson for the Navy (he may not have pinned on the fourth star).
Our senior flags are more corporate managers than military leaders of the Marshall/Patton/MacArthur/Nimitz/King/Leahy variety —- the lack of a serious view and pursuit of a cogent strategy is more evidence of a real need at the top of our military services.
Don’t be looking for a “revolution” in military training with this group…but if we are fortunate, those hardened by ten years of war and willing to remain in service will emerge and fill the existing need.
August 23rd, 2012 at 4:29 pm
slight topic drift, I recently ran across this: vandergriff-raising_the_bar, pg59:
Army Chief of Staff Gen. William Westmoreland directed a task force of officers known as OPMS 71 to review how the Army managed its officers. This came in reaction to a pivotal 1970 Study of Professionalism conducted by Cols. Walt Ulmer and Mike Malone from the Army War College. Westmoreland was so dismayed by the results, and indictment on the officer corps in that report, that he ordered it sealed away for 14 years.
August 24th, 2012 at 12:11 am
Seeing that NDU and the National War College helped educate a generation or two of general officers who led us into such decisive victories in Afghanistan and Iraq, perhaps a defenestration of the institution isn’t such a bad thing…
August 24th, 2012 at 1:06 am
“It appears that the Pentagon no longer intends to educate the most talented members of the officer corps to think strategically.”
Hold on, ZP. The author’s beef is ultimately with what he claims is “dismantling the research, publications, and gaming arms of a policy-oriented university” You could dismantle all of those and not impact the TEACHING of strategic thinking.
Now let’s acknowledge that there are only 2 supporting links for this and both of them are highly opinionated pieces from Tom Ricks’ blog and one of them is anonymous so we don’t know the author’s interests or conflicts or anything. I’d like to see a more objective report, with named sources.
The piece is billed as “A view from the inside” but then in the first graph the author says:
“I am not directly involved in it, but this is what I have been told by many who are.”
Assuming this is true then the whole piece is not an inside view but based solely on hearsay. But it’s also possible that this is not true, that the author is someone whose job is at stake. The piece itself provides no supporting links that would allow those of us on the outside to arrive at our own conclusions.
“All of this represents the systematic destruction of well respected institutions”
Does it? Three star to two star, a new person to report to and budget cuts are “systematic destruction”? Really? Sorry, but this type of reorganization minor compared to what local and state governments, school boards and many public and private universities are having to deal with.
“The future-oriented, big picture research program will shrivel, the number of academic books coming through the NDU Press will be cut to a small fraction of this year’s production, and gaming will be severely restricted.”
What “future-oriented, big picture” breakthroughs has this program delivered?
Do we really need an NDU Press? There’s no barrier to entry for publishing anymore, there are plenty of ebook and print on demand options that make more financial sense than printing academic books that no one will read.
“gaming will be severely restricted”
But mom!
“Worse than functional changes, many government employees, especially senior professionals hired under yearly contracts, so-called Title X professionals, will lose their jobs.”
This I suspect is probably the key to all of this. There are people whose jobs are at stake and it’s entirely possible that the author is one of them and is therefore lashing out. For conservatives, this kind thing normally brings shrugs of indifference when it involves the civilian side of government.
“I wonder why civil experts aren’t writing more about it, and why Congress — long the guardian angel of the university — isn’t getting involved”
Well the Republican House would love to dismantle most of what government is doing, that’s what Conservatism is about, so why would it care about this? And the Democratic Senate, well, it hasn’t passed a budget in, what, a couple of years, if it doesn’t care about one of its basic duties then why would you expect it to care about NDU? Maybe if NDU employees were AFSCME or SEIU members they could get the union goons down and have some real influence.
Neither of these pieces provides any real evidence of an “Uncreative destruction of intellectual seed corn”. Maybe all this is true, but I can’t conclude that based on these to links. Normally I would expect conservatives to champion private sector solutions to the endless variety of things that government is doing. Why shouldn’t this apply to “research, publications, and gaming”? I agree with the ongoing theme here that we as a society need more exposure and training in strategic thinking. I suspect that the solution is more likely to be in the direction of a Massive Open Online Course. After all I’m a citizen, I’m a taxpayer, why shouldn’t I have free, taxpayer-subsidized training in strategic thinking?
August 24th, 2012 at 4:47 am
Hi Ski,
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ZING! Touche my friend.
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Hi PB,
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Excellent rebuttal, first rate comment. My response:
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First, my problem is the curricular shift to focus on joint operations. You are right that I have only linked to Ricks and his correspondent may have a rice bowl in a vice that colors his opinion. Very fair. Unfortunately, I have it on background from an authoritative source that there will be structural changes and changes to the student body in the PME system. Perhaps some of them will be for the better, more rigor is definitely being discussed and that is welcome, but I don’t think joint operations are really a terrible weakness for the US military two decades and more wars after Goldwater-Nichols. Do you? It seems more like an institutional desire to continue polishing an area that is already a strength. Strategy isn’t, and with the quasi-proconsular responsibilities that have devolved upon combatant commanders, they have a need of a broader view of national security, geopolitics, geoeconomics and strategy than what typically is seen from a narrow professional emphasis on campaign design and jointness.
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” Does it? Three star to two star, a new person to report to and budget cuts are “systematic destruction”? Really? Sorry, but this type of reorganization minor compared to what local and state governments, school boards and many public and private universities are having to deal with. ”
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speaking as someone whose livelihood is derived from one of these non-Federal entities, you are definitely correct, but that is also irrelevant. While military power and, say, road construction are both technically “public goods”, one can be of much greater situational urgency if capacity is lacking than the other. BTW, I have met the incoming two star, Gregg Martin. He’s a good guy who has stepped up a rung in responsibility, but without all the authority his predecessor required to run the institution.
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” What “future-oriented, big picture” breakthroughs has this program delivered?
Do we really need an NDU Press? There’s no barrier to entry for publishing anymore, there are plenty of ebook and print on demand options that make more financial sense than printing academic books that no one will read. “
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Looking at the NDU page, Colonel Collins book on the Afghan War was widely read and debated in the defense community when it came out and the ones on Chinese military power seem at least timely contributions to policy debate. These books are not intended for the general public any more than other kinds of academic press. Making them e-books is a good point but many parts of the PME institutions already do that (SSI for example). If it is cheap to do, why kill it? Especially when the DoD can have ppl on staff essentially focus on current problems in their research.
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” “gaming will be severely restricted”
But mom! “
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That one made me LOL. Humor aside, it isn’t quite that kind of gaming as you know and as gaming money is sliced, the games become more high stakes exercises for the services, the less free play is permitted and more scripted the outcomes become because you are not going to shoot the budgetary wad on something that may potentially embarrass the Commandant, the CNO or another bigwig. while you need scripted games to test systems the investigatory learning comes from free play. Again, this is fractions of fractions of pennies in the DoD budget. Why cut it unless you would rather not know where you suck?
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” Normally I would expect conservatives to champion private sector solutions to the endless variety of things that government is doing. Why shouldn’t this apply to “research, publications, and gaming”? I agree with the ongoing theme here that we as a society need more exposure and training in strategic thinking. I suspect that the solution is more likely to be in the direction of a Massive Open Online Course. After all I’m a citizen, I’m a taxpayer, why shouldn’t I have free, taxpayer-subsidized training in strategic thinking? “
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The freeware or massive multiplayer strategic learning game idea for educational institutions or the general public is an excellent idea. It could even be profitable, if Sony is any kind of evidence. A useful support but not a replacement, if only because some of these games and simulations are out of necessity structured around classified options and information.
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The economic/political conundrum is this: When you move away from generalities, teaching strategic thinking skills, to specifics, how the US might attack Iran or support a humanitarian relief operation in Nigeria – it is a shift from a market (come play with our game) to a monopsony seeking to purchase a solution, or at least an evaluation. It is very hard to keep a company afloat specializing in the latter because you have zero bargaining power and variable demand. As a result, private companies usually have less tacit and explicit knowledge than their monopsony customer, the Pentagon, meaning it would be cheaper and better for the Pentagon to use internal resources to game and bring in outsiders primarily to critique or red team
August 24th, 2012 at 4:23 pm
Zen — Okay, I’ve read your essay and studied all the comments in response. Here’s what I’d like to know: Is all this part of the normal faddishness and fashion that every institution regularly undergoes, or is it a sign that the U.S. military is becoming a big SWAT team with nukes and big boats? And if the latter is happening, is this — you’ll pardon the expression — a strategy? Is there a push from the U.S. government and other governments in the developed countries to relegate the concept of warfare, as distinct from policing, to the dustbin of history?
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If that’s the case, then downplaying the teaching of war strategy (and, as you pointed out some years back, no longer teaching the history of U.S. naval battles to American navy cadets, or something to that effect), makes sense.
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No pressure; I don’t expect the answer before next week and you don’t have to bring it in under 100,000 words lol. But seriously — is economics simply a handy excuse for exorcising militaristic thinking from military institutions?
August 24th, 2012 at 9:39 pm
Hi Pundita,
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Your observations are brilliant. There is a policing element, to be sure. I’ve bumped into a few younger officers of late who subscribe the notion of “Team America World Police” and the exportation of “democracy” at the tip of a bayonet. As a classical liberal/conservative, I am disappointed our side made the latter fashionable.
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In addition, for the utopian talk of the “virtues” of globalization, the truth remains that different tribes will have competing interests just like always, and that in some cases those competing interests will be settled only by war.
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Thing is, “If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will get you there!” Perhaps our political-military leadership has decided to “make it up as we go” and avoiding the demands of an articulate and executable strategy. Putting our collective heads in the sand is a sure fire way to lose our next war.
August 25th, 2012 at 4:46 am
Hi Miss Pundita,
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I will second Scott – you have raised important points here. My take:
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As with all bureaucracies there are factional disputes, aside from interservice rivalries, that cut across the services and into civilian national security and intelligence agencies. In terms of the military, we have the following conflicts in play. Scott, feel free to jump in:
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This last one is bitterly emotion-laden and potentially explosive undercurrent, IMHO, though I am a mere outside observer as a civilian. Commenter Mike F. could elaborate here, if he is reading this, and this important schism is one reason I regret that Carl Prine is no longer able to influence public debate on military affairs. When Prine indicated that some flag officers at the top constituted a “tumorous leadership”, he wasn’t joking.
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Against that background, I think this move on the part of the JCS is partly a defensive crouch – “jointness” is embedded in their generational career arc as officers and they blazed the trail, did it well and are probably justifiably proud of the transformation in military operations they accomplished – and partly a desire to shut down debate within the Army/military, or at least get it behind closed doors where gatekeepers can manage it. The recent COIN rewrite, for example, was very closedmouthed, shutting out the wider community interested in the subject. Scott can probably rattle off numerous Navy examples of this behavior. I think this also caters to senior civilian policy makers, the R2P types and political consultant dilettantes who see “strategy” as a straitjacket that constraints using foreign policy and military force as an opportunistic prop in domestic politics or diplomatic atmospherics ( the “do something” brigade).
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“policing” has always been part of “constabulary” small wars of intervention and it is a required tool of empire; it also suits the concept of humanitarian intervention very well because heavy combat troops usually make bad (i.e. rough) occupational forces ( if you look at history, most great powers will rotate in different troops for garrison duty after conquest, as we did in Japan and Germany or even the Germans did after the Fall of France). These are useful tactical skills for armies, no argument, but as a raison d’etre?
August 25th, 2012 at 4:47 am
Well, those bullet points did not come out as I had expected. Not sure what the hell was up with that.
August 25th, 2012 at 5:00 pm
I’ve seen posts where Gen Y complains about Gen X, too! Because we Gen Xer’s aren’t clamoring for a draft or something (from a post on Rick’s Best Defense).
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Zen, I’ve often had a related question to the following, which is, “if we are going to do policing, do the COINdinistas have it right in terms of the best way to approach it?” I mean, is the doctrine and scholarship underlying security or stability operations that robust and is there a third way? I suppose that is Col Gentile and Ken White’s point (from SWJ), that a well-trained army in conventional matters can perfectly well do COIN if the strategy and policy are correct. Well, I’m paraphrasing, so I don’t know if I’ve got it right.
COINdinistas vs. Big Army/Traditionalists/Clausewitzians over role of COIN in future planning, force structure, training
August 25th, 2012 at 5:01 pm
Aargh, mine didn’t come out right either. My question is a third one, which is being forgotten in the back and forth, I think. Even if we are going to do some stability stuff, do the proponents have it right in what to do specifically?
August 25th, 2012 at 5:03 pm
One more time: I’m not sure I like the dichotomy of the debate, that there are only two ways to look at it. Well, I’m not in the military so I have no idea.
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I wondered about Miss P’s point too as I have tried to pin down some of the scholarship behind certain doctrinal concepts like “capacity building.” Just what are we basing things on?
August 25th, 2012 at 7:18 pm
Hi Madhu,
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A partial answer to your get-away question in comment 12 above is “magic.” This town is full of “magical thinkers”—there was a time when the politicians were most susceptible, but from what I’ve seen is becoming pervasive. One reason a guy like Wilf Owen rubs people the wrong way is he doesn’t subscribe to magical thinking. (here is Zen’s review of Derek Leebaert’s excellent book Magic and Mayhem.)
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The Gen Y vs Gen X debate simmers just below the surface. These kids who have decided to stay in the military, who have been at the pointy-end of bad policy are gathering enough seniority to make a difference. Ben Kohlmann and his “disruptive thinkers,” so called, are symptomatic of a cultural shift in military thinking and the use of force. These young folks see what their leaders with little or no combat experience have gened up and want no part for themselves or their subordinates. A lot of the complaining is also from whiners who fall into the trap of believing no one two or three pay grades above, “gets it.” This phenom is as old as the military, and usually represents the shallow end of the thinking spectrum, where the emphasis is on complaining with little or no substantive suggestions of alternatives. That said, with SWJ, USNI, and other sites, many of these folks who have legitimate and constructive ideas for change are shining light on bad ideas and offering alternatives. Good for them. Ideas are good things, the more the merrier.
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Austerity will either make us better, or not. The MICC will, I am afraid, do something truly stupid—as they are wont to do. Everyone knows we spend too much on defense, now is as good a time as any to take a step back an establish workable priorities—made more plausible if we have officers trained in history and strategic thinking—-cutting intellectual development at this juncture is stupid, and leadership should know better.
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“People, ideas, hardware—in that order.” JR Boyd
August 25th, 2012 at 8:33 pm
I have to get that book. You’ve mentioned it before, and I am always intrigued….
August 25th, 2012 at 8:48 pm
So, I read the few pages available on Amazon. I still want to read it, but the author has his own magical thinking going on….rising prosperity in some places may not actually dampen terrorism in the immediate period. It may over time, but it’s really hard to know. The relationship between poverty and extremism is not so well established, and yet, he repeats it. Well, anything one might propose can be argued against, nature of the subject.
August 25th, 2012 at 8:52 pm
Okay, whenever I get in a negative and complaining mood, and overcomment here and elsewhere, that is a signal I need to lay off the topic for awhile. Later, folks.
August 26th, 2012 at 12:54 am
Here’s an excerpt from Dempsey’s speech at the NDU change of presidency ceremony. It’s not much, maybe someone else can provide something better from Dempsey. Is Dempsey’s vision legitimate or is it just a generational groupthink that we need to struggle against?
“Among them is the transition after more than 10 years of war from a force that was relatively static and acting in stability operations to the restoration of some of our atrophied maneuver skills and broader interests in a global environment. So we have to transition from a narrow focus on what we’ve been doing for the last 10 years and really open the aperture. And opening that aperture must start with our – shifting our intellectual bandwidth to that effort. So that’s one pretty significant transition.
“The other transition, as Ambassador McEldowney alluded to is bigger budgets to smaller budgets. And if there’s anybody in the room that can enlighten me on how much smaller – I almost said how much bigger, but I know the answer to that one – bigger budgets to smaller budgets. We have to manage that transition and preserve that which has made us who we are over these many decades of successful service, not only to our own country but to peace and stability throughout the world.
“So each of those transitions is significant in its own right, with far-reaching impacts at the individual, at the institutional and at the global level. And taking together they certainly describe comprehensive change and it’s that change that I’m challenging General Martin and the staff in faculty of National Defense University to help us manage.
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“And my charge to Gregg Martin and the National Defense University is as clear cut as his barber’s: Get down to the essential elements of military education; execute them with exceptional professionalism that is the hallmark and has been the hallmark of your faculty and staff.
“Like our joint force, NDU has become really good at a really wide range of tasks. But today, as you know, we need Marines to get back on ships and fighters to get back in dogfights. And we need tankers to be able – I’m talking about ground tankers – to be able to maneuver, and artillery men to be able to keep up with – in a way, frankly – and logisticians to set theaters in ways that we haven’t really had to fuss about much over the last 10 years. And we need all of that in the framework of an international – of international security thinking and building partner capacity and relationships. ”
August 26th, 2012 at 3:55 pm
Doc Madhu,
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A well led conventional force can do COIN, Ken is correct, but it requires a mental shifting of gears that not every military culture finds easy to do. Delegating initiative down the command chain is difficult for any org dominated by an overselection of micromanaging personalities on the Myers-Briggs. 🙂
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I think many of the small tactical lessons (TTP) of the COINdinistas, the skills, cultural awareness and attention to the counterproductive potential of applying force – which largely gets to the how, why and on whom -are well worth preserving. The scalar grandiosity of pop-centric COIN as a foreign policy third party nation-building is unaffordable (and leads to bad tactics to keep up the political pretense embedded in the policy) unless you are doing it in your own country. Few foreign states are worth that much to American national interest to merit that kind of sacrifice. FID and carefully rationing assistance to the host nation to force them to do their own COIN and seek their own political solutions is generally better, cheaper and more respectful of young American lives – parsimony has better strategic effects than generosity.
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Hi PB
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In the interim, I have heard from a trustworthy voice at NDU who predicts what is happening there will become “a toxic scandal”. We shall see.
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My purpose here is not to personally bash Chairman Dempsey, but it is hard for me to conclude from your excerpt that he is not intentionally converting the War colleges and NDU to training institutions vice educational ones. The students have had “the essentials” already – a war college student is a LTC or full bird colonel in their forties close to or at the 20 year mark – they have been practicing them while commanding units, many of them in combat units in Iraq and Afghanistan. Training and education are both valuable but this joint/essentials business is training more appropriate for captains and majors and not education for the prospective leaders of the Armed Services at the 3 and 4 star rank. It is redundant and very quickly will be recognized as a time-wasting slot by the students who are looking very hard at their career options at that point
August 26th, 2012 at 7:50 pm
“The students have had “the essentials” already – a war college student is a LTC or full bird colonel in their forties close to or at the 20 year mark – they have been practicing them while commanding units, many of them in combat units in Iraq and Afghanistan.”
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So, not being snarky, what exactly are you going to teach a full bird colonel about war, that has been practicing the essentials while commanding units, many of them in combat units in Iraq and Afghanistan? Perhaps they should not be called “war” colleges but “political” colleges.
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It sounds to me like, from your description, the war part of everyone’s career, entering a war college is about over with, and learning is more about planting a flag, here and there, if they continue their career in the military and not some place like GM.
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It seems to me that the amount of flags that are going to come from the student body of a war college is going to be very small for the resources used in the process.
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The rest of the student body, I am sure, will go on to lead in the corporate world. I am not sure why the American tax payer needs to promote these people. Perhaps the war colleges do need, as Dempsey says, to teach about war instead of politics.
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I actually see this as another transition period, in which the U.S. military becomes more resilient (John Robb) by decentralizing command to the states, instead of a federal system that has been taken over by lobbyists, that are not Acting in the interest of the American people, if you can define such a people.
August 27th, 2012 at 1:25 am
Hey Mark,
“My purpose here is not to personally bash Chairman Dempsey”
I know and I’m not trying to defend him. I agree with your concerns and share your interests in ensuring a more widespread awareness of strategic/big picture thinking. I just thought this discussion needed to include quotes from Dempsey’s side which has been sorely lacking. If we are going to critique him and the changes he is making then we should at least address his words directly. Ricks is a journalist, he should do some real reporting on this issue rather than just posting some anonymous screed.
August 27th, 2012 at 5:10 am
Hey Larry,
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Good comment – you are on target. My understanding is that 5 % of the graduates of the US Army War College go on to become brigadier generals under the very competitive promotion system that applies at that rank. I do not know the statistics for the other war colleges but most officers will never get past colonel/Navy captain. However, those that do, need strategic thinking and…yes…political skills to be effective flag officers. You educate many to pick the best and have a pool on standby to replace the worst (or theoretically, deceased, but not too many generals lead from the front these days)
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Hi PB,
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Agreed, Ricks was blogging and not reporting there. I don’t know him personally and I’m not privy to how Ricks sees his role at CNAS. The Chairman though would hardly be ignored by the press if he should choose to address this issue in more detail. Hell, he is more than welcome to post a rebuttal here if he likes or designate a surrogate to do so on his behalf if he feels my post was unfair.
August 27th, 2012 at 5:12 am
Testing, testing, one two three.
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Just making sure to get all my dots in a row before I launch.
August 27th, 2012 at 5:32 am
Hi Zen and Scott — Thank you very much for your replies, which I’ve been pondering along with the excerpts from General Dempsey’s speech provided by PB. I think the excerpts tend to back up Zen’s contention that the teaching of strategy to U.S. military officers is being downplayed.
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Zen — to both parts of my question, you provided a list of factions in the U.S. military. If I read you correctly, by this you were indicating that there are so many competing factions that any plan to purify the military of militaristic thinking would have a hard time rising to the top.
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With regard to my question about a push to turn the U.S. military into chiefly a policing organization, while pointing out that there’s always been a policing aspect to U.S. military operations, you asked, ‘But as a raison d’etre?’
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I take comfort in your observation about competing factions and its implication that these tend to keep the military circling around the status quo. But from several indications since 2010, I think there is a push to integrate the U.S. military into what is a de facto global policing agency.
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If I’m right, then the question is whether placing great emphasis on the policing role for the U.S. military would be the only way to draw many war-shy nations into a true new global security agency. In that event, I’d guess that the U.S. military — or rather the civilians who run it — would want less emphasis in the military on the concept of warfare.
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As to why I believe plans for a global constabulary are underway: what started the ball rolling for me was a February 2010 AFP report, which I read at the time of publication but only mentioned on my blog a few weeks ago, on the ‘Give them enough rope’ theory. (See report, below.)
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I think the report has to be read in its entirety before it sinks in that what the European and American NATO brass and the German defense minister are denying to AFP could well be true; i.e., that NATO is setting up a truly globalized security agency that will pull in many scores of nations from outside NATO.
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The report caused me to view, if only speculatively, the Afghan War in a completely new light. I realized I might have been looking at the war completely upside down. From a kinetic angle, the mission was a crashing failure. But from the angle of using the ISAF mission as a laboratory for meshing many different diverse militaries, and as a university for the U.S. military to teach cutting-edge tactics to militaries whose governments were too poor, or too stingy, to retool them for the new era in warfare, the mission was a smashing success.
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Since then, I’ve seen several reports that I think are indication that NATO is indeed developing a global constabulary. A very recent news report indicated that the end of ISAF combat operations in Afghanistan means only switching out regular combat troops for special forces that are being drawn from all over the world. (The Pentagon is still being close-mouthed about the identify of all the participating nations, although it did let drop the name of Jordan and, if my memory of the report serves, UAE.)
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So one howler in the 2010 AFP report is the claim by NATO chief Rasmussen that the new security hub that NATO envisions doesn’t mean militaries will train together. Another silly remark is his claim that “non-governmental groups avoided armies out of concern it might harm their image, but that changing practices would require a ‘cultural revolution.’ Has he spent the Afghan War in a cave? The ISAF mission is stuffed with NGOs working alongside the ISAF militaries, and which have already come up with rationales for this.
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Oher indications abound, including Nick Turse’s report on the U.S. use of ‘native’ troops around the world to fight al Qaeda, etc.; athough Turse didn’t frame this in terms of a global constabulary, that seems to be what the plan is — except that it’s been sort hidden in the din of constant criticism about the Afghan War, debates about COIN, drones, etc.
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Without delving into whether the idea for a new global constabulary is a good or even workable one, I have noted two wrinkles in the idea — and a third one, after I read your essay on the downplaying of teaching strategy to U.S. officers. (It’s from that viewpoint that I put my questions to you.)
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Two of the wrinkles are immediately evident: First, the USA is trying to integrate into a new global policing agency so many different countries from so many different world regions that it’s backing into the role of Mother Hubbard — never a good role for a superpower. Those young officers who’ve told Scott that they envision a Team America — oh that was the last century. This century is shaping up to be Team International Community.
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Second, the very diverse array of nations being melded into a global security force means that often national aims clash so markedly with that of a global security agency that it risks becoming nothing more than a super-militarized version of the United Nations. Which is to say, gridlock with very expensive guns.
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But, again, the third wrinkle didn’t occur to me until I read your essay about strategy. If a global constabulary is being formed, I think that would place emphasis on policing, which would allow nations that are very shy about war to join the global security team. In that event, though, this could mean less emphasis on the concept of warfare — not only in the American military but others as well.
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So perhaps General Dempsey is being too clever by half when he calls on the NDU to focus on teaching the nuts and bolts of good soldiering then adds: “And we need all of that in the framework of an international – of international security thinking and building partner capacity and relationships. “
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Is that almost a Freudian slip there? If so, he caught himself before he said, “in the framework of an international security force.” Yet if he wants the NDU to place less emphasis on teaching intellectual stuff to American officers, then who, pray tell, will do the strategizing? Perhaps a clue to the answer is found in a statement that Dempsey made in Brussels, in April, at a NATO meeting:<blockquote>The [foreign] ministers get together and provide [the defense chiefs] with political guidance, and we discuss how we turn that into military advice and planning.”</blockquote>So that’s how my mind is working at this time, that’s what I’m seeing and asking about. <blockquote>AFP
The head of NATO says its troubles in Afghanistan show it is vital to boost ties with nations such as China, India and Pakistan and transform the alliance into a global security hub.
Drawing from flaws exposed in Afghanistan, where NATO is struggling to hold off a Taliban and al-Qaeda insurgency, Anders Fogh Rasmussen says the military alliance should become a forum for consultation on major hot spots.
“This is a key lesson we are learning in Afghanistan today… we need an entirely new compact between all the actors on the security stage,” he said at a major security conference in Munich, southern Germany, on Sunday.
“India has a stake in Afghan stability. China, too. And both could help further develop and rebuild Afghanistan. The same goes for Russia. Basically, Russia shares our security concerns,” he said.
NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, and its partners have more than 110,000 troops in Afghanistan, but they have been unable to put down the insurgency more than eight years after a US-led coalition ousted the Taliban from power.
Under a recent switch of strategy, almost 40,000 extra troops are streaming into the conflict-torn country, aiming to protect civilians and win their support, rather than hunt down fighters, many re-supplied from Pakistan.
Following last month’s conference in London, the strategy also involves a “surge” of civilian experts, backed by redoubled efforts from major donors, financial institutions and bodies like the UN and EU.
“We cannot meet today’s security requirements effectively without engaging much more actively and systematically with other important players on the international scene,” Rasmussen said.
“The alliance should become the hub of a network of security partnerships and a centre for consultation on international security issues – even issues on which the alliance might never take action.
“What would be the harm if countries such as China, India, Pakistan and others were to develop closer ties with NATO? I think, in fact, there would only be a benefit, in terms of trust, confidence and cooperation.”
Rasmussen underlined that he did not seek to replace the work of the UN, and his stance was backed by German Defence Minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg.
“We don’t want to enter into any competition with the United Nations,” the minister said. “We don’t want to turn NATO into a global security agency.”
The alliance’s top military officer, US Admiral James Stavridis, added: “NATO is not a global actor, but an actor in a global world. There’s a huge difference.”
Rasmussen said he envisaged a forum in which NATO and its partners worldwide could air views and concerns, and exchange best practice.
“And where, if it makes sense – if we decide that NATO should have a role – we might work out how to tackle global challenges together.”
NATO has 28 member nations, but its partnership involves 44 countries in Afghanistan, as well as ties with other regional forums, such as the group of Mediterranean nations.
But Rasmussen said militaries did not train, plan or organise together, while non-governmental groups avoided armies out of concern it might harm their image, but that changing practices would require a “cultural revolution”.
“NATO is much more than just 28 allies,” said Canadian Foreign Minister Peter MacKay. “Partnerships are integral to NATO’s ability to meet security challenges at a distance.”</blockquote>
August 27th, 2012 at 5:38 am
I see that my attempt to get around inserting dots in the AFP report by using blockquotes didn’t work. Ah well. At least my portion of the comment came out purty. I will return tomorrow with links to Nick Turse’s report and the one that quoted Dempsey in April. Until then, Cheers.
August 27th, 2012 at 1:46 pm
Hi Pundita,
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Thought-provoking comment.
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Am I alone in thinking this is gobbledygook:
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“The alliance’s top military officer, US Admiral James Stavridis, added: “NATO is not a global actor, but an actor in a global world. There’s a huge difference.””
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And Stavridis is supposed to be…? If NATO isn’t a global actor, what the hell is NATO doing a half a world away in Afghanistan? Can we do no better than this thin soup of an excuse.
August 28th, 2012 at 3:27 pm
To be honest, I kinda thought Pundita might be going off the deep end, and then I saw this posted in the comments at SWJ:
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“I second the Barnett recommendation. Over the last several years I’ve had the honor of teaching over 1,200 civil affairs students. Each one of them has seen the TED video referenced here and many of them have written summaries of it.
Good stuff.
If we (USG) desires to continue engaging in stablity operations (with an eye towards stability-an entirely separate conversation), then something needs to give. Either big Army needs to embrace non-lethality as a core competency (for example, making BSO’s out of loggies instead of combat arms types) or DoS needs to buy a lot more equipment.”
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http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/is-the-chairman-a-disruptive-thinker
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At this point, I really, really, really, really should lay off the topic because I am on the road to jaded from skeptical. And I don’t want to be cynical or jaded, only to be skeptical. Cynical helps no one (hey, maybe the SYSAdmin thing is okay, but it’s nothing new. It’s just what we’ve been attempting since Bosnia and if it isn’t going to come together after the 90s and the 00s, it’s not going to happen. Give it up, think of something else.)
August 28th, 2012 at 3:42 pm
Hi Madhu,
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Your skepticism is well-founded.
August 28th, 2012 at 3:45 pm
http://www.fpri.org/multimedia/
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I know there is an FPRI panel on PME featuring Tom Ricks and a retc. Gen Sales (???, is that correct) that is useful for this discussion. Can’t find it right now, just scroll. Listened to it the other day, I thought it was good, but what I know about PME I just wrote out in this comment section. That’s it, you know?
August 28th, 2012 at 3:46 pm
@ J. Scott, thanks for that. I often don’t know if my natural skepticism takes me too far down a negative road.
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I need to spend more time at To Be or To Do….
August 28th, 2012 at 4:37 pm
Hi Madhu,
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For me, I resist these suggested policies because I am more aligned to Washington’s view of America in the world. Admittedly, the world has changed, but I believe we should do less abroad…
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To Be or To Do is sputtering along, and I’ve not been a good blogger this summer. I’ve two or three book reviews in various stages of completion, so things should pick up before too long.
August 28th, 2012 at 7:02 pm
Scott, Madhu — I will return soon to provide comments to your observations and links I promised, but I had a news report I wanted to show you that I’d postoed at my blog, which I titled, “When demons are in charge.” It’s about how British troops are having to make themselves target practice because the rules of engagement demand that they act like police. Of course this also applies to American troops.
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After I posted it I got a lecture from blogger Dan Riehl who linked to the post after changing the title (Dear, who are the demons? Where are they? Let your readers know). Dan, who is an incredible marketeer, has tried for years, to no avail, to make me into a right proper blogger — write catchier titles, communicate my points in under 100,000 words, and so on. But I noted at the time that even with the catchier title he wrote, only one person at his blog had clicked on the link, even though it’s usually nothing for hundreds of his readers to visit my site from links he provides to my posts.
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It struck me that the topic is so dark, so negative, so awful, so — demonic — and Americans are so completely helpless to change the situation that they are tuning it out. They are right to do so; most people are not built to confront too much evil and they shouldn’t have to, if they are to raise families and communicate a hopeful view of life to their offspring.
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I, on the other hand, dealt with so much evil up close for so many years that I became like the forensic examiners who can eat a sandwich while cutting up the dead. But then I had special training and a small army of gurus, saints and whatnots to jump in and save me again and again from despair and nihilism.
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After thinking about all this, I said, “Time to balance things out.” So I sat down and wrote a little more about my encounters with men who cannot be touched by evil.
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I was just putting finishing touches on the essay when I received an email from Madhu alerting me to her latest comments at ZenPundit. When I arrived here and saw her words and yours, it struck me that I’d been correct to write the essay. Now I’ll have to see if I’ll actually publish it. Pundita is a very mysterious person, and a truly anonymous blogger. I’d be giving away a good deal about myself by publishing the essay.
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But then again, i think Madhu will love the parts about my antics at the Line of Control and how all attempts by China’s government to use a living Buddha to serve their ends backfired poetically.
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What the heck. Time for me to cast caution to the winds. Time to get in a few laughs at evil’s expense. Then we will return, refreshed and restored, to the fray.
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The essay’s working title is “Practice: The Tale of Sathya Sai Baba and the Living Buddha.” The ‘practice’ refers to the importance of practicing to achieve mastery in anything, including faith in God.
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Bye for now. Will return soon.
August 29th, 2012 at 7:11 pm
Hi Pundita,
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Your comments have truly jolted me into questioning the trajectory of military thought—of strategic thinking in general. I climbed into this sandbox of thought via my interest in John Boyd, whom I discovered in 2006.
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I was having lunch with a colleague a few weeks ago and was bemoaning the lack of depth in many church leaders these days. My friend responded that these leaders weren’t theologians, but rather “church managers.” Perhaps this explanation works for the military as well: a general lack of intellectual rigor in too much of the military may be attributable to the rise of the MBA [disclaimer, I completed over half the coursework for an MBA]. The “generalist manager” quantifying everything not nailed down—the focus on process at the expense of traditional martial thoughts and arts. I do not know.
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Looking forward to your essay. (wish you had RSS on your blog:))
August 29th, 2012 at 7:16 pm
Hey – more on this a bit – by statute “stability operations” were put on par with warfighting as a DoD mission back in 2005. Going to look into this further as to what that meant for doctrine, budget etc.
September 5th, 2012 at 9:01 pm
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