Night vision, x-rays – what do we have for the fog of war?
[ by Charles Cameron — it occurred to me to ask ]
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I have a question for the assembled horde — but first, the shoes:
Getting your feet x-rayed and fitted for a new pair of shoes, ca. 1950
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You know the way they say (Elizabeth Kübler-Ross, eg, with no implied claim of veracity here, just interest) that you go through various stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance?
Suppose there are stages of response to terror that governments, agencies, leaders, pundits, analysts & journos tend to go though. Suppose at the start they lean to the vengeful and are therefore prone to see things in black and white, no nuance, confrontational, response intense & military rather than diplomatic — and in later stages get calmer, begin to see motives less single-strandedly, catch details previously missed, suggest responses that are more measured, more proportional, etc.
If we got really clear on how this tends to work, could we begin to have an understanding of the ratio between “heat of the moment” and “after the fog of war clears” thinking, which in turn could allow us to discount initial reactions, look for “next stage” signals in the cognitive periphery, and get a more accurate read through the fog from the start?
We know now, eg, that the first reaction at OKC was to expect Muslim blame, but it become clear that McVeigh did it — and first expectations were dashed. With WMD in Iraq the clearing of the fog took longer, but it still happened.
I’m suggesting that people who have just been affronted or attacked will understand better, later, and that for more appropriate response, some time lag may be required. But does the lag time have formal features, styles of assumption that gradually give way identifiably and reliably to more nuance and accuracy as certain formal issues are addressed — so there could be a checklist, and a kind of 2 week, two month, two year, two decade look ahead / lookback methodology devised, charted, and implemented, eg as a part of scenario planning and / or red teaming?
Is some of this implicit in the second O in the OODA loop? Can we take it usefully further?
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Yes, when I was a boy, you stepped up to the x-ray machine in the shoe store, pushed your feet in and peered into the viewer at the top of the machine to see how well your new shoes fit your ghost-of-a-skeleton feet.
Later on, this was viewed as an unhealthy way to judge the fit of a shoe, and life and choice in shoe stores became more complicated.
June 17th, 2013 at 4:28 am
The fog of war reminds me of the fog of ideologies. Over at Ricochet, I see commenters schooling University of Chicago professor Richard Epstein in the comments threads. And paying $3 and some cents annually for the privilege. I see a particular self-described ‘classical liberal’ on Twitter praising Epstein’s arguments in favor of the NSA surveillance, though in his response to critics he is more hedged that if he finds out NSA is improperly sharing data with the Administration to use against citizens that of course, would change his view.
The assumption that NSA data has been used against dissidents or will be used at some point, is precisely what has so many conservatives traditionally deferential to the National Security State freaked out about the NSA NOW — as the talk radio host Mike Gallagher put it, he trusted George W. Bush with such an awesome power but not the Administration of Barack Obama that has shown itself willing to unleash the IRS, EPA and DOJ against ordinary citizens [setting aside the fact that he probably shouldn’t have trusted W either]. Why should the NSA be any different from the IRS or DOJ, even if the NSA is notably higher IQ? And that’s the rub, as this commenter makes clear:
http://ricochet.com/main-feed/Two-Cheers-for-NSA-Surveillance/(comment)/731188#comment-731188
All the more reason those fanatically clinging to the notion that discrediting Snowden or Greenwald is going to make this issue go away (I’m looking at you @LibertyLynx, and you University of Houston professor Craig Pirrong aka @Streetwiseprof) or make an increasingly libertarian Right go back to sleep are delusional. They are behaving as if William Binney and the two other key NSA whistleblowers never existed, and that more revelations linking NSA to the rest of the government’s domestically focused agencies that cannot be pinned on the ‘discredited’ Snowden/Greenwald tandem will not be forthcoming. They will. You can count on it.
June 17th, 2013 at 4:32 am
On the positive side again, I admire Ricochet because they allow thinking conservatives to push back — hard — against the D.C. elite conservative/MIC friendly consensus. See these responses to John “notorious torture memos” author Yoo: http://ricochet.com/main-feed/Is-There-a-Better-Libertarian-Foreign-Policy#comments
Mollie Hemingway, Ed.
At the very least, a sound foreign policy would be one where we don’t, say, get involved in a civil war where the only thing worse than the dictatorial regime oppressing the people is the rebel forces that will, if victorious, massacre the remaining Christian population in the country and otherwise terrorize the people and institute even more draconian measures.
But, then, it probably is easier to make fun of people skeptical about whether we have the money, manpower or national interest to bankroll and fight yet another war and decades of failed nation-building.
And we know how very, very, very, very well our foreign policy has been going in recent years. Why, just look around. Egypt, Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan. Why not add Syria to the list?
June 17th, 2013 at 3:44 pm
X, I generally agree with the sentiment behind your opinions. Western intervention will be a holy mess.
During Iraq, it didn’t seem like anyone was aware or cared that Christians lived there, and it looks like the Syriacs will be getting the same short shrift. It may seem weird considering that they would seem to be natural allies in a dangerous neighborhood. I suppose it’s possible that our current leadership may not be too attuned to the nuances of regional religious & cultural alignments. It could also be Israel’s experience in Lebanon over the past few decades has cooled them to those kinds of entanglements, and that has rubbed off on us.
The thing is intervention may be too good a hand right now. Sure Syria looks strong, but they were being fought to a stalemate before Hezbollah stepped in recently. Hezbollah isn’t set up for protracted combat and can’t afford to absorb losses for very long like they experienced along the border. The Russian missiles are a big problem, but it may be difficult to operate them without Russians on the ground. It’s not clear if Putin is willing to escalate to that level. If Iran gets dragged in with troops then that will open up a lot of possibilities for the nuclear issues. Longer down the line, it pulls their center of gravity westward, away from their tender Parthian side.
June 17th, 2013 at 7:55 pm
“During Iraq, it didn’t seem like anyone was aware or cared that Christians lived there, and it looks like the Syriacs will be getting the same short shrift.”
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Short shrift? Ha! The killing would have been over long ago, if it wasn’t for the Christian element. The thing is, one negotiates from a position of strength, not weakness. Obama is giving the rebels a position to negotiate from and, I think because of McCain, nothing else.
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I mean the problem with living inside a bubble is that you will eventually forget that Obama is both a Christian and half white.
June 17th, 2013 at 9:09 pm
Charles, that’s a very interesting question.
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One problem with the time lag, a major problem, is the fact that with or without intervention, the situation on the ground will have changed in the future when we reach it.
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Another problem, related to the first, is that events often require immediate response. This relates to the first because immediate intervention will have an effect on the future situation — positive/advantageous or negative — but a lack of immediate intervention will also have a positive or negative effect on the future situation. But also, it seems that with modern technology (destructive, economic, communications) and observational capability, cycles of change can be amped up, rapid, and quickly decisive in predetermining future situations.
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I usually think about that last issue while contemplating the U.S. political system: Yes, the 3 branches + Constitution + electoral cycles may have been excellent in the past for creating a pendulum effect for change — conservative vs liberal; or more generally, ideology A vs ideology B vs ideology C…. —that isn’t too damaging, probably a net benefit over the long term. But events and consequences now may be so ramped up, our reactions so decisive for the long term, that our moderate historical pace may no longer be to our benefit. One election cycle can have a major, major impact on much of the near and mid-term future if not also the long-term future. I’m not sure if this is the case, but it’s something I’ve been pondering for a long time.
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The point being, I suppose: One must not overlook the fact that Orientation of the OODA may need to keep up with Observation and Action. In my own peculiar handling of the OODA as a concept/model, I include for “observation” not only observation of exterior events in real-time, but also observation of all past events that reside in memory. This is how we judge current events, by making the comparisons. We have a tendency to be Oriented in a past-weighted manner: current exigencies are in a struggle with the entire remembered past. Shifting that orientation toward being more present-oriented is difficult enough; shifting it toward being future-oriented is much more difficult. (You do however often find many who appear to be attempting to resurrect the past: a funny proposition, if it weren’t so dangerous an orientation.)
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The one thing that might mitigate all the above is the way our actions may be performative. I mean, our actions alter the world—which is then re-observed and weighed into our process of orientation. So self-fulfilling prophecies are possible, if we can ever stick to a vision of the future when observing, orienting, acting. Right now we have various prophets making predictions, but most people don’t know what the future holds.
June 17th, 2013 at 9:45 pm
In physics, fog is a bubble. Just saying, one’s Orientation, a position that has an advantage, can get messed up inside a clear bubble, as well as a foggy one, if you can only look inward, as if you are in a bubble, and not outward, from inside a fog.
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But then that is the whole difference between a Long War, fought by all the branches of the US government, and a Short War fought by just the executive branch.
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The executive branch is pretty good fighting a short war, but without the other two branches that are mostly against Obama, the Long War Obama is fighting, means he doesn’t stand a very good chance of winning.
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Which many Conservatives will say fine.
June 18th, 2013 at 12:07 am
The Syrian regime is controlled by secular socialist Muslims. No Christian is prolonging anything or has any say in political or military decisions.
They aren’t united and have apparently engaged in fighting for both sides.
When the war moves to Aleppo it will be clearer which side they fall on, because there are
many there.
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Obama’s mother was Anglo-American but non-religious. The church he attended before he became president was more culturally and politically aligned with The Nation of Islam than any Christian denomination or philosophy. I don’t know what is in the man’s heart, but many across the political spectrum have suggested he may be agnostic.
June 18th, 2013 at 12:58 am
“The thing is intervention may be too good a hand right now. Sure Syria looks strong, but they were being fought to a stalemate before Hezbollah stepped in recently. Hezbollah isn’t set up for protracted combat and can’t afford to absorb losses for very long like they experienced along the border. The Russian missiles are a big problem, but it may be difficult to operate them without Russians on the ground. It’s not clear if Putin is willing to escalate to that level. If Iran gets dragged in with troops then that will open up a lot of possibilities for the nuclear issues. Longer down the line, it pulls their center of gravity westward, away from their tender Parthian side.” Exactly. Let America’s Sunni and Shi’a enemies have at it. The only interest we have is humanitarian — as Spengler says, the only humane solution at the present appears to be de facto partition on the ground. But where does that leave the Christians? In the Allawi connected zone, or more likely, fleeing for their lives?
June 18th, 2013 at 12:59 am
“The only interest we have is humanitarian — and I suppose, keeping the conflict from spilling over into Iraq or elsewhere.” So I should have said humanitarian and containing the conflict.
June 18th, 2013 at 1:41 pm
“But does the lag time have formal features, styles of assumption that gradually give way identifiably and reliably to more nuance and accuracy as certain formal issues are addressed ”
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But in general, I like this question. Perhaps the answer lies in not so much attempting to address whatever has occurred via action, but rather in being sensitive to our normal mode of response. As for discovering the formal features, we should start with a survey of actions-responses. How much of what has happened has required an immediate response? Obama especially seems prone to wait out the initial effects—some say, to a fault. OTOH, were he to act w/ impulse, I’m sure that would be held against him at least as often.
June 18th, 2013 at 1:55 pm
“keeping the conflict from spilling over into Iraq or elsewhere”
Another possible ingredient in the bouillabaisse to consider is the Islamic pipeline
http://goo.gl/vCwg5
It brings Iraq even closer to Iran and competes with the our preferred route
http://goo.gl/mOjS4
June 18th, 2013 at 1:59 pm
Islamic pipeline:
http://www.knak.jp/others/islamic-pipe.gif
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Nabucco pipeline:
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yBusk96gjUw/TzZ4VGUoghI/AAAAAAAAAqs/XtKkldSspmE/s1600/Turkmenistan-Nabucco+map.jpg
June 19th, 2013 at 4:26 pm
Larry,
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“But then that is the whole difference between a Long War, fought by all the branches of the US government, and a Short War fought by just the executive branch.
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The executive branch is pretty good fighting a short war, but without the other two branches that are mostly against Obama, the Long War Obama is fighting, means he doesn’t stand a very good chance of winning.”
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I wouldn’t say that the other two branches are against Obama directly, but by default.
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You could say that a significant number of members of the Senate and the House are only always fighting the Short War, i.e., the next election cycle. This does mean that their War and Obama’s are, crudely stated, separate OODAs. There is overlap and friction, and there are anti-Obama messages intended to win a Short War (election cycles); and to that degree, at least the GOP House and large portions of the minority GOP Senate are against Obama; but this is by default and according to their own Short Wars. Neither the House nor the Senate are capable of operating with a Long War in view. Even if some members in either chamber, of both parties, are capable of holding a Long War in mind, the individual members who are not capable of this create too much friction and static for the chambers to effectively legislate a Long War.
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I would say that SCOTUS is far more capable of fighting a Long War. But their OODAs are quite different than those found @ POTUS and Congress.
June 19th, 2013 at 10:24 pm
“The Syrian regime is controlled by secular socialist Muslims. No Christian is prolonging anything or has any say in political or military decisions.”
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I think you’re correct in stating that there is no single Christian prolonging anything, but (and I am only assuming here) unlike Iraq there is an element of the regime supported by Christians. An element that would be probably be swept away along with the regime in a sudden regime change. I also assume that Obama understands this.
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As Christians are protected by their faith in a Muslim country, I don’t believe they are protected when it comes to being on the wrong side of a civil war, such as what’s happening in Syria. So while the Christians in Iraq might be on the bottom of some political ladder, there might not be even a ladder for them in Syria, if the regime was suddenly removed.
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As one negotiates from a position of strength not weakness, and with Russia adding strength to Syria’s regime and the US adding support to the anti-regime/ant-Christian forces, maybe some sort of balance is being restored, but who knows?
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“Obama’s mother was Anglo-American but non-religious.”
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She didn’t have to be religious only American to basically destroy a Muslim OODA loop entering America in the 60’s, ha! Islam thought it had it easy until they hooked up with American chicks. Most of them had to go back to momma because they didn’t know what hit them
June 19th, 2013 at 11:02 pm
“I wouldn’t say that the other two branches are against Obama directly, but by default.”
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No, in a time of war the default is that you support the POTUS. The Republicans see their opposition to Obama as an opportunity to privatize and deregulate everything from schools to the EPA.
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The push against Obama is an opportunity, not a strategy. They have formed their opposition as not a way to win the Short War we have going on (because we are leaving, right?), but the Long war they have been waging since Reagan.
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“You could say that a significant number of members of the Senate and the House are only always fighting the Short War, i.e., the next election cycle.”
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That is exactly what I am thinking. None of the branches are set to fight a long war, in the single. It takes them all together to fight a Long War. If Congress was really in this war, they wouldn’t waste resources on tanks that the administration said they didn’t need, but ships they don’t have.
June 19th, 2013 at 11:03 pm
I mean, find resources for “ships they don’t have”.
June 20th, 2013 at 3:53 pm
“No, in a time of war the default is that you support the POTUS.”
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Sounds idealistic, tbh. OTOH, the question arises whether we are actually in a “War” capital-w, and whether these parties in our government are merely engaged in various “wars” lowercase-w —private political wars that play out in the public.
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The “Long war…since Reagan” is understandable as an idea, and I agree that a segment of the GOP actually does have a longer view of what they want to accomplish, but I’m not sure it’s a Long War in the sense I’d use that term. If they really had a Long War in view, they’d be less inclined to destroy their chances of winning by doing what they’ve been doing. Or maybe they are just inept at fighting that Long War.
June 20th, 2013 at 3:54 pm
Larry, I’ll admit that I’m biased, but, like E.L. Doctorow, I’m just trying to find some moral truths in the purity of ridicule. I don’t believe we should assume any understanding or even interest on Obama’s part. He hasn’t given us any reason to. The countries of the Levant and Mesopotamia were artificial constructions of the French and British Empire when they were dividing up the spoils of war. The region is now returning to its natural stance. Now this isn’t a resurrection of the past. More like a reversion to the mean. I don’t expect Obama to understand this or even care.
Christians are in trouble there’s no doubt, but in that part of the world they have always shared the fate of the borderless indigenous tribe, and that is a fate not normally addressed by our leadership.
Thanks for your thoughtful analysis.
June 20th, 2013 at 10:16 pm
“Or maybe they are just inept at fighting that Long War.”
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OTOH, if a status quo POTUS is continually elected, I am not sure how inept they are in fighting that Long War. The Republicans hated Bill Clinton, but they loved his economics.
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George W. Bush was pretty much an extension of NAFTA, only on steroids, and the hand-off to Obama went pretty much without a hitch.
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Obamacare went through, but without a public option, and in the those mostly Republican states that turned away from Obamacare, the healthcare congressional complex barely had a hiccup in their OODA loop. The rates look to be going up in the Red States with no end insight.
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Of course once a new Republican POTUS is elected, the Red States should see some improvement, it’s just hard for me to see from who. Maybe if they can elect another Bill Clinton, but still not sure.
June 22nd, 2013 at 4:38 pm
“I would say that SCOTUS is far more capable of fighting a Long War.”
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I agree. The SCOTUS is far more capable of fighting a Long War. The environment of the SCOTUS has more bureaucracy that makes long term strategy more accurate and precise, although slower. The bureaucracy also helps when there are changes in SCOTUS.
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“But their OODAs are quite different than those found @ POTUS and Congress.”
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While the SOTUS, POTUS, Congress and the SCOTUS Observe different environments and Orient themselves differently according to the advantages they have in those environments, they pretty much occupy the same OODA loops. If this wasn’t true you wouldn’t have performity
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I would also guess that the default is less loops instead of more loops, especially as the environment becomes more connected. I mean it is hard to observe something, even from a great distance, without affecting its and your position, in at least some small way. It doesn’t matter if you are Observing electrons or a butterfly in South America. Observation limits the environment but not the potential that one Orients to. Fog changes our Orientation, it just might not be precisely in the way needed, nor as accurately as wanted.
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After all, Climate Change and Atomic Bombs tells us it is all the same environment. And it is all the same environment even if you can’t see the butterfly’s wings flapping in South America, or know about the Black Swans in Australia.
June 23rd, 2013 at 7:18 pm
Larry, my view is that they have different OODA loops for the very facts that they observe different environments and they are limited in different ways in what they can do in those environments as well as empowered in different ways. Each branch has a different purview, and the distinction has a significant effect on their OODAs, affecting a) their orientations, and b) their actions in ways that c) lead to feedback loops (so-called) that continue to alter/influence their orientations and actions in performative ways.
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Each observes his own activities and effects upon the environment, even while observing the effects others have upon that environment. So the performative effects are not only effective in manipulating the reactions of others who observe that changed environment but also affect those who have committed those actions. While there is overlap and interaction as members of the different branches have an effect on a shared environment that they all may observe, their potential responses to those effects are different, their orientations are different, and their OODAs are different.
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I would suggest that in general, the notion of a “shared OODA” is a wrong step that will lead to many mistakes and mishaps. Even for members of a single body, like the House, the Senate, and SCOTUS, each individual will have a long list of experiences and observations different than the others within that group — not least of which, a different constituency — and these differences will have different effects on orientations. There are Dems and there are Reps after all. So when comparing the three branches as I did before, I was eliding. It is interesting to consider how different constraints and empowerments may shape different OODAs, how similar constraints and empowerments might bring OODAs into closer alignment—and with respect to our system of government, to ask whether this forcing-together and forcing-apart is precisely the purpose of the Constitution. (It is also interesting to ask whether an always-on pervasive observational environment created by our communications technology and a 24/7 news cycle, shared in common, may have an effect on perceptions of tyranny and be related to conspiracies about New World Orders and World Government because it forces a type of larger, shared OODA. I would submit that in actuality no OODAs will be identical between persons, however; we see signs of this disjunction just as often as we see signs of conjunctions, if not more often.)
June 23rd, 2013 at 8:59 pm
“Larry, my view is that they have different OODA loops for the very facts that they observe different environments and they are limited in different ways in what they can do in those environments as well as empowered in different ways.”
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Granted, and I agree that they Observe different environments and they are limited in different ways in what they can do in those environments, with the limits being related to the position they Orient themselves to.
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I also agree that they are empowered in different ways, but empowerment has to mean that there is only one loop. The Senator empowered by his/her constituents to control carbon admissions is in the same loop as the butterfly in Peru flapping its wings and creating a tornado. This is also true with the Senator that doesn’t believe in Climate Change and votes to continue with mankind’s reliance on fossil fuels. The difference is that the Senator that doesn’t believe in Climate Change will be more highly rewarded that the one that doesn’t. It still doesn’t mean they are in different loops.
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It comes down to a matter of faith.
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The Senator is simply giving a different performance than the butterfly in Peru is giving.
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“I would suggest that in general, the notion of a “shared OODA” is a wrong step that will lead to many mistakes and mishaps.”
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I suppose that is where you and Abraham disagree. The disagreement, of course, being that it is the wrong step
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As for being identical, I don’t think that is relevant in this conversation. We are only talking about Observing, and as quantum physics has taught us, you can’t observe without cost, and that cost is in energy (force @ position).
June 23rd, 2013 at 10:29 pm
Larry, I went into more detail here.
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A little rushed, because as usual I felt the pressure of time.
August 23rd, 2013 at 3:08 am
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