SW503
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- Hammond's 6 Principles of war for 21st Century: Sustainment:
- This refers not only to the logistical capability to sustain forces in the field in military requirements but also the ability to sustain the effort required in the contest politically, economically, and psychologically for as long as may be required to achieve success.
- Gray's 12 characteristics of American Way of War: Large-scale -
- As a superpower, the United States tends to excel at enterprises on a scale that matches its total assets.
- Gray's 12 characteristics of American Way of War: Logistically Excellent -
- It may be a cliché, but the maxim that "geography is destiny" is supported abundantly in American strategic history.
- Americans can only remake their strategic performance if they first remake their
- society, and that is a task beyond the ability even of the most optimistic agents of transformation.
- - Airpower is a vital national resource, a powerful tool, and a preferred manner of warfighting. But it
- cannot do everything and it should not be asked to accomplish things (like stopping ethnic cleansing in Kosovo) it is unable to do.
- The American "way" suffers from
- acute political deficit. Antulio J. Echevarria has made this point in uncompromising fashion, accusing the country of adhering to a theory of battle in the mistaken belief that it is a theory of war. The American way, in effect, is to treat warfare as a near autonomous activity, all but separate from its political purposes and consequences. One might characterize the traditional assumption as one which holds that "if we win the fighting, the politics will take care of themselves as a necessary benign consequence."
- Gray's 12 characteristics of American Way of War: Apolitical
- Americans are wont to regard war and peace as sharply distinctive conditions.
- The "new way of war" (Echevaria) points out the
- danger of relying solely on the battle vice winning the war.
- Define Holzimmer's Colonial wars:
- Until the Civil War - search for absolute security; inherent weaknesses; limited means = limited ends. After the U.S. Civil War - change in context (population and economic growth); Military was able to grow larger; "Total" means = total ends.
- Unified actions are planned and conducted by
- joint force commanders IAW guidance and direction received from the President and SecDef, multinational organizations, and military commanders."
- Gray's 12 characteristics of American Way of War: Astrategic -
- Strategy is, or should be, the bridge that connects military power with policy.
- Gray's 12 characteristics of American Way of War: Culturally Ignorant -
- Belatedly, it has become fashionable to berate the cultural insensitivity that continues to hamper American strategic performance.
- The problem for the future is that the preferred American way of war has become so successful
- nobody wants to play by those rules, with those kinds of forces, in that kind of battle space.
- Ways (annihilation)
- Physical destruction of enemy equipment and members
- Hammond's 6 Principles of war for 21st Century: Precision Effects:
- Precision has substituted for mass. It is no longer a matter of attrition and annihilation to achieve the desired effect; rather, it is precision and timing.
- Define Holzimmer's Limited Ends
- Seek to obtain national objectives while maintaining the political independence of the adversary in place (Ex - Coalition against Iraq in first Gulf War; get Saddam out of Kuwait while leaving Baathist regime in place).
- Following, contributing, and supporting are important roles in multinational operations often as
- important as leading.
- Airpower can exercise
- greater strategic leverage at less risk to life than most forms of surface power.
- Define Holzimmer's Means (alternatives):
- Partisan strategy, fortification strategy, constabulary strategy (peacekeeping and nation-building), Napoleanic strategy of annihilation (American style - decisive results with limited casualties).
- The American way of war has embraced
- airpower as its principal component in the process.
- The military leaders of (coalition) member nations must emphasize
- common objectives as well as mutual support and respect.
- Define Holzimmer's Total Ends
- Total destruction or overthrow of the enemy; destruction of his capacity or will to continue hostilities. (Ex - Germany at the end of WWII)
- Gray's 12 characteristics of American Way of War: Impatient -
- America is an exceptionally ideological society and, to date at least, it has distinguished clearly between conditions of peace and war.
- Under Lincoln Ullyses S.Grant adopted a new strategy
- of attrition (vice annihilation); Robert E. Lee was a general who imposed a strategy of annihilation.
- Airpower provides the nation with
- global awareness, reach, and power.
- Strategy of annihilation -vs- attrition in the U.S. Civil War
- altered our nation's capacity to attain total ends and altered our view from annihilative strategy to one of attrition.
- The uneven capabilities of allies and coalition partners complicates the
- integration of multinational partners and the coordination and synchronization of their activities during multinational operations.
- Hammond's 6 Principles of war for 21st Century: Versatility and Adaptation:
- Given accelerating change in nearly all areas of human activity and a constantly evolving world of differential capabilities and desires, one must be ready and willing to adapt to these evolving circumstances.
- JFCs also may support
- a civilian chief, such as an ambassador, or may themselves employ the resources of a civilian organization.
- Because potential adversaries can't win militarily in fighting our way,
- they may become more adept at what the Chinese call "unrestricted warfare" across the spectrum of conflict.
- Gray's 12 characteristics of American Way of War: Firepower Focused -
- Gen. William C. Westmoreland, as commander of the Military Advisory Command Vietnam (MACV), once famously and characteristically told a press conference that the answer for counterinsurgency was "firepower."
- Gray's 12 characteristics of American Way of War: Technologically Dependent -
- The exploitation of machinery is the American way of war.
- U.S. Armed Forces has attempted to combine both strategies of annihilation and attrition,
- not too successfully.
- The complex challenge of achieving unified action includes
- operating with diverse participants having a variety of objectives and unique command or reporting arrangements.
- Hammond's 6 Principles of war for 21st Century: Surprise:
- Those in service to the state must be wary of surprise by their adversaries and constantly consider the means by which they could achieve surprise against their adversaries.
- What principles of war the US has in common with other major countries?
- , initiative, and surprise.
- Max Boot observed OIF and declared it "The New American Way of War," is heavily reliant upon
- precision firepower, special forces, and psychological operations. And it strives to integrate naval, air and land power into a seamless whole."
- Hammond's 6 Principles of war for 21st Century: Focus:
- This is a broader restatement of the objective. While one must have an objective, exactly what it is and how it should be achieved may change during the course of conflict.
- For America, wars are decided by
- battles! (Battles are the currency of our wars.)
- Hammond's 6 Principles of war for 21st Century: Initiative and Shaping:
- Military forces must be ready and willing to seize the initiative at all times, to act rather than merely be acted upon and react. They must be able to shape as well as be shaped by the circumstances they confront.
- Gray's 12 characteristics of American Way of War: Ahistorical -
- America is a future-oriented, still somewhat "new" country, one that has a founding ideology of faith in, hope for, and commitment to, human betterment.
- The American way of war can no longer consist of outproducing adversaries. It must involve
- outwitting them.
- The strategy of attrition was introduced to the U.S. through the
- U.S. Civil War. However, we did NOT necessarily adopt it over one of annihilation.
- The concept of unified action highlights the
- synergistic application of all of the instruments of national and multinational power and includes the actions of nonmilitary organizations as well as military forces.
- US forces will remain bound by US treaty obligations;
- even if the other members in a coalition are not signatories to a treaty and need not adhere to its terms.
- Gray's 12 characteristics of American Way of War: Sensitive to Casualties -
- In common with the Roman Empire, the American guardian of world order is much averse to suffering a high rate of military casualties, and for at least one of the same reasons.
- Gray's 12 characteristics of American Way of War: Problem-Solving, Optimistic -
- Holding to an optimistic public culture characterized by the belief that problems can be solved, the American way in war is not easily discouraged or deflected once it is exercised with serious intent to succeed.
- Gray's 12 characteristics of American Way of War: Profoundly Regular -
- Few, if any, armies have been equally competent in the conduct of regular and irregular warfare.
- By the end of the 1800s, the US had the means to
- execute total, vice limited, war.