The John Boyd collection (merged thread)

[SWJED]

The folks at Defense and the National Interest (http://www.d-n-i.net/) (DNI) have been kind enough to offer a block of seats to members of the Small Wars Journal / Small Wars Council community of interest. Space is very limited – so it’s first come first serve – and the price is right – free. For additional information see the 2007 Boyd Conference entry (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/2007/06/the-2007-boyd-conference/) at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/).

[zenpundit]

I'm attending already - interested in meeting anyone else from SWC who shows up.

[Ski]

I'll be there Zen. Shoot me a PM.

[ericmwalters]

Will be there, running the 9:30 to 10:30 panel on 4GW. Find me during a break!

[Granite_State]

Can anyone recommend a good introduction to Colonel Boyd's strategic thinking? I know some regard him as America's greatest strategist, but I know nothing about him beyond the Fighter Mafia/F-16 stuff and OODA Loop. Is there some good stuff of his online, or should I read Coram's book?

[Stu-6]

There is tons of stuff at DNI
http://www.d-n-i.net/

[Lastdingo]

Yes, DNI is a fine source, although I believe they focus on what he already knew.


Hmm, Boyd as one of the US's greatest strategists?

Well, the sad thing is it may be true. I remember only Mahan as premier league example.
OODA loop merely gives the "tempo" a theoretical framework
What Boyd did on fighters was purely tactical and narrowed on dogfights.

I rate Luttwak at least as high as Boyd due to his work "Strategy: Logic in War and Peace".
Maybe Mitchell was good, too - but I don't know enough about him.

[SteveMetz]

Can anyone recommend a good introduction to Colonel Boyd's strategic thinking? I know some regard him as America's greatest strategist, but I know nothing about him beyond the Fighter Mafia/F-16 stuff and OODA Loop. Is there some good stuff of his online, or should I read Coram's book?

I'd recommend Grant Hammond's book The Mind of War.

[Granite_State]

Thanks for the recommendations, will read Hammond's book and then Boyd's stuff on DNI. Does his Green Book actually exist, or is it just a way to describe his collected lectures and writings?

[Dr Jack]

Can anyone recommend a good introduction to Colonel Boyd's strategic thinking?

Another possibility is Fred Kagan's Finding the Target: The Transformation of American Military Policy. Kagan describes the evolution of airpower theory from Boyd to John Warden to "shock and awe."

http://www.airpower.maxwell.af.mil/airchronicles/bookrev/kagan.html

Here's a paper by Boyd entitled "Destruction and Creation":

http://www.belisarius.com/modern_business_strategy/boyd/destruction/destruction_and_creation.htm

Finally, a paper by Hammond entitled "The Essential Boyd":

http://www.belisarius.com/modern_business_strategy/hammond/essential_boyd.htm

[MASON]

Boyd seems excellent in fighter tactics and strategy but the central analogy when applied to forces of size seems to hold only when one faces a rational enemy who above all wishes to preserve the lives within the force. An army division can outmanuver and corner an enemy but unless the enemy is willing to surrender you may still have to destroy him and that requires a certain level of political will to support such actions made even more difficult when the opposing force usually justs melts back into the populace rather than die or surrender.

Often we solace ourselve that a force that melts back into the populace is destroyed this in fact is not true they melted effectively on their own terms still armed with knowledge and experience if not actual arms.

[zenpundit]

I'll send you two a PM before I leave town so we can connect -Dave I'll come find you as well.

[Ski]

I liked Hammond's book more than Coram's FWIW.

DNI and Belisarius are the two websites that have all of Boyds work on them.

[SWCAdmin]

Well I'll be flying in that afternoon from a business trip so I will definitely miss all the work, but if all goes well it looks like I will be in the AO in time to join the festivities at the "watering hole TBD."

I wish that was all upside and more the story of my life.

I hope to see some Small Wars Council members there.

[Mondor]

How I expected to recognize anyone from SWJ at the conference I'll never know. I guess I thought that everyone would wear their screen name on their name tag. :o

[SteveMetz]

How I expected to recognize anyone from SWJ at the conference I'll never know. I guess I thought that everyone would wear their screen name on their name tag. :o


zenpundit should be easy to spot, what with that black robe and pasty complextion.

[zenpundit]

I'll cop to the pasty complexion but I left my black robe at the cleaners that day. I still found Dave and Ski without benefit of any Sith Lord attire.

Great conference!

[Adrian]

Is there going to be a write-up or summary?

[zenpundit]

Hi Adrian

Here are a few:

DNI Report (http://www.d-n-i.net/boyd/2007_conference/report.htm)

Dreaming 5GW (http://www.fifthgeneration.phaticcommunion.com/archives/2007/07/william_lind_and_john_norman.php)

Zenpundit -Part II (http://zenpundit.blogspot.com/2007/07/part-ii-ideas-at-boyd-2007-ideas-and.html)

Zenpundit-Part I. (http://zenpundit.blogspot.com/2007/07/boyd-2007-was-blast-just-returned-from.html)

[SWJED]

Hi Adrian

Here are a few:

DNI Report (http://www.d-n-i.net/boyd/2007_conference/report.htm)

Dreaming 5GW (http://www.fifthgeneration.phaticcommunion.com/archives/2007/07/william_lind_and_john_norman.php)

Zenpundit -Part II (http://zenpundit.blogspot.com/2007/07/part-ii-ideas-at-boyd-2007-ideas-and.html)

Zenpundit-Part I. (http://zenpundit.blogspot.com/2007/07/boyd-2007-was-blast-just-returned-from.html)

Thanks much Mark. It was a pleasure meeting you there - wish I had more time to talk...

[SWJED]

4GW as a Model of Future Conflict (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/2007/07/4gw-as-a-model-of-future-confl/)
Boyd 2007 Conference, 13 July 2007
Warfare Since Boyd Panel Presentation

F. G. Hoffman


I have been asked to be the token diversity candidate from outside the 4GW “church” today, and am honored just by the chance to appear at an event that preserves John Boyd’s deep intellectual contributions, and to be on stage with my fellow panelists and Col Eric Walters. My assigned task is to explain why academics and historians have problems with the 4GW construct. My remarks will draw up upon my work on an alternative concept called Hybrid Warfare which I have presented at Oxford University this past winter. My comments will also draw upon unpublished work about to be released in a book titled Global Insurgency and the Future of Armed Conflict, edited by Dr. Terry Terriff, of University of Birmingham (UK) and Aaron Karp and Dr. Regina Karp of Old Dominion University, in which several of our distinguished speakers have prominent contributions including Mr. Lind and Col Hammes.

Let me begin by summarizing the arguments up front. The 4GW construct is often criticized for three major faults.

The theory is described as “weak” and the concept is too diffused, having become over time the equivalent of everything that is asymmetric.

Second the history that is drawn upon is uneven and often “too selective,” that is it is packaged to support a major component of the theory without full examination of trends or detailed counter-findings.

Finally, the generational framework is labeled “indefensible” and unnecessary. In my own assessment, I find that it hides more than it reveals...More at the link...

[Ski]

Frank's brief was good - he basically stated that 4GW may be flawed, but it's "right enough" to have a lot of merit.

[William F. Owen]

Forgive me, but I fancy dropping a bit of a rock in the water.

I believe that Lind has contributed very little that is useful, and is mostly proved wrong when subjected to rigor. He is not military theorist, but rather a self-publicist. Maneuver Warfare, OODA loops and 4GW have wasted time set people on the wrong path.

I also believe that John Boyd, is vastly overrate when it comes to his work on MW, even if you believe there is such a thing, is that belief useful?

“Watch and shoot, watch and shoot”

[RTK]

Forgive me, but I fancy dropping a bit of a rock in the water.

I believe that Lind has contributed very little that is useful, and is mostly proved wrong when subjected to rigor. He is not military theorist, but rather a self-publicist. Maneuver Warfare, OODA loops and 4GW have wasted time set people on the wrong path.

I also believe that John Boyd, is vastly overrate when it comes to his work on MW, even if you believe there is such a thing, is that belief useful?

“Watch and shoot, watch and shoot”

I don't know who you are, but I like you already....

Be prepared to get introduced to someone relatively soon named Fabius. You just called his Michael Jordan a horrible basketball player.

[Ken White]

"The truth will set you free, but first it will make you miserable." ~Attributed to James A. Garfield :D

I shall prepare my popcorn...

[Norfolk]

This is kind of funny; on my own site this morning, I put down the first paragraph of a piece where I'm going after three "Peacetime Doctrine" Strategic Theories ("Soft Power", 4GW/5GW, and RMA) that seem to think that Sun Tzu, Clausewitz, and Forrest are either fundamentally wrong or obsolete. I think that they are useful to the extent that they demonstrate areas of negligence or point to areas that require further development in Strategic Thought, but no more. What makes the aforementioned Three Great Military Theorists so great is the simple and basic applicability and usefulness of what they're trying to teach. The newer stuff just doesn't quite cut it there.

And I was horrified by Lind's advocacy of heavy and light teams in the Rifle Squad. There wasn't enough practical difference between the two as he had them to really bother with making the distinction in the first place.

[William F. Owen]

There was a Handbook that was written on 4GW called FMFM-1A (http://www.d-n-i.net/lind/fmfm_1a_r4.pdf), by Lind and others. It was painful to read, and hard to understand how some many bright and clever men could buy into such a poor idea.

[Gian P Gentile]

...Be prepared to get introduced to someone relatively soon named Fabius. You just called his Michael Jordan a horrible basketball player.

RTK, too funny with the analogy to Jordan.

I never bought any of the 4thGW warfare stuff and i dont believe any thinker of quality did either: Too simplistic; too sequential; too much of a rehash of Marx's epochs but with a liberal democratic switch to it. But it sounded good though and it soothed and it fit neatly in with the airpower/techno fetish of the 90s that all wars could be reduced to targets for destruction and that friction in war was gone; and more painfully for the American Army it produced the nonsensical notion of "maneuver out of contact, "certain knowledge of the enemy," and "quality of firsts."

Hey Tom Odom, I thought in that famous photo of John Warden in flight rompers in Checkmate with SecDef Cheney, John Boyd was in his rompers too albeit mystically in the background nodding approval

gian

[Norfolk]

There was a Handbook that was written on 4GW called FMFM-1A (http://www.d-n-i.net/lind/fmfm_1a_r4.pdf), by Lind and others. It was painful to read, and hard to understand how some many bright and clever men could buy into such a poor idea.

Wilf, I understand you've been working on a Doctrine of Infantry for a little while now; when it's finished, I hope it get lots of exposure, especially to the 4GW crowd. A lot of those folks need some exposure to real Infantry Doctrine.

[Steve Blair]

4GW, in my view, is nothing more than a marketing tool/book selling device for people who aren't quite sure what to do with themselves on the weekend.

In all seriousness, 4GW ignores history (by claiming that the majority of its practices began with Mao), relies excessively on sound byte quotes from Sun Tzu and others, and can quite often be boiled down to a smoke and mirrors act. Boyd had some interesting ideas, but to me the greatest accomplishment of those ideas was prodding folks in the Marine Corps to look at how they thought about war and develop the MCDP 1 series.

4GW is really nothing more than non-kinetic maneuver operations accelerated by modern communication methods (specifically the internet) and boosted with a fluid organization taken from the anti-globalization folks and various terrorist networks. A method of organization and operations, but not necessarily a "new" way of war and certainly one that has been around since before the 20th century (look at the operations of the Cuban rebels before the Spanish-American war for just one example).

[max161]

I put down the first paragraph of a piece where I'm going after three "Peacetime Doctrine" Strategic Theories ("Soft Power", 4GW/5GW, and RMA) that seem to think that Sun Tzu, Clausewitz, and Forrest are either fundamentally wrong or obsolete. I think that they are useful to the extent that they demonstrate areas of negligence or point to areas that require further development in Strategic Thought, but no more. What makes the aforementioned Three Great Military Theorists so great is the simple and basic applicability and usefulness of what they're trying to teach. The newer stuff just doesn't quite cut it there.

You should read Colin Gray's new book Fighting Talk: Forty Maxims on War, Peace, and Strategy. In particular, Maxim 14 "If Thucydides, Sun Tzu, and Clausewitz did not say it, it probably is not worth saying", would be useful for your paper.

Dave

[Norfolk]

You should read Colin Gray's new book Fighting Talk: Forty Maxims on War, Peace, and Strategy. In particular, Maxim 14 "If Thucydides, Sun Tzu, and Clausewitz did not say it, it probably is not worth saying", would be useful for your paper.

Dave

Thanks Dave! Much obliged.:)

[PhilR]

I never bought any of the 4thGW warfare stuff and i dont believe any thinker of quality did either: Too simplistic; too sequential; too much of a rehash of Marx's epochs but with a liberal democratic switch to it. But it sounded good though and it soothed and it fit neatly in with the airpower/techno fetish of the 90s that all wars could be reduced to targets for destruction and that friction in war was gone; and more painfully for the American Army it produced the nonsensical notion of "maneuver out of contact, "certain knowledge of the enemy," and "quality of firsts."

Hey Tom Odom, I thought in that famous photo of John Warden in flight rompers in Checkmate with SecDef Cheney, John Boyd was in his rompers too albeit mystically in the background nodding approval

gian

I'm not a big fan of 4GW, but I'm sure they do not associate themselves with air-centric, "sterile" solutions or dominant knowledge, etc. Quite the opposite. Warden and Boyd wore the same uniform, but that's about the limit of their similarity.

[slapout9]

I'm not a big fan of 4GW, but I'm sure they do not associate themselves with air-centric, "sterile" solutions or dominant knowledge, etc. Quite the opposite. Warden and Boyd wore the same uniform, but that's about the limit of their similarity.


You said a mouthful there!

[Gian P Gentile]

Warden and Boyd wore the same uniform, but that's about the limit of their similarity.

But he did model human behaivor in combat through his ooda loop. His upbringing as a fighter pilot (albeit with very limited actual combat experience) informed his thinking to derive his model where human actions could be modeled and if they could be modeled then they could be controlled; the opposite of friction. Boyd was Jomini and not Clausewitz hence my point on friction.

[William F. Owen]

Wilf, I understand you've been working on a Doctrine of Infantry for a little while now; when it's finished, I hope it get lots of exposure, especially to the 4GW crowd. A lot of those folks need some exposure to real Infantry Doctrine.

How the ***k did you know that! Wow. Small world. All true. A work of some 4 years, 3 drafts, a lot of sweat, and perhaps doubtful merit. Publisher extremely frustrated.

The infantry annex of FMFM-1A really worries me, as a friend of mine, very conversant with the ideas I promote, helped write it. He is an extremely gifted Royal Marine officer who risked his career by getting his rifle company to use some of my wild and whacky ideas in the field, which was vastly useful.

He then went to the US and became embroiled with Hammes, Lind and the whole 4GW thing. - so the infantry annex of FMFM-1A cause me some pain and confusion which I am still working through, as the bones of what is contained there is actually nothing to do with 4GW

[Norfolk]

How [] did you know that! Wow. Small world. All true. A work of some 4 years, 3 drafts, a lot of sweat, and perhaps doubtful merit. Publisher extremely frustrated.

The infantry annex of FMFM-1A really worries me, as a friend of mine, very conversant with the ideas I promote, helped write it. He is an extremely gifted Royal Marine officer who risked his career by getting his rifle company to use some of my wild and whacky ideas in the field, which was vastly useful.

He then went to the US and became embroiled with Hammes, Lind and the whole 4GW thing. - so the infantry annex of FMFM-1A cause me some pain and confusion which I am still working through, as the bones of what is contained there is actually nothing to do with 4GW

Wilf, this is the SWC, and we're made up of Infantrymen and IO's (amongst others), so word gets around:

http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showpost.php?p=16686&postcount=2:

Besides, Rifleman has been posting your articles for months here, and you appear to have developed quite a following.

If you've had the "assistance" of real live Royal Marines to test your Doctrine out in the Field (the Marines being the way they are with their own "Right Way" of doing things) - a remarkable feat in itself -, then I'm certain whatever emerges will be eagerly read and discussed in all manner of places. The fact that your Doctrine will have received at least some degree of Field Testing (by Marines no less) will go some way to giving your Doctrine credibility with its audience.

Maybe we should get William Lind on here - not that he'd enjoy the reception that his ideas receive here; and I'm almost surprised that FM hasn't shown up yet. Yep, there could be some real fireworks on some threads here at the SWC then.

Forget the popcorn I say (sorry Ken, but I'll defer to your preferences in your case): if either FM returns or Lind were to show up, we'll need nothing less than whisky, beer chasers, and Cajun chicken wings - to start.:D

[jcustis]

I don't know who you are, but I like you already....

As do I.

[Sargent]

I don't intend to take a position on the value of the content of what the 4GWers were (and still are) arguing. However, I do think they did an invaluable service in taking on the conventional wisdom regarding the future of warfare, primarily the dead hand of recent operational and strategic history, where past success and dominance were used to define the future, even if that future seemed headed elsewhere.

I do agree with the comments put forth by various folks that the notion of "generations" of warfare is too linear and imputes a sort of movement or evolution that does not occur. I don't know whether he still uses it now that he's at Carlisle, but Craig Nation, back when he was at SAIS, offered what I think was a far more compelling vision of the history of warfare, where different forms of warfare dominated in cycles, in an almost predictable fashion. Furthermore, the strength and dominance of a form at any given time was the key to the shift to a new cycle -- those who could not compete according to the current form were inspired to find a "new" way. Likely I'm butchering his argument a bit -- it's been a long time -- but this is the gist of it.

Cheers,
Jill

[Ski]

This is a nice troll. Lots of bait in the water, the chum line is ready.

By the way, Jill, I agree with your take.

[William F. Owen]

. However, I do think they did an invaluable service in taking on the conventional wisdom regarding the future of warfare, primarily the dead hand of recent operational and strategic history, where past success and dominance were used to define the future, even if that future seemed headed elsewhere.

l

I agree the intention was honest enough, but look where we are today. Boyd is applauded in ways that just make no sense given the evidence, and the facts. Lind came up with 4GW, which actually harmed understanding, and I won't even start on the OODA loopy garbage.

The intervening years have given us Maneuver Warfare, which once you actually break it down is an arbitrary collection of the obvious with a few attractive myths thrown in.

Wilf

[Global Scout]

I hear the traditionalists, "if Clausewitz, Mao or Sun Tzu didn't say it, then it isn't worth saying". Perfect position for an arm chair warrior, but not for someone who is leading our Soldiers in battle. What is important to the leader is successfully accomplishing the mission, and if traditional theory doesn't contribute to this, then its value is questionable.

We bring preconceived solutions and theories to the table before we even study the problem. This mindset is a perfect example of why we fail more than we should in irregular warfare.

Those who fault 4GW for its short comings have a lot of ammunition to support their arguments, but one could argue that the whole generational method to describe warfare is what is at faulty. It assumes that one generation replaces another, but the reality is that 1GW through 5GW are additive, they add to the repatoire of options available. The first step to clarifying the debate is doing away with the generations of warfare, then we won't have to waste time defending them, and instead can focus on the real issues at hand.

The nature of warfare and conflict can change as technology and political systems evolve. 5GW is supposed to describe the empowered individual, which is a possibility that can't be denied unless you live under a rock. An intelligent deviant can to some extent now, and to a much greater extent later, will be able to wreck various degrees of havoc with information technology, bio-engineering, etc., but then we argue can one man declare war? or is it just a crime? One man spreading bio-engineered small pox is a national security threat whether it is a war or a crime, and key take away isn't whether this is 1GW, 2GW, or 5GW, but that we have a security problem to solve.

I having seen where serious futurists have criticized Clausewitz, they simply added ideas to be discussed. Clausewitz, Mao, and maybe even Sun Tzu, were extremely intelligent and effectively captured the truth as it existed in their day for the situations they observed, and much of it remains relevant today, but evolution of war didn't stop with the death of Clausewitz (unless you're an U.S. Army CGSC product).

Everyone wants to throw stones at everyone else's ideas and endlessly debate: principles of war, centers of gravity, etc., which unfortunately rarely translates into effective strategy that wins wars. Did we get the center of gravity correct in Vietnam? Iraq? Afghanistan? And as Steve Metz pointed out in another post we're still fighting the insurgencies in the Philippines and Columbia, where victory always seems to be just beyond reach after tens of years of various efforts, so again did we correctly identify the center of gravity, apply the logical lines of operation correctly? Did we incorrectly apply the principles of war?

Instead of criticizing those who at least attempt to develop new ideas at least listen to them, then if need me attack the idea, not the person. So far all I have seen is attacks on the person (in this post Boyd and Lind), but not one valid counter argument to refute their positions.

If the traditionalists are intellectually correct, then prove it. To make it clear I'm not defending the new or the old, but simply want to see the argument evolve into something more productive than saying Boyd (for example) didn't add anything to the body of knowledge, but fail to explain why not.

Boyd added considerably to the body of knowledge of how to engage in aerial combat, and his OODA loop is applicable there. That doesn't mean it applies at the operational and strategic level. However, Boyd brought more to the table than the OODA loop over the years. He also supposedly was involved in crafting the Desert Storm offensive, after then SECDEF Chenny rejected Swarcofts (sp?) initial proposals. I suspect he added a little something to the body of knowledge, as I suspect Lind did also. The question is the same as it is for the traditionalists, does it translate into effective strategy that accomplishes our missions?

[William F. Owen]

Instead of criticizing those who at least attempt to develop new ideas at least listen to them, then if need me attack the idea, not the person. So far all I have seen is attacks on the person (in this post Boyd and Lind), but not one valid counter argument to refute their positions.


As the thread starter, let me respond to this point.

I am not attacking either man personally. I am holding their ideas and writing up for examination and I, and many more, find them lacking. In contrast I find others, less well know, less vocal, whose ideas are generally sound, are ignored as a result of ideas that are marketed rather than being presented for peer review.

Boyd and Lind are the two most well known originators of recent military theory. There ideas and writing are pervasive.

Ideas like "Recon Pull" are patently faulty, yet have received wide spread acceptance because no one had studied and understood exploitation.

I say again, I am not attacking the men personally. Only what they have written and what they have said.

...so what have Lind and Boyd contributed to Military Theory that is so useful? - or that others had not done before?

[Ski]

A few points, then I have to run to the airport. I love 6AM flights.

Context is important when discussing maneuver warfare. The concept was never new - and it was a reaction to the American involvement in Vietnam. Lind challenged the old ways of thinking and the old Guard in the 70's when he wrote a public rebuttal to the FM 100-5 which in its initial draft was more of the same old #### that helped get 58,000 Americans dead in Vietnam. I've often felt that he was a useful whipping boy for many American officers = never served in uniform, so how could he know about warfare? The Manuever Warfare handbook was the culmination of 15 years of trying to reintroduce some concepts into the American way of war that seemed to have perished after Korea. Nature abhors a vacuum.

Boyd is far, far more complex than the OODA Loop. Unfortunately, it seems that this is destined to be his fate - another victim of a military culture that has become the ultimate in reductionist thinking. Hey, we have to get this concept down to the 9th Grade level of thinking and writing. I suggest you read Frans Osinga's book on Boyd's theories to see how complex his writings actually are, and more important, to see how the military has simplified his theories. Boyd talked about friction quite a bit, and questioned Clausewitz and Jomini at length, and finally said that dealing with friction was not necessarily bad, as long as you could reduce it as much as possible on your side and increase it as much as possible on your advisaries side. I would go as far as saying that Boyd is the most misunderstood theorist of the modern era because of the inherent complexities of his work - a lot of the scientific background baffles me to a great extent.

At least the FMFM1-A was something to read about the nature of 21st Century war. The US Army took 6 years to produce a new counterinsurgency manual after the invasion of Afghanistan, and it is still using an operations manual from before the war.

I try and read as much as possible from a variety of sources and theories in order to shape my mental impressions about war and the conduct of war. Lind and Boyd may not be perfect (no theory ever is), but they have introduced concepts that were either ignored, forgotten or in the case of Boyd, never codified in the first place.

I do not hold any one theorist in greater regard than another. Like Boyd said about doctrine in general "The day after it's written, it becomes dogma. Don't talk to me about German, Russian, British doctrine - learn them all and use them as necessary."

[Steve Blair]

I've critiqued their positions on many occasions on these boards, GS. To cut it short, we're not seeing the titanic shift that 4GW advocates claim. What we are seeing is older methods being adapted to suit new technology combined with a bleed-over of methods that have been used by terrorist groups since the 1970s. Boyd was certainly more revolutionary than Lind, but that does not change the basic proposition that "4GW" is really nothing new...just older ideas that have been accelerated through technology. Just because most advocates stop at Mao does not mean that it all started with the ol' Chairman.

[stanleywinthrop]

I've critiqued their positions on many occasions on these boards, GS. To cut it short, we're not seeing the titanic shift that 4GW advocates claim. What we are seeing is older methods being adapted to suit new technology combined with a bleed-over of methods that have been used by terrorist groups since the 1970s. Boyd was certainly more revolutionary than Lind, but that does not change the basic proposition that "4GW" is really nothing new...just older ideas that have been accelerated through technology. Just because most advocates stop at Mao does not mean that it all started with the ol' Chairman.


Am I missing something here? How did Boyd get wrapped up into the 4GW theorists? To my knowledge he never uttered those words, and a careful reading of him shows that he divides warfare into very different categories (mental, moral, physical). Say what you want about his theories, but he really didn't have anything to do with 4GW.

He did have a lot to say about guerilla warfare, however, but only viewed it as another potential form of warfare.

[Steve Blair]

Am I missing something here? How did Boyd get wrapped up into the 4GW theorists? To my knowledge he never uttered those words, and a careful reading of him shows that he divides warfare into very different categories (mental, moral, physical). Say what you want about his theories, but he really didn't have anything to do with 4GW.

He did have a lot to say about guerilla warfare, however, but only viewed it as another potential form of warfare.

Boyd is often brought in by the 4GW folks themselves with the whole OODA loop and other aspects of asymmetric warfare. He didn't have anything to do with it initially, but many of the 4GW folks have hitched him to their wagon.

[stanleywinthrop]

Boyd is often brought in by the 4GW folks themselves with the whole OODA loop and other aspects of asymmetric warfare. He didn't have anything to do with it initially, but many of the 4GW folks have hitched him to their wagon.
I'll admit that I haven't read much of Lind, and so you may be correct about him, but in Hammes book, Boyd recieves no attention (indeed Boyd is not cited at all in the bibliography)and Hammes even rejects Boyd's OODA loop application theories in 4GW. (p. 222)

[Granite_State]

I've critiqued their positions on many occasions on these boards, GS. To cut it short, we're not seeing the titanic shift that 4GW advocates claim. What we are seeing is older methods being adapted to suit new technology combined with a bleed-over of methods that have been used by terrorist groups since the 1970s. Boyd was certainly more revolutionary than Lind, but that does not change the basic proposition that "4GW" is really nothing new...just older ideas that have been accelerated through technology. Just because most advocates stop at Mao does not mean that it all started with the ol' Chairman.

I'm a regular reader of Lind, don't always agree with him, but I think he's entertaining and raises interesting issues on a regular basis. This forum has been great at pointing out areas where he's off base (the distributed ops thread for one).

I think most of the 4GW folks wouldn't necessarily say it was new though. A point a lot of people forget is that it's "Four Generations of Modern War." They start with Westphalia, and the hanging of mercenaries after the Thirty Years War, as the point when the state tried to take a monopoly on the use of violence. I remember Lind recommending reading about the Thirty Years War, Italian condottiere, and the Warring States period in China as a means to understand the way we're headed.

I agree the generations are simplistic, and that 4GW is (in some ways) as old as warfare itself.

[Granite_State]

What about Martin Van Creveld? He never seems to come in for the same kind of criticism as Lind and Boyd, but the decline of the state is his central idea.

[Ken White]

What about Martin Van Creveld? He never seems to come in for the same kind of criticism as Lind and Boyd, but the decline of the state is his central idea.

Well said. Lemme see if I can think of a couple of others... :D

[William F. Owen]

What about Martin Van Creveld? He never seems to come in for the same kind of criticism as Lind and Boyd, but the decline of the state is his central idea.

MvC is an excellent military historian, who does not go around publishing concepts which are straight re-brandings of things armies have always known and often even done.

If enough USMC officers had read Du-Picq, Foch, Clausewitz, and even the awful Liddell-Hart, I don't think they'd even picked up the Manoeuvre Warfare handbook.

[stanleywinthrop]

If enough USMC officers had read Du-Picq, Foch, Clausewitz, and even the awful Liddell-Hart, I don't think they'd even picked up the Manoeuvre Warfare handbook.

Apparently USMC officers are a bit too clever for your comfort.

[William F. Owen]

Apparently USMC officers are a bit too clever for your comfort.

Not sure of your point. I hold the Corps in great esteem, have good friends in it and even wear USMC cuff-links presented to me by a USMC Colonel, so I am not disparaging USMC officers.

The UK adopted the Manoeuvrist Approach to Operations, as did the Australians and the Canadians. My example was referring to the USMC, but the point goes for almost all ABCAN armies, that had more military theory formed more of a part of professional training, then MW would have been treated more cautiously and in a more measured fashion.

...and for what it's worth, I thought MW was better than sex until I started reading and researching its origins in order to understand it better.

[stanleywinthrop]

Not sure of your point. I hold the Corps in great esteem, have good friends in it and even wear USMC cuff-links presented to me by a USMC Colonel, so I am not disparaging USMC officers.




Well, you may not have wished to give offense, sir, but you did so by suggesting the USMC adopted maneuver warfare out of ignorance. I suggest you study the topic and learn how it actually happened.

I'll actually agree that the USMC's version of Maneuver warfare has limited applicability in Iraq or Afghanistan these days, but it's adoption in the 1980s represented one of the biggest shifts in doctrine the U.S. military has ever willingly undergone.

[Steve Blair]

One thing I did like to see out of the USMC along with the maneuver warfare doctrine was a renewed interest in studying war in all its aspects in general. You started seeing the Commandant's reading list about that time, if memory serves, and the MCDP 1 series, which was more how to think about war than actual prescriptive doctrine.

[William F. Owen]

Well, you may not have wished to give offense, sir, but you did so by suggesting the USMC adopted maneuver warfare out of ignorance. I suggest you study the topic and learn how it actually happened.


Well sorry if I caused offence, and my intention was not to imply ignorance, in the way you seem to have understood it.

As concerns how the USMC came to adopt MW, I would love to know. Any sources of information you could suggest (other than the Boyd Biographies) would be gratefully accepted.

I contrast to the acceptance of MW it is interesting to see how the current fascination with COIN manifests itself by referencing vintage published work, and not seeking to manufacture innovative concepts.

[selil]

Well sorry if I caused offence, and my intention was not to imply ignorance, in the way you seem to have understood it.

As concerns how the USMC came to adopt MW, I would love to know. Any sources of information you could suggest (other than the Boyd Biographies) would be gratefully accepted.

I contrast to the acceptance of MW it is interesting to see how the current fascination with COIN manifests itself by referencing vintage published work, and not seeking to manufacture innovative concepts.

That's all right usually it is the Marines! who are offensive and generally distasteful. They don't call em' devil dogs because they are prim proper and refined. Marines! are heart breakers and life takers and Semper Fi.


“The Marines I have seen around the world have the cleanest bodies, the filthiest minds, the highest morale, and the lowest morals of any group of animals I have ever seen. Thank God for the United States Marine Corps!” - Eleanor Roosevelt,

If I remember right the maneuver warfare doctrine for the Marine Corps! was changing as the MEU concept was unfolding. It was pointed out to me recently that the Marines! though more than willing to move fast and light have taken armor to tiny Pacific islands, Vietnam, and in general like high speed maneuver warfare as much as any cavalry/armor army guy. I just think that they like big guns that go BOOM. Well to be more succinct I always appreciated big guns that made "other things" go BOOM.

[Steve Blair]

I contrast to the acceptance of MW it is interesting to see how the current fascination with COIN manifests itself by referencing vintage published work, and not seeking to manufacture innovative concepts.

I honestly don't know if I'd go that far. What they (and I reference the Marines) are doing now is pulling stuff that has worked off the shelf and using it as a touch-point and reference. I've seen some newer stuff come out and concepts develop that range away from some of the ideas expressed in the old Small Wars Manual.

[TT]

An interesting discussion.

As I know many here are very critical of some or all aspects of 4GW, let me say up front that I agree that there are problems with the 4GW concept (but more on that at the end). But let me also put up a bit of a defence for the 4GW advocates, for I also believe that they deserve some credit.

Part of the problem with the concept is that there that there are differences amongst those making the argument about what is 4GW, with perhaps one of the most significant differences being between Hammes’ conceptualization based on the evolution of revolutionary/insurgent/irregular warfare (ie 4GW as evolved insurgency) and many others who see insurgency/irregular warfare as only one aspect of 4GW (though to be fair to TX, he did note in The Sling and the Stone that he ultimately choose 4GW as the term he would use for lack of a better alternative - sorry, can’t remember the page number). But they hold some characteristics of 4GW in common These characteristics are:

1. Back in 1989, at the very heart of the 4GW concept what their argument that the state would face a growing crisis of legitimacy, which would increasingly weaken its authority over social organization and its monopoly on the use of force. This weakening of the authority and legitimacy of the state would in turn lead to the rise of a wide range of non-state actors, many who would challenge, or fight, the state and other entities for goals different from those of the state. Thus, proponents argue(d) that what is ‘new’ in 4GW is ‘who fights’ and ‘what they fight for’. Hence, as Granite State noted above, what they were suggesting (and Lind certainly still does) is that warfare increasingly would resemble in many ways warfare as it was before the Treaty of Westphalia and the subsequent growing control by states over the legitimate use of force. Worth noting here is that few advocates claimed that ‘4GW’ entities would use new tactics, rather their point has always been that they would use conventional and unconventional means (ie, not new ones) to achieve their ‘new’ aims and because of this and because of cultural differences that they might use old approaches in potentially new ways.

2. Proponents of this theory identified (with hindsight, reasonably accurately) the blurring nature of future conflict, especially the blurring of war and peace, the blurring between combatants and non-combatants, and the blurring of what constitutes the battlefield (the collapse, or compaction, of the strategic/operational/tactical levels of war), with conflict being non-linear and unbounded (by this I mean that such entities will use techniques and approaches – such as terrorism – not used by formal military organizations and that there are no front and rear – our societies and our beliefs are immediately pertinent targets). These emerging, non-state entities or actors, are weak in comparison to the militarily more powerful states, and so will use a wide range means other than military means in taking on the state.

3. The main effort of these non-state actors thus will be to use a variety of conventional and unconventional methods and approaches which are designed primarily to undermine the will of their adversaries and to morally undo them in an effort to foster the breakdown or social and political unity. These methods and approaches will encompass political, social, economic and culture means, aimed to affect the political, social, economic and culture of the state. That is, the aim of these nonstate actors is to influence – to disrupt, damage or change - our perceptions of ourselves, of our behaviour both on and off the battlefield. Thus the main thrust of such entities will be the strategic level of ‘war’, with their main aim of their actions being to affect us morally and mentally, and not just of state decision makers but of society as a whole.

These characteristics that they defined are pretty general, but then they were ‘fortunetelling’. These days most of them are fitting what we see happening into the concept (an exercise which can suffer from the facts being shoehorned to fit the concepts).

Finally, a couple of passing observations.


stanleywinthrop said:
How did Boyd get wrapped up into the 4GW theorists? To my knowledge he never uttered those words, and a careful reading of him shows that he divides warfare into very different categories (mental, moral, physical). Say what you want about his theories, but he really didn't have anything to do with 4GW.


As far as I know, Boyd did not, as Steve Blair rightly noted, have anything directly to do with the development of 4GW. The connection stems from 1) the original authors of the 1989 article were all followers of Boyd and his way of thinking (and still are); b) the first 3 generations of war were modeled, more or less in simplified form, from Boyd’s talks; and c) as their methodology, such as they can be said to have one, to limn out 4GW, was to apply Boyd’s general theory of change, ‘The Conceptual Spiral’ - which underpins Boyd's Patterns of Conflict and Discourse on Winning and Losing - as the means to delineate possible (potential?) future changes.


Steve Blair said: ...does not change the basic proposition that "4GW" is really nothing new...just older ideas that have been accelerated through technology

Worth mentioning, again, is that while some 4GW proponents seemed to suggest that these emerging non-state actors would use new tactics, many if most were largely silent on this issue (ie tactics), at least until recently when they started to point to current tactics being used as being consistent with their broader conceptualization of 4GW. Indeed, it was only with 9/11 that some advocates of 4GW (and not the originators or long time advocates) claimed that 4GW ‘has arrived’. But many others continued to refer to it as 'evolving'. In other words, they recognize that warfare constantly and continuously evolves, and that what we see today that is sometimes referred to as being 4GW is simply an early stage, or form, of 4GW.

So, yes, I agree that there certainly are problems with the 4GW concept. Not least is their use of history, but then historians have long complained loudly that political scientists misuse history – ie are selective in their use and interpretation – when these reprobates [errr, ummm, that includes me :eek: ] develop and/or defend a particular theory of international relations. Furthermore, the state, while in many instances is weaker in the way they suggested, is still here and does not appear about to go the way of the dodo anytime soon. So we do not see, to quote Steve Blair, ‘the titanic shift that 4GW advocates claim’ (yet, at any rate :wry: ). These, and other, critiques can be found elsewhere here on SWB, or in the August 2005 issue of Contemporary Security Policy (if you want ‘academics’ take on the concept). And one can (and maybe in some cases, should) question and even take umbrage at some of the specific analysis being generated these days.

Nonetheless, reflecting back to the original 1989 article, and even the 1994 follow-on, they got more right than wrong, in general terms, and decidedly got it more right than anyone else did ‘back in the day’ (think ‘RMA’! :eek: ). Except, of course, for van Creveld, who is often lumped in with the 4GW school due to Transformation of War [1991] but was not a member of it; rather he came to some similar conclusions as he had some of the same assumptions – ie, weakening of the state – but also derived more specific conclusions stemming from his analysis of historical and current (1991) trends (ie, war as crime, crime as war). In the end, I have to agree with Lawrie Freedman, who noted that the problems with the 4GW concept ‘is not in itself reason for neglecting its prescriptive aspects.’ (The Transformation of Strategic Affairs, Adelphi Paper 379, Oxford University Press, 2006 p. 21).

So while I think that the concept has its problems, I also think that the people who argued the concept (and still are) deserve more than a few kudos. I am with Ski that reading their current analyses is worthwhile even if you do not agree with it, for it often does make one think. Which is the reason why I enjoy reading these boards – you all make me think, and therefore learn (and yes, each and every one are unquestionably guilty of this 'crime' :p ).

Cheers

TT

[TT]

William F. Owen asked: As concerns how the USMC came to adopt MW, I would love to know. Any sources of information you could suggest (other than the Boyd Biographies) would be gratefully accepted.

The simple answer with respect to how the Corps came to adopt MW is ‘Vietnam’. Sort of.

It is possible to identify three strands of ‘sources’ (I am using ‘sources’ here fairly loosely and being 'academic'), all of which can be directly or indirectly linked to Vietnam.

First, the first public discussion of MW emerged as a consequence of the ‘heavy upping’ debate within the Corps in the middle to late 1970s. The short explanation of this debate is that Marines were debating how they should go about preparing to fight the Soviets or Soviet military clones, probably outnumbered. This a post-Vietman re-orientation. This debate and the emergence of MW is detailed in ‘“Innovate or Die”: Organizational Paranoia and the Origins of the Doctrine of Manoeuvre Warfare in the US Marine Corps’, Journal of Strategic Studies, Vol. 29, No. 3 (June 2006) pp. 475-503 (sorry, no link, but if you want a copy, PM or email me).

Second, was the Defence Reform movement, which first started to emerge in the mid-1970s and really started to gain political traction in Reagan’s first term. This encompassed a rather broad spectrum of people, but notably included Sen. Gary Hart, Boyd, and Lind. The Defence Reform Movement (though not Boyd in and of himself and his evolving thinking) stems indirectly from Vietnam.

Third, and finally, any number of Marine officers emerged from Vietnam with a view that there had to a better way to fight (ie than methodical warfare). There is no way of knowing how many such officers there were, but those that were so interested were probably very diffused across the Corps. Among the more prominent of such officers were Col. Michael Wyly and Gen. Al Gray (there were others who also fit, more or less, such as Lt. Gen. Paul van Riper who were not vocal – ie writing in the Gazette – proponents of MW).

To keep a long story reasonably short, two of these three ‘strands’ come together, serendipitously, in 1979 and 1980, while the third becomes really apparent in and around 1982/83. To explain, the first mention of ‘MW’ comes out in a two part article (Oct and Dec, 1979) in the Gazette. The article(s) acknowledge a range of actors, from Genghis Khan to Hannibal, among others, but also Boyd. One can semi trace the emergence of the thinking of the author of these pieces (a Marine Capt who disappears a year later) and it is extremely reasonable to assume that he at least heard Boyd give one (or more?) of his famous presentations probably sometime in late 1978 or early 1979 (but the historical record is silent on what other contact he may have had).

Pretty much at the same time as these articles were published, Wyly met Lind at an event (conference?), and Lind then subsequently introduced Wyly to Boyd (who taught at least one seminar of Wyly’s at the C&SC, thereby influencing a group of young officers - among whom were then Capt, now Col., GI Wilson, one of the original authors of 4GW in 1989). A number of these young officers started to meet with Lind to discuss MW (Col. Wilson was one of these). Lind published an article on what was MW in the Gazette in March 1980, thus starting what was referred to in the Corps as the ‘maneuvrist vs attritionist’ debate (publicly played out in the Gazette, though most of the articles were pro-MW). So that is two strands.

The third strand – at least in my thinking – centers on Gray and ‘practice’. Gray was an autodidact who read military history voraciously, and based on his experience and his reading was moving in the direction of MW. Sometime in the second half of the 1970s he met Boyd (I am aware that Gray listened to Boyd give his growingly long presentation at least three times). By 1982 Gray, commanding 2 Marine Division at Lejeune, had made MW the warfighting doctrine for the Division, invited Boyd down many times to give talks (and Lind to do so as well) and formed the MW Board (which generated a reading list of relevant articles and was crossed fertilized by some of the young Marine officers converted by Boyd, Wyly and, yes, Lind). Mostly importantly, he instigated free form, free intelligence, training exercises that converted a great many of his officers to the merits of MW (one example is Lt. Gen. Ray ‘E-Tool’ Smith, who served under Gray and subsequently applied the MW philosophy when he commanded the Marines in Grenada in 1983). Worth noting re the training exercises was that at the end of day there was a discussion of what had happened during the days exercise, with all and sundry able to ask questions, with the emphasis being on what were you thinking and why (Lind was often a participant). In sum, there was a developing practice within the ‘East Coast’ Marines of learning and applying MW. As a consequence of Gray’s efforts, there was at least some diffusion of MW through the Marine Corps by way of the officers who had served under Gray.

But all that said and done, the ‘reason’ why the Marine Corps eventually did adopt MW as its overarching warfighting philosophy was that Gray was unexpectedly (and I mean extremely unexpectedly) named as Commandant in 1987 by then SecNavy James Webb (yes, that James Webb). Webb had asked around about which Marine general who was a ‘warfighting’ general and Gray was named to him. Webb probably fits with those Marines who left Vietnam believing there had to be a better way to fight, for his fiction novel, Fields of Fire, among other things encompasses a critique of the way the Marines fought in that conflict (this book is still on the Commandant’s reading list, but not, I think, because of the critique). The rest, as they say, is history.

This is a very, very rough and ready overview of the ‘sources’ - it is a bit more complicated than I have outlined above. :)


s
elil posted: If I remember right the maneuver warfare doctrine for the Marine Corps! was changing as the MEU concept was unfolding.


Well remembered! You are thinking of the MEU (SOC). Under Gray the Marine Amphibious Unit (MAU) was renamed the Marine Expeditionary Unit (which is what it had been pre-Vietnam) and the Marine Corps, in order to forestall Marines being transferred to Special Operations Command, started giving MEU units Special Operations training (so SOC = Special Operations Capable). Of course, today, Marines have been transferred to Sp Ops Command……


William F. Owen posted: If enough USMC officers had read Du-Picq, Foch, Clausewitz, and even the awful Liddell-Hart, I don't think they'd even picked up the Manoeuvre Warfare handbook.


The Marine Corps Association bookstore in Quantico always has copies and seem to sell a fair few of the same. Whether young Marine officers truly understand the MW philosophy is another matter.


Steve Blair posted: One thing I did like to see out of the USMC along with the maneuver warfare doctrine was a renewed interest in studying war in all its aspects in general. You started seeing the Commandant's reading list about that time, if memory serves, and the MCDP 1 series, which was more how to think about war than actual prescriptive doctrine.

Your memory serves very, very well!. :eek: (There is obviously hope for me yet, apparently). Although there are one or two public mentions of a Marine Corps reading list in the mid 1980s (sorry, can’t remember exactly when but I remember one suggestion authored by some obscure Marine officer named TX Hammes :confused:), the Commandant’s Reading List was initiated officially under Gray in 1990 in support of the promulgation of Fleet Marine Force Manual 1 (FMFM-1), Warfighting (as it was then known – now MCDP -1, which was rewritten in 1996-7). The Commandant’s reading list was part of a push to get Marine officers, at least, to read more military history (and also to undertand the 'why' of adopting MW), and as part of this through 1990-91 they revamped the curriculum at the C&SC (and indeed, created the MC University) with the emphasis being on infusing military history throughout the courses taught (see, for example, Paul K. van Riper, The relevance of history to the military profession: an American Marine’s view’, in Williamson Murray and Richard Hard Sinnreich, eds., The Past as Prologue, Cambridge University Press, 2006).


selil posted: It was pointed out to me recently that the Marines! though more than willing to move fast and light have taken armor to tiny Pacific islands, Vietnam, and in general like high speed maneuver warfare as much as any cavalry/armor army guy. I just think that they like big guns that go BOOM. Well to be more succinct I always appreciated big guns that made "other things" go BOOM.

I am tempted to say something here in response but one thing I have definitely learned is that the Marine Corps does do more than beaches……. ;)

Cheers

TT

[William F. Owen]

Third, and finally, any number of Marine officers emerged from Vietnam with a view that there had to a better way to fight (ie than methodical warfare). There is no way of knowing how many such officers there were, but those that were so interested were probably very diffused across the Corps. Among the more prominent of such officers were Col. Michael Wyly and Gen. Al Gray (there were others who also fit, more or less, such as Lt. Gen. Paul van Riper who were not vocal – ie writing in the Gazette – proponents of MW).


Having met, corresponded, and broken bread with Van Riper, I have the utmost respect for the man. He is truly impressive.

... and like Riper, the USMC created the likes of Evans Carlson, Sam Griffiths and a bunch of other gifted officers, with a clear understanding of effective methods of fighting. Raiding is the acme of MW is it not? Translations of Mao, and Sun-Tzu?

Obviously there was a need to do things better and do better things, so why didn't the project start with the aim of researching this?

Why were concepts, some flawed, grouped together as MW, without someone saying "hold on a god**m second!", and re-write its doctrine emphasising what the historical and operational record told them, as being useful?

[William F. Owen]

.

1. Back in 1989, at the very heart of the 4GW concept what their argument that the state would face a growing crisis of legitimacy, which would increasingly weaken its authority over social organization and its monopoly on the use of force.

2. Proponents of this theory identified (with hindsight, reasonably accurately) the blurring nature of future conflict, especially the blurring of war and peace, the blurring between combatants and non-combatants, and the blurring of what constitutes the battlefield (the collapse, or compaction, of the strategic/operational/tactical levels of war), with conflict being non-linear and unbounded (by this I mean that such entities will use techniques and approaches – such as terrorism – not used by formal military organizations and that there are no front and rear – our societies and our beliefs are immediately pertinent targets)

Very useful summation TT. Many thanks.

1. Legitimacy. Exactly. Mao wrote about it. The Legitimate use of force is the essential under-pinning of all else. I don't think the state has a crisis in using force, IF it is used legitimately - which is the challenge. Why don't 4GW people just emphasise this without constructing all the 4GW stuff?

2. Why future conflict? Based on that description we had 4GW back in the Hussite Rebellion, the various and very annoying Welsh, Irish and Scottish rebellions and the actions of the secessionist living in His Majesties Colonies in the Americas. :D . Look at how the French kicked the British out of medieval France. The Indian Mutiny?

...so being that this is all fairly fundamental stuff, how can it get called 4GW, and who benefits from doing so?

[Ski]

You are missing the point on legitimacy, I think. It's about the legitimacy of the state to exist as a state - the failure to provide services, to provide security, the intrusion of the state into people's lives via high taxes, etc...it has nothing to do about using force, or the application of the military. It has everything to do with the state losing power and legitimacy in the eyes of its own people.

4GW is a return to pre-Treaty of Westphalia warfare in many aspects - due to the fracturing of the nation-state, the rise of non-state/sub-state actors, but with the added aspects of cheap global communications systems (the Internet/cell phones) and the dominance of the 24/7 media cycle where there is no filter for what is defined as "news".

I look at the state as being slowly stretched apart from two directions - economic globalization is degrading the state from above, and the rise of non/sub-state actors are degrading it from below. The larger, more resiliant states will survive and can possibly thrive. The smaller, weaker states often break due to these stresses - Somalia, Afghanistan, Haiti - and we've seen how difficult it is to rebuild states with the Iraqi adventure.

Very useful summation TT. Many thanks.

1. Legitimacy. Exactly. Mao wrote about it. The Legitimate use of force is the essential under-pinning of all else. I don't think the state has a crisis in using force, IF it is used legitimately - which is the challenge. Why don't 4GW people just emphasise this without constructing all the 4GW stuff?

2. Why future conflict? Based on that description we had 4GW back in the Hussite Rebellion, the various and very annoying Welsh, Irish and Scottish rebellions and the actions of the secessionist living in His Majesties Colonies in the Americas. :D . Look at how the French kicked the British out of medieval France. The Indian Mutiny?

...so being that this is all fairly fundamental stuff, how can it get called 4GW, and who benefits from doing so?

[tequila]

Of possible relevance to the whole "fracturing of the state" thing idea - Bolivia (http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5jllDWRVY-Eicrqo4aCEQgi4p45dA).


Four of Bolivia's richest departments Monday said they will put their autonomy hopes to referendum votes, as President Evo Morales called for talks with the country's nine governors in a bid to defuse rising tensions.

The energy-rich eastern departments of Santa Cruz, Tarija, Beni and Pando announced signature drives to get the legal quorum of 8.0 percent of their local populations behind referendums to approve their quest for greater autonomy, officially declared by state officials on Saturday.

The governors of Cochabamba and Chuquisaca have also announced similar aspirations, as Bolivia's three remaining western departments -- La Paz, Oruro and Potosi -- stand firmly behind Morales in the biggest challenge yet to his socialist reform movement.

Morales, the country's first indigenous president, has alienated the country's rich lowland regions, who populations are largely ethnically European and mixed, by pushing his plan to redistribute the country's wealth to the poor natives in the mountains ...

[William F. Owen]

You are missing the point on legitimacy, I think. It's about the legitimacy of the state to exist as a state -

"At the heart of this phenomenon, Fourth Generation war, is not a military but a political, social and moral revolution: a crisis of legitimacy of the state. All over the world, citizens of states are transferring their primary allegiance away from the state to other things: to tribes, ethnic groups, religions, gangs, ideologies and so on. Many people who will no longer fight for their state will fight for their new primary loyalty." FMFM-1A

By G*d Sir! You are right. I did a txt search on the legitimacy on the use of force, and nada. - obviously Mao missed the point, just like I did.

Many thanks

[TT]

William F. Owen posted: Raiding is the acme of MW is it not? Translations of Mao, and Sun-Tzu?

Sometimes, when raiding is appropriate to the situation and the desired ends, and sometimes not. :)


William F. Owen posted: Obviously there was a need to do things better and do better things, so why didn't the project start with the aim of researching this?

Project?? Sorry if I mislead you with my simplified explanation, but the introduction of MW into the Corps was not a ‘project’. I think I am not too far wrong when I suggest that rather than it being a project, that it was more of a ‘fight’ than anything else. MW was very controversial, and strongly resisted in many parts of the Corps, for a variety of reasons (if you are interested in some of the reasons I can do a ‘cut and paste’ - heck if Steve Metz can do that, smart person that he is, then so can I :wry:).

So let me elaborate a bit more on the ‘it was more complicated than this’ part of my previous failed attempt to explain.

The so-called ‘maneuvrist vs attirionist’ debate, which I mentioned above, rolled in public along from 1980/81 to late 1984, at least in the pages of the Gazette (it does not vanish, only fades a fair bit) but I expect it continued in the places where most of that debate occurred – the officers mess, officers club, bars, street corners, training exercises, and so on. Moreover, the hierarchy of the Corps, particularly from 1983 (Commandant Kelly) was broadly resistant to adopting MW. Pressured by the Defence Reform Caucus in Congress, the Corps allowed that MW was amongst its repertoire of warfighting approaches, but there is real sense that this ‘admission’ was grudgingly given at best. I do not think that had one of the Marine Generals that were seen as one of the likely ‘next possible Commandant’ that the Corps would not have eventually moved to adopt MW (if only because the Army had adopted its version earlier) but certainly it was the surprise appointment of Gray (who was not seen by anyone as one of the ‘next possible commmandant’) that meant that it happened when it did.

(Worth mentioning as an aside is that while there certainly were interconnections and cross fertilization between various communities with in the Corps that were advocating MW, these communities can not be seen as being unified. Rather they were disparate communities that over time might be said to have become a ‘movement’ in support of MW.)

With Gray’s appointment, the old debate over MW vs methodical battle (ie 'attrition' was the derogatory term for this) erupted in to the public sphere again. Gray, in part as he was preoccupied with other issues (some stemming from the Corps having suffered due to Lebanon and the Moscow Marine security guards) but also in part because he did not think that the Corps needed an official MW document/doctrine, only in early 1989 started to move to generating what was to become MCDP-1, Warfighting. I believe I am on reasonably firm ground when I suggest that a reason, though certainly not the only one, for this decision to move to promulgate MW officially as the Marines warfighting doctrine, was concern by his staff at the degree of institutional push back on MW.

Indeed, such was the push back that it took at least until 1993 before it was possible to say, as a Marine officer did in the pages of the Gazette that year, that the Corps had finally accepted MW (Commandant Mundy continued to drive the institutionalization of MW). So, no, not a project - more of a fight.


William F. Owen posted: Why were concepts, some flawed, grouped together as MW, without someone saying "hold on a god**m second!", and re-write its doctrine emphasising what the historical and operational record told them, as being useful?

I confess that I am not entirely sure what you are getting at here. Certainly Gray, van Riper (who supported MW), Wyly and other Marines based their thinking on their reading of military history and their operational experiences. All three of these named officers were very well read – and that probably grossly understates how well read they were – in military history, and this along with their own experiences was the basis of their developing perspectives on ‘a better way to fight’. Gray in his thinking and indeed practice (of his commands) was well on his way towards MW by 1976 (or thereabouts), and all three had adapted in Vietnam in ways that also pointed them towards MW. It is Boyd, obviously, who crystallizes MW into a more systematic body of thought, and he certainly influenced these gentlemen, and others, but not because what he was saying was stunningly new to them, rather because Boyd’s conceptions pulled together what they had been thinking and learning from their reading of history and their own operational experience. And Boyd, if this needs to be said, read and based his thinking on mil history, and then read even more widely to flesh this out.

If you are referring to Lind’s Maneuver Warfare book, this is based largely as far I can tell on Lind’s focus on the German military. Lind is an aficionado of the German military (of yore) even to this day, but to be fair the Wehrmacht did seek to systemize MW (or what the Allies termed Blitzkrieg) and applied terms to aspects of it. So in explaining MW there is a tendency, probably understandable, to use the German terms even though any number of them do not really translate to English, simply because there is no analogous English-language term or concept. But, and I think this is a big ‘but,’ MCDP-1, Warfighting and Lind’s book are not the same.

MCDP-1 was written by Capt John Schmitt, under the immediate direction of Gray (apparently many half day and full day one-on-one sessions, with the Cols, etc, sitting in the background), with Gray indicating to Schmitt what he thought, usually expressing concepts and ideas by way of personal operational examples (or those of other Marines) and references to military history. Schmitt further read and included Clausewitz and Sun Tzu (and others) and consulted with a select number of other Marines in writing MCDP-1, including van Riper (Schmitt, in passing, rewrote Warfighting it in 96/97, under the direction of Gen. Krulak, and Lt. Gen. van Riper, in 96-97). Interestingly, while Schmitt sent Boyd copies for comment, Boyd was preoccupied and did not get any comments back to Schmitt. MCDP-1 was meant to be a description of a way to think about war and warfare, not a prescription about how to fight (where Lind’s book is more the latter).

So while many Marines (and Army and other national) officers almost certainly do speak in terms of ‘you do push-pull recon’, etc, and so on (I have talked with officers who talk in this way about MW), that was not what was intended. Sometimes push-pull recon works and is required, other times it is not. To repeat, MW, as laid out in MCDP-1, was meant to be a philosophy or mindset for thinking about war and how best to fight. The Marine’s breaching the Iraqi fortified border defences in GW1 is an example of the MW ‘mindset’ being applied during Gray’s commandancy (see Gen. J. Michael Myatt, ‘Comments on maneuver’, Marine Corps Gazette, Vol. 82, Iss. 10, Oct. 1998, p. 40ff; and and Lt. Col. G.I. Wilson, ‘The Gulf War, Maneuver Warfare, and the Operational Art’, Marine Corps Gazette, Vol.75, Iss. 6 June 1991, p. 23ff.).

That is the best answer I can give at the moment, for in the end I really do not understand your question: ‘Why were concepts, some flawed, grouped together as MW, without someone saying "hold on a god**m second!", and re-write its doctrine emphasising what the historical and operational record told them, as being useful?’. Certainly over time there is tendency (and a very real one at that) to take ‘concepts’ articulated under the umbrella MW and think that these should always be applied – that is, to see them as ‘prescriptive’.. But that is not how Gray and others intended MW to be understood.

To conclude my overly long disquisition….


William F. Owen posted:... and like Riper, the USMC created the likes of Evans Carlson, Sam Griffiths and a bunch of other gifted officers, with a clear understanding of effective methods of fighting.

Yes, but…… Absolutely critical is getting these ‘effective methods of fighting’ institutionalized. You will find lots of lots of reasons profered on many different threads on this board for why institutionalizing such is usually very, very difficult (see above for one example :)), and why such attempts to do so often fail outright.


Cheers

TT

[TT]

Ski posted: You are missing the point on legitimacy, I think. It's about the legitimacy of the state to exist as a state - the failure to provide services, to provide security, the intrusion of the state into people's lives via high taxes, etc...it has nothing to do about using force, or the application of the military. It has everything to do with the state losing power and legitimacy in the eyes of its own people.


Like Ski said! My explanation, in trying to be succinct, was obviously not clear. Thanks, Ski, for clarifying!


Ski posted: 4GW is a return to pre-Treaty of Westphalia warfare in many aspects - due to the fracturing of the nation-state, the rise of non-state/sub-state actors, but with the added aspects of cheap global communications systems (the Internet/cell phones) and the dominance of the 24/7 media cycle where there is no filter for what is defined as "news".

I look at the state as being slowly stretched apart from two directions - economic globalization is degrading the state from above, and the rise of non/sub-state actors are degrading it from below.

Well explained! If anyone is interested, James Rosenau's Turbulence in World Politics, Princeton Uni Press, 1991, argues this in great detail. It is a thick, hard to read book, but he develops the argument that Ski succinctly makes in horrifying empirical detail (rather a ponderous read). Rosenau's argument was that what we were starting to see emerge was what he called the 'bifurcation' of world politics, an international system comprised of the sovereign bound (states) and the non-sovereign bound (both sub state and supra or trans state actors), and that stemming from the transfer of individuals loyality away (either 'upwards' to supra state actors or 'downwards' to substate actor from a 'state' that increasingly cannot meet adequately all the competing demands of its multitudinous citizens, and these substate and suprastate actors will compete and cooperate amongst themselve as well as with states. (and I have no doubt butchered this explanation as well :( ). Rosenau also identifies a range of drivers for this trend, ones that are consistent with SKi's explanation.

Rosenau's book is, of course, dated now but his basic argument still more or less holds.

As a passing aside observation, Rosenau (yes, a political scientist, nothing to do with 4GW) was largely ignored for a number of years by the academic community but somewhere around 1993/94 or thereabouts, you suddenly could not find an academic conference that did not have one or more roundtables dedicated to discussing his argument and its implications.

TT

[William F. Owen]

TT, whoever you are.

A heartfelt thanks for your explanation. I feel no better towards MW but at least I now understand the why and the how, and I really appreciate your efforts. Again, many thanks.

[TT]

William F. Owen posted: Why future conflict? Based on that description we had 4GW back in the Hussite Rebellion, the various and very annoying Welsh, Irish and Scottish rebellions and the actions of the secessionist living in His Majesties Colonies in the Americas. . Look at how the French kicked the British out of medieval France. The Indian Mutiny?


As Granite State rightly noted,


‘A point a lot of people forget is that it's "Four Generations of Modern War."


As I noted above, what they (the original developers of 4GW) said would be ‘new’ would be ‘who fights’ and ‘what they fight for’ – not necessarily how they fight. And they did not focus on insurgencies or guerrilla warfare (or what ever term you wish you use) – Hammes does this in The Sling and the Stone, which ‘popularized’ 4GW. They did not, and never have, argued that their ‘generational’ framework works across all of history.

As to why ‘future conflict’, they were making the point that war ‘always evolves and changes’. They very specifically were intent on poking the US military, which by 1989 had pretty much adopted ManWar (with Gray as commandant of the Corps, that the Corps would was taken as written – which was not entirely correct), suggesting that it should not be complacent, should not rest on its laurels. Their concern was one that is frequently noted here on the boards, which is that US military historically has tended to focus on being able to fight that last war better or to focus one form of warfare, and so are often unprepared for the next war they find themselves engaged in.

As for why specifically ‘future’ war, they contended that the shift from one generation to the next is evolutionary, a process that takes decades (upwards of 50-70 years) to occur. Such a shift does happen suddenly, all at once, rather it emerges slowly, by fits and starts, going backwards and forwards, over a long period of time before there is something clearly different (from decades before) - and also that there will characteristics that carry on from one generation to the next. The later arguments in the 1990s about how past RMA’s occur is broadly consistent with what they were arguing in terms of time frames and why such shifts occur - ie tech, social, economic, political, etc reasons, not just because of a change in one factor (as was the case re tech in the RMA debate of the 1990s). As I noted earlier, the original core writers on 4GW perceive elements of what are witnessing today as part of this evolution to 4GW, not that it means that 4GW has ‘arrived’ and is the only form of war out there.



William F. Owen posted:...so being that this is all fairly fundamental stuff, how can it get called 4GW,


They used the generational framework solely to simplify. They simplified due to space restrictions - their 1989 and 1994 articles are only around 2,500 to 3,000 words in length -- and in order to achieve clarity in reaching out to the US military. In short, they thought that the generational framework would make it easier for the US military to understand their argument that warfare ‘will’ change in time (the first three gens match reasonably well the evolution the US militaries – among other militaries - changing approaches to warfare in the ‘modern’ era.) And having identified three gens, the next evolutionary stage becomes by default the fourth one. 4GW is very inelegant and misleading as a term (a view which I suspect at least some of the originators would agree with these days), just like ‘maneuver warfare’ is a very inelegant and misleading term for an approach to warfighting (makes people think MW is about movement/maneuver – which of course it is not; movement is only one of a host of techniques). But like it or not, that is the term that we are stuck with (which is why Hammes, if I remember correctly used it in his book – not because he liked the term or thought it a particularly good term).



William F. Owen posted: and who benefits from doing so?


This is a very post-positivist, social constructivist question :eek:. Their answer would be the US, for they were making an effort to convince the American military to pay attention to how warfare was evolving so that it would not be caught out down the road by changes (so to speak), lest being caught out (ie defeated) harm the security and interests of the US.

I should probably mention that I am usually referring to the main core of those who have been arguing about 4GW. Post 9/11, 4GW emerged from the margins where it had resided through the 1990s and a lot of other people jumped onto its particular bandwagon. And as is always the case, there has occurred all sorts of drift in how and to what ends various people try to use the concept (and this usually happens to any concept). So while the core writers see aspects of 4GW emerging, others argue that 4GW is here, now (perhaps a subtle difference, nevertheless……).

Cheers

TT

[TT]

William F. Owen: A heartfelt thanks for your explanation. I feel no better towards MW but at least I now understand the why and the how, and I really appreciate your efforts. Again, many thanks.

My pleasure. And no worries about your view of MW - I have not been trying to convince you of its merits (or demerits).


William F. Owen: whoever you are.

Now that is a difficult question to answer!

The short answer is a hippy academic. :wry: A somewhat longer answer can be found on the boards 'Tell us who you are' thread, on this page:
http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?t=1441&page=9

Though I doubt what you will find is anymore enlightening :D

[Ski]

A few other points about Lind's involvement in the Marine Corps development of maneuver warfare in the 1980's. I've written a Master's degree paper about the Military Reform movement and one cannot forget Lind's influence as a key defense staffer for Hart and Taft (although that was in the 1970's).

Lind was able to convince a number of key politicians that Grey was the right choice to be the next commandant. This may have been important, it may have been destined to occur without any influence from Hill anyway. The Defense Reform Caucus was quite large in number although there was a small core of about a dozen politicians who were really active in pushing military reform at any chance.

Lind also had some influence to maneuver warfare because he was an unofficial advisor to Grey, and Lind also helped push the MCDP manuals (this is all according to an interview I had with Bill Lind - have not been able to verify from another source, so I have to take this point as a maybe) to be written and disseminated.


As TT stated, the problem with getting any doctrine introduced into the US military is how to get it institutionalized. It's usually tied back to resourcing - all American military services care about two things - force structure and resources (the two are tied together). Doctrine helps drive force structure, which in turn drives resourcing.

From what I have seen from the Marine Officers, Lind is either seen as a mad genius or he is just plain mad. Lind also disagrees with some of Hammes conclusions about 4GW, including the influence of Mao...

The one aspect of Lind that I find fascinating is his ability to influence military thought and doctrine over a 30 year period as being either a civilian (and not a military civilian, like a Department of the Army civilian) or a defense staffer. When I was researching the Master's paper I mentioned earlier, he literally launched a blitzkrieg of articles and letters to every major military magazine - the Marine Corps Gazette, Military Review, Parameters, Air University Review, Proceedings - it was absurd how much the guys wrote in the 70's and 80's - and it was a credit to all the services that they allowed him to voice his opinion in their service manuals. There was a lot of looking inward because of Vietnam, and Lind, for better or worse, was one of the main contributors in helping develop post-Vietnam doctrine for the Marine Corps, and to a lesser extent the Army. The Air Force and Navy ignored him (the Navy because he helped get a number of ships scuttled due to his influence on Capitol Hill).

[William F. Owen]

I have to say I find this immensely depressing. MW, EBO and 4GW are all the product of the same two men, with a few acolytes, and supporters.

I see very little merit in any of these ideas, and much that is both confusing, nonsensical and even harmful.

So here is something I don't understand. If MW was developed as a product of the Vietnam War, and the Vietnam War contained a very high degree of insurgency, how come MW is utterly silent on COIN?

[Steve Blair]

So here is something I don't understand. If MW was developed as a product of the Vietnam War, and the Vietnam War contained a very high degree of insurgency, how come MW is utterly silent on COIN?

The Marine version of MW was 'utterly silent' on COIN because the Marines felt they already had a working model in place (starting with the Small Wars manual and working up through the CAP-style efforts in Vietnam).

I think another thing that seems to be missing from the discussion is that Gray, Van Ripper, and others in the MC were interested in MW partly because it made people think about how they conducted war and examine their original positions. My take on it has always been that they saw MW as a piece of the puzzle, not the single solution that some seem to want to make it. TT's summation of how the Corps came to adapt MW is good, and it does have its roots in Vietnam. In part I think it spoke to those things they wanted to do there but could not do for a number of reasons (lack of air mobility until 1969 being part of it).

[TT]

Quote:

Originally Posted by William F. Owen
So here is something I don't understand. If MW was developed as a product of the Vietnam War, and the Vietnam War contained a very high degree of insurgency, how come MW is utterly silent on COIN?

Steve Blair Posted : The Marine version of MW was 'utterly silent' on COIN because the Marines felt they already had a working model in place (starting with the Small Wars manual and working up through the CAP-style efforts in Vietnam).

Steve's observation is, I think, pretty much correct. To add to it, MW initially emerged into public discussion as the USMC was facing from the mid-1970s onward (ie post-Vietnam) the prospect that they might have to fight Soviet or Soviet clone military forces, comparatively outnumbered and out armoured, and probably seriously so. MW provided an approach that held out hope that, should such a battle occur, the USMC would hold its own or be able to win (how this might occur is laid out in the two papers I mentioned above, in Oct and Dec 1979 Gazette, and it these two articles that first introduce publicly MW – though the author does not use this specific term).

Toward the end of the 1980s there was a growing view in the US military (not necessarily a prevailing view, mind) that, based on Lebanon and many other small conflicts in the 1990s, that the US military likely would very possibly be faced with being engaged in small wars in the 1990s (this was all derailed by GW1). The Corps reissued their Small Wars Manual in 1990 (I think this date is correc but I would have to check my notes), as part of a general reissue of a number of older manuals, and one can also see an increased interest in small wars/counterinsurgency, especially if one accepts that an increase in the number of articles published on COIN in the Gazette, starting in late 1988 (ie pre the first 4GW article) reflects such interest. The sense one gets is that because of the Corps ‘small wars’ history, coupled with the success of their approaches in Vietnam (ie CAPs, among other approaches), which they thought was the right approach and blamed Westmoreland for pushing them away from, that they thought they could manage small wars very well.

But perhaps somewhat at odds to what Steve suggests, my reading is that 'part' of the reason why MCDP-1 is silent specifically on small wars/COIN is that many Marines at the time believed that the philosophy/mindset of MW was as applicable to COIN as to force-on-force conflict. Certainly these days I have met Marines who believe that the MW ‘mindset’ (not the dogmatic aspects) is applicable to COIN and even to ‘4GW type’ conflicts. I cannot fault their reasoning on this (but then I am a civilian, so what do I know). It seems to me where a central problem with MW is that it has become prescriptive, dogmatic and doctrinaire for many officers, rather than simply being what they intended to be – a way of 'thinking about war'.

This perspective is consistent with Steve’s point, which I wholeheartedly agree with:


Steve Blair posted: I think another thing that seems to be missing from the discussion is that Gray, Van Ripper, and others in the MC were interested in MW partly because it made people think about how they conducted war and examine their original positions.

This astute point of Steve’s is at the core of the ‘fight’ I outlined earlier.


Steve Blair posted: In part I think it spoke to those things they wanted to do there but could not do for a number of reasons (lack of air mobility until 1969 being part of it).

Again, Steve is right (you are on roll, Steve :). Again, to add to this, for many of the MW advocates who had fought in Vietnam as Lts and Capt, MW also fit what they experienced and learned at the tactical level. Today these might seem simple things, but their experience was that they way they had been taught to fight and trained to fight did not work very well in Vietnam. As a couple of simple tactical level examples, many learned that rather than bombarding a target for a long a period of time to kill as many of the enemy as possible, they learned it was better to use indirect fire to suppress the enemy before an immediately ground attack, or rather than forced marched with flanking patrols, the later which reduced their speed and allowed word to get back to their objective before they arrived, it was better, albeit potentially more risky, to not to use flanking patrols so that they catch the enemy at the objective by surprise. These changes reflect a more maneuverist approach, as opposed to the methodical battle approach the Marine Corps trained and educated for.

And MW also connected the tactical level to the operational level, as many Marines in Vietnam could not see the connection between what they were being asked to do, and were doing, on the ground, and what the US was seeking to achieve in the conflict.

[Steve Blair]

But perhaps somewhat at odds to what Steve suggests, my reading is that 'part' of the reason why MCDP-1 is silent specifically on small wars/COIN is that many Marines at the time believed that the philosophy/mindset of MW was as applicable to COIN as to force-on-force conflict. Certainly these days I have met Marines who believe that the MW ‘mindset’ (not the dogmatic aspects) is applicable to COIN and even to ‘4GW type’ conflicts. I cannot fault their reasoning on this (but then I am a civilian, so what do I know). It seems to me where a central problem with MW is that it has become prescriptive, dogmatic and doctrinaire for many officers, rather than simply being what they intended to be – a way of 'thinking about war'.

Agreed. I believe Gray (and others) specifically cautioned against MW becoming "just another doctrine" (that's not a direct quote from Gray...more a paraphrase of what I feel was his original intent with MCDP-1). One of the key points behind Gray's push for MW as a system of thinking (flexibility, use of commander's intent, delegation of as much as possible to subordinates) was that it could be adapted for almost any conflict situation. If you look at the developing Commandant's Reading Lists from that period (and continuing through to today) you see a fair number of books that stretch beyond the conventional conflict framework.

Looking at Vietnam, the Marines always resented being chained to the DMZ in a fixed defense mode. It didn't square with their doctrine at the time, and the impact of the 1st Air Cav's Operation Pegasus on their understanding of air mobility is also important to understand. The Marines saw that, and begin adjusting their use of air assets to allow a much wider application of air mobility within the I Corps CTZ. I think a fair amount of that "stuck" with future MC leaders and made them more receptive to the idea of MW. But, in typical fashion, they adjusted it to fit their needs.

[Granite_State]

TT,

Thanks for all of this, it's interesting stuff. A couple questions when you get a second:


I do not think that had one of the Marine Generals that were seen as one of the likely ‘next possible Commandant’ that the Corps would not have eventually moved to adopt MW (if only because the Army had adopted its version earlier)

They did? Is this AirLand Battle doctrine, or something else? I thought Maneuver Warfare was such a big deal partly because the Marines were well ahead of the curve here, Lind certainly bangs on about that, calling the U.S. Army a "second generation force" all the time.


(Worth mentioning as an aside is that while there certainly were interconnections and cross fertilization between various communities with in the Corps that were advocating MW, these communities can not be seen as being unified. Rather they were disparate communities that over time might be said to have become a ‘movement’ in support of MW.)
....
Indeed, such was the push back that it took at least until 1993 before it was possible to say, as a Marine officer did in the pages of the Gazette that year, that the Corps had finally accepted MW (Commandant Mundy continued to drive the institutionalization of MW). So, no, not a project - more of a fight.

Is it just me, or does this not sound a bit like how the German Army adopted stormtroop tactics in 1917-1918? Innovation at lower levels, a battle against resisters in higher command (albeit a much quicker battle for the Germans), someone at the top fortuitously seeing and agreeing with the new ideas (Webb/Gray vs. Ludendorff)?



If you are referring to Lind’s Maneuver Warfare book, this is based largely as far I can tell on Lind’s focus on the German military. Lind is an aficionado of the German military (of yore) even to this day, but to be fair the Wehrmacht did seek to systemize MW (or what the Allies termed Blitzkrieg) and applied terms to aspects of it.


Did they? Can you provide info on this? My own understanding, based on some relatively light reading as an undergrad, was that blitzkrieg warfare was evolutionary, organic, arguably rooted in traditional German operational doctrine, and got its real base during the Reichswehr years. Do you mean being codified by Seeckt in the training and operations manuals of the day?

[TT]

Granite State posted: They did? Is this AirLand Battle doctrine, or something else? I thought Maneuver Warfare was such a big deal partly because the Marines were well ahead of the curve here, Lind certainly bangs on about that, calling the U.S. Army a "second generation force" all the time.


Yes, FM-100-5 (1982) first brought MW into Army doctrine, and is, as you say, essentially AirLand Battle (and if I am wrong on this someone please jump in to correct me). There are real differences between the Army’s and the Marine’s approach to MW – between FM 100-5 and MCDP-1 Warfighting- however. Lind’s view was the Army approach was nowhere near what it should have been (he gave up trying to convert the Army to focus on the Corps), whereas his view was (and is) the Marine’s approach was the right way to go. To oversimplify, greatly, FM 100-5 (1982) is a 'how to manual' and MCDP-1 is a philosophy or 'how to think' manual, which makes the Army from his perspective a 2nd Gen force. This difference is why the Marines are seen by some as being well ahead of the curve. As Gray observed in a meeting in early 1989 (as reported in the minutes of the meeting), to quote, ‘‘We can’t let the Army be perceived as the front runners in tactical thinking with their FM 100-5. They have a book and can’t do it, we can do it but don’t have a book’. I would add that the first sentence reflects to a degree the USMC cultural trait (as I deem it) of ‘organizational paranoia’.



Granite State posted: s it just me, or does this not sound a bit like how the German Army adopted stormtroop tactics in 1917-1918? Innovation at lower levels, a battle against resisters in higher command (albeit a much quicker battle for the Germans), someone at the top fortuitously seeing and agreeing with the new ideas (Webb/Gray vs. Ludendorff)?


Yes, ‘a bit like’ is about right. There is a degree of innovation at lower levels, for Gray was using MW when he was commanding at Lejeune (though he was a GO). But for the most part, what happens is officers from Capts through to Cols are advocating that the Marine Corps adopt MW as a better way to fight than through ‘methodical battle’. They are not really innovating per se, for Boyd provided them with MW (and Lind did as well – Lind was, as Ski noted above, a very central actor in all of this), as did their reading of military history, so they are rather, me being an academic, 'agents of change or innovation'. Another aspect where your ‘a bit like’ observation holds, I would argue, is that MW is what can be termed a ‘bottom-up’ driven process of innovation (as opposed to a top down process (driven either a senior officer or civilian leadership) and certainly the Germans got to MW through a bottom up approach. The process transforms into a top down process, of course, when Gray is appointed Commandant. But as one officer involved back then that I interviewed observed, ‘we never thought that one of us would be become commandant’.


Granite State posted: Did they? Can you provide info on this? My own understanding, based on some relatively light reading as an undergrad, was that blitzkrieg warfare was evolutionary, organic, arguably rooted in traditional German operational doctrine, and got its real base during the Reichswehr years. Do you mean being codified by Seeckt in the training and operations manuals of the day?

I have to plead guilty here to overstating the case when I used the term ‘systematized’. I used that term mainly because it was the only one that occurred to me at the time. Probably a 'coherent concept of' would be, and have been, better. Certainly the Germans had a terminology for aspects of MW (don’t ask what they are off the top of my head). I have a number of books on the German development of MW in my ‘would like to read pile’, which is somewhat higher than my huge ‘need to read’ pile. I am sure, however, someone here on the boards can provide a more specific answer.

My ignorance admitted, yes, my understanding from what I have read is that your point that the German’s development of MW was evolutionary is correct, starting with their development of infiltration tactics on the Central Front and developing thereafter (as you say in particular during the Reichstag era), whereupon the Allies saw it in full flower in the 1939 and 1940 (the Sedan, in particular) German campaigns. I confess that I am not sure whether they ‘codified’ it, or when, not least as ‘codifying’ MW seems to me to be at odds with MW being a mindset or philosophy (which is what MCDP-1). And yes, my use of ‘systematize’ is equally problematic for the same reason.

As you mention Seeckt, as an possibly interesting aside, I am sitting here trying remember if it was him, or another German general, that Gray brought over to solicit his views on and understanding of MW. I think it was when Gray was in command at Lejuene in the early 1980s but I honestly cannot remember if this is correct right now - it is somewhere in my copious notes (that I am still adding to) and it would take me a while, probably long while to find these (so sorry, but thought you might find the latter day connection to the Germans of passing interest).

[Granite_State]

As you mention Seeckt, as an possibly interesting aside, I am sitting here trying remember if it was him, or another German general, that Gray brought over to solicit his views on and understanding of MW. I think it was when Gray was in command at Lejuene in the early 1980s but I honestly cannot remember if this is correct right now - it is somewhere in my copious notes (that I am still adding to) and it would take me a while, probably long while to find these (so sorry, but thought you might find the latter day connection to the Germans of passing interest).

Thanks for the answers. Wouldn't be Seeckt though, he died not long after Hitler came to power, 1935 or 1936. Maybe Hermann Balck or F.W. von Mellenthin, but those are more or less guesses.

[TT]

Granite State posted: Thanks for the answers. Wouldn't be Seeckt though, he died not long after Hitler came to power, 1935 or 1936. Maybe Hermann Balck or F.W. von Mellenthin, but those are more or less guesses.

Glad to be of help, such as it was. Well, definitely it was not Seeckt :o I think it was not von Mellenthin, so maybe Balck (?). But as I said, I really would have root around in my notes to get the specific details of precisely who and when. It is one of those small details in a much bigger analytical narrative I am working on, so what is left of my memory put the specifics aside knowing I have it on paper somewhere.

[Rifleman]

I'll add this: I like to read Lind's essays; I don't always believe them but I like to read them.

I don't think a lot about whether or not 4GW, MW, or the OODA loop are valid from a military perspective. I like to consider Lind's take on things because of his belief that the nation state is loosing the monopoly on war.

When your enemy is a network, mafia, cartel, tribe, or clan instead of a state sponsored army it has serious law enforcement implications. When is something an act of war and when is something a crime? When is a war really a feud and vice versa?

John Giduck writes in Terror at Beslan that in the coming years military and police forces will move toward each other; in that, the military will seem a little more like the police and the police will seem a little more like the military.

Yeah, I know, this isn't new either: the Roman Army had constabulary forces and some American frontier era police forces, the Texas Rangers come to mind, were a paramilitary police force of sorts. So strictly speaking it may not be new but it is new to the mind of the average 21st Century American.

And that's why I like to read Lind going on and on about the probability of fighting mostly non-nation state enemies in the coming years.

[Ski]

Granite and TT

It was Balck who came over. Boyd and Lind spoke with him at length about a myriad of topics. I've read the actual transcript of a formal interview one of the DC based think tanks did with Balck, for the life of me I can't remember the title or who performed the interview.

Also, when the A-10 was being designed, Sprey and Boyd talked with Hans Ulrich Rudel and received his input on what was needed for the optimal CAS aircraft. Rudel said, "A powerful cannon, an armored cockpit, and some kind of baffling to hide the heat signature of the engines to reduce the SAM threat."

[TT]

Ski posted: It was Balck who came over.

Thanks, Ski, for the clarification!

[William F. Owen]

http://stinet.dtic.mil/oai/oai?verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=ADA301034

I suppose most of you have seen this. It was news to me and I admit to be very strongly pre-disposed to its findings.

if the link goes tech, just Google FMFM-1 Myths

[Jik K]

Whilst accepting the limitations of the medium of internet forums, I am surprised that none of the proponents of the argument against 4GW, MW, etc. have chosen to provide any detailed reasoning as to their objections to these theories of conflict; whilst those who have sought to defend them have provided detailed, reasoned and cogent explanations of both their positions and the context that led to their development.

For example, Mr Owen stated, "..and for what it's worth, I thought MW was better than sex until I started reading and researching its origins in order to understand it better." Which begs the question as to what were the readings that caused him to question his new-found love and the insights that led him to eventually cast her aside with such derision.

Later he states, "So here is something I don't understand. If MW was developed as a product of the Vietnam War, and the Vietnam War contained a very high degree of insurgency, how come MW is utterly silent on COIN?" Whereas Boyd's presentation, Patterns of Conflict, deals with what Boyd terms 'Modern Guerilla Warfare' in some detail - slides 90-109 - with slide 108 in particular setting out very clearly the basic operational principles of a COIN strategy, and does so within the context of a counter-manoeuvre warfare Operational context, (Boyd uses the term counter-blitz). I particularly emphasise Boyd here as Mr Owen explicitly includes Boyd as a progenitor of 4GW, etc.

In February Zenpundit has proposed an online symposium on Frans Osinga's Science, Strategy & War, which is a detailed study of Boyd's principles, i.e. the "On War" that Boyd never wrote. Perhaps the proponents of Clauzewitzian/Trinitarian warfare should get a copy of Col Osinga's book from the library and join the symposium; an informed contradictory opponent can be a useful resource. In any event a more detailed statement of the proposers objections to MW theory would assist in raising the intellectual level of this debate, and increase the opportunity for us all to develop insights into the strengths and weaknesses of our respective positions.

I couldn't find a smiley which adequately reflects my genuine desire to promote an informed debate upon an important subject, without any intention to cause offence to any of the parties involved, so perhaps I'll instead quote Gregory Clark, who said, "Doubtless some of the arguments developed here will prove over-simplified, or merely false. They are certainly controversial, even amongst my colleagues ... But far better such error than the usual dreary academic sins, which now seem to define so much writing in the humanities, of wilful obfuscation and jargon-laden vacuity." Or as Darwin said, "false views, if supported by some evidence, do little harm, for everyone takes a salutary pleasure in proving their falseness: and when this is done, one path towards error is closed and the road to truth is often at the same time opened." (Both quotes taken from the preface to Clark's 'A Farewell To Alms.')

[Ken White]

Whilst accepting the limitations of the medium of internet forums, I am surprised that none of the proponents of the argument against 4GW, MW, etc. have chosen to provide any detailed reasoning as to their objections to these theories of conflict; whilst those who have sought to defend them have provided detailed, reasoned and cogent explanations of both their positions and the context that led to their development.

War is not a theory based phenomenon and that few theorists seem to spend much time carrying spears while few spear carriers have much time for theory might have something to do with it...


In any event a more detailed statement of the proposers objections to MW theory would assist in raising the intellectual level of this debate, and increase the opportunity for us all to develop insights into the strengths and weaknesses of our respective positions.[

Nor is war an intellectual exercise. Regrettable but true. Reality is such a bore.


...But far better such error than the usual dreary academic sins, which now seem to define so much writing in the humanities, of wilful obfuscation and jargon-laden vacuity." ...

Out of context but -- yes.

[Jik K]

Clausewitz was a spearchucker from the age of 14, as was his mentor Scharnhorst, but they spent a great deal of time theorising upon war. So did Moltke the elder, Sun Tzu, Jomini, Napoleon, etc., etc.

To say that war is not an intellectual past-time is complacency verging towards the lower end of ignorance - no insult intended, just an observation. War is first and foremost an intellectual enterprise, the ultimate Darwinian experiment; the stupid die quickly. Didn't a famous spearchucker once say that the moral is to the physical as three is to one, or something like that. Of course, he probably just sat around thinking about war rather than doing any (in fact that's just what he did for two years as a young officer before going on to conquer Europe.)

This is precisely what I'm saying about the level of this debate. "it just is," isn't going to make me change my mind. Give me your reasons, illustrate my oversights, define the fallacies in my orientation that impact upon my decisions and actions. I'm all grown-up and I've chucked a few spears of my own and I don't have a problem with thinking about how to do it better next time.

;)

[Ken White]

Clausewitz was a spearchucker from the age of 14, as was his mentor Scharnhorst, but they spent a great deal of time theorising upon war. So did Moltke the elder, Sun Tzu, Jomini, Napoleon, etc., etc.

As for those whose theories you choose to defend as an intellectual exercise??? ;)


To say that war is not an intellectual past-time is complacency verging towards the lower end of ignorance - no insult intended, just an observation....

None taken. To say that it is an intellectual pastime is foolishness bordering on the edge of delusion. No insult intended.

I did not say that one should not consider ways and means; one obviously should and most of us do. I do contend that esoteric argument and defense of a particular theory (or bunch of theorists) is intellectual hubris and potentially dangerous. There is no perfect war and there is no perfect method. Those that find the Holy Grail are, in my experience quite likely to get tunnel vision and find themselves deprived of flexibility of thought.


War is first and foremost an intellectual enterprise, the ultimate Darwinian experiment; the stupid die quickly...

Stupidity is indeed a killer in war, couldn't agree more with that statement.

We can disagree about it being the ultimate Darwinian experiment -- and about it being the ultimate intellectual exercise. I would agree that it is the ultimate test of the merging of intuition and thought with great speed, not the same thing at all as an intellectual exercise of specious debate on an academic level.


... Didn't a famous spearchucker once say that the moral is to the physical as three is to one, or something like that. Of course, he probably just sat around thinking about war rather than doing any (in fact that's just what he did for two years as a young officer before going on to conquer Europe.)

Yes, he did. Though I'd submit he wasn't a spearchucker but rather an Artillerist -- those folks are always enamored of undue cereberal effort -- and frequently, in my observation, an enhanced view of their capabilities. :D


...This is precisely what I'm saying about the level of this debate. "it just is," isn't going to make me change my mind...

Cannot speak for others but I have absolutely no intention of trying to change your mind; I found out long ago that arguing with true believers is fruitless. You are, after all every bit as entitled to your opinion as I am to mine. I've no intention of debating the 'merits' of 5GW, MW or any other such concepts. I'll study them, adopt what works but am not interested in mantras -- or esoteric debate. I do enjoy throwing darts at balloons, though.


Give me your reasons, illustrate my oversights, define the fallacies in my orientation that impact upon my decisions and actions...

Since I have no idea at all what decisions and actions you've taken, that would be exceedingly difficult. Thus I cannot illustrate your oversights. I can say that in my opinion, the fallacy in your orientation appears to be, in my view (Yes, that's redundant, for emphasis), adherence to a particular theory to the exclusion of other theories and an attempt to denigrate those who do not agree as non-believers and ignorant.


I'm all grown-up and I've chucked a few spears of my own...

Good for you. They hit anything? I've been fortunate enough to use Springfield Armory products -- the original, not the new company of that name and Winchester as well as Colt products without having to rely on older tools. Though I did use my Ka Bar a couple of times. Not a bayonet; silly weapon. :D


...and I don't have a problem with thinking about how to do it better next time.

Nor do I, spend a fair amount of time on that. Avoiding lockstep and being excessively doctrinaire in the process, I hope... :cool:

[Jayhawker]

Here is my take on the worst of 4GW: It reinforces the commonly held belief that history is uniform and linear. First this, then that, now we're here and proceeding on to over there. It's that Hegelian/Marxist hangover causing the consternation. I've just read the first couple of chapters of Hammes' book recently and I keep waiting for him to qualify things more tightly and he has not so far....does he in the end? Timelines don't determine the nature of things, the culture does. I mean one nation state may be fighting a 3GW while a Al Q may be fighting a 4GW and other nations are doing 6GW--whatever that might be... Eurostyle Nye soft power or something? Why is this a problem? In his effort to keep it simple he's misleading. Simple is not harmful, but misleading is. The above posts insisting that it is only in modern warfare seems to have missed my attempt to find that in Hammes' Sling and the Stone.

In order to clarify it more correctly perhaps we should talk more about why an entity like a state or a group, fight the way they do. I think Van Creveld did this to a degree and I would recommend John Linn's book Battle for a good attempt at describing how various cultures manifest their style of warfare. Either Linn or Herodotus! Linn is not hung up on a progressive timeline, but rather discusses the nature of a culture. Interesting similarities appear then, across cultures, not governed by the date but rather more determined by their cultural aspects. He explicitly takes on Victor Davis Hanson.

Once a reader is out of the linear mode, one begins to see that cultures have their own characteristics and that will determine how they will conduct war. Then, with that in mind political leaders and senior military planners begin with examining cultural manifestations in order to understand their adversary's "Clausewitzian Trinity." In other words, for starters....what is the war worth to them and at what point might they consider negotiating or capitulating (depending upon what you seek to achieve). At that point we could get away from technology or Slings and Stones ;) and begin to understand the nature of the war - not the weaponry.

The world does not march in lock step along generational or linear paths. Its messy and I think they gave up clarity in their narrative when some of the 4GW apostles attempt their misleading simplicity.

By the by, I would commend the original Boyd to people. Even HIS OODA loop, not the way its taught in the war college stuff I took, but his discussions hold up well I believe. I did not know about some of his students coming in after him and appending things though...

This is an interesting thread. Very illuminating to this AF guy who believed thinking Marines began and ended with Ellis!

[Jik K]

Ken, thank you for accepting my post in the spirit in which it was intended. I agree with much of what you say and am a true-beleiver only to the extent that I have found the framework to be of utility in planning and decision-making under stress. However, part of the theory is to retain open loops, i.e. reality check your understanding of what is happening in the world, and as such having your views challenged by an informed practitioner is of inestimable value. To paraphrase Bismark it is much more intelligent to learn from the experience of others than to learn from your own mistakes.

That's why I was hoping for more detailed criticism of MW, etc. from this thread; as a reality check. The only disputation seems to be coming from the MW side. I don't know Mr Owen, but from what background checking I have been able to do I believe that he may be a person whose insights would be useful in this regard. You also seem to be a person of integrity and experience, and I would welcome the opportunity to consider any concerns with regard to these issues that you, or any other like-minded member would like to share with the forum. Not merely as an intellectual conceit, but so that I can learn any potential lessons that are available before I use what I think I know to put those under my authority in harms way.

Jim

[Ken White]

Bismark quote I'll acknowledge having followed and read Boyd plus Lind, Record and many other current theorists many years ago. I also read most of those you named above even more years ago and have read Hammes and a few others lately -- not including Robb ;) -- and I've learned something from every one of them. Still check 'em out today from time to time. I have no pride, I'll steal a good idea in a second. Keeping people alive and minimally hassled while getting jobs done is what it's all about and anything that aids in that is fair game for theft...

I have also seen ideas from each of them that I have discarded; some due to many factors being not currently applicable, others being in the "only if you're really lucky" category. Such selective retention or discard is, of course, based on my experience. Some of that is relevant today, some may not be though I take pains to try and stay abreast (not least because I have a erving son whose favorite pastime seems to be taxing the old man's brain. Sigh).

The issue there is what one adopts from the theorists is likely to depend on ones predilections, instincts (which should be trusted) and experience. Nothing wrong with that.

In 45 years of training or helping people train to go to war, I discovered three basic truths. First, we're all different and what works for me may not work for you and vice versa, thus I've long been a proponent of teaching people how to think and not what to think (using that phrase decades before it became popular) and encouraging irreverence, imagination, innovation and initiative (my four "I"s, the irreverence is aimed at "fonts of all knowledge" and 'one way' or school solution proponents).

Secondly, learn the doctrine thoroughly and study prodigously but always remember what Bull Halsey said -- "Regulations were meant to be intelligently disregarded" and that applies to doctrine and theory as well (and that is my only mantra :) ). Lastly, I trained or helped others train for most of 45 years to fight a land war in Europe -- never even got stationed much less fought there-- but I sure have eaten a whole lot of rice. The point there being we do not know where, when or who we will fight -- why is immaterial, how will change...

Then there are three tactical absolutes I learned the hard way. (1) Do not try to adopt the thinking of others, they or their chroniclers will leave something out when they tell you why they did what they did. (2) Do not ever, ever, ever do the same thing twice. Never. Under any circumstances. Never ever. (3) Stay alert to stay alive, stay agile to stay ahead.

Since Wilf Owen posted the thread originally, he may come back and give you more than a one liner. He's a busy guy and many of his posts are, uh, somewhat cryptic. I OTOH, can babble for hours :(

Long way of saying there are aspects of MW that I agree with, there are aspects I take with a grain of salt -- and with knowledge that the US Armed Forces are now (in not all but too many cases) risk averse and (same caveat) excessively over centralized. Too much so to effectively implement the precepts, plus the ISR improvements we actually now possess have made some elements of MW unnecessary and firepower has a place. We can be lot more surgical than MW envisioned...

Boyd's theories are broadly applicable but ability to get inside the OODA loop of the bad guys in tactical, operational or strategic environments is constrained by who the decision maker for a specific action decision happens to be; intuitive guys will do it, the more mechanical will likely be unable to do so and continued attempts by those who aren't quick enough will probably lead to failure. Combat Commanders have to do what works for them, not what worked for John Boyd.

As for the generations of warfare; total academic exercise IMO and I put little stock in any of that. We fight the fight we're sent to. Jayhawker above is spot on with the culture bit and any one from any culture who goes to war (in any sense) is going to seek an 'asymmetric' approach and use the best weapons (in the very broad sense of that word and to include in IO) they can obtain while fighting basically as their culture has provided examples. Both Afghanistan and the ME have proven this in spades. Terror is terror, quick strikes are quick strikes, an assassin is an assassin -- dagger to suicide bombs not withstanding...

Our problem is that we're so bureaucratic that we cannot get inside their OODA loop. We may change and be able to go asymmetric as well, I do believe we're trying in spite of some Mastodons... :D

[William F. Owen]

.
For example, Mr Owen stated, "..and for what it's worth, I thought MW was better than sex until I started reading and researching its origins in order to understand it better." Which begs the question as to what were the readings that caused him to question his new-found love and the insights that led him to eventually cast her aside with such derision.


The readings were, principally, Carl Von C, Robert Leonhards, "Principles of War for the information age," and Richard Simpkin's "Race to the Swift."

...but the real rot set in when I started to look at EBO and 4GW. - and last of all, i sat down and finally read "Manoeuvre Warfare handbook" and FMFM1.

That was it. "Here's your knickers, love, and there's a couple of dollars for breakfast and a taxi" :wry:

[William F. Owen]

Since Wilf Owen posted the thread originally, he may come back and give you more than a one liner. He's a busy guy and many of his posts are, uh, somewhat cryptic. I OTOH, can babble for hours :(



As a great military thinker once said, "A hamster can never defeat a bear, but many hamsters will make a good meal."

Cryptic enough? :D

[Ken White]

As a great military thinker once said, "A hamster can never defeat a bear, but many hamsters will make a good meal."

Cryptic enough? :D

Aside from the fact that too many Hamsters are guaranteed to produce a major case of indigestion... :D

Of, course there is the issue that the same great military thinker also posed a question about the Bear who may or may not have had that particular problem...

[Norfolk]

Aside from the fact that too many Hamsters are guaranteed to produce a major case of indigestion... :D

Not to mention hairballs.:eek:

[Tom Odom]

Not to mention hairballs.:eek:

depends on whether you did them in NAIR before frying :wry:

[TT]

Jayhawker said:

Here is my take on the worst of 4GW: It reinforces the commonly held belief that history is uniform and linear.


Yes, the generations framework they use does indeed do this. As a simplification, the generations of warfare does make clear that the character of warfare does change, and has changed (I use it teaching my MA students for this reason), but it does grossly obscure the chaotic (ie non-linear), complex processes through change occurs. And of course, change need not be, and often is not, progressive......

And this is true of any theory, particularly in the social sciences (and warfare, and war more general, is not a science). ‘Theory’, very simply speaking, is designed to highlight certain ‘relevant aspects’ and so aims to simplify. Which means no one theory ever explains everything (in spite of what the theorists may say). Heck, biologists, palaeontologists, and so on and so forth, have been refining Darwin’s concept of evolution virtually from the time he published Origins of the Species, and are working at refining it (and those that advocate intelligent design completely repudiate it).

Ken, to my mind, has it right when he says:


and I've learned something from every one of them


Wisdom of the ages! And no, Ken, this is not a comment on your age (well, not much of one – I read an article recently arguing that there is a ‘correlation’ between age and wisdom, so you must be very wise :cool:).

There are four or five or six or seven or however many different theories, or approaches, or views, out there today putting forth an argument of one sort or another about what the future of warfare will be like. I seriously doubt whether any one of them has it exactly right (and this includes 4GW). Or maybe, even probably, whether any one of them has it anywhere near right except maybe in general, broad terms. I am in my normal state of being dazed and confused tonight but I think I am right that it was Michael Howard who observed that any view of future warfare will always be wrong in one or more respects or another, but the key is not to be completely wrong (no, not a quote).



Wilf said:
As a great military thinker once said, "A hamster can never defeat a bear, but many hamsters will make a good meal."
Cryptic enough?

Very cryptic. :eek: I was not aware that wild bears eat hamsters. At least not where I come from. Groundhogs, whistlers, old and young elk, ants, shoots, berries, the occasional human, and so on and so forth -- but not hamsters. :D

But quibbling aside, this depends, does it not? The hamster, from its perspective, wins if it is not eaten by the bear, whereas from the bear’s perspective, he loses (ie goes hungry) if it does not catch the hamster. If hamsters cause the bear hairballs, and indigestion, is the discomfort worth the effort? Is the energy expended by the bear in catching one tiny hamster worth the energy gain of eating it? And further, if we adopt Dawkin’s ‘selfish gene’ perspective, as long as hamsters as a species exist and flourish, it does not matter how many a bear, or many bears, eat? These are interesting political questions. :).

[Norfolk]

A couple of comments on zenpundit's latest blog entry (http://zenpundit.com/?p=2552) on the subject of this thread - "A War of Words About 4GW":

Admittedly, I am an admirer of GEN William E. DePuy, and he did have a fair bit of battle experience himself. But I think he put it quite well with regards to questions of "attrition" or "manoeuvre" approaches to warfare:



Partly because maneuver doctrine is so inherently attractive to soldiers, it has generated its own excesses. In arguing its undoubted merits, proponents have apparently felt it necessary to contrast those virtues with the vices of alternative doctrine. The chief contrast has been drawn with the so-called tactics of attrition.


Attrition is such an "ugly" doctrine that it claims no known or announced adherents, even though most wars finally have been resolved on that basis. Certainly it is permissible to be against attrition so long as the critic does not spread his anathema over the whole idea of fighting; not only fighting, but hard, bloody fighting, should that be necessary.

Victory in such combat has classically gone to the commander who concentrates (and applies) superior combat power at the point and time of decision. We know, but sometimes forget, that there are two dimensions to concentration and two methods involved:


* Concentration of forces in space via maneuver.
* Concentration of actions in time via synchronization.

This article's premise is that proper doctrine must seek both goals and employ both methods in ajudicious mix and that synchronization embraces a widening range of complex but essential functions.

Lest this issue seem overdrawn, there are a number of very bright and influential young field grade officers who have contributed much to maneuver doctrine, who by their talent will remain influential in doctrinal matters throughout their careers and who are genuinely worried about what they perceive as a mutually exclusive relationship between maneuver and synchronization. The argument goes that synchronization smacks of set-piece warfare-a Montgomery perhaps, compared with a Rommel or a Patton. And if synchronization, therefore, means stopping the war for time-consuming, deliberate arrangements for every battle, then it will nullify the enormous benefits that otherwise would flow from rapid and bold maneuver.


This is not a trivial issue. Perhaps the logic trap is in moving the discussion to the outer boundaries of each concept. One could visualize an army strangled and immobilized by its internal procedures for synchronization, every battle a Normandy landing or an El Alamein. Correspondingly, an army devoted to an endless bloodless ballet does not inspire much
confidence.


But extremes prove very little. Common sense tells us to move toward the center, to synthesize the virtues of each in a higher order of competence and professionalism-an Hegelian dialectic if you will. The remainder of this article, therefore, centers on synchronization with the goal of bringing that process up to a level of equal prominence with maneuver in doctrinal thinking throughout the Army.


This is not an argument against maneuver doctrine. It accepts the primacy of maneuver as all supporting actions must be keyed to maneuver. The scheme of maneuver (concept of operation) is the first and great requirement. The second, which is like unto it, is synchronization.

The history of war is replete with examples in which superior forces were concentrated for battles which were then lost to smaller but better-handled opponents.


Gen. Sir Bernard L. Montgomery's predecessors in North Africa, with the notable exception of the unsung Gen. Sir Richard N. O'Connor, regularly assembled forces larger and potentially stronger than the Germans, and just as regularly were defeated. At Gazala, Field Marshal Erwin Rommel maneuvered himself into the rear of the British and into what the Germans themselves described as the witches cauldron. With the British commander, Gen. Sir Neil M. Ritchie in the rear, the Eighth Army never made a concerted and decisive move against the trapped Panzer Army. Individual British (Indian and New Zealand) brigades engaged the Germans as the spirit seized their various commanders or as they were forced to fight for survival. But Gen. Ritchie probably never generated, at any one time, more than ten to 20 percent of his army's latent power.


Gen. Rommel, on the other hand, was actively present in the "cauldron" with his troops. He, personally, brought up his supply and ammunition trains, had a path cut back through the British mine field as a direct resupply route, issued orders to his force, routed the Eighth Army and went on to the Egyptian border-capturing Tobruk on the way. He synchronized the actions of his smaller force and developed more intensive combat power at the critical time.

It is interesting to note that the deep enveloping maneuver of the Germans did not stampede the phlegmatic British. The mere presence of the whole Panzer Army in the British rear was not enough. Only when Gen. Rommel delivered a well-coordinated attack did the defense collapse. The psychological effects of maneuver can be overstated. British phlegm may have its counterpart in a Soviet command which is less than skittish.


Finally, on this point, the French have a marvelously descriptive term for the tactics of a force so powerful and confident that it ignored the movements of the enemy and simply marched straight to its objective-"a maneuver of scorn."
(From: "Towards a Balanced Doctrine" in Selected Papers of General William E. DePuy, Compiled by Richard M. Swain, pp.315-317 (http://cgsc.leavenworth.army.mil/carl/download/csipubs/swain3/swain3_pt4.pdf).)


It takes a great deal of time to marshall the resources required for attack compared to the time it may take to establish that for defence. Attack, by its very nature, normally requires a substantial degree of manoeuvre; defence, by comparison normally does not require the same degree of manoeuvre. And the resources required for Attack tend to considerably outweigh those required for Defence, and thus require much more time to assemble. In the meantime, the enemy must be held off, and this requires Defence even in the midst of preparing for Attack.


Under the constrained conditions of war, Defence, and subsequently "Attrition", for lack of a more palatable term, is the norm; Attack, and subsequently "Maneouvre", is the intended decisive moment of action that the Defence has been building up to. Manoeuvre is necessary for victory, but it is not always necessarily available; "Attrition" is in effect a sort of typical condition, and not by any means necessarily as a result of Doctrine or inability or unwillingness to seek "Manoeuvre". This does not excuse those who eschew the opportunity to resort to "Manoeuvre" and instead resort to "Attrition". But when even the German Army, that model of MW that Lind holds up, spent most of its time in the later years of WWI and throughout most of WWII engaged in nothing less than "Attrition Warfare", and not by choice, then it is most important to bear in mind the practical limitations of Manoeuvre Warfare ("3GW") in particular, and 4GW Theory in general.

[William F. Owen]

Y

But quibbling aside, this depends, does it not? The hamster, from its perspective, wins if it is not eaten by the bear, whereas from the bear’s perspective, he loses (ie goes hungry) if it does not catch the hamster. If hamsters cause the bear hairballs, and indigestion, is the discomfort worth the effort? Is the energy expended by the bear in catching one tiny hamster worth the energy gain of eating it? And further, if we adopt Dawkin’s ‘selfish gene’ perspective, as long as hamsters as a species exist and flourish, it does not matter how many a bear, or many bears, eat? These are interesting political questions. :).

Oh but you don't Understand! As long as the hamsters seeks to shatter the bears situational awareness through a variety of rapid, focused, and unexpected actions, which create a turbulent and rapidly deteriorating situation with which the bear cannot cope, they can defeat the bear through an effects based approach!

...remember, 4th Generation Hamsters spend a lot time running on their OODA loops!

[Ron Humphrey]

I'm trying to follow so heres the gist of what Ive gotten so far

4GW - Plan is continually changing no matter what (EBO/OODA)

WILF - Make a plan and stick with it until you find it to be unviable at which point youll know what to change it to because any reasonble person has been looking at options the whole.;)

TT - Something about Bears and berries :confused:

Norfolk - Those who look for a fight will find it and aren't necessarily the wiser for it
(curtesy DePuy)

Ken - Read, and listen to everything, it cost nothing and you might even learn something; otherwise if you have any questions ask me (probably been there done that.

:D

[Ken White]

...
Ken - Read, and listen to everything, it cost nothing and you might even learn something...

True.


...otherwise if you have any questions ask me (probably been there done that. :D

Not so. I'll try to answer but lots I don't know -- fortunately, I probably do know someone who's covered the things I missed. We all offer the testimonial that whatever we did and where ever we did it, we're still here to talk about it so we musta done sump'n right. Better hurry, there are fewer of us every day... :D

[zenpundit]

Hey all,

I'd like to thank the following gents:

Jik for the kind mention here and the original suggestion to invite Wilf Owen to the online symposium.

Wilf Owen for graciously agreeing to participate in reviewing Science, Strategy and War by Col. Frans Osinga and share his insights in greater detail.

Other SWC members who took the time to help bring me up to speed. Much appreciated!

Dr. Chet Richards suggested to me today that I should ask Col. Osinga to participate as well and I readily agreed to do so.

Addendum:

Regarding Boyd's OODA Loop; neuroscientists using MRI and EEG studies have discovered quite a bit about the brain in the last ten years or so regarding it's structural modularity. If this early indication pans out in further peer-reviewed research, in terms of mapping cognitive processing during learning, then John Boyd had, in my view, a remarkably significant insight regarding human intelligence.

[Norfolk]

Happy to see you back.:)

[William F. Owen]

Regarding Boyd's OODA Loop; neuroscientists using MRI and EEG studies have discovered quite a bit about the brain in the last ten years or so regarding it's structural modularity. If this early indication pans out in further peer-reviewed research, in terms of mapping cognitive processing during learning, then John Boyd had, in my view, a remarkably significant insight regarding human intelligence.

I would dispute that assertion. Boyd may have described a process that sometimes occurs (like flatulence!). That is not to say that it forms the basis for anything useful in military thought or science. I have talked to at least three behavioural scientists and psychologists, who have all told me that even Boyd's most detailed OODA does not describe a decision making process that user awareness would enhance. The OODA loop assumes rational collective human decisions under stress. Humans don't work like that.

EG- Someone learning to play chess could be said to be using an OODA loop. How does knowing that help, or speed their decision making process. If they can't see the other sides pieces, (as in conflict) how does understanding of OODA aid them?

How do you ensure all your command staff are using the same OODA loop?

[Jik K]

Hi Ken – sorry for the delay in replying, dammed real world intruded into my OODA Loop
I must say that I am struggling to find a difference between us, which I suspect means that our differences – if they exist – lie at a deeper level than has yet been revealed. It is my understanding that Manoeuvre Warfare is a development of the operational art arising from the practice of the German Army between 1917-1943/5, and not a subversion of the principles of war as espoused in Clausewitz, etc. Indeed the German General Staff would have been scandalised to find themselves considered to have done so.
You say, “Long way of saying there are aspects of MW that I agree with, there are aspects I take with a grain of salt -- and with knowledge that the US Armed Forces are now (in not all but too many cases) risk averse and (same caveat) excessively over centralized.” And I agree. I also believe that the proponents of MW recognised this and sought to promote a change in the cultural environment that would facilitate a flexibility of operational and tactical response that would be required in a changing operational environment – a culture built upon what Boyd termed the principles of the blitzkrieg:
• Without focus and direction (Schwerpunkt) at all levels, people will not know what to do
• Without mission responsibilities (Auftrag), people will not take the initiative
• Without intuitive competence (Fingerspitzengefühl), people will not spot mismatches
• Without mutual trust (Einheit), there is no moral force to put group goals above individuals’
In seeking to promote such a change they sought to establish a doctrine, i.e. a mutually understandable language, in which to express their ideas, and, whatever its admitted limitations, the vehicle they chose to express the difference between the current culture and its preferred model was the generational one, i.e. current meme of the US Armed Forces is second generation. At the same time they seek to illustrate the requirement for a new meme through an exposition of the new operational environment, i.e. the rise of non-state actors as the primary challenge to American/Western national/Geopolitical interests, and express this meme as fourth generation.
If we take Clausewitz’s trinity of state, people and army and recognise that American military superiority is such that no opponent, state or non-state, could hope to militarily defeat the US, we may recognise that any sensible opponent will aim to strike at one of the other foundations – generally choosing the will of the people to sustain a conflict by extending the war’s longevity whilst avoiding direct confrontation and maximising American expenditure of blood and treasure.
At the same time a profound change has taken place in the attitude to the utility of force in Western civilisation. Speaking of the Falaise gap Eisenhower wrote of the possibility of walking for yards at a time whilst stepping on nothing but enemy corpses, and the world looked upon his creation, shrugged its shoulders, and said it was good; at the end of GW1 the infamous “Highway of Death” became a precipitating agent in the political requirement for a ceasefire. Even if we can fix our enemy in one place long enough to apply massive firepower to him we become revolted by the mass extermination of our enemies, without even consideration to the moral effect of any collateral damage to the innocent.
Even if we refuse to espouse MW ourselves we must be cognisant that our enemies don’t share this view, as we have seen recently in the Red Sea:
“Iranian naval swarming tactics focus on surprising and isolating the enemy’s forces and preventing their reinforcement or resupply, thereby shattering the enemy’s morale and will to fight. Iran has practiced both mass and dispersed swarming tactics. The former employs mass formations of hundreds of lightly armed and agile small boats that set off from different bases, then converge from different directions to attack a target or group of targets. The latter uses a small number of highly agile missile or torpedo attack craft that set off on their own, from geographically dispersed and concealed locations, and then converge to attack a single target or set of targets (such as a tanker convoy). The dispersed swarming tactic is much more difficult to detect and repel because the attacker never operates in mass formations.” Fariborz Haghshenass, 211206, Washington Institute Near East Studies..
The Iranians clearly see something in this MW stuff, and are actively seeking to shape the battlefield by getting us used to them performing a “Crazy Ivan” whilst permitting them to close to within 200m of our vessels, i.e. where no defence is possible to a multiple missile launch. Where would they get such an idea? Perhaps from an American military exercise conducted several years ago in which a retired Admiral ‘sank’ so many Blue Force ships that the exercise had to be stopped and then restarted because the Red Force was using the ‘wrong’ tactics.
Mr Owen I haven’t read Mr Leonhard’s or Mr Simpkin’s works and so cannot comment upon them, perhaps somebody else has and can?

[Jik K]

I would dispute that assertion. Boyd may have described a process that sometimes occurs (like flatulence!). That is not to say that it forms the basis for anything useful in military thought or science. I have talked to at least three behavioural scientists and psychologists, who have all told me that even Boyd's most detailed OODA does not describe a decision making process that user awareness would enhance. The OODA loop assumes rational collective human decisions under stress. Humans don't work like that.

How do you ensure all your command staff are using the same OODA loop?

I believe that the link between orientation and action is intended to demonstrate precisely this phenomena, i.e. that humans react in pre-programmed ways to stimuli and create narratives to explain their actions post facto.

The way to develop your command staff is to create a shared orientation, in the way that the German General Staff did, by training in peacetime and shared experience in war, the 'Einheit' of the principles of the Blitzkrieg.

"Balck (General Herman Balck) emphasised the importance of leadership in creating moral strength among toops. Leaders allowed subordinates freedom to exercise imagination and initiative, yet harmonise with the intent of superior commanders. cohesion during combat relied more on moral superiority than on material superiority. Leaders must create this. This requires them to create a bond and breadth of experience based upon trust. They must also lead by example, demonstrating requisite physical energy, mental energy and moral authority to inspire subordinates to enthusiastically cooperate and take the inititative within the superiors intent." Osinga, Science, Strategy & War, Pg 170.

[TT]

Jayhawker posted: In order to clarify it more correctly perhaps we should talk more about why an entity like a state or a group, fight the way they do. I think Van Creveld did this to a degree and I would recommend John Linn's book Battle for a good attempt at describing how various cultures manifest their style of warfare. Either Linn or Herodotus! Linn is not hung up on a progressive timeline, but rather discusses the nature of a culture. Interesting similarities appear then, across cultures, not governed by the date but rather more determined by their cultural aspects. He explicitly takes on Victor Davis Hanson.

I concur that the influence of culture is, or 'can be', very significant, and Linn’s book is very good on this question. If you are interested in the impact of culture on military behaviour, Isabel V, Hull, Absolute Destruction: Military Culture and the Practices of War in Imperial Germany is good, and JE Lendon’s Soldiers & Ghosts: A History of Battle in Classical Antiquity’ is interesting.


Jayhawker posted: Once a reader is out of the linear mode, one begins to see that cultures have their own characteristics and that will determine how they will conduct war.


A caveat to your point, however, is that most military organizations in the world today have by and large adopted the European (Western if you will) model of organizing and equipping themselves and often adopt the way our militaries conduct warfare as well (whether they are very successful at these forms of warfare is another matter), so the influence of culture on the conduct of war ‘may be’ greater on nonstate actors. A possible example of the former aspect of this is the Indian military, which in spite of its very different society and culture which does influence its strategic culture, seems, from what little I do know, to be organized and to fight much like our militaries (but I could be wrong on this point). A possible example of the latter are nonstate fighters in Africa, where often they incorporate elements of mysticism (charms) and contemporary pop culture (Rambo, Reeboks and Raybans) [see, for example, Paul Jackson, ‘Are Africa’s Wars part of a Fourth Generation of Warfare?’, Contemporary Security Policy 28/2 August 2007, pp 267-86]

As for 4GW, as I am lazy and busy today, to quote myself from #38 on this threat
…few advocates claimed that ‘4GW’ entities would use new tactics, rather their point has always been that they would use conventional and unconventional means (ie, not new ones) to achieve their ‘new’ aims and because of this and because of cultural differences that they might use old approaches in potentially new ways. (stress added for this post).



Jayhawker posted: Then, with that in mind political leaders and senior military planners begin with examining cultural manifestations in order to understand their adversary's "Clausewitzian Trinity." In other words, for starters....what is the war worth to them and at what point might they consider negotiating or capitulating (depending upon what you seek to achieve). At that point we could get away from technology or Slings and Stones and begin to understand the nature of the war - not the weaponry.

Proponents argued (argue) that the key drivers underpinning 4GW would be ‘ideas’ and ‘technology’, with an emphasis that ‘ideas’ would be more important than ‘technology’. I cannot remember if Hammes takes this position in his interpretation of 4GW, but the Slings suggest that he too emphasized ‘ideas’.

J
ayhawker posted:This is an interesting thread. Very illuminating to this AF guy who believed thinking Marines began and ended with Ellis!

Once upon a time, in a misty isle far, far away filled with castles (actually I still live there :eek:), I pretty much believed the same thing. But my research and Marines learned me better :wry:.

[Jik K]

Just catching up on some of them, particularly Jayhawker. That's what I meant by Edpanding the debate. :)

[TT]

Wilf posted: Oh but you don't Understand! As long as the hamsters seeks to shatter the bears situational awareness through a variety of rapid, focused, and unexpected actions, which create a turbulent and rapidly deteriorating situation with which the bear cannot cope, they can defeat the bear through an effects based approach!

I believe they do this very thing – run, jink, junk, duck, hide, gone. Poor bear, there was snack right there, absolutely sure it was there, but now it has vanished. Where oh where did that meaty pretzel go? Confusion. Bear leaves, goes to find something easier to browse on (berries when in season, or roots and shoots). Hamster says, ‘Whew’, goes back to eating roots and shoots. :D


Wilf posted: ...remember, 4th Generation Hamsters spend a lot time running on their OODA loops!

I would think a hamster running hard inside of its 'OODA loop' is perfectly safe from the threat of being eaten by a bear. ;) Mind, it may have to worried about the household cat :eek:

[Jik K]

It takes a great deal of time to marshall the resources required for attack compared to the time it may take to establish that for defence. Attack, by its very nature, normally requires a substantial degree of manoeuvre; defence, by comparison normally does not require the same degree of manoeuvre. And the resources required for Attack tend to considerably outweigh those required for Defence, and thus require much more time to assemble. In the meantime, the enemy must be held off, and this requires Defence even in the midst of preparing for Attack.


Under the constrained conditions of war, Defence, and subsequently "Attrition", for lack of a more palatable term, is the norm; Attack, and subsequently "Maneouvre", is the intended decisive moment of action that the Defence has been building up to. Manoeuvre is necessary for victory, but it is not always necessarily available; "Attrition" is in effect a sort of typical condition, and not by any means necessarily as a result of Doctrine or inability or unwillingness to seek "Manoeuvre". This does not excuse those who eschew the opportunity to resort to "Manoeuvre" and instead resort to "Attrition". But when even the German Army, that model of MW that Lind holds up, spent most of its time in the later years of WWI and throughout most of WWII engaged in nothing less than "Attrition Warfare", and not by choice, then it is most important to bear in mind the practical limitations of Manoeuvre Warfare ("3GW") in particular, and 4GW Theory in general.

The Germans so perfected their operational art that they operationalized everything, including strategy, which is what eventually got their ass kicked. The Russians started as a pure attrition force - largely as a result of the Army purges which nullified its ability to Operationalise those MW concepts it had theorised prior to the war. Subsequently the Russians developed into able proponents of MW at the operational and strategic/Grand Tactical level, but by and large remained attritionists at the tactical level. Glantz's two volume work on the Manchurian campaign sets this out very well.

In the current era wars are games of two-halves, the collapse of the armed forces of a nation, whether to the rapier of a Manoeuvreist , the sledge-hammer of an Attritionist, or to the cut-and-thrust of a practitioner combining the best of both arts does not automatically lead to the collapse of the people's will to resist, even if it brings about the destruction of the state. What, of utility, does the attritionist bring to the second-half. Iraq 2003-2006 indicates the answer may be little. Iraq 2007 appears to indicate that an able practitioner with many strings to his bow can achieve much - at least in the military field.

It doesn't have to be either/or. Sometimes it's one, sometimes the other, sometimes it's both.

[selil]

I would dispute that assertion. Boyd may have described a process that sometimes occurs (like flatulence!). That is not to say that it forms the basis for anything useful in military thought or science. I have talked to at least three behavioural scientists and psychologists, who have all told me that even Boyd's most detailed OODA does not describe a decision making process that user awareness would enhance. The OODA loop assumes rational collective human decisions under stress. Humans don't work like that.

EG- Someone learning to play chess could be said to be using an OODA loop. How does knowing that help, or speed their decision making process. If they can't see the other sides pieces, (as in conflict) how does understanding of OODA aid them?

How do you ensure all your command staff are using the same OODA loop?

Meta-cognition (thinking about thinking) is an incredibly important skill for understanding how the decision cycle occurs. Maybe not all ranks in the military need to do so, but it is important to understand how perceptions and queries of thought occur. Understanding meta-cognition allows for perception and misperception to be managed. I won't wade into the OODA/EBO/TLA debate, but one of the earliest educators to look at the decision cycle critically was John Dewey.

[William F. Owen]

The way to develop your command staff is to create a shared orientation, in the way that the German General Staff did, by training in peacetime and shared experience in war, the 'Einheit' of the principles of the Blitzkrieg.


Shared orientation? Like an operations map, and a set of orders? That's nothing to do wit the OODA loop. Indeed how would explaining the OODA loop to your staff help? I have yet to see one aspect of operational art or tactics that the OODA explains any better than many of existing and proven concepts we have all used for some considerable time.

[William F. Owen]

Meta-cognition (thinking about thinking) is an incredibly important skill for understanding how the decision cycle occurs. Maybe not all ranks in the military need to do so, but it is important to understand how perceptions and queries of thought occur. Understanding meta-cognition allows for perception and misperception to be managed. I won't wade into the OODA/EBO/TLA debate, but one of the earliest educators to look at the decision cycle critically was John Dewey.

The decision cycle or a decision cycle? By what methods do you consciously engage in the decision cycle that differs in any significant way from the process you normally use to make descision?

The Intelligence Cycle has existed for 50 years. It works and it is used. It's not the OODA loop and no one would claim that going round it faster means you'll win. It's just a staff procedure. In order for the OODA loop to work at the operational level it has to be useable by a Staff.

[selil]

The decision cycle or a decision cycle? By what methods do you consciously engage in the decision cycle that differs in any significant way from the process you normally use to make descision?

The Intelligence Cycle has existed for 50 years. It works and it is used. It's not the OODA loop and no one would claim that going round it faster means you'll win. It's just a staff procedure. In order for the OODA loop to work at the operational level it has to be useable by a Staff.

Well I don't know about 50 years, but John Dewey in 1911 described how we think. My perspective right or wrong is that how we learn, is directly related to how we think, which is directly related to how we make decisions. Dewey split thinking into the logical and psychological one being the mental processes and the other being the strategies. His process has been used and adapted over time but is the root of much consideration of analysis. A complete thought within his system has five distinct stages or steps of reflection. 1) A felt difficulty; 2) it's location and definition; 3) suggestion of possible solutions; 4) development by reasoning of the bearings of the suggestion; 5) further observation and experiment leading to its acceptance or rejection (Dewey, P.72).

Many decision processes have been built around the Dewey construct. When you look at the andragogy and pedagogy required for transference of expertise the thinking processes are what you are trying to build. In the example of the chess master (a classic example) the chess master may not make a great general but the general may make a passable chess master. Patterns of thought and reasoning skill levels within artificial rule sets can be transitioned from the real world to the game world. Not so much the other way.

I do think that meta-cognition is important to understand so that decisions are based on reason and logic rather than simplistic response. What we refer to as autonomic response (instant response) is actually expertise and ingrained response from training and education. Most practitioner's of education never really consider the steps of the decision process. I doubt a drill instructor really cares about meta-cognition even as he trains soldiers.

When we talk about staff or soldiers using analysis models we are likely talking about layering bureaucratic needs on top of something much more elegant and simplistic. The resultant concept or construct can often be polluted to the point of absurdity. That doesn't mean they can't be used to illustrate what is happening so we can analyze points where misperceptions of egregious mistakes are made.

[stanleywinthrop]

Nor is war an intellectual exercise. Regrettable but true. Reality is such a bore.





As you and many here are not boyd fans i know you'll reject it out of hand, but to quote boyd "War is not fought by equipment or by terrain. It is fought by people--who use their minds."

[stanleywinthrop]

The decision cycle or a decision cycle? By what methods do you consciously engage in the decision cycle that differs in any significant way from the process you normally use to make descision?

The Intelligence Cycle has existed for 50 years. It works and it is used. It's not the OODA loop and no one would claim that going round it faster means you'll win. It's just a staff procedure. In order for the OODA loop to work at the operational level it has to be useable by a Staff.

I think you are confusing the OODA loop with some sort of 'checklist' that one must follow. The OODA loop is more of a parable about how we think.

Many in religious circles make the same kind of mistakes about the bible--some confuse parables (thou shalt take up snakes) with actual rules (10 commandments).

[Steve Blair]

As you and many here are not boyd fans i know you'll reject it out of hand, but to quote boyd "War is not fought by equipment or by terrain. It is fought by people--who use their minds."

This is also something of a key component of many of Clausewitz's ideas. He considered the most important changes in war to come out of the Napoleonic era to be social and political, not technological. I'd tend to agree in most cases: technology often serves as an accelerator for human thoughts and impulses.

[stanleywinthrop]

This is also something of a key component of many of Clausewitz's ideas. He considered the most important changes in war to come out of the Napoleonic era to be social and political, not technological. I'd tend to agree in most cases: technology often serves as an accelerator for human thoughts and impulses.

Boyd was not referring to changes in warfare, he was referring to what to him is the most fundamental aspect of war, wars are fought by human beings who (at least for about 99% of the popluation) think to some degree to another before they act. Therefore, according to boyd, a key to understanding war is understanding how people think.

[Norfolk]

In the current era wars are games of two-halves, the collapse of the armed forces of a nation, whether to the rapier of a Manoeuvreist , the sledge-hammer of an Attritionist, or to the cut-and-thrust of a practitioner combining the best of both arts does not automatically lead to the collapse of the people's will to resist, even if it brings about the destruction of the state. What, of utility, does the attritionist bring to the second-half. Iraq 2003-2006 indicates the answer may be little. Iraq 2007 appears to indicate that an able practitioner with many strings to his bow can achieve much - at least in the military field.

It doesn't have to be either/or. Sometimes it's one, sometimes the other, sometimes it's both.

Much agreed on the latter, as both DePuy's piece and my own posting try to point out. It is creating a false dichotomy (as so many have observed) that either "Attrition" or "Manoeuvre" offer mutually exclusive approaches to the same end - victory.

But both the DePuy piece and my own post try to outline the conditions under which "Manoeuvre" is possible, and why "Attrition" persists even despite the best efforts of the willing. Very often, as the Soviets found in the early years of WWII (as a result of the purges of the late 1930's) and the Germans discovered in the later years of WWII, that "Manoeuvre" is either limited or rendered effectively impossible by casualties or logistical problems, and "Attrition" becomes the default. As I stated earlier, it takes a great deal of time and resources to assemble the means required for "Manoeuvre" operations at the Operational level; even at the Tactical level, which the Germans really excelled at, manoeuvre can be constrained by such factors, and attrition take over by default.

What I am trying to point out is that, depending upon conditions, Manoeuvre, especially at the Operational level, is an option that is not always available, even to the able and willing. And, as in the Soviet Union in the early years of WWII, or in Iraq in 2003, decisive Manoeuvre may not prove sufficient to break the enemy's will or ability to resist. The Germans predicated their War Strategies in both the West in 1940 and in the East in 1941 upon an Operational Method of Manoeuvre, which is good. But the events of 1940 led to over-confidence in the method applied in 1941; whereas France in 1940 was politically divided, and much more susceptible to the strategic shock-effect of the fast-moving German campaign, the Soviet Union was not, though the regime tottered briefy.

The Coalition was most successful using a Manoeuvre approach in 1991, but ended up with an insurgency on its hands in 2003 even after use of much the same method destroyed the Iraqi Armed Forces; the will to resist was not destroyed however, and the Coalition found itself engaged in a long war of attrition with the Insurgency within Iraq itself. The Coalition Strategy had been predicated on a Manoeuvrist approach, albeit one in the vein of the RMA - with all the problematic assumptions that is burdened with, and which Mr. Lind has argued forcefully against. The early failure of that approach resulted, as previously mentioned, in a long war of attrition.

That said, I am not proposing "Attrition" as being normally preferable to "Manoeuvre". They are in reality two aspects of the same whole, but circumstances do have their influence upon which is most viable in a given situation, and moreover, which is possible. Ideally, both "approaches" are available to the Commander to use as suits his needs best; in practice, there may be serious constraints upon using one or the other. More often than not, those constraints are levied upon Manoeuvre, owing to the skill, resources, and time required to create that skill and assemble those resources necessary to carried out decisive manoeuvre.

Few are unaware of the dangers of the so-called "Attritionist" approach - WWI went a long way to pointing those out. I would very much agree with William Lind, however, that many Western Armies have never really detached themselves from it in substance, even if they have in theory.
But there is a danger in subscribing to "Manoeuvre Warfare Theory" in so far as it is predicated upon collapsing the enemy's will to resist and possibly avoiding the wholesale slaughter of pure Attrition; sometimes nothing less than the physical destruction (or "neutralization" if you will, as in COIN) of the enemy will suffice, and that must always be the battlefield object. The German discovered the potential shortcomings of over-reliance upon that approach in WWII, and we have discovered it in Afghanistan since late 2001 and Iraq since late 2003.

In spite of decisive conventional military defeat, the enemy nevertheless persisted in an irregular war of attrition aginst us, and has come close at times to breaking our will to win, even though we continue to resort to Tactical and sometimes even Operational-level manoeuvre, and successfully on the battlefield, against our opponents. Physical destruction of the enemy, sometimes considered an "Attritionist" approach, is the necessary end of decisive manoeuvre. If the enemy will to fight collapses in the interim due to any shock-effect afforded by Manoeuvre, so much the better.

I am not clear that we are in any substantial disagreement here after reading your response to my post; but I am not clear that we agree on physical destruction or "neutralization" (that can be defined in a myriad of ways) as being necessary rather than the destruction of the enemy's will to resist. Quite agreed that the latter is most preferable, but given that that may not occurr, it may be prudent to attempt the former whilst holding the latter to be a most agreeable possibility - if it occurrs.

[Norfolk]

As you and many here are not boyd fans i know you'll reject it out of hand, but to quote boyd "War is not fought by equipment or by terrain. It is fought by people--who use their minds."

I like Boyd's point about taking what is useful from various Doctrines, etc., and rejecting what is not. That's the very definition of using one's mind.:) There is no substitute for good judgement.

[zenpundit]

Thanks Norfolk!

A brief preface, Frans Osinga has agreed to participate in the Science, Strategy and War symposium and give a rebuttal/author's reply and generally discuss with the reviewers and readers.

Wilf Owen wrote:


I would dispute that assertion. Boyd may have described a process that sometimes occurs (like flatulence!). That is not to say that it forms the basis for anything useful in military thought or science.

I've looked at quite a few MRI scans taken in neuroscience and neurolearning. As a layman, the argument that the brain consists of interdependent "modules" capable of simultaneous and asynchronous processing seems to me to be credible enough to at least warrant sustained scientific investigation.

Boyd's OODA diagram represents (as I interpret it) a model of a dynamic mental process where multiple cognitive events are happening ( I'd say simultaneously in many instances). Does Boyd's model match what the brain is really doing ? Too early to say with certainty. Does the OODA Loop have any military utility? That depends on the context.


I have talked to at least three behavioural scientists and psychologists, who have all told me that even Boyd's most detailed OODA does not describe a decision making process that user awareness would enhance.

Having spent now spent over fifteen years working with students ranging from young children to adults, I can't say that I have ever come across one who understood or had awareness of their own decision-making process prior to being prompted to begin an introspective process of self-observation. Selil brought up metacognition. While metacognition does happen spontaneously and briefly, doing so perceptively and efficiently is really more of an acquired skill gained from sustained practice.

Take the "orientation" box for example. Self-awareness of the intellectual-cultural origins of one's own worldview, the limitations, strengths and blind spots is a critical bit of knowledge for being able to take active steps remediate one's own weaknesses. Or as a stepping stone to understanding alternate worldviews or perspectives - like those held by an adversary.

Now, at that level, who is OODA most useful for? Probably statesmen integrating DIME for making national strategy and foreign policy decisions, intel analysts and theater commanders. There are other ways to interpret this model. But what level of conflict is being discussed ? Few things or aspects of things are equally useful at all points on a continuum.


The OODA loop assumes rational collective human decisions under stress. Humans don't work like that

I would argue that OODA is foremost an individual psychological process. Collective OODA comes later and it is heavily mediated by social structure. Hierarchies, networks, markets all move information differently from one another.


EG- Someone learning to play chess could be said to be using an OODA loop. How does knowing that help, or speed their decision making process. If they can't see the other sides pieces, (as in conflict) how does understanding of OODA aid them?

Faster ain't always better. I realize that OODA has been primarily taught or proselytized ( NCW advocates for example) as yielding a comparative advantage in speed and the U.S. military should shoot for speed uber alles. Well, did Boyd actually say that was the only advantage? I'm not sure that was the case but I'm open to correction.

OODA, in the sense of focusing on the opponent's decision process, would certainly influence a commander or planner ( or chess player) into what pieces they might intentionally permit the adversary to see. Patton's fake army in England prior to D-Day, for example


How do you ensure all your command staff are using the same OODA loop?

You can't. The best outcome is relative congruence, IMHO.

[Ken White]

... I also believe that the proponents of MW recognised this and sought to promote a change in the cultural environment that would facilitate a flexibility of operational and tactical response that would be required in a changing operational environment – a culture built upon what Boyd termed the principles of the blitzkrieg:
• Without focus and direction (Schwerpunkt) at all levels, people will not know what to do
• Without mission responsibilities (Auftrag), people will not take the initiative
• Without intuitive competence (Fingerspitzengefühl), people will not spot mismatches
• Without mutual trust (Einheit), there is no moral force to put group goals above individuals’
In seeking to promote such a change they sought to establish a doctrine, i.e. a mutually understandable language, in which to express their ideas, and, whatever its admitted limitations, the vehicle they chose to express the difference between the current culture and its preferred model was the generational one, i.e. current meme of the US Armed Forces is second generation.Yes they did seek to promote such a change -- but they didn't do it very well. Attack the elephants verbally as being too large and a huge Bull will just totally ignore you...

They were and are some smart guys but in their sales pitch, they didn't practice what they preach; they tried a frontal assault on a monolith; never a good plan.

As to the four bullets you provide, I submit, in order:

- Not true. You just have to train them properly. if you do not all the focus and direction is to no avail. with proper training, they'll innately know what the focus is. I'd also suggest that the word 'direction' was misunderstood (purposely?) by the Bulls to centralize decision making even more -- thus, the salesman by a poor choice of words hampered their own programs.

- Not true, comments above apply almost in totality.

- True, totally true. What is not addressed is how one trains intuitive competence... :) . Some have it, some don't. All the doctrine in the world won't fix that. To select for that I agree very much needed capability one has to say that some people are better than others; anathema to the 'egalitarian and meritocratic' US Armed Forces (and to Congress who fostered DOPMA to make sure those Forces didn't get elitist...

- Also totally true; while moral force is just a term, trust is vitally important in the true sense of vital -- because if Commanders do not trust their subordinates they over supervise and hamstring units. That trust is achieved through good training, it cannot be dictated.
...At the same time they seek to illustrate the requirement for a new meme through an exposition of the new operational environment, i.e. the rise of non-state actors as the primary challenge to American/Western national/Geopolitical interests, and express this meme as fourth generation.I disagree with the generational aspect. First, non-state actors are not new; Thugees, assassins and anarchists all precede the adoption of the generational terminology by centuries. I believe non-state actors are a norm, historically and that the relatively artificial world wide suppression of them induced by the predominance of powerful states in the 1900-1990 period of constraint, particularly the Cold War tamped down the non-state effect temporarily. The end of that era allows the world to return to a more historically normal state of scattered chaos.

The terrible flaw is that the onset of such chaos was predictable (and was predicted), has been broadcast since 1972 or so and was diligently ignored by too many in the corridors of power.
...If we take Clausewitz’s trinity of state, people and army and recognise that American military superiority is such that no opponent, state or non-state, could hope to militarily defeat the US, we may recognise that any sensible opponent will aim to strike at one of the other foundations – generally choosing the will of the people to sustain a conflict by extending the war’s longevity whilst avoiding direct confrontation and maximising American expenditure of blood and treasure.Obviously -- and yet, we utterly ignored that in spite of all evidence to the contrary. While the generations of warfare mantra did a good service in delineating the potential, the poor approach to promulgating the issues allowed it to be ignored.
At the same time a profound change has taken place in the attitude to the utility of force in Western civilisation... Even if we can fix our enemy in one place long enough to apply massive firepower to him we become revolted by the mass extermination of our enemies, without even consideration to the moral effect of any collateral damage to the innocent.True but a fact divorced from the MW / 4GW mantra.
Even if we refuse to espouse MW ourselves we must be cognisant that our enemies don’t share this view, as we have seen recently in the Red SeaRight area, wrong body of water... ;)
...The Iranians clearly see something in this MW stuff, and are actively seeking to shape the battlefield by getting us used to them performing a “Crazy Ivan” whilst permitting them to close to within 200m of our vessels, i.e. where no defence is possible to a multiple missile launch...That's not MW, that's just a common sense METT-T approach using so-called asymmetric warfare. Which in itself is just common sense. Do not attack Bull elephants head on; you've gotta flank 'em.
... Where would they get such an idea? Perhaps from an American military exercise conducted several years ago in which a retired Admiral ‘sank’ so many Blue Force ships that the exercise had to be stopped and then restarted because the Red Force was using the ‘wrong’ tactics.Actually, that was Ol' Paul Van Riper, LTG USMC (Ret) who I knew when he was a Captain advising a Viet Namese Marine Battalion in 1966. He just applied common sense to the problem...

[Ken White]

...
Once upon a time, in a misty isle far, far away filled with castles (actually I still live there :eek:), I pretty much believed the same thing. But my research and Marines learned me better :wry:.

some years ago wherein a Navy Captain said; "If you enter a Ship allocation conference with the Marines and see these young men with strange haircuts who seem like neanderthals and think they're stupid, you'll discover at the end of the day that not only did they get every hull they wanted where and when they wanted it but that you have also given away the Admiral's Barge and his Daughter" (or words to the effect). :D

[Ken White]

As you and many here are not boyd fans i know you'll reject it out of hand, but to quote boyd "War is not fought by equipment or by terrain. It is fought by people--who use their minds."

so have many others.

I was using 'intellectual' as I thought JikK was, in the academic sense. In the pure sense of the word intellectual, as in fighting is a mind over matter effort, of course.

I'd also point out that not only Boyd but Travis McGee in the old John B. MacDonald series said "We can't outfight them, we've got to out think them." Even Mel Gibson in Braveheart said "...You don't fight wi' your back, you fight wi' your mind..."

As JikK also pointed out, Napoleon, the guy who went to Moscow and made, in his last fight, made the mistake of attacking the Brits who excel at defense, said "in War, the moral is to the physical as three is to one."

So John from Erie had no patent on that idea...

[stanleywinthrop]

so have many others.

I was using 'intellectual' as I thought JikK was, in the academic sense. In the pure sense of the word intellectual, as in fighting is a mind over matter effort, of course.

I'd also point out that not only Boyd but Travis McGee in the old John B. MacDonald series said "We can't outfight them, we've got to out think them." Even Mel Gibson in Braveheart said "...You don't fight wi' your back, you fight wi' your mind..."

As JikK also pointed out, Napoleon, the guy who went to Moscow and made, in his last fight, made the mistake of attacking the Brits who excel at defense, said "in War, the moral is to the physical as three is to one."

So John from Erie had no patent on that idea...

Wow, john boyd was actually quoting braveheart in the late 1980's! I didn't know he had that kind of power! Thanks for the clue!

And where did I say he had a 'patent' on the idea?

[Ken White]

Wow, john boyd was actually quoting braveheart in the late 1980's! I didn't know he had that kind of power! Thanks for the clue!

And where did I say he had a 'patent' on the idea?

The point was not that he was ahead of his time because he wasn't -- but that fictional characters and that other guy, the short one, said the same sorts of things. So Ol' john gets a minor attaboy, Class 3, for stating the obvious. Lot of that going around.

You didn't. You just said something I thought slightly silly so I replied in kind. ;)

[TT]

Ken posted: ....some years ago wherein a Navy Captain said; "If you enter a Ship allocation conference with the Marines and see these young men with strange haircuts who seem like neanderthals and think they're stupid, you'll discover at the end of the day that not only did they get every hull they wanted where and when they wanted it but that you have also given away the Admiral's Barge and his Daughter" (or words to the effect).

Getting every hull where and when they wanted is only deception, designed to disorganize and confuse the Navy – their main goal is always the Admirals Barge and Daughter. ;)

[Ken White]

more generally the last named is the priority item...:D

Strangely enough, in working with the old 42 Cdo, I noted the RM has similar goals...

[wm]

Boyd . . .was referring to what to him is the most fundamental aspect of war, wars are fought by human beings who . . think to some degree to another before they act. Therefore, according to boyd, a key to understanding war is understanding how people think.

Knowing how people think is not enough. Knowing how people's decisions then motivate them to act is key. The so-called problem of "weakness of the will" has exercised act theorists and moral philosphers since at least the ancient Greeks. The core of this problem may be couched as follows: "How can people know what is the right thing to do yet fail to do it?"

I do not believe that Boyd has an answer any more satisfying than any other theorist about the problem of moving from decision to action. IIRC, he, like everyone else who writes on the subject, assumes that a good decision automatically makes one act. This is just hand waving to disguise what at root is a case of FM--F___ing Magic.

We know that good decisons do not always motivate action--just take a look at many of the so-called intelligence failings of the last century.

[Ken White]

Knowing how people think is not enough...
. . .
We know that good decisons do not always motivate action--just take a look at many of the so-called intelligence failings of the last century.

We over the last century have produced at various levels a lot of really good intel -- which got short shrift by the decision makers who all too often ignored it and thereby made bad decisions. The few real intel failures got a lot of publicity but their saving grace is that they caught the decision makers unaware and thus, no decision was made... :wry:

[wm]

We over the last century have produced at various levels a lot of really good intel -- which got short shrift by the decision makers who all too often ignored it and thereby made bad decisions. The few real intel failures got a lot of publicity but their saving grace is that they caught the decision makers unaware and thus, no decision was made... :wry:

I think just as often, the deicisions that were made were simply just not acted on.

For example, in The Last Battle , Cornelius Ryan describes how FDR proposed to divide up post-war Germany with the US in a wedge in the NW, Britain in the SW, and the USSR in the East. The three pieces of pie that he drew out were centered on Berlin. Unfortunately, no one chose to act on that decision by FDR, for a host of pretty bad reasons I suspect (Ryan identitifes two or three as I recall). I wonder how things would have shaped up in a post-war WWII Europe that gave the US control of the lion's share of industrial Germany, Britain the second largest piece of the spoils, the USSR a distant third and France none at all.

Imagine if senior folks had acted on the decisions that the USDAO Teheran made about the Shah's regime in the 1975-77 timeframe. Suppose the British had actuallty done what Balfour decided was right when he made the declaration instead of waiting about 30 years to act in a "half-stepping" manner on the matter.

Choosing not to act is in fact acting. Failing to act is something else entirely.

[stanleywinthrop]

Knowing how people think is not enough. .

Sometimes I think I'd be better off talking to my dog than around here. To the above-- No Sh## sherlock.

Just because I didn't bring it up before doesn't mean that Boyd doesn't go well beyond 'knowing how people think'. You and Ken White are extremely good at cherry picking and setting up classic straw-man arguments. I mean do you actually believe that Boyd felt that 'knowing how humans think' is the one step process to winning wars??????? Do you honestly believe that Boyd took his thinking no further than that?

Ken, you deride Boyd by pointing out many of his ideas are not origonal. You are failing to see that boyd's genius was the compilation of seemingly disperate ideas into one paridigm. I mean no kidding Boyd steals a lot of ideas from Clauswitz and others. Why is this so repulsive to you? Because a problem with synthetic thinking and reasoning?

John Conrad

[Steve Blair]

Why don't we all calm down and take some deep breaths here....

Sun Tzu, Clausewitz, and Boyd ALL complied ideas from others. They ALL also combined those ideas into something new and different.

I'd hate to see this degenerate into a mud-slinging fest or one riddled with excessive sarcasm and name-calling.

[Ron Humphrey]

Why don't we all calm down and take some deep breaths here....

Sun Tzu, Clausewitz, and Boyd ALL complied ideas from others. They ALL also combined those ideas into something new and different.

I'd hate to see this degenerate into a mud-slinging fest or one riddled with excessive sarcasm and name-calling.

One thing I remember coming to mind while attending courses at Baker was that the OODA cycle made me think of a consistent circle of thought / action.

For the military its all about the mission/fight/effect.
One must always look towards coming confrontation with the understanding that when it comes we must act in some form or another, even if that be not to act.

It seems to me that it often comes down to what we're thinking about about while we act. Although I'm sure it over simplifies Boyd's principles the part which stuck or at least appealed to me most was that during actions there must be constant dynamic reevaluation and subsequent change in action relative to the tasks.

Am I wrong in thinking that any application of Boyd to actual military planning is closer to tactical action than that of higher echelon. Not that it does or would not be beneficial for the higher echelons but simply due to the fact that when it comes to plan of action these echelons generally have more time to work out MDMP and such whereas those on the ground in contact simply have to work with what they've got until said action is complete.

[Eden]

Like the Bible and On War, Boyd is quoted by far more people than have ever read his work - and his body of work, by the way, is not that extensive.

As a result, most people who talk about Boyd have a kindergarten-level view of his ideas. Not anyone on this blog, I'm sure, but most people who discuss his philosophy have never actually read anything by the man himself. So, the creation of caricatures and strawmen is often a problem in evaluating the worth of his work.

In my opinion, his thought directly reflects his experiences. It is exactly what you would expect from a pilot. The OODA loop, for instance, is a great paradigm for a furball but is not particularly useful for the operational thinker. My bottom line appraisal of the man is that he has provided us with one or two new perspectives, but his loops and circles have led to a morbid fascination with technology and targeteering that have crippled deeper thought about operational art.

[Ken White]

Sometimes I think I'd be better off talking to my dog than around here. To the above-- No Sh## sherlock.

Might that have something to do with the tone and words used?


Ken, you deride Boyd by pointing out many of his ideas are not origonal. You are failing to see that boyd's genius was the compilation of seemingly disperate ideas into one paridigm. I mean no kidding Boyd steals a lot of ideas from Clauswitz and others. Why is this so repulsive to you? Because a problem with synthetic thinking and reasoning?

I have a warped sense of humor and am by nature somewhat irreverent. I also have a strong genetic predilection to react adversely to insults. Add those together and one can get some wrong ideas.

I do not deride Boyd one bit more than I deride myself or Britney Spears, I'm equal opportunity. Had you not cherry picked my comments above in this thread, you would have noted that I said I read most and totally agreed with some of his thoughts. I didn't and don't denigrate Boyd -- I do say that no one has all the right answers. Boyd's synthesis of his and other's thoughts are important -- but they are not the Holy Grail, there isn't one. That's all I've been saying.

My thoughts echo those of Steve Blair, above -- no sense in getting ugly and all theorists synthesize the thoughts of others (As, I have also said in this thread, do I). I further agree with the thoughts of Ron Humphrey and Eden above. Boyd has merit, he does not have all the answers.

[Rank amateur]

Therefore, according to boyd, a key to understanding war is understanding how people think.


This idea is also not new. Sun Tzu: "Know your enemy, know yourself." Lee was successful until he ran up against a general who's thinking Lee couldn't understand.

[William F. Owen]

Like the Bible and On War, Boyd is quoted by far more people than have ever read his work - and his body of work, by the way, is not that extensive.


Exactly! - and from what I am reading in Frans Osinga, not that original or well thought out!!

[William F. Owen]

I just spent a week in the company of Bill Lind and T X Hammes. Bill and I had few frank discussions about Boyd, MW and 4GW.

I have to say, I now know more than I ever did. Lind is a fascinating man, and TX is just a hell of a nice guy and hugely smart. Both men think very differently and seldom agree.

Broadly,

a. - I remain unconvinced about MW. - However, as a construct I can now see exactly what it tried to achieve with the US Forces and in Linds mind, failed.

b. - 4GW is designed to do the same thing and has the same weaknesses, as a result. When I pointed out that it was founded on very poor history, TX noted that it didn't matter if it got folks to think through the problem. - thus useful.

c. - According to Lind, the Osinga book is the book Boyd would have written. This disturbs me, but as Lind pointed out, I was seeking precision in a field where no such precision existed or looking for a black cat in a dark room that wasn't there!

[TT]

Wilf,

Kudos to you for admitting you are thinking over your earlier position and 'may' change your mind.

Very unlike a former senior US admin official and general that Steve has been heroically channeling on our behalf......

TT

[ipopescu]

According to Lind, the Osinga book is the book Boyd would have written.
I've just started reading the Osinga book. I don't have much background on Boyd, so I am hoping Bill Lind is right about the value of it.

From the first chapters, Osinga seems to have sourced his book nicely. The tone seems a bit too flattery for my taste, but not unbearably so.

[Norfolk]

I just spent a week in the company of Bill Lind and T X Hammes. Bill and I had few frank discussions about Boyd, MW and 4GW.

I have to say, I now know more than I ever did. Lind is a fascinating man, and TX is just a hell of a nice guy and hugely smart. Both men think very differently and seldom agree.

Broadly,

a. - I remain unconvinced about MW. - However, as a construct I can now see exactly what it tried to achieve with the US Forces and in Linds mind, failed.

b. - 4GW is designed to do the same thing and has the same weaknesses, as a result. When I pointed out that it was founded on very poor history, TX noted that it didn't matter if it got folks to think through the problem. - thus useful.

c. - According to Lind, the Osinga book is the book Boyd would have written. This disturbs me, but as Lind pointed out, I was seeking precision in a field where no such precision existed or looking for a black cat in a dark room that wasn't there!

Well, if Bill Lind (and I will certainly give full credit to him for trying to shove the English-speaking world out of its doctrinal complacency, and by beating us over the head with the German way of war - of which I must personally approve) and COL Hammes (agreed, the man comes out in his writings as a class act, and sharp) are playing the part of Socratic gadflies, then they've probably achieved more than one might have expected, though certainly not as much as they had hoped.

Still, MW and 4/5GW Warfare Theory still strike me as useful mainly to draw attention to what has been forgotten or neglected by classical/traditional military thought; they still don't seem up to the task of supplanting it per se, if indeed that is the intention of folks like Lind and Hammes. Without exception, they acknowledge Sun Tzu and for that matter Clausewitz. And I would be the first to acknowledge that Boyd himself would not have considered himself to be departing from Sun Tzu.

But unless there has been a case of violent disagreement going on, and we're actually agreeing (with those who do not consciously subscribe to MW and 4/5Gw theory and the like simply being unaware that this is in fact the case), then there still seems to be, from the traditional perspective, a critical lack of recognition of the limitations in practice of MW Theory by its theorists, and an oversubscription to novelty on the part of 4/5GW Theorists.

[Ski]

Whatever happens today, for once I am happy.

The conference in the UK must have led to some frank discussions and some great learning, from all perspectives. This is a very good sign. I am also very happy that Wilf, Lind and Hammes all met, and that there was greater discourse for the common good.

We're all in this mess together, and new theories, ideas and strategies should be discussed at length. Whether 4GW is a theory based to last is unknown.

Norkfolk/Wilf:
There is a critical lack of education (ie; officers with History degrees) within the American officer corps. We do not prioritize the learning of history in university, and even fewer learn on their own on their own time once commissioned. It's a tragic flaw that can be easily corrected if driven from the top...instead of West Point graduates having a mandatory engineering degree, make West Point graduates have a mandatory history degree.

[Cavguy]

There is a critical lack of education (ie; officers with History degrees) within the American officer corps. We do not prioritize the learning of history in university, and even fewer learn on their own on their own time once commissioned. It's a tragic flaw that can be easily corrected if driven from the top...instead of West Point graduates having a mandatory engineering degree, make West Point graduates have a mandatory history degree.


I'm not a West Pointer, but I know plenty get non-engineering degrees. I think that went away in the 19th century.

Hacksaw told me the other day the sociology dept (which includes history at WP) has the most graduates of any at WP. (He was a prof there).

[Steve Blair]

Yeah...the mandatory engineering focus did slip from WP some time ago.

What I think it speaks more to is a disconnect in how we teach history, and the neglect of it at the lower education levels. Many high schoolers don't get a good history foundation, and then when they hit the university level they get a couple of semesters of sanitized PC history and then crushed with the full spectrum of diversity history without a good foundation. By that I mean many universities don't bother to offer any sort of historiography instruction until a student is a junior or senior. By that time they've most likely fallen into one of the many splinter groups of historical instruction (environmental history, women's history, lower East Coast disenfranchised lower-caste Irish history....you get the idea) and the tools come too late. Or they get grabbed by a series of "my way or the highway" ideologues, and learn only how to parrot the professor's line of thought.

My attachment to the idea of MW as the USMC put it out was that it encouraged people to think about how they fought. They at least tired to give people the tools they needed to evaluate a situation and to conduct their own historical analysis. It wasn't in-depth, but it was at least a good starting point. It may have gotten hijacked along the way...but the original intent was (I think) good. It's the lack of background (often not the fault of the individual student...more the instructor) that I mentioned above that (to me) led to some of the failings we've identified.

Still not a big believer in 4GW, though.;)

[Hacksaw]

Cav Guy misheard when we were discussing West Point Curriculum...

Dept of Social Sciences confers (or at least used to in the mid 90's) the most degrees (Economics, International Relations, and American History). In fact if memory serves correctly these were the three most popular majors at the Academy and (as coincidence or not) were all apart of the Sosh Dept. As a side note the Department's motto (translated) "Nothing Human is Alien"

That said, I also offered the opinion when I taught there that what USMA offered was a first rate Liberal Arts curricula (exactly the right education). This used to chafe plenty of my colleges at the time; I'd be interested to see how they feel after 5 years of war "in and amongst the people"

Whether serendipitous or not, I find it ironic that cadets were way ahead of the power curve in determining what was a relevant education

[selil]

There is a critical lack of education (ie; officers with History degrees) within the American officer corps. We do not prioritize the learning of history in university, and even fewer learn on their own on their own time once commissioned. It's a tragic flaw that can be easily corrected if driven from the top...instead of West Point graduates having a mandatory engineering degree, make West Point graduates have a mandatory history degree.

I would disagree strenuously that we need more people with history degrees. According to the AHA there are like 2500 PhDs in history granted for 300 positions each year. People with a history degree have a heck of time finding a job except in the military. As a West Point faculty member pointed out to me an engineer with broad enough instruction can make a passable historian, but it will be a rare historian that can make a passable engineer.

I would strongly and vociferously support stronger history and liberal arts education for all degrees including science, technology, engineering math (STEM). I am one of many graduates from an ABET accredited computer science degree program who got all of four or five liberal arts type courses all categorized "for engineers".

I think some of the problems we are having currently with American society and educational goals can be summed up in two words "educational specialization". At most doctoral granting institutions general education degrees are not even offered above undergraduate levels. The upside down pyramid of education from general to ultra specific is now the rule. Philosophers and neo-renaissance individuals need not apply. The principle works for getting tenure, but hampers creativity leading to gaps never to be filled.

[Granite_State]

Whatever happens today, for once I am happy.

The conference in the UK must have led to some frank discussions and some great learning, from all perspectives. This is a very good sign. I am also very happy that Wilf, Lind and Hammes all met, and that there was greater discourse for the common good.


Likewise, what was the conference if I may ask?

And while West Point doesn't require that you major in engineering, it does only hand out a BS, not a BA, correct? I know when I went for a look there, must have been 1999, everyone took three years of engineering, a ton of math and science, and ended up with a BS regardless of major. Has that changed?

[Hacksaw]

Tons of Math and hard science is still true, not sure on BS vs. BA, then again not sure it matters. They get two years of language, history, philosophy, 4 yrs english, economics, ap, and ir all as part of base curricula.

[Ski]

I think it was up until 5 years ago that West Pointers had to have either a BS in Engineering or at least a minor in an engineering speciality. I think it changed in 2002/2003 - a greater choice of degrees.

While I agree with the comments regarding greater liberal arts educations for all officers, I stand by my initial comment. We need more history majors in the officer corps. Small wars require an in-depth knowledge of a country's history in order to understand why the country operates the way it does.

By no means do I want an officer corps specialized in one subject too heavily - like everything else in life balance is required. I honestly do not care about post-military employment possibilities. There is no requirement for cradle to grave security blankets - and the smart individual could use get advanced degrees in other subjects as well.

Steve Blair is correct - history is taught poorly in the US, from grade school through undergrad.

GS - the Royal Marines hosted a conference on their upcoming deployment. Lind, Hammes and Van Creveld were supposed to be in attendance although I heard MVC had to decline at the last minute.

[Ken White]

...While I agree with the comments regarding greater liberal arts educations for all officers, I stand by my initial comment. We need more history majors in the officer corps. Small wars require an in-depth knowledge of a country's history in order to understand why the country operates the way it does.So do large wars; one still deals with other nations. I agree that a broader knowledge of history within the officer corps is important and needed.
...Steve Blair is correct - history is taught poorly in the US, from grade school through undergrad.True. However,Sam is also right, History PhDs are in oversupply -- BUT a glaring lack of knowledge of even elementary history in most Americans is woefully obvious and needs to be rectified. Effort at the Middle and Secondary levels really needs emphasis...

[Steve Blair]

However,Sam is also right, History PhDs are in oversupply -- BUT a glaring lack of knowledge of even elementary history in most Americans is woefully obvious and needs to be rectified. Effort at the Middle and Secondary levels really needs emphasis...

I'm not talking about PhDs....I'm talking about stuff that should be at the basic BA/BA level (if not lower). Personally I think we have way too many PhDs and MAs/MSs running around as it is. Better to beef up the basic education and put more qualified BA/BS people (and especially better-qualified high school grads) in the field.

[selil]

By no means do I want an officer corps specialized in one subject too heavily - like everything else in life balance is required. I honestly do not care about post-military employment possibilities. There is no requirement for cradle to grave security blankets - and the smart individual could use get advanced degrees in other subjects as well.

Then you are not talking about accredited and sanctioned higher education nor should they be given a diploma. Higher education is supposed to be about serving society not just the military and even if it is a military academy it must be more even within the focus of its mission. If the curriculum does not meet certain fairly rigorous standards then it will devolve to little more than vocational training.

[Vic Bout]

geography was the "it" discipline. The study of spatial relationships. Can't get any better than a field that let's you fill in the blank...as in "Gee, Dad, I really wanna study the Geography of Sunni tribes in north-central Iraq"

Back in the day, classically trained military officers were taught the finer art of sketching terrrain...(when they they weren't conversing in latin over tea and riding horses over wog infantry formations)

[Ski]

Higher education - if paid for by the military, in turn paid for by you and me and 299 million other taxpayers - should focus on making the military the best and most successful it can be.

I agree with your comment otherwise.


Then you are not talking about accredited and sanctioned higher education nor should they be given a diploma. Higher education is supposed to be about serving society not just the military and even if it is a military academy it must be more even within the focus of its mission. If the curriculum does not meet certain fairly rigorous standards then it will devolve to little more than vocational training.

[Ski]

Agreed. I would also add that there are too many professors teaching history that have ossified since gaining tenure.

I remember taking a history course in undergrad that discussed the over-specialization of history. This is also a major problem. Again - balance is the key. No one really wants to read or know about "The 47th Infantry Brigade Dining In Ceremonies, A Historiography from 1842-1996." But damned if I haven't read - and possibly even authored :o - a few papers of this nature.


I'm not talking about PhDs....I'm talking about stuff that should be at the basic BA/BA level (if not lower). Personally I think we have way too many PhDs and MAs/MSs running around as it is. Better to beef up the basic education and put more qualified BA/BS people (and especially better-qualified high school grads) in the field.

[Norfolk]

To a limited extent, I will echo Ski on the necessity for properly-schooled History and -related degree majors, though I would not take it to the extent of making such a degree a mandatory requirement. As Steve points out, the fundamental problem begins in elementary and secondary school, where the scant history taught is usually rubbish. I would argue from personal experience that things more often than not actually deteriorate at University-level, even at the Graduate level. That said, there are some Universities (and some professors) that do a good job at teaching real history, and not the pseudo-history that has more or less taken over the discipline over the past 40 years or so.

I will also echo Ski, again to a limited extent, on the point of degrees taken by officers and officer-candidates. It really burned my butt to see so many young officers with degrees for anything except either History, Military or Strategic Studies, or Political Science carrying on with apparently little or no awareness of what their profession really entailed, or any genuine desire to pursue professional self-improvement. Checking a stack of books out of a library to read in your own spare time is hardly an onerous burden, although I will admit that finding the time to read said books - and to ponder their lessons - can be difficult at times. Work, family, and life in general tend to conspire against it, but motivated learners almost always find a way around this.

I wonder if Gian;) is in a position to have his history students (or better yet, to intercede with WP's Commandant with a view to the Corps of Cadets) read the German Army's classic leadership and operations text from 1933, H.D.v. 100/1 Truppenführung I. Teil (Troop Leading, Part I) (http://cid-20167beb77da6d98.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/H.D.v.%20100%201%20Truppenf%c3%bchrung%20I.%20Teil %20%7C5Troop%20Leading,%20Part%20I,%20U.S.%20Army% 20Translation%7C6,%20German%20Army,%201933). CGSC has a on-line copy of that jewel, which the U.S Army translated from the German way back in 1936 (and subsequently used in its preparation of the 1941 edition of FM 100-5, Operations). Wow, if only I had that puppy in my possession when starting out back in the early '90s.:wry: And all the advocates of MW Theory should, if they haven't already, read Truppenfeuhrung, as well as the Red Army's 1944 operational masterpiece, PU-44 Polevoy Ustav Krasnoy Armit, Volume 1, (Red Army Field Regulations, 1944) (http://stinet.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA354524&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf); Tuchachevsky's PU-36 is great in theory, but PU-44 is how Deep Battle worked in reality - and against the Germans.

As an aside, doesn't CGSC still tend to favour science/technical subjects in its entrance examinations, or has that changed in recent years?

All that said, the finest Infantry Officer that I ever met was a Chemistry major, and as a mere Captain he was sent to instruct at the CF Staff College in Toronto (he was the Battalion S-3 for only about two months before he was poached by higher for that assignment). When he resigned his commission (remember, this was the Canadian Army of the 90's), it was a huge shock, and it was a definite loss for the Army (and the Regiment). Now he's a salvage diver making good money at the family business on Lake Erie. As such, it of course depends rather less upon what degree (if any) an officer holds, than upon the officer's inclination and ability to properly educate himself.

When officers spend their free time on the golf green, or at the Rotary Club, but spend little or no time even reading on matters that contribute to their professional development, that's wrong. Instead of hanging out with the lads, or chatting up the Colonel, they should be studying (except when they've earned a well-deserved break). Sadly, it'd the old game where career-enhancement and professional development are two very different, and often mutually-exclusive, things. As Ken, Don Vandergriff, et al., ad neauseum like to say, it's the personnel system (and not just in the US Army, either).:(

[Ken White]

but will plead guilty. :D

Y'know, that's a good post -- and thanks for the links, BTW -- as it brings up a critical point I've often wondered about. How much better off would all the Anglophone Armed Forces be if all the golf courses on bases and posts were removed...

Seriously.

[Ski]

Norfolk,

Everyone gets to go to CGSC now. There is the year long course at Leavenworth, but there are three new courses designed for other functional areas - these folks spend about four months at Leavenworth, and then another 3-4 months at places like Lee for loggies, Belvoir for Force Management officers, and I think there's one at Gordon but am unsure at the moment.

I'm headed to Leavenworth in 8 weeks. No entrance exams at all - just a set of orders. There is a pre-test that is required...but I don't think it's anything strenuous.

[selil]

I wish I could go to CGSC, heck I wish they'd let me go to platoon leader course. Anybody who could arrange that next summer would be my hero.

[Norfolk]

I wish I could go to CGSC, heck I wish they'd let me go to platoon leader course. Anybody who could arrange that next summer would be my hero.

Mine too, Sam.:) I'd take a desk, chair, and a coffee mug set up in a broom closet if it were offered to me, provided I had full access to Leavenworth's libraries and DB's. Sneak me in under the job title Ft. Leavenworth, US Army, Golf Course FOREX Groundskeeper (and then I'd take care of another little bugbear regarding officer education...the groundhogs, or groundhogs and explosives/incendiaries, can be your friends, too...;):D) Course, I'd need the help of the groundhogs to break me out of that other Ft. Leavenworth establishment shortly thereafter.:wry:

[Ron Humphrey]

Mine too, Sam.:) I'd take a desk, chair, and a coffee mug set up in a broom closet if it were offered to me, provided I had full access to Leavenworth's libraries and DB's. Sneak me in under the job title Ft. Leavenworth, US Army, Golf Course FOREX Groundskeeper (and then I'd take care of another little bugbear regarding officer education...the groundhogs, or groundhogs and explosives/incendiaries, can be your friends, too...;):D) Course, I'd need the help of the groundhogs to break me out of that other Ft. Leavenworth establishment shortly thereafter.

Just being able to be here and have that access is immensely beneficial no matter what your job title. I think I heard their always looking for librarians and instructors, so never hurts to try;)

[selil]

I'll finish my doctorate next spring or fall... I wonder if I could take a year to teach there.... hmmmm

[Old Eagle]

CGSC regularly advertises for "title X" instructors. 2 yr contract w/ possible extensions.

[Hacksaw]

They expect a student load increase and are actively looking for CGSC instructors (I think in each department, but not sure). If interests and credentials coincide, you should definitely go to www.usajobs.gov. Not to mention it would increase the size of our non-virtual gatherings. Speaking of which CAVGUY has been delinquent, its time to counsel the young padawan.

[Cavguy]

Mine too, Sam.:) I'd take a desk, chair, and a coffee mug set up in a broom closet if it were offered to me, provided I had full access to Leavenworth's libraries and DB's. Sneak me in under the job title Ft. Leavenworth, US Army, Golf Course FOREX Groundskeeper (and then I'd take care of another little bugbear regarding officer education...the groundhogs, or groundhogs and explosives/incendiaries, can be your friends, too...;):D) Course, I'd need the help of the groundhogs to break me out of that other Ft. Leavenworth establishment shortly thereafter.:wry:

Interestingly, Canada is sending a rep to be a part of the COIN Center here, in addition to the Canada LNO. Unfortunately, he's already been selected and arrives this summer.

And Hacksaw, I'll start a post today on another get together.

[120mm]

I would disagree strenuously that we need more people with history degrees. According to the AHA there are like 2500 PhDs in history granted for 300 positions each year. People with a history degree have a heck of time finding a job except in the military. As a West Point faculty member pointed out to me an engineer with broad enough instruction can make a passable historian, but it will be a rare historian that can make a passable engineer.


Q: Do you know what an Engineer calls a guy with a History Degree???

A: "Boss"

I find that engineers and other technical types make horrendous leaders. Partly because of lack of perspective, partly lack of "soft" skills" and partly because technical types tend to idealize solutions.


I would strongly and vociferously support stronger history and liberal arts education for all degrees including science, technology, engineering math (STEM). I am one of many graduates from an ABET accredited computer science degree program who got all of four or five liberal arts type courses all categorized "for engineers".

IMO, the single biggest downfall of the US education system, is that largely technical subjects are taught "in a vacuum" if you will. EVERY subject, to include Math and the "hard" sciences should be mastered as history, first. I grew up frustrated with mathematics, until I was exposed to math in the context of Airplane Mechanics, and later as the history of Mathematics. The most common thing I've heard kids say is "WTF do I need to know this crap?" and the math teacher seldom is equipped to give a satisfactory answer.

Historians make excellent researchers and analysts. And it annoys us when computer geeks hijack our language and use "analyst" when they mean "fellow computer geek". ;)

[Fuchs]

I agree the intention was honest enough, but look where we are today. Boyd is applauded in ways that just make no sense given the evidence, and the facts. Lind came up with 4GW, which actually harmed understanding, and I won't even start on the OODA loopy garbage.

The intervening years have given us Maneuver Warfare, which once you actually break it down is an arbitrary collection of the obvious with a few attractive myths thrown in.Wilf

Sometimes old stuff needs a new, fashionable package to be seen.

Every - absolutely every - concept outside of hard scientific natural laws seems to be exaggerated. That's how things work. You won't be heard and won't get funds for research or sell books by stating the obvious in an unspectacular manner. Extreme concepts have a much larger audience potential (they need to please the people to realize this potential).

Practitioners don't need a perfect theoretical framework, and it's obvious that such a thing didn't exist any more since the Great War.
It's like the history of universal geniuses; the mankind had individuals who knew everything that was known about sciences till the 18th century - afterwards, we knew too much to fit this knowledge into one mind.
I believe we need to accept that the art of war will forever be a mosaic rather than a one-volume publication as in earlier times.
And every mosaic will have have an unrepresentative colour if looked at in isolation.

[Cavguy]

Okay,

Probably stepping into a minefield here.

I was reading Selil's blog (http://selil.com/?p=410) on the new Boyd book coming out and it got me thinking.

First, I'll admit ignorance similar to I had on EBO (http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?t=5128) a few months ago. I've heard of OODA (big shrug of shoulders, failed to see how it could change my life in any away) and know he was a deep thinking fighter pilot who concentrated on how to do things faster/better/more efficiently. I also understand he was a magnetic personality, kind of a Tony Robbins for the military.

What continues to puzzle me is the almost Jesus-like devotion (http://www.d-n-i.net/dni/2008/02/02/boyd-blogging-bonanza/) to the man by certain groups and organizations, like DNI (http://www.d-n-i.net/dni/)and others (http://www.chetrichards.com/c2w/). Reading some of the fanboi material I am wondering what he has done besides develop the OODA loop that makes him worthy of such reverence. I found this on an amazon.com review (http://www.amazon.com/Science-Strategy-War-Strategic-History/dp/0415371031/ref=ed_oe_h) -


Personally, after becoming acquainted with Boyd's work (I carry printed copies of his only published work, an essay called Destruction and Creation, in my computer bag read while traveling---giving copies to clients and friends) my business has changed and to a great extent, my life has changed. Boyd's method of synthesizing data from disparate sources has helped me to help clients solve problems and exposed me to areas I would have never investigated otherwise.
This book is important and highly recommended. (emphasis mine)

Frankly, the level of messianic devotion of Lind & Co. kind of makes me wary of the stuff surrounding him. The tone of many of the DNI publications is invested with a certainty of opinion that rivals Paul Wolfowitz.

A recent paper discussed here termed him "The greatest American military strategist". A pretty strong assertion.

So educate me (I'm prepared to be convinced) - what is the big deal?

[carl]

I am a bit baffled too. I read a biography of him and concluded that he gave a hell of a briefing, could articulate things well that guys like Grant, Chamberlin and Forrest had a demostrated mastery of and was a hell of a stick and rudder man. The legend came apart a little too when it was explained how he was able to pull off his fabled trick of putting a guy on his six then turning the tables on him in a very short time.

The only thing I can figure is the devotees' never read much about the Forrests of old or of other pilots. (the sayings attributed to Forrest "keep up the scare" etc., are the best.)

[carl]

Oh, I forgot. To me, his best work was the first thing he did, whereby he explained the things good pilots did to beat not so good pilots so the not so good pilots could get better.

[sullygoarmy]

CavGuy...I'm sure a marine type can jump in here but working with the Marine Version of BCTP (MSTP)...they worship his OODA loop. Every class they gave us involved something with the OODA loop. Easier to remember than MDMP I guess.

Remember, this is also big stuff if you are a civilian...very sexy. Observer, orient, decide and act....makes a great t-shirt for a weekend offsight.

[Ski]

A message board thread cannot devote enough space and time to Boyd's work.

Have you read all his briefs (available on DNI)? Read both of his biographies, and Osinga's book if you have a chance.

Is Boyd a messiah? No way. Is he relevant? yep. Is he a great theorist? IMO, yep.

My biggest beef with Boyd's work is that it is overly complex, and not easily translated into the 9th grade reading comprehension standards in the military, so people get confused and blow him off. Kind of plays into the "Fuzziness or Fraud" thread that Col Waters started a week ago about maneuver warfare which isn't a surprise as maneuver warfare tenets are pure Boydian.

[Cavguy]

A message board thread cannot devote enough space and time to Boyd's work.

Have you read all his briefs (available on DNI)? Read both of his biographies, and Osinga's book if you have a chance.

Is Boyd a messiah? No way. Is he relevant? yep. Is he a great theorist? IMO, yep.

My biggest beef with Boyd's work is that it is overly complex, and not easily translated into the 9th grade reading comprehension standards in the military, so people get confused and blow him off. Kind of plays into the "Fuzziness or Fraud" thread that Col Waters started a week ago about maneuver warfare which isn't a surprise as maneuver warfare tenets are pure Boydian.

I've looked through most of the DNI stuff and came away confused - mostly. I guess I didn't see anything radical.

I didn't want to invest more of my reading time (yet) until I had a better idea of what he has done to warrant the devotion.

[ericmwalters]

I think the tone and terminology of religion is exactly appropriate here--"Jesus-like devotion" and "messianic" in particular. Because there are two things that Boyd's disciples (and that is a good term to use) exhibit: (1) there is salvation in the military "gospel" of Boyd and (2) a desire to "spread the good news." And I think you'll find, much like the early Christian church, two kinds of disciples: (1) those that knew Boyd (typically these are the most devoted) and (2) those who didn't but find his message addresses a great deal of their personal warfighting needs.

If you have the kind of itch that the Boyd message will scratch, you'll become one of the converts. If you don't, you won't. It's as simple as that.

As for me, I never got to meet John Boyd, but was tutored by some of the "disciples"--Mike Wyly, Bill Lind, John Schmitt, and Bruce Gudmundsson in particular...I've got my faded, dog-eared copy of Boyd's "Green Book" (a xeroxed collection of stuff he wanted people to read before he'd give his marathon lectures). I have an equally worn copy of Lind's/Wyly's MANEUVER WARFARE HANDBOOK. Back then when all this started we didn't have the commentators that we eventually got. This was all we had.

Apart from MW, Boyd's ideas on Energy-Maneuverability theory (and corresponding mathematics) and fast transients changed the way we evaluated, designed, and built fighter aircraft. The fact that he pushed this design philosophy through an entrenched Air Force bureaucracy that resisted him at every step makes him something of a hero in those circles. His guerrilla-style staffwork in the Pentagon after he retired, taking only the minimum of pay that would allow him to maintain a security clearance, made him an example of self-sacrifice that few saw before or since. That and his embullient, lively personality endeared many to him (and alienated many more).

His work in facilitating "fast transients" in fighter aircraft led to wider applications of the OODA loop into command and control as a whole. This concept--and it's application--is still only dimly understood by most and gets its most thorough treatment in Franz Osinga's book. It resonated with a lot of uniformed guys who saw the best diagnosis of what went wrong in Vietnam and contributed both to the Defense Reform Movement and to the "maneuver warfare" movement in the US Marine Corps. As I mentioned in the Discussion Board thread on "Fraud or Fuzziness?" it doesn't resonate nearly as well outside that context. This is why classic MW advocates always talk about it in the context of its theoretical opposite, attrition warfare (which is seen as personified in our conduct of the Vietnam War).

Certainly he's had the widest impact of anyone else within the U.S. in the late 20th Century in terms of military theory (admittedly, there's not a lot rivals for that title). I"d personally disagree that he's the greatest American military strategist--his contributions were not directly influencing American strategy, but American military theory that had (at best) an indirect influence on strategy, predominantly on military ways and means. But the Cold War thinkers like Herman Kahn, Bernard Brodie, etc., I think have that label of "strategist" best applied to them.

At issue (at least for me) is how well his ideas have translated into actual practice. Within the Marine Corps, we have those who will argue we got enough to make us more successful: Ray Smith in Grenada, Mike Myatt in the Persian Gulf War, and Jim Mattis in both the early days of Afghanistan and in the invasion of Iraq. All these men demonstrated practical mastery of "German School" MW tenets. Perhaps more importantly, the rest of the USMC understood enough to facilitate/support the kinds of things these men were doing--there was enough institutional inclination there as a result of MW to allow that style to be used in combat.

Of course, this is just a thumbnail sketch--to get a really good idea, one must read the books. I don't yet have the Roundtable book that Selil talks about in his blog that Cavguy mentions, but I'd have to recommend BOTH Grant Hammond's (http://www.amazon.com/Mind-War-John-American-Security/dp/158834178X)AND Robert Coram's (http://www.amazon.com/Boyd-Fighter-Pilot-Who-Changed/dp/0316796883/ref=pd_sim_b_1)biographies of Boyd, as well as James Burton's THE PENTAGON WARS. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pentagon_Wars) Those three books will explain Boyd's direct and immediate impact the best. As far as the ripples that flowed in all directions, we'll see if the Roundtable book addresses those.

[William F. Owen]

A message board thread cannot devote enough space and time to Boyd's work.
If we can do if for Clausewitz I suspect we can do it for Boyd.

Have you read all his briefs (available on DNI)? Read both of his biographies, and Osinga's book if you have a chance.
I have read all three, and they leave me unimpressed. I will admit to reading Osinga's book only once.


Is Boyd a messiah? No way. Is he relevant? yep. Is he a great theorist? IMO, yep.
If someone can show me an original or great theory, he authored, I am all ears.

In my opinion, Robert Leonhard is simply light years ahead of Boyd because he has contributed original, insightful and useful work, that you can read in books.

My biggest beef with Boyd's work is that it is overly complex, and not easily translated into the 9th grade reading comprehension standards in the military, so people get confused and blow him off.
I have no beef with Boyd. MY beef is with those who advocate him out of a sense of fashion, and mostly have little experience or knowledge with the wider and mostly more useful bodies of military thought.

Clausewitz is not simple either, but I get him. Most people criticising Clausewtiz haven't read his work thoroughly and/or discussed it with others.
Boyd left very very little written work to "not get".

He left presentations that are now presented by others, and were constantly evolving.

Kind of plays into the "Fuzziness or Fraud" thread that Col Waters started a week ago about maneuver warfare which isn't a surprise as maneuver warfare tenets are pure Boydian.

Boyd used the words "Manoeuvre Conflict". I can't think of one tennet of MW which is original to Boyd, or even if it is, withstands scrutiny. Most of what Boyd said about MW was put into writing by Lind.

What aspects of the conduct of Land Warfare are "Boydian" in nature? I can't think of one.

[Steve Blair]

Boyd's impact on aircraft design and theory was huge. I've never been convinced that he should have made the leap to ground warfare. As Eric points out, he did inspire a number of (in my opinion) better land warfare theorists, but I honestly don't think he was at their level. I've read Coram's book, and also had to slog through the DNI copies of Boyd's presentations for a class, and found little original in his thinking once you left the aviation field. He pulled some threads together, and certainly had the "fighter pilot mojo" to use on his followers, but I'd never call him a great American military strategist, let alone THE greatest.

I also tend to think that the OODA stuff also played well with those who were captivated by Lidell-Hart's indirect approach. I get what Boyd was trying to articulate, but I also think that there are limits to its application, and far too many of his followers overstep those limits.

[Umar Al-Mokhtār]

IMHO was he believed that institutions can often get enamored of a particular theory or doctrine which then tends to morph into dogma. He read widely and thought he better saw the "big picture" of historical military events and their application to current military thought.

Wilf is sort of right when he points out that Boyd offered no original or great theory. His Energy-Maneuverability theory was applied to fighter aircraft development, particularly the F-15 and 16. I do feel much of Boyd's work is insightful and useful, just not enough to place him on some sort of pedestal.

I agree with Cavguy, just going through Boyd's briefings can be confusing since they are absent the "voice over" he provided (they are not stand alone works).

I think through his "marathon" briefings Boyd merely tried to get folks to think more holistically about the lessons that can be gleaned from past conflicts, and that there were certain parallels to be found. Plus, the briefing was constantly being updated right up to Boyd's death, since he felt that nothing was static and that lessons could be constantly drawn.

As to the deification of him, I like to think Boyd would be the first to raise the BS flag on that... :D

[Cavguy]

IMHO was he believed that institutions can often get enamored of a particular theory or doctrine which then tends to morph into dogma. He read widely and thought he better saw the "big picture" of historical military events and their application to current military thought.

Wilf is sort of right when he points out that Boyd offered no original or great theory. His Energy-Maneuverability theory was applied to fighter aircraft development, particularly the F-15 and 16. I do feel much of Boyd's work is insightful and useful, just not enough to place him on some sort of pedestal.

I agree with Cavguy, just going through Boyd's briefings can be confusing since they are absent the "voice over" he provided (they are not stand alone works).

I think through his "marathon" briefings Boyd merely tried to get folks to think more holistically about the lessons that can be gleaned from past conflicts, and that there were certain parallels to be found. Plus, the briefing was constantly being updated right up to Boyd's death, since he felt that nothing was static and that lessons could be constantly drawn.

As to the deification of him, I like to think Boyd would be the first to raise the BS flag on that... :D

Interesting perspectives so far.

Energy/Maneuver. As it sounds that isn't really new - Sun-tzu really covered it in his concept of "chi", didn't he? There is an energy/spirit (there is no good translation for "chi") that is a key factor in military victory, gaining that is key.

I am sure he was a good/great leader/man, a patriot who worked hard for his country and as I understand was the champion of the F-16 as a fighter. I guess I have yet to see anything about what makes him so unique to rise to the "great" at an enduring level.

Secondly, borrowing from Eric's "religious" analogy - religious philosophies "call" us to do something - to change somehow. What is the simple "change" Boyd is calling for, other than to simply make decisions faster than the enemy can react?

[selil]

I'm not a Boydian but I do have interest in decision science. Beyond maneuver warfare, and in the world beyond the military there is an abundance of business decision science literature. How to make good decisions. Yet within my own discipline of information technology and security topics there is a dearth of any type of decision literature. How do you respond quick enough to threats when they are literally happening at the speed of light? The only answer is to get inside of the attacker process (as those happen at human speeds) and outwit or out think an adversary. From the Stoic philosophy scholars, to the John Dewey meta-cognition models, to Boyd and OODA my discipline is less worried about great military thinkers of dubious distinction and incredibly interested in strategies we woefully have under represented. Boyd provides frameworks that are pretty mobile and flexible. Right or wrong I'm not really sure as I'm still thinking about it. The "Round Table Book" though did provide insights that I didn't find in Corams book, or Burtons book. Like why Boyd didn't write a book which seems to be some of the consternation within this thread.

[Steve Blair]

Boyd also tended to react harshly to anything he saw as waste or foolish spending. Coram's book spends some time on this, including his marathon fights with the Air Force brass regarding aircraft design and what he saw as foolish modifications to sound designs (the F-15 and F-16 spring immediately to mind, but it's also worth remembering that one of his disciples played a major role in designing the A-10). I think it was that side of his personality that attracted followers, too.

Boyd in my mind is rather like Poole...a great synthesizer of ideas from a variety of sources but only original in a handful of cases. Boyd's originality is to my mind greater than Poole's, but they are in many ways similar.

[William F. Owen]

Boyd also tended to react harshly to anything he saw as waste or foolish spending. Coram's book spends some time on this, including his marathon fights with the Air Force brass regarding aircraft design and what he saw as foolish modifications to sound designs (the F-15 and F-16 spring immediately to mind, but it's also worth remembering that one of his disciples played a major role in designing the A-10). I think it was that side of his personality that attracted followers, too.

Boyd in my mind is rather like Poole...a great synthesizer of ideas from a variety of sources but only original in a handful of cases. Boyd's originality is to my mind greater than Poole's, but they are in many ways similar.

I would never challenge Boyd's take on fighter design (...yet...). If I wanted to design a a "dog fighter" (silly word) I'd have asked Boyd or better yet, Pierre Sprey. On EM theory, credit where credit is due. Boyd knew his stuff as a fighter pilot.

H John Poole wrote one of the most useful and original books ever, on dismounted infantry operations, with "The Last 100 Yards." Very, very good indeed. My own copy has doubled it's weight in Post-it notes!!

He then wrote some stuff that was vastly variable. Some good, some very poor and some beyond the area where he excels. It sells well, but I see little merit in it.

[Cavguy]

All good stuff. I still haven't seen anyone articulate/demonstrate on why DNI's materials, such as "FMFM-1a" usually contain statements like this:

"
America's greatest military theorist, Air Force Colonel John Boyd, used to say,"

No one has given a specific, concise version of what Boyd did that is new that merits such claims. I looked through the "briefs" on DNI and couldn't make much sense of them, only to be told I had to "see him in person".

I've learned that if one can't explain his/her idea briefly and what its relevance is then there is a problem with the idea.

[Uboat509]

I've learned that if one can't explain his/her idea briefly and what its relevance is then there is a problem with the idea.

Shhhh, they'll hear you.

[Steve Blair]

All good stuff. I still haven't seen anyone articulate/demonstrate on why DNI's materials, such as "FMFM-1a" usually contain statements like this:

"

No one has given a specific, concise version of what Boyd did that is new that merits such claims. I looked through the "briefs" on DNI and couldn't make much sense of them, only to be told I had to "see him in person".

I've learned that if one can't explain his/her idea briefly and what its relevance is then there is a problem with the idea.

Quite simple...they drank the Kool-Aide.....:eek:

[slapout9]

Link to LE paper on survial stress reaction vs. OODA loop. I was taught this back in the 80's and it comes from a medical theory from the 1930's. The four steps are:
1-perception
2-analyzing and evaluating
3-formulating a response
4-initiate a motor response
makes alot more sense to me this way then observe,orient,decide,act.

http://www.emich.edu/cerns/downloads/papers/PoliceStaff/Shift%20Work,%20%20Stress,%20%20Wellness/Survival%20Stress%20in%20Law%20Enforcement.pdf

[zenpundit]

CavGuy wrote:

"I've learned that if one can't explain his/her idea briefly and what its relevance is then there is a problem with the idea."

Hmmm...could be a self-referential example:D

On a serious note, the highest value that I see in Boyd's work was modeling the ethic of being a continuously learning, adaptive, thinking, competitor in a dynamic environment. Something that was very much against the cultural, organizational, grain of the U.S. military at the time, not to mention society at large.

Still does, in some quarters.

Boyd's "original" ideas or insights relate more to the OODA Loop and E-M Theory (if we are going to disallow the latter based on Sun-tzu and ch'i then I guess much of the credit for early twentieth century physics should go to Democritus) while his briefings were definitely examples of synthesis.

Most constructive or innovative thinking, including in the sciences, derives from synthesis, not analysis though both are useful cognitive tools that everyone should have in their kit.

[reed11b]

Boyd did a good job documenting structure and C2 themes and correlations (i.e. smaller independent formations and decentralized control) of successful military organizations. I feel that some of his broad conclusions are based on themes and correlations however. Neither equals empirical evidence. For all that, he invites and creates open thought and debate on tactics and structure that had been stagnant in the Army for a while. He also broke out of the "gaming simulation" that had been a favorite of Duprey and reminded us that war is fought by men. This may actually be his greatest contributions in my eyes, even if most of his tactical ideas are later found wanting.
Reed

[ericmwalters]

Cavguy wrote:


Energy/Maneuver. As it sounds that isn't really new - Sun-tzu really covered it in his concept of "chi", didn't he? There is an energy/spirit (there is no good translation for "chi") that is a key factor in military victory, gaining that is key.

That's not what Boyd was working on or what he meant by the term. Energy-Maneuverability (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy-Maneuverability_theory)theory was completely different. He was quantifying the amount of potential energy that a specific aircraft (i.e., "Aircraft Specific Energy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft_specific_energy)") accumulated--and how fast it accumulated it for specific Air Combat Maneuvers. Likewise, he quantified how much and how fast that potential energy was converted into kinetic energy for certain ACM. I'm going to get overly simplistic here, but some aircraft add energy better than others in various dive profiles--the old F4 Phantom II immediately comes to mind. When the F4 pulled up into a climb out of those dives, it could use a good bit of that accumulated potential energy to help carry it up faster in the climb. E-M theory explained why F4s did so much better fighting in the vertical plane (climbing and diving) to negate the tighter turn radius of their MiG opponents fighting in the horizontal plane, especially at low altitudes. His mathematics changed the way we think about and compare aircraft to each other--mathematics we still use today.

Wilf writes:


In my opinion, Robert Leonhard is simply light years ahead of Boyd because he has contributed original, insightful and useful work, that you can read in books.

Well, I'm a fan of Bob's work which is the most understandable articulation of contemporary tactical military thought, but his books are not without flaws. I could get into that in another thread if anyone is interested so I won't tangent off the current thread here. He knows what my quibbles are; nevertheless, I was heavily influenced by him and it's reflected in my own professional writing. But Boyd has gotten far more exposure--and far more impact--than Bob Leonhard has. At least so far. We'll see in about thirty to fifty years from now.

Indeed, the most irritating thing about Boyd's work is that he left us next to nothing. Those briefs are hollow shells without his verbiage ("speaker notes") behind it. Or even the man behind it, as he could handle questions quite well. There's no body of work that he's written. So we rely on "the disciples" to interpret him and expand upon what he said. Christ wrote not a single book of the Bible and we know of him through his disciples and the interpreters ever since. Yup, the religious aspects really do appear to apply here.

People's frustration ("What's the big deal?") is certainly relevant and germane because--to those well-read in the art of war--we read Boyd's interpreters and shrug our shoulders. So what? Don't we all know that? Didn't we all know that? Like I said, if you don't have the kind of itch that Boyd's ideas were meant to scratch, he doesn't do much for you.

But to appreciate why he had the impact that he did, you have to put yourself back into the climate that existed in the Pentagon/DoD when he got there. Robert McNamara had implemented a heavily systems analysis approach to readiness and procurement--that, plus the natural inclination to package programs to Congress in ways domestic politicians could understand--seemed to pervert the force development process. There was a very heavy atmosphere of distrust about military advice; to McNamara and his followers who remained even after he was gone, what the military guys had to say seemed too fuzzy and "unsubstantiated." Read H.R. McMaster's terrific book DERELICTION OF DUTY (http://www.amazon.com/Dereliction-Duty-Johnson-McNamara-Vietnam/dp/0060929081) and Lewis Sorley's HONORABLE WARRIOR (http://www.kansaspress.ku.edu/sorhon.html) for some necessary insight into what it was like to be a senior uniformed official in those days. And you can imagine how this translated into the action officers who served them. James Burton's book THE PENTAGON WARS (http://www.amazon.com/Pentagon-Wars-Reformers-Challenge-Guard/dp/1557500819)is a good discussion of the latter.

So in walks "Genghis John" who has both the formidable quantitative skills and the historical background to detect any statistical hocus-pocus, and the burning, unquenchable desire to stop the B.S. going on that seems to substitute for sound military planning in "The Building." He embarrassed the hell out of people, and they didn't like being made fools out of. But his arguments were typically far better grounded than theirs were, and so demanded attention. When seniors tried to ignore him, he didn't play fair and often bureaucratically ambushed them. He proselytized through his "marathon" briefings which basically got people to think--if nothing else--gee, he's a really smart guy. If he doesn't like something, we better at least pay attention.

The reason those briefings were so long is that--and it's embarrassing to say this--most military people in the U.S. simply don't have a broad understanding of the art of war. Not really. The schools just don't give it to you. Much of this kind of understanding has to be achieved through a lot of self-study, which most don't have time to accomplish. And the DoD civilians had even less background. So Boyd had to lay some very basic theoretical groundwork that he should not have had to do in his briefings to establish the necessary context for where he was trying to go.

In my mind, Boyd did two things that are somewhat enduring, and I'm sure there will be discussion thread posters here who will disagree. The first is that he took "classic" art of war theory and added to it recent scholarship and thinking from a wide variety of fields. Osinga and Burton both talk about this, but Osinga really lays it out the best (and it also makes him hard to read if you are not familiar with the source books/theories). So Boyd "modernizes" a lot of old thinking. Now some will not be impressed by this, and I understand that. Some will wonder why that was necessary or even useful. I will tell you, if you've ever worked in the five-sided puzzle palace and you have a grip on military history and the art of war, you know why he had to do it. Using modern science, modern scholarship, modern/contemporary ideas were much "shinier" to the systems analysis oriented decisionmakers--it was harder for them to refute Boyd when he was quoting all this stuff. Had he stuck to the classics, he would have sounded like the old dusty generals they'd blown off previously.

Proof of his impact is that much of Boyd's ideas and terminology crept into DoD documents and planning--albeit often imperfectly. Leonhard has not so far enjoyed that kind of exposure and adoption, although I'd agree with Wilf that he deserves better than this.

The second thing is his theory on command and control and the nature of violent competition, shorthanded into the "OODA Loop"/"Decision Cycle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OODA_Loop)." This is very complex idea that gets simplified and a lot is lost. Interestingly, the Soviets were looking at the very same things within their "Troop Control" military science, so I'm not sure who should get credit for the concept--Boyd or the Russian theoreticians. There's another master's thesis/PhD dissertation topic for somebody. I understand the OODA Loop is very much at issue and there are a lot of good criticisms of it. But I won't be able to address that here--I'll do it in the OODA Loop discussion thread over the next several weeks. Suffice it to say that those of us in the command and control business had to think of things differently because of that work--indeed, we'd not had the depth and focus that was needed before this particular theory was articulated. Was it a new theory? While the idea behind it isn't, the way it was discussed/applied was--and was a necessary foundation for both German School and Soviet School MW. But this brief summary isn't going to satisfy the skeptics, so I'll have to explain much more over at the other thread.

[Entropy]

From my perspective (intel), Boyd's EM work was really ground-breaking. Although often associated with fighters and dogfighting, EM theory can be used for any powered, maneuvarable aerodynamic body. The same basic EM diagram showing the performace of an aircraft is also used to model performance of missiles, for example. This quantitative analysis made all kinds of new tactics possible. Instead of relying on the "book answer" for the range of a surface-to-air missile, for example, EM theory allows the intel folks to model the missile's limits which allowed the identification of vulnerabilities. EM theory is really a foundation of almost all our air operations.

[Cavguy]

Cavguy wrote:



That's not what Boyd was working on or what he meant by the term. Energy-Maneuverability (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy-Maneuverability_theory)theory was completely different. He was quantifying the amount of potential energy that a specific aircraft (i.e., "Aircraft Specific Energy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft_specific_energy)") accumulated--and how fast it accumulated it for specific Air Combat Maneuvers. Likewise, he quantified how much and how fast that potential energy was converted into kinetic energy for certain ACM. I'm going to get overly simplistic here, but some aircraft add energy better than others in various dive profiles--the old F4 Phantom II immediately comes to mind. When the F4 pulled up into a climb out of those dives, it could use a good bit of that accumulated potential energy to help carry it up faster in the climb. E-M theory explained why F4s did so much better fighting in the vertical plane (climbing and diving) to negate the tighter turn radius of their MiG opponents fighting in the horizontal plane, especially at low altitudes. His mathematics changed the way we think about and compare aircraft to each other--mathematics we still use today.

Thanks! I stand corrected. This is why I learn a lot from these threads!

[Cavguy]

From my perspective (intel), Boyd's EM work was really ground-breaking. Although often associated with fighters and dogfighting, EM theory can be used for any powered, maneuvarable aerodynamic body. The same basic EM diagram showing the performace of an aircraft is also used to model performance of missiles, for example. This quantitative analysis made all kinds of new tactics possible. Instead of relying on the "book answer" for the range of a surface-to-air missile, for example, EM theory allows the intel folks to model the missile's limits which allowed the identification of vulnerabilities. EM theory is really a foundation of almost all our air operations.

Okay, this is the tangible "so what" I am looking for. (same with Eric above).

[Umar Al-Mokhtār]

this might also answer your "so what:"


People's frustration ("What's the big deal?") is certainly relevant and germane because--to those well-read in the art of war--we read Boyd's interpreters and shrug our shoulders. So what? Don't we all know that? Didn't we all know that? Like I said, if you don't have the kind of itch that Boyd's ideas were meant to scratch, he doesn't do much for you.


For those who are fairly well read, or educated, in the military arts Boyd's military history work might be a bit interesting, but there are no revelations in it. I feel his briefings were more targeted at those who were not very well read in the military arts.

In one area where Boyd influenced the Marine Corps (ironically the service who embraced him more than his own) was to sow the seeds of thought. It was around the time Boyd was briefing in Quantico that the Marine Corps began encouraging Marines to read more, through the publishing of the Commandant's Reading Lists for various grades. That would be books with a lot of big words and not too many pictures. :D

[William F. Owen]

Well, I'm a fan of Bob's work which is the most understandable articulation of contemporary tactical military thought, but his books are not without flaws. I could get into that in another thread if anyone is interested so I won't tangent off the current thread here. He knows what my quibbles are; nevertheless, I was heavily influenced by him and it's reflected in my own professional writing. But Boyd has gotten far more exposure--and far more impact--than Bob Leonhard has. At least so far. We'll see in about thirty to fifty years from now.

I don't agree with all Bob writes either. His Network centric stuff leaves me concerned, and mystified, but so what? There is no requirement in modern military thought to convince Wilf Owen. I'd still hold Bob's work to be some of the most important of the last 40 years.


People's frustration ("What's the big deal?") is certainly relevant and germane because--to those well-read in the art of war--we read Boyd's interpreters and shrug our shoulders. So what? Don't we all know that? Didn't we all know that? Like I said, if you don't have the kind of itch that Boyd's ideas were meant to scratch, he doesn't do much for you.

Could not have said it better myself, and when I did say almost this, on a Zenpundit Blog, there were howls of outrage!

[selil]

:People's frustration ("What's the big deal?") is certainly relevant and germane because--to those well-read in the art of war--we read Boyd's interpreters and shrug our shoulders. So what? Don't we all know that? Didn't we all know that? Like I said, if you don't have the kind of itch that Boyd's ideas were meant to scratch, he doesn't do much for you.

Could not have said it better myself, and when I did say almost this, on a Zenpundit Blog, there were howls of outrage!

Perhaps because figuratively smacking people around because you know something they don't know or have a different opinion about something that may be important to them is the equivalent of smacking a six year old around because they don't know calculus. Never mind the fact that philosophy, inspiration, education, and so much more are of value to a society even if not understood by an individual.

[CR6]

Perhaps because figuratively smacking people around because you know something they don't know or have a different opinion about something that may be important to them is the equivalent of smacking a six year old around because they don't know calculus.

If grown professionals in the defense community demosntrate the same grasp of military theory as a six year old in a calculus class, perhaps they deserve a figurative smack.

What I learned of Boyd from PME, as well as Hammond's and Corrum's books, made me respect the fact that he fought for what he believed in, invested a great deal of effort in his self-development and shared what he knew. Where the Boyd "myth" (an inprecise term, but I lack a better one at the moment) breaks down for me is the point where Boyd fans present his concepts as if everything that came before is irrelevant. It reminds me a little of Vizzini inThe Princess Bride (http://www.neloo.com/fannesite/bride1.html), "Have you ever heard of Thucydides? Mahan? CLAUSEWITZ?...Morons!"

[selil]

If grown professionals in the defense community demosntrate the same grasp of military theory as a six year old in a calculus class, perhaps they deserve a figurative smack.


I think that is taking the analogy a bit far. The issue as I see it is knowledge centric hubris. The equivalent is that "You know Boyd and I know Clausewitz therefore you know nothing of importance". As pointed out to me many times, which translation of Clausewitz, what about Sun Tzu, Clausewitz is better considered and adapted versus applied strictly and all the rest of what I've called "The Clausewitz Caveats". Yet that intellectual honesty is not being attributed in several posts here toward Boyd.

Consider the whimsical Wilf and his comments that he went to zenpundit and told them Boyd was basically worthless (mildly edited) and was surprised at the vehemence he was subjected to. Imagine my surprise that taking a proverbially squat on something people are studying and trying to understand causes some form of censure (It was the book editors website for gosh sakes). Of course about once a week somebody does the same thing to my entire career field so I might be more sensitive to the ramifications.

Consider the squad component thread. It has spiraled around, and around, and around with thematic reversals for a long time. Nobody intellectually thrashed on that or even mentions the circular nature of the engagement. It is interesting to watch the discussion evolve and re-consider elements again and again. Yet now that we are talking about ideas and proponents of particular thinking strategies the cognitive effort evaporates and now anybody who discusses Boyd must defend concepts. There is no need to defend what is basically opinion in a shifting conceptual environment where ideas can be discussed without salience shifting to recalcitrance.

Unless the council is not capable of holding two or more competing concepts in their minds and weighing each on its merits without having to decry one or the others as foul for failure in cognitive intelligence. I'll hold up Clausewitz, Fochs, Liddel-Hart, Boyd, Sun-Tzu and others while I compare and contrast and accept what I can use and still not have to make any of them justify their existence. I don't have to reject all others to accept one. That is what the discussion appears to be leading towards. Rather than trying to discuss why it appears to be trending towards justify.

But, please do continue it is quite interesting and who knew a 57 page book and a review would cause so much amazing discussion.

[wm]

I think that is taking the analogy a bit far. The issue as I see it is knowledge centric hubris. The equivalent is that "You know Boyd and I know Clausewitz therefore you know nothing of importance". As pointed out to me many times, which translation of Clausewitz, what about Sun Tzu, Clausewitz is better considered and adapted versus applied strictly and all the rest of what I've called "The Clausewitz Caveats". Yet that intellectual honesty is not being attributed in several posts here toward Boyd.

. . .

Unless the council is not capable of holding two or more competing concepts in their minds and weighing each on its merits without having to decry one or the others as foul for failure in cognitive intelligence. I'll hold up Clausewitz, Fochs, Liddel-Hart, Boyd, Sun-Tzu and others while I compare and contrast and accept what I can use and still not have to make any of them justify their existence. I don't have to reject all others to accept one. That is what the discussion appears to be leading towards. Rather than trying to discuss why it appears to be trending towards justify.

This guy named Donald Davidson makes what I think is a very interesting point in an essay entitled "The Very Idea of a Conceptual Scheme." He suggests that we actually do a lot of "charitable" interpretation--that is, we presume that we understand what the other person holds for beliefs, etc. when they say things. We then engage in a give and take that allows us to reach some consensus position of understanding. I think that is what happened in the Squad threads.

It seems that a little less charity is being expressed in the various threads about Boyd, OODA, MW, etc. My take on this is that the acrimony in a debate varies inversely to the stakes/outcome of the debate. IOW, lots of folks have a lot of "skin" invested in the expanatory power of Boyd, Clausewitz, Sun Tzu, etc, but the cash value of that "skin" is actually quite small. On a day-to-day, non-academic basis, having one of them be more right really doesn't amount to much in how successfully we get along in the world of prosecuting warfare at the tactical level.

[William F. Owen]

Perhaps because figuratively smacking people around because you know something they don't know or have a different opinion about something that may be important to them is the equivalent of smacking a six year old around because they don't know calculus. Never mind the fact that philosophy, inspiration, education, and so much more are of value to a society even if not understood by an individual.

I strongly resent the implication that I have "smacked" anyone around.
I submit that most, if not all, the material I reference in my scepticism of Boyd , is extremely well known and widely read.

If someone if going to tell me that John Boyd is one of the "greatest military theorists," and is making that statement while being unfamiliar with the works of Clausewitz, Sun-Tzu, and BLH, at the very least, then why should I spare their feelings, by merely pointing them at the content of those works?


Consider the whimsical Wilf and his comments that he went to zenpundit and told them Boyd was basically worthless (mildly edited) and was surprised at the vehemence he was subjected to.

"Whimsical Wilf" did not go to Zenpundit. I was invited by Mark Safranski to Zenpundit to post a challenging or competing view point, as he felt such was lacking. Frankly, I felt it reasonable to expect more intelligent responses than I received. - but I apparently I live and learn.

The reason that Boyd is challenged is, for exactly the reason CAVGUY gave at the start of this thread. I also started a similar thread sometime last year. Why is he considered so great?

For the same reason, I have a great deal of scepticism about Basil Liddell-Hart, and to a lesser extent Fuller.

[Cavguy]

It seems that a little less charity is being expressed in the various threads about Boyd, OODA, MW, etc. My take on this is that the acrimony in a debate varies inversely to the stakes/outcome of the debate. IOW, lots of folks have a lot of "skin" invested in the explanatory power of Boyd, Clausewitz, Sun Tzu, etc, but the cash value of that "skin" is actually quite small. On a day-to-day, non-academic basis, having one of them be more right really doesn't amount to much in how successfully we get along in the world of prosecuting warfare at the tactical level.

WM,

I have very little vested in any of the methods talked about, except perhaps Slapout Based Warfare. ;)

Seriously, what prompted this thread was my confusion over the near sainthood of John Boyd by certain organziations, and their strong claims that he was America's greatest military theorist.

I was simply asking someone to justify why/if this was so (I admitted some ignorance) and trying to separate hyperbole from fact about the man, his work, and influence.

It seems from the resulting discussion (which ties into the MW discussion) that most of the veneration comes from a time when the military thought culture had degenerated into decision matrices, checklists, COFM's, and other linear tools that were teaching individuals what to think, not how to think.

From what I have gathered Boyd began a counter-revolution against this, adding the "art" back into warfare in his lectures and writings. The USMC, in an intellectual rut, adopted this philosophy after some "Young Turks" (Lind, et al.) convinced the USMC to make "Maneuver War" the central tenant of its doctrine instead of attrition tactics. Maneuver War as implemented by the USMC was heavily influenced by Boydian thought.

As Eric stated, it was needed medicine and perhaps an oversold in an effort to change the mindset of a force. Now that that correction has happened in some ways, the devotion and passion of its proponents seems a little extreme to those who didn't grow up in a stats based military (like me), and are skeptical of anyone claiming to have it all figured out.

It seems to me Boyd was a charismatic, no-BS type of guy who didn't have patience for stupidity and things that don't work or are inefficient. Through force of character he managed to change some military culture for the long term. I admire that.

However, I haven't yet seen anything to justify that he is the "Greatest American Military Theorist" that Lind & Co. claim him to be, or why I need to adopt a "Boydian mindset" above all others.

[Steve Blair]

However, I haven't yet seen anything to justify that he is the "Greatest American Military Theorist" that Lind & Co. claim him to be, or why I need to adopt a "Boydian mindset" above all others.

I would suggest that some of this comes from the impact Boyd's personality had on the individuals in question. My "drink the Kool-Aide" comment earlier was facetious in a way, but also intended to point out the impact that Boyd's personality had on people. From what I've read, he was one of those people that you either loved or hated. There was rarely any middle ground. This may in some small extent explain the appeal he had for the Marine Corps, which has a tradition of charismatic mavericks, and the violence with which many in the Air Force establishment rejected him (he wasn't a systems guy in their sense of the term).

One of the more interesting parts of Coram's book is his examination of Boyd's main acolytes (and that's the word he uses for them...and also if memory serves one they used for themselves). If you read that, it might help explain why Boyd has the impact on some people that he does.

[Eden]

I have to say this has been one of the most stimulating threads I've followed in a while, and one of the reasons why I keep coming back here when I should be working. The references and explanatory notes have given me a better understanding of Boyd and his work - though I have to admit I have never been a fan.

I also have to note that, through no fault of his own, Boyd's influence has had an insidious effect on the US military. Like apes with loaded sidearms, some Boyd adapters with an imperfect grasp of his principles did positive harm. The OODA loop, for instance: you can draw a fairly direct line between it and some of the nonsense concepts we've had to deal with over the last decade or so, like accelerated-decision-making, recon-pull, and perfect SA. It has infected planning, acquisition, doctrine, and organization.

Not that that is a lick on Boyd, any more than I blame Clausewitz for trench warfare in WWI. It's just that some ideas can be dangerous in the hands of the dim.

[Entropy]

However, I haven't yet seen anything to justify that he is the "Greatest American Military Theorist" that Lind & Co. claim him to be, or why I need to adopt a "Boydian mindset" above all others.

Personally, I'm inherently skeptical of any an all claims that so-and-so are the "greatest" at anything, though maybe Michael Jordan and Pele' are exceptions ;). IOW, the level of influence a particular theorist has is pretty subjective. I don't know who the "greatest American military theorist" is and furthermore I don't really care - it doesn't really matter in the end.

[Ken White]

...Not that that is a lick on Boyd, any more than I blame Clausewitz for trench warfare in WWI. It's just that some ideas can be dangerous in the hands of the dim.were never spake... :wry:

[ericmwalters]

Entropy writes:


IOW, the level of influence a particular theorist has is pretty subjective. I don't know who the "greatest American military theorist" is and furthermore I don't really care - it doesn't really matter in the end.

Oh, so true...but this isn't any fun!

Feel like going back the the beginning of this thread, trying to figure out where the appellation of Boyd being "the greatest American military theoretician/strategist" came from. It must matter to somebody. I don't count him as a strategist by any means, although he did talk about strategy a good bit. But talking about something doesn't make you that same thing. I can talk about pro football all day long, but that doesn't make me a footballer.

The best than can be said about Boyd in this regard is--I'd argue--he counts as the greatest American military theoretician in the latter half of the 20th century. Wilf will argue that properly belongs to Bob Leonhard. So what is the criteria for "great?" He and I will probably disagree, and that's okay, because at least I could concede that Bob deserves to be a candidate/contender for that characterization. But who else would be in that field? Here's my list of contenders other than Leohard and Boyd...and none stack up given my personal criteria:

Admiral William Owens ("Lifting the Fog of War (http://www.amazon.com/Lifting-Fog-War-William-Owens/dp/0801868416/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1222448465&sr=1-1)," anyone?)
Douglas Macgregor (Breaking the Phalanx (http://www.amazon.com/Breaking-Phalanx-Design-Landpower-Century/dp/0275957942/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1222448514&sr=1-1))
Trevor DuPuy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trevor_N._Dupuy) (Quantified Judgment Model)

If I included the early 21st century, I could toss in:

Thomas Barnett (The Pentagon's New Map (http://www.amazon.com/Pentagons-New-Map-Twenty-First-Century/dp/0399151753/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1222448319&sr=1-1))
TX Hammes (The Sling and the Stone (http://www.amazon.com/Sling-Stone-War-21st-Century/dp/B001CB067S/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1222448358&sr=1-1))
Steven Biddle (Military Power (http://www.amazon.com/Military-Power-Explaining-Victory-Defeat/dp/0691128022/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1222448391&sr=1-1))
Philip Bobbitt (The Shield of Achilles (http://www.amazon.com/Shield-Achilles-Philip-Bobbitt/dp/0385721382) and Terror and Consent (http://www.amazon.com/Terror-Consent-Wars-Twenty-First-Century/dp/1400042437/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_k2a_3_txt?pf_rd_p=304485601&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-2&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=0385721382&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=01DMAAJA1J4C1EBJ11N7))

And if I wasn't so U.S.-centric, I could include people such as:

Colin Gray
Martin van Creveld
Sergei Gorshkov
Nikolai Orgarkov

and more....

Now, if I had to characterize the "Greatest American Military Theoretician" of all time (at least at this writing), it would be dirt easy--Alfred Mahan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Mahan). I'll just say right now--before the literary punches start flying--find or start another thread somewhere else on that!

Seriously, it may be worthwhile--admittedly purely for fun since it truly does not matter--to determine your criteria for what "great" means. If it will help, consider the question of who is the greatest baseball player of the 20th Century? Have fun with that one!

[wm]

WM,

I have very little vested in any of the methods talked about, except perhaps Slapout Based Warfare. ;) I didn't mean to suggest that you were one of the guys with a vested interest. In fact, I suspect that when you were leading that Tank company team in Iraq, you seldom, if ever, asked yourself a question like :"What would CvC or John Boyd suggest I do know?"


Seriously, what prompted this thread was my confusion over the near sainthood of John Boyd by certain organziations, and their strong claims that he was America's greatest military theorist. I tried to answer that. I suspect that a lot of us who did grow up in the metricized afterbirth that came from MacNamara-era MBO and zero-defects thinking were so traumatized that avoidance of critical, original thought became ingrained as a self-defense mechanism. Boyd became a hero/sacrifical lamb of sorts because he did buck the system. However, I have submitted previously that his take is really not new and is missing some critical pieces of the explanation. For one thing he doesn't explain how we get from Observe and Orient to Decide and Act in a timely and meaningful way. Second, he doesn't explain how we avoid the problem that was the motto of several of my frat brothers: "Let's do something, even if it is wrong." IOW, he does not show how we verify that our observations and orientations were properly focussed and conducted correctly. A Boydian explanation is IMHO embeds the "And then a miracle happens . . ." part of many explanations or the Deus ex machina found in too many movie plots.

[Ron Humphrey]

Are we differentiating between applied theory and theoretical constructionist here. Or does that really make a difference when trying to pin the tail on a tiger:D

[Umar Al-Mokhtār]

military iconoclast. As far as "greatest" military theoretician...eehhh maybe not so much IMHO.

He did not really come up with anything new to add to the theory of warfare, what he did was pointed out the inter-relationships and added to the never ending debate.

And the "so what" factor Wilf advanced shouldn't be taken as a smack down, he was expressing what many who are very well read in the military arts felt when looking into Boyd's briefing. Now certainly for many others it proved to be a sort of revelation; but to go back to the 6 year old analogy, if, for some reason, the kid is already fluent in calculus, when he takes the class his reaction will be 'so what I already know this stuff.' Not to smack anyone just to say 'check, got it, let's move on.'

I respect Boyd because he took on the system from the inside, he certainly played well to the dumb, cigar chomping, fighter pilot stereotype, which caused many to underestimate him. His genius lay in his ability to be a governmental guerrilla, an insider insurrectionary, a bureaucratic insurgent…and more metaphorical descriptions I can't match up right now. :D

[slapout9]

I have very little vested in any of the methods talked about, except perhaps Slapout Based Warfare. ;)


All The Way, Sir;)

[William F. Owen]

The best than can be said about Boyd in this regard is--I'd argue--he counts as the greatest American military theoretician in the latter half of the 20th century. Wilf will argue that properly belongs to Bob Leonhard. So what is the criteria for "great?"

I don't think Bob Leonhard is the greatest. If nothing else, most people have never heard of him, or even read him. I just think he is greatly more useful and insightful than Boyd, when it comes to Land Warfare.

I think Doug MacGregor does good work - again he and I strongly disagree, on some issues, but sure makes me think. The same is true of TX Hammes. I can't get around TX's 4GW at all. I have real issues with his acceptance of the idea that the historical record does not need to support the concept of 4GW.

Steve Biddle's book Military Power is good, though a bit one dimensional. I find it a very "comforting read" - but the equations and systems stuff at the end, just leaves me cold.

I would also submit Archer Jones as one of the most insightful US writers on general military thought. His Art of War (http://www.amazon.com/Art-War-Western-World/dp/0252069668), is extremely good.

I get a lot of inspiration from Colin Gray, and corresponding with him, moved me to write the "MW Fraud" article.

As Umar Al-Mokhtār points out, SO WHAT? is the acid test of military thought. Is it true? Is it useful?

From all I have read on Boyd, he seems a very honest and likeable guy. I have profound respect for his personal conduct, and his "Be someone or Do something useful - you can't do both," dicta, in that the important thing was to get the ideas out there, not take the credit for them.

[stanleywinthrop]

breaks down for me is the point where Boyd fans present his concepts as if everything that came before is irrelevant. It reminds me a little of Vizzini inThe Princess Bride (http://www.neloo.com/fannesite/bride1.html), "Have you ever heard of Thucydides? Mahan? CLAUSEWITZ?...Morons!"

The problem with this characteraztion is that, while some boyd fans may seem to forget it, Boyd's work itself is FILLED with references to, quotes from, ideas taken from, examples used, of those listed above and hundreds more of past military strategists, tacticians, and historians. The essance of his work is not some brand new thinking, but rather a synthesis of a large portion of prior military thinking. If you can do that yourself, then Boyd is irrelvent.

Back to the E-M work, remember he accomplished this as an engineer as it required a hell of a lot of math. Every fighter pilot today (at least in the west) lives and breathes the E-M theory; we have books filled with comparitive E-M diagrams of one's own aircraft vs. just about all threat aircraft in existance, comparing performance at various altidudes and combat loads, so that one can see a visible representation of his strenghts and weaknesses against that particular aircraft and develop a strategy to force a fight onto (metaphorically speaking) advantageous terrain. This type of analysis simply didn't exist before boyd.

[zenpundit]

This has been a marvelous discussion and I thank CavGuy for initiating it after reading Selil's review of the short book I edited. I've been following the thread carefully since Wilf gave me a head's up in an email and I wanted to put in a few words on some points of the debate on Boyd's relevance or importance to military thought.

I've learned a fair amount about John Boyd's thinking in the last few years though I do not have near the same level of expertise as do Boyd's collaborators like Chet Richards, Chuck Spinney or William Lind. Or that of Frans Osinga, whose book Science, Strategy and War (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0415371031?ie=UTF8&tag=zenpundit-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0415371031)is a must read for anyone who really wants to know what Boyd actually argued. I think that last point is one on which Wilf would agree.

There's been a discussion if Boyd merits being called "the greatest" or a "great" strategist or theorist. I think it's fair to say that Boyd himself would never have put forth such a claim of that kind or wasted time worrying about what people thought of him or whether he made a more significant contribution to the study of war than Colin Gray or Carl von Clausewitz. Boyd was more interested in learning, teaching and discussing conflict (moreso than just "war") and were he alive, I'm certain Boyd would be delighted with the Small Wars Council and the endless opportunities here for discussion and reflection.

Was he "great", much less "greatest" ? In his briefs, Boyd was trying to shift the paradigm of American military culture away from linear, analytical-reductionist, mechanistic, deterministic, Newtonian-Taylorist, conceptions that resulted in rote application of attrition-based tactics toward more fluid, alinear, creative -synthesist thinking and holistic consideration of strategy. Give the man his due, in his time these were radical arguments for a Pentagon where the senior brass of the U.S. Army had reacted to the defeat in Vietnam by purging the lessons learned of COIN from the institutional memory of the Defense Department.

To me at least, looking from a historical perspective, that's great. In a world with a population now close to seven billion, where the United States maintains a relatively small but expensively trained professional military, remaining wedded to attrition warfare would seem to be losing strategic bet. "Injun country" doesn't just have more Injuns than we have cowboys, they have more Injuns than we have bullets in the six-shooters our cowboys use. Moving the USMC away from an exclusive focus on attrition - and in the long run large portions of the Armed Services - by itself would lead me to use the word "great" in describing John Boyd's work.

Is Boyd a "strategist" or a "theorist" ? Historically, the 20th century is an anomaly because the Cold War and the advent of nuclear weaponry caused the center of gravity of strategic thinking to shift away from generals and admirals and toward statesmen and social scientists - except for George C. Marshall, our great postwar strategic thinkers were entirely civilian: George Kennan, Dean Acheson, Paul Nitze, Albert Wohlstetter, Herman Kahn, Bernard Brodie, Thomas Schelling, Henry Kissinger, Richard Nixon and so on. The U.S. military reacted to the overriding strategic impetus of potential thermonuclear warby retreating psychologically away from the messy complexity of the world into a surreally compartmentalized military professionalism allegedly devoid of politics, economics and other questions considered routine variables by generals in past ages of warfare.

Boyd's briefs, however pedestrian this very self-selected group may find his military history, argued for that messy complexity properly being at the center of military thought. Moreover, and it's kind of amazing no one has mentioned it, Boyd hammered at how revolutions in science were changing society and were going to ultimately change warfare. I'll buy that there were a few other colonels or flag officers at the time Boyd was briefing who were deep reading military classics in an impressive way but I'm skeptical that the potential impact of complexity theory or Kurt Godel on operational art were frequent topics of discussion before Boyd wandered in with some briefing slides. He's a theorist. About what? Strategy.

Much of Boyd's work is modeling a process of dynamic synthesis, of continual learning and adapting competitively and reaching to fields further and further away from "pure" military concerns in order to generate new insights. That's been criticized in this thread repeatedly as lacking in "originality" ( except at the time, no one else was doing it). That was a feature, not a bug, gentlemen. If the U.S. military then or now was overflowing with creativity, novel problem solvers and was a true "learning organization" - to borrow Dr. Nagl's phrase - then Boyd would fail the "So, what" test.

In my humble opinion, the military, while a good sight better on the "learning" score in 2008 than in 2004, still has a ways to go.

[Norfolk]

Boyd might be accurately described as both a great air power theorist, and a great military reformer of the late 20th century. The Aerial Attack Study and the E-M Theory are landmarks in military aviation, and his efforts in reintroducing the military to many of the military classics (partially or largely neglected or ignored during the 60's and into the 70's) have gone a long way to at least putting them back on a competitive footing with the systems analysis/managerial styles of thinking so dominant over a generation ago. If anything, Boyd might be described as the Great Tutor, at least to the USMC, if not quite the rest of the US Armed Forces, and as someone who tried to impress upon military minds that war was and is fundamentally an art. Science is there to support that Art, not to displace it. I expect that Boyd would be rather upset with some of what some people have tried to do with his observations. In any case, however, the institutional amnesia of the Armed Forces at the time predisposed open minds to receive Boyd as the font of verboten knowledge.

Wilf wrote:


As Umar Al-Mokhtār points out, SO WHAT? is the acid test of military thought. Is it true? Is it useful?

Or put another way, can you make it, work? And if so, when, where, and how? At the risk of crossing over into the MW thread, some very promising theories or concepts may be difficult or impossible to put into practice, and for a variety of reasons: deficiencies in leadership, discipline, and training; lack of forces or resources; political constraints or considerations; the characteristics, conditions and circumstances of the AOR; the Enemy who gets a vote in this; and last, but certainly not least, CvC's friction. Guderian's ideal of defeating the enemy by destroying his "nerve centres" rather than outright physical destruction of his forces in the field is the classic example of a concept that was great, but impractical. In the event, the Germans had a difficult enough time trying to prevent the escape of Russian troops (who tended either to rejoin their own armies, or to become partisans harrying the German LOCs) from the great encirclements that Armoured Forces made so much easier to achieve than in the past. Similarly, von Manstein performed brilliantly at a number of places; the Crimean campaign was a marvel of manoeuvre - amongst other things - but Sevastopol itself had to be taken the hard way, by the methodical destruction of an enemy that could not be readily turned out of his positions or his defence critically incapacitated by the loss of certain "nerve centres". Months were spent just making the preparations, during which time manoeuvre was more or less out of the question anyway. Second Kharkhov lies somewhere in between the example of the Crimean Campaign as a whole, and the Siege of Sevastopol in particular.

In any case, when some of the finest generals of the 20th century, commanding some of the finest troops of the time, found themselves with little or no choice but to engage in "attritionist"-type methods, then it is vital to accept that not only do concept have limitations - known or unknown - but that there will always be greater or lesser limitations on when, where, how, and by whom those concepts can be used, if at all. I doubt that Boyd himself was not acutely aware of this, but I fear that many of those who have drawn upon his work may not possess this same degree of awareness, let alone an acceptance, of, certain persistent and often irreducible limitations on how workable theories or concepts may be in frail human hands. Personally, I'm more or less fine with Boyd, and some of his work is must-know when dealing with air power matters. As to his role in promoting what came to be MW Theory, I'm still okay with that to the extent that he was trying to get people to think, and using military classics as well as his own unique contibutions to that end - though I strongly disagree with many aspects of MW Theory. I do see him restating many of the military classics from a unique perspective, which is good. I may or may not agree or disagree with his takes on these, but that the way thing's work.

However, to go so far as to claim that Boyd is the "American Sun-Tzu" or at least the "Greatest" of his time or whatever is at least premature; some of his observations and propositions may require a good deal more time to become fully relevant (or at least clearly observable), and some of his (and especially some of his followers') observations and propositions are limited in their practicality or suffer from some critical flaws, just as virtually all theorists do. To echo Selil, Boyd is someone (amongst many others) whose observations and theories are something to be kept in the tool box for use when, where, how, and to whom, they may be useful and workable. Boyd himself took this same approach, and it's the right one

[slapout9]

I have located the suspect and he is doing a lot of talking but want answer any questions. The link below is to Boyd Himself giving his Conceptual Spiral presentation. They are numbered 1-8. The one below starts you off, from there just follow the numbers. The audio is not that great but nothing I can do about that. Later Slap..world greatest detective and stuff:D




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_fjaqAiOmc

[slapout9]

Link to zenpundit blog about how Glenn Beck is using John Boyd's Strategy construct of 3 levels. The Moral...The Mental...The Physical. The Moral is the first and most important and if you get that right all else will follow?


http://zenpundit.com/

[zenpundit]

Here's the permalink to the original post by Lexington Green:

http://chicagoboyz.net/archives/15295.html

FWIW: Lex's primary interest is politics and history but he is a serious aficianado of military history, especially 19th century British/Victorian period. His site, Chicago Boyz, a large conservative group blog, has occasionally been graced by familiar names like Wilf Owen, Chet Richards, Gian Gentile and Steve Metz. I post there too on occasion.


Here's the permalink to my post which links to both Green and Beck:

http://zenpundit.com/?p=3524

Personally, I don't know much about Beck, never having watched him, beyond what is said about him in the media/online (I'm not all that interested in writing about domestic political foodfights). Lex may be on target in terms of identifying Beck's intention or Beck's actions might just fit into Lex's larger analysis of a potential political strategy. Either way, it was a thought-provoking, if partisan, analysis.

[slapout9]

Zen, I don't know how much he knows about Boyd either, but he does use classic UW Propaganda techniques extremely well, Bob's World would recognize them instantly. He also boasts of having extensive ties to the Special Operations community:eek: how true that is I don't know. He uses my 3F technique(the relationship between family,friends and finances in criminal/political organizations) using a blackboard,chalk and pictures with absolute precision.....but often draws the wrong conclusions.:( But he definitely has struck a chord with the American public.

[slapout9]

From Zenpundit.

http://zenpundit.com/?p=3526#comment-21169

Link to GB's post from Friday....read the part about MLK pledge and how this goes with SWC own Robert C. Jones many post on MLK.
http://www.glennbeck.com/content/articles/article/198/39452/

[SWJ Blog]

Announcement: Boyd & Beyond 2012 Conference (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/announcement-boyd-beyond-2012-conference-0)

Entry Excerpt:



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Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/announcement-boyd-beyond-2012-conference-0) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
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