Relationship between the political system and causes of war (questions)
Hello all.
I'm currently in the process of doing a research paper for a class on war and peace. The quoted text below is my thesis. The basic premise is that the multi-polar political system has flooded the state actors with information. New technology also enables the participation of significant non-state actors, and more effective management of the information collected. As a result, the strategic aspects of intelligence will more directly influence all levels of decision making and execution ('strategic corporal'). The ways in which state actors discriminate information will dictate their actions. This creates the appearance that war has transformed, though its basic drivers remain the same.
Reviewing my thesis, I in my mind come to a resounding "duh, so what?" at the end. So my questions are:
(1) To what extent is strategic intelligence relevant to state decision making on war?
(2) In what ways has technology transformed, or modified, the relevance of intelligence, if at all? Does an increase in capabilities generate a proportional increase in dependence on the effects it enables?
(3) What is the link between the causes of war and intelligence? Are states more likely or less likely to enter conflict with more effective information management?
I've put together a list of 20 or so sources, so I'm currently wading through the waves of pages and concepts to connect all the components together. Thanks for any assistance.
Quote:
The “transformation” of warfare, its increased intensity, and decentralization originates from the increased tempo of the decision-making process enabled by technology and facilitated by the factional nature of the modern political system. Underneath the masks of ideology and religion, the fundamental drivers and components of war remain the same. The concept of hard power, operationalized by the military as firepower and maneuver, remains essentially unchanged, but now existing in the modern context of a fragmented political structure. The notion of soft power arises from the complex dynamic of political, military, and economic interactions on multiple levels, shifting focus from dominance to influence, and an orientation on the effects that may be produced by a variety of compulsive means other than physical violence. For this reason, the nature of intelligence in war has undergone the most notable transformation. The capacity to make relevant decisions more rapidly than the adversary has become of extreme importance due to the fluid and mixed environment in which war and politics now exist. Information management which enables this capacity by increasing the tempo of the decision-making process will have a decisive impact on all levels of warfighting. This paper will focus on the strategic aspects of war where the political and military aims work in collusion, and why strategic intelligence will define the security challenges of the 21st century. The method in which state actors collect, evaluate, and apply strategic intelligence will decisively judge their fate.
Regarding your questions 3 and 1
3. Depends (the classic answer) on the intel. If we had accurate info on WMD in Iraq in 2002 would we have gone to war? If we had accurate intel on Saddam's intentions prior to his 1990 invasion of Kuwait, could we have prevented it?
This leads to #1:
As a Lieutenant (back in the dark ages) I was a strat intel officer assigned to the Pentagon. We analyzed all kinds of info (political, economic, military, and informational - the classic instruments of power) from all sources for the decisionmaking political and administrative leadership. Responding to our analysis (I'm talking here about the entire intel community) they would use this as input to their policy decisions. Intelligence, of course, was not their only source of critical info. For non-denied areas, the media was often better informed than the entire intel community. This remains the case although, perhaps, the degree to which it is true may have changed. In addition to intel on friends and adversaries the decisionmakers have to take account of our own capabilities. For the military, this is coordinated through the 3 shop. As Graham Allison points out in Essence of Decision (if you haven't read it for pol sci you must;) ) Presidents are limited by the capabilities of their bureaucracies. Finally, recognize the wisdom of Clausewitz' (Saint Carl to the denisons of SWJ) in his one point of total consistency through all 8 books, that war is the continuation of policy/politics with the addition of other means.
I'll leave the other questions for others more current like Wilf.:)
Hope this was of some use.
Cheers
JohnT
Only an idiot could have won this war, and he did.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Jedburgh
You also must understand that capabilities are inextricably linked with intent. Neither intentions without capabilities nor capabilities without intentions pose a threat.
It seems to me that it isn’t always true since the Grand Fenwick Expeditionary Force had intentions without capabilities yet still managed to bring the US to its knees. :D
Jedbugh, I agree with everything you said...
Particularly this:
Quote:
"However, I have to say - excepting those areas - I agree with your point."
Kidding but you'll have to admit that was too good to pass up... :D
I'll also point out that I did caveat a tad; ""...are virtually discounted by many analysts unless corroborated by technical means. "" (emphasis added /kw)
I have met a few with some smarts and the gumption to trust their instinct and the guy who's out there; just not enough of 'em.
Quote:
Over the past few years, there have been a number of highly-visible unfortunate incidents as a result of targeting based on single-source intel that turned out to wrong – sometimes intentionally so from a manipulative source, sometimes just plain ol’ bad info. The numbers that have passed without mention is much larger. Also unfortunate is the fact that much of that originated with HUMINT.
Agree -- and I agree with your exposition of the various whys which leads us to this:
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To finally get to a point, Ken (if you’ve stuck with me this far), this ultimately breeds bias into analysts against HUMINT. Its not the fault of the analysts – it’s the fault of the system that has produced so many HUMINTers incapable of effective collection and (just as important) effective reporting.
Yes, thus we have a systemic failure that gets swept under the table. Yet again, it all boils down to the training we pay lip service too but do not do well.
On an allied note, An old Cav Colonel recently said, with respect to tactical reconnaissance; "We don't do that very well, Americans don't have the patience for it. We just go out looking for trouble and to do that, you've got to have Armor." On the surface he's correct about the national dearth of patience and he's absolutely correct about the US Army approach to combat reconnaissance since WW II. I submit that while he's correct, he's wrong on what should be -- patience can be trained; patience on the part of the kid you want to sneak about and patience on the part of senior commanders who are unwilling to take the time to do a job right -- or pay for the training so that can be done.
I think that latter bit about commanders is a big part of why a lot of Analysts like tech means; it's rapid -- and it produces something to show the boss instead of a faceless troop, handler or agent.
In both the cases of poor tactical reconnaissance and of excessive reliance on technical means, I think we have a philosophical and practical failure at high levels...
And I know we have a training quality failure...
I think we're in agreement ...
And I may have given a false impression. Intel has to be all source. The point I was aiming at is the erosion of our HUMINT capability. (Ken, we're in complete agreement on who should bear responsibility for that stupidity.)
But I will stick to the assertion that however good the other sources are, they can never completely replace HUMINT.
Rational actors and other things
Hi Entropy--
Good post. I will only take issue with you on an aspect of the rational actor approach/model. This is, as Graham Allison pointed out in his classic Essence of Decision, the realist model of international relations that has long dominated the field (Thucydides through Morgenthau and the Military decision Making Model). It tends to explain and predict better than any other single model as long as (1) the analysis is rigorous and (2) the analyst has a solid understanding of the explicit goals of the target. For example, if one had read Hitler's Mein Kampf and assumed that Hitler believed what he said in the book then all his subsequent actions were a rational strategy to achieve some essentially irrational goals. Use of the model would, under those conditions, have been an effective predictive tool - as it was for Churchill (who used it implicitly). Like Adam Smith's economic theory (which has been expanded but never overturned) the rational actor model assumes that individuals rationally seek to satisfy their interests. This works in the aggregate in economics. In IR/intel/policy it depends on a little more before the whole thing comes together. Again, Allison showed that much of what the rational actor model does not explain/predict can be explained by 2 other models: (1) organization theory and (2) an individual political model. But what he does not do is to connect the 3 models and show how they mesh in the way that Adam Smith did. For Smith the individual rationally sought to maximize his economic interest. He and his successors added the notion of the firm doing the same thing. The result was the entire economy rationally maximizing its economic interest moved "as if by an invisible hand." Realist IR theory historically starts with the state and never moves down. Allison made the move downward. The final step (and why the rational actor model explains/predicts better than any other single approach) is to bring it back up - individuals acting rationally in organizations tend to move the state into rational policies (with the caveat noted above in the Hitler example). So, the danger you note is not inherent in the model but rather in the way the analyst uses it - or misuses it, as the case may be. One other caveat - in some (few) cases what is rational for theindividual or organization is not rational for the state (or the economic system as a whole - hence the need for regulation).
The only other comment I have is related to what technology can do. Your thoughts on that express most of the dilemmas and positive results very well. (I left the intel analyst business before the advent of the PC so I only experienced deluges of paper.) But what computer technolgy can do for the analyst is to call up all reporting on a given subject. Much of what we got from Humint was F6 (old term for "source has never reported before - reliability unknown - and validity of info unknown"). :confused: this stuff was often discarded unless the analyst saw it being reported again from a different source - in which case he could/should upgrade the source and the info. But given paper files, it essentially depended on the analyst to remember. Now a click of the mouse can bring ups all reports on the subject or from the source for comparison. A good capability of technogy, I think, as long as we know enough to use it.:D
Cheers
JohnT
Me, too. Not least because at the end of the day
Quote:
Originally Posted by
John T. Fishel
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PS I did like the A - F, 1 - 6 scale. Used well it was a good shorthand but it never was scientific and F 6 was most often misinterpreted as meaning bad info instead of unknown quality of both source and info.
you could see how many F6s were laying about in comparison to all others that came in -- kept one sorta honest... ;)