The Warden Collection (merged thread)

[slapout9]

"This is another major pathology in current Systems theory applications to the real world. IT has varioous forms - "you look for your wallet under the street light because you can see there, even though you know you heardit dropp a block back in the dark" or the "This is the thing we all agree on as a potential effect to generate this cause, so therefore it has a high probability of actually being a cause." The implication of that is that if enough people agree on something, it then physically manifests itself (which is something sports fans in particular are susceptible to ) "

That is not really Systems theory, that is Human behavior theory. That is why he has consistently said to stay away from such actions.

[Ken White]

Cliff:

But you can still create a model of any system, and attempt to apply probabilities to it.

Can you define the 'you' quoted?

Can you insure that the 'you' involved will always be someone competent to make the judgements required?

I submit that if the answer to the first question is not 'whoever is in the chair at the time' and the answer to second question is not anyone of 'moderate intellect with experience in the efforts to be undertaken' then the concept is flawed. A strategic conceptualization that does not itself prepare to contend with the vagaries of humans is unlikely to provide an effective approach to dealing with problems or situations involving humans. If a concept takes an exceptionally capable person or persons to make it effective then it is likely to fail at any time employed by lesser beings. There are a lot of those about...

I've watched the US Army among others try to develop mechanistic theories to improve planning and other capabilities. None of them really worked well, mostly because attempts to make people think in mechanical terms, to apply metrics to everything, simply are rejected by most minds. Some people think like that, the vast majority do not and will subtly resist being forced to do so.

This question from Cliff deserves an answer and I'm sure pvebber has one:

So we should throw up our hands and give up? What do you suggest as an alternative?

However, in the interim, my answer is "pretty much what we humans have been doing for thousands of years when confronted with complex systems -- make the best judgment possible with the information available at the time." The item in bold is to illustrate another flaw in the Warden approach; to return to his background, nations and people do not react IAW the laws of physics like airplane do thus perfect or near perfect information on which to make decisions will rarely be available. In fact, generally far from perfect information is available in small quantities and some of that may have been skewed by the opponent and there will assuredly be gaps and errors in that which is available. You cannot perform Slap's "good systems analysis" far more often than you can do so...

I've long observed and we all really know that flawed input leads to erroneous conclusions which in turn drive improper responses. To use Slap's analogy, if you think the electricity is important -- and it is not -- then you can screw up. Indeed, you may do more harm than good. Conversely you may go Iraq and deliberately not attack the power system so that it can be used by you or your new friends...

pvebber:

..."theory at the theoretical level" and not be troubled to dig into the implications of that theory or the need to "roll up the sleeves" and find the devil's in the details.

Interesting observation. While I have not had the pleasure of talking to Colonel Warden, I have in encountered people in all four services who unfortunately tend toward that approach. I've met a very few who could and would adapt their theory to cope with reality but they've been the exception. I mention that to address your subsequent point:

In broad terms keeping "theory theoretical" is OK - until someone says that we need to throw out our vocabulary and rethink our concepts of doing business.

The current US Army training system was adapted from several civilian technical training theories designed ib the late 1940s to train assembly line workers. It was not appropriate for the Army even in the bad recruiting days of the mid 70s when it was adopted -- it is today totally inappropriate for a professional force. We still have it. It was a theory, it had neat slides, it was adopted by a less than stellar General (pun intended...) and as a result the Army has suffered -- I use the word advisedly -- for over 30 years with that theory. Our moderately well trained Army is as good as it is due to a lot of good leaders doing more than the system provided or required.

Point: It's not just a vocabulary issue, it's far more dangerous: 'neat' ideas get adopted and take on a life of their own.

Slap also says of Warden and applying his theory -- or any strategy -- to specious causes:

That is why he has consistently said to stay away from such actions.

Yes, he has. So have hundreds of thousands of thinkers before him, to include many in recent time. Any intelligent person would heed such advice. Yet, we went to Viet Nam, to Somalia, to Afghanistan, to Iraq. I think that goes back to who sits in what chair and when...

It's a flawed concept. Not disastrous, just not particularly helpful in many situations. It has certainly use in some cases but it is not safely applicable universally. No theory is.

[pvebber]

What is the alternative?

Here is a paper that gets at some of the issues:

http://www.necsi.edu/projects/yaneer...CSI_3_Litt.pdf

(Puts on flak vest to ward off incoming salvos targteing Martime -centric context )

[Cole]

Let's analyze COL (ret) Warden's perception that attack of the the Five Rings in the title above decreases in importance from left to right.

Leaders:
That's why we are conducting serial Predator/Reaper attacks in Pakistan and night raids in Afghanistan. Don't believe Pakistan would be nearly as receptive to parallel massive bombing of every madrassa and all of Northern Waziristan. The intelligence takes time anyway. It's hard to find a target from the air that does not want to be found. Should we have instead dropped a 2,000 lb bomb on Karzai's erring young relative and multiplied the collateral damage manyfold? Should we be bombing ISI leaders since they seem to be part of the problem? That would go over well.
Processes:
Believe that's why we attempt to replace the poppy-growing in Afghanistan with a different crop, and pursue better government as a solution to graft and warlords. It's difficult to encourage either from 40,000' or many miles off shore.
Infrastructure:
We know who gets blown up by IEDs or sniped trying to secure the host country's rebuilding efforts. The guy on the ground, not in the air or at sea. If you say, we don't need a guy on the ground, I would answer what happens when the enemy has invaded another country and still has guerillas, foreign fighters, and sympathizers staying behind? Do we abandon our allies? Now let's say the offending invader is Russia or China. Do we attack the infrastructure of invaded Ukraine or invader Russia. Russia is big and its hard to retrieve downed pilots there. They have nukes. China too! What happens to our infrastructure (Walmart) and oil supplies (Russia, Iran, Libya, Venezuela, Canada oops sorry).
Population:
Some would say that's why we have a population-centric strategy for locating the bulk of ground forces. It's more difficult to influence the population from 60,000' with a F-22 or B-2. Don't believe either has much of an EO/IR capability with stealth and altitude. How do they assure no collateral damage?

The British population increased its resolve as a result of WWII German bombing of London. A small diameter bomb can take minutes to travel multiple miles during which time targets may move near civilians or vice versa. With a "parallel" strategy and inability to perform BDA for multiple simultaneous targets, we miss failures and lose successes attributed as collateral damage by the adversary.

Fielded Forces:
Conveniently, this has the least priority because it the most difficult for airpower to accomplish. Bad guys can easily hide from airpower once their invasion is complete...and because of blitzkrieg-like ground invasions, they will nearly always be complete IN ALLIED TERRITORY, by the time a decision is made to do something about it.

So the author would say attack the leaders, processes, and infrastructure because they are more important. But the government we leave behind will simply go back to the original undesired behavior or fall again if we like that government, unless our ground forces have the opportunity to train their host nation replacements. It's insufficient to train only host nation pilots.

How long did it take us to find Saddam Hussein and would it take to locate Qaddafi or Kim Jon Il, or Chavez, or Ahmadinejad and Khameini? That last leader would go over well in the Islamic world.

If the leader is a tad crazy as many potential rogue nation leaders are, do they really care about processes and infrastructure? What if religious beliefs subscribe to an austere existence anyway, and jihadist sacrifice of the people is viewed as fully acceptable? What if they have nothing to lose anyway. Look at satellite pictures of North Korea at night to see how much electricity they have. If the enemy army is in allied territory, what stops them for living off the land and goods of the allie ala Sherman? If we ignore the fielded force sitting in allied territory ala Kosovo, and the leader is not as rational as Milosevich was, how does the war end?

Badly and with little accomplished I would respectfully submit. I would like to hear how the sniping would have stopped if NATO peacekeeping forces were not on the ground and if allied ground forces were not threatening a full scale invasion. We see how well we stopped leaders, processes, and infrastructure in Desert Storm without the full monte ground attack until completion. The Shiite populations didn't fare too well, either?

If instead of massive bombing of hidden enemies and hitting populations instead, or their infrastructure/processes (that will make long term friends) we instead attack the invading country on the ground, from the sea, and air...they are forced out of hiding where airpower, long range fires, and rapid maneuver can engage them. They are slowly choked of oil and exports by blockades. Our rapid build-up of ground forces by air initially, and eventually sea, protects ports and airheads from further invasion. Having adequate force remaining for stability operations, and keeping the "enemy" army intact and on our side to help stabilize prevents the problems that occurred in OIF and an initially neglected Afghanistan.

Just an alternative theory some call Joint and Combined Arms warfare and full spectrum operations.

[slapout9]

Posted by Cole:"If instead of massive bombing of hidden enemies and hitting populations instead, or their infrastructure/processes (that will make long term friends) we instead attack the invading country on the ground, from the sea, and air...they are forced out of hiding where airpower, long range fires, and rapid maneuver can engage them. They are slowly choked of oil and exports by blockades. Our rapid build-up of ground forces by air initially, and eventually sea, protects ports and airheads from further invasion. Having adequate force remaining for stability operations, and keeping the "enemy" army intact and on our side to help stabilize prevents the problems that occurred in OIF and an initially neglected Afghanistan."

Cole, your right. You just described Warden's Gulf War 1 Strategy. Perfect 5 rings example, works exactly as advertised.

[Fuchs]

Surely, Warden was in best Boyd tradition; vague enough that almost everybody can interpret his stuff at will, and come to the conclusion that he agrees with Warden.

[pvebber]

Cole, your right. You just described Warden's Gulf War 1 Strategy. Perfect 5 rings example, works exactly as advertised.

Well, not EXACTLY, there was the whole ground invasion thing that according to the theory was not supposed to be necessary... It particularly sticks in the airpower theorists craw that the whole "leadership paralysis" thing was the supporting effort to enable a more effective ground campaign and not the supported end in itself. Well the Way to achieve the desired end itself.

Since its inception in Douhet, the dream of airpower theory is that it make the rest of the means of war obsolete. That belief is grounded in a set of assumptions about the superiority of the coercive form of strategy over cost imposing and incentivising strategies.

The differentiating characteristic of airpower is that it provides "action at a distance". Thats is its "super power" and its "achilles heel". No matter how attractive it is to think you solve any problem with action at a distance, it is in general necessary but insufficient. Redefining the problem set to include only those cases were it might be both necessary and sufficient is not the "attainment of its potential", but defining itself out of relevance in the mainstream.

TO focus the topic on the boards subject, how would the Warden approach of a "fully capable airpower" and "unconstrained link from effect to strategy" achieve and endstate like "Eliminate the influence of the Taliban from Afghanistan" in a single, parallel operation, or "remove the threat of pirate activity from the Horn of Africa"? How do you accomplish what I consider the new "mainstream" sort of endstate the military is is asked to accomplish, with "action at a distance"?

[Cole]

Posted by Cole:"If instead of massive bombing of hidden enemies and hitting populations instead, or their infrastructure/processes (that will make long term friends) we instead attack the invading country on the ground, from the sea, and air...they are forced out of hiding where airpower, long range fires, and rapid maneuver can engage them. They are slowly choked of oil and exports by blockades. Our rapid build-up of ground forces by air initially, and eventually sea, protects ports and airheads from further invasion. Having adequate force remaining for stability operations, and keeping the "enemy" army intact and on our side to help stabilize prevents the problems that occurred in OIF and an initially neglected Afghanistan."

Cole, your right. You just described Warden's Gulf War 1 Strategy. Perfect 5 rings example, works exactly as advertised.

Two points Slap:

1) Other than the 82n ABN, it took 6 months to sea deploy to Desert Storm which did not end the problem nor did the Iraq no-fly zone. What if Hussein had continued his attack into Saudi Arabia? Early airpower and airborne or SOF forces alone would not have stopped that. Even in 1991 in atypically open terrain, it took the ground attack to dislodge Iraqi forces from defenses and Kuwait so they were more effectively bombed and strafed. Assumptions that Hussein would fall did not pan out anymore than they are now in Libya. Multiple available options from air, land, and sea complement one another and cover multiple contingencies when things don't go as predicted.

2) An easy analogy for you is law enforcement. Is there any law enforcement agency that relies on aircraft or boats for anywhere near the bulk of its efforts. Of course not, because aside from cost (also an issue) even low flying helicopters and harbor ships cannot influence the bulk of the 24/7 ground efforts or respond to and deter crimes.

Ships are slow, vulnerable near the shore, and too far from many threat country interiors and their land-based forces and insurgents. Airpower at higher altitudes and faster speeds, often with a single pilot, cannot begin to locate and effectively target ground threats in complex or urban terrain even with effective electro-optical pods.

It takes someone on the ground finding targets for them, or a slower and lower flying helicopter or unmanned aircraft with a two-man crew and extensive combat arms, intelligence, and operations personnel cueing them to fullly exploit airpower. It takes ground forces able to survive close combat to force the enemy from cover and concealment to fully exploit air attacks and long range fires.

[pvebber]

Douhet wasn't totally off, he just didn't take into account that aggressors are almost always greedy and defenders quite often stubborn. Plus almost nobody dared to open Pandora's Box (C weapons) again after WWI.

We came close in the heady early days of the nuclear era with the idea that nuclear weapons would make conventional war obsolete. The "potential" of modern airpower for some is to achieve this goal through "acceptable conventional means". Unfortunately making existential threats to bend others to one's will is a difficult thing to justify. There is more to war than the Halt scenario...

[slapout9]

it took the ground attack to dislodge Iraqi forces from defenses and Kuwait so they were more effectively bombed and strafed.

That is debatable because less than 50% of Warden's original plan survived the cut list.

Is there any law enforcement agency that relies on aircraft or boats for anywhere near the bulk of its efforts.

Yes there is one I am personally familiar with the Alabama Marine Police a total water LE agency(they do have trailers and SUv's) to haul their boats to the launch but that is about it.

[slapout9]

Let's analyze COL (ret) Warden's perception that attack of the the Five Rings in the title above decreases in importance from left to right.

That is a good idea on how to learn the process. Don't want to be critical but you were a little off as to how you would actually do one. Want to do Qaddafi as a system so you can see what I mean?

[pvebber]

The navy could easily claim to be a full military with its naval + marine air and marine ground force...

It could, but it doesn't

And as you say the only reason it could is because it has an integrated force of air-, land- and sea- power capabilities. It could not argue the dominance of seapower the way airpower theorists do (if it did I would criticize it as vociferously as I do airpower dominance advocacy).

And there is the pre-airpower sea-power vs landpower debaets - but that was not about putting the other out of business, but in essence who was "supported and supporting".

That is the real problem if his uniform was different color none of this would matter.

If you'd follow along carefully, there is much of the THEORY side of Warden I have no problem with. Its what he claims the implications of the theory are where I cease willing suspension of disbelief...

Gray gets it - Airpower is an INDISPENSIBLE, NECESSARY part of America's future fighting force and without it as an enabler, the rest of the services are unable to play their role. I'm all over that!

That is a far different thing from saying that airpower will is SUFFICIENT to achieve our strategic goals.

Failure to do so will con#demn airpower to suboptimization and deprive its owners of using force in such a dramatically different way that will achieve
national objectives quickly and at minimum cost.

This statement is exemplary of the 'implication' problem. Even the 5-rings theory enabled the fog and friction of war to be lifted, there is nothing in the theory that justifies the leap from "what is good about the theory" to enabling the owners of airpower to use force ina "Dramatically different way" and bypass the need for "battle".

That is a good idea on how to learn the process. Don't want to be critical but you were a little off as to how you would actually do one. Want to do Qaddafi as a system so you can see what I mean?

Please - I'm all ears. I WISH I COULD BELIEVE. I am just a poor seapower sinner yearning for his soul to be saved

[slapout9]

Please - I'm all ears. I WISH I COULD BELIEVE. I am just a poor seapower sinner yearning for his soul to be saved

If you have ever seen any business versions of the 5 rings I would be whats called an evangelist so ok, I still have chores to do today so I will start tomorrow. So until then it's time for some music. So here is Jewelle and "Who Will Save Your Soul"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LukEq643Mk