Quote Originally Posted by AmericanPride View Post
Interesting topics Bill. One thought that immediately comes to mind: I think the U.S. suffers in this regard in part due to the barrier constructed between military strategy and political strategy, often leaving both military officers and political officials confused or frustrated with the other. This barrier has become increasingly destructive because of the intensification of 'political warfare' (a term I use broadly here to describe all the non-military activity taken by states to compel other states to change behavior). So, what element that has changed is that military strategy is most directly and strongly connected with political strategy than in previous generations.
Some would argue that our current operational art, despite claims to the contrary, are increasingly disconnected from political aims. I agree with that, how many times have you seen a senior officer state he or she just wants a clearly defined military objective or end state, so they can say they did their part? How many appreciate the complexity of strategy from the start and accept it is interactive, and that we must interact with all elements of national power and allies to pursue shifting political aims? I will never forget the claim from senior military officers in Baghdad in APR 2003 that they won the war and it is time to go home. If you only looked at from a military perspective their argument may have made sense. This is why you increasingly see a push to get military officers to start thinking strategically again. We have dumbed down the force with our mindless focus on task, condition, and standard, and it has percolated to the top ranks in many cases.

I just started reading "Toward a New Maritime Strategy," by Peter Haynes. So far I would give 5 out of 5 stars, but will offer a more thorough review later. He hooked me in the introduction, where he made an argument that the Navy had become too focused on threats, operations, and war fighting at the expense of thinking strategically. He reviewed the history of cold war strategy and post-cold war navy strategy. Of note, he made the point that civilian strategists in the early years of the Cold War (still a problem in my opinion) we hyper rational, ahistoric, and apolitical. He also noted strategy goals shifted from winning to deterrence and all that implies (I won't repeat it here).

Since we were freed from the concept of winning, the Depart of Defense focused on program management instead of winning strategies. Using best business practices to ensure we had sustainable positive balance of power (off set strategies, metrics, centralized decision making, McNamara's budgeting process, etc.). I'm still wrestling with all the implications, since deterrence is still a needed mainstay of our strategy, but it shouldn't be the sole aspect.

He argues, and I agree, that the military (he focused on the Navy) seems content focusing on threats, and largely ignoring opportunities to advance interests that are not relative to known threats. Haynes argues that instead we should be focused on vital strategic interests, which in the view of the Navy is protecting the U.S. international system (economic and political), which is what the U.S. derives most of its power from. If we focus on our vital interests, then we can put threats in perspective and that would seem to open a host of opportunities that we may be missing now.

More to follow, but overall I think the military strives to be apolitical and misguidedly focus solely on military objectives as though they can be extracted cleanly from political, economic, and information objectives. What we seem to be missing, and of course this is not a fresh insight, is whole of government integration.