If it's with Chris Barnes' question, then I would have to say the moral-ethical, and political-cultural domains (as much as I loath the domain-speak) are most important. For, if we exist as profession to do this (BTW I think we do):

Quote Originally Posted by William F. Owen View Post
the application of violence in the service of policy? - the ONLY job armed forces have.
Then it is curious why we should, as a profession, ignore the context in which we apply force. What if a given application of force will actually undermine the current policy goal? How would we know?

Is this the solution? To assume that

Quote Originally Posted by William F. Owen View Post
your policy is ALWAYS ethical.
seems to me to be self-defeating. At the very least, we should agree that policies that would lead to defeat, less security etc aren't ethical. Also, if I take your "ALWAYS" to mean in all possible cases, then we might have another problem. Certainly there is at least one case, or even a small set of cases in which the policy in question will not be ethical.

What I think is lacking in our Army is precisely the understanding we need to turn tactical action into effective strategic responses to the hybrid threats we face. For my money, this is because the Army has, for too long, assumed that all policy is, ipso facto (had to use my own latin), ethical and worth killing and dying in service to it.

Regards,
Bob