The Price of Glory, Thru May 1916

I'm probably halfway through the battle and the book, but I figured I would drop in some thoughts.

-A recurring theme in the battle is the dominance of artillery, the combat arm that was present in our Overland Campaign study but only played a minor role. On the German side, the initial gains in the first few days were brought about by massive use of heavy artillery from prepared firing positions and supported by established supply lines. Those guns rained down 1800 lb. shells on French troops from miles away. "Men hideously mutilated by the huge German shells seemed utterly baffled by never once having seen the enemy," the author notes on p103.

On the other side, the French artillery response was almost non-existant, and certainly not coordinated for those critical first days. This didn't help the French infantry's resolve either. “The French artillery had become ominously silent, which always had a depressing effect on the infantry.” (p102) Remember that when the enterprising Sergeant Kunze stormed Douamont, the massive fort was only firing one of its 155mm heavy guns, and more importantly was firing at computed positions with no information about where the Germans actually were.

This tide only turned because logistics that favored the Germans in the beginning changed to France's advantage. The backbone of German artillery was the 420mm "Big Bertha" gun (it's where we get the term from) that from the rear lines could fire over German positions and rain down destruction on the French. But when the front line moved forward towards Verdun, planners hadn't realized that they would have to move the guns through the moonscape they had created to get within range of the new FLOT (Forward Line of Troops). Horse teams couldn't tug the guns through muddy blast craters easily, and once they were repositioned, the 1-ton shells were difficult to resupply.

On the French side, the new commander, Petain, was an artilleryman by training and coordinated French responses. With fresh 155's brought in, the French could reach the advancing german infantry without putting themselves at risk from the stranded Big Bertha's.

Perception, misperception, Jervis, Levy and Stein

Robert Jervis, “War and Misperception,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 18, no. 4 (Spring 1988), 675-700.

It's worth keeping Jervis' definition of misperception in mind while reading this article. He says misperception includes "inaccurate inferences, miscalculations of consequences and misjudgments about how others will react to one's policies."

A few interesting points ... Jervis' discussion of risk-aversion for gains and risk-acceptance for losses and the role this psychological phenomenon can play in conflict. Is this prospect theory (making decisions while dealing with risk)? Levy has an article on prospect theory and rational choice which may be useful.

An important question broached after a discussion of misperceptions in WWI and WWII: did the misperceptions cause the war? Did they even matter at the end of the day? Jervis references Stein, who argues that misperception can lead to cooperation, not just conflict, and questions whether a linkage between a misperception and an impact on the actor's behavior and final outcomes is, in fact, fait accompli.

Most of the conversation on misperception focuses on historical precedent and the Cold War guessing game. I'm interested in what our key perception dilemmas are post-Cold War. In particular, the number of conflicts we are now engaged in where misperceptions occur on a nation state level (Saddam's possession of WMD) and a sub-state/transnational level (al-Qaeda - Bin Laden actually substantiated his threats).

This week on Afghanistan

Amidst the proliferation of op-eds and blog analysis of Afghanistan, a few pieces stand out, marked with unusual clarity of thought. Kissinger's piece in Newsweek is one of those, particularly when he describes the difference between military and guerrilla strategy:

"Military strategy is traditionally defined by control of the maximum amount of territory. But the strategy of the guerrilla—described by Mao—is to draw the adversary into a morass of popular resistance in which, after a while, extrication becomes his principal objective."

Another article that needs to be added to the counterinsurgency reading list is "10 Steps to Victory in Afghanistan" featuring vignettes from the COIN heavyweights - Kilcullen, et al. Of note, the description of "Type A" and "Type B" adversaries by Merrill McPeak:

"The Type A objective of fatally weakening an opponent by destroying assets important to his success — in theory, a measurable process — is replaced in Type B war by the much more complicated, essentially unquantifiable task of defeating him"

Also note Pillar's commentary (in the same article) on Pakistani patronage. His points, while right on, seem to fall into the Type B snare of soft, unquantifiable metrics, as AFCEA's NightWatch observed.

Postscript - 06 OCT: Our classmate's reporting on the Afghanistan debate. Have I mentioned that I love the practitioner-oriented envirnoment cultivated at SSP?

Cultural theories supplement, not supplant realism

Michael C. Desch, "Culture Clash: Assessing the Importance of Ideas in Security Studies," International Security 23, no. 1 (Summer 1998), 141-170.

Desch discusses culturalism in security studies. In this nicely organized article he reviews three waves of cultural theories, three problems with assessing the explanatory power of current cultural theories, and three ways culture can supplement (not supplant, as he says quite emphatically) existing theories in national security. While the common thread of these cultural theories seems to be a repudiation of realism, Desch points out that many critiques of realism come from its own adherents, citing Schweller, in an article on bandwagoning vs. balancing (unrelated, but looks like a good discussion of Walt's "balance-of-threat" theory).

Wave I contains little detail; Wave II (Cold War) has a few interesting details. Of interest is the view at the time that the U.S. was cultural inept when it came to strategy, in contrast with the "Clausewitzian" Soviets. Vietnam was used to illustrate this criticism (there does seem to be some merit if you look at McNamara and the whiz kids trying to apply cutting-edge capabilities in a context bereft of cultural understanding). However, Desch points out the similarities between Vietnam and the Soviets' experiment in Afghanistan; and if we look at failure from a relative standpoint, we didn't come out quite as bad as the Soviets did. Wave III, being in full-swing at the time of writing, is where most of the time is spent. Question: have any of the 3rd wave views/concepts gained traction over the last decade? Faded? What is the current cultural contribution to national security studies?

Joint publications, field manuals and systems of systems

Joint Publication 3-0, Joint Planning and Operations, chs IV and V

Thanks to Matt Williams' emailed link, here's the Joint Publication 3-0 in its entirety.

Chapter IV discusses joint operational planning, operational art and design, and assessment. The level of command examined here is the joint force commander (JFC). A few misc. highlights/observations:

Joint Op Planning - uses two processes, JOPES and JOPP (Chapter III).

Interesting paper out of the U.S. Army War College on the JP 5-0 definition of CoGs, how it applies to a nonconventional warfare environment, and the relationship between operational net assessment and CoG analysis. The author has also identifed quite a few sources on the topic of CoGs in joint planning today, also useful.

Chapter V discusses planning for stability operations concurrently with joint ops planning (V-2). Is this basically an introduction to full-spectrum operations from a different angle (the planning?)

This week's Afghanistan fray

The Washington Post has a redacted, unclassified copy of Gen. McChrystal's assessment of the situation in Afghanistan. There's a text searchable version here.
Of note recently, Paul Pillar's commentary on what really constitutes a safehaven and whether Afghanistan is worth the cost to prevent from becoming one. On the other side of the spectrum, John Nagl's call for more troops.

Goldwater-Nichols and Civ-Mil Relations

Cohen, Eliot. "A Theory of Civilian Control," in Supreme Command.

Cohen reviews the main body of thought behind U.S. civil-military relations - Samuel P. Huntington (The Soldier and the State). In his work, Huntington identified a distinctive military mindset; a distinct definition of military officers as a unique profession - directly relating to the management and application of force; and two forms of civilian control over this fighting force - subjective and objective. Objective control, Huntington said, is necessary for a professional, apolitical military. Cohen summarizes the major arguments for and against this theory and offers a slightly more fluid/hybrid take on Huntington's principles, calling for a more nuanced definition of objective control.

Interesting point Cohen makes is the influence of Huntington views on the Goldwater-Nichols legislation. Question: while the intent of Goldwater-Nichols was to solidify an objective control approach to civ-mil relations, did it in fact undermine civilian control? Christopher Bourne seemed to think so in 1998, after the 10-year anniversary of the legislation, when he wrote in Joint Force Quarterly that the consequences were "reducing the checks and balances within and between the executive and legislative branches."

Another question is ... how does the structure of the officer and NCO corps affect the value set, distinctive culture, etc that Cohen discusses? For example, the structure of the NCO corps in the IDF is vastly different (well, non-existent in some lines) according to Patrick Lang's blog, Sic Semper Tyrannis. Leading to a relative breakdown of internal control, particularly on the tactical end of the stick. Sounds a little like Tolstoy's strategic nihilism.