The Classic Works Of Strategy

Over the course of history, the strategic environment has changed rapidly and is now more complex than ever before – it is currently characterized by unpredictability and disorder, and may yet manifest itself in the collapse of nuclear armed nations, destabilizing conflict in geo-politically vital regions, and humanitarian crises. A world of disparate actors – not all nation states – now exists. Unpredictable events will continue to cause strategic surprise. The widespread effects of past conflicts such as World War II, Vietnam and the Iraq war are still being felt and have created significant strategic repercussions. The failures of these conflicts are the result of our military and political leaders’ failure to quickly adapt to wartime conditions. This occurs because of a general refusal to commit to a military culture of learning that encourages serious debate, critical assessments of our military operations, and challenges to our doctrine in the face of emerging change. Additionally, leaders have struggled with the critical responsibility of forecasting and providing for a ready force, one that is well-resourced and prepared to conduct future operations. It is the responsibility of our military and political leaders to send our military to war with a ready force, and a strategy that will ultimately result in victory. But understanding war and warriors is critical if societies and governments are to make sound judgments concerning military policy.

The concept of war as a static and unchanging occurrence is an outdated and dangerous miscalculation. More accurately, war is a fluidic, evolving and shifting phenomenon constantly reinventing itself, rendering stagnant, inflexible principles potentially disastrous. Consequently, as students of war and future players in this transforming theatre, the study of eras of significant development is an extremely relevant pursuit. Recognizing the need for adaptation and the creation of doctrine is now a prerequisite for any effective modern commander. War is unpredictable in nature and particularly so in current theatres of operation, in which change is rapid

Clausewitz’s attack of enemy centers of gravity and Sun Tzu’s prioritization of attack of important elements of national power provide contrasting approaches to the development of effective strategy. These contrasts are reflections of each author’s perspective on how war should be waged, the proper use of force, their definitions of the ideal victory and how best to achieve that victory as well as their methodologies,

This essay will explore the influences of Sun Tzu in the Second World War. Sun Tzu (544 – 496 BC) was a Chinese general and strategist in times of the Zhou dynasty. His techniques, even today are highly respected. The teachings of Sun Tzu were used not only in Asia and Europe but have also been applied today by the western society.

Clausewitz who was convinced that no theory of war could be taken seriously unless it included the psychology of commanders and soldiers and their relations to one another (Peter Paret, Napoleon and the Revolution in War, pg. 134). The human factor within the nature of war is the most complex and difficult to predict a sure outcome without addressing psychological state of the enemy and environment in with you are about to conduct operations. Boyd integrates the key ideas of two primary theorists, Sun Tzu and Carl von Clausewitz, and hypothesizes that making sense of one’s environment, making military decisions, and acting on those decisions is a respective, competitive process (OODA loop) in which one seeks to make faster and better decisions than one’s adversary, overwhelming his ability to make sense of his environment and cope with change. (Module 3, John Boyd and A Discourse on Winning and Losing, pg. 6). This thought process is relevant today through our military war games, operation plans, and TDG’s providing an opportunity for multiple levels of outcome based scenarios fundamentally rooted in understanding the

Strategy is the name of the game, and in Russell Weigley’s The American Way of War, the U.S strategies and policies used throughout history are revisited. Weigley’s focus on the historic strategies of American warfare starts as early as 1775 This book is arranged in different sections depending on the location and strategy, not really sequential in some cases. Weigley went very in depth with his work and made his book a fun read and understandable. He also gave a very detailed amount of historic American military past. To wrap it up, The American Way of War was overall very enjoyable.

Originally influenced by the strategic events seen throughout the Napoleonic Wars in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the nine principles of war derived from the United States’ Army’s “Principles of War and Operations” outline a basic strategic guide on waging war. Shortly before the military adopted these guidelines, however, the United States of America saw civil unrest as the Southern states seceded to form the Confederate States of America. As the Union Army of the North battled the Confederate Army of the South, strategic principles similar to those outlined in the U.S. Army’s doctrine began to appear on the battlefield. Although the armies of the Union and the Confederacy both utilized strategic elements outlined in the United States’ Army’s “Principles of War and Operations”, the Union army’s stricter adherence to certain strategic principles resulted in their ultimate success.

For this paper, I am going to define strategy using Joint Pub 3.0’s definition: A prudent idea or set of ideas for employing the instruments of power in a synchronized and integrated fashion to achieve theater, national, and/or multi-national objectives. Using this definition of strategy, I’ll argue that Nightingale makes a valid claim when he states that the US is weak in formulating strategy by highlighting several aspects of strategic development where the US needs improvement. Nonetheless, let the record show that America’s success rate in conflicts in the last century is mixed, laying claim that the US may not be great at strategy development, however, it has done well enough to defeat some pretty ruthless villains ie., Hitler, Saddam, Milosevic, and Bin

A guided response paper presented to the faculty of the U.S. Army War College, in partial satisfaction of the requirements of the Theory of War and Strategy (TWS) course.

However strategic development does not confirm the argument that a ‘Military revolution’ took place in sixteenth century Europe. There were changes but rather evolutionary and progressive then that of a revolution. Gustavus Adolphus strategic warfare may not be seen as

There are no universal theories to explain the true nature and character of war, and any war theories are not a fact or absolute truth. All strategic principles are dynamic and contextual, so “every age had its own kind of war, its own limiting conditions, and its own peculiar preconceptions.” The battlefield environment of the 21st century will be the volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous, and nature of war will be completely different because of the Revolution in Military Affairs. Highly advance communication and information technologies, a dramatic increase in computing capabilities, developed of precision munitions, dominant air and space power ‘war could be waged by the projection of

Thinking about historical experiences and analyzing their current relevance appears to be an important component of strategy development. Having to balance between political demands and military necessity (i.e., Luttwak’s linear versus paradoxical logic) further complicates strategic art. Regardless, as Corbett, Slessor, Wylie, and Luttwak’s books demonstrate, strategic thinking evolves through an iterative process to arrive at new concepts the fit within the social, political, and economic contexts of the strategist’s time. Although these authors demonstrate the evolution of 20th Century strategic thought, they also show the continuity of themes regarding the achievement of control through economy of effort, consideration of non-military

“Strategy as Revolution” is also associated with a set of weaknesses that compromise the quality of the article. For instance, the author recommends top executives to gather the viewpoints of lower rank employees in terms of strategy formulation; however, Hamel (1996) fails to highlight the ways these viewpoints can be filtered taking into account the fact that there could be dozens if not hundred ideas and implementing all of them is not practical.

There are various schools of strategy that have been vigorously debated on and after a consolidated effort; three schools of strategy were produced. They are the planning school, the positional school, and the resource based school of strategy (Ritson, 2013). All these strategies will be described with examples to buttress each.

While “The Art of War” was written by Sun Tzu during the 6th century B.C., long before the colonization of the Americas, the onslaught of the Crusades, and before the Persian Wars of around 490 B.C., it remains relevant to this day. There is also strong evidence that the work inspired Napoleon and was used in the planning of Operation Desert Storm. “The Art of War” has withstood the sands of time due to its simplistic approach, and its applicability to non-military strategies. “The Art of War“, interpreted by Gerald, A. Michaelson, as well as other authors, use Sun Tzu’s timeless strategies and apply them to the modern day corporate world.