On The Political Conditions in War

Taken From: Seabury and Codevilla's WAR: ENDS AND MEANS

The Fog of Wars

War is more than who has the superior force; it is also about leadership, and what leaders will do under the stress of a moment. It is about a leader’s ability to see when and where to apply the proper amount of force.

“Thus Tolstoy concludes, victory and defeat are not to be understood as consequences of rationally managed physical and political engagements, rather, they are the consequences of profoundly more-psychological conditions.”

Battle is neither controllable nor completely uncontrollable; instead one must do one’s best to effect and direct the chaos.

Conditions during war are not static, but dynamic. Seemingly rich and powerful regimes can fall apart under bad management (ie, Ottoman Empire), and an advantage can be turned against a nation if the enemy makes a powerful counter-measure (ie, German Submarine Warfare in WWI).

“The fog of war is thickest for those least willing or able or able to impose their will on events, and it is most transparent for those most able to affect the conditions in which they operate.”

What makes the fog?

“The fog is the result of the unpredictable interactions of incalculable human factors… This is because one’s own intentions and plans are all one can be sure of.”

The Reasons No-One Can Predict the Nature of War:
1) Wars are contests between active wills
2) Those who initiate war conceal their intentions and capabilities, and once war starts it tends to take on a concealed life of its own.
3) No-one can foretell which side will more quickly change its own ways to minimize the other’s strengths.
4) The scope, intensity and purpose depend to some extent on how hard the other side tries and on the degree to which the war engages the nation’s energies and ingenuity.
5) The principle reason for the fog of war is that so much depends on human purpose, and human purpose is so variable.

Piercing the Fog

The Fog of War can be pierced only by leaders since it results from the turbulent human emotions; it can only be pierced by the assertion of human qualities that master these emotions.

All attempts to pierce the fog of war must be based on the knowledge of the enemy.

Rehearsed attacks can be useful, but they cost time. Also, if too rehearsed, they becoming rigid inflexible, which can be a problem in situations where the conditions are different than anticipated. (This highlights the necessity of good intelligence.)

Victory

Victory is the whole point of war, and it means the forceful application of one’s will on another.

The traditional concept of victory is putting the enemy military into a position where they can no longer handle the pressure, both military and political.

The best way to secure victory is land forces, who will put the bayonet to the back of the enemy to compel obedience, and who can then determine the fundamental political decisions of who gets what when, where and how much. Though even this ultimate method is not infallible, as there remains the possibility for rebellion. However, most rebellions fail unless done in tandem with outside conflict, or a morally weak enemy.

On the other hand, if you are losing the primary objective is to avoid occupation or disarmament at all costs. The losing party must minimize the damage, and live by the code conserve, retreat and fortify.

The Political Conditions of Battle

Important political decisions are who will fight? Who will lead? How? What will the plan be?

Who will fight?

In western civilization, military service has been regarded either as art of citizenship or something that the taxpayer is obliged to foot the bill for.

There are several different categories of purchased troops:
1) Actual mercenaries.
2) Janissaries (captured and brainwashed children, usually enemy children.)
3) Imperial power putting its own officers over conquered nation’s units.
4) Armies purchased by alliance (sometimes to fight, sometimes to deter war)
a. Not usually a good idea for two reasons
i. They allied armies are more likely to lose, because they don’t have a stake.
ii. If they win, they may not be willing to give up what they’ve won to ally, and may turn against him, stronger than they were originally.
5) Domestic troops who are not compelled by civil authority to join the army, and are instead paid handsomely to ensure loyalty and quantity to the sovereign.

In America a small, professional army of life-long members was not sufficient after WWII. The draft was instated, but was soon abolished because of western principles of classical liberalism, pragmatism and ideals (people should join because of patriotism, not compulsion.) and they turned the US Army into a volunteer force. The consequences of which are as follows:
1) Disproportionate minorities in the ranks.
2) Upper middle class don’t sign up
a. This means that there is a rift between policy makers and policy enforcers
b. The makers have a major disconnect with the military realities of their decisions
3) There are women in the military.

Why does Western Civilization discourage the use of female soldiers:
1) Sexual attraction and its essential distraction
2) Special attention to lovers undermines unit cohesion
3) Women are the living assurance that society will survive

In America, women have been integrated into the armed forces, but not into combat units. They have been so because of egalitarian ideals and the constant need for recruits in a volunteer force.

Who will lead?

Government in wartime has both a civilian and military aspect. Its primary task is to balance the task of war between the two.

There is a fluid connection between the actual conduct of battles and the political aims of a war. This means politicians and their aims must be sensitive to the course of a battle.

The quest for a battlefield victory may overwhelm the political leadership, who then abdicate power and become impotent observers. Conversely, the civilian authority may saddle the military leadership with political strategic objectives that they see as impossible to accomplish.

Even when political military relations are good, political leaders may end up subordinating the higher political goals of war to immediate battlefield success.

Excessive involvement of political leadership can also hamstring or usurp the necessary functions of the field commander, by adding complications, conditions, and confusion. This is a problem that modern communications only exasperates.

“There is only one sound principle: Authority must be proportionate to responsibility. The person in charge of planning must be the responsible for making it succeed.”

Leadership

Leadership is more than just a flow of orders or commands to the battle.

No operations is likely to succeed if the people who are supposed to make it work don’t want to do it, or are otherwise discouraged, disconsolate, morally defeated, sullen, lazy, etc., etc.

The essence of leadership, then, is to keep up morale, namely by:
1) Having troops fear their own commander more than the enemy.
2) Rewarding troops who do well.
3) Reminding the troops of the value of their actions.
4) Making their survival conditional on staying loyal to the group (Cortez sinking his ships when he reached the new world.)


Morale is also dependent on the “habit of loyalty”:
1) Close units that stick together for each other’s sake.
2) Cultural programming (Japanese in WWII)

Morale also depends on faith in leaders and on hope of victory. If these things disappear, soldiers tend to think they have been sold out and give up.

Leadership consists of providing and personifying answers to the questions that move people. The leader must show he knows where he is going, how to get there, and that it is worth reaching that goal. Most importantly, he must be loyal to those who have been loyal to him, and reward those who fight for him.

Strategy

Strategy is using specific acts to produce specific results leading to a direct outcome.

To make strategy is to answer five main questions:
1) What do I want?
2) What do I have to do to get it?
3) What will my opponent do to stop me?
4) What resources do I have to defeat my enemy?
5) Am I willing to do what is necessary in good time to win?

One must be absolutely clear about the goal, and be certain about all the questions, including “what constitutes a victory?” and “who is an enemy?” in addition to those above, which can be difficult considering the human inclination to want it all, before one enters combat.

In war, intentions don’t count as much as calculations.

Sometimes it is necessary to take the enemies strategy into account, or your actions may become irrelevant.

One must put oneself in the enemies’ shoes to try and understand his intentions and strategy but both under and over-estimating his abilities can lead to catastrophe.

Realism is necessary, not only in estimating forces but in regard to time.

The effect of forces also depends on the tempo of operations.

The whole point of strategy is to figure out what will defeat the enemy and doing it.

Strategy consists of a commitment to whatever is necessary in order to make the plan work, with the limits of prudence. Trying to carry out a strategy on the cheap is courting disaster.

Making Peace

Fighting stops when one of the parties in war changes its objectives enough that mutual satisfaction can occur without further violence.

Making peace is harder than war because of all the possibilities of deception and betrayal.

The ending of a war requires an agreement between the winner and the loser.

Negotiations

Surrendering is a complex matter, and as such, negotiations are necessary.

Negotiations are not necessarily a harbinger of peace. Negotiations can be:
1) The stronger dictating terms to the weaker.
2) The losing party buying time, to rebuild or improve their bargaining position.
3) Negotiations, due to near parity, can help decide who has won or lost.
4) Actually working towards peace.
5) Deciding to what degree the loser must capitulate.

Armistices are acts of faith, whether good or bad. One never knows if the opponent is going to kill you.

The whole point of negotiations is to discover what both parties are willing to kill and die for, and to make a deal with the other side to get the most out of them.

Things to remember about negotiations:
1) Any small power drawn into peace negotiations with a big power should hold onto its weapons, otherwise it might lose any ability to hold on.
2) Negotiations between undefeated antagonists rarely end a struggle.
3) Nothing greases peace negotiations like the appearance of a larger third enemy, or of a bigger fish to fry.

Capitulation

There are six rings of capitulation, and they are as follows:
1) The first ring is the best circumstances, where the defeated party must merely give up its objectives. This can cause significant political backlash, bit isn’t nearly as bad as the other options.
2) The second ring is, the defeated party must give up both its objectives and its form of government.
3) In the third ring, the previous apply, and there is the added condition of occupation. In this ring, the occupation is deliberately benign. Thought the occupier may rule more justly and charitably than the previous rulers, the nature of occupation is such that a major disruption occurs in the way of life, especially in regards to the economy, with results such as recession and widespread hunger.
4) The fourth category include all of the above in addition the occupation viewing it as their duty to cleanse the defeated society of the element responsible for the war, punishing it and exacting reparations. This means an massive increase of prostitution, cronyism, denouncements and self-deprecation all to gain the occupier’s favor, and therefore, enough food to survive.
5) The fifth ring is much more common, and includes the privation and degradation from above but it also includes the intention to severely punish, exploit and radically reform the defeated society. The horrors are much worse. Rape, murder, and starvation are characteristic. There is still some control and protection from the occupiers.
6) This is the worse kind of capitulation, and only differs quantitatively from previous ring. A vengeful occupier will want to simply eradicate or change in a revolutionary way resulting in the deaths of a third or more of the population. This is accomplished by genocide, usually carried out through enforced mass starvation.

The degree of severity following a surrender depends on the character of the winning troops, the level of hatred that built up during the war, the level of their discipline and most importantly, what the policy of the winning side will be.