u.s. army war college strategic studies institute from military power, published by princeton...

U.S. Army War College Strategic Studies Institute

From Military Power, published by Princeton University Press, copyright Princeton University Press, 2004

Military PowerExplaining Victory and Defeat

in Modern Battle


Stephen Biddle November 10, 2004




Agenda

1. What is “military power”?

2. Standard explanations

3. A new explanation

4. Recent experience: Afghanistan and Iraq

5. Implications



What is “Military Power”?

• Ability to take and hold territory

• Ability to inflict (and avoid) casualties

• Time required Initial focus:

mid-high intensity conventional

warfare



Standard Explanations

1. Material Preponderance (Quantity)

2. Technology (Quality)

3. Force Employment (Strategy, tactics, skill, motivation)



A New ExplanationForce employment-technology interaction as key

• Radical lethality as dominant technological fact of post-1900 battlefield • Survival requires exposure reduction • Since 1918, “modern system” force employment has been key to exposure

reduction – and thus, successful operations • Problems with the modern system:

– Very hard to do – Politically unpopular side effects

• Result is wide variation in degree of implementation • Where fully implemented, limits impact of weapons’ growing lethality, range• Where little-implemented, troops exposed to full weight of modern firepower

– Increasingly grave consequences as firepower has grown more lethal – Growing gap in real military power of those who can, and cannot, implement

• Effects of technology depend on force employment: – Technological change can have opposite effects depending on force employment– Modern system force employment can compensate for wide range of technical,

numerical, shortcomings



Lethality TrendsArmor Penetration

200 mm RHA penetration range

0

2000

4000

6000

8000

1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000

meters

Artillery Range

0

50

100

150

1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000

kilom

eters

Mean Penetration Range of U.S. Heavy Antitank Systems

0

2000

4000

6000

8000

1945 1955 1965 1975 1985 1995 2005

meters

• Ongoing, progressive increase in lethality for last 100 years

• Central problem of modern tactics:

How to survive long enough to perform meaningful missions?



The Modern System

• Cover, concealment

• Dispersion

• Small unit independent maneuver

• Suppression

• Combined arms



Problems with the Modern System

• Very hard to do

– Individual, custom decision making by thousands of jr. leaders

– Tight coordination between dispersed, moving units, multiple commanders

– Leaders must master employment, support requirements of multiple, radically dissimilar weapon types

• Unpopular Political, Organizational Side Effects

– Requires devolution of authority; autonomy, initiative at jr. levels

– Harder for superiors to control subordinates’ behavior

– Yields territory early

– Requires high military proficiency



New Theory Summarized

0.1

1

10

100

1000

1900 1925 1950 1975 2000

Attac

ker T

errito

rial

Gai

n (k

m)

Non-Modern-System Defense

Non-Modern-System Offense

Modern-System Offense and Defense



Recent Experience: Afghanistan and Iraq

• Does 21st century technology undermine modern system, overturn new theory?

– Many see ongoing military revolution requiring transformed military; Afghanistan and Iraq as examples

– New theory sees no revolution: incremental extension of trends dating to First World War

• Do Afghanistan or Iraq suggest radical departure?

No.

Recent warfare as further examples of force employment’s role in surviving modern firepower



Afghanistan, 2001-2• Many see Afghanistan as campaign of standoff precision warfare • At first it was: indigenous Afghan Taliban unskilled, unable to reduce exposure, easily defeated by standoff precision • As target base shifts to better-skilled al Qaeda, close combat increasingly necessary • Al Qaeda adopts important

elements of modern system; reduces exposure

• Operation Anaconda (3/02): – Under 50% of al Qaeda's actual

fighting positions identified prior to ground contact, in spite of intensive intelligence effort

– Most fire received by US units came from initially unseen, unanticipated al Qaeda fighting positions



Iraq, 2003

• Why were Coalition casualties so low? • Many credit technology: warfare

transformed by speed, precision strike• But Iraqi force employment very

permissive: non-modern system

• In 2003, 21st c. firepower punishes non-modern-system exposure very severely

• 2003 does not suggest that new technology can overwhelm modern system exposure reduction

• Caution warranted in extrapolating technology’s effects vs. other militaries



Central Findings

• Force employment and technology interact in powerful, nonlinear way

– Predictions of combat outcomes based on materiel alone subject to gross error

• Future warfare debate exaggerates change, underestimates continuity

– Technology’s role in war commonly overestimated

– Force employment’s role understudied, underemphasized

• Current developments are extensions of longstanding trends; no revolutionary discontinuity in prospect



Implications: Policy• Force Structure

– Many advocate radical restructuring to shift away from orthodox close combat, toward standoff precision and/or SASO, COIN

– Risky: Works well vs. non-modern-system opponent Ineffective otherwise Cannot guarantee that we will never again

face a modern-system opponent

• Joint Doctrine – Many advocate radical change:

Emphasize speed, nonlinear operations; avoid close combat

Neither take nor hold terrain per se Replace concentration-breakthrough-exploitation with simultaneous operations

throughout depth of enemy positions

– Neither necessary nor desirable Warfare not being revolutionized: radical change not necessary to keep up Radical doctrines require unskilled enemy to work; cannot guarantee this

Change is needed, but orthodox incremental

adaptation is sufficient



Backup Slides



How to Explain Military Power?

• Formal modeling • Small-n case method testing

– Operation Michael, March 1918 – Operation Goodwood, July 1944 – Operation Desert Storm, January-February 1991

• Large-n statistical testing – COW – CDB90 (“HERO”) – Miltech

• Ex ante simulation experimentation



Implications: IR Theory

• Standard material indicators are poor proxies for actual capability – Empirical literature likely to underestimate effects of capability relative

to resolve, audience costs, signaling

– Potential effects across wide range of empirical studies in IR

• Offense-Defense Theory misspecifies technology’s role• To do better, must account for force employment • Central role of states’ internal characteristics

– Force employment variance driven by states’ varying internal politics, social organization

• Avenues for research: – Other conflict types

– Explanation of variance in force employment; ex ante prediction

– Data development for force employment variables



Historical Test: Operation Michael, March 1918




• Typical of Western Front stalemate • Rough parity between attacker, defender

Numerical Balance: • 1.17:1 theaterwide troops • 1.5:1 initially engaged troops• Typical of Western Front stalemate

Theater Numerical Balance

GermanAllied

AlliedAllied

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

1915 1916 1917 1918

Attac

ker/

Def

ende

r Tro

ops

Local Numerical Balances

0

1

2

3

4

5

1915 1916 1917 1918 1919

Attac

ker:D

efen

der D

ivisio

ns

MICHAEL

Technology:






Technology:

• Modern-System German attack • Non-Modern-System British defense

– Exposed

–Forward

Fraction of Defenders in Reserve

0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.6

0.7

1915 1916 1917 1918 1919

MICHAEL

Force Employment:

Depth of Prepared Defenses

0

5000

10000

15000

20000

1915 1916 1917 1918 1919

Yar

ds

MICHAEL

– Shallow






Technology:

• Modern-System German attack • Non-Modern-System British defense

– Exposed – Shallow

–Forward

Force Employment:

Outcome: • Breakthrough

– 47 battalions of British infantry annihilated

– 530 British guns overrun

• Exploitation fails – 40 mile advance – Exhaustion, Allied

reserve arrivals halt offensive

– 250K casualties ea – War continues

Orthodox theories predict shattered offensive New theory predicts offensive breakthrough, but limited consequences



Experimental Test: Refighting the Battle of 73 Easting

• Many see Desert Storm result as technologically predetermined

• New theory implies not: if Iraqis had used modern system, no rout

• Test via Janus recreation of 1991 Battle of 73 Easting

• Counterfactuals: – What if Iraqis had used modern

system in 1991?

– What if US technology had been less advanced?

Experimental Results, 73 Easting Janus Simulation

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

Historical Base O lder USTechnology

ModernSystem Iraqi

Tactics

Arm

ored

Veh

icle

Los

ses

Iraqi Losses

US Losses

Findings: Outcome not technologically predetermined• Technology’s effects influenced powerfully by force employment • Modern system defensive tactics negate Iraqi technological inferiority



Anaconda Battlefield

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