This study explores the role of the military as an instrument of national power in the transformation of Republics to Empires. It concentrates on two case studies. The first is the Athenian transformation from Radical Democracy to an Informal...
As warfare continues to become more complex due to the advent and proliferation of new technology, blending of ethnic and cultural groups, population growth and urbanization, and tendency towards asymmetric warfare, commanders will have more...
In this paper I will attempt to put in chronological order several major and minor events that have taken place throughout my military career. These events cover a span of 18 years which took place prior to me reporting to the USASMA Academy to...
Within the literature on Systemic Operational Design, discourse is generally treated as a mechanical communicative process. The monograph presents alternative ways to consider discourse, the implications of this for theory of Systemic Operational...
American military doctrine and professional literature in the past decade have stressed maneuver warfare and the operational level of war. This monograph traces the evolution of maneuver theory and its conceptual opposite, firepower theory, and...
Department of the Army, Office of the Chief of Military History
In wars involving vast land masses in which the available manpower of a nation is severely taxed it may be expedient and necessary to use "volunteer" forces. It is gathered from this treatise that the basic mistake of the planners was that no...
This summary report on the British Home Guard concludes that the force was just as vital and an important arm of the total defense of any country as any of the other forces, such as the Army and Navy and the Civil Defence Forces. The Home Guard was...
The current U.S. Army Transformation process has experienced several changes due to operational commitments in the Global War on Terror (GWOT) and different perceptions about required military capabilities among political and military authorities....
The recognition of the failure at the strategic and operational levels of war during the Global War on Terror, specifically in Iraq, has resulted in a quest for intellectual solutions to complex operational and strategic problems. To date this has...
The prevailing U.S. Army professional military education (PME) system reflects the legacy of the twentieth-century, modern, mechanized age of warfare. The twenty-first century security environment presents a unique set of challenges for U.S....
“German General Staff Officer Education and Current Challenges” examines the institutional education of German General Staff Officers, as experienced by the author, and offers a “Conceptual Competency-Skill-Framework” for professional...
Throughout the past 15 years, both the Western allies and the Russians have entered into a series of military engagements that have in one way or another spectacularly failed to achieve the results intended, namely a decisive military victory which...
The term asymmetric warfare is comparatively new in Chinese defense circles, and it is often used in reference to the U. S. Yet China has a long theoretical and historical tradition of seeking asymmetric responses to strategic challenges throughout...
This monograph examines operational surprise by answering the question, "What are the essential elements for producing operational surprise?” This issue is important because very little has been written about operational surprise despite the...
The present situation in Afghanistan is not being resolved by the current U.S. strategic approach. Given the recent uptick in insurgent violence, the shift in emphasis with regards to Afghanistan, and the change in presidential administrations, the...
This paper is a critical analysis that questions whether or not the French General staff in 1914 was surprised by the strength of the German forces initially employed on the western front, the employment of German reserve units for immediate...
Is American air power sliding toward irrelevancy in the security environment that the United States confronts as it moves into the twenty-first century? Attitudes of certain senior airmen about the application of air power in the new security...
Operational design is an intellectual exercise that draws on the creative vision, experience, intuition, and judgment of commanders to provide a framework for development of detailed operation plans. Recently, a number of authors have questioned...
This monograph will argue that understanding and addressing the nature of the threat's identity is paramount to the United States' ability to win the GWOT. In an attempt to remain ahead of its enemies in the prosecution of the GWOT, the United...