Military Theory and Strategy
Lsn 2
ID & SIG:
• Clausewitz, Corbett, Douhet, forms of
maneuver, Jomini, Mahan, Mitchell,
principles of war, Sun Tzu
Agenda
• Key Theorists
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Sun Tzu
Jomini
Clausewitz
Mahan
Corbett
Douhet
Mitchell
• Principles of War
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Objective
Offensive
Mass
Economy of force
Maneuver
Unity of command
Security
Surprise
Simplicity
Key Theorists
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Sun Tzu
Jomini
Clausewitz
Mahan
Corbett
Douhet
Mitchell
Sun Tzu
• Chinese military theorist
circa 453-221 B.C. who
wrote The Art of War.
• Significantly influenced Mao
Zedong and subsequent
writers on revolutionary
warfare
• Stressed the
unpredictability of battle,
the importance of deception
and surprise, the close
relationship between
politics and military policy,
and the high costs of war
Sun Tzu
• Emphasized the role of situational awareness
– “So it is said that if you know your enemies and know
yourself, you will not be imperiled in a hundred
battles; if you do not know your enemies but do know
yourself, you will win one and lose one; if you do not
know your enemies nor yourself, you will be imperiled
in every single battle.”
• Championed the bloodless victory
– “One hundred victories in one hundred battles is not
the most skillful. Seizing the enemy without fighting is
the most skillful.”
Antoine-Henri de Jomini
• Jomini (1779-1869) was a Swiss military
theorist who sought to interpret Napoleon
• Published the Summary of the Art of War
in 1838
– Became the premier militaryeducational text of the mid-nineteenth
century and greatly influenced Civil
War generals
– “Many a Civil War general went into
battle with a sword in one hand and
Jomini’s Summary of the Art of War in
the other” (General J. D. Hittle)
Antoine-Henri de Jomini
• As a product of the Enlightenment, Jomini sought natural
laws to govern the conduct of war
• Developed a very geometrical and scientific approach to
war
• Stressed the principle of concentration, the strategic
value of interior lines, and the close relationship between
logistics and combat
• Interior lines are “those adopted by one or two armies to
oppose several hostile bodies, and having such a
direction that the general can concentrate the masses
and maneuver with his whole force in a shorter period of
time than it would require for the enemy to oppose them
a greater force.”
Interior Lines
• The benefits of
interior lines
could be gained
either by central
position or
superior lateral
communications
Exterior
Lines
Interior
Lines
Carl von Clausewitz
• Prussian officer born in 1780
• Resigned his commission in
1812 and joined the Russian
Army to fight Napoleon
• Ideas on war were heavily
influenced by the mass
popular warfare of the French
Revolutionary period and
Napoleon’s Prussian
adversary Gerhard von
Scharnhorst
• Died in 1831 and his wife
published his On War in 1832
Carl von Clausewitz
• War is neither an art nor a science
– It is a continuation of “policy” (or “politics”) by
other means.
– A form of social intercourse
• War is like a wrestling match
– It is “an act of force to compel our enemy to
do our will.”
– But it is not unilateral. It is a contest between
two independent wills.
Carl von Clausewitz
• Used a trinitarian analysis consisting of (1) primordial
violence, hatred, and enmity; (2) the play of chance and
probability; and (3) war’s element of subordination to
rational policy
– Often loosely expressed as “the people, the military,
and the government”
Carl von Clausewitz
• Analyzed “absolute war” or “war in theory,” but
then noted that factors such as poor intelligence,
chance, friction, etc make war in practice
different than war in the abstract (the “fog of
war”)
• Argued one should focus his military efforts
against the enemy’s “center of gravity”
(“Schwerpunkt”)
– Very important concept in modern American
military doctrine
Albert Thayer Mahan
• US naval officer who lived from 1840 to
1914
• Wrote The Influence of Sea Power
Upon History, 1660-1783 and The
Influence of Sea Power upon the
French Revolution and Empire, 17931812
• Considered “sea power” to include the
overlapping concepts of command of
the sea through naval superiority and
that combination of maritime
commerce, overseas possessions, and
privileged access to foreign markets
that produces national “wealth and
greatness”
Albert Thayer Mahan
• Advocated
– “that overbearing power on the sea which drives the
enemy’s flag from it, or allows it to appear only as a
fugitive”
– “(1) Production; (2) Shipping: (3) Colonies and
Markets– in a word, sea power”
• Thought the Navy should be used offensively
and that its principle object should be
destruction of the enemy’s fleet
– Destroying the enemy’s battle fleet would in turn
cause his merchant fleet to find the sea untenable
– To be effective, the fleet should not be divided and
should be autonomous
Albert Thayer Mahan
• Saw the Navy’s economic strangulation of
France by blockade as the key to Britain’s defeat
of Napoleon
– “It was not by attempting great military operations on
land, but by controlling the sea, and through the sea
the world outside Europe,” that the British “ensured
the triumph of their country.”
• Critics argue that Mahan confused a necessary
or important cause with the sufficient cause
– The British Navy was important, but the Army and
diplomacy also played key roles
Albert Thayer Mahan
• Considered the navy to be a better
instrument of national policy than the army
– This was especially true for the United States
which had “neither the tradition nor the design
to act aggressively beyond the seas,” but at
the same time had “very important
transmarine interests which need protection”
• Increasingly became an imperialist in
order to gain control of the resources the
US needed to best use its naval power
Julian Corbett
• Mahan’s British contemporary and chief
competitor as a naval theorist
– Corbett stressed the limitations as well as the
importance of naval power
– He emphasized coordination between land and naval
strategy rather than independent naval action
– He rejected the invariable dominance of the offensive
and focused on the dynamic relationship between the
offensive and the defensive at sea
Julian Corbett
• Although originally
much less well-known
than Mahan, Corbett
gained increased
prominence in postCold War American
naval thought
• Ideas became more
relevant in an era in
which the US Navy
has no peer competitor
and conducts more
littoral operations than
blue-water fleet-to-fleet
actions
Giulio Douhet
• Italian air power theorist who lived
from 1869 to 1930
• Saw air power as a way for Italy to
overcome its inherent weaknesses in
manpower and natural resources
– But to become the dominant weapon it
could be, aircraft had to be freed from
the control of ground commanders who
did not understand the new capability
– Advocated the creation of a separate air
arm to be commanded by airmen
Giulio Douhet
• Wrote “Rules for the Use of Airplanes in War” in 1912 but
met resistance from his superiors who forced him to
change references to the airplane as a “weapon” and
instead consider it only a “device” to support the ground
forces
• Advocated the production of bombers
• Soon became known as a radical and his methods for
advancing the cause of airpower often worked at crosspurposes with his goals
– His criticism of Italy’s conduct in World War I got him
arrested and court martialed
– In 1920 the verdict was overturned and Douhet was
promoted to general, but instead of returning to active
duty he focused on writing
Giulio Douhet
• Douhet’s argument was that airpower added a
third dimension that revolutionized warfare by
granting new flexibility and initiative
• The speed of aircraft and the vastness of the sky
equaled offensive power
• Considered airpower to be supreme
– Without control of the air, all operations– land, sea,
even air– were doomed
– The appropriate target was not the enemy’s planes in
the air but their airfields and air industry on the
ground
Giulio Douhet
• Saw airpower as being able to crush the
enemy’s will to fight by destroying or
neutralizing a country’s “vital centers”–
those elements of society, government,
and industry essential to the functioning of
the state
– It could do so without the need for the bloody
commitment of ground forces that had made
World War I so costly
Giulio Douhet
• Douhet recognized the importance of targeting
– Aircraft could strike virtually anything but in order to
be most forceful they should not attempt to strike
everything
• Instead, focus on the five basic target systems
that Douhet considered the vital centers of a
modern country
– Industry, transportation, infrastructure, communication
nodes, and the will of the people
– The will of the people was the most important target
– Douhet did not advocate aircraft attacking or
supporting ground forces; airpower was to be used
strategically, not tactically
Billy Mitchell
• Building on his World War I
experience and relationships
with British air marshall Sir
Hugh Trenchard and, to a
lesser extent, Douhet,
Mitchell (1879-1936) led the
American charge for air force
autonomy
• Viewed “independent” air
operations, such as strategic
bombing, as more lucrative
than simply supporting land
or sea forces
Billy Mitchell
• Argued that bombers could win wars by
destroying an enemy’s war-making capability
and will to fight, and that in so doing could yield
a victory that was quicker and cheaper than one
obtained by surface forces
• The key to obtaining victory through airpower lay
in establishing an autonomous air force, free of
control by surface commanders and led by
airmen possessing special expertise
– Began calling for a separate air force in 1919
Billy Mitchell
• Believed airpower could wreck an enemy’s will
to fight by destroying his capability to resist and
that capability was not the army or the navy but
the nation’s industrial and agricultural base
• Eliminating industrial production “would deprive
armies, air forces and navies… of their means of
maintenance.”
• Did not necessarily want to attack civilians
directly but to sever the population from the
sources of production
– Considered civilian will to be very fragile
Billy Mitchell
• Mitchell’s personality did not help him
– Boundless ego, extremely driven, short of temper
– “Mitchell tried to convert his opponents by killing them
first.” (Hugh Trenchard)
• Mitchell took his case to the American people
with many of his writings appearing in popular
magazines rather than military professional
journals
• Did not favor aircraft carriers, because, among
other things, they represented naval air selfsufficiency which threatened his vision for a
separate air force
Billy Mitchell
• Mitchell’s vehemence toward the military bureaucracy
reached a peak on Sept 5, 1925 when he blamed the
crash of the Navy dirigible Shenandoah on the “in
competency, criminal negligence, and almost
treasonable administration of the National Defense by
the Navy and War Departments”
• Two weeks later President Coolidge himself proffered
court martial charges against Mitchell
– He was found guilty on Dec 17 and retired from the service Feb
1, 1926
• Mitchell’s message was carried on by more diplomatic
advocates such as Hap Arnold and the Air Force became
a separate branch of the US military in 1947
Principles of War
Principles of War
• British military officer J. F. C. Fuller developed a list
of principles based on the works of Clausewitz and
Jomini for use by the British Army in World War I
• The US Army modified them and published its first
list in 1921
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Objective
Offensive
Mass
Economy of force
Maneuver
Unity of command
Security
Surprise
Simplicity
Objective
• When undertaking any mission, commanders
should have a clear understanding of the
expected outcome and its impact. Commanders
need to appreciate political ends and understand
how the military conditions they achieve
contribute to them.
– Ensure that all actions contribute to the goals
of the higher headquarters.
– Example: Ho Chi Minh’s objective in the
Vietnam War was the unification of North and
South Vietnam under communist rule.
Offensive
• Offensive operations are essential to maintain the
freedom of action necessary for success, exploit
vulnerabilities, and react to rapidly changing situations
and unexpected developments.
– Offensive actions are those taken to dictate the
nature, scope, and tempo of an operation.
– Offensive action is key to achieving decisive results; it
is the essence of successful operations.
– Example: Rather than continue to defend at Pusan,
MacArthur went on the offensive with Operation
Chromite (the Inchon landing) in Korea.
Mass
• Commanders mass the effects of combat power in time
and space to overwhelm enemies or gain control of the
situation.
– Time: applies the elements of combat power against
multiple targets simultaneously
– Space : concentrates the effects of different elements
of combat power against a single target
– Example: Schwarzkopf’s decision to increase the
Operation Desert Storm force from one to two corps
reflected his concern for mass.
Economy of Force
• Commanders never leave any element without a
purpose. When the time comes to execute, all
elements should have tasks to perform.
– Economy of force requires accepting prudent risk in
selected areas to achieve superiority in the decisive
operation.
– Economy of force involves the discriminating
employment and distribution of forces.
– Example: In World War I, the Schlieffen Plan
depended on an economy of force effort in the east
in order to gain mass in the west.
Maneuver
• As both an element of combat power and a principle
of war, maneuver concentrates and disperses combat
power to place and keep the enemy at a
disadvantage. It includes the dynamic, flexible
application of leadership, firepower, information, and
protection as well.
– Achieves results that would otherwise be more costly
– Keeps enemies off balance by making them confront new
problems and new dangers faster than they can deal with
them.
– Example: In the Mexican War, Winfield Scott fought a war of
maneuver based on the turning movement.
Unity of Command
• Unity of command means that a single
commander directs and coordinates the actions
of all forces toward a common objective.
– Develops the full combat power of a force
– Usually requires giving a single commander
authority
– Example: Eisenhower did an excellent job of
maintaining unity of effort among coalition
forces in World War II.
Security
• Calculated risk is inherent in conflict. Security protects
and preserves combat power.
– Does not involve excessive caution
– Measures taken by a command to protect itself from
surprise, interference, sabotage, annoyance, and
threat
– Example: The French did not have adequate security
in the Ardennes Forest when the Germans attacked in
World War II.
Surprise
• Surprise results from taking actions for which an
enemy or adversary is unprepared.
– It is only necessary that the enemy become
aware too late to react effectively.
– Contributions to surprise include speed,
information superiority, and asymmetry.
– Example: The terrorist attack on September
11 depended on surprise.
Simplicity
• Plans and orders should be simple and direct. Simple
plans executed on time are better than detailed plans
executed late.
– Clear and concise plans cut down on
misunderstandings
– Example: Grant’s orders to Sherman in the Atlanta
Campaign are classic in their simplicity and clarity.
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• Military Theory and Strategy (cont)