Revolution in Military Affairs

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Revolution in Military Affairs

• PPA 706 -- National Defense
• November 13/14, 2000

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Perspectives on RMA

• Revolution doesnt exist -- future construct will
  look like the present
• The Revolution arrived -- Gulf War
• This is the middle of the Revolution -- system
  of systems
• The Micro Revolution -- info systems will
  dominate all other variables
• Continuous Revolution -- technology renders all
  things obsolete continuously

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RMA Hypothesis

• Capabilities are more important than geopolitics
• strategic pause -- conditions have changed
• Holding pattern....... or transformation?
• significant adjustment in time or space
  assumptions can constitute an RMA

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Hypothesis (cont)

• RMA assumed to be synergistic
• positive interaction of forces/elements to
  produce a more desirable outcome
• Whigs and Calvinists
• adaptation -- range of competence required to use
  new technology
• defining event usually required to determine if
  RMA occurred

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The Revolution in Military Affairs Intellectual
Origins

• The military historians
• Soviet writings in the late 1970s and 1980s --
  The Military Technical Revolution
• The Gulf War
• Admiral Owens and the System of Systems

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Questions

• Is there a revolution?
• What drives warfare?
• What are the policy challenges?
• What are the greatest threats?

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Four American Views

• Owens IIThe Uncertain RevolutionaryThe Gulf War
  VetThe Skeptic

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1 Owens IIBuild the System of Systems

• a single revolution resulting from employment of
  information technologies
• most of warfare has been wasted motion because of
  uncertainty
• utilize the array of available systems to improve
  space awareness employ forces
• the enemy is us -- service parochialism and
  bureaucratic inertia

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2 The Uncertain RevolutionaryLet a hundred
flowers bloom

• One in a series of revolutions
• Revolutionary change occurs from a mixture of
  technology, organization, and operational
  concepts
• Challenges are experimentation and innovation
• Threats are (1) diffusion of technology (2) peer
  competitor

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3 The Gulf War VeteranBeen there, done that

• The revolution occurred in the 1980s
• Recruitment and training make all the difference
• Challenge is developing new technology while
  keeping an adequate force structure
• Threats are asymmetric responses (terror, weapons
  of mass destruction)

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4 The SkepticWhat revolution?

• The history of warfare is a history of evolution
• Human nature, not technology, drives warfare
• The challenge is keeping the warrior spirit alive
  in the face of social change
• The danger of being too clever

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Consequences

• Owens II radical cuts in force structure and
  organizational surgery make the current
  technologies work together
• Cautious Revolutionaries experimentation
  organizational and educational reform
  incrementalism
• Gulf War Veterans emphasis on readiness and
  training current technologies
• Skeptics continue the current strategy and see
  what world changes occur

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Revolution in Military Affairs
SAIS
MAXWELL