Precision Engagement at the Strategic Level of War: Guiding Promise or Wishful Thinking?
Abstract
Air Force Basic Doctrine asserts that the precise application of force can reliably generate desired, disseminate effects at the strategic level of war. A deconstruction of that assertion reveals three necessary assumptions: the ability to clearly define desired disseminate effects at the strategic level of war, the ability to trace the desired discriminate effects back to a triggering action, and the ability to ensure that the actual effects generated by the triggering action are only the disseminate ones being sought. This paper presents evidence that these assumptions suffer from important conceptual weaknesses that are amplified when examined from the perspective of nonlinear and complex systems. Further evidence suggests that technological fixes are not likely to resolve these weaknesses nor produce the strategic efficiencies implied by the doctrinal concept. In fact, such fixes could increase the potential for small errors to combine in unexpected ways to create a system accident, where outcomes diverge in significant and undesirable ways from the intended discriminate strategic effect.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Apr 01, 2001
- Accession Number
- ADA407716
Entities
People
- Timothy J. Sakulich
Organizations
- Air University