Warning and Planning: Learning to Live With Ambiguity
Abstract
The success or failure of military enterprises is often attributed to surprise. Surprise, in turn, is characterized as the result of intelligence failure, specifically, a failure of "warning." This common perception perpetuates the myth that where surprise attacks occur, there is by definition an absence of warning. In fact, one is hard pressed to cite in past decades a military attack that took place with no warning whatsoever--a true "bolt from the blue." Most attacks that have achieved tactical surprise have taken place in an atmosphere of strategic warning, the result of detection and evaluation of some discernible, discrete turn of events that has created or raised tension between attacker and victim. In fact, more ironic is that so much surprise has been achieved in spite warning.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 01, 1995
- Accession Number
- ADA441101
Entities
People
- Michael J. Mccormick
Organizations
- National War College