Assessing Strategic Effectiveness in the War on Terrorism
Abstract
The United States strategy for the war on terrorism encompasses four goals: defeating terrorist organizations, denying further sponsorship support, diminishing the underlying conditions that terrorists seek to exploit, and defending U.S. interests against terrorist attack. Unlike past wars fought against conventional threats, operationalizing the strategy requires more thoughtful integration of all components of national power diplomatic, economic, and military. Also unlike wars past, we do not expect victory to occur in a single defining moment. Therefore, measuring how well we are achieving our strategic objectives involves challenges unique to the asymmetric, long-term nature of the endeavor, and requires knowledge of the existence of threat and a fundamental understanding of how the adversary interacts within the global environment. The purpose of this research is to propose a conceptual framework based upon concepts inherent to systems theory for developing strategic measures of effectiveness. The goal is to develop insights into how to establish and maintain a comprehensive perspective, thus avoiding the tendency towards strictly quantifiable and often irrelevant metrics i.e., "the body count approach" in order to provide for a more complete and thorough assessment of the nation's strategy implementation.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Mar 15, 2006
- Accession Number
- ADA448536
Entities
People
- Ray A. Combs Ii
Organizations
- United States Army War College