Defending America's Center of Gravity

Abstract

The National Defense Strategy states America is a Nation at War", but unless the United States effectively employs strategic communications and secures the National Will, the ability to maximize military power to achieve national security objectives is jeopardized. Where once the military domination of land sea and air were sufficient to bring victory warfare in the twenty- first century now requires information dominance to preserve the United States Center of Gravity (COG). Using Colonel Harry A. Tomlin's COG construct this project was able to demonstrate the United States strategic vulnerability to achieving policy objectives as well as the corrosive effects of non-kinetic firepower from both foreign and domestic propaganda. As a result unless the United States recognizes this vulnerability and develops a strategy nested in the National Security and National Defense strategies we may win every tactical fight on the battlefield but lose the strategic fight for the political objective that motivated the decision to go to war.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Mar 07, 2006
Accession Number
ADA448816

Entities

People

  • Ehrich D. Rose

Organizations

  • United States Army War College

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Biomedical
  • Energy and Power Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Center Of Gravity
  • Education
  • Globalization
  • Governments
  • Gravity
  • Information Operations
  • International Organizations
  • International Relations
  • Military Operations
  • National Security
  • Quality Of Life
  • Security
  • Strategic Communications
  • Terrorism
  • Terrorists
  • United States
  • War Colleges

Readers

  • Irregular Warfare and Special Operations Cyberspace Operations against Adversarial Threats.
  • Strategic Security Studies