Why Great Powers Fight Small Wars Badly
Abstract
The military organizations of great powers embrace the big-war paradigm. They are large, hierarchical institutions that generally innovate incrementally. Great-power militaries do not innovate well, particularly when the required innovations and adaptations lie outside the scope of conventional war. Great powers do not win small wars because they are great powers; their militaries must maintain a central competence in symmetric warfare to preserve their great-power status vis-a-vis other great powers, and their militaries must be large organizations. These two characteristics combine to create a formidable competence on the plains of Europe or the deserts of Iraq. However, these two traits do not produce institutions and cultures that exhibit a propensity for counterguerrilla warfare. In addition to a big-war culture, there are some contradictions that derive from the logic that exists when a superior industrial or postindustrial power faces an inferior, semifeudal, semicolonial, or preindustrial adversary. On one hand, the great power intrinsically brings overwhelmingly superior resources and technology to this type of conflict. On the other hand, the seemingly inferior opponent generally demonstrates a willingness to accept higher costs and to persevere against many odds. Asymmetric conflict is the most probable form of conflict that the United States may face. Asymmetric conflict will therefore be the norm, not the exception. Even though the war in Afghanistan departs from the model of asymmetric conflict presented in this article, the asymmetric nature of the war there only underscores the salience of asymmetric conflicts. This article circumscribes the scope of asymmetric conflict to analyze conflicts in which either national or multinational superior external military forces confront inferior states or indigenous groups in the latter's territory. Insurgencies and small wars lie within this category, and this article uses both terms interchangeably.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Oct 01, 2002
- Accession Number
- ADA489552
Entities
People
- Robert M. Cassidy