Operational Design and Irregular Warfare
Abstract
The world has witnessed unprecedented change over the last two decades, from the fall of the Soviet Union to the invention of the internet. This change has led to a corresponding alteration of the United States military's operating environment on a comparative scale. There were earlier warnings to changes in the operating environment, such as Vietnam, Somalia, and Beirut, but these went largely unnoticed. Perhaps our failure to properly recognize the signals of change from past events such as Vietnam was because it did not fit our concept of what conflict was supposed to be. Perhaps those preconceptions still exist and limit our ability to continue adapting to our new environment. Understanding how we comprehend information and recognizing that we are predisposed to view things in a particular way is important if we are to be successful at solving the ill-structured problems we as military professionals face today. Operational design is a comprehensive approach to understanding the environment and the problem through critical and creative thought and then applying that understanding to some form of a planning process. We are still coming to grips with how to operate in our new environment and the author will explore how applying operational design to our planning processes is the best bid for success.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Oct 21, 2009
- Accession Number
- ADA513963
Entities
People
- Karsten S. Heckl
Organizations
- Naval War College