DrTdaxp

purpleslog-

In no place did I ever say or imply that war is ONLY kinetic…indeed, both Clausewitz and I recognize that any war that is purely kinetic is not war at all, but rather primordial violence divorced from policy.

I *am* saying that all war *must* have a kinetic aspect, whether the threat of kinetics or actual kinetics. And by kinetics, I mean there must be a real possibility of death or harm. A war with no kinetic aspect is pure policy, and represents the opposite extreme from that of primordial violence. The kinetic aspect may be academic–like the nuclear calculations made by the US and USSR during the cold war, or it may be very, very real–the snipers bullet, fragmentation from artillery, poison gas, etc. Even Lend-Lease of pre-WWII represented an aspect of war–it was almost purely political with almost no violent aspect, save for the fact that we were supplying allies with arms which to kill with.

I am even willing to say that a virus intended to destroy or disrupt a computer system of an enemy may be a form of war, for that could infict harm on the enemy.

But a war without a kinetic aspect–meaning no threat of violence or harm, or no actual violence or harm? Ha!

purpleslog said:
“I have come to believe recently that those actors that think war is only kinetic are going to be loosing a lot of wars to those actors that don’t think that way.”

I think the exact opposite–those who seek a paradigm of war without a kinetic aspect are seeking a utopia. Those who seek utopias tend to have their Observation and Orientation pretty messed up. And they tend to lose wars.

tdaxp wrote:

“* In 3GW, the strategist offloads even more of the violence. While in 1GW you can have all able-bodied men at a front, and in 2GW you divide them between the direct war of fighting and the indirect war of production, in 3GW you offload even more by swapping some of your labor & capital for increased human capital. 3GW’s light infantry must be able to correctly identity the purpose of their mission, distinguish it from the means of their mission, and operate independently. Those that assist in the building of this human capital are just as much part of the war effort as the machine-producers of 2GW and warriors of 1GW.”

Good stuff here. Now that I understand the terminology (“unloading of violence”), I recognize that what you speak of as something I already knew of.

My only criticism is that you neglected to continue your discussion through and past 4GW –where we start to get into insurgencies that share much in common with conceptions of general peoples’ war. The prospect of completely politicized populations of entire cities/provinces, etc…has the potential to bring the “unloading of violence” full circle back to the state the approximated 1GW. This, I think, would both increase the density and the omnipresence of the political violence. Political Correctness takes on a whole new violent aspect. It might be worth looking at The Great Terror of Soviet Russia for analogues of this.

Good stuff!

Purpleslog wrote:

“The Hama-Example-as-4GW is Lind’s problem not yours though. One shortcoming of Lind’s model is that he tries to group actors and timeframes under his generations. So, he had no choice but to claim the Syrian action at Hama is 4GW. In reality it was 2GW attrition (or perhaps even 0GW genocide). Lind’s GMW backed him into a corner. With the XGW, we don’t have that problem.

I think the definition that most use for 4GW is to limiting. 4GW is more then advanced/evolved Insurgency + Information Warfare. Mostly, this is Lind’s fault as his GMW concepts can not be “improved” upon unless the idea is really his. Go read the Chinese book “Unrestricted Warfare” to get a better idea of real scope of 4GW. We are only seeing the tip of 4GW right now.”

I think you’re mixing up Hammes and Lind here. Hammes uses the words “evolved insurgency” to define 4GW in The Sling and the Stone. Lind actually opposes that definition, because it is too narrow. He has said so on the d-n-i site.

Nor is Lind too Hegelian. He allows for non-4GW forces to exist in 4GW times–he is the first to say the US military is hardly even a 3GW force, because he thinks that we are too reliant on attritive firepower in the form of PGMs (I agree with this–to a point). He therefore has no problem with a 4GW campaign using 2GW forces (Syrian’s military) against Hama. The point of the Hama campaign was to destroy the moral heart of that insurgency, and they were remarkably successful.

Fallujah II:

Tactically it was a 3GW penetration operation. Operationally it was physical destruction of self-selected insurgents, facilitated by the IO campaign, and by allowing self-selecting citizens out of the city prior to the American onslaught. Strategically Fallujah II was 1)Making an example of the city (mental), 2)Documenting and disseminating evidence of the atrocities of the city (moral), and 3) Destruction of the insurgent city government (moral, mental, and physical).

In Fallujah the insurgents certainly were NOT 3GW. They violated just about every 3GW principle–use of massive fortifications for protection rather than canalization, use of firepower for attritive effects, rather than shaping enemy mental processes, little use of reserves, lack of concentration of forces in either space or time. The insurgents were strategically 4GW, with largely attritive 2GW tactics.

What was the Rwandan genocide? 4GW or oGW? There was a very strong IO component in that fight that could not be present in a oGW situation. And there was political differentiation between Hutus and Tutsis–it was a political fight as much as a tribal fight. That level of politicization could not exist in oGW. Yet the killing was done with machetes and small arms, and without much regard to the moral aspects of the fight…it was almost purely attritive.

“Regarding Rwanda, becuase war is an extension of politics, the Rwandan genocide was no more or less political than any Yanomamo battle: two socially defined groups in a resource conflict, ending with the near-extermination of the loser. Thus, 0GW.”

Dan-
I think someone other than you or I defined the 0GW as Primordial Violence–which is a Clausewitzian term, and is congruous to the Ideal War concept that Clausewitz also formulated. Ideal war is basically perfect violence. It is known as Ideal War because it cannot exist–it is hostile even to its own policy, and therefore is useful only as a tool for analysis rather than a descriptive term for an actual war. This is why taking a given conflict and empirically stating whether it is representative of a given GW is so difficult. All GWs, I think, are ideal. (Not to mention that empirically saying anything about war is anti-Clausewitzian. Remember the concepts of “uncertainty” and “fluidity” that are so important to 3GW and later generations).

So it was a trick question…Yanomomo war cannot be 0GW, unless 0GW is defined as something other than Primordial Violence/Ideal War. The policy of Genocide is even too political to even qualify as 0GW, if 0GW is defined as primordial violence. It was something else…and certainly not ideal.

So Yanomomo war cannot be 0GW. I guess that means neither can the Rwandan genocide be 0GW. It was 4GW with crude weapons.

Another thing to consider is that 1GW, in Lind’s GMW conception, is defined in part by the advent of the use of firearms by infantry, and brought a democratization of violence to the battlefield, tactics of lines and columns, etc. So is 0GW tactics of the Crossbow and Pike (Swiss Squares)? The Alexandrian Combined Arms Synthesis? Khan’s Flying Columns of Mangudai? –Or is it the Primordial Violence/Ideal War? This is worth exploring because 1GW is defined in part by technological innovation in the age of gunpowder. xGW may have tried to jettison this technological baggage with the rest of the socio-political-economic aspects of war that Lind relies on, but then the question remains how do you define each generation regardless of the Socio-Political-Economic-Technological (SPET) aspects? Unless we can define these GWs without regard to SPET, I think we’re stuck with at least some of Lind’s GMW.

1GW isn’t the only generation with these problems. Crucial to 4GW is the technological advent of nukes, which reduces the ability of conventional 3GW forces to fight.

I’m just asking for workable definitions here…

Dan-

“In terms of the dispersel of kinetic violence in society. In other words, in terms of how much of the warfighting is “offloaded” from the actual fighters to support mechanisms.”

I fail to see how this is not an economic decision, rooted in socio-economic-political-technological circumstances. Nor do I see how greater off-loading of violence is congruous with higher-generations of war. I am no great fan of Jomini, but this even runs counter to the Principle of Mass.

For example: Capital-rich fighting organizations (US military, for example) spend their money on equipment, offloading the production of violence to industry. Labor-rich fighting organizations (N. Vietnam, VC) offload less of their production of violence, instead relying on their large labor pool. Less violence was offloaded by the VC than the Americans, yet they managed to strategically beat the US, using 4GW mixed with 3GW tactics. The fighting force that offloaded less violence won against a force that offloaded greater violence.

The offloading is inherently an economic decision, and I don’t think it gives much bearing on the advancement from one xGW to another xGW.

Not only that, you will find many guerrilla movements that are labor-rich, offload little violence, and also practice more advanced styles of war than do 3GW maneuver forces. FARC, Hizbollah, JAM, Hamas, VC, IRA, GSPC, etc…

Dan-
“However, XGW measures the offloading of kinetic violence (reducing the kinetic intensity), not the offloading of the war effort.”

Yet violence in each succeeding GW is more intense than in the previous GW. In WWI, the fighting was mostly 2GW in nature, with concentrated violence along the fronts. In WWII, a largely 3GW war, violence was both more intense and less concentrated, extending to the industrial areas. In Vietnam, a 3 & 4GW, the violence was even more intense than WWII (look at tonnages of bombs dropped in VN vs. WWII–you will be surprised to find that far more firepower was used in VN as WWII, even if you add in the atomic bombings). In VN the violence was even more intense, yet less concentrated.

Now look at the recent Hizbollah v. Israel War in 2006. Terror-rockets were fired at civilian centers wherever they could be ranged. PGMs were used by a 4GW force against 3GW tanks. Intensity increaced. Concentration decreased. These effects were combined with increasingly effective IO campaigns, perhaps giving the impression of offloading violence, but I think that would be wrong.

I just don’t see how even in these examples how more advanced GWs have decreased concentrations of kinetic violence. In fact, they kinetic violence may be generalized, or specific–that, frankly, doesn’t seem to matter.

Abherring-
Ironically, Victor Davis Hanson in his book “Carnage and Culture,” claims that the institution of the Flower War prevented the Aztec from dealing with Cortez as they should have. Hence Cortez conquered Mexico with a few hundred Europeans with firearms. It seems the Aztec were incapable of genocidal war.

Frankly, I don’t see how:

-Strategic Bombing is 2GW–it’s very nature is the deep raid, bypassing strength in armies to attack weaknesses in industrial production (whether this was effective is an open question, however.) It’s nature is also to attack the will of the enemy (again, effectiveness is open for debate.) It did not attempt to destroy armies through attrition, which would be 2GW.

-Archers are 2GW, given that they operated in combined arms formations with heavy (shock) infantry. It seems that their range is a rather moot question when your options are to be hacked or stabbed by a sword or be pierced by a crossbow bolt. The violence for each is just as near. And if you’re an archer, your biggest enemy is the lancer. If, you, as an archer, perish, it would probably be due to the cutting of a blade or piercing by a lance, Agincourt and disease notwithstanding. So, again, here the placing of apparently 2GW archers with apparently 1GW men-at-arms is rather myopic. It’s myopic because it mistakes a specific weapons system for an entire style of warfare that actually persisted from prehistory through the invention of the Arquebus. And even with primitive firearms, the Pikeman had a heyday in the formation of the Swiss Square, and this was in the 17th century!

Furthermore, there are plenty of examples of using persisting logistics strategies to defeat invaders–an example would be wasting fields and burning crops. Such actions also are capable of destroying armies without ever once even engaging them, yet these almost certainly do not amount to a higher generation of war. Likewise, Alexander used superior Maneuver through the Cilician Gates of Anatolia to avoid contact and attack the rear of his Persian enemies, yet even this is not 3GW (he was using archers (apparently 2GW), hoplites (apparently 1GW), and primitive cavalry (take your pick as to what GW). Alex provided a great example of the utility of Maneuver, yet he wasn’t a Maneuverist in the true sense of the term.

As far as 4GW goes, you say that “the will itself can be attacked by the very idea of violence.” Indeed. And I can also say that this is not unique to 4GW. When even a remotely competent commander recognizes that “The Enemy Gets a Vote,” he admits that his will is being attacked at some level by enemy action. This is not 4GW. This is METT-T.

Arherring-

I think you’re moving in a better direction as far as defining the types of XGW with regard to doctrine…this is still fraught with lots of problems (that Lind, Hammes, and van Crevald all avoided by beginning their constructs of modern war with the age of gunpowder.) But it is superior, I think, to the “offloading of violence” theory put forth earlier.

So, if the issue of classifying the types of XGW based is on doctrine, the best way to do that would be to assemble an intellectual history of warfare, which is a fine idea. Doing this seems to imply, however, that the XGW must be rooted in the SPET landscape. This can be done without the Hegelianist construct of Lind…we could build a freer, more open framework that may allow for an Alexandrian maneuver warfare, for example, followed by a 2GW type warfare of the early Roman period–with their strengths in Heavy Infantry, followed by a return to Maneuver with the Cataphracts of Byzantium, etc…

This is tough, however…Alexander may have used Combined Arms, and may have attacked weakness with strength, and used fortifications for controlling the maneuver of the enemy. But he still didn’t have a doctrine that allowed for use of a reserve, or a doctrine that allowed for devolved C2, etc. So he may have practiced a type of maneuver war, but a very primitive form of it, at best. Other Great Captains and their styles of war have similar problems. In fact, seperating doctrine from the person of Alexander is remarkably difficult. We could talk about his tendencies in battle and try to build a doctrine from that, but that would still be an inferred doctrine. So whatever framework we use will have to be remarkably open.

And by the way, Thermopylae, though in some ways a positional fight, was also a maneuverist fight. Firstly, it was not an attritive battle…it was a delaying action to rally allies (delaying actions are not sought in positional battles). Second, a picked force was used, which is also a 3GW technique. Thirdly, the dislocation forced on the Persians in that battle was technological–it was based on Greek hoplite heavy infantry fighting against Persian light forces in confined terrain–that is strength v. weakness.

How I wish we were discussing this in a bar!!! Great discussion!

Dan’s “offloading” needs to be better defined. My mind is still struggling what exactly is meant by it with regards to the individual xGWs…(how is offloading accomplished in one GW, and how is that same offloading accomplished in the x+1GW. How is that offloading sufficiently different between generations to make such generational distinctions possible? How do I know that the offloading isn’t a symptom of some other social/political/economic/technological process that might be the real cause for the differences in generation?)

I am more comfortable with Abherring’s doctrinal explanation, although I have differences of opinion as to which generation a particular type of war might be (strategic bombing, etc…) The feature/bug of this approach is binding of the generations of war to the intellectual history of war–something I have no problem with and certainly an approach with some merit. Note that this is still remotely connected with the social/political/economic/technological, but not as closely tied as Lind’s framework.

Such an approach would allow for the generations of war to coexist in different forms throughout a larger span of history than merely the gunpowder age, yet would also recognize the incompleteness of, say, 2GW styles of war prior to the Industrial Revolution.

As far as Liddell Hart goes, I would say that his indirect approach is possibly analagous to offloading of violence–although I’ve already stated my uncertainty of the definition of offloading. I think this might be graphically depicted better, which is what prompted the comment that we should be in a bar–because then there would be plenty of napkins to write on. Anyways, I’ll stew on this some more and see if I can find a better way of expressing this. I know my thesis to be correct intuitively, but don’t yet have the words to express myself.