Tailored and Time Constrained: Key Considerations for Military Innovators
Introduction
Those who innovate well find success, while those who do not become cautionary tales. When discussing military innovation, there are many considerations. The most important considerations that influence military innovation are that the innovation must solve a problem and that no innovation provides a permanent advantage. When evaluating military innovation, and thinking about how to approach future innovations, an interconnected focus on doctrine, organization, technology, and tactics, or the DOTT framework, provides an effective lens.
Innovation Solves Problems
Innovation does not occur in a vacuum. Military innovation, as a strategic study, requires a link between a theory and practice. Put simply, military innovation should seek to overcome existing battlefield dilemmas and create new dilemmas for one’s foes. History demonstrates that good innovations come from theories that are tailored to solve specific problems. At the same time, theories that seek a panacea tend to fare poorly.
The improvements in combined arms warfare is an example of innovation overcoming a specific problem. Immediately after World War I (WWI), the defense appeared to be the dominant form of warfare. Trench warfare, accurate predicted artillery fire, and machine guns made the battlefield static. Static battlefields fuel wars of attrition, in which both sides seek to exhaust their foes.
German leaders, like General Hans von Seeckt, responded by developing a new doctrine to “wage offensive warfare even against larger enemy armies and letting it aim at a decisive battle of annihilation against the enemy.” For the Germans, innovation occurred because a new problem, static trench warfare, needed to be overcome.
Though faced with the same dilemmas of trench warfare, the British in the interwar period did not innovate as well as their German counterparts. British failure seems especially galling since J.F.C. Fuller, one of the leading advocates for armored combined arms warfare, was British Army officer. However, Fuller did not merely advocate for the tank as a solution to the battlefield dilemmas of WWI. Rather, Fuller sought to break the yoke of attrition by returning mobility to the battlefield. In doing so, he proposed innovations not tailored to specific problems. Instead, Fuller prescribed a panacea-like solution to the complexities of battlefield realities.
American innovation in the post-war era further demonstrates that military innovation is that it should solve a defined problem. In the 1950s, the US had a clear challenge to solve: the US military and NATO did not possess the conventional assets required to contest the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact in a European land war. In response, President Dwight Eisenhower implement what became known as the New Look. The New Look was an asymmetric escalation strategy. Conventional attacks by Warsaw Pact forces would be responded to with large-scale nuclear retaliation. To execute the New Look, the US military developed new doctrines, military organizations, and technologies to fuel the option for nuclear responses to conventional Soviet and Warsaw Pact threats. The New Look precipitated both the First and Second Offset Strategies – key innovations for competing against Soviet strategic competition. For the Cold War-era American national security, the problem was specific, and a useful theory to drive innovation resulted.
Effects-Based Operations (EBO), an offshoot of the Second Offset Strategy, proves that when military innovation does not solve a tailored problem, innovation is less useful. Rather than a clear problem, such as countering numerical superiority or overcoming static battlefields, EBO promised “an almost universal applicability for the concept from strategic to tactical levels.” At a basic level EBO proposed that the intent-based application of force against a threat could control the threat’s reaction. EBO drove innovation, but it was not amorphous. Instead, EBO advocates like Brigadier General David A. Deptula proposed a hypothetical synergy of stealth and precision strike to achieve what they called parallel effects. Parallel effects describe a near-simultaneous strike against all the vital targets of an adversary across time, space, and level of war. Once achieved, the parallel effects would paralyze the enemy, even if their centers of gravity were not fully understood. As a result, the duration of a conflict might be shortened.
Instead, America fought two lengthy wars in the 21st century. The US military tried and failed to achieve anything significant with EBO in Afghanistan and Iraq. Instead, stealth and precision came at the cost of land forces, which is ultimately what the successive commanders in both theaters continually asked for. The innovation did not lead to efficacy. As seen through the examples above, military innovators must consider the problem they are trying to solve. The better the problem is defined, the more effective the innovation developed to solve is.
Innovation Has a Shelf-Life
A second important consideration for military innovation is that all innovation is temporal. In the words of Max Boot: “no military revolution has ever conferred an indefinite advantage upon its early innovators. Rivals inevitably copy what they can and come up with tactics or technologies to blunt the effectiveness of what they cannot produce or acquire.” Thus, states cannot be complacent; they must consider the length of time each innovation gives them an advantage.
The Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) is a cautionary tale of why one must consider the impact of time on military innovation. Nuclear parity between the US and the Soviet Union in the 1960s created a new need to innovate during the Cold War. The United States developed satellites that could provide tactical effects on the battlefield. Space assets, combined with loitering drones, allowed commanders to rapidly to understand the battlefield and the enemy in real time. Once the enemy was understood, precision guided weapons could reliably hit the intended target.
The synthesis of these technologies resulted in the concept of a lean force that replaced redundancy with agility. The RMA enabled the identification and destruction of the enemy while mitigating most risks. Moreover, the advocates for the RMA envisioned transformational, enduring change.
The challenge to the RMA is that as time progressed, opponent capabilities increased. Space is now contested. Companies and other nations are launching ever increasing numbers of satellites which occupy increasingly large proportions of the available spectrums and orbits. Adversaries can degrade or destroy space-based assets, degrading battlefield awareness. Simultaneously, electronic warfare can degrade other parts of the system. Finally, drones and other precision weapon systems are now widely available. For example, Russia now produces several thousand drones per day, each a precision weapon.
The RMA promised a convergence of new, exquisite technologies that would provide the United States lasting overmatch against its peers. However, this promise did not account for the passage of time and watchful adversaries’ interest in replicating useful technology and tactics. Over time, the innovations of the RMA have become commonly available. Innovators must consider the amount of time each innovation confers.
Conclusion
When discussing military innovation, it is easy for one to adopt too myopic a view. There are many aspects to military innovation, each important, and different people are attracted to different aspects. For example, some discuss military innovation solely as the advance of technology. The DOTT framework provides a holistic method for evaluation, enabling a more thorough understanding of innovation through time. With a thorough understanding, one can compare different military innovations. Further, military innovators can understand how to better innovate, focusing on true change instead of becoming distracted with incomplete notions.
Military innovation is complex. The DOTT framework allows one to effectively evaluate innovations holistically, rather than piecemeal. When discussing innovations, two key considerations shape whether an innovation is good or bad. First, the innovation must solve a problem, and the more defined the problem, the better. Second, the innovator must consider that no innovation will provide a permanent asymmetric advantage. Therefore, when innovating, one must consider the amount of time for which their innovation will provide an advantage, accounting for adaptations and responses by a foe. If one considers these two things, they will more effectively innovate.
