Strategy - an Interpretation

Summary of Krister Pallin's and Markus Anderson's article in RSAWSPJ no 3 2001.

This is the third in a planned series of articles dealing with issues related to the current Armed Forces process of developing a military strategic doctrine. In a historical overview, and with an excursus on contemporary military and civilian theory, the continually evolving term strategy is explored.

Carl von Clausewitz, Sir Basil H. Liddell Hart, André Beaufre, Thomas Schelling, Sir Michael Howard and Henry Mintzberg are just a few out of a significant number of theorists that have contributed to the evolution of the term strategy, from the original Greek word stra-tegos to its modern wider conno-tations. Furthermore, numerous military commanders and civilian leaders have through practice and application explored the boundaries and potentials of strategy. Different contributions are hard to compare, partly because they concern different levels of war or different dimensions of strategy, but also because the different views of strategy have been a product of the times during which they evolved. Changing political, economic, social, technological and military circumstances have always influenced the evolution of strategy. Hence, the evolution of the term strategy and the evolution of warfare have walked hand in hand through history.

Given its roots and historical use, the word strategy has always been associated with warfare and the military capability of using battle to support the overarching aim of war itself. This has led to a common tendency to look upon the contents of strategy with too narrow an eye. To some extent, this is still true today. However, the complex, large-scale conflicts of the 19th century and their devastating consequences put renewed focus on the fact that all military activity must be subordinated to politics and its grander scheme. Liddell Hart’s introduction of the term Grand Strategy is one of many examples of such highlighting of political primacy. Today, labels like national strategy or political strategy are so commonly used, that no one should be surprised by the fact that military means is but one in the political toolbox for security.

In the 20th century, the development of weapons of mass destruction and international arms races brought with them a view on war and conflicts as the dynamic interaction between opposing human wills. Although no novelty in military thinking - even Clausewitz viewed war as a grand duel between commanders - the modern development of strategy was the systematizing of warfare into a complex, dynamic struggle where actions always spurred reactions. One way of study-ing this was through Game Theory. In this context, international relations were viewed as a game or a competition in which the fundamental task was to "win" against your opponent. Strategy consequently turned into a set of rules or theory for action, reaction, and interaction. War could be seen as a very violent form of "the game".

The perhaps most important role model for modern strategic thinking is the French General André Beaufre. He approached strategy from a very pragmatic and comprehensive perspective. He argued that war and conflicts are only in part resolved by using military means and by annihilation of the opponent’s resources. By viewing war as the dialectic struggle between opposing wills, Beaufre once again highlighted the fact that the decision is psychological, i.e. when one side feels that it must unconditionally yield to the other.

In order to get even closer to the term strategy, one can study how different strategies reveal themselves in organizations in general. Within civilian as well as military theory, several frameworks for strategy have been developed as pedagogical tools. There is no simple or universally accepted definition - vision and policy are examples of terms that are used synonymously with strategy. A commonly used civilian characterization - the five p’s of strategy - was devised by the American professor Henry Mintzberg. He argued that strategy could be viewed as a Plan, Pattern, Perspective, Position, or Ploy. Representing different aspects of strategy, Mintzberg’s categorization indeed reflects the inherent variety of possible interpretations and even ambiguity of the term.

With the help of the historical exposé and the excursus on modern military and civilian science presented in this article, some important deductions can made concerning a Swedish military application of the term strategy:

The original denotation of strategy in Swedish concerns the art or method of warfare; a well-planned procedure; a long-term, overarching procedure [...], or in a military context (the science of) warfare in general. The most common military view is also that strategy is some form of plan or operation. Basically the authors of this article do not disagree with the view that a strategy should be regarded as a plan. However, such a statement must be amended with an insight into why strategy should be viewed not just as a long-term procedure, but a plan for a specific purpose. Furthermore, if one regards strategy as a plan, one must also provide the general outline of its possible contents. As a consequence, any strategy will most likely contain not only different ploys, but also elements of position, pattern, and perspective.

Hence, there is a significant difference between strategic doctrine and strategy. Strategy is a coherent description of the ends, ways and means necessary to achieve a certain strategic goal. Strategy is mainly expressed in plans for operations. Military strategic doctrine is a codification of strategic theory to serve our own purposes, not a strategy in itself. Instead, a military strategic doctrine should support the strategic process and provide guidelines for the design of strategies. Primarily, such a doctrine concerns the operational dimension of strategy, i.e. military ends, ways and means that should be chosen to produce a decision on the battlefield. However, every military or operational strategy must emanate from and be supported by strategies within the other dimensions.

The strategic level is consequently the level of war on which different operations and other actions are conducted to achieve strategic goals. Military ways and means might be essential to achieve a certain strategic goal, but they should work in concert with other ways and means. The military strategic level should convert and implement security policy and those national strategic goals, where the military has a role to play, into plans for the development and use of military means.