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Lesson Objective: Analyze by whom future wars will be fought, about what future wars will be fought, how future wars will be terminated, the causes of future wars, and strategies to prevent future conflict.

Desired Leaning Outcomes/Questions for Study and Discussion:

Kaplan suggests changing patterns and sources of future conflict are population growth, environmental degradation, resource scarcity and failing states. To understand the events of the next fifty years, then one must understand environmental scarcity, cultural and racial clash, geographic destiny, and the transformation of war. The order in which these are named is not accidental. Each concept except the first relies partly on the one or ones before it, meaning that the last two-new approaches to mapmaking and to warfare-are the most important. They are also the least understood. He further discusses the possible implosion of countries in Africa, the Mid-East, and the Far East. Fueling this implosion are the causes stated above.

According to Kaplan, the environment is the national-security issue of the early twenty-first century. Scarcity, crime, overpopulation, tribalism, and disease are rapidly destroying the social fabric of the planet

In the twenty-first century water will be in dangerously short supply in such diverse locales as Saudi Arabia, Central Asia, and the southwestern United States. A war could erupt between Egypt and Ethiopia over Nile River water. Even in Europe tensions have arisen between Hungary and Slovakia over the damming of the Danube, a classic case of how environmental disputes fuse with ethnic and historical ones. Future wars and civil violence will often arise from scarcities of resources such as water, cropland, forests, and fish. Just as there will be environmentally driven wars and refugee flows, there will be environmentally induced praetorian regimes—or, as Kaplan puts it, "hard regimes."

The political and strategic impact of surging populations, spreading disease, deforestation and soil erosion, water depletion, air pollution, and, possibly, rising sea levels in critical, overcrowded regions like the Nile Delta and Bangladesh. Developments such as these will prompt mass migrations and, in turn, incite group conflicts and will be the core foreign-policy challenge from which most others will ultimately emanate, arousing the public and uniting assorted interests left over from the Cold War.

Kaplan argues that what used to be called the "Third World," now more optimistically the "developing countries," is the hotbed for future conflict. But so-called developed countries are not immune to the phenomenon--far from it. The instability and implosion that is brewing in countries like Sierra Leone and Ivory Coast threaten Western European countries and the US.

Kaplan argues that rather than realizing progress toward a more homogenous community of peoples, the world is hurtling toward an increasingly violent and divided society.

According to Scales, it is too soon to postulate who our significant competitor might be. Warfare among the 20 developed industrialized democracies is unlikely. The poorest states are not likely to pose a serious military threat. Transitional states between these two extremes located primarily in Europe, the Middle East and Asia are already developing economic means to support more sophisticated militaries.

The key concept that both authors share is an emphasis on the increasing fragmentation of the historical social model. Nation states appear to be losing relevance in the face of exploding populations and the ills that they spawn.

Kaplan keys on the conceptual barriers erected by maps. "[Maps] create a conceptual barrier that prevents us from comprehending the political crack-up just beginning to occur worldwide. Borders do not correspond to reality. Overpopulation and scarce resources will drive everything. Conflict will be localized and based on simple issues of resources and group, not national politics. (Environmental political science) Population and conflict will move to cities where environmental pressures are strong. Cultures have the power to control reaction to environment (North Africa slum vs. West Africa slum, power of Turkey). War is a better state than poverty for much of the world--a distraction, ennobling effort. Van Creveld vs. Clausewitz. Going back to pre-Westphalian situation, the Thirty Years War. Crime and war will become indistinguishable, war more like the struggles of primitive tribes. The world is fragmented. He says that population growth and migrations will combine with cultural similarities to allow chaos to spread to geographically separated parts of the world. "The ‘Last Map’ will be an ever-mutating representation of chaos."

Scales, feels information technology may be an equalizer. The most obvious is that the information revolution will be neutral in this looming competition; in fact it may favor the competition more than it favors Western militaries because potential enemies will be able to tailor new technologies to their particular style of war without becoming information-dependent. On one hand, the increasing flow of information is quite literally drowning commanders, staffs, and intelligence organizations. This is the crucial problem of the information age--one that we have yet to solve. The evidence is already clear that information technology will not simplify the decision-making process, but in fact makes it more complex. Our future opponents, however, given their expectations and aims, will require much less information to strike effectively--particularly since their aim is not to win a decisive victory. Scales also discusses the Chinese revolution and the patience taken to employ forces only when and where desired. Mao focused on three tenets: area control (most important), isolate and compartmentalize, and collect and mass against weak points.

Since several key missions (i.e. counterterrorism) have no key responsible government entity with the power necessary to accomplish them he refers to them as homeless. The US government is not well structured—nowhere is found the authority, resources, accountability and managerial focus to handle several truly critical security missions. These missions include: counterterrorism, combating WMD proliferation, homeland defense (including protection against computer attacks and biological weapons), information warfare, peacekeeping, civil reconstruction and conflict prevention. These mission have something in common they cut across many agencies. Carter, p. 26.

For example: A terrorist attack or an assault on government institutions could be viewed as either a military attack, a crime, or a disaster. This means that the DOD, Justice, and others as well as the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), could all lay claim to being in charge of the federal government’s role in prevention and response. Clinton assigned the NSC to delegate responsibilities, which they did—however, funding to carry out such mandates was not provided.

Homeless missions are not likely to be accomplished because there is no coherent interagency program for actually accomplishing them. The NSC does a good job coordinating policy but not actual working programs—Since the members have exceptional foreign policy experience but almost no experience with programming, budgeting, or the management of technical programs or large organizations.

Carter notes that the Goldwater-Nichols Act of 1986 ensures that the Army, Navy and Air Force fight together. Unified commanders (CINCS) were given clear authority for joint operations. However, the jobs of organizing, training and equipping the forces remained with the separate services … Not governed by the CINCS. Of several possible solutions, Carter notes the following as best: Give the Joint Forces Command CINC the power to inject joint thinking into the acquisition process on behalf of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the other CINCS. To make the process work the following 4 steps should be taken: One—The Joint Forces Command should prepare for the chairman of the Joint Chiefs a broad road map, updated annually, for developing truly joint systems. Two, the Joint Forces Command should be given the personnel and resources necessary to take on its new acquisition responsibilities. These should include some direct authority over budgets for purchasing inherently joint systems. Three—The person chosen to head the Joint Forces Command should be a senior officer with experience as a CINC, service chief, or vice chief. Four—He or she should become a member of the DOD’s key decision-maiing bodies on acquisition matters: the Joint Requirements Oversight Council and the Defense Resources Board.

Clarke and Clad: Today’s debate about military force takes place on two fronts. In some instances, resort to force is uncontroversial and also likely to be effective. Examples might be a defensive response to any direct attack on the United States or on any vital American interest overseas by an identifiable enemy with conventional forces. The second aspects of this debate concerns the discretionary threats that do not constitute a direct attack on American property or lives or are more ambiguous in the involvement of American interests. This category of threat appears more likely to provide the stuff of future challenges to the United States.

While American military planners continue to place their central emphasis on winning a conventional war, Smith’s conclusion that "war, at least in its western form, to a large extent has lost its utility" may more accurately describe the future. Instead, the United States is more likely to face a series of conflicts in which its adversaries conduct operations, in Smith’s words, "below a threshold in which the bulk of the West’s technical superiority can be brought to bear." Again, the lessons of Somalia come to mind, as does the bitter experience of Russian tank crews at the hands of ill-equipped but highly motivated Chechens. In expressing cautious views, Americans are not collapsing into a new bout of isolationist exhaustion, instead they are picking up the threads of earlier instincts of caution, of staying out of conflicts where they discern little American interests or power to influence events.

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Sources of Victory: One such issue is whether military developments favor the offence or the defense. A second and related issue concerns the threat that military operations pose to civil society. This leads to a third issue, the relationship between political aims and military means. A fourth issue is the balance of alliance. For these reasons, developing the military art in its most advanced form now appears to be the responsibility of the US. The dominant approach to this task reflects a long-standing objective to develop a military instrument capable of such sharp and efficient direction that it can mitigate war’s terrors and bring hostilities to swift and relatively clean conclusions, before too much damage has been done. The US now leads the world, in quality if not always in quantity, in all types of conventional military capability.

Information Advantage: It is therefore important not to exaggerate the West’s information advantage. Modern sensors come into their own when observing a conventional order of battle, but have more trouble monitoring urban militias, rural guerrillas or crude mortars on trucks. Despite the wonders of the information age, the fact remains that few outsiders have any notion of what is really going on in many contemporary conflicts. Local actors manipulate outside perceptions, normally by stage-managing events or feeding snippets of information to the Western media. An independent local press, a potentially reliable source, rarely survives a civil war.

Scales, Clarke & Clad and Bellamy all indicated that conventional state-based war is diminishing. Scales is eloquent in recommending that we are cautious and develop new strategies. Clarke & Clad believe we must develop capabilities for lower technology conflicts, Bellamy suggests we need flexible responses and proposes a model. Bellamy also recommends being more rather than less heavily armed.

"Urban combat siphons off unit combat effectiveness through fatigue, high casualty rates, and the need to leave soldiers behind to secure cleared rooms or defend the many potential avenues of approach." "Integration of simulation, urban training site exercises, and the use of actual urban terrain into tactical and operational level intra- and inter-service training is essential to force preparedness." "Replication of a major city or use of an actual metropolitan area is necessary (until virtual reality makes simulation a viable option)."

Our continued military role per Kaplan is peacekeeping and low intensity conflicts, e.g. Somalia, Haiti and Serbia. Our military must concentrate on urban fighting skills, police-type training and rebuilding infrastructure (Humanitarian efforts).

Yes. Public acceptance of casualties has diminished considerably. Bellamy: The public has become, and remains, unaccustomed to and probably intolerant of high casualty levels. Clarke and Clad: In expressing cautious views, Americans are not collapsing into a new bout of isolationist exhaustion, instead they are picking up the threads of earlier instincts of caution, of staying out of conflicts where they discern little American interests or power to influence events.

Clarke and Chad: A look at the problems identified by policy makers or in independent analyses, as in the Heritage Foundation’s blueprint A Safe and Prosperous America, yields proliferation, terrorism, religious extremism, ethnic intolerance, or access to foreign trade as major issues. Note the subtle change: these problems decreasingly express themselves as activities primarily between governments, let alone as between one government and the United States; more often, they are entirely "non-state" or "transnational" in nature. They do not assemble themselves neatly or visibly for battle. Perhaps Clausewitz was right after all: it is not possible to take politics out of war; there really is a continuum between the two.

Bellamy: The most naive, and most easily dismissed, misconception about operations other than full-scale war, whatever we call them, is that ‘low intensity’ equals low technology.

The public has become—and remains—unaccustomed to and probably intolerant of high casualty levels. The most crucial factor identified at the conference was the emergence of ‘non-state actors’--sub-national or transnational warlords, cartels and corporations, with which the international community was unprepared and ill-equipped to deal. A conflict between a state or even, for example, the EU and international terrorists might be ‘low intensity’, for the state or the EU, but not for the terrorists, and so on. The strategic environment in the next twenty to thirty years will be affected by three main factors. The most traditional military concern will be the proliferation of military technology, especially chemical and biological weapons—and also information warfare—which will enable weaker states and sub-state groups to level the playing field compared with traditional nation states. Then there will be environmental limitations on global development, which will affect the global economy and probably make the less developed states, denied the ability to catch up, feel resentful, leading to deepening socioeconomic divisions, both between states and within them.

Bellamy states, "It is generally accepted that in military operations you can trade down, but you, can’t trade up. A force designed to fight and win a big or ‘hot’ war, to conduct operations on a big scale, with the ability to command and control on that scale, under the most demanding, paralyzing, crippling attack, can handle anything else. The converse is untrue."

"Urban combat siphons off unit combat effectiveness through fatigue, high casualty rates, and the need to leave soldiers behind to secure cleared rooms or defend the many potential avenues of approach." "Integration of simulation, urban training site exercises, and the use of actual urban terrain into tactical and operational level intra- and inter-service training is essential to force preparedness." "Replication of a major city or use of an actual metropolitan area is necessary (until virtual reality makes simulation a viable option)."

We should still address our success based on making the combatants do what we want. However, since the combatants may not be nation-states, the result may not be measurable.

Bellamy takes issue with the terms Low Intensity Conflict and High Intensity Conflict as inappropriate designations.

Freedman: The future development of the military art will be more the result of the changed structure of international politics than of advances in military technology.

DLO 1: Explain Kaplan's argument that future war is likely to be driven more by fundamental needs than by national interests.

Option A is correct. Kaplan begins his article with the premonition of a future where war is pervasive and revisits this theme under his topic " A New Kind of War". He uses West Africa specifically, and events since he wrote do bear him out. In this example, increased conflict clearly relates best to this response. Reference 11th edition, Term 1, Book 1, pgs. 6-8, 18-20.

Option B is incorrect. This may remain an underlying cause, but is not referenced in the scenario. Reference 11th edition, Term 1, Book 1, pgs. 10-12.

Option C is incorrect. No evidence for US destabilization is presented. Reference 11th edition, Term 1, Book 1, pg. 23.

Option D is incorrect. This Kaplan thesis is not described by this scenario, borders are remaining intact as it were, though again, this is an underlying factor. Reference 11th edition, Term 1, Book 1, pgs. 21-22.

DLO 3: Predict how well the United States is prepared to utilize the military in meeting national objectives in response to conflict in the next century.

Option C is correct. This is the byproduct of the modern intersection of the information age and international politics. If the decision is made to intervene, the rationale for doing so must be strong, balanced and perceived as fair. The government will seek to counter the enemy by demonstrating proportionality and economy in the use of force (Freedman). Reference 11th edition, Term 1, Book 1, pgs. 45, 48, 51.

Option A is incorrect. This media coverage is not immediately a big impact necessarily on the military. Reference 11th edition, Term 1, Book 1, pgs. 30, 50-51.

Option B is incorrect. While secrecy is reduced and no longer assumable, it is still attainable. Reference 11th edition, Term 1, Book 1, pgs. 50-51.

Option D is incorrect. Military operations can mitigate all of these as seen in the Gulf War.

DLO 4: Relate the impact of post-Cold War international politics to warfare and conflict resolution.

Option C is correct. This refers directly to the major change in the concept of national security, that has played out during the last 8 years of conflict and deployments as predicted by Clarke and Clad. Reference 11th edition, Term 1, Book 1, pgs. 56-57.

Option A is incorrect. These countries do not pose real threats to physical survival (Insufficient nukes) of the US and our military is clearly capable and prepared to respond to them, therefore it is not limited in its usefulness. Reference 11th edition, Term 1, Book 1, pgs. 55-56.

Option B is incorrect. Clausewitz has not necessarily been repudiated as he refers to root human behaviors and continues to focus on politics as a cause for conflict, which certainly remains true. Reference 11th edition, Term 1, Book 1, pgs. 58-59.

Option D is incorrect. These provisions could restrict the use of force to "high force" engagements if they were followed, but they are only considerations at best as recent history since the Gulf War has shown with Bosnia, Somalia, Kosovo, etc. as examples that clearly violate these conditions. Reference 11th edition, Term 1, Book 1, pgs. 59.