Just saw the XKCD cartoon above, and was thinking about both Russ and Mike's comments regarding teaching. Surely that cartoon is apt for the sciences, but I wonder about "purity scales" for other fields. Could one really argue that tactics are merely applied strategies, for example?
32 comments:
Interesting question. I was going to say no, but started thinking about it. The end statement of both are to beat the enemy, the real difference is the scale. The bigger the scale, the more opinions open to you, but the trade off is much greater complexity. If you want to talk real god honest strategy, you rapidly get into such complexity that you can't really be a total expert in "strategy", but an aspect (economic, military, political) at best. To win at that level you need the best "team" as you can't possibly have one person manage everything. Successful leaders at that level are those best able to make their team work. Eisenhower is a great example, not the greatest military mind to ever roll down the pike but he was a great leader in that he could make his team work together (ur, more or less). The Germans and Japanese couldn't even get their army and navy to cooperate for simple missions (hell the Japanese army had its own shipping line to move its supplies and troops, and its own landing craft to do amphibious attacks so they wouldn't have to work with the navy). Our current war is an even better example of hits and misses. Current Iraq plan great success becuase we matched up the right guy who knew what parts to put together, but you hop up a level to the national war effort and its not so good. The fighting part okay, but the politcal?
Yeeck.
I might argue in this case strategies are really more applied tactics. Warfare started simple and evolved upwards with technology. Tactics came first, strategy evolved from tactics.
I do agree with the though, Sociologists are the bottom-feeders in this chain.
Perhaps we might just agree that sociologists are bottom-feeders, period? :)
They want so hard to be a science.
Agreed with Mike... strategies are applied tactics, not vice versa.
Which, in turn, is simply applied biology....
:)
So you think that strategy is the decision-making surrounding when and where to apply tactics and/or their resources?
I'm not here to say anything intelligent, just to point out that the biologist has a cephalopod.
In fact, very much, a matter of deciding when and where to apply the resources relevant to (which) specific tactics.
It's a necessary step once you're no longer running equipment (say, a bow and arrow), and instead, using leadership, where your equipment is other people, and the people with bows and arrows that report to them...
Thanks Russ - apparently I'm a master strategist being a chemist and all!!
Now if I could just get out of this wet paper bag. I know - I'll use this flask of acid.
AAAAAHHHH!!!!! IT BURNS!!!! THE GOGGLES!!!! THEY DO NOTHING!!!!!
Seriously though - as I think about all the good thoughts here, especially the comments about having a good team, then it seems to me that applied psychologists can become some of the best leaders (they know how people think and what motivates them) and that applied sociologists, especially those study specific cultures, are the intelligence arms that direct strategy. Together they make the "know yourself as well as you know your enemy" statement come to reality.
Note I'm saying "applied" and not theoretical practitioners of these fields. Understanding a field of science is one thing, but actually being able to apply those skills towards making something happening has this comic reversed. You could argue that the arrow would point the other way if you put it as "fields arranged by practicality in getting things done", and whether we like it or not, its those sociologists and psychologists that influence how decisions are made - it's not the scientists. I may discover something that changes a tactic, but only those who practice the social sciences actually put it into use.
And Alex, you just hit on why so many of the times the military has issues in this category. We rarely get people who can apply this stuff (sociologists and psychologists)in real life, we instead get the policy from idiots on high who do most of the work in a vacuum while listening to way to much NPR. People have issues with soldiers because we usually get seen as grunts, apes, idiots, thugs, and cavemen who would rather shoot something than talk about it.
There is some truth to that theory though...
But we are people of action. We are trained to DO SOMETHING. We have lots of type A personalities (I am kind of a weird hybrid A/B type that likes to do things, but also likes to think about it) and guys who understand the value of action versus talk. Try and get action out of the left side of this scale in our type of world and you can see how this starts to break down. But we are getting much better, and are much better than what we were before. The overall level of education in the Army is pretty high, most of our enlisted has college credits after one tour, and our officer and NCO corps are really up there. This is mixed in with the hands on stuff we do and we get a nice mix.
So we are a bunch of psuedo-nerds who kill things in clever ways, I guess. But the interaction with other types is where we disconnect. I see it once a week on average from our Mental Eval Folks who can't wrap their heads around the idea of how basic training works and that, yes, it DOES have to be stressful.
And on Jim's comment. Yes Strategy is basically the art/science of properly applying tactics on a large scale. Example: Desert Storm was in its most basic form a simple holding attack. We held the Iraqis attention in Kuwait and then proceeded to send 2 corps around their flank and take them in side and rear. But you boil that down and think of how many moving parts we are talking about. Air Support, logistics for something like 6 plus divisions, three air assaults, diversion plans, and so on. Its a tactic sure, but it is way above and beyond just being "a" tactic.
Actually, come to think of it, this would be an Operational Level mission. Building, supplying and organizing the Coalition and getting them to agree to the overall plan would be the strategic part. Operational Level is between Tactics and Strategy and really came into existance with the advent of modern communications and mass armies (WWI is arguably the first war with operational level stuff going on).
Cool; I like that inversion of the normal thought process that considers tactics to be something left to lesser mortals while the strategists commune with the Gods.
or some slightly less poetic form of the above.
Go Cephalopods!
Many think of the tactical and strategic realms in just that light which is why you get these "experts" commenting on why we are doing stupid stuff in their (not so) humble opinion. They are the priests on high who bring down the word, so to speak.
Now, there are some cases where that thought process can be applied. Me talking to my hippy aunt is one, her sum value of knowledge on tactics is less than zero, so I know damn sure she has much less than zero knowledge on actual strategy. I can't get that to sink in because of course SHE went to college, listens to NPR and reads the papers. Because of that she can just skip over the mere tactics and jump into a complete and total understanding of strategy.
Now that everyone has stopped laughing I can continue. The point about tactics is that they are the building block for understanding strategy. I mean really understanding it. Everyone "gets" how a car works, but not everyone is a mechanic who really "gets" how it works. Everyone started at the driver/user level but not nearly everyone had the brain power, desire or work ethic to become a mechanic. The military is no different. You don't graduate someone from VMI or WP and make them a general in the Pentagon becuase they scored an A in US Military History, you make them a LT so they learn how it works on the small scale. Then if they can work it, they move up the chain to higher levels applying the lessons to the next step up. Tactics come first becuase you build the strategy on them.
Of course the really fun part of this equation is that in the grand scheme of things strategy trumps tactics. Sure you need to have the right tactics to win, but if you have only tactics you will lose. Just ask the Confederates, the Germans (in WWII, they had a strategy in WWI but is was WRONG), the French (in several cases anyway) and even the US on occasion (not right now though, we got a good one going currently, did have to work to get there though).
You gotta start small, work bigger and then (most importantly) work your level. A general who thinks like a squad leader is not who you want in chanrge. A general who can think like a squad leader, platoon leader, Company CO, Bn CO, BDE CO, DIV CO and Corps CO, apply how all that works in the big picture and make it come together is what you want. A hard job and another reason why people who jump to the strategic level without any thought or experience in the "lesser" tactical area usually don't know jack.
I forgot a sentance above. We also don't want a general who can't think like a squad leader or who never had too. There is a reason why everyone needs to be a PLT leader to make it to CPT, and why CPT needs to be a Company Commander to make Major.
You can't learn those lessons from NPR.
Sounds like you should write a book for the layman "Our Military, How it works and why you should understand it", or some such....
Well, they already have some. But a couple of them are written backwards with ideas like "You too can understand strategy in 13 easy steps." I.E. they boil down the really big strategic ideas into their most basic tactical format instead of going from the other direction, kind of like making the skin and then trying to insert the bones after. "How to Make War" and "A Quick and Dirty Guide to War" are both really good for this.
I think the other problem lots of folks have one this is understanding how it breaks down. Military strategy for fighting an insurgency is not the same as one for fighting hordes of Chinese in Tanks. Yes, both do build off of the basic tactics, but end up going radically different directions.
Actually, this post has made me realize something. I think I have finally figured out why I get so damn annoyed with so many people running off about how we should be fighting this war. You never hear people debating nuclear engineering because its complex, (policy yes). There are certain areas that people seem to think you can "dumb down" or understand with some superfical study. The military is one. Of course, you actually can't, but try telling that to anyone with a college degree. How many times has anyone here talked to someone with sum zero experience with anything military and yet thinks they "get it" because they read Sun Tzu (all 82 pages)? Or understand how insurgencies work because they saw "Platoon" (you laugh, I had it happen) but give you a blank stare when you mention Gupta?
Don't get me wrong, I do know folks (some on this post) who do know lots about the military but have never served. Reading can teach you a lot, but what gets me is the old saying "a little bit of knowledge can be a dangerous thing". Lots of folks seem to think a reading of Sun Tzu and watching CNN's dateline give them an understanding equal to MINE as to how wars are fought.
Oh hell no.
And I again forgot something. The two books I mentioned were good to read, not good as in they do it backwards.
Mike,
You seem to have a problem with NPR - what gives? I never ever hear strategy or tactics discussed on NPR, just news (or Car Talk).
But I won't disagree that there are those who think by knowing a little they know a lot. What's worse is that they come in both educated and uneducated forms and because they tend to be so loud and vocal it can be the only voice one hears.
The big picture thinking and knowing how to think at all levels is indeed what makes someone a good leader and a good strategist, and you're dead right that it takes learning at the lower levels to master it. Interestingly, this same route to expertise is used the same way in the scientific fields. One must start as a student and move up through the ranks of scientific experiments and project management to really make an impact. Yes, you get geniuses that can pull it off without all that training and experience, but they're incredibly rare, just like they are in the military. And sadly in science we have the loud-mouth idiots who think they know it all while only really knowing a lot, but if one can give the perception of knowing it all, sometimes that's all it takes with certain crowds.
Oh I don't have really anything against NPR. Its just easier to type than "the Washington Post Editorial Page" and I have beaten up on CNN so much its lost it flavor.
You kind of hit the point though. You are correct that they never DO talk about tactics, that was the issue. I have actually heard them talk strategy, only the word never came out. It was usually titled something a bit different, a piece about USAID operations, or UNICEF or the like. But what they were hitting on was strategic level (or operational level) operations to bring about a favorable endstatement for our side. The entertaining part of this is usually when the commentor makes the "point" that if we were doing this or focusing more on it we would be winning. We are doing it and they don't see it. Strategy is the true high end stuff. I.e. if USAID is running a project that is part of the overall US approach (and a big one, I don't think USAID gets near enough credit for its work). But many people seem to think that a USAID project and the US Military operations are somehow totally disconnected and not supporting each other. No dummies, that is exactly what they are doing. It is all part of the overall US STRATEGY. But lots of people stop looking at the tactical level not realizing that a disconnect at that level doesn't mean they are disconnected all the way up. I will agree we have had some serious tactical disconnects during this war, and then point out that's nothing new as we ALWAYS have them. That's the problem of trying to learn strategy backwards which seems to becoming quite common.
I don't know about this scale though. I am not sure I agree that biologists rank beneath chemists :).
And Math is pure evil so this whole scale is suspect, even though they got the sociologist thing correct.
A clarification. On the above the point I was getting at was that what I see happening is that since people are trying to leap to the strategic level, they end up applying strategic level thinking (or a very poor form of it) to tactical or operational problems.
That is BAD.
I know a LOT more than the average civilian, because I've studied this stuff.
And one of the things I've learned, very clearly, is that every single sergeant knows more than I do, and almost every single corporal except the ones who are asleep at the wheel. And, frankly, you were correct to mention NPR. They talk all the time as if they have a clue, when very clearly they do not.
I am currently in an interesting situation in that our battalion has sent 3 NCOs to OCS to become officers. Each one comes back to the unit for a couple of weeks before moving on and works for my S3 shop. We usually end up talking about the transition and what differences there are from being an NCO and an officer, and usually we end up on the topic of "the bigger picture" with the NCOs beginning to see the different levels and views that officers have to have in order to do the right thing. They start to see the disconnects with decisions coming from above not meshing with what would work best at the squad/platoon level. I then I get to tell them about the more entertaining levels as they move up the chain (operational to tactical, strategic to operational, etc). They can get the basic points, but see how the complexity grows quickly. Its tactics, but much more than just tactics. But they can grow their understanding due to their excellent backgrounds.
I do agree with one lower level thing that I don't think should be such a problem. We need to get rid of all our stupid, multi-word operations titles and just use "Operation Cave Their Freaking Skulls In VII" for all military operations titles.
Although I'll give "Operation Arrowhead Ripper" a pass.
I think "cave their skulls in" is an excellent goal, if not plan.
:o)
Jim
PS. You talked about books regarding strategy, but I think understanding the military itself might be valuable to the NPR set. Technically, I'm part of the NPR set (although that depends on which station -- there are two leftist stations out here not worth tuning in), but at least I know I'm clueless (and a lot less tough that most guys in uniform -- no PFT stud here)....
Not everybody has to be a stud. Every informed citizen needs to realize, however, what they DON'T know. I am competent to editorialize on educational policy. I am NOT competent to editorialize on highway infrastructure. I am NOT competent to editorialize on the regulation of hospitals, pharmaceuticals, or aerospace.
The problem with the NPR set is that they tend to think that being both well-intentioned and intelligent is sufficient to overcome ignorance. It's not.
And, to be fair, though AM conservative radio doesn't suffer quite the same overreach, it suffers from precisely the same intellectual fallacy.
Funny, I was just having a conversation about "unknown unknown"'s last week, in fact....
What people don't know they don't know and what people don't know that they do know; both are very common for all fields of study. The standard cure for this is to act as if one knows everything. :)
The more I think about this funny strip the more arrogant it comes across. Don't get me wrong, I laughed at it, as I normally do with this strip, but, everyone is in reality an ignorant fool and is impure in the eyes of knowledge. I would argue only those who realize that they are ignorant and seek to learn more become the wise ones who really understand while everyone else is just covering up so they can sound authoritative and therefore have clout. So the louder they are, the more ignorant they most likely really are. Most unfortunately, there is something in human nature that listens to that loudest authoritative voice and has a tendency to agree with it, even when it is dead wrong.
Supposedly this can be cured with education, but I think instead it involves an ability to listen and teach while building credibility with one's audience all at the same time - and - knowing when to admit that you don't have all the answers and when someone else is right and you're wrong. This is what psychology and sociology should be, and is, so don't dismiss all of it out of hand as crap as it can explain a lot more of human nature than math, physics, chemistry, and biology can.
And I'm a Ph.D. chemist saying this. I know what I'm talking about. :P
No, clearly quantum electrodynamics provides a more accurate portrait of human behavior.... :)
Now prove your thesis and derive it.
Please show your work - and - the Cox-Zucker* machine is not allowed during your proof. No matter how pleasurable it may be to do so.
*This is an actual published mathematical machine. I can send citations for those interested.
Well, you know, "applied" also tends to mean "possesses a useful context..."
Actually, the key to all wisdom is the ability to recognize and then stay in one's own lane. Or if you just have to pop off, you start with "I really don't know anything about this, but here is my two cents worth..." That way everyone knows you don't really have much of a clue, but at least you have enough brain power to know that. I don't see a whole lot of the liberal set EVER saying this. Such as my liberal aunt (and favorite verbal punching bag) who likes to try and debate me on the military and how I don't really know anything about it.
Real converstation:
Aunt: "You are artillery correct?"
Me: "Yes, been a redleg my entire career."
Aunt: "Redleg?"
Me: "Army slang for artillery."
Aunt: "Ah, well that's not important. The thing is that we are talking about counter-insurgency, and since you are artillery trained and not counter-insurgency trained you can't really understand how it works."
Me: "Loud Laughter"
Aunt: "Why are you laughing?"
Me: "That was a joke right?"
Aunt: "No, why would it be?"
Me: "OMG."
Conversation went downhill from there. When I started asking simple military questions and she couldn't get them, she got hostile. Being told that a IET soldier knows what a "flank" is after day two caused her to get a bit bitchy...
Anyway, I think Ales has the point. The true sign of an IQ is knowing what you don't know and being honest about it.
No, clearly quantum electrodynamics is provides a more accurate definition of "flank"....
:o) !
I really like the formulation "recognize and stay within one's own lane". Opinion is great, but to disavow authority because it's politically or philosophically inconvenient is insane -- one might as well attempt to fix a flood by disavowing rain gauges.
Or global warming by ignoring ten years of cooling?
Exactly.
But then again, we live in a world where people believe price controls prevent shortages, so all bets are off. I forget the exact words, but Churchill famously quipped that the best counterargument to democracy was the average voter.
Post a Comment