Science, Strategy and War The Strategic Theory of ... - Boekje Pienter

as focus for military planning on the following description of the dynamics of non-linearsystems 170 :Chaos theory predictions are general in nature, and describe system interactions rather thanspecific end states;Initial conditions and the dynamic factors that govern system dynamics can seldom beabsolutely known or defined;It is possible to anticipate certain processes and functions;Long term prediction is, however, impossible, you cannot predict specifically what willhappen next after an event or when an event will occur;They are often self-repeating , exhibiting scaled structures;Minute differences over time can produce surprisingly diverse results;Patterns within a dynamic system will form around functions (‘strange attractors’); thesepatterns will resemble each other by exhibiting similar properties, but will never exactlyrepeat themselves;Systems open to their environment will self-organize into similar patterns in accordance withtheir fundamental structures;Non-linearity can stabilize systems as well as de-stabilize them;Open systems can be driven to crises points where they will either bifurcate and self-organizeagain, or go into a period of stochastic chaos (exhibiting erratic randomness);Based on the model of the adversary and on the dynamics of chaotic systems, Pentlandasserts that crises points can be precipitated by:closing a system off from its environment and propelling it into equilibrium;by eliminating feedback within the system;driving any of the dimensional dynamics to singularity by overloading or destroying it;applying quantum amounts of broad external energy to the entire system.Only if massive force disparities exist is the latter available option. Chaotic systems tend tobe very resilient. Any chaotic system can maintain its structure and even organize into higherlevels of organization as long as energy can be drawn from their environment. This alsoapplies to disturbances to the system. An important feature of chaotic systems is theinterdependence and self-compensating characteristic of systems. If targeted, an element ofpower adjusts from within to compensate, and draws upon resources from the otherelements of power through interconnected linkage mechanisms. In the economic sphere, forinstance, an opponent can opt for economic slack, substitution, reallocation, reengineering,reconstitution, and increased productivity. Other forms of compensation are stockpiling,rationing, importing and dispersing. And while a society may be defeated militarily, deepcultural and political powers are almost immune to military force, short of prolongedoccupation. Alternatively, different sorts of military power may be sought after, for instanceby responding to a conventional attack with a long low intensity irregular campaign. Thisfeature forces one to acknowledge that war is a process of appraisal, innovation andadaptation. The opponent’s society will constantly appraise, innovate, and adopt newcombinations of power to achieve different results 171 .170 Ibid, pp.11-12.171 Ibid, pp.34-36.164