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

2. ON STRATEGY AND STRATEGIC THEORYSo long as war is a possibility the discipline concerning its use is indispensable to sovereign groups that are tosurvive.Quincy Wright 1What is strategy? A mental tapestry of changing intentions for harmonizing and focusing our efforts as abasis for realizing some aim or purpose in an unfolding and often unforeseen world of many bewildering eventsand many contending interests.John BoydStrategyIntroductionThe core subject of his study concerns a comprehensive theory about success and failure inconflict. A Discourse on Winning and Losing examines how organizations can be effective inconflict, how they can win, or loose, or in the words of John Boyd, how they can ‘surviveand prosper’, and ‘improve our ability to shape and adapt to unfolding circumstances, so thatwe (as individuals or as groups or as a culture or as a nation-state) can survive on our ownterms’ 2 . In military terms this conflict is called war. But A Discourse also looks beyond warand into organizational behavior under adversarial conditions in general, as the epitaph byBoyd already suggests. This means that military theory, operational art, military strategy,strategic theory and thinking strategically in general are key terms defining the content of thisstudy. These terms are not self explanatory nor is it generally appreciated what the specificcharacter is of strategic theory as theory, and which peculiar inherent difficulties are attachedto developing strategic theory, nor indeed, what sources of inspiration – formative factors –generally influence the development of a strategic theory. For understanding the nature ofJohn Boyd’s endavour an introduction on the nature of the subject of this study is necessary.It will illuminate the subject matter Boyd was concerned with; it will show the specificcharacter of strategic theory and it will lead toward an appreciation concerning the criteriathat may be applied in judging innovations in strategic theory. Moreover, it will introduce theconcept of formative factors of strategic theory which underlies the subsequent chapters thatdescribe the various sources of inspiration and motivation behind Boyd’s work.1 Quincy Wright, The Study of International Relations (New York, 1955), p.155.2 John Boyd, The Strategic Game of ? and ?, p.58.13