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

The debates resulted via the improved 1986 FM 100-5 edition into the AirLandBattle concept and the Follow On Forces Attack plan 143 . And as Naveh asserts:the transition from the traditional paradigm of attrition by means of superior technology andtactics to one of advanced operational maneuver comprises the essence of the evolutionaryprocess in the US armed forces and the community of military theoreticians 144 .It involved a refocusing of attention toward the moral and human dimensions of battle,introducing into the US doctrine the clarifying notion of the operational level of war and areturn to the fundamental principles of attaining victory and appreciation of immeasurable ofcombat such as leadership, initiative and the commander’s intuitive sense of time andmaneuver 145 . It was a ‘Kuhnistian venture’ and at heart lay an approach to war that was basedon intellectual innovation rather than sheer material superiority 146 . A short discussion of thisventure will illustrate both Boyd’s important role, as well as the fact that Boyd’s ideas whichwere maturing in this period, were influenced by the agenda of the reform movement whichwas focussed on inspiring change.Naveh proves and Coram suggests it was the activity of the civilian reformers whichignited the cognitive crisis and set in motion the professional debate of the late 1970s. Boydis considered one of five intellectuals which served as the catalyst of the conceptualreform 147 . The intellectual innovation was inspired first and foremost by Boyd, as Naveh invarious sections demonstrates 148 . Naveh, Hammond, Coram and before them, US senatorGary Hart, assert that Boyd was in many respects the intellectual leader of the group 149 .Boyd’s ideas, including the OODA loop construct, were considered the philosophicalbasis 150 . As William Lind stated in an article in the Marine Corps Gazette, later repeated byanother author in Military Review, ‘The Boyd Theory is the background for maneuver warfaredoctrine’ 151 . Boyd was also unique in being the only (former) military officer to intellectuallycontribute to the military reform 152 .143 Good short descriptions are provided by Hallion, pp.72-82 and Lambeth, pp.83-91. Two shortstudies are, and Richard M. Swain, ‘Filling the Void: The Operational Art and the US Army’, in B.J.C.McKercher and Michael A. Hennessy, The Operational Art, Developments in the Theories of War, (Preager,Westport, 1996). For a very detailed account see Naveh, chapters 7 and 8.144 Naveh, p.251.145 Lambeth, p.91; and General William Richardson, ‘FM 100-5, The AirLandBattle in 1986’, MilitaryReview, March 1986, pp. 4-11 (Richardson was the commander of the organization responsible for thepublication of the new doctrine).146 Naveh, pp.252-56.147 Ibid, p.258.148 See for reference to Boyd and the OODA loop in the development of US Army doctrine inparticular pp. 256-262, 297, 301.149 Ibid, p. 279, note 35.150 Ibid, p.260.151 See Lieutenant Colonel Mark Hamilton, ‘Maneuver Warfare and All That’, Military Review, January1987, p.3; Willian Lind, ‘Defining Maneuver Warfare for the Marine Corps’, Marine Corps Gazette,March 1980, p.56.152 Naveh, p.257. Later, in a often noted article, Lind and four co-authors again acknowledged thatBoyd was to be credited for rediscovering the art of maneuver warfare in his work and the OODAloop theory. See William Lind, Colonel Keith Nightengale, Captain John Schmitt, Colonel JosephSutton, Lieutenant Colonel G.I. Wilson, ‘The Changing Face of War, Into the Fourth Generation’,Military Review, October 1989, p. 4.74