Free Essay On Military Theory

During the early phases of the American Civil War, the Confederate Army made some considerable strides against the Union, despite the advantages that the North had in terms of industrial capacity, maintaining supply lines, and available manpower. The reason for these earlier advantages for the South had to do with superior application of military theory and strategy to the conflict by General Robert E. Lee. It was not until Ulysses S. Grant was named commander in chief of the Union forces that the tide began to turn for the North. Military theory was key to the transformation of the conflict. In general, a military theory is a thorough anslysis of each element of war, including the structure and patterns, as well as the connections among all of the various elements. It includes a consideration of the social, economic and political networks inside a particular society, as well as those among all of the societies that have come into conflict, thus producing the war. A quality military theory will tell a successful leader the best way to operate and win a war. These theories can also include ways to use force to keep war from breaking out.
There are different types of military theories, ranging from those that deal with war in general from those that deal to certain forms of hostilities, as well as the use of force to combat insurgency – and even to maintain the peace. There are military theories that focus on one sort of warfare, such as sea or air combat. There are even military theories that deal with different time periods.
Carl von Clausewitz, one of the most important military theorists, realized that every different time period had a unique type of war. When changes took place in the worldwide network of relationships among countries, or in political ideology, economic conditions, or technology, military theory had to be revised. Just one example of this happened during the Battle of Agincourt, when the British brought out the longbow as an innovative weapon. Although the French side had superior numbers, the British were able to wipe out enough of the French, using the longbow, before the French were able to arrive and overwhelm the smaller British force through hand-to-hand combat. After that battle, the entire calculus of war had changed, as it was no longer possible to simply overrun the other side with larger numbers on an even battlefield.
Clausewitz also wrote that the main purpose of any theory is to bring clarity to ideas that have lost focus. One must define the concepts in play before one can examine a question for a reader with any reliability. When it comes to military theory, Clausewitz believed that military theory is at its most useful when it takes into account all of the different elements of warfare; after that, those who come later in time can use that theory to plan their own combat. For a military theory to be sound, though, it must not only show a proper understanding of past conflicts but also provide a useful paradigm for operating a successful war in the future. It yields the necessary framework for comprehending the whole spectrum of combat; without one, it is not possible to determine the correct cause and effect in a combat situation. While it is true that even an unfinished theory can yield some answers, there is no substitute to a complete military theory when it comes to planning and implementing a combat strategy.
Every war can be broken down into an entire series of elements, and while Clausewitz's focus when it came to military theory was more general, several other theorists, such as Giulio Douhet, who developed a military theory that had to do with strategic bombing. It was his ideas that added the element of aerial bombardment to the horrors of war, during Italy's war against the Ottoman Empire for Libya in 1911. He wrote that “to gain command of the air” would make an enemy “harmless.” When Italy fought the Ottomans, it was the first conflict in which war aircraft performed such tasks as artillery spotting, transport, reconnaissance, as well as some short bombing runs. Italy entered World War I in 1915, and Douhet was taken aback by the sheer incompetence of the army He suggested a brigade of 500 bombers that could drop a total of 125 tons of ordnance on enemy targets each day. The purpose of this would have been to break up the ongoing stalemate with Austria-Hungary, but the Italian leadership ignored him. He did not give up, sending correspondence to people throughout the Italian government and military hierarchy about his ideas for expanding war to include the element of aerial bombardment. However, the only rewards he received at that time for his stubbornness was a court-martial, with a jail sentence for a year for giving criticism about the Italian military leadership. However, he still worked intrepidly to make his case, writing a novel about the topic in jail and sending communications to government leaders about the possibilities of this new technology. Finally, 1918, he was called back to active duty and was placed in charge of the Italian Central Aeronautic Bureau. He retired from the military in 1921; under Mussolini's government, he was one of the first heads of aviation, but he spent the majority of his time theorizing about the possible effects of air power in a military conflict, and so he was shuffled out of his administrative post.
For Douhet, the key element of air power was that it gave conflict a third dimension – that of the vertical. Without air power, war was an extremely flat pursuit. However, aircraft could overwhelm surface troops quickly; the sky was virtually impossible to defend, meaning that to succeed, a military force would need a strong offense. Once the air was taken over by one power, the conflict could end, because it is impossible to defend against the very sky. Also, bombing, according to Douhet, could have corrosive effects on the morale of the people being bombed. This did not work in London, because of the heroic motivation that came from Winston Churchill, but it did work in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Another intriguing military theory came from Dr. Fred Ikle, most well known for writing Every War Must End. His theories had much to do with what to do with a country after one has conquered it, or at least devastated it. One of his most controversial proposals, though, had to do with his evaluation of the CIA's cooperation with Pakistan in 1985, in part because of its desire to get the Russian Government out of the system. Ikle recommended that the U.S. government supply the Afghan rebels with the anti-aircraft missiles called Stingers. While the military establishment was, at first, reluctant to issue Stingers to Afghan rebels, President Reagan soon caught wind of the idea and loved it – and it was a short time indeed before people started heading overseas, trying to help nations modernize themselves. Ikle's innovation comes chiefly from the fact that he realized that military leaders often struggle with the “intellectual difficulty of connecting military plans with their ulimate purpose.”
Ultimately, though, there are as many military theories as there are leaders in a combat situation. It can be difficult to choose one and stick to it, but that is necessary for a war to come out successfully. The most important military theorists throughout history have seen the importance of the effective use of a successful theory; one of the most intriguing exercises that one can do in a history class is to break down the theories at work in a given conflict, to identify the key touch points. Students of military history use these points to avoid the difficulties in analyzing the next age.