What Is American Way of War? How Does It Differ from Other Forms of Warfare?
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What is American way of war? How does it differ from other forms of warfare?
The further developments of technology, especially those of Information Technology and their increasing role in military affairs, as well as the growing risk averseness and the decreasing numbers of the ground forces eventually led to the ‘Rumsfeld’s transformation’ or the ‘new’ American way of war. The transformation of military strategy can be said to have started already in the middle of the Cold War with the so-called Eisenhower’s “New Look” in 1955- ‘a nuclear deterrence strategy where Air Force played the pre-dominant role’ (Kurth, 2005:634). The Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) and the Reagan doctrine in the 1980’s played a significant role in the transformation process as well. RMA, similar to Rumsfeld’s ‘transformation’ was focused on the developments of the ‘C4isr-command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance’ (Boot, 2003). Meanwhile, the Reagan doctrine was a national strategy that implied ‘the use of allied subconventional forces against communist conventional military forces’ (Kurth, 2005:640). The Reagan doctrine has been applied in the war in Afghanistan since 2001 using the local militia with the help of the U.S. Special Forces (SP) against Islamist fundamentalists. Yet this can be criticised a lot because it contradicts itself with the national strategy or the Bush doctrine that declares the ‘pre-emptive (or preventive) action against the enemy and the regime change’ (Kagan, 2003). Hence, because the ‘superpowers do not do windows’ (Kagan, 2003) the Bush doctrine is simply a failure because the regime change contradicts the ‘transformation’ of military strategy. ‘Transformation’ roughly consists of two cohesive ‘elements’: Network-Centric-Warfare (NCW) and ‘shock and awe’ strategy. ‘NWC translates information superiority into combat power by effectively linking knowledgeable entities in the battle space’ (Kagan, 2003)...
The further developments of technology, especially those of Information Technology and their increasing role in military affairs, as well as the growing risk averseness and the decreasing numbers of the ground forces eventually led to the ‘Rumsfeld’s transformation’ or the ‘new’ American way of war. The transformation of military strategy can be said to have started already in the middle of the Cold War with the so-called Eisenhower’s “New Look” in 1955- ‘a nuclear deterrence strategy where Air Force played the pre-dominant role’ (Kurth, 2005:634). The Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) and the Reagan doctrine in the 1980’s played a significant role in the transformation process as well. RMA, similar to Rumsfeld’s ‘transformation’ was focused on the developments of the ‘C4isr-command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance’ (Boot, 2003). Meanwhile, the Reagan doctrine was a national strategy that implied ‘the use of allied subconventional forces against communist conventional military forces’ (Kurth, 2005:640). The Reagan doctrine has been applied in the war in Afghanistan since 2001 using the local militia with the help of the U.S. Special Forces (SP) against Islamist fundamentalists. Yet this can be criticised a lot because it contradicts itself with the national strategy or the Bush doctrine that declares the ‘pre-emptive (or preventive) action against the enemy and the regime change’ (Kagan, 2003). Hence, because the ‘superpowers do not do windows’ (Kagan, 2003) the Bush doctrine is simply a failure because the regime change contradicts the ‘transformation’ of military strategy. ‘Transformation’ roughly consists of two cohesive ‘elements’: Network-Centric-Warfare (NCW) and ‘shock and awe’ strategy. ‘NWC translates information superiority into combat power by effectively linking knowledgeable entities in the battle space’ (Kagan, 2003)...