http://blog.mopsos.com/archives/Schrage_wp03-1.pdf

Many also understand that the fog of war, will never disappear. They believe that information transformation, and overreliance on technology (vs. scouts and security forces) is a dangerous practice.

There must be a middle ground. Some analogies may help to understand.

Picture a chess board where both players have a perfect view of the other player’s locations and moves. Yet clearly only one side can win (or both can draw) despite all that information. But warfare, unlike chess, seldom involves a start point where both sides have equally powerful pieces. And unlike chess, both players have opportunities to add pieces back to the board, up to a point.

One may argue that in warfare, unlike chess, one “player” may more clearly “view” the battlefield due to better sensors and communications. Local commanders with real time sensor information on armored vehicles, a common operational picture display showing friendlies and enemies, and with access to outside information through things like One System Remote Video Terminals may realize a significant advantage. But an opposing commander with less information yet stronger or more numerous “chess pieces” may still emerge victorious, especially if all our pieces have yet to arrive. In addition, an enemy commander with weaker but elusive, largely invisible chess pieces, may also drag the game on. The enemy may also recruit “pawns” in the form of civilians to hide behind and cry foul if our queen inadvertantly takes out the pawns by mistake.

But the chess analogy fails insofar as it involves just one play at a time by a single piece. Warfare involves multiple “pieces” on both sides playing simultaneously.

In warfare, even if both sides can see all the pieces moving at once, the side able to more rapidly discern and analyze the relevant, most critical moves, and respond accordingly, will often be the victor. One part of information transformation is an attempt to do a better job of managing information to preclude information overload, by filtering out information that is not relevant or not as critical. That is why commander’s create priority intelligence requirements…to tell others what they want to know. It’s why automated and semi-automated information systems and staff officers exist to filter and find only that info essential to the commander.

Football is one example of information management and rapid processing of visual information. Both sides are moving rapidly during each play. The success of the play depends on the strengths of the players, their ability to see/understand the play that is occurring, the deception involved, the focusing of power, and each side’s ability (coaches and players) to predict and be unpredictable. Replays of concluded plays can help coaches discover what went wrong or right. An elevated perspective from the upper coaches box can help see things the head coaches/players on the ground cannot see. But in the end, the success or failure of each play depends on the view at the player level seen in real time…analogous to the ground and helicopter scout, sensors on combat vehicles, and the M2 eyeballs/NVGs of the infantryman.

Warfare, unlike chess or football, also involves being able to get the chess pieces on the board or players on the field before the “game” starts. If the “game” started 20 days ago and you chose to take the bus instead of the plane to get there, you may arrive too late, especially if one team starts the “game” without announcing it to the other team.

War also involves requirements to sustain the pieces/players as they arrive and continue to battle it out. This is an essential but unheralded aspect of the game that also relates to training prior to the game. Unlike chess where the king’s capture ends the game, in warfare, the “game” is not necessarily over and the losing team may continue to fight a guerilla war. Unlike football, in warfare the clock never runs out, and the losing team may employ a strategy of waiting it out until all the spectators get tired and go home. Because unlike football, the spectators and players in war, continue to pay big bucks as long as the war goes on.

So transformation and a “revolution” in military affairs must involve a whole lot more than information.

Now I know some of you will fire back and say it’s much more than that… and it is. the internet does not have the billions upon billions of $$$ worth of existing legacy infrastructure to contend with. But if I can get internet on my iphone we damn well sure can get it to the warfighter on the ground. Note the problem is analogous to the last mile problem for the internet several years ago. It will be solved. It is absolutely crucial the DoD transform.

I’d like to use this forum to further discussions. Any other transformation experts out there?