Challenges Facing the US Military - Essay Example

? CHALLENGES FACING THE U.S. MILITARY Randolph Slaughter Foundations of Strategy 2008 19 Oct The military of the United s has been serving for more than two hundred years and over the years it has emerged as one of the most powerful one. The “nerve centre” of the U.S defense is considered to be the Pentagon in Washington which is the headquarters. All the final decisions regarding the affairs of the army is taken here. Along with it is located Department of Defense, and the Departments of the Army, Navy, and Air Force’s “command and control elements” so that coordinated work can be achieved (Benett, 2002, p.35). In the years following its inception the military has always faced a number of challenges ranging from ethical, climatic to financial. The paper seeks to identify three such challenges faced by the U.S. army in the context of two wars. The paper also aims at identifying how far has these challenges translated the political outcomes in case of two specific wars. The Challenges The military capability of the U.S is definitely unmatched by any other state. The wars in which the U.S has been involved as often been as a result of an on the nation itself or as result of clash in opinions. This was evident after the 9/11 attacks when potential threats to the homeland and the measures to counter it were considered in full swing (Challenges to Military Operations in Support of U.S Interests, 2008, p.3). The war with Iraq in 2003 was justified by the Bush government as a measure to protect the homeland because they thought Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait as a potential threat to U.S interests (Knecht, 2010, p.113). On the other hand the involvement of America in the Vietnam War was questioned not only by the rest of the world but also by the American citizens themselves. Critical Thinking There is a domain of reasoned opinion between the world of facts and opinion. Nobody is a perfect decision maker. Numerous cognitive biases distort our judgment, and the heuristics, or mental short cuts, our minds use to deal with complexity can sometimes lead us astray. In addition, we are prone to making errors in logic which lead us to faulty conclusions. Overconfidence may lead us to overestimate the soundness of our judgment. Here logic gets more priority than emotions and both process and outcome are equally important. Reasoned opinion is often a source of discomfort because we fail to understand it and hence sense of evaluation and logic should prevail. In the modern age one has to possess these skill and proper approaches are required to learn. One such approach is critical thinking which is very crucial. The concept of critical thinking is very important and it also finds an important place in the army. It has become synonymous with military education as it is considered to be an essential tool for operating in a complex and dynamic world (Emilio, 2000, p.4). Critical thinking is important as it helps a person to analyze a situation more analytically and to take the decisions accordingly. It enables a person to be more competitive in dealing with arguments and different situations (Brink-Budgen, 2002, p.16). Such critical thinking becomes crucial in the army also has here decision needs to made not on emotion but logic and this creative approach will enable “the potential of digitized approach” (Bonn, 2005, 106). Critical thinking refers to improvement of one’s judgment. One might assess the information on a PowerPoint slide in a Pentagon briefing, browse a newspaper article, or take part in a conversation with an Iraqi mayor; critical thinking indicates purposeful cognizant and suitable relevance of thoughtful cynicism (Gerras, 2006, p 12) . Ethics Ethics are basically standards which one should follow and they are based on values. It has become one of the challenges in the U.S army and it is threatening the political stability of the government. The violent combat between human beings has always resulted in the loss of humanity. Morality and ethics in humans were also there in the past and although every culture realized the gravity of taking human life yet an urge was always felt to justify the taking of lives on the terms of religion and moral (Cooks n.d. p. 113). It has been cited by the army that the value programs enable the soldiers “to discern right from wrong in any situation.” In practice they hardly assist any soldier while making a choice between the right and the wrong (Patterson & Phipps, 2002, 18). After the many ethical atrocities from WWII as in the holocaust, firebombing of populated cities, executing capture combatants and so on, modern governments agreed and established documents as in the Geneva Conventions, the Charter of the United Nations, military manuals such as the U.S.Army’s “Law of Land Warfare to distinguish just conduct in war for other types of killing of human beings (Cooks 2006, p 113). The ethical challenges for our military members include attempts to fight combatants with a different set of moral values and ethics. When our troops lower our ethical standards of just cause in this world of 24 hour news and the internet, we lose the moral high ground to conduct a war and the needed support of the American people. Strategic Thinking Strategic thinking is another challenge faced by the U.S. army. The American military is strong enough to defeat any opponent in conventional war. Our enemies have taken notice of this and have taken up unconventional, or indirect, ways of fighting in order to achieve their objectives (Phelps, 2006 p. 240). Strategic War is fought by human beings, instead of machines but the later might be crucial factors. After several years, human nature is more or less unaffected. The center of war theory arises from the extent of human values, that is, the way in which people view and think of war. The first 50 years of the Twentieth century comprise a sequence of bloody wars and inhuman extermination arising from the wars. Weapons of overpowering consequence had methodically terrified mankind. Under the current continually altering and irregular environment of today, we can best describe the strategic environment as unstable, unsure, multifaceted and unclear. This environment uses the readily accessible systems, political, economic, social, and military to induce the adversary’s political decision makers that their strategic goals are either unachievable or too costly for the perceived benefit. While waging a war it is very vital to have a prior strategy planned. A mistake in the strategy can cost a lot in terms of economic and political impact. Strategic thinking involves a process which incorporates intuition and creativity. It involves “gathering information, formulating ideas, and planning action” (Wootton & Horne, 2000 p.v). Strategic thinking basically “act as lenses to assist the strategist in his evaluation” of the situation (Bartholomees et al, 2010, p.61). Implications on the Wars- The Vietnam War The above challenges faced by the U.S. military needs to be evaluated in terms of two wars in which the Americans were involved. The Vietnam War essentially began in 1955 and ended with the fall of Saigon in the year 1975. US military challenges in critical thinking have been not taking a heuristic approach to Vietnam, but taking a cookie cutter approach to strategy from pass wars. Decision makers had current and clear impressions of the breakdown of conciliation in WWII and the victory of Korea to provide a basis for imagining likely scenarios if the U.S. did, or did not, get involved in Vietnam (Gerras, 2006, P 27) When the war began initially there was no American involvement but certain global events led to American’s involvement. The fear of communism getting an upper hand in Vietnam prompted the then President Harry Truman to support the French supported government. Many officials within the U.S. government never approved this involvement but all warnings were ignored (Levy, 2004, pp.13-14). America’s involvement in the war resulted in the loss of life and also caused a strain on its financial resources as huge amount of money was spent during that time. As a part of their strategic goal to establish a free and secure environment there was a combination of both air and ground campaign in South Vietnam, efforts were being given for nation building in South Vietnam and an aggressive approach which combined naval and air attack on North Vietnam was used (Rottman, 2008 p.6). America’s extend of critical thinking before getting involved in the war and their strategic planning was very much criticized as the longest American war had resulted in the loss of many American lives and also lots of Vietnamese deaths. In fact the War Powers Act in 1973 made it an explicit requirement to seek “Congressional approval” prior to sending American forces beyond the borders (Learn About the Vietnam War, 2011). The American government was also highly criticized on ethical grounds. In the My Lai Massacre US Army members killed somewhere between 347-504 Vietnamese civilians of mostly elderly men, women and children. In my opinion we lost the moral and ethical high ground. There were widespread protests within the American society against the My Lai Massacre in South Vietnam and bombings in North Vietnam. America’s involvement in the war under the pretext of being a harbinger of peace resulted in loss of people’s faith on the U.S. government and it even reduced the popularity of the U.S. military. The U.S. strategic thinking on fighting a large standing military force in a conventional or regular warfare has been proven sound and effective. The challenges we have faced have come from irregular or insurgent forces whose goal was not to win battles, but to protract and out last us to win the war. Vietnamese leaders Ho Chi Minh and Vo Nguyen Giap adopted Sun Tzu's indirect approach when they fought the United States. Vietnamese lead a technologically inferior force to victory against the Americans by extending the battlefield from the conventional arenas to the enemy's will to fight. He robbed our country of their national and international support and won (Phelps, 2006 p. 243). The Iraq Invasion The invasions in Iraq took place in the year 2003 and there were the combined forces of United States, United Kingdom and many other small countries. The result of this war was the fall of the Saddam Husain regime. The major reason cited for this war the belief that Iraq possesses “weapons of mass destruction”. In fact this was a very common belief among most of the intelligence agencies in the West (West, n.d. p.392). Yet on the contrary it was the believed that the establishment of America’s hegemonic power and their endeavor to fight against terrorism post the 9/11 attacks were the main reasons behind it. The attack was designed to change the Middle East in such a way so as to suit the interests of the U.S. and in order to legitimize the war the issue of weapons of mass destruction was used as a means to turn the “war on terrorism” against Iraq. To make the link the all the U.S. government had to do was to establish the connection between Hussein and al-Qaida in making weapons of mass destruction and those might be used against the U.S. However critics had later pointed that the reasons given by the Bush government were in fact fabricated (Hinnebusch, 2007, p.11). It had only been 28 years and many lesson learned from Vietnam and our government leaders were once again were challenged with critical thinking. In regards to decision making and Iraq, it could be argued that Americans improperly applied the comparatively peaceful conclusion to the Cold War and obvious ease of democratic change in the Easter-Bloc countries to the Middle East, where democratic change will be anything but easy (2006 p 27). There was a direct correlation to a increase of insurgents violence and a clear ethical issues we had at the Abu Ghraib Prison. Members of the 320th Military Police Battalion were charged with prisoner abuse, negligence of duty, mistreatment, motivated attack and battery. Many of the lower enlisted members charged claimed that their actions were authorized and performed by sub contractors (Greenberg, Dratel, 2005 p 1-30). Our military members lowered their ethical standards took unlawful orders that were a direct violation of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. The Abu Ghraib incident became a recruiting and rallying cry for the insurgents and a increase in violence against U.S. troops. Junior members of the military ethics can affect or prolong conflict by losing the moral high ground. Once again America’s military actions were questioned and the political stability was seen dwindling. The war cost had almost reached $204.4 billion by the year 2005 and there was a budget deficit of $374 billion deficit in 2003. It also involved the deaths of many American soldiers and also Iraqi civilians (Hinnebusch, 2007, p.24). The strategic airstrikes by the U.S army had led to the death of a lot of civilians and under that circumstances the viability of such plans were very much under the scanner. Ethical grounds of the strikes were also questioned as no evidence of weapons of mass destruction was found instead the hegemonic interests of the Americans were exposed. Lack of strategic thinking mostly by our civilian leaders led a quick military victory in to a long and protracted occupation. Our lack of understanding that the insurgency was based on Sunni rejection of democracy, replacing military with civilian unity of command, disbanding of the Iraqi army (West 2006 P 392). A few strategic mistakes led the U.S. from being declared liberators to occupiers of Iraq. Concluding Remarks First applied to critical thinking you can see from Vietnam and Iraq we had fallen into a mode of cognitive thought. Automatically because it was how succeeded in WWI, WWII and the Cold War we did not apply real effort or critical thinking that had a direction or purpose. To meet our challenges we must use the same skills needed to run a professional football team or a corporate organization. We must become a country of great thinkers and improve our critical kinking skills. Men and women in our country and military overcome complex problems every day we just must apply it to future conflicts. The Challenges the U.S. must overcome in critical thinking is just having our military leaders in Washington or the field understanding its value. But we as military officer must give our ultra progressive and neo conservative leader’s good advice and transform them from cognitive thought and help them take some time and effort to think critically about our nation’s actions and conflicts (2006 p 15) Second challenge is not to lower our standard and ethics because our adversaries do not have any. Our ethics are standards by which military members values and actions be based on. We have examples of My Lei and Abul Gray prisons how junior level leader’s ethics damage countries’ creditability. Our advisories know that they cannot beat us in a conventional war; their war is in the court of public opinion and on CNN. Our values are core beliefs such as duty, honor, and integrity that motivate attitudes and actions. Not all values are ethical values (integrity is; happiness is not). Ethical values indicate right and wrong and adopt priority over nonethical principles during ethical decisions. Military members must always cautiously judge ethical values when making decisions in the field or at headquarters as part of official duties. I’m a military officer so I am apolitical but an observation of the last two years of the George W. Bush administration and currently with President Obama. Both presidents have depended more heavily on the advice of our military leaders and less from civilian advisors where strategic thinking on military matters are not a strong area for them. The challenges the military are starting to overcome dealing with strategic thinking are that there is no cookie cutter approach to military strategy. If we are fighting a conventional military, insurgent force or whatever the next style of war that is created by our advisories. We as a country must be flexible and critically think about the conflict, the Just Cause or Ethics that we will apply and the appropriate strategy for each unique opponent. Only then we will overcome our current challenges, with a new set of dilemmas around the corner. References 1) Bartholomees, J. et al (2010), U.S. Army War College Guide to National Security Issues: Volume1: Theory of War and Strategy, Volume 1, Pennsylvania Strategic Studies Institute. 2) Bennett, G.D. (2002). The United States Army: issues, background and bibliography. New York: Nova Publishers 3) Brink-Budgen, R. (2002). Critical thinking for students: learn the skills of critical assessment and effective argument. Oxford, How To Books Ltd. 4) Bonn, K.E. (2005). Army Officer’s Guide, Pennsylvania: Stackpole Books 5) Challenges to Military Operations in Support of U.S Interests. (2008). ACQ, retrieved on October 17, 2011 from: http://www.acq.osd.mil/dsb/reports/ADA491393.pdf 6) Cook, M.L. (n.d). Ethical Issues in War; An Overview, Foundations of Strategy 7) Emilio, G.A. (2000). Promoting Critical Thinking In Professional Military Education, AU, retrieved on October 17, 2011 from: http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/acsc/00-058.pdf 8) Knecht, T. (2010). Paying Attention to Foreign Affairs: How Public Opinion Affects Presidential Decision Making, Pennsylvania: Pen University. 9) Levy, D. (2004). The Vietnam War, Breckenridge: Twenty-First Century Books. 10) Learn About the Vietnam War. (2011), UH, retrieved on october 17, 2011 from: http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/modules/vietnam/index.cfm 11) Patterson, M.S & Phipps, J.E. (2002). Ethics- Redirecting The Army’s Moral Compass, DTIC, retrieved on October 17, 2011 from: http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf&AD=ADA404268 12) Rottman, G.L. (2008). The U.S. Army in the Vietnam War 1965-73, Oxford: Osprey Publishing 13) Wootton, S. & Horne, T. (2000). Strategic thinking: a step-by-step approach to strategy, Philadelphia: Kogan Page Publishers. 14) West, F.J.B. (n.d) American Military Performance in Iraq, Foundations of Strategy 15) The Torture Papers: The Road to Abu Ghraib, (Karen J. Greenberg and Joshua L. Dratel eds. Cambridge Univ. Press 2005) Read More