Conventional Military Forces Research Articles

International Responses over Nontraditional Security Threats: A Comparative Analysis into Rational and Sources

Security concerns of the contemporary period have gone beyond the traditional form of existential threats caused by conventional military forces to a vast range of non-conventional security concerns, including climate change, pandemics, and cyber threats. The direct spillover effects of these non-traditional security issues do not just influence national relations but require global cooperation and a comprehensive approach. In conclusion, increased international cooperation will be essential along with the principle of equitable resource distribution and the pursuit of novel technological solutions to attain lasting resilience against NTS threats. As such pressures on human security continue to unfold, it is critical that the global community facilitate adaptive measures and strong frameworks for global security and stability. This paper represents the value added to the scientific debate on nontraditional security, as effectiveness is linked to international responses, with further recommendations for better action toward implementation.

Competing Visions for US Grand Strategy in Cyberspace

Cyberspace is a primary battleground of the twenty-first century. Yet, grand strategists have been slow to address cyber strategy. We examine the implications of four prominent American grand strategies—restraint, deep engagement, liberal internationalism, and conservative primacy—for core topics in cyber strategy. Several unique features of cyberspace, including its nonviolent effects, pervasive secrecy, and the challenges of global governance, generate counterintuitive implications. For example, advocates of restraint, usually skeptical of conventional military force, should be more comfortable wielding cyber power, generating surprising convergences with conservative primacy. Conversely, liberal internationalists place importance on legitimating the use of force, rendering them more cautious than even proponents of the "restraint" strategy. We also briefly explore two newer grand strategies—progressivism and conservative populism—in order to show how our framework applies to emerging debates. Our approach can also help analyze how grand strategies extend to other emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence.

Challenges and Prospects in Urban Warfare: An Analytical Framework

Abstract The population living in cities around the world will increase in the next decades. Conventional military forces will deploy more in constrained areas where their high-tech capabilities are not an advantage. This research provides an analytical framework for understanding the main challenges of urban warfare for conventional forces. The analysis identifies the military organizational dimension, dual-use technologies as game changers, and the role of civilian population in urban environments as key factors. The conclusions provide some policy recommendations concerning training and communication strategies. The prospects of urban warfare will be defined by a combination of cognitive and kinetic actions.

‘Gray Zone’ Strategy as a Theory of Success for Revisionist Powers: Cases of Russia and Iran

The Russian and Iranian approach to warfare has gained significant traction as both revisionist actors have managed to play a ‘weaker hand’ effectively against their stronger rivals. Over the years, Moscow and Tehran have encapsulated a theory of success that entails creating asymmetric advantages and developing a competitive edge over their rivals. Their strategic approach is based on the assumption that undermining opponents with conventional forces is not an option and that strategic success requires the development of asymmetric capabilities. These revisionist actors have become increasingly proficient in carefully calibrating their long-term competition with militarily and economically stronger adversaries. This well-refined modus operandi is labeled as a hybrid warfare or a ‘gray zone’ strategy. These two concepts, although often used synonymously, noticeably differ from one to another. Russia’s decision to expand its influence and challenge the international order by the unconcealed use of military power starkly differs from Iran’s gradualist approach that seeks to incrementally alter the regional security landscape. The immense political, economic, and military costs that Moscow has already incurred during the Ukraine conflict would further validate the value of Iran’s strategic culture. It will display the primacy of ‘gray zone’ tactics over the open resort to conventional military force. In other words, the failure of Russia’s conventional forces in Ukraine will reinforce the merits of ‘gray zone’ activities in a modern-day conflict rather than signal their potential demise. More importantly, it will caution other revisionist actors against open engagement in conventional military operations, hence encouraging them to employ ‘gray zone’ tactics in pursuit of their strategic interests. Moreover, in the era of strategic competition, ‘gray zone’ tactics will remain as a strong instrument for undermining adversaries without risking the outbreak of a full-scale conflict. In this period of enhanced rivalry among great powers, when costs of escalation may incur catastrophic consequences for all stakeholders, countries such as Russia and Iran would have a powerful incentive to exploit their competitive advantage designed to employ ‘gray zone’ tactics against militarily and economically stronger adversaries. To this end, the relevance of ‘gray zone’ activities, as the revisionist actors’ primary strategic tool and the basis of their theory of success is unlikely to recede in the foreseeable future.

Russia's Possible View on the Future Shape of the War

Leading security experts warn the Western community about the correct understanding of Russia's vision of future conflicts. Based on the study of the available literature, we analyzed individual approaches and pointed out the importance of understanding Russia's individual steps to fulfill their interests. The aim of the research was to compare the approach of the Western Community and Russia to new ways of conducting future conflicts with an emphasis on the hybrid way of conducting war. In our research, we primarily focused on the Western vision of hybrid warfare and the Russian vision of the future war, which is diametrically different. The basic findings are that Russia is shaping military and non-military instruments of state power to combat hybrid threats. The Russian military defines "hybrid warfare" as an effort at the strategic level to shape, manage and geostrategically orient a target state, in which all means adopted, including the use of conventional military forces in regional conflicts, are the subject of an information campaign. Russia considers the Venezuelan presidential crisis, the Libyan conflict, the Syrian civil war, and the crisis in Belarus and Ukraine as examples of hybrid war. In conclusion, we assess that the Russian army is actively focusing on preparing for future conflicts and increasing the capabilities it considers necessary for victory in the hybrid war. In addition, we have compiled a list of measures to reassess the strategy and approach of the Western Community and Slovakia to Russia.

The three ages of modern Western special operations forces

Troops with special skills have typically played strategic and tactical roles as valuable components of conventional military organizations. The start of World War II marked a change, wherein special forces (SF, as they were referred to in Britain, and special operational forces [SOF] in the United States) were separated and played roles distinct from conventional military forces. Recently, Finlan (2019) advanced the notion that since the start of World War II, three unique, punctuated ages of SOF have existed, reflecting various political-military needs and realities. First-age SOF were largely restricted to operations behind enemy lines, aiding the conventional forces. Second-age SOF fought in proxy wars, with and against guerrilla forces, and engaged in aiding political ends when nuclear realities rendered direct military confrontations between world powers too risky to contemplate. The advent of extremist ideology-related terrorism initiated a rethinking of the role of SOF and their initial mobilization to combat this growing threat. Third-age SOF became invaluable in the global fight against terrorism. This paper advances this theory by further delineating differences between the three ages and providing in-depth evidence supporting the soundness of the construct.

The Dutch Uzi: Service Variants of the Army, Navy & Air Force, 1957–1997

The well-known Israeli Uzi sub-machine gun saw service with the Dutch Armed Forces between 1957 and 1997. Other than the Israel Defense Forces, the Netherlands were the first nation to adopt this weapon for their conventional military forces—and also the first to use the Uzi in combat. The Dutch Navy, Air Force, and Army all adopted the Israeli sub-machine gun, although each service selected a slightly different configuration, including variants with different stocks and modes of fire. This article presents a brief history of the Uzi in Dutch service, tracing the primary variants in service with all three branches of the armed forces and examining how this variety highlights a recurring small arms acquisition trend within the Dutch military.

Transformation of war – use of conventional military forces against state actors

Transformation of war – use of conventional military forces against state actors

Deploying Portable Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (GC-MS) to Military Users for the Identification of Toxic Chemical Agents in Theater.

The use of portable gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) is an important capability that has been available commercially for almost 25 years. These systems have been used within a variety of different industries, including their extensive use by environmental scientists for the analysis of hazardous air pollutants. Recently, these systems were deployed to conventional military forces for use in theater to detect and identify toxic chemicals including chemical warfare agents (CWAs). The challenges of deploying such complex analytical instruments to these military users are unique. Among other things, these organizations have considerable and variable mission strains, complex and difficult logistics and coordination needs, and variability in user backgrounds. This review outlines the value portable GC-MS systems offer to these warfighters in theater, discusses some important aspects of the design of portable systems that makes their deployment to this type of end user possible, and proposes methods that can be used to overcome challenges to successful deployment of portable GC-MS to non-scientists working within hostile environments.

Violence on the Home Front: Interstate Rivalry and Pro-Government Militias

ABSTRACT With an increased focus on the role of pro-government militias in understanding intra-state conflict, scholars have primarily argued that states use militias as a proxy of the government because of low capacity or as a means of avoiding responsibility for violence against civilians. However, states with both high capacity and a willingness to commit violence against civilians have also relied upon pro-government militias in counterinsurgency operations. This paper argues that states involved in enduring interstate rivalries are more likely to use pro-government militias in order to reserve conventional military forces for potential conflict with their rival. Based on a case study of India’s Kashmir insurgency and logit analysis of pro-government militia data from 1981 to 2001, the findings provide empirical support for this theory and are robust to alternative measures and model specifications.

Iraq, 2003–2011: succeeding to fail

ABSTRACT This study examines the US experience during the Iraq war, from the planning phase that began in 2001 to the withdrawal of US forces in 2011. It reveals a dearth of planning and intelligence leading up to the invasion; reluctance by conventional coalition military forces to conduct reconstruction, political and security capacity-building; and, later, full spectrum counterinsurgency operations. These forces took on some missions traditionally reserved for special operations forces, and they increasingly assumed diplomatic roles as they interfaced with the Iraqi leadership and local kingpins. Although these efforts yielded some impressive organizational learning and limited operational successes, they were hampered by lack of adequate preparation, a poor understanding of the human terrain, shortsighted strategies, and ultimately a dearth of political will to stay the course. The outcome was far from the model Middle East democracy envisioned by the invasion’s architects, and the American experience in Iraq instead became a cautionary tale for military intervention.

Deployability of Armed Forces in Irregular Warfare

Abstract The use of a conventional military force is increasingly difficult in today's armed conflicts. “Complex” civil-military force, which is still suffering from the lack of cooperation, is generally preferred. So-called irregular warfare demands different skills of the military forces compared to conventional warfare. Preparation of armed forces to conditions of irregular surroundings requires new approaches to education, training and deployment

The rise of targeted killing

ABSTRACTTargeted killings have become a central tactic in the United States' campaigns against militant and terrorist groups in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa. Both ‘demand’ and ‘supply’ factors explain the rise of targeted killings. Demand for targeted killings increased as the United States faced new threats from militant groups that could not be effectively countered with conventional military force. Concerns about the political consequences of long-term military involvement overseas and American casualties led political leaders to supply more targeted killings. The conclusion discusses how this tactic may have unintended consequences as other states follow the United States use of targeted killings.

Deployability Of Armed Forces In The Current Armed Conflicts

Abstract Achieving victory in nowadays armed conflicts by using of conventional military forces seems more and more difficult. Military solutions are not satisfying and used civilian-military effort still needs many improvements. So-called irregular warfare requires more regular or conventional capabilities than is usually necessary to win in regular warfare. The question is how to adapt armed forces for the nowadays irregular environment. How to educate, train and deploy armed forces? How to create a reliable tool of military power for using in irregular warfare?

Adapting nuclear modernization to the new administration

ABSTRACTThe US nuclear modernization program is slated to bring profound changes to all three legs of the nuclear triad. But with Donald Trump in office, modernization now operates in a different context. The Trump administration, in launching a new nuclear posture review, seems to have abruptly altered the Obama administration’s rationale for modernization. It has also pledged a large build-up in conventional military forces – a build-up that would exacerbate the cost pressures already constraining nuclear modernization. These developments will change the way nuclear modernization is financed and threaten the political coalitions that have supported modernization. Strategic stability will also face significant challenges, especially if Russia and China come to perceive modernization as a US attempt to limit damage during a nuclear exchange or to establish escalation dominance. Likewise, if US allies come to doubt the credibility of US defense commitments, the risk of nuclear proliferation would increase. These dangers can be limited in a number of ways – through declaratory policy, major investments in alliance consultations, and moderate acquisition policies. In the coming years, civil service and uniformed military personnel will play a crucial role as they engage foreign governments on strategic issues and present political appointees with fair assessments of the costs of provocative action.

Agonistic governance: The antinomies of decision-making in US Navy SEALs

This article expands organization theory about Wicked, Tame and Critical problems and their associated decision-making styles, Leadership, Management and Command, by offering a framework that spans across all three which we call ‘Agonistic Governance’: an approach to decision-making that is premised on the acceptance that complexity generates paradoxes and contradictions and, to be successful, organizational actors must have the agency to positively embrace these, rather than try to eliminate them, recognizing that some failure is the price of overall success. Through an ethnographic study of US Navy SEALs, we suggest that, unlike the cultures of conventional military forces, elite military units can thrive in a leadership environment that is much more subtle, paradoxical and complex, and can be seen as illustrative of Agonistic Governance. Findings reveal that the success of these groups is dependent on the construction of a contradictory decision-making model that recognizes leadership is often as much an art as a science, and an understanding that the willingness to seek out and learn from failure rather than avoid it, is itself part of the solution not the problem. Agonistic Governance offers a way to move from binary thinking rooted in decision-making models that aim to be internally coherent, unilinear and without contradiction, and instead offers a way to accept the irrational and paradoxical prevalent in today’s complex organizational environments. In effect, Wicked Problems can only be addressed by accepting that failure is a prerequisite not a proscription.

North Korea’s nuclear issue and South Korea’s response : Focused on North Korea’s proliferation

The fourth nuclear testing of North Korea made on Jan. 6 is becoming large threat in peace and security in Korea as well as North and East Asia. Nuclear provocation of North Korea following the third nuclear testing in 2013 is becoming stronger and giving severe threat to neighboring countries in North and East Asia. Nuclear development of North Korea is based on a parallel line of nuclear and economy that North Korea in inferiority in conventional military force and international relations aims to secure balance of power through nuclear weapon and then, accomplish economic growth through economic aid from North and East Asia, and the USA. International society resolved to restrain North Korea in UN against their nuclear development, But it is still questioned if such sanction is effective.BR Since the first nuclear testing in 2006, North Korea has developed nuclear technology and transportation means bluntly though international sanction. Although North Korea’s nuclear development is still in state of vertical proliferation, Korea directly thrilled, and neighboring Japan are facing severe security dilemma. Though Korea is protected by nuclear umbrella of the USA, advocates for having nuclear weapon are appearing in Korea for ‘balance in power’ against North Korea. Even in case North Korea does not intend, horizontal proliferation by North Korea was told recently. So it is expected that security order in North and East Asia would be considerably complex in the future. This is the time to give attention on if North Korea’s nuclear development would bring proliferation in South Korea and North and East Asia.

Doctrinal Approachs of the Land Operations at Tactical Level

Abstract The character of armed conflict will be further granted by the use of conventional military forces, of professionalized but high-tech armies - as it has been enshrined in recent finished confrontations as well as in the ones currently underway- the manifestation area and the intensity of the threats have extremely diversified and expanded in the context of the operational environment. This meant the need for new approaches of the specific operational framework for the conduct of military operations, with consequences for the structure of the operation of groupings of forces and the way of conducting actions.

Making Sense of Hybrid Warfare

IntroductionSince the Russian Federation invaded Crimea in March 2014, analysis and commentary on the concept of warfare have increased exponentially.1 An Internet search will identify hundreds of entries covering the phenomenon. Hybrid warfare has become the most common term used to try and capture the complexity of twenty-first-century warfare, which involves a multiplicity of actors and blurs the traditional distinctions between different types of armed and even between war and peace. Hybrid warfare has ceased to be a topic only for military strategists, as it has now entered the broader public domain and become a major security concern for Western governments. Both NATO and the European Union (EU) are working on strategies to strengthen defensive capabilities and prevent attacks.This article seeks to clarify the different ways in which the term warfare and related terms have been used by scholars and policy analysts and summarize discussion on the topic to date. The paper will examine, in particular, the Russian approach to warfare as demonstrated by operations in Ukraine and will briefly assess the significance of these developments for Western security policy.Defining Hybrid WarfareNot surprisingly, there are many definitions of warfare. The concept has been delineated in different, if related, ways and these definitions have evolved in a relatively short period of time. Defining warfare is not just an academic exercise. The way the term is defined may determine how states perceive and respond to threats and which government agencies are involved in countering them.One approach to warfare takes an historical perspective. This defines the term simply as the concurrent use of both conventional and irregular forces in the same military campaign. Military historian Peter R. Mansoor, for example, defines warfare as conflict involving a combination of conventional military forces and irregulars (guerrillas, insurgents, and terrorists), which could include both state and non-state actors, aimed at achieving a common political purpose.2 Viewed from this perspective, warfare is clearly nothing new. There are numerous examples of techniques and approaches at the tactical, operational and strategic levels stretching back at least as far as the Peloponnesian War and the writings of the Chinese philosopher, Sun Tzu, in the fifth century BC. Irregular fighters have proved to be the bane of numerous conventional militaries. Formidable armies such as Napoleon's Grand Armee and Hitler's Wehrmacht struggled to combat irregular fighters who understood and exploited the local human and geographical terrain and targeted vulnerable logistic bases and lines of communication. Over time, guerrilla operations had a significant and lasting impact on the broader conventional military campaigns of which they were part. Recent counter insurgency (COIN) campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan have once again highlighted the difficulty of defeating de- termined irregular fighters without committing human rights abuses against the local population and consequently undermining domestic and international public support for the campaign.During the 2000s, the use of the term hybrid became a common way to describe contemporary warfare, particularly because of the increasing sophistication and lethality of violent non-state actors and the growing potential of cyber warfare. Although there was no agreement that this necessarily constituted a new form of warfare,3 definitions of warfare emphasized the blending of conventional and irregular approaches across the full spectrum of conflict. For example, in 2007 Frank G. Floffman, a leading analyst of the concept, defined warfare as Threats that incorporate a full range of different modes of warfare including conventional capabilities, irregular tactics and formations, terrorist acts including indiscriminate violence and coercion, and criminal disorder, conducted by both sides and a variety of non-state actors. …

Robert H. Ferrell, Harry S. Truman and the Cold War Revisionists. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2006, paper 2015. 142 pp. $19.95

First published in 2006 and now reissued in a paperback edition, this useful book, well suited for classroom use, gives us both less and more than its title implies. A collection of Robert Ferrell’s reflections on the Truman administration published from 1972 to 2002, it takes its name from an initial chapter on Cold War revisionists, then segues to chapters on the nuclear bomb, the early Cold War, Korea, and the historiography on Harry S. Truman. Ferrell’s critique of the revisionists is restrained and gentlemanly. He calls the father of the genre, University of Wisconsin historian William Appleman Williams, a friend. He shrinks from describing as Marxist the far-fetched assertion by Williams that the central theme of U.S. foreign policy was a perpetual quest for “Open Door” markets. Indeed Ferrell almost seems to buy Williams’s implausible declaration that the Open Door interpretation was simply an adaptation of Frederick Jackson Turner’s frontier thesis to the wider world of diplomatic history. In reality it was much more akin to Karl Marx’s interpretation of the dynamics of capitalism than Turner’s evocation of pioneers moving toward the setting sun. Ferrell admits as much by describing Williams, Lloyd Gardner, and other revisionists as “socialists.” By the time he gets around to Gabriel Kolko he finds it impossible to avoid “Marxist” (p. 13). The “C-word” never makes the text, although Ronald Radosh’s autobiographical work, Commies, makes clear that a strong, covert Communist allegiance was central to the upbringing of at least some Cold War revisionists, sometimes characterized as “red diaper babies.” Two chapters on post-World War II U.S. foreign relations—“Diplomacy without Armaments” and “NATO”—are rewarding. In sharp, concise prose, Ferrell describes a diplomatic world in which the United States, with conventional military forces that could accurately be described as impotent, successfully contained Soviet expansionism. What Ferrell does not do—it likely would require a separate article—is explain why the Soviet Army did not simply march into Western Europe. The U.S. nuclear monopoly in the years immediately after the war no doubt had a lot to do with Soviet restraint, even if Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov might protest that his government was not impressed with the bomb. The USSR, moreover, needed to recover from the appalling wartime devastation, including the deaths of some 26 million, widespread destruction, and huge population dislocations. Having to pursue a rough equivalent of the Marshall Plan for his own country, Iosif Stalin moved with deliberation to consolidate his grip on territories the Red Army had occupied by the end of the war. The United States,