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The information revolution and related organizational innovations are altering the nature of conflict and the kinds of military structures, doctrines, and strategies that will be needed. This study introduces two concepts for thinking about these issues: "cyberwar" and "netwar." Industrialization led to attritional warfare by massive armies (e.g., World War I).Mechanization led to maneuver predominated by tanks (e.g., World War II). The information revolution implies the rise of cyberwar, in which neither mass nor mobility will decide outcomes; instead, the side that knows more, that can disperse the fog of war yet enshroud an adversary in it, will enjoy decisive advantages. Communications and intelligence have always been important. At a minimum, cyberwar implies that they will grow more so and will develop as adjuncts to overall military strategy. In this sense, it resembles existing notions of "information war" that emphasize C3I. However, the information revolution may imply overarching effects that necessitate substantial modifications to military organization and force posture. Cyberwar may be to the twenty first century what blitzkrieg was to the twentieth. It may also provide a way for the U.S. military to increase "punch" with less "paunch." Whereas cyberwar refers to knowledge-related conflict at the military level, netwar applies to societal struggles most often associated with low intensity conflict by non-state actors, such as terrorists, drug cartels, or black market proliferators of weapons of mass destruction. Both concepts imply that future conflicts will be fought more by "networks" than by "hierarchies," and that whoever masters the network form will gain major advantages. "Knowledge must become capability." EMERGENT MODES OF CONFLICT Suppose that war looked like this: Small numbers of light, highly mobile forces defeat and compel the surrender of large masses of heavily armed, dug-in enemy forces, with little loss of life on either side. The mobile forces can do this because they are well prepared, make room for maneuver, concentrate their firepower rapidly n unexpected places, and have superior command, control, and information systems that are decentralized to allow tactical initiatives, yet provide central commanders with unparalleled intelligence and "topsight" for strategic purposes. Warfare is no longer primarily a function of who puts the most capital, labor, and technology on the battlefield, but of who has the best information about the battlefield. What distinguishes the victors is their grasp of information--not only from the mundane standpoint of knowing how to find the enemy while keeping it in the dark, but also in doctrinaland organizational terms. The analogy is rather like a chess game where you see the entire board, but your opponent sees only his own pieces; you can win even if he is allowed to start with additional powerful pieces. We might appear to be extrapolating from the U.S. victory in the Persian Gulf war against Iraq. But our vision is inspired more by the example of the Mongols of the thirteenth century. Their "hordes" were almost always outnumbered by their opponents, yet they conquered, and held for over a century, the largest continental empire ever seen. The key to Mongol success was their absolute dominance of battlefield information. They struck when and where they deemed appropriate, and their "arrow riders" kept field commanders, often separated by hundreds of miles, in daily communication. Even the Great Khan, sometimes thousands of miles away, was aware of developments in the field within days of their occurrence. Absent the galvanizing threat that used to be posed by the Soviet Union, domestic political pressures will encourage the United States to make do with a smaller military in the future. The type of war-fighting capability that we envision, which is inspired by the Mongol example, but drawn mainly from our analysis of the information revolution, may allow America to protect itself and its far-flung friends and interests, regardless of the size and strength of our potential future adversaries.
Throughout history, military doctrine, organization, and strategy have continually undergone profound changes, owing in part to technological breakthroughs. The Greek phalanx, the combination of gun and sail, the levee en masse, the blitzkrieg, the Strategic Air Command: history is filled with examples in which new weapon, propulsion, communication, and transportation technologies provided a basis for advantageous shifts in doctrine, organization, and strategy that enabled innovators to avoid exhausting attritional battles and pursue instead a form of "decisive" warfare.[1] Today, a variety of new technologies are again taking hold, and further innovations are on the way. The most enticing include non-nuclear high-explosives, precision-guided munitions, stealth designs for aircraft, tanks, and ships, radio-electronic combat (REC) systems, new electronics for intelligence-gathering, interference, and deception, new information and communications systems that improve command, control, communications and intelligence (C3I) functions, and futuristic designs for space-based weapons and for automated and robotic warfare. In addition, virtual reality systems are being developed for simulation and training. Many of these advances enter into a current notion of a military technology revolution (MTR).[2] The future of war--specifically the U.S. ability to anticipate and wage war--will be shaped in part by how these technological advances are assessed and adopted. Yet, as military historians frequently warn, technology permeates war but does not govern it. It is not technology per se, but rather the organization of technology, broadly defined, that is important. Russell Weigley describes the situation this way: "... the technology of war does not consist only of instruments intended primarily for the waging of war. A society's ability to wage war depends on every facet of its technology: its roads, its ransport vehicles, its agriculture, its industry, and its methods of organizing its technology. As Van Creveld puts it, 'behind military hardware there is hardware in general, and behind that there is technology as a certain kind of know-how, as a way of looking at the world and coping with its problems.'"[3] In our view, the technological shift that matches this broad view is the information revolution. This is what will bring the next major shift in the nature of conflict and warfare.
The information revolution reflects the advance of computerized
information and communications technologies and related innovations
in organization and management theory. Sea-changes are occurring
in how information is collected, stored, processed, communicated,
and Advanced information and communications systems, properly applied, can improve the efficiency of many kinds of activities. But improved efficiency is not the only, or even the best, possible effect. The new technology is also having a transforming effect, for it disrupts old ways of thinking and operating, provides capabilities to do things differently, and suggests how some things may be done better if done differently: "The consequences of new technology can be usefully thought
of as first-level, or efficiency, effects and second-level, or
social system, effects. The history of previous technologies
demonstrates The information revolution, in both its technological and non-technological aspects, sets in motion forces that challenge the design of many institutions. It disrupts and erodes the hierarchies around which institutions are normally designed. It diffuses and redistributes power, often to the benefit of what may be considered weaker, smaller actors. It crosses borders, and redraws the boundaries of offices and responsibilities. It expands the spatial and temporal horizons that actors should take into account. Thus, it generally compels closed systems to open up. But while this may make life difficult, especially for large, bureaucratic, aging institutions, the institutional form per se is not becoming obsolete. Institutions of all types remain essential to the organization of society. The responsive, capable institutions will adapt their structures and processes to the information age. Many will evolve from traditional hierarchical forms to new, flexible, network-like models of organization. Success will depend on learning to interlace hierarchical and network principles.[5] Meanwhile, the very changes that trouble institutions, such as the erosion of hierarchy, favor the rise of multi-organizational networks. Indeed, the information revolution is strengthening the importance of all forms of networks, such as social networks and communications networks. The network form is very different from the institutional form. While institutions (large ones, in particular) are traditionally built around hierarchies and aim to act on their own, multi-organizational networks consist of (often small) organizations or parts of institutions that have linked together to act jointly. The information revolution favors the growth of such networks by making it possible for diverse, dispersed actors to communicate, consult, coordinate, and operate together across greater distances, and on the basis of more and better information than ever before.[6] These points bear directly on the future of the military, and of onflict and warfare more generally.
The thesis of this thinkpiece is that the information revolution
will cause shifts, both in how societies may come into conflict
and how their armed forces may wage war. We offer a distinction
between what we call "netwar"--societal-level ideational
conflicts waged in part through internetted modes of communication--and "cyberwar" at
the military level. These terms are admittedly novel, and better
ones may yet be devised.[7] But, for now, they help illuminate
a useful distinction, and identify the breadth of ways in which
the information revolution may alter the nature of conflict short
of war, While both netwar and cyberwar revolve around information and communications matters, at a deeper level they are forms of war about "knowledge," about who knows what, when, where, and why, and about how secure a society or a military is regarding its knowledge of itself and its adversaries.[9]
Explaining Netwar Netwar refers to information-related conflict at a grand level
between nations or societies. It means trying to disrupt, damage,
or modify what a target population knows or thinks it knows about
itself In other words, netwar represents a new entry on the spectrum
of conflict that spans economic, political, and social, as well
as military forms of "war." In contrast to economic
wars that target Netwar will take various forms, depending on the actors. Some may occur between the governments of rival nation-states. In some respects, the U.S. and Cuban governments are already engaged in a netwar. This is manifested in the activities of Radio and TV Marti on the U.S. side, and on Castro's side by the activities of pro-Cuban support networks around the world. Other kinds of netwar may arise between governments and non-state
actors. For example, netwar may be waged by governments against
illicit groups and organizations involved in terrorism, proliferation
of weapons of mass destruction, or drug smuggling. Or, to the
contrary, it may be waged against the policies of specific governments
by advocacy groups and movements, involving, for example, environmental,
human-rights, or religious issues. The non-state actors may or
may not be associated with nations, and in some cases Another kind of netwar may occur between rival non-state actors, with governments maneuvering on the sidelines to prevent collateral damage to national interests and perhaps to support one side or another. This is the most speculative kind of netwar, but the elements for it have already appeared, especially among advocacy movements around the world. Some movements are increasingly organizing into cross-border networks and coalitions, identifying more with the development of civil society (even global civil society) than with nation-states, and using advanced information and communications technologies to strengthen their activities. This may well turn out to be the next great frontier for ideological conflict, and netwar may be a prime characteristic. Most netwars will probably be non-violent, but in the worst cases one could combine the possibilities into some mean low-intensity conflict scenarios. Martin Van Creveld (1991: 197) does this when he worries that, "In the future, war will not be waged by armies but by groups whom today we call terrorists, guerrillas, bandits and robbers, but who will undoubtedly hit on more formal titles to describe themselves." In his view, war between states will diminish, and the state may become obsolete as a major form of societal organization. Our views coincide with many of Van Creveld's, though we do not believe that the state is even potentially obsolete. Rather, it will be transformed by these developments. Some netwars will involve military issues. Possible issue areas
include nuclear proliferation, drug smuggling, and anti-terrorism
because of the potential threats they pose to international order
and Netwars are not real wars, traditionally defined. But netwar might be developed into an instrument for trying, early on, to prevent a real war from arising. Deterrence in a chaotic world may become as much a function of one's cyber posture and presence as of one's force posture and presence.
Cyberwar refers to conducting, and preparing to conduct, military
operations according to information-related principles. It means
disrupting, if not destroying, information and communications
systems, broadly defined to include even military culture, on
which an adversary relies in order to know itself: who it is,
where it is, what it can do when, why it is fighting, which threats
to counter This form of warfare may involve diverse technologies, notably
for C3I, for intelligence collection, processing, and distribution,
for tactical communications, positioning, and identification-friend-or- Cyberwar may have broad ramifications for military organization
and doctrine. As noted, the literature on the information revolution
calls for organizational innovations, so that different parts
of an institution function like interconnected networks rather
than separate hierarchies. Thus, cyberwar may imply some institutional
redesign for a military in both intra- and inter-service areas. Cyberwar may also imply developing new doctrines about the kinds of forces needed, where and how to deploy them, and what and how to strike on the enemy's side. How and where to position what kinds of computers and related sensors, networks, databases, and so forth., may become as important as the question once was for the deployment of bombers and their support functions. Cyberwar may also have implications for integrating the political and psychological with the military aspects of warfare. In sum, cyberwar may raise broad issues of military organization and doctrine, as well as strategy, tactics, and weapons design. It may be applicable in low- and high-intensity conflicts, in conventional and non-conventional environments, and for defensive or offensive purposes. As an innovation in warfare, we anticipate that cyberwar may
be to the twenty first century what blitzkrieg was to the twentieth
century. Yet, for now, we also believe that the concept is too In a deeper sense, cyberwar signifies a transformation in the
nature of war. This, we believe, will prove to be the better
approach to defining cyberwar. Our position is at odds with a
view (see Arnett 1992) that uses the terms "hyperwar" and "cyberwar" to
claim that the key implication of the MTR is the automated battlefield,
that future wars will be fought mainly by "brilliant" weapons,
robots, and autonomous computers, that man will be subordinate
to the machine, and that combat will be unusually fast and laden
with stand-off attacks. This view errs in its understanding of
the effects of the information revolution, and our own view differs
on every point. Cyberwar is about organization as much as technology.
It implies new man-machine interfaces that amplify man's capabilities,
not a separation of man and machine. In some situations, combat
may be The post-modern battlefield stands to be fundamentally altered by the information technology revolution, at both the strategic and tactical levels. The increasing breadth and depth of this battlefield and the ever-improving accuracy and destructiveness of even conventional munitions have heightened the importance of C3I matters to the point where dominance in this aspect alone may now yield consistent war-winning advantages to able practitioners. Yet cyberwar is a much broader idea than attacking an enemy's C3I systems while improving and defending one's own. In Clausewitz's sense, it is characterized by the effort to turn knowledge into capability. Indeed, even though its full design and implementation requires
advanced technology, cyberwar is not reliant upon advanced technology
per se. The continued development of advanced information and
communications technologies is crucial for U.S. military capabilities.
But cyberwar, whether waged by the United States or other actors,
does not necessarily require the presence of advanced
FOOTNOTES [1] Delbruck (1985 edn.) describes warfare as a dual phenomenon:
it [2] This notion borrows from an earlier Soviet notion of a scientific [3] Weigley (1989: 196), quoting Van Creveld, (1989: 1). [4] See Bell (1980), Beniger (1986), and Toffler (1990). [5] The literature on these points is vast. Recent additions [6] Ronfeldt, "Institutions, Markets, and Networks," in preparation. [7] Terms with "cyber-" as the prefix--e.g., cyberspace--are [8] We are indebted to Carl Builder for observing that the [9] The difficult term is "information;" defining
it remains a key [10] The importance of topsight is identified by Gelernter (1991:
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1993 by Taylor & Francis, 1900
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