WAR IN THE INFORMATION AGE

General Gordon R. Sullivan

Colonel James M. Dubik

June 6, 1994
*******

The views expressed in this report are those of the authors

and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of

the Department of the Army, the Department of Defense, or the

U.S. Government. This report is approved for public release;

distribution is unlimited.

*******

Comments pertaining to this report are invited and should be

forwarded to: Director, Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army

War College, Carlisle Barracks, PA 17013-5050. Comments also may

be conveyed directly to the Director of Research by calling

commercial (717) 245-3234 or DSN 242-3234.
PREFACE

We are beginning to realize the emergence of a new age--the

information age. On the one hand, the full dimensions of this new

age, if indeed it is such, are unknown. On the other hand, the

authors argue that enough is known to conclude that the conduct

of war in the future will be profoundly different. Paradoxically,

however, they claim that the nature of war will remain basically

the same. In this monograph, General Sullivan and Colonel Dubik

examine that paradox and draw some inferences from it.

When societies and states changed from an agrarian base to

an industrial base, the way they made war also changed.

Industrial nations furnished their armies with tools very

different from those produced by agrarian nations: the machine

gun, steam and petroleum powered engines, the railroad,

telegraph, radios, aircraft, and much more. Furthermore,

industrial armies changed in organization. Their leadership

requirements were different and they developed new operational

concepts.

The nature of war, however, did not change. In spite of the

"new" industrial technology, war remained a human endeavor and

very much as Carl von Clausewitz described it in the early 18th

century; subject to emotion and characterized by death and

destruction. Human fears, bravery, sacrifice and courage operated

within the realm of fog, friction and uncertainty. Great captains

were masters of both the science and art of war.

The root causes of war also stayed the same. People, whether

heads of states or leaders of other kinds of groups, still

started wars as a result of fear, hatred, greed, ambition,

revenge or a host of other "nonrational" considerations.

The authors of this study suggest that today we stand at

what many consider the threshold of the information age, an age

that has already begun to transform the conduct of warfare just

as the industrial age did earlier. New weapons systems,

organizations, and operational concepts will emerge, just as they

did in response to industrialism. No one knows the full details

of what the information age will bring, but the authors

demonstrate that the future is sufficiently clear to move the

Army in the right direction. Also clear is the fact that

Clausewitz is still relevant to the study of war because while

the conduct of war will change, the nature of war will be the

same.

This monograph explains the governing concepts of the

industrial age and how they affected the concept of war. Then it

describes the concepts emerging to govern the information age and

suggests ways in which these concepts may affect the conduct of

war. Finally, the monograph discusses those steps that the Army

is taking to position itself to exploit what are becoming the

dominant military requirements of the information age: speed and
precision.

Specifically, the authors discuss the ways in which the Army

has changed its strategic systems over the past several years so

that the Army operational and tactical forces will be able to

"see" a situation, decide, adapt, and act faster and more

precisely than their opponent. These changes will give strategic

planners, and operational and tactical commanders, a new set of

information age tools to use in theater and on the battlefield.

The net result: more flexibility, more versatility, faster

decision making, and broader scope of weapons systems at their

immediate disposal.

EARL H. TILFORD, JR., Ph.D.

Director of Research

Strategic Studies Institute
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES OF THE AUTHORS

GENERAL GORDON R. SULLIVAN, Chief of Staff, United States Army,

was commissioned a second lieutenant of Armor and awarded a

Bachelor of Arts degree in History from Norwich University in

1959. He holds a Master of Arts degree in Political Science from

the University of New Hampshire. His military schooling includes

the Armor School, the Command and General Staff College, and the

Army War College. He has served in a variety of command and staff

positions including four years in joint and allied assignments.

His overseas assignments include four tours in Europe, two in

Vietnam and one in Korea. General Sullivan also served in

assignments on the Army Staff in Washington, DC, including a tour

as the Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations and Plans and as the

Vice Chief of Staff of the Army. General Sullivan has commanded

at platoon through division level. In United States Army, Europe

he commanded the 4th Battalion, 73d Armor and the 1st Brigade, 3d

Armored Division, followed by an assignment as 3d Armored

Division's Chief of Staff and the VII Corps Operations Officer

(G-3). Subsequently, he served as the Assistant Commandant of the

Armor School at Fort Knox, Kentucky, on the NATO staff as the

Deputy Chief of Staff for Support of Central Army Group in

Germany, and as the Deputy Commandant of the Command and General

Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. He also served as

Commanding General of the 1st Infantry Division at Fort Riley,

Kansas. In June 1991, General Sullivan became Chief of Staff of

the United States Army. He also serves as a member of the Joint

Chiefs of Staff.

COLONEL JAMES M. DUBIK currently serves on the personal staff of

the Army Chief of Staff. A former philosophy instructor at the

Military Academy, he earned a Bachelor's degree from Gannon

University and a Master's degree from Johns Hopkins University.

He also holds a Master of Military Arts and Science Degree in

Theater Operations from the School of Advanced Military Studies.

He has written extensively in military and civilian journals.

Colonel Dubik's operational assignments have included service

with the 82d Airborne Division, 1st Ranger Battalion, and 2d

Ranger Battalion. He also commanded the 5th Battalion, 14th

Infantry in the 25th Infantry Division, and will assume command

of the 2d Brigade, 10th Mountain Division, in July 1994.
WAR IN THE INFORMATION AGE

The developed world may well be at a watershed between the

eclipse of the industrial age and the start of the information

age.1 This transformation will affect every aspect of human life,

just as the advent of the industrial age influenced many parts of

Europe and North America nearly two centuries ago. Almost

imperceptible at first, the transformation began in many

industrialized countries almost two decades ago.2 The United

States is well into the information age, and the Army is changing

to accommodate this new epoch. America's Army must meet the

challenge to change itself from an industrial age army of the

cold war into an information age, power projection instrument.

The future, of course, is not entirely clear. But "the one

thing we can be sure of," says Peter Drucker, "is that the world

that will emerge from the present rearrangement of values,

beliefs, social and economic structures, of political concepts

and systems, indeed, of world views, will be different from

anything anyone today imagines."3 Equally certain is this: the

U.S. Army will jeopardize its position as the world's best army

if it is satisfied with maintaining the status quo or caters to

internal institutional prerogatives. Thus, despite not knowing

the full details, the future is sufficiently clear to move the

Army in the right direction.

To provide historical context, this monograph will first

survey the last great socioeconomic transformation, that from the

agrarian to the industrial age and its effect on military forces.

Then it will discuss the new age--the information age--and the

kind of army it may shape.

The Industrial Age.

From the late 18th through the end of the 19th and into the

20th century, the Industrial Age changed almost every aspect of

life in Western Europe, the United States, and parts of Asia.4

 In

Europe, where it began, economies regulated by guilds and home

industries turned to capital investment as free enterprise

developed. By the 20th century, inventions and machines

proliferated. Large farms, using machinery, chemistry, and

mechanical power replaced small, family-tilled plots. Faster

communication and transport systems, the rise of the middle class

and urban centers, increased productivity and purchasing power,

and the importance of secular and scientific explanations of

reality accelerated industrialization. Nations which flourished

during industrialization and then colonized or conquered other

nations and peoples to serve as markets and a source of raw

materials altered the world map. Societal mores changed.

Individuals questioned "right" and "good," and tested the limits

of permissible thoughts and behavior. New theories on everything

from human rights to the very tenets of how mankind appeared

abounded.5

 Industrialism "rent the fabric of society, then rewove
it in an entirely different pattern. The structures of everyday

life changed forever; and with them the nature of families,

governments, cities, and farms, language, art, even our sense of

time."6 Even family structure changed from a norm of extended

units to that of nuclear families.7

Standardization, specialization, professionalization,

synchronization, concentration, maximization, and centralization

characterized the industrial age. These principles gave us the

kind of social, political, economic, and military world into

which all of us were born and in which we all matured. Applied,

these traits resulted in the mass production, mass consumption,

mass education, mass government, big bureaucracies, "scientific"

management, and corporate leadership with which we are all

familiar.8

As the industrial age developed and matured, the U.S. Army

refined and applied these principles. Over the decades,

particularly after the Second World War, they became the

framework within which the Army conceived its ideas and solved

its problems. Distinct industrial age "governing concepts"

emerged, concepts consisting of at least three major elements.

The Machine as Model. Machines are mechanical systems. They

consist of standardized, interchangeable parts, each with a

single, special function. The parts fit together into a

synchronized whole. When the machine is turned on, it works

automatically, grinding out its products efficiently. Using this

model, management simplified work to the point where labor

performed repetitive tasks and productive workers often performed

only one task. Efficiency became synonymous with effectiveness.

Work became rote, management rigid.9 Machine-like organizations-

-corporate, political, social, as well as military--often created

ponderous bureaucracies composed of standardized, interchangeable

parts (people), each with a specific function or specialty that,

when put together in departments would automatically grind out

its product (integration and control) using an approach

eventually dubbed "systems analysis."10

Paced, Sequential, Continuous, Long-Run Production. Machines

run at a preset, regular, "conveyor-belt" pace. If one increases

or decreases the pace beyond the machine's set parameters, one

risks breaking the machine or producing imperfect goods. Most of

the machines of the industrial age, and the organizations modeled

after them worked in sequence. Henry Ford's famous assembly line

became the model not only for manufacturing but also for

government, business, and most other organizations. Business

processes were sequential. Concept development, design,

production, marketing, and sales followed sequentially with a

centralized decision-making apparatus monitoring and approving

movement through various departments. Retooling any manufacturing

line to produce a different product was a major operation which

sometimes entailed closing down parts, if not all, of a plant for

weeks or months.
Mass Output. Perhaps the most recognizable characteristic of

the industrial age was mass: mass production, mass media, mass

markets, mass advertising, mass communication, mass education,

mass distribution and mass movements of all kinds.11 Products of

the industrial age--whether corporate, political, economic,

social-welfare or military--required and demanded uniformity.

Some changes resulted from debate; other changes followed

conflict; still others, war.

These governing concepts provided the context within which

Western social, political, economic and cultural life evolved.

Indeed, within each "industrialized" nation, a new political

architecture emerged. The transition to the industrial age,

however, was not without turmoil.

Industrialism also changed the way military forces were

organized, as well as how they fought. Industrialized nations

could furnish their militaries with "tools" very different from

those that an agrarian nation could provide. In most

industrialized countries, the armed forces developed operational

concepts to accommodate a more mechanistic way of war. Just as

industrialism altered social, political, and economic aspects of

life, it also changed the conduct of warfare.12

In Europe, during the 18th century, the "strategy of a

single point was the dominant military paradigm." Even though the

industrial age was in its infancy, Napoleon Bonaparte's decisive

battle epitomized this paradigm.13

Decisive victory during the industrial age, required the

destruction of the enemy's army as well as his war-making

capability and resources: infrastructure, manufacturing base, and

raw materials. No army could achieve these expanded objectives in

one decisive battle. Thus, over time, distributive campaigns

became the new way of making war.

Commanders of these kinds of armies needed a different set

of skills than their predecessors used. Just as the industrial

age fostered a managerial elite in business, the military

underwent a managerial revolution. Specialization took effect and

a staff system evolved to supplant the old leadership based upon

the feudal, landed aristocracy. Service in the military had

become a profession.14 In the industrialized nations, beginning in

Prussia, military education systems emerged to ensure that

officers had the conceptual, technical, and organizational skills

necessary to synchronize the efforts of the disparate parts of

their military machines.15

Mixed in with the development of a new set of conceptual,

technical, and organizational skills came an explosion of

technical innovations: the rifled musket, the repeating rifle,

and the machine gun, steam and then gasoline powered engines,

breach loaded artillery, the railroad, the telegraph, and heavier
than air flying machines. All affected the conduct of warfare.

Other innovations, like administrative and accounting procedures,

preprinted forms, maps, the technical means to coordinate large

numbers, accurate portable clocks, the telescope, and many other

nonmilitary inventions, proved to have substantial military

applications. The fighting front and the supportive rear were

united first by rail and ship and then by air. This unification

of front and rear allowed for the continuous flow of personnel,

units and supplies. Thus, large and geographically separated

formations, under the control of ever-larger staffs, could act as

one unified force in what was often a war of attrition.16 The

ultimate result: war, conducted and sustained over years, first

in the multiple theaters of global combat, and then in a

half-century global "cold" war.

Simply put, industrial armies differed from their agrarian

predecessors. Industrial age military objectives were distributed

between enemy forces, infrastructure, manufacturing base, and

resources. Thus, industrial armies had to be raised, equipped,

trained, educated, and organized to conduct sequential,

distributed operations throughout the depth of a theater, or

multiple theaters, and sustain such activities over time.

Industrial armies were characterized by continuous logistics and

mobilization, from rear to front and back; centralized

communications; an enlarged, bureaucratically organized staff;

and large, durable formations.

The First and Second World Wars epitomized industrialism's

governing concept as the major powers in each war became "war

machines" capable of continuous, long-run production and mass

output of arms, soldiers, units, and equipment. Historian Forrest

Pogue describes the plan for victory in World War II as one in

which the United States would "create air superiority, strengthen

naval forces, create industrial production sufficient to arm the

defenders of the Western Hemisphere, outfit task forces for

operations in the Atlantic and in the European Theaters, and

furnish weapons and supplies for friendly powers wherever they

might be."17 Appropriate for its time, the World War II model

included an industrial base and training base; long runs of mass

produced equipment, people, and units that were distributed from

the base to the front, and returned to the base if need be; and

sequential campaigns and operations. World War II was an

attritional war in which Allied forces attempted not only to

destroy Axis armies but also to destroy the war-making

capabilities of Germany and Japan by attacking their resources

and, when possible and through the use of air power, attacking

their industrial war-making facilities. The World War II model

reflected the governing concepts of the industrial age.

Furthermore, this model for making war continued through the

1980s. It is how the U.S. Army, along with the other services,

have been raised, equipped, deployed, trained, educated,

sustained, resourced, and commanded for over 50 years.

The end of the cold war and the transition from the
industrial age to the information age has made this model

obsolete. The information age has been colliding with the

institutions of the industrial age for almost two decades. While

the result will not be complete elimination of industrial age

structures and institutions, over time the information age will

dominate the industrial age just as the Industrial Revolution

overtook agrarian Europe and America. This transformation will be

as profound and, some scholars believe, as conflict ridden and

violent as the shift from an agricultural society to an

industrial society.18

In the current historical watershed, capital and wealth are

again shifting, but this time the move is to knowledge.19

Knowledge enhances the ability to use tangible items and

processes to create wealth. In the information age, the path to

wealth will be knowledge. Thus, Peter Drucker explains, every one

of the assumptions upon which the economic theory of

industrialism is based flies in the face of today's realities.20

Indeed, many contend that the information age has arrived.

The "capital" of the information age is the organizational

capacity achieved by less hierarchial "learning organizations."

The ideas, skills, and abilities of well-educated workers and

leaders also are primary economic assets; part of the capital of

the information age.21 The information age brings with it a host

of new inventions: computer networks, internetworks, digital

information, information technologies and architectures, and

cellular communications; electronic fiscal transactions,

information "highways"; shrinking factories and industrial work

forces. Even as quality and productivity increase, new reliable

energy generating, storing and transmitting technologies are

transforming the work place. As the information age matures,

other yet-to-be-conceived inventions will continue this

transformation and accelerate its pace.

This transformation is not just an economic one. The

information age, like the industrial age, will affect social,

political, and corporate structures as well as most other public

institutions and organizations.

In many nations the economic structure is changing to

accommodate the information age. A new set of principles and new

governing concepts are beginning to take shape.22 The details

remain partially obscured, but the outline is clear. The

governing concepts of the information age are taking the

following shape.

The Network as Model. A network is a nonmechanical system.

"In the machine model...things can be taken apart...then put back

together without significant loss."23 A more holistic approach,

one in which relationships among the parts gain in importance, is

replacing the old model. Processes, not tasks, determine the

ability to be effective and compete in the information age.

Hierarchies will remain, but their efficacy will not. Rather,
information sharing networks will gain in prominence.24 This will

require

a sophisticated information network that gathers

precise and exhaustive data on markets and customers'

needs combining it with the newest design methods and

computer-integrated production process, and then

operating this system with an integrated network that

includes not only highly skilled employees of the

company but also supplies, distributors, retailers, and

even customers.25

Success will depend upon high quality, sophisticated workers and

managers.

Workers in an information age corporation are not

standardized, interchangeable parts with little to contribute

other than their single, specialized function along an assembly

line or in a bureaucracy. Rather, workers are becoming

collaborators, communicators, and contributing members of the

team in many successful corporations. In information age

corporations, training and education are paramount along with

worker longevity and loyalty. Quality is the key.

Middle management positions are disappearing as two of their

main functions, information transfer and worker supervision,

decline in importance. Computers "talking" to themselves by

digital transfer of information and workers becoming more

self-regulated make much of middle management obsolete. Staffs,

as they have developed during the industrial age, are changing

dramatically. Bureaucracies will not vanish, but spans of control

will grow larger while organizations become flatter and "process

action teams" play an increasingly important role.26

Decision making under these kinds of conditions will also

change. Many decisions will be decentralized. Of those

decision-making processes that remain centralized, most will be

structured in a participative way; fewer decisions will be made

by a single leader or manager. Successful corporations will

become adaptive organizations, constantly learning and

"self-renewing" in response to external realities, internal

changes, and market considerations.27 But, however decisions are

made, successful corporations will have to speed through the

decision cycle faster than their competitors. One of the most

important advantages of the network over the machine is speed.

Near-Simultaneous, Continuous, Short-Run Production. The

preset, regular, "conveyor-belt" pace of the machine age is over.

Only fast-paced, adaptive organizations will succeed in this new

era of competition. Today, competition comes not only from

traditional adversaries in traditional sectors, but also from

disintegrating barriers to previously insulated and protected

markets. Few corporations can now predict from where their next

"peer" competitor will come. Competition now arises unexpectedly,
from anywhere.28

To deal with this degree of uncertainty, information age

corporations seek "to compress product development time, to

shrink the interval between identification of the need for a new

product and the beginning of its manufacture."29 Again, the time

between observed need, through decision, to action will get

shorter and shorter. Thus, speed in identifying, then meeting new

market needs grows in importance. The inflexible machines and

bureaucratic processes of the industrial age justified their

expense through mass, but the speed of an information age

corporation will turn this industrial world inside out.

Information age corporations beat their competition by

compressing time, expanding market share, and increasing

productivity. They also try to eliminate the "assembly line

mentality" while, simultaneously, trimming their bureaucracies.

These are keys to success in the information age. The most basic

and common feature of an information age business will be the

absence of an assembly line attitude and the presence of many

formerly distinct jobs and tasks integrated and compressed into

one.30

Mass-Customized Products, Precisely Targeted, Near

Instantaneous Distribution. Advertising and marketing were the

tools to convince the customer to accept mass products. Low

prices and sheer abundance helped make this acceptance complete.

But what is becoming known as "demassification" is becoming de

rigueur, with the niche market replacing the mass market.31

Corporations must be able to make a product or provide a service

in response to a particular customer's demand. Cost effective,

mass-customized products and services are now available. Custom

design, rapid delivery, a product or service adapted to the

customer, not vice versa, are the hallmarks of business in the

information age.32

Customers will be served, ultimately, by the products of

information age machines. Production machines in the information

age will be able to reset themselves, thus allowing

continuous-flow, fully-customized production. Mass production

will continue to have a place in history, albeit a small one. In

the information age, profitability will not result from mass but

from precision: precision first, in identifying the needs of a

particular market segment; second, in developing and producing a

product or service customized to that specific segment; and

third, in delivering that product or service. The successful

information age corporations will be those that do all of these

things faster than their competitors. Constant innovation and

speed will become two of the important ways to retain one's

competitive advantage.33

As the information age matures, corporations will not simply

spend money on new technology and then use it in old ways. They

will not simply ask how they can do things faster and better.
These are actions that will have already been taken in the early

stages of the information age.34 The fundamental question will be,

"Why do some things at all?" Success will come to corporations

that can exploit the full potential of computer technology within

new organizations, new attitudes toward workers and work

processes, new ways of operating and new management concepts.

That is, success will come to those who unlearn the rules of the

industrial age and adopt the new practices of the information age

the fastest.

Ultimately, the information age will surpass and then

dominate the industrial age. The dominance, however, will not be

absolute. Around the globe, vestiges of the industrial and

agrarian ages will remain. While some parts of the world will

become information-based, others will remain industrial- based,

and still others will be agrarian. In some nations, all three

ages may exist. The result will be at least a "tri-sected" world

in which many changes run together in a world of increased

complexity and uncertainty.35 And in this very complex world, the

concept of war will change fundamentally.

The Information Age and America's Army.

With respect to change, some like to compare today's Army to

its cold war self. In the spring of 1990, the Army had nearly

6100 soldiers operating in 45 countries. Now it has 21,000

operating in over 70 countries. This represents a 300 percent

increase in operational tempo. During the same period, the size

of the Army was reduced by 25 percent--Active, Guard, and

Reserve--from 2.0 to 1.5 million. The force structure has been

cut from 5 corps to 4, 18 active divisions to 12, and 10 National

Guard divisions to 8. Over 100,000 soldiers have returned to the

United States from their bases overseas; and the budget was cut

by about 40 percent. Further, about half of all base closings and

personnel reductions accomplished so far by the armed forces have

come from the cold war army. But the real story of America's Army

is not how it compares to the past, but in how it is transforming

for the future.

This transformation from a cold war Total Force to America's

Army of the 21st century is, in a very real sense, growth.

America's Army has a tradition as a power projection force going

back to the Spanish American War; this is a tradition it must

reenforce and continue so that it can be the kind of power

projection force capable of establishing land force dominance

quickly any place it is sent. The Army must grow into the

information age, but this is not growth in the sense of increased

size, rather it is developmental growth.

Such a transformation is not new to an Army which has

reinvented itself before.36 The Army leadership, understanding the

enormity of the challenge, believes that intellectual change must

lead physical change. From the early 1970s, intellectual debate
has been welcomed in the Army as a way of fostering a better

understanding of the problems and challenges facing the nation

and its military services.37 From the very top down, Army leaders

are preparing America's Army for the information age.38

War is, as it has been and will remain, the most complex of

human undertakings. Warfare conducted by an information age army

will be as distinct from warfare conducted by an industrial age

army as that form of warfare was from war made by an agrarian age

army.

To succeed against an industrial state generally requires

the destruction not only of its army, but also of the military

infrastructure, resources, and manufacturing base of the total

war-making capability. Achieving victory against an

information-based state will entail destroying that country's

armed forces, as well as destroying its war-making capability

(which may well include industrial and information-related

targets) and its information system.

The above description, while generally correct, is

incomplete because it addresses only wars conducted by the armies

of one nation-state or group of nation-states fighting another.

Nation-states, however, do not have a monopoly on war making. A

variety of entities can use violence in the pursuit of specified

goals. Throughout history, tribes, religious groups, and

city-states bound by economic interests have made war. More

recently, ideologically-motivated guerrilla groups often have

achieved their goals through a combination of political and

military initiatives. In the last 30 years, first, terrorist

organizations and, then, some drug cartels have engaged in

violence to achieve political purposes. While the variety of

threats will stay basically the same during the information age,

the available weaponry may increase in variety. Entities from an

agrarian age army to a drug cartel can purchase information age

weaponry and, thereby, blur the distinction between "war" and

"operations other than war."39 Military competitors may arise

unexpectedly, and the conditions for victory may differ with each

conflict.

In the world where agrarian, industrial and information age

nations exist, threats from a great many different sources may

confront the United States simultaneously. America's Army will

engage in joint operations, sometimes as part of a coalition and

sometimes alone. There will be interagency operations combining

the armed forces with other government entities. Rules of

engagement are likely to be precise, perhaps voluminous, and

operations will take place under the watchful eye of a media that

will be on the cutting edge of the information age. Furthermore,

the public may have unreasonable expectations about casualties.

America's Army will find itself engaged quickly with decreased

time between the observed "crisis" and "troops on the ground"

more the rule than the exception. Above all, each use of military

force will be unique; the leaders of America's Army must truly be
masters of the art of war, not merely information age gurus or

military "techno-wonks."

Information age "tools," to include speed and precision, are

already a part of the battlefield. Only the highest quality

soldiers, leaders, staffs, and organizations who understand the

importance of speed and precision in information processing and

applications will be able to succeed in this kind of environment.

America's Army is developing the ability now to fight and win in

the information age.

The kind of army that can use information age "tools" and

succeed under a variety of these conditions differs from the mass

production army of the industrial age. Already, successful

information age businesses and corporations have dispensed with

industrial practices and applied new principles and concepts to

their organizations, processes and operations. The Army, too, has

reached this conclusion. Certainly, the application in the

military will be different from that in the corporate world;

however, the information age paradigm will change army

organizations, processes and operations. Furthermore, and more to

the point, it will change the way wars are fought.

The utility of distributive campaigns that delivered

decisive victory during the industrial age will fade. In the

information age, armies will conduct operations resulting in the

near-simultaneous paralysis and destruction of enemy forces,

war-making capability, and information networks throughout the

depth of a theater. Armies in the information age will develop a

shared situational awareness resulting from having common,

up-to-date, near-complete friendly and enemy information

distributed among all elements of a task force. First, an

information age army will be able to locate enemy forces quickly

and precisely, whether those enemies are agrarian war lords,

industrial armies, or an information age peer. Second,

information age armies will know where their own forces are, much

more accurately than before while denying that kind of

information to their foes. Finally, information about enemy units

and friendly formations will be distributed among all committed

forces--land, sea, air, and space--to create a common perception

of the battlefield. This shared situational awareness, coupled

with the ability to conduct continuous operations, will allow

information age armies to observe, decide, and act faster, more

correctly and more precisely than their enemies. All the elements

of the battlefield, armor, artillery, infantry, air platforms and

command centers will be linked digitally in information age

armies. Furthermore, in the future, warfare will be conducted

jointly with the whole of any force being greater than the sum of

its parts. Speed and precision are becoming the dominant military

requirements.

Additionally, direct fire will be redefined in the

information age. Armies will be able to shoot or move directly

against enemy forces or specific targets even though they may be
tens of thousands of kilometers away.40 Finally, all of these

capabilities will be exercised under the watchful eye of an

independent, global, and instantaneously transmitting media.

America's information age Army must be able to use these

capabilities to defeat enemies whether they be from agrarian,

industrial or informational nations. Therefore, it must be

prepared to destroy or control armies--whether conventional

armies of nation-states or those of feudal lords, religious

groups, drug cartels, ethnic groups, crime syndicates,

transnational corporations, or other entities that may emerge in

the information age of the 21st century--as well as the

infrastructure, production, base, and information grid--again

whether in agrarian, industrial, or information societies. The

military sector will come to reflect the variety of the

information age social, economic, political, and private sectors.

Because the threats will be so diverse, information age armies

must be more flexible and versatile than those of the present.

America's Army will be smaller but more capable, but only if it

is equipped with modern technology, is well-trained and led, uses

up-to-date doctrine, and has organizations that "fit" its

technology and doctrine. The processes required to create and

sustain America's Army in the information age will also differ

from those required for the cold war U.S. Army. For example,

force structures that can exploit and maximize speed and

precision will replace those now in use; force allocation

"rules," as well as personnel and equipment replacement factors,

will change; and acquisition processes that can keep pace with

technological innovation will replace current industrial age

processes. Decision-making processes will also change. They will

include a mix of artificial and human intelligence and become

much less sequential and more simultaneous.

Many nations will approach the use of military force

differently. In the United States, the hyper-diversity of

conditions under which America will employ its information age

army will require very close strategic and operational level

coordination. This requirement is clear when nations conduct what

has been traditionally recognized as war; that is, organized,

properly sanctioned and directed violence to achieve a

predetermined political objective. The requirement is less clear,

but no less important, in operations other than war. The

information age will not allow the luxury of this artificial

distinction, however. Any use of America's Army in a situation in

which one or more of the parties is using violence to compel

others to do its will requires that the nation approaches the

situation as "war" and very strong civil-military and interagency

links must be forged.

Much will change in the way wars are conducted in the

information age. Paradoxically, however, some elements of war

will not change significantly. Even in the information age, war

will remain a human endeavor, subject to emotion and

characterized by the shedding of blood and the effects of chance.
Information age war will not be remote, bloodless, sterile or

risk free--it will still be war. Death and destruction,

traditionally the currency of war, will remain so in the

information age. Despite all the technology of the information

age, what Carl von Clausewitz described as the fog of war,

uncertainty and ambiguity, may be intensified. That is why

military leaders must be masters of the art of war in the

traditional sense of understanding history and philosophy--the

foundations upon which strategic thinking and the operational art

are, and will always be, grounded.

Finally, the root causes of war remain constant. People,

whether political leaders in the traditional sense, or heads of

other organizations, will start wars as a result of fear, hatred,

greed, ambition and revenge. People will fight when they believe

that they can accomplish their objectives by resorting to force,

or when they think that they have no other alternative, or when

pride, principles, or religious convictions demand it. Although

the conduct of war will be different in the information age, the

nature of war will remain remarkably the same.

The information age is not yet fully upon us. Some of the

ideas described above are abeyant. Others, however, are clearly

visible and currently viable. Nevertheless, it may take another

decade or two before the United States is fully into the

information age.

But the time to anticipate the coming information age is

now. America's Army is committed to change as it grows in

understanding of the kind of organizations and processes that

will be needed to fight to win in the information age. The

challenge is to translate that commitment to change into reality.

Implications and Conclusions.

Although it may be tempting to do so, strategists must be

careful not to idealize the information age. By the same token,

military professionals, including military strategists, cannot

afford to ignore the obstacles that stand in the way of

transforming America's Army. It is an ambitious journey upon

which the Army has embarked during this time of shrinking

resources. The Army must balance its dollars among funding

current operations; recruiting and retaining good people;

financing training and leader development, and base operations;

as well as developing those programs involved in moving into the

information age. Below a certain floor, however, balancing

becomes nonviable. The Army's leadership understands this

challenge and knows that there are no "time outs" from training

and preparedness. The Army must forecast as accurately as

possible the military requirements for the information age, then

make policy and program decisions that meet those requirements.

For the present, the task is to develop a menu of forces and
capabilities within America's Army, a menu that will provide

today's and tomorrow's National Command Authority and the

Commanders-in-Chief (CINCs) what they need. The digitized

battlefield is happening now. The Army is in the process of

upgrading its intelligence capabilities, as well as maneuver,

fire support, sustainment, and command and control platforms, by

use of advanced technologies that can gather, sort, and

distribute information among themselves. The technological

insertions and upgrades will allow our task forces to observe,

decide, and act faster and more precisely than before. In the

future, soldiers will be able to mass the effects of fire support

or maneuver forces from dispersed locations and do so nearly

simultaneously. Speed and precision, lethality and versatility--

these are the capabilities that the Army is building into its

forces today. These are the capabilities that CINCs will find

useful in a variety of conditions.

Doctrinal adaptation continues. The next edition of FM

100-5, Operations, will capture the variety of the information

age, describe the flawed distinction between war and operations

other than war, and flesh out the principles governing the

conduct of warfare in the information age. Additionally, FM-101-5

will adjust the decision-making processes and describe staff

functions, duties and relationships for a digitized force. Other

doctrinal manuals will follow suit.

The Army's Force XXI initiative will study the organizations

of battalions, brigades, divisions, and corps to determine how

they may evolve to a size and composition that will provide the

versatility needed to succeed on the variety of information age

battlefields. That evolution will proceed as the Army finds the

right mix of soldiers, leaders, skills, functions and equipment

needed to employ information age technologies.

The organization of the institutional Army will also change.

Throughout the industrial age, and culminating with the cold war,

the Army created, then refined a set of policies, programs,

procedures, and models upon which it based its personnel,

mobilization, training, education, equipment sustainment,

deployment, employment and command and control processes. The

Army then built a set of organizations around these processes and

created industrial style bureaucracies to run them. While

appropriate for deterring war with the Soviet Union and preparing

to fight the Soviet Army and Warsaw Pact forces along the Fulda

Gap, these processes, and their accompanying organizations and

bureaucracies, are rapidly becoming outmoded by the accelerating

pace and variety of the information age.

Four basic forms of information will form the core upon

which America's information age Army procedures and organizations

will be built. First is content information, the simple inventory

of information about the quantity, location, and types of items.

Second is form information, the descriptions of the shape and

composition of objects. Third is behavior information, three
dimensional simulation that will predict behavior of at least

physical objects, ultimately being able to "wargame" courses of

action. Finally, action information is the kind of information

that allows operations to take the appropriate action quickly.41

Leveraging these forms of information will allow army

organizations to maintain quality and increase "productivity" and

effectiveness, even while reducing in size.

New training strategies are also emerging. Hands-on,

performance-oriented training will remain valid, useful, and

essential. So will range firing and field exercises. Practicing

under stressful, realistic, field conditions will never go out of

style, nor should it. But more and more, a variety of simulations

and other computer assisted programs will precede or follow

hands-on and field practice. Simulations, often distributed, will

form an essential part of the information age training strategy.

Simulations will intensify individual leader and collective

training. Soldiers, leaders and organizations can be "immersed"

repetitively, and to increasing degrees of difficulty, in a

variety of simulated scenarios.42 If these scenarios are the

appropriate ones, this immersion will provide preparatory,

remedial, and reinforcement training; all excellent augmentations

to the kind of hands-on, field training essential to producing a

trained and ready army.

The weapons and materiel of the information age army will

look almost the same as that of the late industrial age army.

But, the tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, artillery pieces,

rocket launchers, helicopters, command and control, engineer and

logistical support vehicles and trucks will all be "smarter."

They will derive their intelligence from computers and other

advanced technologies. These systems will be linked to those of

other services. The joint, digitally-integrated force that

results will need supply, maintenance, and service systems

different from those that supported the mass army of the

industrial age. Ultimately, the Army will have to alter the rules

by which combat, combat support, and combat service support are

currently associated. Otherwise, a gap between operational

potential and sustainment capability will develop. As the

information age progresses, and inventions not yet conceived

become reality, the Army must be ready for whatever will follow

the current set of maneuver, fire support, logistics, and command

vehicles.

Finally, leadership development programs must shift to

accommodate the new conceptual, technical, and organizational

skills required of information age officers and noncommissioned

officers. Leaders of the information age Army must think

differently than those of the industrial age. They will have more

information made available to them over increasingly compressed

spans of time. They will have to make decisions quicker and

execute those decisions over greater distances and in decreasing

time. They will have to orchestrate fire and maneuver under more

diverse conditions while maintaining cohesion among more
dispersed units.

Success in the information age will go to those who have the

courage to challenge themselves, who constantly innovate, and who

learn to adapt as they go. Positioning America's Army today so

that it will succeed in the information age is a historic task;

one the Army has taken on. No one has a clear picture of the

future; no single conception of what the information age will

bring is entirely complete and correct. But the foregoing

description, drawn from a number of diverse sources, is an

accurate enough forecast for the purposes of action. One thing is

known for sure; America's Army is marching toward the 21st

century. The final objective may not be completely known, but the

line of march is obvious.

ENDNOTES

1. Among the many books that discuss this topic are the

following: James V. McGee and Laurence Prusak, Managing

Information Strategically, New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.,

1993; William H. Davidow and Michael S. Malone, The Virtual

Corporation, New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1992; Peter

Drucker, Post-Capitalist Society, New York: Harper Collins, 1993

and The New Realities, New York: Harper & Row, 1989; Robert B.

Reich, The Work of Nations, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1991;

Michael Hammer and James Champy, Reengineering the Corporation,

New York: Harper Business, 1993; Alvin Toffler, The Third Wave,

New York: Bantam Books, 1980 and Powershift, New York: Bantam

Books, 1990; Alvin and Heidi Toffler, War and Anti-War, New York:

Little, Brown, and Company, 1993; John Naisbitt, Megatrends, New

York: Warner Books, 1982; John Naisbitt and Patricia Aburdene,

Megatrends 2000, New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc.,

1990; and Don Tapscott and Art Caston, Paradigm Shift: The New

Promise of Information Technology, New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc.,

1993. Although he does not talk in terms of the information age,

Hedrick Smith, in The Power Game, New York: Random House, 1988,

describes the effects that information age technologies and

attitudes are having on the way our government conducts business.

This list is neither exhaustive nor authoritative. Rather it

merely represents growing body of literature that describes the

information age into which we are moving, and have been for a

number of years.

2. McGee and Prusak, Managing Information Strategically, pp.

1-4; Naisbitt, Megatrends, pp. 1-33; Toffler, The Third Wave, pp.

139-141 and 186-204.

3. Drucker, Post-Capitalist Society, p. 5.

4. Toffler, The Third Wave, pp. 21-23.

5. Will and Ariel Durant, Rouseau and Revolution, New York:

Simon and Schuster, 1967, pp. 680-683. Alasdair MacIntyre, A

Short History of Ethics, New York: The MacMillan Company, 1966,
pp. 146-248. To understand the intellectual groundwork of the

industrial revolution see: "Foundations of the Modern World View"

in Richard Tarnas, The Passion of the Western Mind, New York:

Ballantine Books, 1991, pp. 282-290.

6. Toffler, The Third Wave, pp. 21-23.

7. Davidow and Malone, The Virtual Corporation, p. 1.

8. Toffler, The Third Wave, pp. 26-82. See also Drucker,

Post-Capitalist Society, pp. 20-47, and Davidow and Malone, The

Virtual Corporation, pp. 1, 11, 28, 73, 90, 162-167, 178, 239,

and 244.

9. Davidow and Malone, The Virtual Corporation, pp. 28,

162-167, and 244-245.

10. Ibid., pp. 166-167.

11. Alvin and Heidi Toffler, War and Anti-War, p. 19.

12. That different cultures have distinct ways to make war,

even distinct concepts of what war is, is a major theme in John

Keegan's A History of Warfare, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993,

see pp. 386-392 for a summary.

13. James J.Schneider, "Vulcan's Anvil: The American Civil

War and the Emergence of Operational Art," unpublished paper,

School of Advanced Military Studies, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas,

June 16, 1991, p. 1.

14. Martin van Creveld, Command in War, Cambridge,

Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1985, pp. 103-188, and

van Creveld, Technology and War, New York: The Free Press, 1989,

pp. 137-149; T.N. Dupuy, A Genius for War, Fairfax, Virginia:

Hero Books, 1984, pp. 44-69.

15. Schneider, "Vulcan's Anvil," pp. 9-10.

16. J.F.C. Fuller, The Conduct of War: 1789-1961, New York:

Da Capo Press, 1961, pp. 86-94; van Creveld, Technology and War,

pp. 111-123 and 153-166; and Schneider, "Vulcan's Anvil," pp.

2-9.

17. Forrest C. Pogue, George C. Marshall: Ordeal and Hope, 1939-1942, New York: Viking Press, 1965, pp. 139-165; quoted p.

157; see also Russell F. Weigley, Eisenhower's Lieutenants, Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1981, pp. 2-7.

18. Naisbitt, Megatrends, p. 9.

19. Toffler, Powershift, pp. 35-68 and The Third Wave, pp.

127-130 and 349-361; Drucker, Post-Capitalist Society, pp. 1-47

and 181-218; McGee and Prusak, Managing Information
Strategically, pp. 1-4.

20. Drucker, The New Realities, pp. 160-161.

21. Robert B. Reich, The Work of Nations, New York: Alfred

A. Knopf, Publisher, pp. 154-196; Toffler, Powershift, p. 60;

Peter M. Senge, The Fifth Discipline, New York: Doubleday

Currency, 1990, pp. 3-11; Davidow and Malone, The Virtual

Corporation, pp. 162-216.

22. For other ways of looking at the principles and

"governing concepts" of the information age corporation, see

"Seven Key Drivers of the New Business Environment" in Tapscott

and Caston, Paradigm Shift, pp. 6-10; "The Corporate Identity

Crisis," in Toffler, The Third Wave, pp. 226-243; "A New Kind of

Business," in Davidow and Malone, The Virtual Corporation, pp.

1-19; or "Labor, Capital, and Their Future," and "The

Productivity of the New Work Force" in Drucker, Post-Capitalist

Society, pp. 68-96.

23. Margaret J. Wheatley, Leadership and the New Science,

San Francisco, California: Berett-Koehler Publishers, 1992, pp.

8-9. See also pp. 25-45.

24. Naisbitt, Megatrends, pp. 211-229.

25. Davidow and Malone, The Virtual Corporation, p. 6, see

also pp. 139-161 and 217-238; Hammer and Champy, Reengineering

the Corporation, pp. 50-101; Toffler, Powershift, pp. 180-189.

26. Drucker, Post-Capitalist Society, pp. 68-74, especially

pp. 83-109 and The New Realities, pp. 207-231; Davidow and

Malone, The Virtual Corporation, pp. 167-174 and 184-216;

Toffler, Powershift, pp. 204-232; and Tapscott and Caston,

Paradigm Shift, pp. 10-13.

27. Wheatley, Leadership and the New Science, pp. 75-99;

Toffler, Powershift, pp. 190-203.

28. Tapscott and Caston, Paradigm Shift, pp. 4-5.

29. Davidow and Malone, The Virtual Corporation, p. 89.

30. Hammer and Champy, Reengineering the Corporation, p. 51.

31. Toffler, The Third Wave, pp. 155-207 and 349-361.

32. Davidow and Malone, The Virtual Corporation, pp. 4, 3-7,

24, 42, 49, 107, 137, 141, 157-158, 162, 219, and 222.

33. Toffler, The Third Wave, p. 184; Davidow and Malone, The

Virtual Corporation, pp. 219-221, 223-229, and 235-238.

34. Naisbitt, Megatrends, pp. 19-25. The author describes
the three stages of technology: first, application of technology

in ways least threatening to existing organizational norms;

second, using technology to improve what we already have; last,

new directions. He then goes on to argue that we are in the last

stage of technological innovation--the most threatening, yet the

most productive and innovative stage.

35. Alvin and Heidi Toffler, War and Anti-War, pp. 18-25;

Davidow and Malone, The Virtual Corporation, p. 12.

36. Alvin and Heidi Toffler, War and Anti-War, pp. 9-12 and

44-56.

37. Lieutenant General Frederic J. Brown, The U.S. Army in

Transition II, New York: Brassey's (US), Inc., 1993, esp. pp.

ix-17 and 160-165.

38. General Gordon R. Sullivan and Lieutenant Colonel James

M. Dubik, Land Warfare in the 21st Century, Carlisle Barracks,

PA: Strategic Studies Institute, February 1993, esp. pp. 12-25.

39. Martin van Creveld, The Transformation of War, New York:

The Free Press, 1991, pp. 192-227; Alvin and Heidi Toffler, War

and Anti-War, pp. 81-85.

40. For a more complete description of the technological

changes and trends already at work in land combat, see Sullivan

and Dubik, Land Warfare in the 21st Century, esp. pp. 12-25.

41. Davidow and Malone, The Virtual Corporation, pp. 67-72.

42. Brown, The U.S. Army in Transition II, pp. 99-106,

116-124, and 137-144.
U.S. ARMY WAR COLLEGE

Major General William A. Stofft

Commandant

*****

STRATEGIC STUDIES INSTITUTE

Director

Colonel John W. Mountcastle

Director of Research

Dr. Earl H. Tilford, Jr.

Authors

General Gordon R. Sullivan

Colonel James M. Dubik

Editor

Mrs. Marianne P. Cowling

Secretary

Ms. Rita A. Rummel

*****

Composition

Mr. Daniel B. Barnett

Cover Design

Mr. James E. Kistler