Talk:Operational level of war

message: What would people think of a name change to 'operational level of war' which I believe would capture the concept better? Thoughts invited. Buckshot06(prof) 13:03, 23 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd agree with that, the current title is highly misleading, the problem is that there isn't (in English) a single work like strategy or tactics that can be used.  I'd also suggest that the assertion that the operational level of war originated in Germany is a tad contentious.  IIRC Simkin pointed out that the main reason for Germany's defeat by the USSR was because the German general staff didn't understand operational art, the Soviet STAVKA and generals did, ie the Germans were out-generalled, I realise this isn't a popular view in some circles that worship at a particular shrine.Nfe (talk) 02:09, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

text: Done. I've found no reliable sources to back up "opertional mobility" as a better established concept, or a more common term, than "operational level of war". I've further checked that the latter yields a lot more Google Books hits, as of now, than "operational art" and "operational warfare", two more candidate names backed by sources. --Kubanczyk (talk) 13:12, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rename from "Operational mobility" to "Operational level of war" 

message: This article seems to conflate operational level of war (art) vs operational mobility. I plan to rework using Robinson with a focus on operational art. Please let me know of any concerns. K.e.coffman (talk) 18:39, 3 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: Parking uncited / off-topic material here in case anyone wants to use it. K.e.coffman (talk) 18:21, 5 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text:  My concern is that the "off-topic" material you parked here is much, much closer to what the other articles linking to this one expect the primary topic to be: an explanation of what operational warfare is, how it has developed over the last century, and what it looks like when put into practice. (It is uncited though.) Now we have a shiny new article about the cognitive approaches required to conduct operational warfare, but is that what we need? -165.234.252.11 (talk) 20:37, 8 December 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Operational level of war vs operational mobility 

message: Although the vast majority of English language militaries call it 'operational level', there is no ‘operational level’ of warfare despite English language militaries repeatedly stating so. 
A ‘level’ uniquely describes an altitude. 
Even where 'opearational' is used to refer to the military planning proces, it is in no way a 'level', being conducted at a given command echelon to achieve perception of the threat and ways/means of dealing with it. 'Echelon form 1796, echellon, "step-like arrangement of troops," from French échelon "level, echelon," literally "rung of a ladder," from Old French eschelon, from eschiele "ladder," from Late Latin scala "stair, slope," from Latin scalae (plural) "ladder, steps," Sense of "level, subdivision" is from World War I. But of course ladders that pertain to levels are not relevant in references to location of military decision makers, with military planning often undertaken physically below ground level :-)!
The etymology of ‘operational’ is from Latin operationem (nominative operatio) "a working, operation," from past participle stem of operari "to work, labor" (in Late Latin "to have effect, be active, cause"), from opera "work, effort," related to opus (genitive operis) "a work". The surgical sense is first attested 1590s. Military sense of "series of movements and acts" is from 1749. The principal sense of the ‘operational’ (adj.) is from 1922, "pertaining to operation," from operation + -al. Meaning "in a state of functionality" is from 1944. 
Based on th eabove, the unique military sense meaning that ‘operational’ ought to be given is in association with the verb reach, ‘stretch out an arm in a specified direction in order to touch or grasp something’, that something being the enemy. Operational Reach (OR) is - that work, performed to actively cause a functional (the quality of being suited to serve a purpose well) effect. For the most part what operational planning has involved since the Napoleonic Wars is the transitioning of forces from strategic depth (usually bases) to the tactical area of combat (AO). In this OR replaced the 19th century 'grand-tactical movement', i.e. that movement ocurring outside the immediate battlefield and reach of enemy artillery or cavalry.Crock81 (talk) 00:11, 7 August 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: All this reasoning has very little to do with how we name articles in WP; that's covered in WP:COMMONNAME.  If we find a good number of WP:RS that use "Operational Reach", and few that use "Operational level", then we rename it.  Otherwise, we cannot.  --A D Monroe III (talk) 21:29, 8 August 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rename 'operational level of war' to Operational Reach 

message: I removed the tags -- the prose seems clear enough; pls see diff. I also removed the "quotation needed" tag -- the text is in public domain, and this is what appears in the article. K.e.coffman (talk) 01:31, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Recent edit 

message: The section about WW2 only lists a brief paragraph about how Nazi Germany mostly failed to be aware of the operational level. Since the lede implies the operational level of warfare owes its nomenclature to the Soviets, who did apply it in WW2, why don't we put the focus on Soviet examples? Focusing on the army which didn't apply this art and not even mention the army who mastered it seems odd. The andf (talk) 23:37, 15 June 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unwarranted focus on WW2 Germany