Strategic goal ( military ) A strategic military goal is used in strategic planning to define desired end - state of a war or a campaign . Usually it entails either a strategic change in enemy ' s military posture , intentions or ongoing operations , or achieving a strategic victory over the enemy that ends the conflict , although the goal can be set in terms of diplomatic or economic conditions , defined by purely territorial gain s , or the evidence that the enemy ' s will to fight has been broken . Sometimes the strategic goal can be to limit the scope of the conflict . It is the highest level of organisational achievement in a military organisation , and is usually defined by the national defence policy . In terms of goal assignment it corresponds to operations performed by a front or a fleet on a theatre scale , and by an Army group or , during the Second World War , by a Red Army Front . A strategic goal is achieved by reaching specific strategic objective s that represent intermediary and incremental advance s within the overall strategic plan . This is necessary because " high - level " strategic goals are often abstract , and therefore difficult to assess in terms of achievement without referring to some specific , often physical objectives . However , aside from the obstacles used by the enemy to prevent achievement of the strategic goal , inappropriate technological capabilities and operational weakness in combat may prevent fulfilment of the strategic plan . As an example , these are illustrated by the failure of the Royal Air Force ' s Bomber Command during the winter of 1943 / 44 . A critical product of the analysis which leads to the strategic decision to use military force is determination of the national goal to be achieved by that application of force . However , analysis of military history abounds with examples of the two factors that plague goal setting in military strategies , their change during the campaign or war due to changes in economic , political or social changes within the state , or in a change of how achievement of existing goal is being assessed , and the criteria of its achievement . For example , The complex and varied nature of the Vietnam War made it especially difficult to translate abstract , strategic goals into specific missions for individual organizations . This occurred because aside from the economic change that saw cost of war escalate beyond original predictions , and the change in political leadership was no longer willing to commit to the conduct of war , but also to the radical change which the United States society experienced during the war , and more importantly because The American strategic goal was not the destruction of an organized military machine armed with tanks , planes , helicopters , and war ships , for which the United States had prepared , but the preservation of a fragile regime from the lightly armed attacks of both its own people and the North Vietnamese . The United States did not intend to conquer North Vietnam for fear of a Chinese or Soviet military reaction . Likewise , the United States strategically assumed that the full extent of its power was not merited in Vietnam .