Military Review English Edition January-February 2017 | Page 34

of Iraq was militarily valid but strategically invalid , because the assumptions undergirding the policy direction to the war proved false .
Organizational learning . The third dimension is organizational learning . The process of designing a deliberate war plan should generate insights and innovation that otherwise would not emerge . President Dwight D . Eisenhower characterized the value of learning through the medium of planning in a quote that is often invoked in the contemporary American prewar planning community : “ Plans are useless but planning is indispensable .” 17 Approached from this perspective , deliberate war planning can add value by facilitating individual and organizational understanding of complex problems . 18 Organizational learning as a dimension of war planning utility is measured by observing the number of doctrinal changes and professional journal articles published because of the planners ’ insights and innovation .
Organizational networking . The fourth dimension is organizational networking . Deliberate war planning should breach organizational stovepipes and connect communities of interest . Organizational networking is measured by observing the formation of networks ( at all levels ) that would not have otherwise occurred had the planning effort not taken place . Additionally , experience should validate that such networks proved to be invaluable in a crisis .
Unfortunately , in some cases , organizational networking is inhibited when deliberate war planning becomes exclusionary because of formal security compartmentalization , informal information sharing barriers , or even restrictions established by the chain of command . Exclusivity is sometimes necessary because of operational and political sensitivities , though it reduces the effectiveness of organizational networking .
Resourcing influence . The fifth dimension is resourcing influence . Effective deliberate war plans should influence the military ’ s investments in technology , equipment , organizational restructuring , and overseas basing posture . Resourcing influence is measured by observing changes in military resource allocations that resulted from the plans .
Flexibility . The sixth dimension is flexibility . War plans should offer a range of options , thereby providing a wide enough range of planning latitude to effectively adapt to unpredicted situations . 19 Flexibility is measured by determining the number of potential adversary actions that the plan anticipates as well as the number of options it provides for the U . S . military commander to deal with such actions .
Clarity . The seventh dimension is clarity . War plans should articulate an operational approach that is clear to multiple different organizations and users , thus increasing the possibility of unity of effort and lowering the probabilities of miscalculation and miscommunication . 20 Clarity is measured by observing accurate cognition by operational planners in a crisis and service planners in steady-state readiness generation .
Note that the last two dimensions , clarity and flexibility , are inversely related . How to manage this tradeoff is a pervasive question being grappled with by contemporary practitioners and thus must be accounted for in any useful model . In doing so , Albert Einstein ’ s advice is instructive : “ Everything should be made as simple as possible , but no simpler .” 21
Military planning doctrine accounts for aspects of these seven dimensions ( see the footnoted references ). But their articulation as separate analytic concepts is insufficient . Elaboration of the dimensions into a theoretical framework is the contribution sought here . To be sure , this theoretical framework is not a panacea , but there is plenty of room for incremental improvement , as we have seen .
Further research is needed to validate the theoretical framework , potentially through its application to a series of case studies from U . S . military deliberate planning experience . Case studies would ideally include the definitive U . S . military deliberate war planning efforts : Plan Orange , 1924 – 1941 ; the General Defense of Western Europe , 1945 – 1989 ; and Plan 1002 / 1003 , 1991 – 2003 . 22 Ultimately , this research will equip future practitioners with a framework to overcome the tensions that will otherwise pervade the process and generate greater satisfaction at all levels .
Conclusion
While deliberate war planning has real benefits , the environment in which it is carried out today is riven with competing tensions that at best impair its effectiveness and at worst render it irrelevant . This outcome is , perhaps , inevitable . The way to improve the benefits of deliberate planning is not to tinker with the process . The process brings all the relevant parties together . What is needed is a way to improve the outcomes of the process .
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MILITARY REVIEW