Military Review English Edition July-August 2014 | Page 5

Contents July-August 2014 Volume 94 ◆ Number 4 28 Hurtling Toward Failure Complexity in Army Operations Maj. Donald L. Kingston Jr., U.S. Army The crash of Air France Flight 447 illustrates how the increased complexity of information systems and our reliance on them increase the risk of catastrophic mission failure. 33 Sustaining the Army National Guard as an Operational Force Col. Thomas M. Zubik, U.S. Army Reserve, Col. Paul C. Hastings, U.S. Army National Guard, Retired, and Col. Michael J. Glisson, U.S. Army National Guard Three officers assert the need for the Army National Guard to maintain its designation as an operational force and provide guidance on how to get it done. 44 The Defense Entrepreneurs Forum Developing a Culture of Innovation Lt. Col. Curtis D. Taylor, U.S. Army, and Maj. Nathan K. Finney, U.S. Army To foster a culture of innovation, the Army needs a means for lower-ranking personnel to connect with one another to refine and incubate their ideas, and a forum to discuss them. The Defense Entrepreneurs Forum can provide that mechanism. 50 War as Political Work Using Social Science for Strategic Success Matthew J. Schmidt, Ph.D. Army culture favors a quantitative/predictive approach to analyze problems. The author argues, however, that strategic thinking requires the relative subjectivity of a qualitative approach to problem solving. 58 Army Experimentation 58 Developing the Army of the Future— Army 2020 Van Brewer, Ph.D., and Capt. Michala Smith, U.S. Navy, Retired The authors discuss how Army experimentation helps to validate emerging concepts and accurately predict the effect of future force structures and force reductions in real-world scenarios. 3