“That which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts;
Made weak by time and fate;
To
strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield”.
Ulysses,
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Alphen, Netherlands. 31
October, 2019. Transformative change is coming, and the Alliance had better be prepared. In my forthcoming book, Future
War and the Defence of Europe, which will be brilliant and very
reasonably-priced, I suggest that multi-domain warfare reaches across air, sea,
land, cyber, space, information and knowledge. Last week, I had the honour of
addressing senior Allied and Partner officers at the excellent NATO Defence
College in Rome. Founded by the then Supreme Allied Commander, General Dwight
D. Eisenhower, the mission of the College is to provide to NATO officers two of
the most important strategic enablers – knowledge and understanding.
Writing my latest book I
have been struck by the vital importance knowledge and understanding at all
levels of command will have in the maintenance of deterrence, the conduct of
defence and, if needs be, the fighting of future war. Knowledge and
understanding will be vital to block and mitigate adversaries’ planned exploitation
the digital fog of future war. Indeed, isolating command from its force and
effects, and leaders from led, will be a primary aim of the future enemy
warfighter.
This challenge got me
thinking. If, as many at the higher echelons of NATO believe, the Alliance is
moving fast into multi-domain future war, surely the place and role of all strategic
enablers should be afforded equal importance in NATO’s changing, informal, and
real, strategic concept, and more particularly in its military strategy. After all, Allied Command Operations (ACO)
covers the ‘doing’ stuff, and Allied Command Transformation (ACT) drives force
transformation and development. And, whilst I accept that transformation also
includes a role in command mindset-change, I am not sure ACT should, or could, affect
the kind of knowledge-change mindset-change NATO forces will need to deal with
a future war emergency. Such change will
be critical if the Alliance is to successfully and really adapt to credible future
deterrence and defence against what the US Strategic Technology Office calls ‘mosaic
warfare’.
The essential ‘thing’
about the NATO Defence College is that it is not a stand-alone institution. It
supports and enables security and defence colleges across the Alliance by
promoting best-practice models of education and research – how to know and what
to know given the mission. If the
College is to further adapt it must also build on its efforts to exploit the
digital domain through distance and e-learning, and by promoting a life-long
professional military education culture that will be critical to future success
at every level of mission command. More is needed. NDC should be given far more
tools so that it can partner ACT and ‘transform’ education and training to
drive forward ‘the cohesion, effectiveness, and readiness of multinational
formations’.
The College adds real
value to the Alliance mission, which is why, each year, I go there with enthusiasm.
I believe in the mission. It is certainly not for the money. What they offer, to my mind, is already at
the cutting edge of professional military education. Still, as a former member
of the NDC Academic Advisory Board I am also convinced they could offer so much. If critical cohesion is to be afforded Alliance
forces in an age of pan-spectrum digital fires what is needed is a range of
best-practice education and knowledge ‘products’ from junior to senior levels
of command, including simulation and table-top exercising, and which can be
offered to all NATO nations. The NATO
Defence College is the place to develop and provide such ‘products’ precisely because
it has the legitimacy and, with the support of the Chairman of the NATO
Military Committee, because it can.
Is there a problem? No.
However, there is a possible confusion of roles in adaptation between transformation
and education. The danger is that Allied Command Transformation might see
education and knowledge as a sub-set of military transformation. They are not. They
are, at the very least, the equals of transformation for without knowledge
transformation military transformation can neither be generated, nor enacted.
Therefore, I have a
simple suggestion: turn the NATO Defence College into Allied Command Education,
arm it with a strategic education and knowledge mission, and promote the commandant
of the NATO Defence College to Supreme Allied Commander, Education. Such a step
would be both transformative, adaptive and exploit a critical Allied
comparative advantage – its people.
To paraphrase Tennyson:
that which we are can be improved; to equal understanding in heroic hearts;
made strong by knowing and commanding our fate; to strive, to seek, to find, to
know, so that we never have to yield.
Julian Lindley-French
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