The Ancient Art of Modern Warfare

Can strategic bombing of cities ever be justified? In the previous episode of this podcast series (E126), Col. Altieri said that the air force always considers itself revolutionary. Before I began recording, he cited strategic bombing in World War Two as both revolutionary and consistent with Clausewitz’s concept of making things so painful that the enemy will not continue to resist. I responded, saying that strategic bombing of the civilian population was a war crime and violates Just War criteria. Afterwards, I thought my response might have been hasty. In this episode, I re-look the idea of strategic bombardment, not as we might see it today, but as it was believed during WWII. In any examination of history, we need to see things as they were understood by those making decisions at that time, not from our current perspective.

 

Music: Holst, G. The Planets: Mars Bringer of War, downloaded from Internet Archive

The philosopher of war, Carl von Clausewitz, described three legs that support the architecture of war: Primordial violence, the play of chance, and reason. Clausewitz aligned the element of chance the military. Every revolution brings unintended consequences -- the free play of chance. A revolution in military affairs, therefore, means exponential chance to affect the other legs of that trinity. Did the predicted revolution in military affairs come about? Are we at the threshold of one? Is that a good thing or an unacceptable risk that must be avoided? Can we avoid it? Colonels Jayson Altieri and Robert Waring, US Army Retired and instructors in our War Colleges, join me to discuss some of these questions. This is longer than my recent podcasts, but I think it will be worth your time.

 

Music:

Liszt, F., and the USMC Band, Les Preludes. Public Domain

Beatles, Revolution (1968). (Unpublished take) Downloaded from Internet Archives, Identifier# 680904f-revolution-take-1 (Fair use for education)

The inevitable never happens. It is the unexpected always.

-- J.M. Keynes 1938

 

Almost everyone plays with predicting the future. Persons who speak with presumed authority and say that some outlandish thing is inevitable often get a lot of media attention. The more media attention, the more people come to think that the outlandish thing really is inevitable. In warfare, I have lived through the inevitability of guerilla warfare as the model for all future warfare; the inevitable demise armored warfare, the transformation of maneuver warfare; counter-insurgency warfare as the inevitable future war form; and more recently, that drones will so dominate the battlefield, that all previous forms of warfighting will be obsolete. In my opinion, inevitability has a rather bad track record. From time to time in these podcasts, I will revisit some of these predictions and see which of these were inevitable and which were overcome by reality.

 

The information in these podcasts is solely my own opinion and do not represent the position of the U.S. Department of Defense, or any other organization I am or have ever been associated with.

 

Certified 100% natural intelligence. No artificial intelligence was used in making this podcast.

 

References:

Pournelle, J., The Mercenary, (1977, republished 1986, ISBN 9780671655945)

Recompiled with other works of the series and published as:

Pournelle, J. and Stirling, M., The Prince (2002) (ISBN 0-7434-3556-7)

Heinlein, R., Starship Troopers, (1959) ISBN 978-0450044496

Music: Kiilstofte, P. Mercenaries, Machinamasound (Licensed)

The idea that we would invade Greenland is about the stupidest idea I ever heard. I find it difficult to believe that anyone believed that implying the United States might use military force was anything other than a negotiating tactic. An ill-advised negotiating tactic, but still, nothing more than that. Putting aside the fear and anger generated from different sources there are concerns and questions to be addressed, particularly as Greenland continues to move on its path to independence from Denmark.

 

Outside References:

The United States and Greenland, Part I: Episodes in Nuclear History 1947-1968 https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/nuclear-vault/2025-06-03/united-states-and-greenland-part-i-episodes-nuclear-history

Trump is Right About Greenland – Wrong about How to Secure It: https://www.justsecurity.org/128707/trump-right-greenland-wrong-secure/

 

Music:

Traditional, The Army Strings, Garryowen (Public Domain)

Recently, there has been controversy over public statements from some politicians about the responsibility of members of the armed forces to disobey unlawful orders. In theory, there should be nothing objectionable about that. Members of the armed forces, from the lowest enlisted to the highest general or admiral, receive regular instruction on the laws and customs of war and our responsibilities under the Constitution. In this episode, I describe what that means and where the responsibility to promptly and effectively execute orders ends.

Music Credits:

Wagner, R. and the USMC Band, Siegfried’s Funeral (Public Domain)

Hagman, R., Main Theme from “She Wore a Yellow Ribbon,” from The Wild West - The Essential Western Film Music Collection, (Fair use for educational purposes.)

Kiilstofte, J., The Cavalry, Machinamasound (Licensed)