Project White Horse Forum » Adaptive Leadership

Unconventional Response: Steve Jobs, The Crazy Ones

Ed Beakley — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 16:04:58 +0000

Day is Done – September 11th 2011

Ed Beakley — Mon, 12 Sep 2011 14:20:47 +0000

As the day closed on September 11 2001, we began the process of "doing what we know"- we had been attacked – strangely suprising to some in other lands, Americans strike back hard when treaded upon – so we went to war in the way we know how. The events of September 11, 2001 were of such magnitude, shock and so far outside the norm of how we perceived warfare, and our whole intelligence process was so much still Cold War mind set, we didn't "know what to do" ...really. We attacked, we fought, we used B-52s and smart bombs with special forces guys doing the targeting and riding with Afghans on horses. We learned, but we were still doing what we know not knowing what to do.

After the invasion of Iraq, that became apparent - who exactly were we fighting, how many groups, were they connected? We learned, the hard way. Army General Petraeus and Marine General Mattis rewrote the counterinsurgency manual – many had long fought even using the term insurgency. Americans fought, Americans died, some learned. But it has been a tough think. What kind of war have we been fighting: guerrilla warfare, non conventional, unconventional, fourth generation, irregular? Is the answer counterinsurgency, counterterrorism, what? The debate on whether what applied in Iraq applies in Afghanistan still ebbs and flows – below the surface for most Americans.

It's gets hard when the protagonist stop wearing blue and red uniforms to understand the true nature of warfare. Yet, old principles still abide, Clausewitz's trinity does indeed still hold:

primordial violence, hatred, and enmity, which are to be regarded as a blind natural force;

the play of chance and probability within which the creative spirit is free to roam;

element of subordination, as an instrument of policy, which makes it subject to reason...."

(This set of elements is usually labeled "emotion/chance/reason"; sometimes "violence/chance & probability/rational calculation"; or, even more abstractly, "irrationality/nonrationality/rationality.")

So questions still persist; Are we better off ten years later, have we gained the imagination so lacking pre 9-11, are our leaders really prepared to make the decisions necessary in a world so ill defined, indeed, are we capable of knowing what to do rather than doing what we know?

Like most Americans over the past week I've searched the blogs, read the opinion pieces, the stories of the folks most directly involved, watched hours of commentators and ceremonies and dedications. I've searched and struggled to find words for this blog, given the focus on decision making in severe crisis.

Below are three articles and links to the originals that surround the idea of learning and focusing so that we as a people – top to bottom – can know what to do. They are well worth your time.

One introductory comment, then the rest stand on their own needing no help from me. The first article is about Rick Rescorla. His story has been featured here before. (See Sheepdog of Morgan Stanley) He may be the only person who knew what to do on September 11 2001. Learning from the first WTC attack, he prepared those at Morgan Stanley for what he was sure would be another attack. Ignoring Port Authority notice to remain in place after the attacks, he evacuated Morgan Stanley employees. Were it not for him, the losses at the twin towers would have been not 2800 but 5300.

Knowing what to do is possible – it takes constant learning and the will to stay the course. Day is done, what next?

Rick Rescorla, Hero: Vietnam to 9/11

By: Bud Alley Date: September 11 , 2011

Late Sunday, June 1st, 2001, my wife, Caroline and I pulled into the front of Rick and Susan Rescorla's condo. In keeping with his ebullient personality, Rick had hung his signature First Cavalry jacket on the porch light. Always larger than life, he bounded down the steps with a welcoming smile and bear hug.

He was that kind of guy, absolutely fearless and totally selfless.

A singer of songs in the face of the enemy, he calmed his men on Landing Zone X-ray as they awaited a North Vietnamese attack at dawn–and later after the attacks of 9/11.

That was Rick. Big guy–must have been over 6'2", Bunyanesque in life. He was a hero to all of us, fellow lieutenants and enlisted.

In Vietnam, while serving with the 2nd Battalion 7th Cavalry in 1965, he invented what became officially known as the LURP team. And later, he was featured on the cover of We Were Soldiers Once…and Young.

In later years, I got to know Rick as a man of insatiable scholarly curiosity and intellect as well as a father.

We occasionally exchanged small tokens like knives or articles with one another. All who knew him were amazed at his generosity. As we left following dinner that June night, Rick handed me something in an expensive cloth bag. He knew I had spent my career in the box business. He said, "Look at it later."

Ten years ago on September 11th, at about 6:30 pm, I made the hardest phone call I ever made in my life–to Rick Rescorla's wife Susan.

I hoped against hope that he had not gone to work that day in the World Trade Center. I hoped he and Susan had taken the opportunity to enjoy one of their day trips to the Jersey countryside. But somehow deep down inside, I knew I had lost a friend.

Inside that bag he had given me that June was a beautiful wooden box, the kind you keep on your dresser, with your watches, your precious jewelry, and your memories. His box is still on my dresser and not a day goes by that I don't thank God for the privilege of counting Rick Rescorla as a friend.

Later that winter, I visited Susan and she took me to the Raptor Center to show me the living memorials she had endowed in Rick's memory. There were two American Bald Eagles that had been rescued from injury. How perfect and magnificent they were–sitting proudly on their perches, so like Rick. Survivors. Poised. Erect. Unbroken. The message in their eyes: "We Will Never Surrender."

Rick, head of security for Morgan Stanley, managed to evacuate the 2500 employees of the South Tower on 911. There are photos of him singing to calm the evacuees. Rick was last seen climbing back up the stairs to make a final sweep before the building collapsed.

Rick's physical remains have never been recovered but his spirit will never die.

His statue is now permanently placed on the grounds of the National Infantry Museum along with a piece of steel from the building.

Ten years ago a petition began to circulate calling for him to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom. It went viral and garnered thousands of names. Conversations with the White House staff were held, but nothing ever came of it. Now, as we pause to recall those who stood up on 911, there is a pall cast by the lack of recognition of Rick's valorous sacrifice.

Those of us who knew Rick and served with him in combat are still trying to see that he gets the national recognition he deserves. He has been honored in his native England, his hometown of Cornwall, and by his friends who contributed to the Columbus Georgia memorial.

The man who saved more people on one day by his actions has not been awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

If he had been fighting on foreign soil, he would have received the Congressional Medal of Honor. Damn shame ten years later, our leaders have not honored this immigrant citizen who so magnified our American values.

CP Note: *Watch "Voice of the Prophet," an interview with Rick Rescorla, done with Robert H. "Bob" Edwards' son Robert Edwards, who fought at Ia Drang with Rick. In the interview, Rick all but predicts the attacks of 9/11.

The Nine Eleven Century?

By Mark Safranski at ZENPUNDIT

Ten years ago to this day, almost to the hour of which I am writing, commercial jetliners were highjacked by al Qaida teams armed with boxcutters, under the direction of Mohammed Atta, were flown into the towers of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. A fourth plane, United Airlines Flight 93, believed to be headed to the US Capitol building, crashed in Pennsylvania when passengers led by Todd Beamer heroically attempted to stop the highjackers. The whole world watched – most with horror but some with public glee - on live television as people jumped out of smoke-engulfed windows, holding hands, to their deaths. Then, the towers fell.

From this day flowed terrible consequences that are still unfolding like the rippling shockwave of a bomb.

We look back, sometimes on the History Channel or some other educational program, at the grainy, too fast moving, sepia motion pictures of the start of World War I. The crowds wildly cheered troops with strangely antiquarian uniforms that looked reminiscent of Napoleon's day, march proudly off to the war that gave Europe the Somme, Gallipoli, Passchendaele and Verdun. And the Russian Revolution.

After the armistice, the victors had a brief chance to reset the geopolitical, strategic and economic patterns the war had wrought and in which they were enmeshed. The statesmen could not rise to that occasion, failing so badly that it was understood even at the time, by John Maynard Keynes and many others, that things were being made worse. World War I. became the historical template for the short but infinitely bloody 20th century of 1914-1991, which historians in future centuries may simply describe as "the long war" or a "civil war of western civilization".

There is a serious danger, in my view, of September 11 becoming such a template for the 21st century and for the United States.

On the tenth anniversary of 9/11, as we remember the fallen and the many members of the armed services of the United States who have served for ten years of war, heroically, at great sacrifice and seldom with complaint, we also need to recall that we should not move through history as sleepwalkers. We owe it to our veterans and to ourselves not to continue to blindly walk the path of the trajectory of 9/11, but to pause and reflect on what changes in the last ten years have been for the good and which require reassessment. Or repeal. To reassert ourselves, as Americans, as masters of our own destiny rather than reacting blindly to events while carelessly ceding more and more control over our lives and our livelihoods to the whims of others and a theatric quest for perfect security. America needs to regain the initiative, remember our strengths and do a much better job of minding the store at home.

The next ninety years being molded by the last ten is not a future I care to leave to my children. I can think of no better way to honor the dead and refute the current sense of decline than for America to collectively step back from immersion in moment by moment events and start to chart a course for the long term.

Pull out the chocks. Let's roll

Posted on 10 Sep 2011 by Starbuck

Say what you will about the messenger, but "Courtney" was right. September 11th was a watershed event for an entire generation of Americans; one which would dominate their worldview for much of their adult lives.

Sure, some might scoff at the jubilant crowds gathered around the White House after news leaked of Osama bin Laden's demise at the hands of US Navy SEALs. But while September 11th may not have been as militarily significant as, say, Pearl Harbor, it was no less visceral: New York and Washington weren't mere US territories thousands of miles from the shores of the US, as was Hawaii in 1941. The Pentagon and World Trade Center were fixtures in the lives of everyday Americans; and in the 21st Century, live footage of the conflagration could be piped into every home in America in vivid color. And though only a tiny portion of America would serve in uniform in the decade to come, the effects of the attacks would permeate nearly every aspect of our lives: the economic downturn, terror alerts, airline security, even the ubiquitous news ticker, now a staple on nearly every cable news station.

But above all, there was the culture of fear.

Osama bin Laden, for all of his malfeasance, certainly didn't pose the same existential threat to the United States as Imperial Japan, Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union. Yet, his escape from the wrath of the US military, and his wraith-like presence for nearly a decade gave him the allure of a boogeyman. And, like many boogeymen, simply whispering "Osama bin Laden" or "9/11? could frighten and cajole Americans into rash and irrevocable actions: torture at Guantanamo, the invasion of Iraq, and trillions sunk into wasteful security programs.

Yet, for all our mistakes, al-Qaeda erred even greater.

The invasion of Iraq might have been a massive recruiting boon for al Qaeda and its Iraqi affiliate, but by the end of 2006, the organization had overplayed its hand. Local sheiks, and even former al-Qaeda members eventually joined US forces in a counter-offensive against al-Qaeda in Iraq, having been sickened by the violence unleashed by Zarqawi and his minions. The movement, dubbed "The Awakening", was seen by many as a turning point in the war in Anbar Province.

Meanwhile, in Pakistan, remotely-piloted drones pounded away at the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, keeping senior al-Qaeda figures at bay. Finally, the organization was dealt a deadly blow when US Navy SEALs mounted a spectacular raid into a compound in Abbotabad, Pakistan, killing the former al-Qaeda leader who had spent nearly a decade presumably under house arrest, under the watchful eye of the Pakistani government. Months later, a fierce drone campaign picked off al-Qaeda's number two operative.

And though US officials are rightly cautious over alleged terror plots timed to coincide with the tenth anniversary of 9/11, they're nowhere near the size or scope of 9/11.

Reduced to underwear bombs, al-Qaeda is a mere shell of its former self.

But though we may have crippled al-Qaeda, we've been weakened, too. Thousands of American troops have been killed in wars abroad, and tens of thousands more have been horribly wounded. Our national debt has surpassed fourteen trillion dollars–roughly our yearly Gross Domestic Product. Unemployment is rampant, and our collective confidence is shattered. Our public image has been bruised, and partisan rancor cuts so deeply that we cannot even agree upon a decent memorial to commemorate the victims of 9/11, even ten years later.

As a nation we can be shallow, petty, and selfish. But deep down, we can learn to sacrifice and cooperate.

Shortly after the attacks of September 11th, our rallying cry was "Let's roll": a call not just to punish the perpetrators of this odious act–rightly so–but also to rebuild.

Ten years later, it's time to start rebuilding. For nearly a decade, our national wheels have been chocked with pernicious emnity and fear mongering. It's time to finally pull out the chocks and roll.

Essential Element of Information for a Culture of Preparedness: They called him “Coach”

Ed Beakley — Sat, 05 Jun 2010 18:29:10 +0000

If one is to discuss leadership, what it requires to "decide and act" in severe crisis, the journey should start here.

A real love for the hard battle, knowing it offers the opportunity to be at your best when the best is required.

Competiveness: John R Wooden

More reading about Coach Wooden and his "pyramid of success:"

The Official John R. Wooden site

Biography at Wikipedia

Pyramid of Sucess (PDF printable)

and finally

"Failing to prepare is preparing to fail" in his own words follow the "Favorite maxims" tab to "never stress winning"

Teams of Leaders: Stand-up of The Center for Collaborative Leadership in Healthcare

Ed Beakley — Fri, 07 May 2010 04:04:20 +0000

This is an Essential Element of Information for a Culture of Preparedness post

The Teams of Leaders (Tol) concept introduced in the book America's Army; A Model for Interagency Effectiveness by retired Army Generals Frederic Brown and Zeb Bradford has been a point of discussion and thread through many articles and posts on both this blog and the main "e-zine" website. (See Edition 7 in the Archives for links to the primary articles). Now through hard work by PWH advisor and author of many of the articles discussing TOL in a homeland security context, Dag von Lubitz, along with leaders at Central Michigan University and the University of Western Ontario, The Center for Collaborative Leadership in Healthcare is underway with a new website defining their mission, capabilities, and future plans.

As a refresher, from the site introduction,

Teams of Leaders (ToL) is an approach for rapidly building and effectively employing cross-boundary teams that are highly competent in making and executing decisions and in learning and adapting together. The ToL approach helps the leader-teams to gain a common understanding of the situation and requirements, develop shared purpose, trust and confidence, and reach a higher level of performance faster. Cross-boundary teams today consist of leaders from different organizations brought together to leverage the expertise, experience, and resources of their entire organization.

The mission of the Center is three-fold: to explore, educate, and provide expertise on all issues related to collaborative, ToL-based leadership nationally, internationally, and globally under conditions of day-to-day routine operations, and on demand whenever and wherever services of the Center shall be required.

The Scientific Director is Dr. Dag von Lubitz, Adjunct Research Professor, College of Health Professions, Central Michigan University. Leadership from Central Michigan University is Dr. Steven Berkshire. Director, Doctor of Health Administration Program, College of Health Professions, Central Michigan University; and from The University of Western Ontario, Dr. Candace Gibson, Associate Professor, Department of Pathology, Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry.

As discussed in the current PWH e-zine edition on implementation of TOL in EUCOM, ToL policies, programs and practices are equally applicable across military or civil, governmental and nongovernmental organizations. Originally developed to serve in the military world of joint, inter-agency, inter-governmental, multinational JIIM teams it is exceptionally well suited for the same type of global activities executed by agencies and organizations of civilian corporations. This is the first formal translation in a non-military context.

In every sense, as defined, this is an important INTERSECTION.

EEI#30 Leadership – First follower

Ed Beakley — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 16:43:37 +0000

Essential Elements of Information for a Culture of Preparedness

We continue to discuss the idea of "team of leaders." This video well worth your time. Thanks to John Robb at Global Guerrilllas. See his site for comments.

But let's take this one step further into the context of "What kind of war" determination as impacting how we approach "the war" once we have determined "what kind." Consider the comments from the Blog – Challenge COIN; Perspectives on the evolving U.S. Counterinsurgency and Counterterrorism doctrine. What works, what does not, and what we think we know: "COIN/CT Lessons from drug induced dancing."

... The main lesson to walk away with is how crucial it was to easily mimic the dance. Were this a difficult dance, the originator would have been nothing more than an observed solo performer. Also the role of the first follower made it acceptable for a few more people to join. Once the first follower's friends join in, the tipping point is then reached at 1:15. From then on, people join in groups and the originator or "leader" is irrelevant as the movement has a life of his own. Only the music ending stops everyone from dancing, not the "leader."

Now take that template and apply it to al Qaeda in Iraq. What sort of impact would killing or capturing the leadership have today? This is precisely why the classic insurgency texts emphasized the need to destroy an insurgency at its onset. Otherwise it becomes an integrated part of a society for at least a generation if not longer. So how do we end the al Qaeda-styled movements? Find the music and turn it off…

EEI#14 Return of the Jedi

Ed Beakley — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 16:47:53 +0000

Essential Elements of Information for a Culture of Preparedness

Prior to Desert Storm, Gen. Norman Schwartzkopf created a small cell of four majors and a colonel to act as his intimate "brain trust" to plan his campaign. The group became known as the "Jedi Knights." All were graduates of the School of Advanced Military Studies, essentially the Army staff college's second year honors program. The success of SAMS was emulated by other services and became the model for a similar program at the Army War College focused on strategic studies.
Success of the SAMS model provides a good template for an advanced learning program for specially selected strategic staff officers.

EEI #5 – "The Big Picture"- The Nexus Between Education and Grand Strategy - begins with (Mark Safranski at Zenpundit) questioning our educational preparedness to deal with 21st century problems.

Why would our societal orientation in complex, dynamic, fast moving situations be good when our educational system trains people only to think through simplified, linear, sequential problems? Strategic thinkers need to be able to see "the big picture" and handle uncertainty, or they cannot be said to be strategic thinkers.

From the beginning, a PWH continuing point of critical concern has been that our leaders – civil, military, and private sector had neither the experience nor education necessary and sufficient to match the problems presented, and were therefore un-prepared and "unready" on September 11, 2001, not only for the attacks themselves, but for either near term or long term critial policy, strategic or operational decision making in the wake of the attacks. With great hindsight (?) some now claim, the initial responses were the result of high level panic coupled with political motivation. Could it be that we responded in a tactical sense based on complete lack of understanding as to the nature of the problem and defaulted to what we knew – a 20th Century mix of two violent world wars and a fifty year Cold War?

As a second offering (for the first, see EEI#5) on a thread of "learning, unlearning, relearning," as an Essential Element of Information for a Culture of Preparedness, this post provides an excerpt from Armed Forces Journal by retired Army Major General Robert Scales. General Scales is a former commandant of the US Army War College, now president of Colgen Inc., a consulting firm specializing in land power, war gaming and strategic leadership, and is a graduate of West Point, with a PhD in History from Duke University He served more than 30 years in the Army, commanding two units in Vietnam.

As a major theme he notes "The complexities of recent wars suggest that the reforms that dictated jointness, while necessary, are no longer sufficient. Today's conflicts demand officers who can lead indirectly and perform in an uncertain, ambiguous, complex, chaotic and inherently unpredictable environment. Our educational system needs to produce more men and women who can anticipate conditions that do not yet exist. They must be capable of dealing with unfamiliar cultures and an enemy who is unconstrained by Western values and methods of warfare. To be sure, the services possess many talented, and indeed some brilliant, practitioners of the strategic art. But the demand for strategists is greater than the supply. Our system of professional military education produces too few officers capable of understanding and dealing with the complexities of war at the strategic level."

To that I would add/ask and is it not the same for all this country's leaders?

I highly recommend the full article at Armed Forces Journal, but here in part:

Return of the Jedi

MAJ. GEN. ROBERT H. SCALES (RET.)
It's that time again. About once a decade, the military services attempt to reform how they educate officers. This time, the catalyst is a series of Senate and House hearings on how well the services educate officers. The Defense Science Board will begin a study on military education reform soon. The defense intellectual blogosphere is electric with calls for reform. Other creative ideas for reform will follow in the coming days. And all will fail.

They will fail because the services will not be able to attract the brightest and groom them through proper schooling for positions of responsibility unless the intellectually gifted are rewarded with selection for promotion and command. Unless intellectual excellence is tied to the services' personnel systems, true reform is impossible. Only once in the past century have powers of reform overcome the cultural glue that binds together the services' systems of professional rewards. In the mid-1980s, Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., as part of the Goldwater-Nichols legislation, forced the services to learn how to operate efficiently – the essence of "jointness." Skelton's effort gained traction because of the failure of the services to fight together as a team during the invasion of Grenada in 1983. Skelton leveraged the law to hold the services' reward systems for promotion and command hostage to a meaningful commitment to jointness. To ensure that his reforms would last, Skelton legislated that staff and war colleges bring together student officers from all services to study joint as well as service-specific subjects.

The complexities of recent wars suggest that the reforms that dictated jointness, while necessary, are no longer sufficient. Today's conflicts demand officers who can lead indirectly and perform in an uncertain, ambiguous, complex, chaotic and inherently unpredictable environment. Our educational system needs to produce more men and women who can anticipate conditions that do not yet exist. They must be capable of dealing with unfamiliar cultures and an enemy who is unconstrained by Western values and methods of warfare. To be sure, the services possess many talented, and indeed some brilliant, practitioners of the strategic art. But the demand for strategists is greater than the supply. Our system of professional military education produces too few officers capable of understanding and dealing with the complexities of war at the strategic level.

We have too few of these officers because the services tend to accelerate the careers of officers who, early in their careers, show talent at the tactical level of war. Battalion, squadron and ship commanders habitually reward subordinates who mirror themselves. These subordinates tend to be officers who get things done, the go-to, can-do types who make their mark with managerial brilliance. The irony of the system is that the requirement for competence shifts from the tactical to the strategic at just the time in their careers when tactical officers leave command to move on to higher levels of responsibility at the colonel and flag level. As a result, too often we see skillful tacticians thrust into strategic staff jobs they are ill-prepared to perform.

HOW TO DEVELOP STRATEGIC THINKERS
We have met the archetype strategic warrior, and his name is David Petraeus. He is joined by a remarkably successful cadre of leaders who have demonstrated exceptional talent in the chaotic environments in Iraq and Afghanistan. Some names are familiar because they reached three or four stars: Chiarelli, Stavridis, Dempsey, Ward, Dubik, Eikenberry. Others are equally successful but less well known because of their lesser rank and profile. These are behind-the-scenes officers who have offered advice and insight to their flag officer bosses: Nagl, Yingling, McMaster and Mansoor, among a few others.

Most of these proven strategic thinkers share a remarkably common provenance. Very early in their careers they learned to think critically and communicate strategically by attending a government-financed graduate program at a top-tier civilian university. Later, most of them sharpened these skills by teaching at a service academy. They all share (along with fellow intellectual travelers such as Adm. Mike Mullen and Marine Gen. Jim Mattis) a lifelong obsession with reading history and studying the art of war. At some time in their careers, they ignored the caution of personnel officers about spending too much time in school while under scrutiny for command selection. Today, this is a critical period for upwardly mobile officers because those who are screened for command are on the fast track to flag rank. Those who don't command will not grasp the brass ring. The proclivities of service culture cannot be easily overcome. The reality is that educational reform hinges on the ability to create a path for the intellectually gifted to be promoted to flag rank. But the climate today tends to reward tactical rather than strategic excellence. This must change.

BEGIN AT THE TOP
Flag officers with highly developed strategic skills are needed principally in the key operations, planning, strategy and civil-military billets – a relatively small cohort that embraces conservatively about a sixth of flag and general officers from all services. Consider a reform scheme that establishes a Senior Strategist Program (SSP) that would identify key strategic appointments and fence them for officers educated in a program of demanding, selective advanced schooling and preparation. ... As in any profession, our young officers are ambitious and seek promotion. They will see that intellectual excellence has become a prized credential for promotion, and they will actively seek higher education and intellectual preparation as the surest means for achieving flag rank.

Promotion of these specially selected and accredited officers to flag rank would begin early in their careers … These officers would study the human and social sciences with particular emphasis on history, international relations, anthropology, economics, language and culture. Officer students would be expected to complete the course requirements for the Ph.D. A successful preliminary examination would waive the education and service requirements necessary to gain credit for joint service, thus leveling the career playing field by giving these officers the same amount of time to command as their conventionally educated peers.

CREATING JEDIS
Prior to Desert Storm, Gen. Norman Schwartzkopf created a small cell of four majors and a colonel to act as his intimate "brain trust" to plan his campaign. The group became known as the "Jedi Knights." All were graduates of the School of Advanced Military Studies, essentially the Army staff college's second year honors program. The success of SAMS was emulated by other services and became the model for a similar program at the Army War College focused on strategic studies.

Success of the SAMS model provides a good template for an advanced learning program for specially selected strategic staff officers. In this scheme, each service would be responsible for teaching their respective version of SAMS. The SAMS course would last two years with eligibility reserved principally for officers who completed the two-year program at civilian graduate schools. Others could be accepted provided they pass a very rigorous entry examination. During the course, SSP students would be required to finish their dissertations for the doctorate degree and demonstrate proficiency in a foreign language. Like today's SAMS, the course would be enormously rigorous. The curriculum would be history based. Students would follow the case study method and would be evaluated and graded by an experienced faculty, most of whom would be SSP program alumni. Graduates would then return to operational assignments and subsequent selection for battalion, squadron and ship commands…

MAKING THE CUT
.......The Skelton reforms have shown that often legislation is the only sure way to achieve what cultural friction cannot overcome. To be sure, no effort as culturally disruptive as this can be implemented quickly. At least five years would be needed to get it off the ground, and more than a decade would pass before SSP-qualified officers would advance to positions of authority. But if we are to create a body of gifted officers capable of dealing with the complexities of modern warfare, we soon must begin to break the stranglehold of the service personnel systems and offer the proper rewards to those young, talented and ambitious officers who are most gifted in the strategic art. AFJ

Complete article at AFJ

EEI #9 Operational Art for Policing

Ed Beakley — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 20:05:57 +0000

Essential Elements of Information for a Culture of Preparedness

The military, facing a complex and intractable mixture of "wicked problems" on the battlefield, has responded with a doctrinal revolution in the production and practice of operational theory. But most police agencies don't incorporate the "operational level of maneuver" into their planning and concept of operations. We face a constellation of complex "high-intensity policing" problems such as counterterrorism, transnational organized crime and gangs that demand development of a true operational art and doctrine, rather than current focus on tactical response. The police service desperately requires an understanding of operational theory and must develop operational doctrine to successfully address contemporary threats.

We propose a model for urban police operational art that has a five-dimensional view of the operational space, focusing in particular on the doctrinally neglected elements of cyberspace and temporality.

Our intention is to summarize and clarify a wide array of military thought, incorporating it into an operational framework for police operational response. In particular we will examine the military theories of Robert Bunker, Robert Leonhard, and William McRaven

In the current edition of PWH, in the introduction to Postcard from Mumbai: Modern Urban Siege it was noted that the concepts provided break through thinking on survival in urban "war amongst the people." Authors John Sullivan and Adam Elkus continue their "intersectional" thinking with two additional pieces in this series.

Toward Operational Art for Policing at GroupIntel

Police Operational Art for a Five-Dimensional Operational Space, at Small Wars Journal

EEI #5 – “The Big Picture”- the Nexus between Education and Grand Strategy

Ed Beakley — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 18:23:55 +0000

Essential Elements of Information for a Culture of Preparedness

Why would our societal orientation in complex, dynamic, fast moving situations be good when our educational system trains people only to think through simplified, linear, sequential problems? Strategic thinkers need to be able to see "the big picture" and handle uncertainty, or they cannot be said to be strategic thinkers.

The ship of state has been steered, over the last forty or so years, into an epistemological cul-de-sac and we are headed for the rocks. America needs a grand strategy for a competent citizenry in order to reach the point where it can again have a grand strategy to deal with an unruly world.

If ever there was an essential element of information for a culture of preparedness Mark Safranski—aka "Zenpundit" discusses it here. Please see: Zenpundit

#4 – The Resilence Doctrine – Essential Elements of Information for a Culture of Preparedness

Ed Beakley — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 03:55:10 +0000

This current series of posts links a discussion of culture of preparedness to both the resilient community concept and to the environment in which that community must persist. For a wider perspective, the editors of Global Dashboard, Alex Evans and David Steven offer a perspective of the concept of resilience as the core of a new doctrine for managing transnational risk and global instability

In The Resilience Doctrine, we argue that globalization is both unstable and inevitable, and that governments have little choice but to build collaborative platforms to manage risk. We conclude with a dozen guidelines for building an international system fit for the 21st century.

The introduction …

In a Time of Crisis – In the past year, we have witnessed a global emergency, with the world experiencing the worst economic meltdown since the 1930s. This crisis will not be a one-off. Over the next 20 years, we will be confronted with a series of systemic and interlocking risks that will cross national borders with alacrity. As a result, the divide between domestic and international policy will largely be erased.

To carve out a strategic response to these risks requires huge effort. Our assumptions about the world were formed in another age and are ill-suited to contemporary challenges. The international system, meanwhile, is inveterately short-term in its outlook, national governments are myopic and complacent, and the media is unforgiving towards politicians who fail to conform to the dictates of an increasingly frenetic news cycle.

Leaders therefore need a new lens through which they can view the task of creating security in the 21st century. The projection of power, and attempts to balance the power of others, no longer provides a useful perspective. Instead, the concept of resilience should be at the heart of a new doctrine for managing transnational risk and global instability.

Resilience offers a guiding principle for informing strategy and animating alliances. It also provides a yardstick for measuring success. At present, much of what governments do internationally inadvertently increases vulnerability. This must change if globalization is to be saved from itself.

For their recommendations and a link to the full article on World PoliticsReview, see The Resilience doctrine on Global Dashboard

#3 – Transboundary Crisis & Local Response Issues – Essential Elements of Information for a Culture of Preparedness

Ed Beakley — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 22:25:11 +0000

By Captain Charlie Meinema

Tacoma Washington Police Department

Disasters may be local, but few are. Even local disasters are not local, as Yogi Berra might say. This is often because criminals, explosions, terrorists and fires fail to respect jurisdictional borders, and / or because the crisis – even if inside one geographical or jurisdictional boundary – is too big for any one agency to handle with troops available at the time of the incident. We staff according to anticipated 'normal' work load. Any major event immediately stresses the system, because we have to send pretty much all we have and that leaves everything else insecure. We just can not staff to crisis level unless we are SURE the crisis will occur – and when do we know that? After it has happened.

>> This is one problem constantly besetting the Israelis. In the period 1969 / '73, the Arab nations – especially the short lived United Arab Republic of Syria and Egypt – practiced a policy of 'no war / no peace' toward Israel. There was – like today – constant agitation, raids, small incidents, and every fall large 'war game' exercises in western Egypt and Syria. Israel routinely activated a significant percentage of reserves when raids reached a certain frequency and / or to offset the potential of the large annual war games, since Israel knew that their neighbors were only waiting for the right moment. However, the cost of such heightened levels of activation became overwhelming to Israel. Israel stopped the raised activation level during the fall 'war games,' due largely to the cost of the deployments.

This of course was what the Arabs were awaiting and in 1973 the 'normal war games' were held on the west bank of the Suez Canal. The Israelis did not make significant additional activations of reserves, because 'they do this every year.' 1973 was different. On Yom Kippur the Egyptians cut through the berms on the east side of the Suez Canal and the Yom Kippur War was launched. Israel simply could not afford to keep staffing to a level appropriate to meet the threat unless they KNEW the threat was real on a particular occasion.

We are all in this situation. We live our lives day by day and the Devil waits for but a moment – but his moment spans far beyond our lifetimes. The threat is always there, but we can not afford to staff sufficiently to address it on a daily basis.

The 'normal' crisis (e.g. Lakewood, a suburb of Tacoma, just experienced a homicide / robbery of an armored car guard inside a major department store.) may be local to Pierce County, Washington, but may span 05 police jurisdictions and as many fire districts.

One result of the 'squad' or 'all crisis is local crisis' mentality is 'chasing the pain.' Post operative pain medications are meant to be taken on schedule to PREVENT pain from becoming disabling (help me out here, Dr. von Lubitz). People are told not to wait until they hurt – get ahead of the pain, don't chase the pain – to take the pain meds because the meds take some time to begin to work. If someone / agency thinks, 'I can handle this,' and he / they find they can not 'handle it,' the unnecessary delays in obtaining, briefing, deploying the help can result in a greatly increased level of 'pain,' as in New Orleans.

If we experience a disaster in just one jurisdiction, we still likely have to deal with multiple departments within that one jurisdiction to handle it. The problem still may require seeking outside help in the future of the event. We would always be ahead if we not only trained to work together but also had an automatic briefing / notification system to alert nearby agencies of each other's big issues as they emerge. This would allow the groundwork for effective interaction when and if it is needed. (e.g. On the small scale compared to the nation, the county wherein Tacoma dwells was 'host' to a large gathering of an outlaw motorcycle gang at one of their taverns. This was an intentional display for turf and for recruiting – the bikers were in full colors and the party was in the parking lot of the tavern next to a major street. Although the tavern hosting the event was 02 – 03 miles outside the city, the swing shift commander for TPD contacted his opposite number for Pierce County to determine how we would provide assistance if something were to erupt, such as another gang driving past the tavern and shooting – a plausible issue given motorcycle gang turf and dominance issues in the state recently).

Further, the contact gave the TPD commander a direct line from county on where the group was going when it left the tavern. 'tis always good to know if 40 – 60 bikers in full colors are motoring into your town before they get there. However, had this gone badly, we would have had officers from other cities and the state patrol arriving to help in short order. We do not have any automatic incident notification system that would tell ALL nearby agencies of the situation and which could be updated to include direction for responders. Working on it.).

A problem that probably hits us all is the scope of the disaster and appropriate assessment of crisis. "How bad is it, really?" Inevitably, after some major debacle we have reports of people who DID accurately predict the incident, attack,…., but could not get a serious hearing from anyone in position to make a difference. Sometimes this is because the predictors – like the seers of old – said there would be an attack, but could not say where or when with any degree of certainty. They only attain prescience in retrospect – and we have all probably met a few of these folks. By contrast, sometimes disasters happen and the initial reports are accurate, but are not given sufficient weight. The response is insufficient and the disaster – which might have been contained – grows out of control.

[In the recent terrorist attack in Mumbai, I am sure initial intelligence reports / assessments were confusing. Responses were not in scope to the level of attack. Worse, the troops responding were using weapons they had almost never shot and suffered problems in coordination, … I do not disparage Mumbai Police / military. Any one facing what Mumbai faced is going to have a very bad time of it. However, getting a handle on how big / bad the problem is as soon as possible is critical.]

For every legitimate disaster we have multiple Chicken Littles yelling 'The sky is falling. The sky is falling,' in regards to relatively minor issues. We have to develop the ability to make rapid and accurate determinations of the level of crisis to trigger the appropriate level of response as quickly as possible. .

The military analogy to the above is having a plan for incorporating reinforcements / augmentations into the battle without loss of coordination. Each squad has to fight as a squad (and often each man in the squad only knows what the squaddie to his right or left is doing at best), but it needs to be aware of at least what the squad on either side of it is doing, in case it has to defend a flank if their neighbor is overrun or has to detach a couple of riflemen or machine gun / mortar crew to reinforce a squad getting hit hard next to it. No officer should go into battle without knowing some idea of what will need to be done, how do we proceed to the forward edge, where do we go, what do we need to prepare, how will we exploit a sudden opening, where is the rally point,.. ,if the enemy fails to react as expected – something the unpleasant enemy has a habit of doing.

All this is a lot of coordination even if we are on the attack. 'tis all that much harder when adversaries attack us. If we fail to assess enemy strength and assume an assault is only a probe or the famous 'reconnaissance in force,' we are courting disaster. The penny packet reinforcements sent will be gobbled up as they arrive and the crisis will only get worse. If we make the right assessment and an effective deployment of reinforcements in strength coupled with combined arms support, we can – hopefully – stop the attack or at least minimize the damage.

In the civilian world, we are almost always on the defensive. We can not eradicate a threat before it strikes. We can not plan to attack a specific problem – we can and must develop the best possible plans for general responses. In the modern world, such plans would not be old fashioned plans as we know them, but effective preparation for and use of the 'teams of leaders' concept and related ideas.

In our world we have done a better job of determining generally what is available and how to request it in the past few years. Alas, we still tend to await the actual crisis to have any serious work on what is needed at that moment in that situation, and how to integrate it effectively into our reaction without unnecessary loss of time and effectiveness. We are still.'chasing the pain,' and the patients often suffer..