The most recent document that had a major impact on the development of the notion of hybrid warfare was Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's initial National Defense Strategy (NDS).
The National Protection Strategy lays forth a multi-pronged, multi-layered strategy to the nation's and its interests' defense.
It aims to establish circumstances that promote nation-state sovereignty and a stable international order that promotes freedom, democracy, and economic opportunity.
According to Hoffman, the NDS presented a strategy for dealing with "unusual problems and strategic ambiguity" and "preparing the Department of Defense to tackle 21st-century issues."
The National Defense Strategy (NDS) is divided into three sections:
- 1. 'America's Security in the Twenty-First Century,'
- 2. 'A Defense Strategy for the Twenty-First Century,' and
- 3. 'Desired Capabilities and Attributes.'
NDS 2005 outlines "an active, layered approach to the defense of the [US] nation and its interests."
While it appears that the NDS's main purpose was to reexamine the US Department of Defense's (DoD) investment portfolio in light of the changing security environment since September , Hoffman's conceptualization also included an analysis of the four major groups of challenges that shape the security environment in the twenty-first century.
- The first category contains 'traditional challenges,' which are most typically associated with governments that utilize armies, navies, and air forces in long-established forms of military conflict.'
- The second includes 'irregular challenges,' which are posed by 'Adversaries,' who use 'irregular methods to erode US influence, patience, and political will... [and] take a long-term approach, attempting to impose prohibitive human, material, financial, and political costs on the US to compel strategic retreat from a key region or course of action.' 'Catastrophic challenges' are the third kind of difficulty.
- These problems arise as a result of "hostile forces" pursuing "catastrophic capabilities, notably weapons of mass destruction."
- The fourth category includes 'disruptive challenges,' which are offered by prospective adversaries aiming to create breakthrough technologies and accompanying military weapons with the ability to radically alter combat ideas.
Such "disruptive" developments, according to the NDS, might come in biotechnology, cyber operations, space, directed-energy weapons, and other fields.
On the one hand, these descriptions of difficulties provide relatively little new information, particularly since the notion of irregular challenges resembles the previously mentioned 4 GW concept.
On the other hand, the NDS's key contribution is its proposal that these difficulties may overlap, since "actors skilled in one might be anticipated to strive to strengthen their position using techniques and skills from others."
The NDS notes in its examination of this increasing capacity of combined challenges:
- Recent experience shows that the most perilous scenarios come when we are confronted with a complex of difficulties.
- In Iraq and Afghanistan, for example, our foes posed both classic and irregular threats.
- Terrorist organizations such as al Qaeda pose sporadic risks, but they are also aggressively seeking catastrophic capabilities.
- North Korea faces conventional, irregular, and catastrophic issues all at the same time.
Furthermore, the NDS concludes that "in the future, the most competent adversaries may strive to combine really disruptive capabilities with conventional, irregular, or catastrophic means of warfare."
Two major characteristics of the NDS should be highlighted.
- 1. On the one hand, the NDS establishes a highly conventional framework of distinct developing issues, focused on the highest strategic level and developed with the particular objective of preserving and improving America's competitive advantages in light of the changing security environment.
- 2. On the other hand, it recognizes that the lines between these issues are blurring, and that this fusion will create America's most competent opponents. In other words, the NDS implies that tomorrow's difficulties will not offer particularly distinct and independent dangers, but a deadly mixing of them, without diving into the nuances of this fusion, since that is not its aim.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS:
What is the summary of the National Defense Strategy?
It discusses how the United States' Armed Forces will fight and win America's conflicts, as well as how we will cooperate with and through partner countries to create opportunities in the international environment in order to improve security and avoid conflict.
What are the 3 Components of the National Defense Strategy?
The National Defense Strategy is divided into three components:
- First, we must restore military preparedness as we construct a more deadly Joint Force;
- second, we must deepen alliances as we seek new partners;
- and third, we must change the Department's commercial operations to improve performance and cost effectiveness.
Who came up with the National Defense Strategy?
The Office of the Secretary of Defense came up with the NDS.
The United States Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) develops the National Defense Strategy (or NDS), which is signed by the Secretary of Defense as the Department of Defense's (DoD) capstone strategic direction.
What year did the first National Defense Strategy come out?
The Goldwater-Nichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act of 1986 (Public Law 99-433), which tasks the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the President, and the Secretary of Defense with providing strategic direction for the armed forces, created the National Military Strategy (NMS).
What is the total number of national defense strategies?
There have been four NDS reports, the first of which was released in 2005.
The NDS was established by the Secretaries of Defense prior to FY2017 to expand on the principles outlined in the QDRs.
What is the frequency of changes to the National Defense Strategy?
The National Defense Strategy (NDS) establishes military goals for the United States and is updated every four years to coincide with the election of a new president.
What is NATO's National Defense Strategy, and what does it entail?
Individual liberty, democracy, human rights, and the rule of law are all fundamental elements of NATO's overarching strategy: averting conflict and war, defending Allies, retaining freedom of choice and action, and supporting the ideals and values it stands for.
Is the National Military Strategy a classified document?
The NMS is classified to allow the Chairman to fully assess the Joint Force operating environment and provide unfettered military advice in support of the 2018 National Defense Strategy.
While an unclassified overview of the NMS is made available to the public, the strategy itself is classified to allow the Chairman to fully assess the Joint Force operating environment and provide unfettered military advice in support of the 2018 National Defense Strategy.
What Is The National Defense Strategy's Main Goal?
The National Defense Strategy (NDS) focuses on the role of the Department of Defense in carrying out the President's National Security Strategy (NSS).
It was established by Congress in Section 941 of the National Defense Authorization Act for FY2017 (Public Law 114-328) to replace the Quadrennial Defense Review, in compliance with the National Security Act of 1947.
There have been four NDS reports, the first of which was released in 2005.
The NDS was established by the Secretaries of Defense prior to FY2017 to expand on the principles outlined in the QDRs.
The Office of the Secretary of Defense prepares the NDS, which is issued every four years.
The paper explains how the Department of Defense will contribute to the achievement of NSS goals in order to sustain global security and prosperity.
The National Defense Strategy must address the global strategic environment, military posture, and the United States' role in international security.
Attached: Read the National Defense Strategy 2005
Read The Summary Of The Latest National Defense Strategy 2018
Sources, References & Further Reading:
- Hoffman, Frank, Conflict in the 21st Century: The Rise of Hybrid Warfare, Arlington: Potomac Institute for Policy Studies, 2007, p. 14.
- For example: Nemeth, William, ‘Future War and Chechnya: A Case for Hybrid Warfare’, PhD diss., Monterey, Naval Postgraduate School, 2002; Morelock, Jerry, ‘Washington as Strategist: Compound Warfare in the American Revolution, 1775–1783’, in Huber, Thomas (ed.), Compound Warfare: That Fatal Knot, Fort Leavenworth: Combat Studies Institute, US Army Command and General Staff College, 2002, p. 78.
- Qiao, Liang and Xiangsui Wang, Unrestricted Warfare: China’s Master Plan to Destroy America, Panama City: Pan American Publishing Company, 2002.
- Scobell, Andrew, ‘Introduction to Review Essays on “Unrestricted Warfare”’, Small Wars and Insurgencies, 11, 1 (Spring 2000), pp. 112–13; Cheng, Dean, ‘Unrestricted Warfare: Review Essay II’, Small Wars and Insurgencies, 11, 1 (Spring 2000), pp. 122–9.
- Thomas Moorer cited on the back cover of Qiao and Wang, Unrestricted Warfare.
- Bunker, Robert, ‘Unrestricted Warfare: Review Essay II’, Small Wars and Insurgencies, 11, 1 (Spring 2000), pp. 114.
- Luman, Ronald (ed.), Unrestricted Warfare Symposium 2006: Proceedings on Strategy, Analysis, and Technology, Laurel, MD: Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, 2006; Luman, (ed.), Unrestricted Warfare Symposium 2008: Proceedings on Combating the Unrestricted Warfare Threat; Integrating Strategy, Analysis, and Technology, Laurel, MD: Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, 2008.
- Qiao and Wang, Unrestricted Warfare, p. 155.
- Hoffman, Conflict in the 21st Century, p. 22.
- Qiao and Wang, Unrestricted Warfare, p. xxi.
- Bunker, ‘Unrestricted Warfare: Review Essay II’; Van Messel, John, ‘Unrestricted Warfare: A Chinese Doctrine for Future Warfare?’, Master’s thesis, Marine Corps University, Quantico, 2005.
- Qiao and Wang, Unrestricted Warfare, p. 48.
- Lind, William, et al., ‘The Changing Face of War: Into the Fourth Generation’, Marine Corps Gazette (October 1989), pp. 22–6.
- Van Creveld, Martin, On Future War, London: Brasseys, 1991.
- Huntington, Samuel, The Clash of Civilisations and the Remaking of World Order, London: Simon and Schuster, 1997.
- For example: Terriff, Terry, Aaron Karp and Regina Karp, (eds), Global Insurgency and the Future of Armed Conflict, New York: Routledge Press, 2007; Hammes, Thomas, The Sling and the Stone: On War in the 21st Century, St. Paul, MN: Zenith Press, 2004; Benbow, Tim, ‘Talking ’Bout Our Generation? Assessing the Concept of “Fourth Generation Warfare”’, Comparative Strategy, 27, 2 (2008), pp. 148–63.
- Echevarria, Antulio, Fourth Generation War and Other Myths, Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, 2005.
- Lind, William, ‘Understanding Fourth Generation War’, Military Review (September–October 2004), p. 12.
- Echevarria, Fourth Generation War and Other Myths, p. v.
- Hammes, Sling and the Stone, p. 16.
- Rogers, Clifford (ed.), The Military Revolution Debate: Readings on the Military Transformation of Early Modern Europe, Oxford: Westview Press, 1995; Parker, Geoffrey, The Military Revolution: Military Innovation and the Rise of the West, 1500–1800, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988; Boot, Max, War Made New: Technology, Warfare and the Course of History, 1500 to Today, New York: Gotham Books, 2006; Murray, Williamson and Macgregor Knox (eds), The Dynamics of Military Revolution 1300–2050, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
- Hammes, Sling and the Stone, pp. 17, 18.
- For example: Rogers, Military Revolution Debate; Parker, Military Revolution.
- Lind, ‘Understanding Fourth Generation War’, p. 12.
- Lind et al., ‘Changing Face of War’, p. 23; also see Hammes, Sling and the Stone, pp. 22–31.
- Lind, ‘Understanding Fourth Generation War’, p. 13.
- Hammes, Thomas, ‘War Evolves into the Fourth Generation’, Contemporary Security Policy, 26, 2 (2005), p. 197.
- Hammes, ‘War Evolves into the Fourth Generation’, p. 206.
- Echevarria, Fourth Generation War and Other Myths, p. 16.
- Huber, Thomas, ‘Napoleon in Spain and Naples: Fortified Compound Warfare’, in C610: The Evolution of Modern Warfare, Term I Syllabus/Book of Readings, Fort Leavenworth: Combat Studies Institute, US Army Command and General Staff College, 1997.
- Huber, Thomas, ‘Compound Warfare: A Conceptual Framework’, in Huber, Compound Warfare, p. 1.
- Roberts, Michael, ‘The Military Revolution, 1560–1660’, in Rogers, Military Revolution Debate.
- See Morelock, Jerry, ‘Washington as Strategist: Compound Warfare in the American Revolution’ in Huber, Compound Warfare; Baumann, Robert, ‘Compound War Case Study: The Soviets in Afghanistan’, in Huber, Compound Warfare.
- Hoffman, Conflict in the 21st Century, pp. 25–6.
- Rumsfeld, Donald, ‘The National Defense Strategy of the United States of America’, Washington, DC, March 2005, p. v.