Tactics Warfare Quotes

All warfare is based on deception. Hence, when we are able to attack, we must seem unable; when using our forces, we must appear inactive; when we are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away; when far away, we must make him believe we are near.

Disinformation, which is the same as lying but for some reason has a different name, is the top tactic in corporate negotiation/warfare.

The skillful tactician may be likened to the shuai-jan. Now the shuai-jan is a snake that is found in the Ch'ang mountains. Strike at its head, and you will be attacked by its tail; strike at its tail, and you will be attacked by its head; strike at its middle, and you will be attacked by head and tail both.

            It was stated by an Australian Army Officer, “Phuoc Tuy offers the perfect terrain for guerrilla warfare. It has a long coastline with complex areas of mangrove swamps, isolated ranges of very rugged mountains and a large area of uninhabited jungle containing all of the most loathsome combinations of thorny bamboos, poisonous snakes, insects, malaria, dense underbrush, swamps and rugged ground conditions that the most dedicated guerrilla warfare expert could ask for.

We lack spiritual-warfare tactics and spiritual-warfare training, and we also lack understanding of the arsenals of heaven because we do not have the faith to confront the devil.

The truth is that we have entered a rest when we give up ownership of the matter, as Christ did in saying, "Not My will, but Yours, be done" (Luke 22:42). Rest

In such a society as ours the only possible chance for change, for mobility, for political, economic, and moral flow lies in the tactics of guerrilla warfare, in the use of fictions, of language.

Marinate your

One cannot make command decisions simply by assessing the tactical situation and going ahead with whatever course of action will do the most harm to the enemy with a minimum of death and damage to your own men and materiel. Modern warfare has become very complex, especially during the last century. Wars are won not by a simple series of battles won, but by a complex interrelationship among military victory, economic pressures, logistic maneuvering, access to the enemy’s information, political postures—dozens, literally dozens of factors.

Marinate your prayers in faith in the Word of God, just as Daniel did. Pray the Word, not your worries. Pray the promise, not the problem. In

Thus the way of prayer dictates that until there is a release in your spirit-an assurance that the matter is resolved or tangible evidence of deliverance-do not stop praying. This

Their leader had no real knowledge of warfare or tactics. I was only a stubborn man and that was my greatest advantage in this fight.

The defeats which many small Red areas have suffered have been due either to the absence of the requisite objective conditions or to subjective mistakes in tactics.

[The wives of powerful noblemen] must be highly knowledgeable about government, and wise – in fact, far wiser than most other such women in power. The knowledge of a baroness must be so comprehensive that she can understand everything. Of her a philosopher might have said: "No one is wise who does not know some part of everything." Moreover, she must have the courage of a man. This means that she should not be brought up overmuch among women nor should she be indulged in extensive and feminine pampering. Why do I say that? If barons wish to be honoured as they deserve, they spend very little time in their manors and on their own lands. Going to war, attending their prince's court, and traveling are the three primary duties of such a lord. So the lady, his companion, must represent him at home during his absences. Although her husband is served by bailiffs, provosts, rent collectors, and land governors, she must govern them all. To do this according to her right she must conduct herself with such wisdom that she will be both feared and loved. As we have said before, the best possible fear comes from love. When wronged, her men must be able to turn to her for refuge. She must be so skilled and flexible that in each case she can respond suitably. Therefore, she must be knowledgeable in the mores of her locality and instructed in its usages, rights, and customs. She must be a good speaker, proud when pride is needed; circumspect with the scornful, surly, or rebellious; and charitably gentle and humble toward her good, obedient subjects. With the counsellors of her lord and with the advice of elder wise men, she ought to work directly with her people. No one should ever be able to say of her that she acts merely to have her own way. Again, she should have a man's heart. She must know the laws of arms and all things pertaining to warfare, ever prepared to command her men if there is need of it. She has to know both assault and defence tactics to insure that her fortresses are well defended, if she has any expectation of attack or believes she must initiate military action. Testing her men, she will discover their qualities of courage and determination before overly trusting them. She must know the number and strength of her men to gauge accurately her resources, so that she never will have to trust vain or feeble promises. Calculating what force she is capable of providing before her lord arrives with reinforcements, she also must know the financial resources she could call upon to sustain military action. She should avoid oppressing her men, since this is the surest way to incur their hatred. She can best cultivate their loyalty by speaking boldly and consistently to them, according to her council, not giving one reason today and another tomorrow. Speaking words of good courage to her men-at-arms as well as to her other retainers, she will urge them to loyalty and their best efforts.

Terrorism should be considered a valuable tactic when it is used to put to death some noted leader of the oppressing forces well known for his cruelty, his efficiency in repression, or other quality that makes his elimination useful. But the killing of persons of small importance is never advisable, since it brings on an increase of reprisals, including deaths.

His system is a combination of ferocious blows, holds and throws, adapted from Japanese bayonet tactics, ju-jitsu, Chinese boxing, Sikh wrestling, French wrestling and Cornish collar-and-elbow wrestling, plus expert knowledge of hip-shooting, knife fighting and use of the Tommy gun and hand grenade.

Every single sorrow in my heart came about as a result of my forgetting who I am. Every single catastrophe that has happened in my life was designed to cause me to forget who I am. If there is one weapon you need to repeatedly pick up and continuously hold onto, that is the sword and shield and armour of KNOWING THYSELF. Know your soul, see your spirit, look at who you are and breathe it. This is your mission in life. This is the treasure your enemy wants to steal.

The concept of surfaces and gaps is one of several concepts that bear on tactics. It is of the same level of importance as mission tactics and the main effort, which will be the subjects of the two tactics lessons following this one. All of the concepts should be constantly at work during the execution of battle.

The guerilla fighter will be a sort of guiding angel who has fallen into the zone, helping the poor always and bothering the rich as little as possible in the first phases of the war. But this war will continue on its course; contradictions will continuously become sharper; the moment will arrive when many of those who regarded the revolution with a certain sympathy at the outset will place themselves in a position diametrically opposed; and they will take the first step into battle against the popular forces. At that moment the guerilla fighter should act to make himself into the standard bearer of the cause of the people, punishing every betrayal with justice.

Satan’s chief tactic is deception” and he does it “by telling people lies about God

Education without excellence in techniques means action will not be timely or effective. But techniques without education means tactics will be formulistic, rigid, and predictable to the enemy.

Satan is always at church before the preacher is in the pulpit or a member is in the pew. He comes to hinder the sower, to impoverish the soil, or to corrupt the seed. He uses these tactics only when courage and faith are in the pulpit, and zeal and prayer are in the pew; but if dead ritualism or live liberalism are in the pulpit, he does not attend, because they are no danger to him.

Disinformation, which is the same as lying but for some reason has a different name, is the top tactic in corporate negotiation/warfare. (There had been a whole episode about it on Sanctuary Moon.)

a crucial element of English success was their commanders’ ability to learn on the fly, make adjustments, and attempt new tactics. The Spanish paid a heavy price for their lack of equal flexibility.

Terrorism is often confused or equated with . . . guerrilla warfare,” the terrorism theorist Bruce Hoffman once wrote. “ This is not surprising, since guerrillas often employ the same tactics (assassination, kidnapping, bombings of public gathering-places, hostage-taking, etc.) for the same purposes (to intimidate or coerce, thereby affecting behavior through the arousal of fear) as terrorists.”34

Only someone who is willing to look beyond the bureaucratic limits of tactics and strategies and the obsolescent will to "win" can truly wield an artist's touch with a medium so difficult as warfare in the modern age.

Conspiracy theories have long been used to maintain power: the Soviet leadership saw capitalist and counter-revolutionary conspiracies everywhere; the Nazis, Jewish ones. But those conspiracies were ultimately there to buttress an ideology, whether class warfare for Communists or race for Nazis. With today’s regimes, which struggle to formulate a single ideology – indeed, which can’t if they want to maintain power by sending different messages to different people – the idea that one lives in a world full of conspiracies becomes the world view itself. Conspiracy does not support the ideology; it replaces it. In Russia this is captured in the catchphrase of the country’s most important current affairs presenter: ‘A coincidence? I don’t think so!’ says Dmitry Kiselev as he twirls between tall tales that dip into history, literature, oil prices and colour revolutions, which all return to the theme of how the world has it in for Russia. And as a world view it grants those who subscribe to it certain pleasures: if all the world is a conspiracy, then your own failures are no longer all your fault. The fact that you achieved less than you hoped for, that your life is a mess – it’s all the fault of the conspiracy. More importantly, conspiracy is a way to maintain control. In a world where even the most authoritarian regimes struggle to impose censorship, one has to surround audiences with so much cynicism about anybody’s motives, persuade them that behind every seemingly benign motivation is a nefarious, if impossible-to-prove, plot, that they lose faith in the possibility of an alternative, a tactic a renowned Russian media analyst called Vasily Gatov calls ‘white jamming’. And the end effect of this endless pile-up of conspiracies is that you, the little guy, can never change anything. For if you are living in a world where shadowy forces control everything, then what possible chance do you have of turning it around? In this murk it becomes best to rely on a strong hand to guide you. ‘Trump is our last chance to save America,’ is the message of his media hounds. Only Putin can ‘raise Russia from its knees’. ‘The problem we are facing today is less oppression, more lack of identity, apathy, division, no trust,’ sighs Srdja. ‘There are more tools to change things than before, but there’s less will to do so.

Parenthetically, in the West’s current war against Islamic fundamentalist terrorism, it would be good for the leaders to remember this “Islamic tactic of warfare.” According to this “religious” doctrine of Islam, what Muslims say does not have to be true— after all, to them, “War is deception.” And the end justifies the means.

Ways that God's army will not be like a human army:   1) It will fight to give life, not take it.   2) It will fight to free people, not conquer them.   3) Its victory is not the destruction of those controlled by the enemy, but rather the tearing down of strongholds that are keeping them in bondage so as to set them free.   4) Its weapons are not carnal, but spiritual.   5) The battles, objectives, strategies, and tactics will be spiritual, not physical.   The above is corroborated in a number of Scriptures, but we will review just a few, beginning with II Corinthians 10:3-6:   For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, and being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled (NKJV).

In OSW, the source code of warfare is available for anyone who is interested in both modifying and extending it. This means the tactics, weapons, strategies, target selection, planning methods, and team dynamics are all open to community improvement. Global guerrillas can hack at the source code of warfare to their hearts’ delight.

When we teach tactics in the opposite order, that is, the mechanics ahead of the thinking, too often we produce, instead of soldiers, structured mechanics who find it difficult to think without rules. The art of war has no traffic with rules. Yet I have often seen students reject their best tactical ideas because they could not fit them into the format.

Excuse me, please. You do not understand. You do not really understand who it was we talked with in the tent that night. He may have seemed an ordinary man to you – a handicapped one, at that. But this is not so. I fear Benedict. He is the Master of Arms for Amber. Can you conceive of a millennium? A thousand years? Several of them? Can you understand a man who, for almost every day of a lifetime like that, has spent some time dwelling with weapons, tactics, strategy? All that there is of military science thunders in his head. He has often journeyed from shadow to shadow, witnessing variation after variation on the same battle, with but slightly altered circumstances, in order to test his theories of warfare. He has commanded armies so vast that you could watch them march by day after day and see no end to the columns. Although he is inconvenienced by the loss of his arm, I would not wish to fight with him either with weapons or barehanded. It is fortunate that he has no designs upon the throne, or he would be occupying it right now. If he were, I believe that I would give up at this moment and pay him homage. I fear Benedict.

Maneuver warfare tactics are trust tactics. That is their single most important characteristic. And that’s the biggest difference from what we do now.” It is certainly the biggest change from the current command and control system. Trust and a shared way of thinking, leadership and monitoring, not fancy new C2 equipment, are what you need to be able to fight using maneuver warfare.

Although these actors and their views were part of the strategic landscape, our strategic planning still seldom factored them into the equation. Third, at an operational, even tactical level, the battlefield was now global. An enemy group could plot and plan on one side of the planet and execute on the other side in days, if not hours. In cyberspace, impact could be measured in seconds. If these emerging and converging factors were changing the nature of warfare, then what was the role of intelligence? How would we identify and discern these micro-actors with macro-impact bouncing around a global battlefield, burrowing into the human terrain and employing deception and denial tactics? Intelligence seemed to be getting harder even as it was becoming more important.

Wells recognized that these crude novels correctly foresaw modern warfare as aiming at the massive destruction of the physical structures of an enemy civilization and the terrorizing if not annihilating of its noncombatant population. His Martians anticipate with uncomfortable accuracy, for example, American bombings of Dresden and Tokyo, followed by Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and boastful proclamations of “shock and awe” tactics against Iraq.

28.  Do not repeat the tactics which have gained you one victory, but let your methods be regulated by the infinite variety of circumstances. [As Wang Hsi sagely remarks: “There is but one root-principle underlying victory, but the tactics which lead up to it are infinite in number.” With this compare Col. Henderson: “The rules of strategy are few and simple. They may be learned in a week. They may be taught by familiar illustrations or a dozen diagrams. But such knowledge will no more teach a man to lead an army like Napoleon than a knowledge of grammar will teach him to write like Gibbon.”] 29.  Military tactics are like unto water; for water in its natural course runs away from high places and hastens downwards. 30.  So in war, the way is to avoid what is strong and to strike at what is weak. [Like water, taking the line of least resistance.] 31.  Water shapes its course according to the nature of the ground over which it flows; the soldier works out his victory in relation to the foe whom he is facing. 32.  Therefore, just as water retains no constant shape, so in warfare there are no constant conditions. 33.  He who can modify his tactics in relation to his opponent and thereby succeed in winning, may be called a heaven-born captain. 34.  The five elements (water, fire, wood, metal, earth) are not always equally predominant; [That is, as Wang Hsi says: “they predominate alternately.”] the four seasons make way for each other in turn. [Literally, “have no invariable seat.”] There are short days and long; the moon has its periods of waning and waxing. [Cf. V. ss. 6. The purport of the passage is simply to illustrate the want of fixity in war by the changes constantly taking place in Nature. The comparison is not very happy, however, because the regularity of the phenomena which Sun Tzu mentions is by no means paralleled in war.]

Genghis Khan’s ability to manipulate people and technology represented the experienced knowledge of more than four decades of nearly constant warfare. At no single, crucial moment in his life did he suddenly acquire his genius at warfare, his ability to inspire the loyalty of his followers, or his unprecedented skill for organizing on a global scale. These derived not from epiphanic enlightenment or formal schooling but from a persistent cycle of pragmatic learning, experimental adaptation, and constant revision driven by his uniquely disciplined mind and focused will. His fighting career began long before most of his warriors at Bukhara had been born, and in every battle he learned something new. In every skirmish, he acquired more followers and additional fighting techniques. In each struggle, he combined the new ideas into a constantly changing set of military tactics, strategies, and weapons. He never fought the same war twice.

Under the leadership of Henry Kissinger, first as Richard Nixon’s national security adviser and later as secretary of state, the United States sent an unequivocal signal to the most extreme rightist forces that democracy could be sacrificed in the cause of ideological warfare. Criminal operational tactics, including assassination, were not only acceptable but supported with weapons and money. A CIA internal memo laid it out in unsparing terms:        On September 16, 1970 [CIA] Director [Richard] Helms informed a group of senior agency officers that on September 15, President Nixon had decided that an Allende regime was not acceptable to the United States. The President asked the Agency to prevent Allende from coming to power or to unseat him and authorized up to $10 million for this purpose. . . . A special task force was established to carry out this mandate, and preliminary plans were discussed with Dr. Kissinger on 18 September 1970.

The non-state organizations that wage it rely largely on terrorism, guerrilla tactics, and popular insurgencies. However, they also engage in small-scale conventional warfare. The perfect examples are Hezbollah in 2006 and Daesh (ISIS) in 2014–2015. Neither organization is a state. Neither maintains the usual distinctions between government, armed forces, and people. However, both have enough money, troops, and conventional weapons to do more than wage terrorism and guerrilla alone.

Basil Liddell Hart, the British author, called it the expanding torrent system tactic. He drew an analogy between an attacking army and a torrent of water: If we watch a torrent bearing down on each successive bank of earth and dam in its path, we see that it first beats against the obstacle feeling it and testing it at all points. Eventually, it finds a small crack at some point. Through this crack pour the first driplets of water and rush straight on. The pent up water on each side is drawn towards the breach. It swirls through and around the flanks of the breach, wearing away the earth on each side and so widening the gap. Simultaneously the water behind pours straight through the breach between the side eddies which are wearing away the flanks. Directly it is passed through it expands to widen once more the onreach of the torrent. Thus as the water pours through in ever-increasing volume the onreach of the torrent swells to its original proportions, leaving in turn each crumbling obstacle behind it.

If America, for instance, used the Bible to shape its warfare policy, that policy would look like this. Enlistment would be by volunteer only (which it is), and the military would not be funded by taxation. America would not stockpile superior weapons—no tanks, drones, F-22s, and of course no nuclear weapons—and it would make sure its victories were determined by God’s miraculous intervention, not by military might. Rather than outnumbering the enemy, America would deliberately fight outmanned and under-gunned. Perhaps soldiers would use muskets, or maybe just swords. There would be no training, no boot camp, no preparation other than fasting, praying, and singing worship songs. If America really is the “new Israel,” God’s holy nation as some believe, then it needs to take its cue from God and His inspired manual for military tactics. But as it stands, many Christians will be content to cut and paste selected verses that align with America’s worldview to give the military some religious backing. Some call this bad hermeneutics; others call it syncretism. The Israelite prophets called it idolatry.

You have probably noted a lack of “how to” instructions to this point. While some technical and tactical suggestions will be offered in the next chapter, the essence of maneuver warfare is its approach to tactics and operations. Rather than concentrating on formulas and checklists - with their inherent predictability - maneuver warfare emphasizes a thought process. It is a process of seeing your options, creating new options, and shifting rapidly among those options as the situation changes. Ultimately tactics in maneuver warfare require that you “out-Boyd Cycle” the enemy.

Take a community of Dutchmen of the type of those who defended themselves for fifty years against all the power of Spain at a time when Spain was the greatest power in the World. Intermix with them a strain of those inflexible French Huguenots who gave up home and fortune and left their Country forever at the time of the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. The product must obviously be one of the most rugged, virile, unconquerable races ever seen upon Earth. Take this formidable people and train them for seven generations in constant warfare against savage men and ferocious beasts, in circumstances under which no weakling could survive, place them so that they acquire exceptional skills with weapons and in horsemanship, give them a Country which is eminently suited to the tactics of the huntsman, the marksman and the rider. Then, finally, put a fine temper upon their military qualities by a dour fatalistic Old Testament religion and an ardent and consuming patriotism. Combine all of these qualities and all these impulses in one individual, and you have the modern Boer. The most formidable antagonist who ever crossed the path of Imperial Britain.

After the collapse of the Portuguese fascist regime in Lisbon in April 1974, that country’s colonial empire deliquesced with extraordinary speed. The metropolitan power retained control only in the enclave of Macau, on the coast of China, and later remitted this territory to Beijing under treaty in 2000. In Africa, after many vicissitudes, power was inherited by the socialist-leaning liberation movements which had, by their tactic of guerrilla warfare, brought about the Portuguese revolution in the first place and established warm relations with its first generation of activists.

Although these firms deploy units that are often much smaller in manpower relative to their client’s adversaries, their effectiveness lies not in their size, but in their comprehensive training, experience, and overall skill at battlefield judgment, all in fundamentally short supply in the chaotic battlefields of the last decade.14 Utilizing coordinated movement and intelligent application of firepower, their strength is their ability to arrive at the right place at the right moment. The fundamental reality of modern warfare is that in many cases such small tactical units can achieve strategic goals.

Lind’s scheme has been widely adopted. Note, however, that it is based mainly on developments on the tactical and operational levels. It has relatively little to say about strategy, let alone grand strategy and the kind of political, economic, social and cultural factors in which the latter is rooted. In this it differs from some other schemes, including my own which is based on the distinction between “trinitarian” and “non-trinitarian” warfare. Here the assumption is that there are two basic kinds of war, i.e. those in which the distinction between government, armed forces and people is maintained and those in which it is not.

When understanding fails, there is always more force in reserve. As the "experiments in material and human resources control" collapse and "revolutionary development" grinds to a halt, we simply resort more openly to the Gestapo tactics that are barely concealed behind the facade of pacification. When American cities explode, we can expect the same. The technique of "limited warfare" translates neatly into a system of domestic repression - far more humane, as will quickly be explained, than massacring those who are unwilling to wait for the inevitable victory of the war on poverty. Why should a liberal intellectual be so persuaded of the virtues of a political system of four-year dictatorship? The answer seem all to plain.

Military tactics are like unto water, for water, in its natural course, runs away from high places, and hastens downwards. So, in war, the way is to avoid what is strong, and to strike at what is weak. Water shapes its course according to the nature of the ground over which it flows. The soldier works out his victory in relation to the foe in which he is facing. Therefore, just as water retains no constant shape, so in warfare, there are no constant conditions. He who can modify his tactics in relation to his opponent, and thereby succeed in winning, may be called a Heaven-born Captain. The Five Elements: Water, Fire, Wood, Metal, Earth, are not always equally predominant. The Four Seasons make way for each other in turn. There are short days, and long. The Moon has its periods of waning, and waxing.

National Security demanded that this entire matter be kept quiet at all costs. No cost was spared in doing so. But there was one very large and busy fly in this ointment: The ETs were flying over the skies of America, sometimes in formation and before thousands of witnesses. How do you hide that? The answer is―the mind hides it. In an Orwellian twist, it was found from past psychological warfare efforts that if you told a lie often enough and the lie is repeated by “respected” authority figures, the public will believe it. One of the masters of psychological warfare during WWII was put in charge of this diversionary tactic in the late 1940s. General Walter Bedell Smith helped coordinate the psychological warfare components of this ET problem and launched the big lie: UFOs, even though thousands of people had reported seeing them, did not exist.

Gazans hypothesized that the brutality of the offensive was a tactic to force them to turn against Hamas. In many instances this worked, particularly when Hamas showed its own merciless face. Under the heavy toll of bombing, Hamas used the chaotic environment of war to settle its own political scores and carry out extrajudicial assassinations of its domestic enemies, including members of Fatah who were held in its jails, as well as suspected collaborators or informants for Israel.40 More disturbingly, in the early days of Operation Protective Edge, Hamas’s Ministry of Interior called on citizens not to respond to evacuation orders by the Israeli army, asserting that these were only issued as a form of psychological warfare to create panic.41 Many in Gaza criticized Hamas, not least for its role in dragging the coastal enclave into another conflagration. Others were critical of Hamas’s governance record and its authoritarian streak.

APRIL 1 PREPARE TO CONFRONT THE ENEMY’S TACTICS MY CHILD, DO not be ignorant of the devil’s tactics. The devil is a schemer, and he sets traps or snares for My children. But I will give you the power to overcome all of his schemes. Fix your eyes upon Me, for I am your Sovereign Lord. Do not be deceived by Satan’s lies. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for he is a liar and the father of lies. Be aware that in these times there are some who will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. Follow closely after My Word, for everything I created is good, and you should receive it with thanksgiving. EPHESIANS 6:10–12; PSALM 140:8–10; 1 TIMOTHY 4:1–4 Prayer Declaration Lord, arise in me and scatter your enemies. Cause my evil foes to flee before You. As wax melts before the fire, may Satan’s evil schemes perish before You. You have given me Your shield of victory, and Your right hand sustains me. I pursued my enemies and overtook them. I did not turn back till they were destroyed. You are the God who avenges me and saves me from my enemies.

APRIL 2 SATAN IS A LIAR AND THE FATHER OF LIES DON’T ALLOW THE enemy to strategize against you. Overcome and destroy his strategies through prayer. The main tactic of the enemy is deception. He is a liar and the father of lies. My Word will expose his tactics to you. I am light, and My Word is light. The light exposes the enemy and tears away the darkness. Beware of the hosts of lying and deceiving spirits that work under the authority of Satan. These spirits cause delusion, deception, lying, seducing, blinding, error, and guile. Call upon My name, and I will strip away the power from these deceiving spirits and will cause your eyes to be opened. Pray that your enemies will be scattered, confused, exposed, and destroyed. JOHN 8:44–47; 1 TIMOTHY 4:1; PSALM 68:1 Prayer Declaration The Lord has rescued me from all my enemies and from the lying and deceiving spirits that belong to the devil. My enemies are destroyed by my God. The Lord will lead me on level ground and will preserve my life. In His righteousness He has brought me out of trouble. With His unfailing love He has silenced my enemies and destroyed all my foes. In His power I will contend with the powers of darkness that are set against the kingdom of God.

While I am free to speak my mind, Kelly, now 14, is not so fortunate. Kelly has yet to receive rehabilitation for her shattered personality and programmed young mind. The high tech sophistication of the Project Monarch trauma based mind-control procedures she endured, literally since birth, reportedly requires highly specialized, qualified care to aid her in eventually gaining control of her mind and life. Due to the political affluence of our abusers, all efforts to obtain her inalienable right to rehabilitation and seek justice have been blocked under the guise of so-called "National Security." As a result, Kelly remains warehoused in a mental institution in the custody of the state of Tennessee--a victim of the system—a system controlled and manipulated by our abusive government "leaders" a system where State Forms make no allowances to report military TOP SECRET abuses--a system that exists on federal funding directed by our perverse, corrupt abusers in Washington, D.C. She remains a political prisoner in a mental institution to this moment, waiting and hurting! Violations of laws and rights, Psychological Warfare intimidation tactics, threats to our lives, and various other forms of CIA Damage Containment practices thus far have remained unhindered and unchecked due to the National Security Act of 1947 AND the 1986 Reagan Amendment to same which allows those in control of our government to censor and/or cover up anything they choose.

The same effort to conserve force was also evident in war, at the tactical level. The ideal Roman general was not a figure in the heroic style, leading his troops in a reckless charge to victory or death. He would rather advance in a slow and carefully prepared march, building supply roads behind him and fortified camps each night in order to avoid the unpredictable risks of rapid maneuver. He preferred to let the enemy retreat into fortified positions rather than accept the inevitable losses of open warfare, and he would wait to starve out the enemy in a prolonged siege rather than suffer great casualties in taking the fortifications by storm. Overcoming the spirit of a culture still infused with Greek martial ideals (that most reckless of men, Alexander the Great, was actually an object of worship in many Roman households), the great generals of Rome were noted for their extreme caution. It is precisely this aspect of Roman tactics (in addition to the heavy reliance on combat engineering) that explains the relentless quality of Roman armies on the move, as well as their peculiar resilience in adversity: the Romans won their victories slowly, but they were very hard to defeat. Just as the Romans had apparently no need of a Clausewitz to subject their military energies to the discipline of political goals, it seems that they had no need of modern analytical techniques either. Innocent of the science of systems analysis, the Romans nevertheless designed and built large and complex security systems that successfully integrated troop deployments, fixed defenses, road networks, and signaling links in a coherent whole.

In Nevada, at Frenchman’s Flat, a bright flash and ugly mushroom cloud had signified a gigantic change in the tactical battlefield—a change that had not come about at Hiroshima, despite statements to the contrary. In its early years the atomic device had remained a strategic weapon, suitable for delivery against cities and industries, suitable to obliterate civilians, men, women, and children by the millions, but of no practical use on a limited battlefield—until it was fired from a field gun. Until this time, 1953, the armies of the world, including that of the United States, had hardly taken the advent of fissionable material into account. The 280mm gun, an interim weapon that would remain in use only a few years, changed all that, forever. With an atomic cannon that could deliver tactical fires in the low-kiloton range, with great selectivity, ground warfare stood on the brink of its greatest change since the advent of firepower. The atomic cannon could blow any existing fortification, even one twenty thousand yards in depth, out of existence neatly and selectively, along with the battalions that manned it. Any concentration of manpower, also, was its meat. It spelled the doom of Communist massed armies, which opposed superior firepower with numbers, and which had in 1953 no tactical nuclear weapons of their own. The 280mm gun was shipped to the Far East. Then, in great secrecy, atomic warheads—it could fire either nuclear or conventional rounds—followed, not to Korea, but to storage close by. And with even greater secrecy, word of this shipment was allowed to fall into Communist hands. At the same time, into Communist hands wafted a pervasive rumor, one they could neither completely verify nor scotch: that the United States would not accept a stalemate beyond the end of summer. The psychological pressures on Chinese Intelligence became enormous. Neither an evaluative nor a collective agency, even when it feels it is being taken, dares ignore evidence.

Navy Seals Stress Relief Tactics (As printed in O Online Magazine, Sept. 8, 2014) Prep for Battle: Instead of wasting energy by catastrophizing about stressful situations, SEALs spend hours in mental dress rehearsals before springing into action, says Lu Lastra, director of mentorship for Naval Special Warfare and a former SEAL command master chief.  He calls it mental loading and says you can practice it, too.  When your boss calls you into her office, take a few minutes first to run through a handful of likely scenarios and envision yourself navigating each one in the best possible way.  The extra prep can ease anxiety and give you the confidence to react calmly to whatever situation arises. Talk Yourself Up: Positive self-talk is quite possibly the most important skill these warriors learn during their 15-month training, says Lastra.  The most successful SEALs may not have the biggest biceps or the fastest mile, but they know how to turn their negative thoughts around.  Lastra recommends coming up with your own mantra to remind yourself that you’ve got the grit and talent to persevere during tough times. Embrace the Suck: “When the weather is foul and nothing is going right, that’s when I think, now we’re getting someplace!” says Lastra, who encourages recruits to power through the times when they’re freezing, exhausted or discouraged.  Why?  Lastra says, “The, suckiest moments are when most people give up; the resilient ones spot a golden opportunity to surpass their competitors.  It’s one thing to be an excellent athlete when the conditions are perfect,” he says.  “But when the circumstances aren’t so favorable, those who have stronger wills are more likely to rise to victory.” Take a Deep Breath: “Meditation and deep breathing help slow the cognitive process and open us up to our more intuitive thoughts,” says retired SEAL commander Mark Divine, who developed SEALFit, a demanding training program for civilians that incorporates yoga, mindfulness and breathing techniques.  He says some of his fellow SEALs became so tuned-in, they were able to sense the presence of nearby roadside bombs.  Who doesn’t want that kind of Jedi mind power?  A good place to start: Practice what the SEALs call 4 x 4 x 4 breathing.  Inhale deeply for four counts, then exhale for four counts and repeat the cycle for four minutes several times a day.  You’re guaranteed to feel calmer on any battleground. Learn to value yourself, which means to fight for your happiness. ---Ayn Rand

Nevertheless, that Obama was a movement leftist with ambitions to be a transformative president was information available, without great effort, to anyone who wanted to be informed. His statist policy preferences, his class warfare tactics, and the disconnect between his rhetoric and our reality have long been readily apparent. Yet he was elected and, after four years of his governance, reelected (albeit by a much narrower margin and with markedly diminished support). This may tell us as much about contemporary America as it does about the president.

According to Thucydides, in 414 BC during the siege of Syracuse in Sicily the Athenians sent men under the sea to saw through and clear wooden piles blocking the harbour mouth. They also broke underwater chains, all with the aim of enabling galleys carrying troops to enter harbour. Cutting the anchor cables of enemy vessels – so they would be driven ashore to destruction or collide with each other – was another favourite tactic. The earliest image of submerged men carrying weapons is a wall painting in the Nile Valley of duck hunters armed with spears stealthily approaching their prey while using reeds to suck in air. Aristotle claimed Greek combat divers used an early form of snorkel like the trunk of an elephant

Similarly, Clausewitz is often, but erroneously, characterized as eschewing rules of war altogether. While On War is best known and highly regarded for its introduction and evaluation of the moral and psychological aspects of war, Clausewitz does devote a significant portion of his classic work to the presentation of strategic and tactical principles.2

Moderate’ Muslims, and apologists and propagandists for Islam, will attempt to deny or obscure the real meaning, nature, and intent of jihad. Some will say that jihad means only a Muslim’s ‘inner struggle’ to be a better person, and that jihad has no military meaning whatever. Others will acknowledge that Muslims have a religious duty to spread Islam throughout the world, but insist that it is to be spread only peacefully, through dawah—literally ‘the call’— meaning persuasion and reasoning. Finally, some will go so far as to admit that it can also mean warfare, but insist that in Islam, warfare is allowed only in self-defense or against oppression. However, all of these assertions are examples of a tactic that Islam encourages in waging jihad: taqiyya or Kithman—‘lying,’ ‘deception,’ ‘deceit.’ Muslims are encouraged to lie if, in the opinion of the liar, telling the lie will be ‘good’ for Islam. This is a documented fact according to both ancient and modern scholars of Islam.

It was the concentration of resources and power in hierarchical political organizations, the millions of cannon-fodder citizens subject to their disposal, the galleon, compass and sextant, the ox-wagon, steam engine, railroads, and factory production, as well as smallpox, measles, and weeds, that allowed the nations of western Europe to gain ascendancy over the uncivilized world during the past half-millennium. It was not the much discussed and theatrical weaponry, discipline, and tactical techniques that gave soldiers their eventual triumphs, but their mastery of the rather pedestrian arcana of logistics. In modern guerrilla warfare, when superior primitive tactics are wedded to even very limited civilized logistics, more completely civilized adversaries are very commonly discomfited. Guerrilla warfare merely incorporates manpower and supply capacities on a civilized scale and uses more up-to-date weaponry. Primitive warfare is simply total war conducted with very limited means. The

It’s rare I’ll accuse one side or the other in any conflict of cheating. First off… there’s no such thing. Cheating in warfare is called tactics. Nothing in warfare is cheating. There are no rules, contrary to what people who’ve never had to fight in any real battle try to impose on the controlled chaos that is battle itself. Real battle. They usually do this, start labeling things as cheating, or war crimes, because they are in fact cheating and trying to gain advantage by denying the opposition the ability to do everything

It’s rare I’ll accuse one side or the other in any conflict of cheating. First off… there’s no such thing. Cheating in warfare is called tactics. Nothing in warfare is cheating. There are no rules, contrary to what people who’ve never had to fight in any real battle try to impose on the controlled chaos that is battle itself. Real battle. They usually do this, start labeling things as cheating, or war crimes, because they are in fact cheating and trying to gain advantage by denying the opposition the ability to do everything in their power to defeat you. Anything that denies this basic truth is just play-acting and politics for political advantage being done by the lowest form of life… politicians.

A young Vietnamese man working in a London hotel as a dishwasher watching events in Ireland unfold, as rebels made their bid for freedom in what became the War of Independence following the rising, was moved to remark on the death of Republican hunger striker Terence MacSwiney that ‘a country with a citizen like this will never surrender’.1 His name was Ho Chi Minh, and he would go on to emulate the guerrilla warfare tactics developed in Ireland as he took on the might of the United States’ war machine in the Vietnam War.

Disinformation, which is the same as lying but for some reason has a different name, is the top tactic in corporate negotiation/warfare

Kamikazes would sink at least 59 Allied vessels and damage over 300 by the end of the war, resulting in minimum casualty figures of 6,805 Americans killed and 9,923 wounded. The actual numbers likely ranged much higher due to lack of precise casualty figures from many ships, particularly those not sunk outright. That said, the rise in the use of kamikaze attacks was evidence of the loss of Japan’s air superiority and its waning industrial might. Altogether, nearly 4,000 kamikaze pilots died in combat between October 1944 and August 1945, and about one in seven managed to hit his target. At their peak, they did far more damage to the American Navy than did conventional air attacks, and they undoubtedly placed a significant new obstacle in the path of the American forces slowly encircling the Japanese home islands.

The paradoxical confusion is not usually over the New Testament writer’s awareness of spiritual warfare, but rather over the relative silence of the Evangelical church in North America about it, despite Scripture’s testimony to its reality. Why are so many Evangelical church leaders so hesitant to talk about this topic publicly? Why so hesitant to train people to distinguish between the various tactics and warfare strategies of the world, the flesh, and the devil? The short answer is fear. We fear the unknown, and we fear potential theological associations with groups or individuals who abuse this subject.

EO promoted itself as providing five key services to clients: strategic and tactical military advisory services; an array of sophisticated military training packages in land, sea, and air warfare; peacekeeping or “persuasion” services; advice to armed forces on weapons selection and acquisition; and paramilitary services.

Boyd got the idea for “O-O-D-A” loops (he used dashes indicate that the steps are not distinct, but flow into each other) from observing the effects of jerky, unexpected, and abrupt maneuvers in air-to-air combat. After deciding that it was his quick OODA loops that allowed him to fight this way, Boyd defined “agility” in these terms: A side in a conflict or competition is more agile than its opponent if it can execute its OODA loops more quickly. This generalizes the term agility from air-to-air combat and from warfare in general. It also turns out to be equivalent to the definition floated in chapter II, the ability to rapidly change one’s orientation, since it is orientation locking up under the stress of competition and conflict that causes OODA loops to slow and makes one predictable, rather than abrupt and unpredictable. Speed, that is physical velocity, may provide an important tactical option, but it is not The Way.77 In fact, speed increases momentum, which can make one more predictable.

simply that he asked what Jesus was praying at the right hand of the Father, and then let the Jesus inside of him pray those prayers. As John described it:

Hence the saying: If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not your enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither your enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.

The three classic levels of war – strategic, operational, and tactical – still exist in Fourth Generation war. But all three are affected, and to some extent changed, by the Fourth Generation. One important change is that, while in the first three generations strategy was the province of generals, the Fourth Generation has given us the “strategic corporal.” These days, the actions of a single enlisted man can have strategic consequences, especially if they happen to take place when cameras are rolling. The Second Persian Gulf War provides numerous examples. In one case, U.S. Marines had occupied a Shi’ite town in southern Iraq. A Marine corporal was leading a patrol through the town when it encountered a funeral procession coming the other way. The corporal ordered his men to stand aside and take their helmets off as a sign of respect. Word of that action quickly spread around town, and it helped the Marines’ effort to be welcomed as liberators. That in turn had a strategic impact, because the American strategy depended upon keeping Shi’ite southern Iraq quiet in order for American supply lines to pass through the territory.

These changes point to another of the dilemmas that typify Fourth Generation war: what succeeds on the tactical level can easily be counter-productive at the operational and strategic levels. For example, by using their overwhelming firepower at the tactical level, state forces may in some cases intimidate the local population into fearing them and leaving them alone. But fear and hate are closely related, and if the local population ends up hating the state forces, that works toward their strategic defeat.

Fourth Generation war poses an especially difficult problem to operational art: put simply, it is difficult to operationalize. Often, Fourth Generation opponents have strategic centers of gravity that are intangible. These may involve proving their manhood to their comrades and local women, obeying the commandments of their religion, or demonstrating their tribe’s bravery to other tribes. Because operational art is the art of focusing tactical actions on enemy strategic centers of gravity, operational art becomes difficult or even impossible.

The game of connection and isolation will therefore be central to tactics and operational art as well as to strategy and grand strategy. It is important to ensure that what you are doing at the tactical level does not alienate independent power centers with which you need to connect at the operational or strategic levels. Similarly, you need to be careful not to isolate yourself today from independent power centers to which you will need to connect tomorrow.

This leads to the central dilemma of Fourth Generation war: what works for you on the physical (and sometimes mental) level often works against you at the moral level. It is therefore very easy to win all the tactical engagements in a Fourth Generation conflict yet still lose the war. To the degree you win at the physical level by utilizing firepower that causes casualties and property damage to the local population, every physical victory may move you closer to moral defeat, and the moral level is decisive.

Fortunately, there is a simple tool that can help meet this complex challenge: the grid. The Grid Physical Mental Moral Tactical Operational Strategic By using the grid to evaluate every proposed mission before it is undertaken, it is often possible to avoid the sorts of contradictions and unwanted second-order effects that bedevil actions by state militaries in Fourth Generation wars. How can you do that? By asking what the effects of the mission are likely to be in each of the nine boxes. Let’s consider three examples, looking just at the basics.

We also see the power of weakness. In Fourth Generation warfare, the weak often have more moral power than the strong. One of the first people to employ the power of weakness was Mahatma Gandhi. Gandhi’s insistence on non-violent tactics to defeat the British in India was and continues to be a classic strategy of Fourth Generation war. When the British responded to Indian independence rallies with violence, they immediately lost the moral war.

Changing the mindset of your men is not a “one-off” event. It must start immediately and continue throughout training. One part of this is an ongoing education program to teach troops about the basics of light infantry. Such an education program may consist of guided professional reading with linked discussions, tactical decision games, sand-table exercises, and tactical exercises without troops.

Empathy and integration permit effective cultural intelligence, which is to say, becoming able to understand how the society works. In Fourth Generation war, virtually all useful intelligence is human intelligence (HUMINT). Often, such HUMINT must both be gathered and acted on with stealth techniques, where the state’s actions remain invisible to the local population. As in Third Generation war (maneuver warfare), the tactical level in Fourth Generation conflicts is reconnaissance-driven, not intelligence-driven. The information state militaries need will almost always come from below, not from higher-level headquarters.

The lecturer’s name was Dr. Shen Weiguang, and although he’s now regarded as the founding sage of Chinese information warfare theory, his views were then on the fringe in strategic circles in the Middle Kingdom. “Virus-infected microchips can be put in weapon systems,” he pointed out. “An arms manufacturer can be asked to write a virus into software, or a biological weapon can be embedded into the computer system of an enemy nation and then activated as needed. . . . Preparation for a military invasion can include hiding self-destructing microchips in systems designed for export.” Tactics like these, he said, could have profound strategic implications if carried out carefully and systematically. They could “destroy the enemy’s political, economic, and military information infrastructures, and, perhaps, even the information infrastructure for all of society.” If China could do that, Shen said, it could achieve the greatest of all strategic military objectives: It could “destroy the enemy’s will to launch a war or wage a war.

The agents of imperial demise would certainly be backed up by military power—the Chinese have never wavered in that view—but the agents would be many and varied: economic, legal, public relations—and electronic sabotage. The success of George Soros’s then recent speculative attack on the currencies of several East Asian nations impressed but appalled the Chinese (who have pegged their own currency to the dollar in part to discourage such tactics). Soros and his traders had driven down the value of these currencies, forcing them into line with their true worth! But that point was lost on Qiao and Wang, as it was lost on noncapitalists (i.e., most people) around the world, who saw only economic chaos in Asia created by Western capitalists. To the authors of Unrestricted Warfare, these attacks were a form of economic terrorism on par with bin Laden’s bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa, Aum Shinrikyo’s sarin gas attack in the Tokyo subway, and the depredations of malicious hackers on the Internet. They “represent semi-warfare, quasi-warfare, and sub-warfare, that is, the embryonic form of another kind of warfare.” Such warfare knows no boundaries, and against it, borders have no meaning.

carriers again set out to

difficult situation, the Iraqi civilian trying to care for a family amid chaos and violence. They are the people who pay every day with blood and tears for the failures of high officials and powerful institutions. The run-up to the war is particularly significant because it also laid the shaky foundation for the derelict occupation that followed, and that constitutes the major subject of this book. While the Bush administration—and especially Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, and L. Paul Bremer III—bear much of the responsibility for the mishandling of the occupation in 2003 and early 2004, blame also must rest with the leadership of the U.S. military, who didn’t prepare the U.S. Army for the challenge it faced, and then wasted a year by using counterproductive tactics that were employed in unprofessional ignorance of the basic tenets of counter-insurgency warfare. The undefeated Saddam Hussein of 1991 The 2003 U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq can’t be viewed in isolation. The chain of events began more than a decade earlier with the botched close of the 1991 Gulf War and then it continued in the U.S. effort to contain Saddam Hussein in the years that followed.

MARCH 23 YOU WILL BE SOBER AND VIGILANT AGAINST YOUR ADVERSARY MY CHILD, REMEMBER that you are not living in darkness, but I have made you aware of the evil schemes of the devil. Stay awake and watchful, for you should not be surprised by anything the enemy may try to do. Because you belong to the day, put on faith and love as a breastplate, and wear the helmet of salvation when you attempt to make war against Satan. With your mind alert and sober, set your hope on the grace that will be revealed to you when My Son returns to bring you home to heaven. Be holy in all you do. Live out your time here as a foreigner. Purify yourself with My holy Word. Resist the devil, and stand firm in your faith. 1 THESSALONIANS 5:4–11; 1 PETER 1:13–15; 5:8 Prayer Declaration I am sober and vigilant against my adversary, the devil. I am prepared to be victorious over his evil attacks, and I have armed myself with the breastplate of faith and love and the helmet of salvation. Because of the salvation of Christ, I am able to see the evil schemes and tactics of Satan before they are able to do harm to me or my family. He may cause me to suffer, but he will never be able to overcome me or to take me out of the protection of God, my Father.

tactical refusal of confrontation is itself only a stratagem of warfare. It’s easy to understand, for example, why the Oaxaca Commune immediately declared itself peaceful. It wasn’t a matter of refuting war, but of refusing to be defeated in a confrontation with the Mexican state and its henchmen. As some Cairo comrades explained it, “One mustn’t mistake the tactic we employ when we chant ‘nonviolence’ for a fetishizing of non-violence

Tactical ethics, by my own definition, is the moral and ethical armor that accompanies our warriors into battle. It applies to the engaged unit as well as to the individual. The Laws of Land Warfare and theater-specific rules of engagement (ROEs) define the legal combat boundaries within which our warriors must function. Tactical ethics augment these legal constraints. Together, they define the limits and structure—the permissions and the prohibitions—that govern the lethal work of combat. They allow the warrior to take life in the name of his nation and his profession, and they guide him in issues of discrimination and proportionality in the use of force.

After the war, Manor returned to New York University and finished his degree in 1947. Later that year he became an instructor at the air tactical school at Tyndal Field, Florida. Following that assignment he went to Maxwell Air Force Base at Montgomery, Alabama, and helped organize the squadron officers’ school, staying on to teach the first class. He departed Maxwell for the Tactical Air Command air-ground operations school at Southern Pines, North Carolina.

In the eighteenth century the extreme expense of highly professionalized armies made them far too precious to be risked in battle once technological innovations in warfare made actual fighting so lethal; advantages accruing to the defense imperiled any army that actually sought battle.19 * Battles became actions of maneuver, culminating in the tactical withdrawal of one party once it was forced into an untenable position. Similarly, in the second half of the twentieth century, nuclear weapons—which, once mutual and secure against pre-emption, gave to the defense an asset of infinite value—made the hot battles of the First and Second World Wars too risky for the U.S. and the USSR.

According to a former drone operator for the military’s Joint Special Operations Command, the National Security Agency often identifies targets for drone strikes based on controversial metadata analysis and cell phone tracking technologies—an unreliable tactic that results in the deaths of innocent or unidentified people. Rather than confirming a target’s identity with operatives or informants on the ground, the CIA or the U.S. military orders a strike based on the activity and location of the mobile phone a person is believed to be using.

The tactics used by the English in their warfare with the Indians crossed the foggy dividing line between strategic deception and outright immorality.

In the end, Adams believes, we “may come to regard tactical warfare as properly the business of machines and not appropriate for people at all.”7

The Spartans’ unusual aggression probably arose from the atypical dual kingship, which would have set two ruling families against each other in efforts to be acclaimed the best in warfare, manliness, policy, and wealth.

The tight Spartiate oligarchy, the habitual privacy among messmates, periodic expulsions of foreigners from Lacedaemon (xenēelasia),32 and Spartans’ devotion to ‘laconic’ speech–their peculiar form of eloquence, substituting pithy responses for lengthy discussions–produced a security-minded secretiveness unusual in ancient Greece. Spartans could keep their own counsel. This, combined with a native penchant for deceit and craftiness, made the ruse de guerre a common feature of Spartan warfare.

Here’s how two countries fight these days. First, they declare the type and quantity of all of their tactical and strategic weapons. Then a computer can determine the outcome of the war according to their mutual rates of destruction. Weapons are purely for deterrence and are never used. Warfare is a computer execution of a mathematical model, the results of which decide the victor and loser.

The virtue of patience disarms the tactics of the devil, who loves drama. Demons tempt us to treat ourselves and family members impatiently. These temptations turn us against ourselves and loved ones, making us angry and resentful. Bearing with yourself requires patience. Bearing with your loved ones calls for greater patience.

The various branches of the US military have special operations forces. These are made up of units of soldiers who have been specially trained to tackle the most risky and dangerous military operations in the world—most of which are never heard about by the general public. Special-ops forces such as the Navy SEALs, Army Green Berets, Marine RECONs, and Air Force Special Tactics are comprised of the most elite soldiers in the world. Their training is beyond rigorous, and the qualifications to join such exclusive groups of warriors are extremely high. These elite soldiers make up a small percentage of the total military, but they are the tip of the spear when it comes to critical combat operations. These units usually operate in small numbers, drop behind enemy lines, practice tactics repetitively before executing a given operation, and train for every combat condition they might encounter. But even with an exceptional level of training and expertise, there is one critical component that is absolutely necessary for them to successfully reach their objective: communication. These elite special-ops fighters are part of a larger overarching entity with which they must stay in communication—SOCOM. This acronym stands for Special Operations Command.1 Key to their success from the elite soldier on the field all the way to the commander-in-chief is communication through SOCOM. A unit or soldier on mission in the theater of battle can have the latest weapons and technology, but they cannot access the fuller power and might of the military without the critical link—communications. If a satellite phone goes down or can’t access a signal, this life-or-death communication is broken. Without the ability to call in for air support when being overrun, medical evacuation when someone is injured, or passing on key intelligence information to SOCOM, an operation can be compromised. When communication is absent, things can go south in a hurry. In the realm of special military operations, communication is life.

Russia has perfected political warfare by using cyber assets to personally attack and neutralize political opponents. They call it Kompromat. They hack into computers or phones to gather intelligence, expose this intelligence (or false data they manufacture out of whole cloth) through the media to create scandal, and thereby knock an opponent or nation out of the game. Russia has attacked Estonia, the Ukraine, and Western nations using just these cyberwarfare methods. At some point Russia apparently decided to apply these tactics against the United States and so American democracy itself was hacked.

Today’s rebel groups rely on guerrilla warfare and organized terror: a sniper firing from a rooftop; a homemade bomb delivered in a package, detonated in a truck, or concealed on the side of a road. Groups are more likely to try to assassinate opposition leaders, journalists, or police recruits than government soldiers. Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, masterminded the use of suicide bombings to kill anyone cooperating with the Shia-controlled government during Iraq’s civil war. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of ISIS, perfected the use of massive car bombs to attack the same government. Hamas’s main tactic against Israel has been to target average Israeli citizens going about their daily business. Most Americans cannot imagine another civil war in their country. They assume our democracy is too resilient, too robust to devolve into conflict. Or they assume that our country is too wealthy and advanced to turn on itself. Or they assume that any rebellion would quickly be stamped out by our powerful government, giving the rebels no chance. They see the Whitmer kidnapping plot, or even the storming of the U.S. Capitol, as isolated incidents: the frustrated acts of a small group of violent extremists. But this is because they don’t know how civil wars start.

In modern military colleges strategic theory often receives significantly less attention than subjects such as defence management and procurement. The result of such an approach is that the military tend towards an over-reliance on simplistic principles concerned with tactical and operational issues, such as the Principles of War.