In the second Red Team Journal occasional paper, “Red Team Reign,” GEN Carter Ham, COL (Ret.) Greg Fontenot, LTC David Pendall, and Mr. Larry Closter advocate the use of red teaming in support of joint task force decision processes. The authors provide first-hand insight into how the practice of red teaming has evolved in recent years and offer a variety of useful observations, insights, and recommendations.
RTJ readers have been pretty quiet lately. I’d like to spur some discussion by intentionally posing a controversial argument:
- On a tactical level–where choices have direct consequences, and real learning sometimes does occur–red teaming can make a difference.
- On a strategic level–where policy is charted and events are saturated in political opportunism–red teaming is worthless.
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The idea that one should study warfare and national security history, theory, and “science” in order to make instruments of national security more effective is so accepted within government and the military that is banal. In academia, it is substantially more controversial. Without giving into stereotypes of “tenured radicals” that are less valid today (a time of heightened cooperation between academics and the government on national security), it is eminently justifiable to point out that the intimate connection between government and academia fostered during World War II and the early years of the Cold War is a thing of the past. Moreover, the idea that the study of warfare in order to make one’s nation more effective at the winning of military operations, campaigns, and wars is vastly more controversial today than it has been in the past. However, it shouldn’t be–and enabling one’s forces to win is a noble goal for research and analysis. [click to continue ...]
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There’s a new article in Joint Forces Quarterly on the perennial issue of the American interpretation of Clausewitz’s Center of Gravity (COG). The article makes the point that the definition of the COG in Joint Publication 5-0 (as well as the general American interpretation of the COG) is incoherent and proposes a new operational definition: “The center of gravity is the primary entity that possesses the inherent capability to achieve the objective.” The author also argues that a slavish devotion to the COG definition originally laid down by Carl von Clausewitz is inappropriate. [click to continue ...]
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We are pleased to launch the Red Team Journal occasional paper series with an article by John P. Sullivan and Adam Elkus titled “Adaptive Red Teaming: Protecting Across the Spectrum.” In the article, John and Adam propose three methods of improving analytical red teaming and discuss each in turn. Additional papers in the series will follow in the coming months.
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Cross-domain red teaming, also called multidimensional or full spectrum red teaming portrays real adversaries better than single-domain red teaming. Cross domain doesn’t refer to Microsoft domains or multilevel security domains. We’re talking about how attacks by real adversaries take advantage of three major security domains–cyber, physical, and human–to attack systems. Small digression–here at Sandia, we define systems as a combination of people, processes, and technologies–not as a computer system alone. Thus, cross-domain red teaming attacks systems through the people, their processes, and the technology (cyber or physical) to achieve the effect that the portrayed adversary would want. [click to continue ...]
It is a tenet of modern strategic theory and practice that globalization has made local problems international. An ethnic revolt, tyrannical dictator, environmental disaster, or criminal gang’s operations in a distant land can have repercussions in Miami, Los Angeles, or New York. The problem is that these analyses start by stating a threat and then proceed to strategies for dealing with them. Rather, we ought to begin to think about our policy. [click to continue ...]
As campy is it is (especially in light of Chuck Norris’ general canon), the trailer linked above represents one of decision-makers’ worst national security nightmares during the 1960s to the early 1980s: a hijacking and hostages scenario. What UCLA’s David Rapaport calls the “New Left Wave” of paramilitary terrorism featured a number of groups, ranging from highly competent state-supported terrorists with military training and tactical skill to disjointed student radicals playing Che with pipe bombs and poorly written “radical manifestos.” Many groups were somewhat in between. It is sometimes difficult to recognize it in today’s threat environment, but the state’s tactical and operational response to the New Left Wave’s tactical challenge is one of the great success stories in national security policy. [click to continue ...]
I am something of a science fiction fan. I love things having to do with giant robots, artificial intelligence, aliens, etc. And as I’ve written with Crispin Burke, science fiction can be an interesting lens to look at present defense debates. One of the more interesting contemporary examples of this is Robert Heinlein’s novel Starship Troopers. [click to continue ...]
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One of the biggest hot-button issues in strategy today is limited war. The degree of restraint and the amount of force that can be employed without jeopardizing the mission is both an ethical and operational controversy in counterinsurgency theory and practice. There’s also a growing frustration over the way that the West has been constrained in utilizing force against irregulars and rogue states that do not play by the rules. Shelby Steele’s June 21 op-ed, “The Surrender of the West” typifies a certain kind of reaction to this feeling of futility. The problem, however, is that we have been living in an era of what might broadly can be called “limited warfare” for over sixty years. And this limit may be structural. [click to continue ...]
