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Abstract.
Much has been written on the conflicts in Bosnia and
Kosovo, arising from the breakup of Yugoslavia. This book provides
a unique personal perspective on both these conflicts, and modern
warfare in general, from the point of view of a
senior commander. As well as having been Supreme Allied Commander,
Europe during the conflict between NATO and Serbia, General Clark's
previous appointments gave him personal involvement in the international negotiations
surrounding the civil war in Bosnia. Although structured primarily as
a narrative of the events, the book covers the breadth
of issues in current debates on modern warfare, and the
structure of forces to fight and win these wars. It
includes discussion of joint and coalition operations, command and control,
the role of the media and other non-combatants, rules of
engagement, political involvement (or interference) in the military command and
control cycle, and the relationship between operational commander and defense
and civilian bureaucracies. It sets out many examples of distortions
of policy caused by forgetting its original intent. Perhaps the
most notable of these is the US policy of being
able to support military operations in two theatres simultaneously. Because
two particular theatres were mentioned as examples in the policy,
its implementation was often based on these two specific theatres,
leading to difficulties in supporting forces in the Balkans. Because
of the central, personal role of the author in the
major events described, this book will be an important resource
for future studies of the Kosovo conflict. In some ways,
this is likely to be more for its setting out
of the sequence of events and Clark's personal view than
for its analysis. In this respect, a number of critical
issues for modern warfare, especially coalition warfare, are raised without
detailed analysis. An important property of the military chain of
command has always been that it provides a means of
summarising the behaviour of a large number of soldiers into
a small number of subordinate organisations, each of which is
commanded as a single entity. While more detailed visibility of
a particular, critical, small part of a force is sometimes
required (Clauswitz's directed telescope), the concept of mission command means
discourages a commander from micro-managing subordinates. The influence of the
international media on public opinion (and through this on politicians),
especially relating to operations in Bosnia, had the effect of
greatly increasing commanders' needs to have detailed knowledge of operations
at the lowest levels. A key danger of this trend
for senior commanders is that it significantly increases their workload,
getting them much more involved in the minutie of operations,
and arguably distracting them from the big picture and their
primary role. A related, but equally important, problem experienced by
Clark was difficulty in defining the freedom of action available
to subordinate commanders. Several examples are given where he found
it necessary to overrule a decision made by a subordinate.
Once again, the influence of the media on political decision-making
was a key cause of Clark's difficulties in this area.
Wesley Clark's unique personal view of events alone is enough
to make this an important book on NATO's role in
Bosnia and Kosovo. The challenges faced by commanders in modern
warfare, raised throughout the book, may provide a starting point
for a much-needed, detailed analysis of these issues. Waging Modern
War is therefore of interest to those involved in the
current discussions on modern warfare. It sheds considerable light on
the US approach to military operations, particularly those directly in
support of US foreign policy.
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Related topics:
command and control, art of war, coalition operations, book review
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