Throughout history surprise and deception have played a major part on the outcome of all major military conflicts. It is the desire of every military commander to achieve victory against the enemy with minimum attrition to own forces and equipment. In striving to realise this goal, milirary thinkers both past and present, have recognised the vital role which surprise action and deceptive practices play in achieving the objective. Although surprise itself cannot guarantee ...Read more >

Asymmetric warfare originally referred to war between two or more actors, or groups of actors, whose relative power differed by a significant amount (David small, Goliath big). Contemporary military thinkers tend to broaden this original meaning to include asymmetry of strategy or tactics the core idea is that "weaker" combatants will attempt to use strategy to offset deficience in quantity or quality. Today, the asymmetric threat paradigm is defined by radically ...Read more >

The end of the 20th century saw the emergency of a tremendous explosion in new technology and information access. The national security strategy of the United States describes the changes in the last decade as, "The world is undergoing an accelerating process of globalization in which technology is developing exponentially, information is exchanged around the globe cheaply and instantaneously economies are increasingly becoming ...Read more >

Conflict is as old as human existence. As the human race progressed, the nature of warfare also changed. Development of weapons led to creation of organizations which in turn depended on technology. Requirement of ideas or doctrines or strategy came up to use the equipments and organizations optimally. Large number of theories exist on trends in change in ...Read more >

"When the ground in front in raked by machine gun fire, torn by ball splinters, a soldiers will not emerge at all, because a man wearing certain badges tell him to. Those soldiers must feel that the man leading them is the man in whom they can confidently trust themselves. That requirements fulfilled the obligation of duty, the soldier s sense of responsibility and the discipline he has been taught - and has accepted - pays its dividend. But with no confidence in the leader, all your ...Read more >

Directive Control is the British term for the German word Auftragstaktik. The US Army refers to it as Mission Oriented orders. It is based on the effective delegation of authority. An underlying reason for promoting this concept of command and control is that the battlefield is a scene of uncertainty and that success in battle will come to those who exploit uncertainty to their advantage. Thus directive style of command depends on the commander giving a ...Read more >

From the earliest days of armed conflict military forces have endeavoured to occupy the "high ground" of the battlefield. The "high ground", whether it be a hill, a mountain, the air, or space, has always given the occupying force an advantage over his adversary. As a result, most successful armies have sought to find and control this "high ground". As technology advanced the definition of high ground changed. With the advent of the airplanes, air became the new high ...Read more >

One of the favorite buzz words for the last several years has been the idea of transformation. Transformation is a process by which the military achieves and maintains advantage through changes in operational concepts, organizational structure, and/or technologies that significantly improve its warfighting capabilities or ability to meet the demands of a changing security environment. As one can imagine, the term transformation can have many different ...Read more >

Deception has been an integral part of warfare since warfare came into being. Wise military planners throughout history have used deception. It is a low cost and effective way to cause the enemy to waste his efforts. Imaginative use of deception, coupled with aggressive training, improves combat effectiveness at all levels. It is the desire of every military commander to achieve victory against the enemy with minimum attrition to own forces and ...Read more >

Since the advent of warfare the main effort to win the war has been to put maximum combat power at the "decisive point" of the battlefield. In the information age with rapid advancements in Information Technology (IT) this has become all the more relevant since the forms of warfare are undergoing phenomenal changes. ...Read more >

The military professional operates in a community that is a subset of society. The community that the military professional operates in has a shared set of values and ethical standards. This shared set of values and ethical standards encompasses what is expressed in normal society but also goes a step further and outlines acceptable behaviour that is military-oriented specific. "LOyalty and obedience, integrity and courage, subordination of the self to the ...Read more >

Special operations (SO) are opetations conducted in hostile, denied, or politically sensitive environments to achieve military, diplomatic, informational, and/or economic objectives employing military capabitities for which there is no broad conventional force requirement. These operations often require covert, clandestine, or discreet capabilities. Special operations are applicable across the range of military opetations. They can be conducted independently or in ...Read more >

The nature of future opetations will be more complex, volatile, and lethal than ever experienced. Information flow will be quick and detailed. The advances of technology have reuced friction and uncertainty in certain areas of warfare. The Global Positioning System allows individual soldiers and forces to maneuver and know locations more accurately regardless or weather and terrain. Networked systems allow commanders to pass information faster vertically and ...Read more >

There has been profound changes in the last two decades of the 20th century which have altered our perceptions of the nature of future conflict and the mechanics of its rsolution. There has also been a sea change in the way nations perceive themselves and each other int the international system. The militaty will continue to be an important and critcal element of national power. However, Indian Military Extablishment requires creative adaptation, fundamental ...Read more >

Change is essential. Effecting change is not easy. This has been recognized by senior Army leaders throughout history. Defence transformation has preoccupied the U.S. Defence Department for over a decade and has the promise of a paradigm shift in the character and conduct of warfare. At the same time, it is more than simply overlaying new technologies and new hardware on existing force structures it requires fundamental changes in military doctrine, operations and organization. ...Read more >