Operations planning revisited: theoretical and practical implications of methodology

Abstract

Parts of NATO’s contemporary planning framework called the comprehensive operations planning directive (COPD), and parts of the operation-level planning process should be revised since they suffer from methodological inconsistency. This claim is defended by discussing contradicting methodological properties and heuristics applied when framing and managing a military problem in accordance with the COPD. The methodological inconsistency within the COPD; in other words, simultaneously applying contradictory methodological properties, implies one theoretical and three practical implications. The theoretical implication is summarised in a meta-theoretical framework and explained by discussing five methodological properties: non-linearity, emergence, independently changeable generalisations, invariance and boundaries. The three practical implications of methodology imply that methodology is guiding: the problem-frame, conceptual development and action. To improve military planners’ understanding and management of these four identified implications, NATO is recommended to develop a “handbook of methodology.” The purpose of such a handbook should be to emphasise the utility of methodology when planning military operations.

Keywords:

• Operations planning
• methodology
• COPD
• complexity
• causalist approach
• systemic approach

Acknowledgment

I would like to thank prof. Till Grüne-Yanoff and two anonymous referees of this journal for many helpful comments and suggestions.

Notes

1. Operational level: “The level at which campaigns and major operations are planned, conducted and sustained to accomplish strategic objectives within theaters or areas of operations” (NATO 2013, p. lex-14). The OLPP is “developed to support a joint force commander (JFC) and his staff in conducting operational-level planning” (NATO 2013, p. 3-1).

2. The characteristics of ill-structured problems are given by Simon (1973). Whether ill-structured and wicked problems should be considered as synonyms is debatable, but they are considered as synonyms in this article.

3. For examples of epistemic and metaphysical issues, see, for example: Checkland (1983); Richardson et al. (2000); Vego (2008); Wass de Czege (2009); Haug and Maao (2011); Odgaard (2014); Angstrom and Widen (2015a).

4. The causalist approach is also associated with reductionism; see, for example, Pearl (2000), and Russo (2009). The term system is also associated with two adjectives, systemic or systematic. See, for example, Flood and Carson (1993).

5. The paper focuses on the operational level and for further information about other planning levels and each phase see NATO (2013, pp. 4-5, 4-13, 4-32, 4-78, 4-111).

6. The COPD has more than 400 pages and issues of practical and educational usefulness of the document can and should be debated, but these kinds of issues are outside the scope of this article. The choice of heuristics is not crucial as one might assume since many of the heuristics are not explained in such a detailed manner that a military planner can read the COPD and then conduct operations planning without further guidance. As stated earlier, focus is on methodology; hence, discussing descriptive matters such as experiences of operations planners and empirical outcomes of conducted campaigns is irrelevant for this paper. Although descriptive perspectives are important and valuable, such empirical inquiry merits further research. For further description of a main part, a phase, a step and a heuristic, see NATO (2013).

7. For an introduction to complexity theory, see, for example, Hooker (2011), Jackson (2003), Mingers (2006) and Midgley (2003).

8. Cillier’s view is chosen since it offers a consistent link between a few of the most important systemic properties such as non-linearity and emergence (this has also been argued by Midgley (2000), Jackson (2003) and Mingers (2014). For further information, see Cilliers (1998).

9. COPD states that “Rather than trying to identify and demonstrate how changes in the environment can be ‘attributed’ to particular actions (implying causal relations), it may be more constructive to talk about how activities might or might not have contributed to the creation of effects or the achievement of objectives” (NATO 2010, p. 5-20). This seems a bit unreasonable; why plan to conduct an action if one doesn’t believe that a specific action will generate a specific outcome or effect? Can one plan without some notion of causation?

10. This notion is also called spatiotemporality and means that both the action and the effect have to happen in the same space (location) during a specific time frame.

11. There are many views on the term mechanism and Hedström and Ylikoski (2010) discuss nine different definitions and conclude that “the mechanism approach has considerable consequences for how theoretical work ought to be conducted … in order to explain macro-level change, rigorous theorizing is needed that explicitly considers the micro-level mechanisms at work and the dynamic processes that they give rise to” (Hedström and Ylikoski 2010, p. 64).

12. For further discussions on the incompatibility of the two methodological approaches, see, for example, Richardson et al. (2000), Bunge (2000), Jackson (2003) and Russo (2010).

13. Examples are General systems theory, Complex systems theory, Hard systems thinking, Soft systems thinking, Critical systems thinking and methods like Soft systems methodology and Total systems intervention. Examples of sub-disciplines are: open systems theory, cybernetics, chaos theory and complexity theory. For more information, see, for example, Jackson (1991), and Checkland and Scholes (1999).

14. Examples of other issues are given by, for example, Russo (2007), Bunge (2004), Flood and Jackson (1991), Mingers and White (2010) and Jackson (2001).

15. See NATO (2013, pp. 2-7, 2-12, 4-10, 4-11, 4-18, 4-21, 4-39, 4-43, 5-1, 5-4).

16. Many philosophers and scholars have contributed to the academic development of causation and explanation, for example, Hume, Hegel, Mill, Mackie and so on. For more information on different perspectives on causation, see, for example, Pearl (2000), Psillos (2002), Woodward (2003), Cartwright (2007) Bunge (2009), Illari et al. (2011), and Illari and Russo (2014).

17. Bunge (2009) addresses the methodological problem of causality in the social sciences stating that “Every person counts on certain causal links when, intent on causing someone else to do something or on preventing somebody from causing him to behave in a given manner.” (Bunge 2009, p. 366) The sequencing of conditions, actions and effects, as stated in COPD, implies that operations planning is trying to do exactly that – to cause a component or a system condition to behave in a predetermined manner.

18. This theory also has problematic issues, for example, that the system has to be modular and those two variables might show the same time trend. For more criticism, see, for example, Cartwright (2007).

19. EBAO has an American predecessor called effects-based operations (EBO). Whether these two concepts are synonyms is debatable, see, for example, Carpenter and Andrews 2009, but this article addresses them as the same concept.

20. Further arguments on EBAO are given by, for example: Davis (2001), Smith (2003), Vego (2006), Kelly and Kilcullen (2006), Smith-Windsor (2008) and Jobbágy (2009).

21. The comprehensive approach is outside the scope of this paper, but can very shortly be described as “enhancing integrated civilian-military planning and development of process and structures for effective co-ordination and co-operation with other actors, to allow each to complement and mutually reinforce the others’ efforts, ideally within an overall strategy agreed by the international community and legitimate local authorities” (NATO 2013, p. 1-1). Further examples on how EBO and CA can be interlinked to operations planning are described in, for example: Mitchell (2010), and Splidsboel Hansen (2009).

22. The usability of the COPD should be further researched since one could argue that its educational value might be limited based on the absence of references, arguments or explanations concerning issues of methodology related to the heuristics.