Mission Command in the Information Age: A Normal Accidents Perspective on Networked Military Operations

Abstract

Theory on the use of information technology in military operations assumes that bringing together units in an information network helps units to work together. Decentralized command systems such as mission command have been proposed for these networks, so that units can adapt to changes in their turbulent working environments. Others have proposed centralized command systems that permit higher organizational levels to closely direct military operations. This article uses Perrow’s (1984, 1999) Normal Accidents Theory to propose that increasing interdependencies between units in information networks places incompatible demands on the design of networked military operations. It is concluded that networked military operations require decentralized command approaches, but only under the condition that interdependencies between modules of networked units are weak rather than tight. This precondition is essential for retaining control over networked military operations.

Key Words:

• Network-Centric Warfare
• Mission Command (Auftragstaktik)
• Military Innovation
• Military Transformation

Notes

¹ Bradford Booth, Meyer Kestnbaum, and David R. Segal, ‘Are Post-Cold War Militaries Postmodern?’ Armed Forces & Society 27/3 (Spring 2001), 319–42. Kenton G. Fasana, ‘Using Capabilities to Drive Military Transformation: An Alternative Framework’ Armed Forces and Society 37/1 (Jan. 2011), 141–62. Anders McD. Sookermany, ‘The Embodied Soldier: Towards a New Epistemological Foundation of Soldiering Skills in the (Post) Modernized Norwegian Armed Forces’, Armed Forces and Society 37/3 (July 2010), 469–93.

² Eitan Shamir, Transforming Command: The Pursuit of Mission Command in the US, UK, and Isaeli Armies (Stanford UP 2011); Stephen Bungay, The Art of Action. How Leaders Close the Gaps between Plans, Actions, and Results (London: Nicholas Brealey Publishing 2011); Ad L. W. Vogelaar and Eric-Hans Kramer, ‘Mission Command in Dutch Peace Support Operations’ Armed Forces and Society 30/3 (Spring 2004), 412.

³ Vogelaar and Kramer, ‘Mission Command’, 409–31.

⁴ We use the term networked military operations to refer to military operations where IT is used for sharing information and communication. For more information on different approaches to networked military operations see: Theo Farrell and Sten Rynning, ‘NATO's Transformation Gaps: Transatlantic Differences and the War in Afghanistan’, Journal of Strategic Studies 33/5 (Oct. 2010), 673–99.

⁵ More information about NCW and the value chain can be found in the research report of the NATO RTO Task Group SAS-065, <http://www.dodccrp.org/files/N2C2M2_web_optimized.pdf>. See also David S. Alberts, John J. Garstka, and Frederick P. Stein, Network Centric Warfare (Washington DC: CCRP Publication Series 1999).

⁶ David S. Alberts and Richard E. Hayes, Power to the Edge: Command and Control in the Information Age (Washington DC: CCRP Publication Series 2003). David S. Alberts and Richard E. Hayes, Understanding Command and Control (Washington DC: CCRP Publication Series 2006).

⁷ Damon Coletta and Peter D. Feaver, ‘Civilian Monitoring of US Military Operations in the Information Age’, Armed Forces and Society 33/1 (Oct. 2006), 106–26.

⁸ Eitan Shamir, ‘The Long and Winding Road: The US Army Managerial Approach to Command and The Adoption of Mission Command (Auftragstaktik)’, Journal of Strategic Studies 33/5 (Oct. 2010), 645–72.

⁹ Thomas S. Sowers, ‘Nanomanagement – Superior Control and Subordinate Authority in Conflict’, Doctoral thesis, London School of Economics (2011), 67–74.

¹⁰ Douglas A. Macgregor, Transformation Under Fire – Revolutionizing How America Fights (Westport, CT: Praeger 2006).

¹¹ Robert R. Leonhard, The Principles of War for the Information Age (Novato, CA: Presidio 1998).

¹² Sowers, ‘Nanomanagement’, 70.

¹³ Eliot A. Cohen, ‘Change and Transformation in Military Affairs’, Journal of Strategic Studies 27/3 (Sept. 2004), 395–407. David J. Betz, ‘The More You Know, the Less You Understand: The Problem with Information Warfare’, Journal of Strategic Studies 29/3 (Sept. 2006), 505–33.

¹⁴ Stephen Bungay, ‘The Road to Mission Command: The Genesis of a Mission Command Philosophy’, The British Army Review 137 (Summer 2005), 22–9; Bungay, The Art of Action; Keith G. Stewart, ‘The Evolution of Command Approach’, paper presented at the 15th International Command and Control Research and Technology Symposium, Santa Monica, CA, 23 June 2010; Shamir, ‘The Long and Winding Road’, 645–72.

¹⁵ Shamir, The Long and Winding Road, 647; Shamir, Transforming Command, 33. New technologies that were used by von Moltke included rail and river transportation, breach-loading artillery, and the telegraph. See Antullio J. Echevarria, After Clausewitz: German Military Thinkers before the Great War (Lawrence: University of Kansas, 2000), 38.

¹⁶ Ibid.

¹⁷ Keith Spacie, ‘Mission command in Peace Support Operations: Does it Apply?’, in Peter Essens, Ad Vogelaar, Erhan Tanercan, and Donna Winslow (eds), The Human in Command: Peace Support Operations (Amsterdam/Breda: Mets & Schilt/KMA 2001), 205–11.

¹⁸ For an overview of differences between US and UK mission command approaches, see Thomas S. Sowers, ‘Nanomanagement’, 67–74.

¹⁹ Bungay, The Art of Action, 54–89. Shamir, ‘The Long and Winding Road’, 645–72.

²⁰ Keith G. Stewart, ‘Mission Command: Problem Bounding or Problem Solving?’, Canadian Military Journal 9/4 (2009), 50–9.

²¹ Vogelaar and Kramer, ‘Mission Command’, 409–31.

²² Alberts and Hayes, Understanding Command and Control, 91–2.

²³ Vogelaar and Kramer, ‘Mission Command’, 409–31.

²⁴ Coletta and Feaver, ‘Civilian Monitoring’, 106–26.

²⁵ Eitan Shamir, Transforming Command, 188.

²⁶ Coletta and Feaver, ‘Civilian Monitoring’, 121.

²⁷ Christine van Burken, ‘The Non-neutrality of Technology’, Military Review 93/3 (2013), 39–47.

²⁸ Charles Perrow, ‘A Personal Note on Normal Accidents’, Organization Environment 17/9 (March 2004), 9–14.

²⁹ Charles Perrow, Normal Accidents: Living with High-Risk Technologies (Princeton UP 1999; New York: Basic Books 1984), 72–3.

³⁰ Perrow, Normal Accidents, 333.

³¹ Ibid.

³² Martin van Creveld, Command in War (Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP 1985).

³³ Perrow, Normal Accidents, 92.

³⁴ Van Creveld, Command in War, 269.

³⁵ Macgregor, Transformation Under Fire, 12.

³⁶ Perrow, Normal Accidents, 334.

³⁷ Scott D. Sagan, The Limits of Safety: Organizations, Accidents, and Nuclear Weapons (Princeton UP 1993), 40.

³⁸ Van Creveld, Command in War, 270.

³⁹ James D. Thompson, Organizations in Action: Social Sciences Bases of Administrative Theory (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction 2003 rev. ed./ New York: McGraw-Hill 1967).

⁴⁰ Karl E. Weick, Making Sense of the Organization, Volume II: The Impermanent Organization (Southern Gate, Chichester: Wiley 2009), 54.

⁴¹ See Charles Perrow; ‘Difficulties with Network Centric Warfare’, in Jacques S. Gansler and Hans Binnendijk (eds), Information Assurance: Trends in Vulnerabilities, Threats, and Technologies (Washington DC: National Defense Univ. 2004), 132–46.

⁴² Ibid., 143.

⁴³ Ibid., 144.

⁴⁴ Ibid., 143.

⁴⁵ Carliss Y. Baldwin and Kim B. Clark, ‘Managing in an Age of Modularity’, Harvard Business Review 75/5 (Oct. 1997), 84–93.

⁴⁶ Melissa A. Schilling, ‘Toward a General Modular Systems Theory and its Application to Interfirm Product Modularity’, Academy of Management Review 25/2 (April 2000), 312–25.

⁴⁷ Erik De Waard and Eric-Hans Kramer, ‘Tailored Task Forces: Temporary Organizations and Modularity’, International Journal of Project Management 26/5 (July 2008), 544.

⁴⁸ See Douglas A. Macgregor, Breaking the Phalanx: A New Design for Landpower in the 21st Century (Westport, CT: Praeger 1997).

⁴⁹ De Waard and Kramer, ‘Tailored Task Forces’, 544.

⁵⁰ J.A. Bonin and E. Telford, ‘The Modular Army’, Military Review, March--April (2004), 21–7. Erik De Waard, Engaging Environmental Turbulence, Doctoral thesis, Rotterdam: Erasmus Univ. 2010.

⁵¹ See Macgregor, Transformation Under Fire, 119–54. S. Johnson, J. Peters, K. Kitchens, A. Martin, and J. Fischbach, A Review of the Army’s Modular Force Structure (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corp. 2012).

⁵² A. Ryan, Putting Your Young Men into the Mud. Land and Warfare Studies Centre, Working Paper No. 124 (Dandroon, Australia: Army Land Warfare Studies Centre 2003).

⁵³ Macgregor, Transformation under Fire, 129.

⁵⁴ Perrow, ‘Difficulties with Network Centric Warfare’, 139.

⁵⁵ Ibid.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Bart Van Bezooijen

Bart van Bezooijen is post-doctoral research fellow at the Department of Industrial Engineering & Innovation Sciences of the Eindhoven University of Technology (Netherlands). He is part of the research program ‘Moral fitness of military personnel in a networked environment’, which is supported by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) under grant number 313-99-110.

Eric-Hans Kramer

Eric-Hans Kramer is associate professor Human Factors and Systems Safety at the Netherlands Defence Academy.