Air University Review, January-February 1985
Lieutenant Colonel Dennis M. Drew
WAR is more than battle. War is more than the panoply of military and industrial actions that prepare and bring armed forces to battle. Rather, war is an all-encompassing struggle between societies, and battle is only its most obvious and deadly manifestation. America's experience in the Vietnam War illustrated that the impact of war on the fabric of society rivals the importance of events on the battlefield. In this sense, the Vietnam experience confirmed Clausewitz's most famous dictum that war is a continuation of political activity with the addition of other means.
Traditionally, Americans have had considerable difficulty in accepting that war was anything more than battle writ large. The American "principles of war" reflect this attitude. In theory, these principles are axiomatic doctrinal beliefs that offer fundamental guidance for the conduct of America's military crusades. In reality, they are principles of "battle" that present basic factors which military commanders should consider before sending or leading their forces into combat. Principles such as mass, maneuver, and surprise apply directly to battlefield situations but have only a tenuous relationship to the broader concept of a nation at war.
The American experience in Vietnam demonstrated that victory in battle does not necessarily lead to victory in war. Time and again, American forces defeated the enemy in battle. At the high point of our involvement, we could transport our troops anywhere in South Vietnam, engage any enemy force, and be confident of victory. We controlled the seas around Vietnam and the skies above. Nevertheless, we were unable to translate tactical victory into strategic victory. We were unable to win the war even though we won the battles. Thus one wonders if the Vietnam experience might indicate some higher order of principles that concern a nation at war rather than simply forces on the battlefield. This essay explores that possibility and focuses on four higher-order principles of war that are specifically related to the Vietnam experience. Other analysts may not agree with the formulation of these four principles. The important point, however, is that each of these principles offers evidence that factors far beyond the confines of battlefields affect the outcomes of wars. Taken as a group, these principles suggest that the American military establishment must expand its horizons beyond the blood and smoke of combat.
Expositions of the traditional principles of war make the point that the objective is the "master" principle. Folk wisdom about the Vietnam conflict holds that American objectives were ill-defined and thus formed the root cause of our problems. This assertion is debatable. Careful examination of the record indicates that broad American political objectives were clearly and consistently articulated from the late 1940s through the fall of Saigon in 1975. It is more accurate to state that the American military found it difficult to translate those political objectives into military objectives in the peculiar circumstances of the war. Worse, the American people found the political objectives unworthy of support in the face of the heavy costs of the war. All of this indicates that just as the objective is the master principle of battle, the political objective is the master principle of war.
The political objective is of paramount importance for at least three reasons. First, political objectives and enemy resistance to those objectives form the reasons for resorting to war. Political objectives define the goals of war and thus imply and circumscribe, but do not necessarily define, the objectives of military operations. In effect, political objectives assign broad roles and missions to the armed forces during hostilities. In the Vietnam conflict, political objectives controlled both the basic conduct of the war (e.g., North Vietnam would not be invaded) and many of the operational details of military operations (e.g., restrictions on the bombing of North Vietnam). Although many Americans prefer to believe that the restrictions imposed on the military in Vietnam by political objectives were unique to that war, the fact is that political objectives and politicians have had considerable control over military operations in virtually every American war.
One need only look to the Mexican War to find a president dictating strategy from the White House. In the Civil War, the political desire for quick victory played a part in the early Union disasters in northern Virginia. Lincoln personally hired and fired his generals as he sought decisive action on the battlefield. Later, in 1898, President William McKinley went so far as to establish a war room in the White House from which he directed military preparations with messages sent out via twenty-five telegraph lines installed specifically for that purpose. In World War II, the shape of the Allied effort (e.g., Europe first and the invasion of North Africa) was dictated as much by political considerations as by military exigencies. Finally, the political restrictions placed on military efforts in the Korean War offered an immediate foretaste of what would follow in Southeast Asia.
Political objectives affect the relationship among the various instruments of power and determine whether or not military actions are appropriate. In some cases, political objectives either cannot or should not be sought by military means. In crisis situations, the national leadership must determine not only whether successful military action will achieve the desired objective but also what nonmilitary actions are appropriate and how those actions can work in concert with military power. In the Vietnam conflict, it was clear that much more than military success was required if South Vietnam was to remain an independent state. A strong and independent South Vietnam required governmental reform, economic reform, military reform, and political stability, along with military success.
The third reason for the importance of political objectives has to do with motivation and morale. War is not to be undertaken lightly, for its consequences include the expenditure of human life and the destruction of things that mankind values. If the American people are to support such a costly undertaking, they must be presented with political objectives that they can support with both their blood and their treasure. To ensure this support, political objectives should meet three standards. First, they should be simple and straightforward. In the ideal case, they should be reducible to a short catch-phrase, such as "hang the Kaiser." Second, political objectives should be, or at least appear to be, morally and politically lofty. Americans wage crusades rather than wars and need objectives that fit the crusading image. Finally, political objectives must be perceived as vital to the interests of the United States. The American people will not and should not sacrifice their blood and treasure for trivial objectives.
In the Vietnam conflict, American political objectives failed to meet any of the three criteria. There was nothing simple and straightforward about the reasons for American involvement. The best catch-phrase for our objectives was "to contain communism," which somehow paled beside "hang the Kaiser," and other earlier war cries. Our objectives may have been morally lofty, but they were tarnished by the corruption and political infighting of those we were trying to assist. Finally, most Americans had a great deal of difficulty associating America's vital interests with a civil war in a small former French colony ten thousand miles across the Pacific.
The motivation and morale of society, which begins with well-conceived political objectives, can have a decisive effect on the nation's ability and will to prosecute a war successfully––particularly when the war spans a considerable length of time. In the Vietnam conflict, homefront morale crumbled as the war continued with no end in sight. In the final analysis, it was the American body politic, not the Vietcong or the North Vietnamese, that forced the withdrawal of American fighting forces from Vietnam.
Short of suffering an attack on Pearl Harbor, even the most carefully constructed political objectives will not result in unanimous American support for military action. Although Americans are fond of viewing the fractious political debate that surrounded our participation in the Vietnam conflict as something unique in American history, deeply divided political opinion has actually been the rule rather than the exception in the history of American warfare. Beginning with the Revolution in 1776, every major American war has caused great rifts in the citizenry, with the possible exceptions of the two world wars.
The problem is to maintain public support for the war effort. American popular support is contingent on the clear recognition that the sacrifices of the nation are leading, however slowly, to ultimate victory. For this reason, perceived progress becomes very important in a war of any significant length. It has been postulated that democratic societies cannot sustain long wars. However, this thesis has not been proved in the American experience. What has been demonstrated is that Americans have little patience with long struggles that seem to make little headway.
The first three years of the American Civil War caused terrible bloodshed but yielded few dramatic results. In Virginia, Union forces met with little but embarrassing defeat. In the West, Union forces had been very successful but still had not penetrated deeply into Dixie. War weariness swept the Union, and Lincoln's reelection was in some doubt. Finally, in 1864, Sherman was able to march on Atlanta and, after its capture, devastate the heart of Georgia. After three years, Union forces had finally attacked a vital center within the Confederacy, emerged as victors, perhaps ensured Lincoln's reelection, and kept the Union in the war. Progress could finally be clearly perceived.
In World War II, Americans faced an equally long and arduous struggle, but determination never seemed to wane. Progress was clear as battle maps showed Allied forces marching relentlessly toward the heart of both German and Japanese power. Three years after Pearl Harbor, American troops were on the Rhine and had returned to the Philippines. Progress was easily perceived.
Vietnam was a far different story. American forces won one battle after another, but the enemy never seemed defeated. Every area in Vietnam seemed to be contested year after year. After three years of continuous American victories, the enemy somehow managed to launch the massive Tet offensive in 1968, which was the final straw. It mattered little to the American people whether Tet was a victory or defeat. What mattered was that after three years of pounding by the world's foremost military superpower, the enemy was still able to launch such a massive and well-coordinated attack. American progress in the war was difficult to perceive, and the American withdrawal began in 1969.
To perceive progress, observers must have an accepted standard of measurement. The traditional military standard was conquered territory, which had the added convenience of being easily displayed on a map for the public. In Vietnam, the insurgent nature of the war (at least during some of its phases) made territorial claims an inaccurate barometer of success. The substitute for conquered territory was the number of dead enemy bodies. Unfortunately, body counts suffered from two crucial shortcomings as symbols of success. First, body-count accuracy was always suspect. When career advancement depended on success and success meant a large body count, many believed that the statistics were inflated. Second, high body counts could be interpreted as a lack of progress. In a war in which the enemy stood and fought only when he wanted to do so, high body counts indicated that the enemy was both able and willing to sacrifice its manpower against superior American firepower. In this sense, high body counts meant that the enemy recruiting and resupply program was continuing to succeed.
One could speculate that a much better measure of success would have been low body counts and a low level of enemy activity. Such a situation would indicate both success in destroying the Vietcong infrastructure that provided many recruits and success in interdicting the flow of men and material from North Vietnam. It appears that we chose the wrong threads from which to weave the fabric of success and that, in the eyes of the American people, the Tet offensive revealed that the emperor had no clothes.
The main point that this line of reasoning leads us to is that American strategy in the Vietnam War was seriously flawed. The decision-making process linking political ends with appropriate means somehow went awry. In the peculiar circumstances of the Vietnam War, the United States could not apply the various instruments of national power, including military power, in such a way as to translate battlefield victory into strategic victory. This inability suggests the critical importance of understanding the circumstances of the conflict.
The key to understanding the circumstances in the Vietnam War was to understand the motivation of the enemy. Our adversaries in Vietnam were organized by the harsh discipline of Communist ideology, but they were motivated by the passions of long-suppressed Vietnamese nationalism. Their objectives was politically unlimited, as they sought nothing less than unification of Vietnam under Hanoi's leadership. Ho Chi Minh and his followers had been waging the struggle for more than two decades by the time American troops arrived in force, and they were willing to accept the challenge of American arms. They waged an unlimited war in virtually every respect. North Vietnamese society was mobilized for the long struggle. On the battlefield, their troops used every military means at their disposal. They were ready to endure, to sacrifice, and to persevere.
In retrospect, it would seem that the United States did not understand the circumstances of the Vietnam conflict and that the means we used were inappropriate as well as unsuccessful. Unlike our opponents, the United States fought a limited war in virtually every respect. Our strategy was based on the belief that gradually increased military restraint and the subtle threat of limited patience, would convince the North Vietnamese that they could not win and should negotiate a reasonable settlement. However, viewed through lenses colored by Vietnamese nationalistic passion, American restraint connoted both a reluctance to fight and something less than total commitment.
America's enemies in Vietnam understood the circumstances of the war. They understood that a guerrilla army wins when it is not defeated and that a conventional army loses when it does not win. They understood the problems faced by democratic governments when waging long foreign wars. Their answer, in these circumstances, was to continue the struggle and avoid decisive defeat until time, casualties, and frustration destroyed the American commitment altogether.
The misguided American strategy played directly into the enemy's strong suit. Gradual escalation and attrition warfare require considerable time and patience. They also can extract a high price in blood and treasure. The American body politic would not tolerate such slow results requiring such a high price. As the war dragged on, it became very clear that the United States did not have a clear vision of how the wear would or should end and had no firm plan concerning the end of the American involvement. Rather than a deliberate and well-planned ending to the American effort, it was the American people who decided that they had suffered enough and that the United States must get out.
The United States spent four years, from 1969 through 1972, in a slow withdrawal while making feverish but belated attempts to prepare the South Vietnamese to defend themselves. In 1975, when the enemy armies were overrunning South Vietnam, the American people made it very clear that we would not become reinvolved. Thus, the American involvement in Vietnam ended not with a flourish but with a whimper and a sigh of relief.
However, even the whimpering was full of confusion. As pressure mounted in the United States to end the bloodshed in 1972, the peace negotiations came to a head. But it was clear that we had not even come to an agreement with our principal ally, the South Vietnamese, on the shape of an acceptable settlement. The result, even after the intensive bombing campaign against Hanoi and its environs in December 1972, was a ceasefire unsatisfactory to the South Vietnamese and satisfactory to the United States only in the sense that the American travail was over.
The confusion that resulted in such an unsatisfactory conclusion to a long and costly struggle suggests the importance of considering conditions of termination. Termination should be considered "up front," preferably at the same time that a nation considers the option of going to war. Conditions of termination are particularly important in the current era of limited war––limited at least from the perspective of the United States. Limited wars for limited objectives are rarely fought to absolute and complete victory. Rather, these wars typically end with negotiations and compromises. An early consideration of termination conditions should clarify what is negotiable and what is not. Among allies, whose objectives will differ at least in some details, early consideration of acceptable outcomes should clarify those differences and make it possible to present a united front to the adversary during negotiations.
Understanding the desired conditions of termination is part of understanding the circumstances of the war and thus is also a critical step in determining strategy. Early consideration of termination conditions forces the objectives of the war into sharper focus, which, in turn, should help define the best means and methods to achieve those objectives.
It is worth repeating that the importance of the four principles discussed in this essay lies not in the principles themselves. Rather, their importance lies in the realization that factors far removed from combat can determine success or failure in war. Political objectives set the stage for all other actions. Understanding the circumstances and defining the conditions of termination play key roles in shaping the course of the war. Finally, a war of any length requires the continuing public support generated by perceived progress. In essence, although these four principles have little to do with battle, they have everything to do with war.
When we look back on the Vietnam conflict, it is clear that our vision of the war was limited to the battlefield. This narrow vision was evident in a president who personally selected individual bombing targets and in military professionals who still do not understand that winning the battles does not equate to winning the war. The price of our failure in Vietnam was paid in blood, treasure, prestige, and influence. America cannot afford more failures. We must expand our horizons beyond the bloody confines of the battlefield. We must learn, at long last, that war is more than battle.
Center for Aerospace Doctrine, Research, and Education
Maxwell AFB, Alabama
Lieutenant Colonel Dennis M. Drew (B.A., Williamette University; M.B.A., University of Wyoming) is Deputy Director for Research, Center for Aerospace Doctrine, Research, and Education, Hq Air University. He has served in several SAC missile assignments and as Chief, Warfare Studies Division, Air Command and Staff College. Colonel Drew is a frequent contributor to the Review, and his article in this edition is first-prize winner in the fourth annual Ira C. Eaker Essay Competition. He is a Distinguished Graduate of Air Command and Staff College and a graduate of Squadron Officer School and Air War College.
Disclaimer
The conclusions and opinions expressed in this document are those of the author cultivated in the freedom of expression, academic environment of Air University. They do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Government, Department of Defense, the United States Air Force or the Air University.
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