Alessandra Nisch
Putin’s Wars: Testing Boyd’s Strategy of ...

President Putin made three foundational assumptions in launching his war against Ukraine that should have been correct but were not. First, Putin assumed the invasion of Ukraine would be a quick and easy fight. Second, he assumed the world would denounce the invasion but tacitly allow it. Third, Putin assumed the war would deter NATO expansion.

Putin’s Wars: Testing Boyd’s Strategy of Applied Friction

Cognitive Bias

The Fallacy of the Short, Sharp War: Optimism Bias and the Abuse of History

The Fallacy of the Short, Sharp War: Optimism Bias and the Abuse of History

War is naturally characterized by uncertainty, and humans are known to exhibit an in-built optimism bias that frequently causes them to overestimate the likelihood of positive outcomes. This bias may have evolutionarily adaptive advantages in many situations. Yet in the dialectic between military planners generating coercive options within available means and national cabinets seeking solutions to intractable diplomatic or geostrategic problems within acceptable costs, optimism bias can lead to tragic and avoidable outcomes.

Do Not Trust Your Gut: How to Improve Strategists’ Decision Making

Do Not Trust Your Gut: How to Improve Strategists’ Decision Making

Critical thought can benefit from both patience and intellectual humility. Military strategists should thoughtfully consider their cognitive limitations as well as the range of possible outcomes in pursuit of political goals and in support of civilian leaders. Strategists who devote attention to thinking about thinking and learning from the mistakes of the past may improve their ability to plan for the future.

Social Engineering as a Threat to Societies: The Cambridge Analytica Case

Social Engineering as a Threat to Societies: The Cambridge Analytica Case

The key to counteracting social engineering is awareness since social engineers are targeting our lack of cognition, our ignorance, and our fundamental biases. In a cybersecurity context, it’s not as easy to mitigate social engineering as it is to mitigate software and hardware threats. On the software side, we can purchase intrusion detection systems, firewalls, antivirus programs, and other solutions to maintain perimeter security. Attackers will certainly break through at one point or another, but strong cybersecurity products and techniques are readily available. When it comes to social engineering, we can’t just attach a software program to ourselves or our employees to remain secure.

A Re-Examination of the Schlieffen Plan

A Re-Examination of the Schlieffen Plan

What best explains the German General Staff’s decision to go to war in 1914? Was Alfred von Schlieffen’s war plan a self-fulfilling prophecy that pushed the Triple Entente to balance together against Germany? This article argues that the best, most recent scholarship concerning the impact of pre-war German military planning depicts a situation in which not one, but a multitude of of causal factors led Germany to go to war in 1914.