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

#Reviewing

#Reviewing Tribe

#Reviewing Tribe

Though [Tribe] is brief, in this enjoyable book readers—whether veteran or not—will walk away with a greater appreciation for the challenges facing those weary from war at their homecoming. Those who study war will also uncover profound wisdom, both in the conduct of war and the care of its combatants. If it is incomplete in the defense of its underlying ideology, it does, however, succeed as a warning, a reminder of the cost of war and a challenge to society cultivate the solidarity that brought us “to this extraordinary moment in our history.” If, as Junger implies, solidarity brought us this crossroads in our history, “it may also be the only thing that allows us to survive it.”

#Reviewing A War

#Reviewing A War

Ultimately, this film is about many things. Stale and hollow storytelling is not one of them. A War is ripe with the chaos that is war. Watching it, one is struck by courage, tragedy, death, grief, and the circumstantial bureaucracy of war. One has thrust upon them the impact of deployment on family, the demands of brotherhood, and its connections beyond the blurred lines of battle.

Max Weber & Groucho Marx Walk Into A Bar: #Reviewing Victor in the Rubble

Max Weber & Groucho Marx Walk Into A Bar: #Reviewing Victor in the Rubble

Simply, Victor in the Rubble is a delight. It produces that same sense of glee that comes from opening an MRE to find a pop tart perfectly whole rather than smashed into a gazillion crumbles. Alex Finley, a former CIA officer, has crafted a magical satire of the Intelligence Community post-9/11, Iraq, and the 2004 intelligence reforms.

#Reviewing Blood Year: Islamic State and the Failures of the War on Terror

#Reviewing Blood Year: Islamic State and the Failures of the War on Terror

The bottom line is that the rise of ISIS has exposed the weakness of a strategic approach, which, for too long, focused just on neutralizing terrorist plots and killing or capturing senior terrorist leaders. This approach looked and often felt, as if it was proactive—taking the fight to the enemy. But in reality, as the defeats of 2014-15 have shown, it was too narrowly focused to succeed.

#Reviewing A Passion for Leadership

#Reviewing A Passion for Leadership

From the autumn of his lifetime in public service, Gates offers a final lesson for reformers. When the ideas for change stop flowing, leave. “The reality of reforming bureaucracies is that when a leader thinks he is done, he probably is done.”  This is a straightforward statement, but its implications are radical: leadership is reform, and reform should be constant.

#Reviewing Shanghai 1937 and Nanjing 1937

#Reviewing Shanghai 1937 and Nanjing 1937

One of the more egregious omissions in Western scholarship has been the treatment of China’s great War of Resistance, waged against Japan from 1937 to 1945. Given the countless volumes written about other campaigns of World War II this omission is inexcusable; this was, after all, not only a war American soldiers and spies participated in, but the ultimate reason Americans were involved in the Second World War in the first place. Fortunately, our picture of China’s part in World War II has brightened considerably over the last decade...Books focused on individual campaigns are just now being written and published. Peter Harmsen...is at the forefront of the effort to tell the story of China’s experience in World War II from the perspective of the soldiers who fought it.

#Reviewing The Army Officer's Guide to Mentoring

#Reviewing The Army Officer's Guide to Mentoring

For those who wish to be either a mentor or protégé, or those who wish to foster effective mentorship in their organization, Kimball’s Army Officer’s Guide to Mentoring is an excellent how-to manual. His observations, insights, and best practices are drawn from the experiences of those who have profited from effective mentor-protégé relationships. They are practical, easy to implement, and sure to make each reader more aware of his or her own approach to and effectiveness as a mentor.

Advocatus Diaboli: #Reviewing Red Team

Advocatus Diaboli: #Reviewing Red Team

Allocating resources to red teaming can be costly, access to necessary information can be frustrating, and the importance of the boss’s support is critical to the success of any alternative analysis team. If the boss does not support the red team, and is not open to the criticism uncovered by its analysis, it can be a fruitless endeavor. Zenko provides a handy roadmap to the mistakes of others as a guide to future organizations.  In an arena where failure results in loss of life or treasure, Red Team will be a critical resource for leaders that want to give their organization the best chance at success.

#Reviewing Success and Failure in Limited War

#Reviewing Success and Failure in Limited War

Strategic performance is strongly affected by the state’s information management capabilities. Top policymakers must have the ability to understand the environment in which they are acting (outside information) and how their national security organizations are behaving in that strategic environment (inside information). Strategic risk assessment is based on an understanding of the opponent’s strengths and weaknesses, the challenges and opportunities present in the international environment, and the capability of the state to act in a purposeful way along multiple lines. Without sound outside and inside information, risk assessments will suffer, as will the quality of strategy.

#Reviewing "The Sun Also Rises" and "The Road Back From Broken"

#Reviewing "The Sun Also Rises" and "The Road Back From Broken"

We are locked in with Jake; we know his thoughts and feelings, or at least we know as much as Hemingway lets us know. Jake's inability to connect with those around him is as emotional as it is physical, and the first-person narrative allows the reader to experience some measure of that isolation. Fitz, however, is not alone in his head with the reader. His failing connections with those around him are not completely severed lifelines. The third-person omniscient perspective allows Morgan to explore not just Fitz's feelings but how his injuries affect those around him, those trying to help him, and those who depend on him. The shift in perspective from one to the other underscores a shift in our own perspective on the injuries of war since Hemingway's own experience: no one should have to travel the road alone.

#Reviewing Naval Cooperation

#Reviewing Naval Cooperation

Throughout much of history, the world’s oceans and seas belonged to no one, yet everyone. For that reason, nations that depend on the sea for trade, as a source of food, and more recently, as a source of minerals, have cooperated to some extent. Naval Cooperation is a compilation of USNI Proceedings articles written over the last ten years discussing a range of topics related to cooperation. 

#Reviewing Success and Failure in Limited War

#Reviewing Success and Failure in Limited War

In the Information Institution Approach, Bakich gives critical importance to whether or not key decision makers have access to multi-sourced information and whether the information institutions themselves have the ability to communicate laterally. When information is multi-sourced and there is good coordination across the diplomatic and military lines of effort, Bakich predicts success. When information is stove piped and there is poor coordination, he predicts failure. Where the systems are moderately truncated, Bakich expects various degrees of failure depending on the scope and location within the state’s information institutions.

#Reviewing "Lawfare: Law as a Weapon of War"

#Reviewing "Lawfare: Law as a Weapon of War"

The examples presented throughout the book demonstrate not only how successful lawfare has been in the past, but arguably that the United States should continue to apply it throughout its international diplomatic and military strategies...Lawfare is a must read and belongs in the library of strategic thinkers, in and out of the government!

#Reviewing "Syren's Song"

#Reviewing "Syren's Song"

Since 2001, the landscape of warfare has drastically changed.  Drones, armed non-state actors, and private security firms have become common on the battlefield, and their influence continues to evolve and grow.  While their involvement in the future of warfare is uncertain,  more than likely they will be as commonplace in future conflicts as tanks, airplanes, and submarines are today. In his latest book, Claude Berube offers readers a vivid glimpse of this possible future.

#Reviewing "The Strategist"

#Reviewing "The Strategist"

Sparrow’s account of Scowcroft is full of insight and surprises. Readers will take pleasure in Sparrow’s depiction of the NSC debates, executive-level relationships, and the nuanced recollections of a consummate strategist. Anyone interested in understanding the unique role of the NSC in foreign policy and executive-level decision-making during the Nixon, Ford, Reagan, or first Bush administrations will be interested Sparrow’s work. This book also has practical use for journalists, political scientists, as well as students of U.S. security strategy, foreign policy, and American government.

#Reviewing The U.S. Naval Institute on Naval Strategy

#Reviewing The U.S. Naval Institute on Naval Strategy

The strategic mind of the navalist is on full display in the latest Wheel Book from the U.S. Naval Institute. Naval Strategy, edited by Thomas J. Cutler, is paired well with the earlier installment, Naval Tactics by Captain Wayne P. Hughes Jr., USN (Ret.). Cutler’s volume, however, is the meatier one as it includes articles by Admiral J.C. Wylie, Sam Tangredi, Milan Vego, Samuel Huntington, Sir Julian Corbett and Admiral James Stavridis, amongst others. The essays by Wylie and Corbett are themselves worth the price of admission.

#Reviewing God and Sea Power

#Reviewing God and Sea Power

Few, if any students or practitioners of strategy can argue the importance of Admiral Alfred Thayer Mahan’s influence on sea power theory, as well as his impact on the American military institution as a whole. As with any theorist, however, we tend to examine his body of work, and to look at the factors that shaped who he was as a strategist and a mariner.  Most works only give a cursory glance at the things that influenced Mahan’s character across all facets of his life. In God and Sea Power, author Suzanne Geissler goes beyond that, following the closely-interwoven relationship between Mahan’s faith and his work as a sailor, leader, and strategist.