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Technical Sergeant Justin Davis, tactical air control party specialist with 137th Special Operations Wing, Oklahoma National Guard, acts as intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance air asset for multinational military members participating in antipiracy exercise on vessel moored at shore base facility during Tradewinds 23 in Georgetown, Guyana, July 24, 2023 (U.S. Air National Guard/Brigette Waltermire)

Across the competition continuum, speed of action requires timely decisions and adjustments to a joint task force (JTF) operation plan. As mission command systems improve and information-gathering tools increase in sophistication, a consistent challenge for a headquarters staff is determining the relevant information to analyze for decisionmaking. Arguably, increased mission command technology and capabilities have outpaced decisionmaking performance, leaving then U.S. Army Chief of Staff General Mark A. Milley to remark, “The sheer volume and speed of conflicting information can easily bring decisionmaking to a screeching halt.”¹ However, commander’s critical information requirements (CCIRs) are designed specifically to combat these challenges and enable the commander’s decisionmaking process.

CCIRs remain critical throughout an operation. Unfortunately, key observations of recent operational-level exercises of JTF commands and their components in the Armed Forces and North Atlantic Treaty Organization illustrate that the development and use of CCIRs lack holistic staff understanding and are often not fully valued or managed to enable timely decisionmaking by the commander.² Despite these observations and lessons identified, organizations continue to fight from their original plan, without adapting their approach to achieve objectives that remain relevant to an ever-changing operational environment (OE).

Marine Corps Lance Corporal Megan Roundpoint, motor transportation vehicle operator with Combat Logistics Battalion 11, Combat Logistics Regiment 17, 1st Marine Logistics Group, communicates via radio during Adversary Force Exercise as part of Service Level Training Exercise 2-24 at Marine Corps Air-Ground Combat Center, Twentynine Palms, California, January 31, 2024 (U.S. Marine Corps/Justin J. Marty)

This article is intended for staff officers who desire better understanding of the connection between CCIRs and decision points, and how CCIRs enable joint synchronization through headquarters fusion and command involvement. Operational-level staffs consistently misunderstand the purpose of CCIRs, resulting in suboptimal staff contributions to the commander’s decisionmaking process. When optimized, CCIRs become a critical factor that prioritizes information that a commander needs to make decisions, thereby enabling joint synchronization and aligning the JTF, across all domains, to achieve mission success.

This article describes the importance of CCIRs, offers techniques to develop CCIRs to ensure they are tied to decision points, and relates CCIRs development and use across all three planning horizons. Last, the article recommends how headquarters should use CCIRs and decision support tools across an operation and describes several recommendations joint doctrine should incorporate to improve CCIR understanding across the joint force.

The Importance of CCIRs

Successful commanders identify and approve critical information requirements to answer knowledge gaps, evaluate a situation, confirm or deny planning assumptions, and develop a successful approach to accomplish military objectives. Many of these commanders consider identifying critical information as a commander’s business.³ Joint doctrine defines CCIRs as “elements of information the commander identifies as being critical to timely decision making.”⁴ They are unknown but needed information elements of such critical importance to enable the commander’s decisionmaking process and directly relate to criteria needed to execute successful operations.⁵

CCIRs drive the collection of information by all elements across the command and consist of two components: priority intelligence requirements (PIRs) and friendly force information requirements (FFIRs). These two components represent the commander’s and staff’s knowledge gaps throughout the joint planning process (JPP) and execution and require continuous evaluation.

PIRs focus on both the adversary and conditions within the OE and link to the commander’s decision points. All staff sections can recommend potential PIRs they believe meet the commander’s guidance. However, the JTF J2 has overall staff responsibility for consolidating PIR nominations and providing the staff’s recommendations to the commander.⁶  PIRs represent an intelligence gap that normally identifies opportunities or threats for the JTF. Once approved by the commander, they provide the focus for joint intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (JISR) assets. PIRs must be specific to at least one decision point but sufficiently broad in scope to enable the J2 to develop a detailed intelligence collection plan (ICP) to enable the commander’s decisionmaking process.

When discussing enabling the decisionmaking process, Lieutenant General Scott Berrier, USA, then director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, noted a crucial aspect of intelligence requirements: “[I]t’s my job to make sure that we can illuminate [threat] activities to the Department of Defense so that our senior leaders can make . . . smart decisions about next steps. And so, from my perch . . . I want to deliver decisive information at the right time to [DOD leadership], so they can have an understanding of what’s going on and give them options of what actions to take.”⁷ The “decisive information” to answer “what’s going on” is the intelligence collection and analysis against PIRs to deliver “understanding” to senior leaders, which enable decisions of what “actions to take.”

FFIRs focus on information that a headquarters must have to assess the status of friendly forces and supporting capabilities. FFIRs form the friendly force information criteria needed for the commander to decide. To ensure the headquarters can take advantage of opportunities or mitigate threats, FFIRs prioritize reporting requirements for supporting and subordinate commands. Like PIRs, all staff sections can recommend potential FFIRs they believe meet the commander’s guidance, and once approved by the commander, are automatically CCIRs. PIRs and FFIRs constitute the total list of CCIRs.⁸

When reviewing how PIRs and FFIRs are described in joint doctrine, PIRs are sufficiently described particularly within Joint Publication (JP) 2-0, Joint Intelligence, and JP 2-1, Joint and National Intelligence Support to Military Operations.

However, there is minimal attention paid in joint doctrine to describe and illustrate the importance of FFIRs and how they directly link to decision points. FFIRs focus on forces, capabilities, and ideally the timing available to support joint action. Because FFIRs focus across the JTF, collaboration and synthesis are required across all joint functions to ensure forces, capabilities, and support requirements are synchronized in time and space. This is traditionally why the J5 or J35 is responsible for developing FFIRs, depending on the time horizon of the decision. Without staff analysis conducted on FFIRs, the facts about an adversary and the environment are of little value unless the commander understands what forces and capabilities are directly available to mitigate or exploit a threat. Answered FFIRs are a valuable tool to support risk management and form the friendly force criteria to allow the commander to decide.

Although not in doctrine, a best practice when operating in a multinational environment is the development of Host Nation Information Requirements (HNIRs) to confirm information, effectively plan, and increase interoperability with the host-nation’s military and civilian institutions.9 The genesis of HNIRs dates back to joint operations in Afghanistan and Iraq where commanders acknowledged that mission success was achieved by, with, and through multinational and host-nation partnerships. Now understanding the importance, purpose, and composition of CCIRs, staffs can avoid misconceptions and better develop CCIRs to support a commander’s decisionmaking (see table 1).

Developing CCIRs

The single most important person in the development of CCIRs is the commander. CCIRs are developed and maintained due to the constant uncertainty present in an OE. Knowledge gaps in an assigned joint operational area (JOA) are normal for all commanders. To maintain situational understanding, the commander, through his or her staff, should determine the essential information he or she needs for continued decisionmaking. Essential information can be broken down into four basic areas:¹⁰

• What actions can or will the adversary(s) adopt that will either interfere with or present opportunities for the JTF to accomplish its mission?

• What is the next major decision foreseen at this time, and what information is needed to make it?

• What information about the terrain or environment is needed that is presently unknown?

• What force or support capabilities are required to accomplish objectives and maintain the initiative, operational tempo, or JTF operational reach?

As a headquarters completes the steps of the JPP, CCIRs are developed primarily to answer knowledge gaps and enable the JTF to select the best course of action to accomplish assigned objectives. Commanders assist with CCIR development through their planning guidance and directed information requirements to better understand the OE. A headquarters staff assists in the development of CCIRs by analyzing the political and higher headquarters’ planning directives and by anticipating likely decisions the commander will make throughout an operation.

The advantages of developing CCIRs early during the JPP are numerous. CCIRs enable parallel planning, promote mission command, and provide focused requirements for JISR assets to answer the commander’s intelligence gaps. Developing CCIRs early and issuing them through warning orders enable supporting and subordinate commands to organize and task JISR assets to answer critical information requirements to enable further planning. However, due to various reasons, many staffs and commanders have difficulty developing their initial CCIRs as an output of mission analysis with a complementing initial ICP to synchronize JISR assets to confirm information requirements needed for course of action development.

One technique to ensure the development of CCIRs is aligned with decisionmaking is to backward-plan CCIRs off anticipated decision points. During this technique, a commander and staff first analyze the potential decision points required throughout an operation. Only after potential decision points are analyzed can a staff then determine necessary PIRs and FFIRs that meet the criteria for the commander to decide. This technique is most useful during the initial steps of the JPP, but subsequent decision points and CCIRs will be further refined during the remainder of planning or adapted during an operation based off the changes in the OE.

Backward-planning CCIRs off anticipated decision points naturally leads to the development of decision support tools such as a decision support matrix (DSM). The simplest form of a DSM is using an if-and-then methodology. This method begins by clearly defining the issue and decision required in either a statement or in the form of a question. Once complete, staff should determine the necessary PIRs relevant to the decision that requires confirmation. Only after PIRs are developed can a staff determine the FFIRs—this is required to be in place for a commander to reach the decision criteria. Once PIRs and FFIRs are determined, the last part is to clearly label the decision a commander is required to make or request to their higher headquarters. The “if” represents PIRs, “and” represents the confirmed FFIRs, and lastly “then” states the decision to be made once the PIR and FFIR criteria are met (see tables 2 and 3). Decision support tools such as the DSM are useful to predict when the conditions are likely met for a commander’s decision; however, judgment for when the decision is made remains with the commander.

Once the staff better understands how its commander prefers to receive information to support decisionmaking, DSMs should be updated to include important information relating to time and risk. Throughout the development of anticipated decision points, it is important for both the commander and the staff to recognize that some decisions exceed the authority of the commander. When this occurs, the staff alerts their higher headquarters when conditions are met for the higher headquarters’ commander to approve the recommended decision by the subordinate commander. Through parallel planning and joint synchronization, commanders and staffs can assist decisionmaking across echelon.

Marine Corps Corporal Ayman Moser, field artillery fire controller with Tango Battery, 1st Battalion, 11th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, relays call for fire during exercise Steel Knight 23.2 at Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, California, December 5, 2023 (U.S. Marine Corps/ Adeola Adetimehin)

To ease the development of CCIRs even further, a headquarters should maintain a running list of common decision points a commander could likely make during an operation, such as:

• change of task organization or command relationship

• change of main effort or operational priority

• phase transition • movement/repositioning of an operational or strategic asset

• expanding, extending, or creating an alternate theater distribution network commitment of a Reserve

• execution of a branch or sequel.

If or when these common decision points are required or relate to the assigned mission, a staff should use the if-and-then methodology to determine the needed PIR and FFIR criteria for the decision point. By thinking through anticipated decisions, a staff can better develop the necessary PIRs, FFIRs, timings of a decision, and risk management requirements to enable the commander’s decisionmaking process.

Starting with a generic running list of decision points, with complementing PIRs and FFIRs, could enable faster planning, promote a critical thinking culture for continuous wargaming, and better set conditions for the JTF to prepare the environment for deployment, seize the initiative, or exploit opportunities. Once senior leaders in the headquarters approve a common decision point list, they should be included within planning standard operating procedures (SOPs) and rehearsed during collective training events to refine CCIR requirements and decision support tools.

CCIR in Execution

CCIRs enable the commander’s decisionmaking process and remain critical throughout an operation. PIRs focus the commander’s JISR activities, while FFIRs provide how the commander understands the status of supporting and subordinate units and capabilities during an operation. In planning and execution of an operation, PIRs and FFIRs must be identified and assigned, and a process of reporting must be implemented to manage CCIRs.¹¹

Nonetheless, personal observations from operational-level exercises and recorded observations from the Joint Lessons Learned Information System and Center for Army Lessons Learned reveal the following key observations:

• many units lack efficient reporting mechanisms to enable CCIRs to remain relevant under changing circumstances

• headquarters do not adequately integrate PIRs into their ICPs to prioritize collection and assessment across an operation

• units are misaligning CCIRs with a commander’s notification requirements.¹²

CCIRs Through Each Planning Horizon. The life cycle of CCIRs across all planning horizons (short, mid, and long term) is dependent on the commander’s understanding and assessment of the environment and if the CCIRaligned decision points remain relevant in an operation. The duration of each planning horizon may vary depending on the headquarters SOPs and the type of operation the JTF is conducting. Traditionally, the short-term planning horizon, owned by the J33, focuses on the execution of current operations. The mid-term planning horizon, owned by the J35, validates, refines, and, if required, redirects future operations using the orders process. The J5 focuses on the long-term planning horizon, typically the next phase of the operation, to set conditions for future planned operations through detailed planning and assessment.

In all planning horizons, CCIRs play a critical role in assisting decisionmaking. As decision points draw nearer to execution, prioritization of collection assets and reporting requirements must account for time sensitivity when associated decisions need to occur. Nevertheless, at the JTF and operational levels, it is unlikely that decisions are made during the short-term planning horizon. At the operational level, decisions are comparatively more comprehensive across time and space from those at the tactical level to account for when the decision needs to occur versus when and where the conditions are set to achieve the effect. This “notice-to-effect” considers the entire JOA and realistically cannot take place within the short-term planning horizon.

Using and answering CCIRs allow a headquarters to remain ahead of the commander’s decisionmaking cycle. During execution, approved CCIRs and decision points should already have contingency plans with associated decision support tools developed by the J35 or J5 based on the likelihood they will be implemented. CCIR-associated decision support matrices assist with decision point anticipation and execution as the situation evolves in favor of, or against, the JTF. To ensure decisions remain at the speed of relevance, contingency plans should include draft changes in task organization, command relationship adjustments, and synchronization matrices. Once the situation dictates a decision by the commander, these prearranged planning products allow the staff to immediately finalize and issue the necessary orders to subordinate and supporting commands to minimize the notice-to-effect lag time.

However, throughout an operation, events will occur that require timely notification to the commander but do not require a CCIR-driven decision by the commander. A reoccurring challenge for headquarters is the misunderstanding that significant events requiring command- level notification are CCIRs.13 This type of notification is called a commander’s notification requirement. Sometimes referred to as serious incident reports, they are not CCIRs but do require a command-approved process to manage this important information. Commander’s notification requirements often necessitate a reporting requirement to higher headquarters and, potentially, a press release to mitigate associated negative effects, all of which can be already authorized in a joint operations center (JOC) preplanned response checklist.

Figure. Notional Intelligence Planning Team and Related Functions

Source: Joint Publication 2-0, Joint Intelligence (Washington, DC: The Joint Staff, 2013), IV-6.

Linking CCIRs to the Collection and Analysis Cycle. Across all planning horizons, commanders at all levels depend on timely, accurate information and intelligence on an adversary’s disposition, strategy, tactics, intent, objectives, strengths, weaknesses, values, capabilities, and critical vulnerabilities to answer CCIRs. The intelligence process is composed of a wide variety of interrelated intelligence activities:

• planning and direction

• tasking and collection

• processing and exploitation

• analysis and production

• dissemination and integration

• evaluation and feedback.

Joint intelligence elements support planning and execution by providing information, finished intelligence products, and targeting information to the JTF and component commands (see figure).14

These intelligence activities, in collaboration with the J3 and J5, must focus on the commander’s mission, CCIRs, and therefore inform the commander’s decisionmaking process.15

While the J33 is managing current operations through mission command systems via the JOC, the decision support tools provided by the J35 and J5 enable the headquarters to efficiently track CCIR reporting requirements and ongoing operations in the OE. Concurrently, the J2 aligns intelligence activities in close cooperation with all staff elements, executing the ICP focused on CCIR-derived PIR. The J2’s component divisions typically (and most effectively) synchronize their personnel activities with the J3 and J5 directorate staffs.16 The current intelligence watch and analysis staff support the J33 current operations staff. Intelligence operations, collection management, and ISR planning staff are often in direct contact with the J35, among other divisions, especially when supporting the joint collection management, targeting, and assessment boards. Finally, the intelligence plans and analysis staff supports the J5, especially during contingency planning. The commander’s requirements drive staff operations across all J-codes and special staff as well as subordinate and supporting commands to expend resources to answer these requirements, thereby manifesting the environment where the commander makes a decision.

Intelligence operations answer PIRs, which answer CCIRs. Based on intelligence requirements, associated information requirements and indicators are organized into a detailed ICP. Within the collection plan, PIRs are further broken down into essential elements of information (EEIs) and specific information requirements (SIRs). Answered EEIs and SIRs assist in gaining better clarity on the intentions of an adversary as well as the composition, disposition, and strength of opposing forces (see table 4). The collection plan may be either a simple, single-discipline spreadsheet or a complex, multidiscipline, multimedia software tool containing various spreadsheets and other metadata, such as the reconnaissance, surveillance, tasking, and acquisition annex to the air tasking order produced by a theater air operations center. The ICP enables the J2 to look across the JTF and determine which commands and JISR assets are best suited to answer EEIs and SIRs. Once finalized across echelon, the collection asset allocation plan includes PIRs, their associated EEIs and SIRs, and component collection assets to be tasked, or additional collection resources for the operational commander to request. It also includes when the information report is needed and who is to receive it. The completed collection plan forms the basis for further collection actions against PIRs and, therefore, CCIRs.¹⁷

Four E-2C Hawkeyes from “Sun Kings” of Carrier Airborne Early Warning Squadron 116 fly in formation near aircraft carrier USS Nimitz, Pacific Ocean, June 13, 2023 (U.S. Navy/Hannah Kantner)

After successful receipt of a higher headquarters’ CCIRs, EEIs, and SIRs, subordinate units are tasked, and they determine how best to contribute to answering the JTF CCIRs. This process promotes mission command by centralizing information requirements across the JTF, which increases synchronization and enables prioritization of resources and tasks. The JOC assists with component synchronization by ensuring information-sharing across echelon, especially when subordinate commander decisions are made. This approach also enables decisionmaking at the tactical level while keeping the JTF focused at the operational level.¹⁸

CCIRs remain fluid as the JTF moves through the JPP and phases of the operation. To enable situational understanding and promote adaptation, the collection plan will be prioritized across the operation plan to enable decisionmaking and needed adjustments. The JTF must therefore develop CCIRs that deliberately feed into the analysis and assessment of how well the operation is progressing.

CCIRs Assisting with Operational Assessments. Throughout an operation, CCIRs may not be answered in the JOC within the short-term planning horizon but rather through analysis provided during the assessment process. However, operations assessment, which is dependent on evaluation and feedback from actors and events within the OE, is often deprioritized in intelligence processes.19 Regardless of the type of military operation, joint headquarters should use CCIRs in conjunction with operational priorities to focus and synchronize collection and analysis assets to support all three planning horizons.

CCIRs play a role in evaluating the quality of understanding and assessment toward the JTF’s progress in an operation. As a headquarters conducts the assessment process, CCIRs support the JTF’s understanding of whether it is doing the right things—and the right things are being done correctly. To ensure decisions are tied to desired effects and the status of operational objectives, measures of effectiveness and measures of performance must assist with answering PIRs, FFIRs, and HNIRs.²⁰ When actions, effects, and objectives are not changing the environment positively, CCIRs embedded into the assessment process allow the commander to know when the operational design requires reframing and adaptation.

Although the J5 is responsible for long-term planning and has large equities in operations assessment, developing assessment-oriented CCIRs requires an integrated cross-functional headquarters approach. Staff officers must actively take part in assessment working groups to ensure inputs and outputs are oriented to answer the commander’s priorities and enable decisionmaking. Assessment-oriented CCIRs may lead to decisions that require additional force capabilities, authorities, or command and control mechanisms, which take much longer to resource and are therefore better suited as CCIRs in the long-term planning horizon. By deliberately thinking through CCIRs that aid in assessing the OE, a headquarters will better predict long-term decisions to ensure the JTF maintains the initiative, tempo, and operational reach.

Recommendations

Developing CCIRs. When developing CCIRs, a headquarters should stage the development, tracking, and refinement of CCIRs to achieve situational understanding of the OE, manage ongoing operations, and prepare for and anticipate future operations. To remain valuable to the commander, CCIRs must be oriented on enabling decisionmaking through the confirmation of PIRs, FFIRs, and HNIRs. Conceptualizing CCIRs in three stages could lead to the development of a seemingly long list of CCIRs, which goes against the recommendation of JP 5-0, Joint Planning, to maintain a short list of CCIRs.21 However, what may initially seem like a long list of CCIRs actually is manageable when staff prioritize CCIRs on the next decision point and greatest risk to the JTF, deprioritize CCIRs when no longer relevant, and recommend delegation of decision authority to subordinate commanders based on the level of risk and comfort level of the commander. Delegating decision authority enables decentralization. Moreover, to enable mission command and minimize risk, commanders should communicate clear guidance and intent to the delegated decision authority.

To add clarity and organization when listing CCIRs, staff should link the decision point they support and timing for when the decision is anticipated. Visually presenting the linkage between the CCIR to the decision point, rather than a generic list of CCIRs, enables better understanding across echelon. Simply, a decision point adds the purpose for each CCIR collection and reporting requirement task.

Joint Doctrine Adjustments. Joint and other Service-specific doctrine adequately describes the who, what, when, where, and why of CCIRs; however, in practice the definition is ambiguous and leads to misinterpretation on “how” to develop and use CCIRs to enable timely and effective decisionmaking.22 These misinterpretations lead staffs to create CCIRs untied to decision points. Recommendation 1: Joint doctrine should provide greater clarity on how to develop and used CCIRs tied to decision points because of the central role CCIRs have in enabling the commander’s decisionmaking process.

There is also uncertainty on how CCIRs are written; for example, are they written as a question or a statement? This uncertainty is currently mitigated by commanders involving themselves in the development of CCIRs and by staffs knowing how their commander prefers to receive information. Recommendation 2: In future versions of joint doctrine, adding written examples of PIRs and FFIRs would provide joint officers a doctrinal starting point for writing and developing CCIRs. Additionally, by illustrating in joint doctrine how CCIRs are linked to one or more decision points, staffs will increase their understanding of CCIRs across echelon, which will enable better synchronization of joint operations.

When reviewing the evolution of CCIR in joint and Service doctrine, nearly every alteration in the development of CCIRs was revised from lessons learned following large-scale conventional operations. U.S. military experiences from stability, peacekeeping, and counterinsurgency operations have not influenced CCIR development in doctrine.23 The breadth of activities involved in low-intensity operations over the past two decades has clouded staff planning and execution, leading staffs to struggle with the development of CCIRs tied to decision points. Recommendation 3: Although decisionmaking generally happens at a slower pace during low-intensity operations, doctrine should emphasize that CCIRs are an important tool to enhance understanding and enable decisionmaking across the competition continuum.

Conclusion

Joint force commanders face a highly complex and challenging task. Decisions at the operational level are substantially different in time and space, and the volume of information received from modern mission command systems has the potential to overburden a staff and delay decisionmaking. Faced with global competition in every domain, senior leaders in the U.S. military increasingly desire innovative technologies that will enable decision dominance and overmatch to win the next fight.24 However, for the commander to provide timely and valuable direction and guidance, he or she must have good information to consider and interpret. CCIRs are designed specifically to combat these challenges and prevent decisionmaking paralysis. When optimized, CCIRs become a critical factor that prioritizes the information a commander needs to make decisions, thereby enabling joint synchronization and aligning the JTF, across all domains, to achieve mission success.

In planning and execution, CCIRs should prioritize resources and assigned tasks throughout the JTF—particularly with JISR assets. Understanding the enemy, the environment, and friendly forces allows the commander to apply his or her creativeness and judgment while synchronizing subordinate capabilities and resources to best accomplish objectives. The combined effect of PIRs and FFIRs enables the commander to understand the capability and status of his or her own forces as well as those of the enemy and the OE. When combined with HNIRs, prioritizing resources to collect and analyze critical information requirements enhances the commander’s ability to provide better direction and guidance and increases the quality of operational assessments to support operations across all three planning horizons.²⁵

Cross-functional headquarters integration in the development of CCIRs is essential, but the most important person in this process remains the commander. To mitigate observed misunderstandings on the development and use of CCIRs, commander involvement is critical, and his or her staff needs to be aware of how the commander prefers to receive information. The creation of CCIRs tied to decision points directly supports an improved ICP, creates better anticipation throughout the JTF, facilitates the creation of branch plans and sequels, and increases the confidence of commanders when decision points are reached. Developing CCIRs by backward-planning off an anticipated decision point provides a jumpstart for the staff to develop decision support tools. These tools then assist in driving the commander’s decisionmaking process and enhance the utility of required planning products to enable joint synchronization. JFQ

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After nearly 80 years of scholarship on nuclear weapons, one might understandably believe that all the important issues have been addressed, if not settled. However, Vipin Narang, professor of political science at MIT, has a knack for asking and answering questions that other nuclear strategy researchers have overlooked. Whereas most academic work looks at superpowers, Narang’s book Nuclear Strategy in the Modern Era: Regional Powers and International Conflict (Princeton University Press, 2014) examines how the strategic deterrence postures of non-superpower nuclear states differ from those of superpowers. And now, in his latest, Seeking the Bomb, he extracts insights from studying the various ways states pursue nuclear weapons, discovering that most would-be nuclear powers take different proliferation paths than Great Power states.

By examining all the successful and unsuccessful cases of nuclear proliferation, Narang develops his Proliferation Security Theory to model a state’s path to the bomb. Taking the form of a decision tree, the theory begins with a state that has already decided to develop nuclear weapons. A series of binary questions— about security threats, defense treaties, domestic political consensus, vulnerability to intervention, and superpower protection— leads a state to one of four optimal strategies: sprinting, hiding, sheltered pursuit, and hedging.

Sprinting and hiding are the most straightforward proliferation strategies. Sprinting is an open dash to the bomb as fast as a state’s economic and scientific legs can carry it. Unencumbered by threats from the international community, sprinters are untouchable. Although the academic literature assumes sprinting to be the default strategy, Narang points out that it is available only to major powers, all of which already have nuclear weapons.

Hiding—the strategy of building nuclear weapons without discovery—is a complicated and high-risk endeavor that invites violent reprisals and crippling sanctions. It is, however, the only option for pariah states and for states like Taiwan and South Korea that have been caught up in a security tango between nuclear superpowers. Of the 10 states that have tried to develop the bomb in secret, Narang found that only apartheid-era South Africa was able to do it successfully.

Interestingly, Seeking the Bomb has a subtle, almost hidden message beyond nuclear proliferation. In discussing the final two strategies—sheltered pursuit and hedging—Narang embeds a fascinating commentary on reverse leverage. Throughout the history of nuclear proliferation, several weaker states have been able to exploit a Great Power—usually, the United States—to gain access to the bomb or other concessions. Seeking the Bomb demonstrates that a supported state can sometimes find unique leverage despite its dependence on a client, or perhaps even because of that dependence.

The sheltered pursuit strategy entails the temporary protection of a vulnerable state by a major power, providing a window of opportunity to pursue nuclear weapons. The three countries that used this proliferation strategy—Israel, North Korea, and Pakistan—offer a sobering lesson. Narang argues convincingly that each state was able to calculate and seize a moment when its more powerful partner was conflicted or distracted and used the opportunity to develop nuclear weapons. For Israel and Pakistan, the United States went against its nonproliferation commitments because of its short-term desire to gain access to the Middle East (in the case of Israel) and to defeat the Soviets in Afghanistan (in the case of Pakistan). And despite North Korea’s absolute dependence on China for survival, the prospect of a nuclear-armed North Korea keeping the United States and South Korea at bay seemed like a tolerable tradeoff to the Chinese. In all three cases, the United States and China could have stopped these sheltered pursuers but chose not to, raising the question of what opportunities for reverse leverage exist today or in the future. Narang hints that Saudi Arabia and Turkey might be only one or two cards short of the reverse leverage needed to play the sheltered pursuer hand.

The final proliferation strategy, hedging, has three forms: technical, insurance, and hard. Each involves deliberately stopping short of the bomb. Hedging reduces the time needed to develop nuclear weapons later. Technical hedgers do not have a pressing security threat, so they develop nuclear infrastructure like nuclear energy or research facilities but go no further. Insurance hedgers have intense security threats but enjoy formal defense treaties with a major nuclear power. They maintain robust conventional militaries and the capability to ramp up enrichment and develop weapons but hold off on doing so. In Narang’s discussion of Japan and West Germany as insurance hedgers, leverage and reverse leverage are major factors.

West Germany was able to reverse leverage the United States into loaning it nuclear weapons, thereby exploiting the Americans’ desire to manage escalation dynamics on the European continent. Partly as a hedge against abandonment, both West Germany and Japan developed robust civilian nuclear sectors and militaries, which could shorten the time to weaponization. Narang believes that Japan—similar to West Germany during the Cold War—enjoys reverse leverage today, which it could parlay into a similar nuclear weapons–sharing arrangement now or in the future.

Finally, hard hedgers have a severe security threat but no superpower defense treaty, and—central to Narang’s theory— they also lack a domestic consensus about whether to go all the way. Seeking the Bomb offers the post–World War II stories of Switzerland and Sweden as prime examples. Lacking membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, these countries each faced the Soviet Union alone, leading them to pursue nuclear weapons until the late 1960s. Ultimately, what held them back was not technical challenges or foreign interference but ambivalence about whether the route led to the ultimate strategic deterrent or destabilization.

Internal politics, Narang believes, is the key policy lesson from Seeking the Bomb. Fractured political support causes states to refrain from fully developing nuclear weapons. This presents an opportunity for nonproliferation states to influence potential proliferators. Narang admits that lamentably, he lacks a generalized theory about domestic consensus-making, and this is one of the book’s most underdeveloped parts.

Although the topic of domestic consensus is one part of Seeking the Bomb that needs more specificity, there are other problems. Narang presents his Proliferation Security Theory model as if it had more rigor than it does. First, he uses recursive logic in his decision tree. A state comes to the decision to pursue nuclear weapons because of hostile neighbors, real or perceived, but the first node in the theory asks if there is an acute security threat. Second, Narang’s assertion that the existence of a formal security pact is what guides a state down the proliferation path is problematic. The signed paper is unimportant. What truly affects a state’s strategic decision is the belief in the protector to fulfill the pact’s promise.

These holes make Narang’s theory a heuristic, not a testable statistical model. Regardless, Seeking the Bomb is well-written and rich with ideas that will significantly interest those focused on nonproliferation. Narang’s case studies are captivating, and they more than support his central argument that there are many paths to the bomb. Seeking the Bomb’s findings should be immensely valuable to policymakers, arms control researchers, and intelligence analysts trying to limit access to the nuclear club. JFQ

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These are lively times for discus- sions about the future of war. After decades of conjecture about what war between two large nation-state militaries with modern ground, sea, and air capabilities might look like, we now have real data and experiences to draw on. Some trends now seem confirmed—such as the lethality of the modern battlefield for rotary-wing and fixed-wing aviation forward of the line of contact and, concurrently, the growing military value of unmanned autonomous systems. With other questions about the character of warfare, the debate has grown even fiercer—such as what the balance is between offense and defense, or what the significance and role of cyberwar- fare is. Questions about trends—in what Michael Howard calls the for- gotten dimensions of strategy—have also reappeared: What constitutes a sustainable defense industrial base, what is the value of professional armies versus citizen armies, and what causes a society to choose resistance instead of submission?

Beyond Ukraine tackles these questions and more in a collection of essays by leading defense theorists on both sides of the Atlantic. The edited volume arose from an October 2022 conference on the future of war, sponsored by the Netherlands Defence Academy in collaboration with the University of Oxford. It also reflects an increasingly sophisticated trans-Atlantic and trans-Pacific military discourse that American readers should benefit from. Additional examples of those engaged in this discourse include the Royal United Services Institute, the Swedish Defence Research Agency, the Hague Centre for Strategic Studies, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, and Japan’s National Institute for Defense Studies.

The chapters in Beyond Ukraine are grouped into four topics: bound- ing the impact of the Russia-Ukraine war, exploring landscapes of future war, examining military innovation in future war, and anticipating what future war will look like. These are weighty questions that defy singular synthesis by one author. In this edited volume, the authors grapple with first-order questions about the nature of war and character of warfare—questions that U.S. security discourse sometimes neglects in its focus on pressing questions about operational concepts, specific force-structure choices, and preferred budget allocations. The danger of this American discourse is that U.S. military officers and defense professionals can miss emerging trends and changes that do not fit neatly within their own bureaucratic fights. Beyond Ukraine is a welcome antidote to this myopia.

One of the curious elements of this anthology is how the editors and contributors toggle between assessments of the changing character of warfare and the evolving nature of war. Antulio Echevarria, for instance, recasts common explanations for the decline of interstate wars as factors that are instead spurring their outbreak and increasing their severity. Other authors reexamine assumptions prior to the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, that the next war could be a cyber war. Several authors, including Frank Hoffman, present new frameworks for categorizing war’s faces, dimensions, or typologies, with the goal of better understanding how war is changing. Intriguingly, Jan Honig explores the degree to which future war might be characterized by people’s war or professional war. David Betz wrestles with how war is changing because of conflict in a sprawling, three-dimensional urban landscape with layers of overlapping social orders. T.X. Hammes directly takes on the question of the rising dominance of the tactical defense, while Audrey Cronin describes how nonstate actors and minor powers would be able to exploit cutting-edge dual-use technologies to their advantage.

On the other hand, Paul van Hooft cautions against overestimating this tactical “denial-centric vision,” arguing that in a globalized, specialized, high-tech world, only a few Great Powers have the strategic capabilities to deny other powers their access to resources or movement of military forces outside their home territories. Other chapters consider the implications of artificial intelligence, drone swarm technology, and individual “new-age tinkering” on how militaries could innovate and how defense-industry complexes must change.

Grappling with the changing face of war is clearly like blind men trying to describe an elephant. The concluding chapter by Antoine Bousquet makes the case that those who argue that the nature of war is “immutable”—driven by anger, fear, hatred, and courage—miss the “unparalleled plasticity and open-endedness” of the human animal and thus miss the ways that both the nature of war and the character of warfare change as polities, societies, and technologies evolve. Indeed, that is an underlying theme of Beyond Ukraine—and it is a rejoinder against the singular focus on technology by most Western military establishments. Fortunately, Beyond Ukraine shows how more perspectives—even contradictory ones—organized in a loose structure that illuminates through juxtaposition, can bring the reader closer to war’s true nature and character—or at least closer to what questions we should be asking. JFQ

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The New Makers of Modern Strategy, edited by the prolific Hal Brands, is a monumental tome of 1,100-plus pages. Its readers may recall the 1986 version edited by Clausewitz scholar Peter Paret (itself an update of the original from 1943). Brands notes in the introduction that the church of strategy is broad, and as testimony in New Makers, a profusion of ideas, events, and facts tumble out in 45 essays, loosely connected by a handful of themes. “Foundations and Founders” starts with key historical strategic thinkers and then proceeds in a chronological sequence: “Strategy in an Age of Great- Power Rivalry” (roughly 1648–1914); “Strategy in an Age of Global War” (1914–1945); “Strategy in a Bipolar Era” (1945–1991); and “Strategy in the Post–Cold War World” (1991–present).

The volume is a major contribution to what could be called strategic studies or perhaps national security studies. Such studies are not quite military history, not quite diplomatic history, not quite political science or international relations theory, but an amalgam of all these intellectual fields. And so too is New Makers. Within it is an assortment of intellectual biographies, occasional leader sketches, and numerous recountings of various political and military maneuverings. Essays range from neo-mercantilist to nuclear strategies, from John Quincy Adams to Xi Jinping.

The volume is not only wide-ranging but also traditional. One will find little to no bottom-up social or identitarian history. Postmodern conceits are hard to find. The sole reference to Michel Foucault is in an essay on Francis Lieber and the origins of the law of armed conflict. Nor does the book spend a great deal of time on what has been variously called the second machine age or the fourth industrial revolution. There are few references to artificial intelligence, artificial general intelligence, quantum theory, Moore’s law, or ever-decreasing nanometer levels. There are some references to cyber in an essay near the end of the book, but the essay deals just as much with cyber’s limitations as it does with cyber as a war-winning wonder weapon.

What is present throughout the book, on the other hand, is the seeming omnipresence of governed territorial spaces, whether called empires, citystates, or—for the past four centuries or so—nation-states. New Makers is fundamentally oriented around them. Elite academia may not deal too much these days with the topics of strategic studies; it is noticeable that the essays in the book come predominantly from Beltway institutions, think tanks, and war colleges. Almost none are from Ivy League or other high-prestige U.S. universities. But the nation-state has not withered away. Great Powers act in competition as much as in cooperation. Wars—including brutal, attritional state-on-state wars—rage. And so hard thinking about strategy, more precisely termed grand strategy in its traditional and imperfect sense, seems as timely as ever.

Yet if Brands’s volume evoked only plus ça change musings, its value would be limited. It is more. It is also, fundamentally, a history of strategy, which has a contemporary purpose—to understand what strategy is, one must understand what strategy was. We see in New Makers how strategy emerges as a practice in city-states and empires, long before it becomes codified as an intellectual discipline. We see it in Walter Russell Mead’s essay on Thucydides and Polybius and their tellings of the Peloponnesian and Punic wars. Mead explains how those authors write of Athens and Rome practicing a kind of proto-strategy—statecraft that includes a certain degree of thought on how to make war. Domestic politics dominated these ancient polities, to be sure, but the Mediterranean world, with its trade and alliance politics, increasingly incorporated competitive interstate interactions, and strategic thinking emerged.

Subsequent essays track the rise of post-Westphalian nation-states. Those states developed thinking at the grand strategic level. It is exemplified in Iskander Rehman’s essay, where we read about the cunning Cardinal-advisors Richelieu and Mazarin, who skirt confessional lines and plot continental chess moves of intricacy and subtlety. Other essays show how throughout the Renaissance, Enlightenment, and afterward, statecraft interweaves with the speculations of Machiavelli, Kant, and of course, Clausewitz—and the foundations are seemingly set for a sophisticated, integrative grand strategy inextricably bound up with nation-state behavior.

Despite all this intellectual sophistication, grand strategic thinking among those who practice failed to develop— and perhaps even regressed—in the early 20th century. Margaret MacMillan points out that pre–World War I strategic thinking on both sides is viewed in nearexclusive military terms. Even questions that seem so fundamental to us now, such as ensuring there are sufficient resources for a long war, were neglected in the war plans of Germany, France, and Russia. “Strategy,” writes MacMillan, “was largely [the nations’ militaries’] business, and . . . once war started, entirely theirs.”

Full-blown grand strategic practice— the integration of instruments of national power for use in war, but also outside of war—came only later. It emerged during World War II, when unprecedented global conflict required massive economies of scale and full national mobilization. Afterward, strategy in the nuclear age, as Lawrence Freedman notes, became infused with enormous importance—far too important to be left simply to generals. After all, as Francis Gavin writes in his essay, the whole point of nuclear weapons is that the threat of their use must remain a threat only. This requires a special emphasis on dominance by civilian policy, which must harness and direct such a threat of weaponry as appropriate. What follows are the quintessential Cold War formulae: the connection of strategic “ends, ways, and means” and the coherent integration of various “instruments of national power.”

And then the Cold War ended. Grand strategy fell out of favor. Who needed such thinking when superpower rivalry was over? Wasn’t it the age of golden straitjackets when multinational corporate interests would limit nation-states’ behavior? And in the revolution in military affairs–dominated 1990s and even after, who needed Clausewitz when unmatched technological dominance made all this strategy talk something like fanciful literature? Except that the nation-state, competition, and the advantages sought in these competitions did not end but persisted into the new millennium.

Meanwhile, strategy persisted as well, and New Makers shows how mutable and multifaceted the meanings of strategy are. Strategy is often thought of as a noun, a referent to a mental artifact. To conceive of strategy this way is to think of a product: a proposal, plan, direction, or framework. Joshua Rovner offers a definition of this sort. Strategy is a “theory of victory, a logical story explaining how the use of force will help combatants achieve their political goals.” This may appear a bit narrowly militarized, so Rovner offers this broader definition: strategy is a “logical story about how states and non-state actors keep themselves safe.” Even this might seem predominantly focused on security. Thomas Mahnken defines strategy as how to “array limited resources in order to achieve one’s aims against a competitor.” This definition sounds economic-like, with its emphasis on scarcity and the implied tradeoffs that follow. In both, the notion of strategy as an artifact is predominant. Strategy is a story, a theory, and a coherent arrangement of resources. This artifact is directed somewhere—generally, against a rival or competitor. The implication, still, is that at least one of these rivals a nation-state.

These are indeed useful definitions. However, New Makers does not leave us with only those. The closing essay—by John Lewis Gaddis, the dean of American Cold War scholars and a significant strategic thinker in his own right—offers another meaning of strategy, sometimes associated with words like “process,” though such a term is highly inadequate. Gaddis relies both on Clausewitz and on the Chinese concept of shi to define strategy as being fundamentally present. Strategy is an awareness of the point where the grammar that informs one’s thinking—the inner guidance provided by methods, rules, laws, for example— and the logic of the experience—the actual behavior unfolding in the external world—meet. This does not mean action necessarily follows; the grammar may be inadequate to address the behavior. Awareness precedes action (even if such action is, essentially, to do nothing). But such awareness requires “breadth in identifying potentials, ingenuity in applying them, and the timing needed to slip them through windows of opportunity before they close.” Strategy, then, is also this constant, vigilant attention.

Of course, the preceding definitions do not exhaust the meaning of strategy, and the point of a work as broadly gauged as New Makers is to show that it is pointless to do so. To paraphrase Herbert Simon (with some modification), the right definition is not the point—the point is that any number of definitions permit functional strategic reasoning.

In the new millennium, strategists need both helpful definitions and usable pasts to manage if not solve contemporary strategic problems. New Makers amply provides both. JFQ

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Troops of 12th Cavalry move from beach, past splintered trees and fires caused by heavy bombardment preceding their landing on Leyte Island, Philippine Islands, October 20, 1944 (U.S. Army Signal Corps/Wienke)

As Alfred Thayer Mahan stated, “The study of history lies at the foundation of all sound military conclusions and practice.”¹ When we consider maritime strategy today, analysis of the Pacific War offers substantial lessons. For centuries, the Pacific has proved crucial to the global economy and as a stage for Great Power competition. In the late 19th century, European powers vied for control over rubber, oil, and minerals, as well as external markets for their domestically produced consumer goods. Mimicking the foreign policy of other imperial nations, Japan sought to revise the European-dominated regional order to better serve its own national interests. The Japanese Imperial Army began conquests in China in the 1930s and then—after Japan proposed the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere in 1940—set its sights on Southeast Asia in the 1940s. Sea lines of communication between the Japanese home islands and their territorial expansions became imperative. In the geographic center of this ambitious Japanese strategy lay the U.S.-controlled Philippine Islands.

The competing interests of two great Pacific powers—Imperial Japan and the United States—resulted in the largest naval conflict in world history. While Americans often focus on the climactic battles at sea, control over the Philippine Islands remains of equal importance to those naval battles. In the struggle over the Philippines, seapower provided the most decisive means of maintaining military dominance, but unconventional warfare afforded an asymmetric approach to contest it.

Troops pinned down on beach on Leyte Island, Philippine Islands, by Japanese mortar and machine gun fire, October 20, 1944 (National Archives and Records Administration/U.S. Army Signal Corps)

The U.S. Achilles’ Heel

Nearly as soon as the United States defeated Spain in 1898, and then after its subsequent war with the First Philippine Republic from 1899 to 1902, the U.S. Army and Navy initiated plans on how to properly defend America’s new Philippine territory. The wars for control over the Philippines had exposed a U.S. Achilles’ heel.² The United States had always relied on its geographic isolation in North America as an imposing fortress. Now, millions of noncitizen U.S. nationals lay outside those boundaries and within the periphery of many European-controlled Pacific territories.³ Retaining U.S. dominion of its new imperial estate resulted in direct competition with these other Great Powers.

American concerns dramatically increased with the rise of Imperial Japan. In 1905, Japan defeated Russia in the Russo-Japanese War—a shocking result that included the utter destruction of the Imperial Russian Navy. Of great concern, the Japanese home islands lay much closer to the Philippines than did the continental United States. Consequently, military planners needed to understand how America would defend the islands against a technologically sophisticated and ideologically inspired near-peer competitor.

In 1903, the United States organized the Joint Army-Navy Board, a panel of eight members who reviewed and coordinated strategy. The Board organized a series of schemes concerning how to defend the United States against other Great Powers. To identify each potential adversary, the plans evolved into colors. Orange was the color selected for Japan, and consequently War Plan Orange emerged. From this point onward until the Japanese attack on the Philippines 30 years later, the Army and Navy conducted many wargames and revised a series of Orange plans for a potential conflict.

Each generation of U.S. officers perceived the Philippines in terms of the same Achilles’ heel. In the advent of war, the Navy would not be able to secure the sea lines of communication with the Philippines for many months. This meant that any Army forces defending the islands would be stranded. For decades, military planners revisited a series of Orange plans with the same dilemma. The optimistic compromise, which no one felt enthused about, was that the Army could hold out for some amount of time until the Navy could consolidate enough forces from both the Atlantic and the Pacific. Then this combined force would have the requisite mass for a climactic battle with the Imperial Japanese Navy and subsequently save the garrison in the Philippines.⁴

Remarkably, military planners understood the challenges of defending the Pacific from the aggression of a modern Asian power decades in advance and still failed to adequately address the flaws in their underlying strategy. Most planners understood that with the loss of sea control, conventional defense of the Philippines would remain uncertain at best and doomed at worst. At the same time, the Army’s mission included defense of U.S. territory—a duty that it could not discard. Instead, the defense mission (seemingly a lost cause) was simply neglected. This situation of ignoring the problem began to change under the leadership of Philippine President Manuel Quezon in 1935.

A Conventional Defense of Thousands of Islands

The Philippines had sought the goal of independence for many decades. In its current form of governance, thousands of islands and dozens of multi-ethnolinguistic peoples were represented in a commonwealth system— all under the supervision of the U.S. Congress. However, the United States had promised that the subservient condition of the Philippines was only temporary and that Philippine independence was the goal (although the United States planned to retain military basing rights). Consequently, prior to hostilities, the Philippines had negotiated a full path toward independence. However, with the impending war between Japan and the United States, achieving liberation while maintaining neutrality appeared unachievable.

Quezon realized that the vital strategic locations of the Philippine Islands generated imminent danger from Great Power competition. Simply put, the forthcoming conflict between two superpowers would not allow Filipinos to act as bystanders. With a good sense of the inevitable, Quezon made a choice: to defend the Philippines from Japanese invasion, even though those actions would bring his nation directly into war. With great calculation, Quezon sought out the most qualified military general to assist with this task: a war hero and Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army, Douglas MacArthur.⁵

Accustomed to War Plan Orange and its gloomy strategic outcomes, MacArthur promised Quezon that the islands could be defended and the improbable achieved.⁶ He retired from the Army in 1937 and fully committed himself to Quezon’s task, moving to Manila as Military Advisor to the Philippine Commonwealth. MacArthur recommended and implemented a Philippine conscription system to build a national army—one trained and supervised by U.S. Soldiers. This idea had its skeptics, including many from within the U.S. military.

Although shortfalls certainly hampered the development of the Philippine army, the primary problem was an incongruence between the diverse cultures of the Filipino tribes and the unifying components of national identity required to amalgamate a conventional force. One U.S. officer explained: “[I]n most Philippine army units many men could not understand the languages of most of the others; moreover, they had been together so briefly that they had not had time to learn one another’s names, much less develop mutual confidence or collective esprit de corps.”₇ Then there were the materiel issues:

More than a few units had first sergeants and company clerks who could not read or write. Vehicles of every type were notable mainly by their absence, and the available rifles were mostly ancient British Enfield’s [sic], in some of which the steel extractors had deteriorated so badly in tropical heat and humidity that they broke when used. The only ammunition for these relics dated from 1914 or before.⁸

The situation at sea appeared equally discouraging. During a period of intense technological advancement, naval power in the Pacific had dramatically changed in the two decades between the 1920s through the 1940s. While not capable of competing with the scale of the U.S. Navy, Imperial Japan developed the most sophisticated and technologically advanced navy in the world. Arguably, Japan was first to fully realize the primacy of the aircraft carrier. By 1941 it had built 10 carriers and greatly improved carrier operations by flying combat missions off the coast of China in support of the Imperial Army. Many Japanese veteran pilots now operated the Mitsubishi A6M “Zeke” (commonly referred to as the Zero), with a reputation as the most agile fighter while at the same time demonstrating incredible range. Hedging their bets on the future of naval warfare, the Japanese simultaneously built the largest battleships in history, with enormous 18-inch guns. In another attempt at achieving naval superiority, the Japanese developed unmatched night combat procedures with complementary arrangements for cruiser and destroyer torpedo attack—torpedoes that boasted much longer ranges and higher explosive yields than their American counterparts. The Imperial Navy deliberately designed all these impressive leaps in naval technology and tactics to offset size disadvantages with the U.S. Navy.⁹

The imposing seapower developed by Japan over two decades facilitated its invasion of Luzon and the other major Philippine Islands in December 1941, leading to one of the most humiliating American defeats in history. In mid-1941, the United States finally committed additional resources for a conventional defense of the islands but without the same sea and air forces needed to maintain sea control. Fresh submarines, fighters, and bombers remained too few, while the Asiatic Fleet was generally composed of antiquated surface ships. Adequate defense under these conditions proved unattainable. The newly formed Philippine army’s performance against the Imperial Army was predictable in terms of its mediocrity. Surprisingly, however, it remained steadfastly loyal to MacArthur and attempted to follow every order from his United States Army Forces in the Far East. The disastrous defeat of the U.S. Navy’s Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor by the Japanese First Air Fleet further compounded any chances of a relief force. Meanwhile, Imperial Japan undertook steps to secure an impressive naval defense perimeter in the Central Pacific (locations between Hawaii and the Philippines). In the Mariana Islands, Caroline Islands, Gilbert Islands, and Marshall Islands the Japanese built naval bases, airfields, and fortifications. Philippine defenders soon realized that support from the United States would not be forthcoming for years.

With the end of America’s defense efforts in sight, MacArthur escaped Luzon on March 11, 1942. While in Mindanao and en route to Australia, MacArthur convinced President Quezon (who was on Panay in the central Visayan Islands) to depart with him. While trapped on Corregidor during the initial Japanese invasion, Quezon had seriously considered returning to Manila and preserving his administration under Japanese occupation.¹⁰ Instead, the U.S. evacuation of Quezon led to the establishment of a Philippine government-in-exile in Washington. Quezon’s departure preserved a highly public and internationally recognized Philippine authority, one that continuously delegitimized Japan’s attempts to create a credible puppet state. General Jonathan Wainwright surrendered his defenders on Corregidor and the rest of the Philippines on April 9, 1942. In the largest defeat in U.S. history, the Japanese “had driven the United States from its stronghold in the Far East, destroyed a combined American and Philippine Army of 140,000 men, and forced the Far East Air Force and the Asiatic Fleet back to the line of the Malay Barrier.”¹¹

Philippine Resistance to Japanese Occupation

Perhaps a surprise for those unfamiliar with Philippine history, the disastrous end to conventional defense of the islands failed to stifle local opposition to occupation. In their past, Filipinos had lost many conventional battles for independence, from Rajah Sulayman’s surrender of Manila to the Spanish in 1570, to General Emilio Aguinaldo’s surrender to the Spanish in 1897, and to General Miguel Malvar’s surrender to the United States in 1902. These types of reverses only reinforced the accepted forms of irregular warfare practiced by Filipino tribes for centuries—methods of resistance at which they were particularly good. Many of the men and some portion of equipment from the defeated Philippine army soon became integrated within the armed factions of the Tagalog, Cebuano, Ilocano, Bicolano, Kapampangan, Maranao, and many other peoples.

In 1942, while MacArthur reestablished his headquarters in Australia (eventually called the Southwest Pacific Area command, or SWPA), he became aware of the outbreak of dozens of Philippine resistance movements. In southern Luzon, a Tagalog resistance— President Quezon’s Own Guerrillas—formed. In central Luzon, the Tagalog and Kapampangan supported the communist Hukbalahap movement. Also in Central Luzon, the Tagalog, Ilocano, Pangasinan, and Kapampangan supported Luzon Guerrilla Army Forces. In eastern Luzon, the Tagalog supported the East Central Luzon Guerrilla Forces. In northern Luzon, the Ilocano and Igorot supported U.S. Army Forces in the Philippines–Northern Luzon. In the central Philippine Islands, the Hiligaynon, Hamtikanon, Capiznon, and Akeanon formed the Free Panay Guerrilla Forces. In the southern Mindanao islands, the Maranao, Bisaya, and Cebuano formed the Maranao Militia Force. These impressive resistance movements represented only a few of the major organizations, with many smaller ones spread throughout (map 1).¹²

Map 1. Major Guerrilla Forces in the Philippines, 1942–1945

 

Unconventional Warfare and Support to Resistance

With little hope of direct military action in the Philippines as the United States built up its forces through 1942 and early 1943, MacArthur began to realize the potential of irregular warfare in the Philippines. Imperial Japan struggled with the same challenges previous occupiers had. While the Imperial Army maintained a firm grip in Manila, it lacked the forces for complete subjugation of 2,000 inhabited islands. In fact, most of these islands had never been under firm control of an external power. Left unmolested, Filipinos may have stayed clear of the fighting, but now Japan and the United States vied for their loyalties, and many chose one side or the other. Fittingly, MacArthur (from 6,000 kilometers away in Melbourne) started to see the value of influencing disparate populations in opposition to Japanese occupation. Fortunately, the indigenous residents needed little encouragement to resist invaders, which they had done for centuries. Regarding the newly discovered opportunities for unconventional warfare, SWPA’s lines of effort included establishing communications, leveraging influence operations, exploiting indigenous intelligence networks, and supplying arms and equipment to resistance forces.

Communications

Initially, SWPA had no communications with the resistance movements, a situation resolved primarily by Filipinos. According to one U.S. report, “the Federal Communications Commission monitoring station at San Leandro, California, intercepted an unidentified radio station with the callsign VCJC attempting to contact General Douglas MacArthur’s Southwest Pacific Area Headquarters” in June of 1942.¹³ It remains unclear which resistance movement used the callsign VCJC at the time, but the organization apparently functioned in the Luzon islands. SWPA initially discounted this transmission as stemming from the Japanese army, but such transmissions would intensify.

Probably the most prominent and largest organization to establish communications with SWPA was the Free Panay Guerrilla Forces (FPGF), under the leadership of Macario Peralta, Jr., who contacted SWPA as early as November 1942.¹⁴ From that point onward, many guerrilla organizations desiring contact with MacArthur relayed information through the “bamboo telegraph” to Peralta, who distributed them to SWPA. Once Philippine guerrillas discovered effective radio capabilities, each group sought to establish its own means as quickly as possible.

American Wendell Fertig, appointed leader of the Maranao Militia Force on Mindanao, was one of the next outfits to establish communications with SWPA, in February 1943. Three Filipinos— Gerardo Almendras, Eleno Almendras, and Florentino Opendo—constructed a transmitter.¹⁵ Fertig then instituted a round-the-clock unit called Force Radio Station to carry out radio traffic. Due to its reliability and frequency of communiqués, Force Radio Station became one of the most important resistance communication nodes. The Maranao Militia Force’s more secure position in the southern islands allowed it not only to transmit its own messages but also to relay the messages of other resistance movements, all relatively free of raids from Japanese ground forces.¹⁶ Essentially, Force Radio Station was a “24 hour a day, seven days a week operation.”¹⁷ Substantial radio networks established in the Visayas and Mindanao by late 1943 are indicated on map 2.

Map 2. Allied Radio Network in December 1943

 

General Vicente Lim’s underground movement in Manila put together its radio from stolen components of Japanese military radio transmitters—an effort that cost his underground organization many lives.18 Once their radios were constructed, Lim’s movement and other movements on Luzon had challenges, one of which included the need to frequently change locations when the Japanese triangulated the positions of their transmissions. The other challenge, particularly for guerrillas in remote locations, involved finding sources of electricity. One ingenious method used by the FPGF was to power batteries with improvised stationary bicycles.¹⁹

One of the most enterprising aspects of numerous guerrilla outfits was their ability to intercept and decrypt Japanese messages before sending them forward to SWPA. The radio operators likely listened in to the Philippine puppet government’s inter-island, high-frequency radio system. The communiqués intercepted included assessments by high-ranking government officials. Somehow, guerrillas also captured Japanese communications with essential information such as troop movements and unit status reports.²⁰

The number of resistance radio stations operating inside the denied area of the Japanese army was incredible. On the island of Panay alone, the FPGF operated 18 radio stations.²¹ One U.S. after-action report summarized that the guerrillas employed 120 radio stations in total on the islands.²² Additionally, the U.S. Army—primarily via submarine— eventually “supplied radios, technical personnel, codes, ciphers, signals operating instructions and even M-94 and M-209 cipher devices for the guerrillas to use.”²³ Providing codes and ciphers to Philippine rebels demonstrated a great degree of trust from SWPA, as these items could prove dangerous if captured by the Japanese. Meanwhile, Philippine resistance movements provided an extraordinary amount of vital intelligence, which included Japanese troop locations, details of military installations, navy and aircraft movements, the morale of enemy and friendly forces, the status of prisoners of war, and the names of Japanese collaborators.²⁴

 

Psychological Warfare

Along its second line of effort, SWPA eventually produced an information campaign. MacArthur’s propaganda effort became quite famous, highlighted by the well-known phrase printed on multiple mediums: “I shall return.” However, SWPA neglected the potential for information operations for quite some time, and its efforts generally excluded attempts to win the loyalties of local populations.²⁵ In fact, not until June 1944 did MacArthur establish his Psychological Warfare Branch. The late timing of this organization indicates that information warfare activities generally supported MacArthur’s upcoming invasion but not particularly the ongoing resistance to occupation.

Once established, the Psychological Warfare Branch aimed to demoralize the Imperial Army and hasten the collapse of any pro-Japanese governance.²⁶ Accordingly, many leaflets dropped on the Philippines in 1944 were written in Japanese and intended for the occupying forces. Despite any perceived deficiencies in SWPA’s information campaign, one scholar describes it as “the most intensive effort to weaponize cultural knowledge and penetrate enemy psychology for strategic ends.”²⁷ Another interesting decision by SWPA that influenced its approach to information operations was to keep the presence of guerrilla activities a secret. Consequently, the American public did not learn of Philippine guerrillas until after the invasion. This decision about concealing the presence of resistance derived from the desire to protect the identities of participating U.S. Servicemembers. However, not publicizing the pervasive Filipino movements might be considered a lost opportunity.

In contrast to the Psychological Warfare Branch, Philippine undergrounds began information campaigns to win hearts and minds of local populations almost immediately following American defeat. President Quezon’s Own Guerrillas established the Manila Free Press as one such printed source of advertising resistance, and likely the most influential example. Illustrations of clandestine radio broadcasts included “Voice of Freedom” and “Voice of Juan de la Cruz.”²⁸ In 1942, the Japanese discovered and executed many local resistance radio broadcasters. Consequently, the San Francisco radio station KGEI became the most popular Allied news source; Filipinos could receive it via shortwave radio (although the Japanese deemed doing so a crime). Exiled Filipina broadcaster Carmen Ligaya’s daily program “Music America Sings” proved very popular. For those without access to radios, the underground often distributed news via leaflets (typed on recycled paper). At the local levels, resistance propaganda—whether by print, radio, or word of mouth—was pervasive.

Members of D Battery, 457th Parachute Field Artillery Battalion, fire 75mm gun point blank at caves on hillside, near Lipa, Batangas, Luzon, April 27, 1945 (National Archives and Records Administration/U.S. Army Signal Corps/Robinson)

Intelligence

Along its third line of effort, SWPA realized the potential for exploiting indigenous intelligence networks. Following defeat, MacArthur’s headquarters in Australia lost nearly all situational awareness of activities in the Philippines. Radio contact with the FPGF was the first indication that underground networks existed and could be used as an entry point for intelligence. William Donovan, from the newly created Office of Strategic Services, attempted to create a spy network in Manila.²⁹ However, MacArthur refused any interference within his region, instead desiring to construct his own intelligence services. In October 1942, Allied Intelligence Bureau (made up of American, British, Dutch, and Australian counterparts) established a separate Philippine division specifically for developing information “on the military, political, and economic aspects of the Japanese-dominated Philippine Government, as well as on the attitudes of the guerrillas themselves.”³⁰

While submarines served as a vital clandestine means of transportation, Allied Intelligence Bureau used other means as well, particularly commercial vessels such as fishing boats. In December 1942, the Allied Intelligence Bureau inserted five Filipino agents back into the islands. In a simultaneous effort, the Maranao Militia Force sent three guerrillas to Australia in a small boat.³¹ From this point forward, the movement of spies back and forth from the Philippines to Australia became somewhat routine. Even President Quezon leveraged this network to send to the islands his own operative, Dr. Emigdio C. Cruz, with orders to contact influential resistance leadership. Cruz was inserted via the submarine USS Thresher from Australia to Negros Occidental in July 1943; he was eventually extracted and made his report to Quezon in Washington, DC.³² While setbacks occurred, once these networks solidified, indigenous intelligence provided SWPA essential information on strategic, operational, and tactical aspects.

Map 3 illustrates the infiltration of multiple agents, landing at will throughout the Philippine Islands. These missions illustrate two important facts: (1) the clandestine use of submarines and commercial vessels for insertion and extraction of agents into a denied area was a highly successful method, and (2) the extensive and pervasive resistance undergrounds allowed for excellent penetration and access. Intelligence agents using submarines included Chick Parsons, Jesus Villamor, Charles Smith, Jordan Hamner, Emigdio C. Cruz, Jay D. Vanderpool, George Rowe, and many others. Map 3 does not highlight the totality of intelligence agent insertions, but it provides a solid snapshot.

One key member of the resistance who constantly supported SWPA intelligence included the previously mentioned Vicente Lim. Lim’s frequent hospital stays helped him remain free of impressment into the Philippine Constabulary. As such, it is difficult to ascertain which of his ailments were real or imagined. Lim’s underground network consisted primarily of Philippine army officers such as Amado Bautista, Tomas Domaoal, Amado Magtoto, and Alfredo Santos. But his network also included frequent communications with the Philippine government, including Senators José Ozámiz and Manuel Roxas. While Lim avoided service in the Philippine puppet regime, he encouraged others to serve and act as double agents. Until his imprisonment and execution, Lim “conducted intelligence work, gathered information through trusted officers and individuals, and continued formulating plans.”³³ Lim’s ambition was to unite all the Philippine guerrilla movements under one command (presumably with himself in charge). Despite Lim’s attempt not to expose his activities, his high-profile position made it easy to identify him as a member of the resistance. Lim was quite aware of this fact and tried to escape Manila for Australia. The Japanese arrested General Lim in 1944 and executed him.

Another important Philippine operative was Josefina Guerrero, who had leprosy. Guerrero was a solid intelligence agent, and her disability assisted in her movements and activities. Visible lesions on her face and exposed arms ensured the Japanese left her movements uninterrupted and unsuspected.³⁴ Following the Japanese invasion, Guerrero persistently sought out the Manila underground and volunteered her services as a spy. Once she was finally accepted, she used her condition to gain quick access and move unmolested through searches at checkpoints. As a courier, she typically relayed written messages by placing them in her hair bun. She also acted as a courier of weapons and supplies. Another important task for Guerrero included walking around the city and mapping out Japanese defenses.³⁵

^{Map 3. Intelligence Agent Insertions Into the Philippines, 1943-1944}

 

One of Guerrero’s most dangerous and important missions came when the underground asked her to provide a detailed map to the U.S. Army in January 1945. The underground had identified the locations of Japanese mines laid on routes of advance toward Manila. If this information were in the hands of the Americans, U.S. Soldiers might avoid these dangerous impediments. Guerrero taped the map on her back, between her shoulder blades. With absolutely no knowledge of the American positions, she departed on a 35-mile trek through multiple Japanese checkpoints. Exhausted by her illness but relentless, she navigated her way through dangerous combat conditions to finally meet up with the U.S. Army’s 37th Division at Calumpit, Bulacan. Not only did Guerrero provide the important map, which likely saved many American lives, but she also provided a host of other important intelligence, including vital information on the Santo Tomas Internment Camp, in Manila.³⁶

By the time the 6th and 8th Armies landed in late 1944, SWPA and Allied Intelligence Bureau had established extremely accurate information on Japanese army locations and activities, which proved a critical factor for planning the invasion. As one example, an intelligence report dated May 31, 1944, regarding Nueva Vizcaya Province on Luzon, detailed the number of Japanese troops at 14 locations as well as the numbers of the Philippine Constabulary. Reports also provided information on unit morale, training, and activities.³⁷ Incredibly, intelligence reports often detailed the names of each Japanese commander and a description of the units they commanded. Additionally, reports provided comprehensive information on U.S. prisoners of war, and there was great demand for this.³⁸ The amount of detail provided by intelligence efforts in the Philippines is staggering and perhaps the most comprehensive in the history of modern warfare. Such intelligence efforts continued to support the U.S. Army’s reoccupation of the Philippine Islands until the end of the war, all of which was made possible by underground resistance.

Private First Class Lyle O. Slaght, right, member of 503rd Parachute Infantry Regiment, scouts out area next to cloud of burning gasoline used to force Japanese soldiers out of hiding, on Corregidor Island, Philippine Islands, February 1945 (U.S. Army Signal Corps/Morris Weiner)

General of the Army Douglas MacArthur, with Soldiers from 37th Infantry Division, watches shelling of Japanese-occupied houses from artillery observation post in Fort Stotsenburg, Luzon, Philippine Islands, January 29, 1945 (U.S. Army Signal Corps/Gae Faillace)

Submarine Operations

At times these techniques used commercial craft, but the most significant form derived from adaption of conventional submarines. Operations began in January 1943, landing supplies on the Negros Islands in the Visayas. The quantities of materials a submarine could deliver (normally 1 or 2 tons) proved remarkable, particularly for the nominal needs of resistance movements that had no other readily available sources of sustainment.

From the earliest stages of war in the Philippines, submarines had conducted a special mission for personnel transport and resupply. Submarines supported the United States Army Forces in the Far East during the defense of Bataan Peninsula. Submarines made possible the movement of the Philippine national treasury (in gold bars) from Manila to their eventual destination in the United States. And, once MacArthur established SWPA in Australia, submarines continued to conduct clandestine missions to the Philippine Islands.

Over time, U.S. submarines played a continuous supporting effort, one that grew naturally during the war.

Four U.S. submarines, the Narwhal, Nautilus, Seawolf, and Stingray—and eventually more—carried out continuous support operations to Philippine guerrillas from January 1943 through January 1945. There were, in fact, over 40 of these special missions taken by 19 subs, many of which sailed from the port of Darwin in Australia’s Northern Territory. A summary of the submarine missions is detailed in the table. Of the 41 missions, the Seventh Fleet categorized only 3 as partially successful and 1 as unsuccessful (when the sub was lost). Transportation of resistance support via submarine proved successful and only 4 (10 percent) were discovered and attacked by Japanese forces.³⁹

 

 

By the time the 6th and 8th Armies invaded the islands, the submarines had delivered hundreds of radios, creating a large intelligence network. Also of importance was the delivery of counterfeit Japanese currency, which allowed guerrillas to pay for local goods and services without the need for promissory notes. In Mindanao, submarines supplied both plates and paper for printing Philippine money—a process approved by Quezon in Washington.⁴⁰ In total, the U.S. Navy delivered an impressive 1,325 tons of equipment via submarine. Moreover, 331 intelligence agents and other personnel were infiltrated to the islands and 472 exfiltrated. Vital items like weapons and ammunition empowered guerrillas to carry out increased ambushes, raids, and sabotage.⁴¹

The Hard-Won Lessons

In hindsight, MacArthur’s approach to guerrilla activities in the Philippines might be construed as reactive and ill-planned. Still, this case study provides excellent lessons about Great Power competition in a contest for supremacy via multiple domains, particularly the maritime. When the U.S. Navy could not readily gain naval supremacy around the islands, supporting indigenous guerrillas proved an excellent alternative to conventional defense. Meanwhile, the geography and populations within the islands offered a powder keg of insurrection that the Japanese were woefully unprepared for. MacArthur’s support to, and sustainment of, violent and nonviolent resistance to Imperial Japan remained an important component to combating the enemy until such time as the United States could regain sea control. When the U.S. Pacific Fleet achieved maritime superiority in late 1944, the Japanese conventional defense of the islands experienced the same doomed fate as the United States had in 1941.

As the Department of Defense considers Great Power competition in the Pacific today, it should adhere to Mahan’s advice by taking a hard look at the pivotal lessons of history. Both maritime geography and diverse ethnolinguistic populations remain dominant considerations in strategy. Competitors such as China and Russia have developed antiaccess/area-denial capabilities with the intention of neutralizing U.S. naval and aerial supremacy in the first island chain. The first chain of major Pacific archipelagos includes the Kuril Islands, the Japanese archipelago, the Ryukyu Islands, Taiwan, the northern Philippines, and Borneo (map 4). While technology has changed, the importance of maintaining sea control remains essential to this theater. Indeed, retention of self-governance on Pacific Island nations will likely require control of sea lines of communications. Like in the Philippines in World War II, the United States can attempt to contest this region with conventional force capabilities, but that effort may prove ineffective, particularly in the short term.

Map 4. First and Second Island Chains

Source: Annual Report to Congress: Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China (Washington, DC: Office of the Secretary of Defense, 2012).

When conventional defense appears unachievable, a resistance strategy can support many U.S. national objectives. The first island chain is inhabited by various ethnicities, religions, and cultures. In cases of foreign occupation, a spectrum of resistance from nonviolent protest through violent insurgency remains likely. A government-in-exile (or a shadow government) could impose obstacles to the legitimacy of an occupying power, undergrounds could sabotage strategically important objectives, spies could provide essential intelligence, and guerrillas could weaken enemy strength. An external sponsor to resistance could greatly aid these indigenous activities—actions which contest the enemy’s purposes despite the loss of sea control. Unfortunately, the United States failed to prepare for resistance opportunities in the Philippines during the Pacific War, but time remains to incorporate such strategies into contingency planning today.⁴² JFQ