Disruptive military innovation and the war on terror: some thoughts for perfect opponents / Raymond E Franck, Terry C Pierce
Material type: TextPublication details: 2006Subject(s): In: Defense and Security Analysis Vol 22 No 2, June 2006, pp.123-140 (94)Summary: This paper views contemporary terrorism as a disruptive military innovation i.e. using existing technologies in new ways. It describes this innovation in terms of foundations, preferred modes of operation, and ideal opponents and suggests that modern democracies such as the USA clearly qualify as ideal opponents and should be especially concerned with developing counters. The RMA that the U.S. and some of its allies are achieving makes them unbeatable in traditional warfare. But terrorists are not traditional fixed point targets; they have recognised the value of asymmetry and are busy exploiting a virtual domain RMA. Some historical examples of perfect opponents are presented, and the article concludes with a series of thought provoking questions.Item type | Current library | Call number | Copy number | Status | Date due | Barcode | |
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Journal Article | Mindef Library & Info Centre Journals | TERRORISM (Browse shelf(Opens below)) | 1 | Not for loan | 20533-1001 |
This paper views contemporary terrorism as a disruptive military innovation i.e. using existing technologies in new ways. It describes this innovation in terms of foundations, preferred modes of operation, and ideal opponents and suggests that modern democracies such as the USA clearly qualify as ideal opponents and should be especially concerned with developing counters. The RMA that the U.S. and some of its allies are achieving makes them unbeatable in traditional warfare. But terrorists are not traditional fixed point targets; they have recognised the value of asymmetry and are busy exploiting a virtual domain RMA. Some historical examples of perfect opponents are presented, and the article concludes with a series of thought provoking questions.
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