Swarming & the Future of ConflictSwarming is a seemingly amorphous, but deliberately structured, coordinated, strategic way to perform military strikes from all directions. It employs a sustainable pulsing of force and/or fire that is directed from both close-in and stand-off positions. It will work best--perhaps it will only work--if it is designed mainly around the deployment of myriad, small, dispersed, networked maneuver units. This calls for an organizational redesign--involving the creation of platoon-like pods joined in company-like clusters--that would keep but retool the most basic military unit structures. It is similar to the corporate redesign principle of flattening, which often removes or redesigns middle layers of management. This has proven successful in the ongoing revolution in business affairs and may prove equally useful in the military realm. |
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20th century able activists actors adversary aircraft AirLand Battle airpower all-channel network American approach armored Army Battle of France battlespace BattleSwarm blitzkrieg British campaign capabilities Chechen Chechnya close-in communications concept coordinated cyberwar defeat defense disruption effective emerge enable enemy engage fighting fire form of organization formations German guerrilla Gulf Gulf War hierarchies information flows information operations information revolution internetted John Arquilla kamikaze light strike vehicles logistical maneuver units maneuver warfare mass and maneuver melee military doctrine military swarming mobile Mongols move naval Navy netwar network form network-centric warfare NGOs notion nuclear offensive organizational overall panzer pods and clusters potential precision-guided munitions Russian small units social spectrum of conflict stand-off strategic strike structures swarmers swarming doctrine swarming force swarming in force tactical tanks target technologies tions topsight U-boats U.S. forces U.S. military units of maneuver University Press Vietnam weapons World World War II York Zapatista Zulu