Andrew Wilson (historian)

Transcription

Naomi - click here and write a clever title Transcription of interview with Andrew Wilson on May 27, 2013. Douglas Goldstein, CFP�, Financial Planner & Investment Advisor Andrew Wilson is a professor of strategy and policy at the United States Naval War College. He has written a number of books and teaches about strategy. Douglas Goldstein, financial planner & investment advisor, interviewed Wilson on Arutz Sheva Radio. Douglas Goldstein: Could you just focus a little bit on why it�s so important to learn the strategies from history, being that the world today is just so much different? Andrew Wilson: I think there are two big reasons why the classics of strategy are really useful, even when dealing with contemporary issues. Warfare has changed immeasurably over the course of history. There�s little in common between a Roman galley and a modern aircraft carrier, but strategy is a question of using the means at your disposal, whether it�s a galley or an aircraft carrier, to compel an adversary, to bend to your political will or more. The greatest works of strategy, like Clausewitz or Sun Tzu�s Art of War, are about the human contest of will that takes place within the larger machinery of warfare, and that makes them really useful if you study them rigorously. The second reason is the case study method, whether you�re using it in business school or in a war college, which is what we do at the Naval War College. A case study accustoms the mind to critical analysis and looking back at crucial strategic choices, both good choices and bad choices made by leaders in the past, and that�s the best way to hone the skills needed to evaluate the risks and rewards, cause and benefits of different courses of action in the future. It�s very easy to engage in theoretical analysis, which is that a decision worked out really well, they could have made a profit, or they won that particular war. But you have to interrogate the twist as it was made in real time, operating on imperfect knowledge and how well did that decision maker, that general, or that business leader make that choice based on that limited knowledge, and that�s all about analysis. It�s not about picking the right number. It�s not what we call money more than quarterbacking. It�s not second guessing. The decision that the coach made yesterday is coming up with an alternative course of action that�s better. Those are really essential skills because if you�re looking at a risk for work calculation in perfect knowledge, if you want to make that investment, or if you want to invade that country, you�re going to downplay the risk and sell the rewards really big. That�s not objective, and you really need to have that objective analytical skill. Douglas Goldstein: You�re working on a new translation of Sun Tzu�s Art of War. What are you bringing to the table that wasn�t there before? Andrew Wilson: What I focus on in my study of that particular book, and this is why I like the book, and it�s also one of the reasons why it�s so popular in business school and military curricula, is that it�s a book about leadership. If you study the context within which this book was written, what the author is trying to do is invent a new model of leadership, a new model that�s appropriate to the ever-changing realities of warfare and statecraft in ancient China, and that require a new standard of leadership of command. That required a leader not to be an aristocrat born to command in war, but someone who is bred to command in war, who has been educated, who is a brilliant strategist, but also a ruthlessly effective organizer. Douglas Goldstein: Today, we�ve got computers and all sorts of satellites to help see what�s going on but how could they have done that thousands of years ago? Andrew Wilson: This figures very prominently in the book. How do you lead an army in battle? Here, you have a commander who is standing on top of a command tower, ordering different flag configurations and different beatings in drums and bells to coordinate the movements of a hundred thousand people on a field of battle. The book says, �Tumult and uproar, the battle seems chaotic,� but the general sees order in that and that�s not just management skills. It�s a kind of artistry, like being a conductor of an orchestra. But here you have an orchestra of a hundred thousand armed men clashing with another hundred thousand armed men. It�s really an absolutely unique set of skills. Douglas Goldstein: A lot of times in business, when we�re looking at investments, we find that there are military leaders who left the military and went into business and they�re incredibly successful. In Israel, we often find that the top people, both in the economy, as well as the government, were all top people in the army. Is that just a given that we should assume someone who is a leader will succeed in any aspect of life? Andrew Wilson: My answer would be a qualified yes. It�s a yes in a sense that the organizational skills, the discipline, the personal management abilities required in the military, are going to be essentially the same as in business. In any large hierarchal goal organization engaged in a competition, you�re going to see a lot of parallels. Likewise, I think that because good business leaders have those skills, they can be very good military leaders. I think there�s movement back and forth, but I�d say that it�s a qualified yes because the ultimate leadership decisions are going to be different. This is because in business, it�s about profit and loss, financial risk and reward, but in the military the calculations are about life and death. It�s about political risk and reward, it�s about the survival or ruin of the nation. Douglas Goldstein: So you wouldn�t say necessarily that this company has a CEO, CFO, and CIO, and they were all generals. That�s not necessarily a proof that this will be a successful stock to invest in, for example? Andrew Wilson: Not necessarily, and this is definitely a modern phenomenon, but particularly apt for decision makers who have come up in the U.S. and the Israeli militaries and achieved very high ranks. These are high-tech, very well-funded forces, where leaders are much more likely to throw money at technology. Obviously, frugality, when it comes to blood is a very good thing, but this doesn�t necessarily make senior military leaders as financially frugal as one would like to see in a business leader, so I think ultimately that the calculations are going to be a little bit different. Douglas Goldstein: One of the things that you�ve spoken about in terms of strategy is what you referred to as �strategic adaption.� Is that just a nice way of saying, �I was wrong. Let�s try the next approach?� Andrew Wilson: It is, and a few reasons in Art of War in particular, is that it seems to tell you to be infinitely flexible and supremely adaptable in any circumstance, to change your strategy on a dime. This is great in theory, but really difficult to do in practice. Douglas Goldstein: Is this something that you teach your students, and how do you teach them? Andrew Wilson: Our students want flexibility and want to be adaptable, and that�s somewhat easier in different levels of war, but when you�re talking about maneuvering large armies or getting logistics and place and things like that, there�s incredible limits on your flexibility and on your ability to be adaptable in different circumstances, and it�s very difficult to change course completely. A lot of commanders are personally and professionally invested in their strategy. When Washington got trounced by the British in New York in 1776, he changed his strategy completely. He goes from an idea of, �if I can get a decisive battle against the British,� to a Fabian strategy, which is the strategy of protraction and frustration. We were down against British means and will until the Americans, with a lot of help from the French, could transition back to the offenses. That�s a 180-swing, and it took vision and moral courage to make that shift, but also took eloquence to sell it to the communal congress. He is not operating in a vacuum. He is operating in a political system, so it�s very difficult to shift gears that dramatically, and it�s rare when somebody does it. It may seem that failure is staring you in the face to change or sell, so you shift your assets into something else. But it is equally difficult to understand that even though the indicators are good and your measures of effectiveness seem to point towards success, your extra strategy is actually not working. Think about the body count in Vietnam. The U.S. military created its own measure of effectiveness, and by that measure it was succeeding, but that was the wrong measure. In that case, you think your strategy is working. You think your investment choice is paying off, but all of a sudden, you realize you should have showed us in that strategy, months if not years ago, even when the indicators of your own invention were telling you it was a good choice. Douglas Goldstein: What should you do if you feel you simply have no choice? How do you work through that as a military strategist? Andrew Wilson: It�s fairly straightforward when you can match your political objectives to a fairly straightforward strategy and a fairly straightforward operational idea: �What do you want to do militarily?� That�s relatively easy. If you think about the First Gulf War, where the objective was to liberate Kuwait and restore the Kuwaiti government, that�s something that�s pretty easy to operationalize. You need mass forces, march them into Kuwait, drive the Iraqi military up, very straightforward, kind of linear. But then if you think about what are the larger grand strategic or reasonal political objectives in the United States after that war, which were peace and stability in the Middle East, how do you operationalize a concept like that? They tell a joke about the guy who hopes to win the World Series, and a genie says, �How about something easier?� and he says, �How about peace in the Middle East?� so the genie replies, �Let me work on the cups then.� That�s very difficult, and this sounds a little trite, but you have to think about the different instruments of national power that you want to capitalize on and different mixes of coercive diplomacy. Or do you want to incentivize good behavior? There are ways to facilitate good decision-making in Iran. I think the U.S. president was speaking the other day with the Turkish president about giving Assad an out in Syria. So he�s not going to fall like Gaddafi. They�ll get him on a plane, put him someplace else. But he is going to absolutely fight to the end. This is a very difficult balancing act that has to be struck, and a lot of times the classics of military strategy might be a little too straightforward. It might not be as you spoke in those environments. You have to complement your study of the classics of like Clausewitz�s On War or Sun Tzu�s Art of War, which are about primarily achieving your political objective through violence, with some Kissinger on Bismarck and try to figure out the military�s instrument. Actually in a lot of circumstances,, not even the best instruments will achieve your objectives. You need that strength and that course of ability to complement the other positive incentives you might be providing. Douglas Goldstein: Isn�t there a concept in the military that you just have to go full force without trying an equal force against your fighting, especially for the Americans, because there is no equal force? Andrew Wilson: The idea that half measures are dangerous, and this is one of the problematic lessons that incrementalism is signaling through the use of force, doesn�t really do a good job in compelling the enemy or coercing the enemy because you�re not going the whole hog. You�re bringing overwhelming force to bear, and that creates maneuver room for your opponent. You�re not bringing the maximum pain on them. In the chapter two , it gives us an idea of sort of a hierarchy or progression, a hierarchy of strategic preferences or a progression of strategic targets and the first is to attack the enemy�s strategy, figure what their means and equations are, and how are they trying to achieve their political ends. You try to figure out how to flummox that, you get inside their decision making, but you still doubt. The second thing you do is attack the enemy alliances. Make them feel isolated, and that can be diplomatic, or use the military to isolate an adversary physically from its allies, preventing material and manpower aid from getting into them. That�s a way of using not just the military but diplomacy, economic incentives or propaganda, to substantially increase the likelihood of the military operations if and when you do undertake them. Douglas Goldstein: How can people follow your work? Andrew Wilson: I�ve done two courses for a company called the Great Courses, and those are available for the Great Courses website www.greatcourses.com. You quite often see me in The Economist, in the Wall Street Journal and New York Times. One is on Sun Tzu�s Art of War specifically and the other one is a broader survey course called Masters of War, which covers history�s greatest strategic thinkers from antiquity up to the information age. Douglas Goldstein, CFP�, is the director of Profile Investment Services and the host of the Goldstein on Gelt radio show (Monday nights at 7:00 PM on www.israelnationalradio.com. He is a licensed financial professional both in the U.S. and Israel. Securities offered through Portfolio Resources Group, Inc., Member FINRA, SIPC, MSRB, NFA, SIFMA. Accounts carried by National Financial Services LLC. Member NYSE/SIPC, a Fidelity Investments company. His book Building Wealth in Israel is available in bookstores, on the web, or can be ordered at: www.profile-financial.com (02) 624-2788 or (03) 524-0942. Disclaimer: This document is a transcription and/or an educational article. While it is believed to be current and accurate, divergence from the original is to be expected. The original podcast can be heard at https://sites.google.com/site/goldsteinradioshows/. All information on this website is purely information and should not be used as the sole basis for making financial decisions. The opinions rendered herein are those of the guests, and not necessarily those of Douglas Goldstein, Profile Investment Services, Ltd., or Israel National News. Readers should consult with a professional financial advisor before making any financial decisions. Please see the complete disclaimer at https://sites.google.com/site/goldsteinradioshows/.