by
Stefan T. Possony, Ph.D.; Jerry E. Pournelle, Ph.D. and
Francis X. Kane, Ph.D. (Col., USAF Ret.)
The PREFACES are on this page. Scroll down. Read those first, then See Contents and chapters above. There is a short disquisition on this book with a brief biography of Stefan Possony written in January 1999 that may be useful.
You may think of this edition of this book as a form of shareware. If you find it useful, please send five dollars:
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or by mail – bills will do—to
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"A gigantic technological race is in progress between interception and penetration and each time capacity for interception makes progress it is answered by a new advance in capacity for penetration. Thus a new form of strategy is developing in peacetime, a strategy of which the phrase ‘arms race’ used prior to the old great conflicts is hardly more than a faint reflection.
There are no battles in this strategy; each side is merely trying to outdo in performance the equipment of the other. It has been termed ‘logistic strategy’. Its tactics are industrial, technical, and financial. It is a form of indirect attrition; instead of destroying enemy resources, its object is to make them obsolete, thereby forcing on him an enormous expenditure….
A silent and apparently peaceful war is therefore in progress, but it could well be
a war which of itself could be decisive."
--General d’Armee Andre Beaufre
The quotation above opened the original edition of this book; it was clearly prophetic. The silent and apparently peaceful war was decisive.
This book was originally written in 1968 to 1970, a time when the Cold War was real and the outcome still very much in doubt; it will be recalled that Nixon’s Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, convinced that the Cold War was lost, hoped to negotiate détente and come to terms with Soviet International communism; and it was widely assumed in 1975 that the United States had been dealt a major defeat in Viet Nam.
In 1991, just before the collapse of the Soviet Union ended the Seventy Years War, we attempted to edit this work into a form suitable for publication in an electronic medium. This was well before the popularity of the world wide web, and before electronic publishing tools were readily available.
The end of the Seventy Years War brought other problems. The senior author, Dr. Stefan Possony, lived to see the victory which he had done so much to bring about, but died shortly after the collapse of international communism. Dr. Kane and Dr. Pournelle were involved in the development of the space program, and particularly the renewal of the X projects which had been canceled by McNamara in the name of Arms Control (because they were so successful at generating new military technology. New technology wasn’t wanted by those enamored of Arms Control strategies.)
For those and other reasons, this book languished for six years with little or no work done.
A generation of students used this book, but a new generation can’t find it; the copies still in use in the War College are Xeroxes, the book long being out of print. Meanwhile, new threats loom on the horizon. The Seventy Years War is over; the Technological War continues relentlessly. It is possible that this book is needed now more than ever.
Most of the examples in this book were chosen for their impact on thoughts about the Cold War and the threat of Soviet communism. They are now historical rather than current, and a proper revision of this book would use examples from current threats; alas we haven’t time to do that; nor have we time to do a proper chapter on space and space weapons. You will find THOR and SDI in these pages, but they aren’t given their proper emphasis. No matter. The principles in this book remain as true today as when they were written; we find little that needs explaining, and nothing that requires an apology.
Jerry Pournelle
Studio City, California 1997
When this book was originally published, the Cold War was very real. The United States was winding down the agony of Viet Nam, and one heard calls for "one, two, three, many Viet Nams" to bring the United States to her knees.
The threat of nuclear war was quite real, although it was not everywhere taken quite as seriously as it should have been.
The Soviet Union was not seen as an evil empire, but as the representative of the wave of the future.
The result was that the early portion of the book was devoted to convincing the readers that the threat was real, and imparting an understanding of the nature of that threat. That was needed then. It is less needed now; yet some of the early material also introduces the concepts of strategic analysis and the technological war, and those concepts are vital to understanding the principles we try to explain in this book.
A full rewrite of STRATEGY OF TECHNOLOGY would go through and pare away those portions written to respond to the threat of the 70's and would add new examples and analyses to fit the threat of the 90's. Alas, we have not time to do this; our choices are a 'quick fix' or not to publish for some years.
[That paragraph was itself written in 1991; what we did then was essentially nothing. It is clearly time to get this published in electronic form, whatever else we do.]
STRATEGY OF TECHNOLOGY was a textbook in the Service Academies for several years, and off and on has been a textbook in the Air and National Defense War Colleges. We have reason to believe that its arguments were useful in bringing about adoption of a high tech strategy for the US Armed Forces. That such a strategy was adopted is self evident from the victory in Iraq and the collapse of the Soviet empire. How much was due to this book can be debated, but we can at least claim that this book explains the principles of technological strategy.
Some day we will revise the examples. However, the principles haven't changed, and the rapid changes in the Soviet Union as well as the Iraq victory can be explained as consequences of an earlier victory in the 'silent and apparently peaceful conflict which may be decisive' which we called The Technological War.
From time to time we have inserted comments made at times later than the first publication. Those are marked with brackets and dated. We find we haven't had to do much revision of the book, and none of the principles espoused needed changing. We have pointed up new examples of the application of those principles.
Portions of this revised text have from time to time been published in different volumes of THERE WILL BE WAR, an anthology series edited by Jerry Pournelle.
You may think of this edition of this book as a form of shareware. If you find it useful, please send one dollar – a bill will do—to
J. E. Pournelle, STRATEGY OF TECHNOLOGY
12358 Ventura Blvd.
Box 372
Studio City, California, 91604.
Enclose any comments you like. I’ll see that Dr. Possony’s widow gets his share.
Chapter One - The Technological War
Definition of Technological Warfare
Foundations of the Technological War - Fundamentals of Technological Strategy
Dimensions of the Technological War
An Overview of the Nature of Technology
The Decisive War
The Elements of Strategy - What is Strategy?
The Principles of War
Strategy and Technology
1988
Chapter Two - An Overview Of The Recent History of the Technological War
Organization of This Chapter
Soviet Technological Strategy
The U.S. Conduct of the Technological War
The 1950 Era
The Nuclear Powered Airplane
The ICBM
SLBM
The 1960 Era
Apollo
Military Aircraft
The 1970 Era
MIRV
SHUTTLE
The 1980 Era
B-1
SDI
The Present Assumptions Governing U.S. Conduct of the Technological War
The Abandonment of the Initiative
Surprise
Science Is No Substitute for Military Judgment
Systems Analysis and Military Decisions: The TFX (1970)
The Limits of Scientific Military Analysis
Other Fallacies
Technological Process
Centralized Decisions
Small Advantages
Symmetry of Motives
Overkill
Fear of Obsolescence
We Don't Need to Do Anything
An Illustrative Case History: GPS NAVSTAR: The Revolution 25 Years in the Making
Chapter 3 -The Nature of the Technological Process
U.S. Policies and Technological Progress
Technology and the Economic Base
The Technological War General
Conclusion
Chapter 4 - Strategic Analysis
Note to the Second Edition:
The Creation of Technological Strategy
The Elements of Technological Strategy: An Overview
The Creation of Military Technology
Phase One
MIRV: An Historical Example
Phase Two
Phase Three
Leadership in Technological Warfare
Political Decision Makers
Budget
Intelligence
Strategists
Military Operations Specialists
Scientists
Engineering and Development
Procurement and Production
Nonmilitary Warfare
Systems Analysis
Strategic Analysis
Chapter 5 - Surprise
The Sneak Attack
Strategic Surprise
Tactical Surprise
Strategic Surprise through Operational Surprise
Technology and Surprise
Stratagems to Achieve Surprise
The Basic Purpose of Surprise
Historical Examples
Breakthroughs
Exploitation of Surprise
Conclusion
Chapter 6 - Assured Survival
Introduction
Assured Destruction
Soviet Strategic Doctrine
Requirements of Assured Survival
The Case Against Active Defense
Discussion
The Case for a New Strategy
The Technology of Active Defense
The Nature of the Threat
Defense Problems
The ABM Problem
Boost Phase
Post-Boost
Midcourse
Reentry or Terminal Phase
Interception Possibilities
Passive Defense
Laser Weapon Systems
What Kind of Defense
Survival
Chapter 7 - The Nuclear Technology Race
Foreword: 1988
The Applications Effort
The Basic and Continuing Role: Deterring War
The Initiative
The Shape of Things To Come: The Baruch Plan
The Second Ploy: The Test Ban
The Test-ban Strategy
Another Strategic Failure
Yield-to-weight Ratio
Nuclear Strategy
History of the Nuclear Race : Nuclear Research Requirements
The Impediments to Nuclear Research
Conclusion
Chapter 8 - What Kind of War Is This?
Classification of Conflicts
What Are Small Wars?
Political Correlation of the Forces
Correlation of Morale
Correlation of Economic Power
Correlation of Technological Power
Correlation of Military Power
The Spectrum of Small Wars
Insurrection
Rebellion
Coup D'Etat
Revolution
The Revolution
Escalation to Centralized War
The United States and the Future of Small Wars
U.S. and Small Wars
World Policeman?
Force Requirements for Small Wars
Small Wars and Escalation
Conclusion
Chapter 9 - The Prevention of War
Why Wars Are Not Fought
The Nature of Strategic Decisions
Offense and Defense
The Modern Strategic War
The Effect of Nuclear Weapons
Force Levels in the Nuclear Era
Security Through Arms Control
Security in the Modern Era
(THOR: code name given to a long range kinetic kill missile system described by Possony and Pournelle in 1978. One variant uses orbiting weapons. Another uses lofted weapons. The key in all cases is high accuracy with low collateral damage.)
SDI: the Strategic Defense Initiative came to existence following Ronald Reagan's 23 March 1983 speech on strategic defenses. Much of the concept for and the content of that speech was drafted by the Citizen's Advisory Council on National Space Policy, J. E. Pournelle, Chairman. The first Council report was incorporated into the Reagan Transition Team papers; Colonel Kane served as the editor for the space and defense portion of those papers. Strategic Defenses are covered in this book in the chapter on Assured Survival.
