I. Introduction to "New War?" Theme
Teachers may want to have the students read this introduction before they read the selected essays on "New War?" to provide a basic understanding of the concepts included therein. In his first major address to the nation after the events of September 11th, President George Bush declared war on terrorism and those who support it. He said that this would be a new type of war, unlike any that the United States had fought in the past.
Authors of the essays in this section ask the question whether this engagement really is a new type of war, and if so, what are the new characteristics of this war. They investigate multiple causes of this transformation: advances in military technology, changes brought about by the post-Cold War era, impacts of US domestic politics, and new types of engagement required to fight terrorists.
As background for exploring these questions, it is useful to define the characteristics of "conventional warfare" as it was known throughout much of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Conventional warfare required the direct engagement on land, sea, and/or air of two or more military forces. Conventional wars were either between nation-states or were civil wars between the established government of a nation-state and dissident group(s) within that country.
1. Technologies and the New War
Technology is one of the major contributing factors to the shift in the way that wars are waged today. For armed networks around the world, like Al Qaeda, improved information and communications technology offer the means for these groups to organize across borders or from different corners of the world. And it is based on these global communication systems that they can raise money through illegal trading in drugs, illegal immigrants, illicit remittances from members of the networks throughout the world, etc. It is also through information technology and the global media that these networks can gain strategic information about countries like the United States that was not so accessible in years past.
It is not only armed networks that use information technology to their advantage. Governments throughout the world use technology for intelligence purposes. For example, satellites can be used to determine the location of enemy camps, criminal bank accounts can be monitored, and developments in other countries can be observed through news media there. Likewise, as will be discussed further in the essays, leaders use communications media to influence populations' views of events, and movies and television programs can add legitimacy to particular political positions.
Some experts also consider that advanced nation-states, which are dependent on technology for everyday life, are especially vulnerable to having their own technology used against them. In the new age of "virtual war," hackers could attempt attacks on anything that relies on information technology to function -- from water supplies to banking systems - potentially wreaking havoc in a given country. The question remains whether terrorist networks possess the high level of expertise necessary to commit these acts.
Advanced countries, especially the United States have used technology to improve their defense systems. The development of "smart weapons" means that forces can exact tremendous damage on their opponents with only minimal loss of their personnel because they use advanced technology to avoid direct engagement. This type of high-tech warfare was first demonstrated in the Persian Gulf War fought by the US in 1991 and was fine-tuned in the US engagement in the wars in Bosnia and Kosovo in the mid- to late-1990s. And by all accounts, smart weapons were militarily very effective in Afghanistan, the first phase of President Bush's declared war against global terrorism.
The great reduction in the potential for US casualties by using smart weapons has significantly affected public opinion about US military engagement, and has minimized domestic opposition. Now the US can more easily use force - or the threat of force - internationally.
However, the use of smart weapons raises important ethical questions. The Geneva Conventions (i.e., a group of four treaties, or written contracts, adopted in 1949 which govern all nation-states' treatment of members of the military, civilians and prisoners in times of war) call for the protection of civilian non-combatants. In conventional warfare where two armed forces are directly engaged, the ethics of warfare recognize that soldiers will kill soldiers but condemns harming civilians. This principle brings the use of smart bombs into question, since even with their increasing accuracy, smart weapons targeted by distant combatants and dropped from high-altitude aircraft occasionally miss their mark and kill or injure civilian non-combatants, or may cause "collateral damage" (i.e., killing or injuring civilians and/or damaging civilian objects) even when they directly hit their target.
2. Political Realities and the New War
In terms of international politics, the convergence of the easing of bi-polar tension at the end of the Cold War with the expansion of globalization has greatly reduced the likelihood of a major nuclear confrontation or a war that would engage most of the major nations of the world. However, at the same time, there has been a surge in informal and privatized armed forces causing considerable instability in various countries and regions of the world. While their objectives range from conflict to conflict, it is increasingly apparent that these groups rely on international funding/trade and global crime networks to survive.
Domestically, the past decades have witnessed a growing ambivalence on the part of the US policy makers and the US public regarding the US's role in global politics. While there is a bi-partisan agreement by the majority of the US public, according to public opinion polls, in support of active US engagement in the global economy, no such consensus exists regarding US engagement in global politics. Indeed, several scholars and commentators have noted an isolationist tendency in the US. On the military front, this has surfaced in the reluctance of the US, as the sole superpower, to become militarily involved in conflicts in other areas of the world except in cases where US national interests are clearly and directly affected. However, as discussed above, the development of technologically sophisticated weapons that inflict fewer casualties and place many fewer US combatants at risk has increased the willingness of the US public to become militarily engaged in foreign conflicts.
3. New War and Global Terrorism
As will be expanded upon in the selected essays, neither global terrorism nor the declared war on terrorism fits the norms of conventional warfare, as described above. Global terrorism is executed by small, secretive, and often invisible networks of individuals who are not identified with a particular nation-state. While these "non-state actors" (i.e., those entities that are not official arms of recognized nation-states or governments) networks often have defined political objectives, they are not directly associated with the traditional type of national objectives. For example, the Al Qaeda network does not seek to take over a particular nation or government, nor does it target the military defeat of a particular government of a nation. Moreover, its armed units are not organized into traditional armies and do not engage their enemy with conventional strategies and tactics.
Thus, the new war on global terrorism by necessity will differ from conventional warfare. Because the enemy is not a nation-state, victory cannot be achieved by defeating an opposing government, even when it may be deemed necessary - as in the case of Afghanistan - to defeat a regime that collaborates with terrorists. While a combination of high-tech weaponry and strong support for internal forces opposing the Taliban led to the defeat of that regime, it is questionable that the same military strategy can be used effectively to destroy the capability of Al Qaeda and other networks. Alternative technologies and strategies will need to be employed if global terrorism is to be defeated.
