IN-DEPTH BRIEFING // #37 // SEPTEMBER 22
KNOWING THE ENEMY: THE COGNITIVE CHALLENGE OF MODERN WAR ‘Know the enemy, know yourself; your victory will never be endangered’ – Sun Tzu, The Art of War
AUTHOR
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Aaron Edwards Senior Lecturer in Defence and International Affairs Royal Military Academy Sandhurst
The Centre for Historical Analysis and Conflict Research is the British Army’s think tank and tasked with enhancing the conceptual component of its fighting power. The views expressed in this In Depth Briefing are those of the author, and not of the CHACR, Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, Ministry of Defence or the British Army. The aim of the briefing is to provide a neutral platform for external researchers and experts to offer their views on critical issues. This document cannot be reproduced or used in part or whole without the permission of the CHACR. www.chacr.org.uk
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USSIA’S invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has led to an unprecedented level of scrutiny on the country’s behaviour on the world stage and, crucially, the combat effectiveness of its military forces. However, it is important for Western strategists to ask serious questions about how the Russian state conceptualises its security challenges to gain greater insight into how and why it has responded in the way that it has in Ukraine and elsewhere. In an era of persistent competition, a more precise understanding of illiberal state thinking on security will, therefore, better equip the UK as it seeks to radically transform its own philosophy around the utility of the military instrument. Only by better appreciating how our adversaries think can we better equip ourselves to meet the cognitive challenge of modern war.
KNOWING OUR ENEMIES In a much quoted but little understood article published in the Russian newspaper VoennoPromyshlenni Kurier (VPK) in 2013, the country’s Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov observed: “I would like to say that no matter what forces the enemy has, no matter how welldeveloped his forces and means of armed conflict may be, forms and methods for overcoming them can be found. He will always have vulnerabilities, and that means that adequate means of opposing him exist.”2 Gerasimov’s article is often perceived as the intellectual elixir which helps explain Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its fomenting of separatist insurgency in Eastern Ukraine3, as well as the more recent ‘special
military operation’ in the country. Nonetheless, as Charles K. Bartles has argued, the main thrust of Gerasimov’s article appeared to be its author’s intent to send a message to the Kremlin that the Russian armed forces were well positioned to meet the challenge of current and future threats.4 From his rather lofty perch at the top of his country’s security architecture, General Gerasimov believed that it was essential for the Russian military to rethink not only how their forces were physically configured but also how they would meet the cognitive demands of these threats. Interestingly, Gerasimov argued that the changes necessary for a fundamental shift in thinking about modern war must come from within the
Aaron Edwards, the author of Strategy in War and Peace: A Critical Introduction (Edinburgh University Press, 2017), offers his thanks to his colleagues Tim Bean and Lance Davies for reading over a draft of this briefing.
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Valery Gerasimov, ‘The Value of Science Is in the Foresight New Challenges Demand Rethinking the Forms and Methods of Carrying out Combat Operations’, Originally published in Military-Industrial Kurier, 27 February 2013. Translated from Russian on 21 June 2014 by Robert Coalson, editor, Central News, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. Reproduced in Military Review, January-February 2016.
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Andrew Monaghan, Dealing with the Russians (Cambridge: Polity, 2019), p. 38.
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Charles Bartles, ‘Getting Gerasimov Right’, Military Review, January-February 2016, p. 31.
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