The Pentagon sharpens its cultural sword to win future wars

The war in Ukraine is hastening America’s own military rethink. The fighting holds lessons, from the vulnerability of tanks to the value of defensive weapons. Those pondering a future war between America and China draw a further conclusion: the advantage that “mission command” can give a military force, even one as outgunned as Ukraine’s.

A “decentralised, power-down, do-whatever-it-takes-to-win approach” to command and control is one reason the Ukrainians have pushed the Russians back from Kyiv, notes Doug Crissman, who was recently in charge of the Mission Command Centre of Excellence at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, where much military doctrine is developed. In contrast, the Russian army’s rigid, top-down command system from the Soviet era has left it flat-footed, able to advance only through destructive artillery fire. Around a dozen Russian generals, taking charge of matters on the front line, have been killed there.