This work was written in an American context. I do not view myself as solely an American citizen, and believe that the interests of the American people should mirror the interests of the global citizen
Acronyms:
WMD: Weapons of Mass Destruction
SA: new Security Agenda
GCR: Global Catastrophic Risks
BTW: Bilateral Total Warfare: This is the contemporary version of the Western Way of War
COIN: Counter-Insurgency
IT: Information Technology
MAD: Mutually Assured Destruction

Part I: Strategic Situation of the 21st Century
Background: Many theories about the future of warfare exist. There is a much-discussed trend in the last 60 years of the extinction of Bilateral Total War (BTW). The argument is that because bilateral total warfare between states has the potential for Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD), it is now obsolete (c.f. Fukuyama’s “The End of History”). The claim is that new types of warfare, asymmetrical and network-based, have become more relevant.  However, obsolete is not the right word. Bilateral Total War (BTW) (implying bilateral nuclear war) is merely taboo; it should not be used because the implications would be catastrophic, but it still could be used. Should global security break down enough, it is still the most powerful means of violence, and it will be used.
The New Security Agenda (SA):
Context: Global security could be breached in a variety of ways. Threats to the SA include any variety of Global Catastrophic Risks (GCRs), which could lead to enough instability for nations to wage BTW against each other. Therefore risks to America’s security and risks to global security are one and the same.
1.    The Threats to Global Security: These can be broken down into 4 categories based on scale: non-human, non-state, state, global.
•    Non-human (Non-anthropogenic) Factors: A variety of GCRs stem from the perilous nature of our planet’s existence. Global catastrophes would transform civilization by casualties numbering in the billions, and the stage would be set for BTW. Global catastrophes could ensue from any of the possible scenarios (keep in mind that these have happened within the last few million years, and will happen again):
o    Collision with “rock from space (asteroid or comet) with a diameter> 1km
o    Super-Volcano: believed to be the reason behind the Permian Extinction (320 m.y.a., largest extinction in archaeological history).
o    Solar Flare.
•    Non-state actors. This is the threat of the rogue WMD. In fact, the 21st century is witnessing the democratization of WMD due to the rapid and unstoppable diffusion of technology inherent to the Information Age. The threat is that any individual or non-state actor, or even a graduate student making a mistake in a lab, can cause massive destruction.  Examples of WMD proliferation due to IT: (For more information, see Global Catastrophic Risks, edited by Nick Bostrom)
o    Using Laser Isotope Separation technology a nuclear arsenal can be assembled in any kind of warehouse (around 37,000 square feet). It is no longer a detectable, industrial process (c.f. Wired magazine, Oct. 2008).
o    Bioengineered viruses can be concocted by a grad student in a lab. For example, a virulent virus accidentally created from mousepox in 2001during an attempt to sterilize rats had a one hundred percent mortality rate on lab rats, even once they had been inoculated against this bioengineered pandemic.
•    States with geopolitical ambitions. Although the monopoly that states have traditionally held on violence has broken down due to the democratization of WMD, the state still is the most powerful actor on the global scene. Traditional political ambitions could lead to asymmetrical warfare between two states, which could develop into BTW. The greatest threat is of a Russian-Sino axis leading such a war (c.f. the Chinese Unrestricted Warfare) against the USA. Other fears are of an antagonistic E.U. or of a rising Iran. See p.150-151of Another Bloody Century by Colin S. Gray for more information.
•    Global human effects.  Due to the number of people on this planet, earth systems are increasingly modulated by human beings. One of the most publicized systems is that of the carbon cycle, which we have rapidly altered due to our use of carbon fuels, our clearing of forests, and the total number of carbon-exhaling humans and their livestock. Other critical systems that we influence dramatically include the nitrogen, phosphorus, and hydrologic cycles. The solutions to these problems are extremely complex, but if they cannot be found this represents a substantial GCR. Rapid Climate Change, for example, could lead to a much greater competition for scarcer resources, and since the competition for resources in order to survive is one of the deepest sources of war (c.f. Azar Gat, War in Human Civilization), this is a threat to the SA. For more information on dealing with earth systems management, see Reconstructing Earth by Brad Allenby.

Part II: The role of the Western Way of War in the 21st Century

The Western Way of War has a dual role in the 21st century. First and foremost, it needs to enforce the new Security Agenda (SA). This requires a complete revamping of a military that excels at BTW into a much more specialized force that transcends the traditional WWoW. In fact, the military of the 21st century that enforces the SA will be unrecognizable when compared to the militaries that waged BTW during WWII. However, should Global Catastrophes force the SA to fail, BTW will be a consequence. Therefore militaries still would be used for conventional BTW. Remember: currently BTW is taboo, but not obsolete.

1)    Role of the military in the SA: it is useful mainly for Threat categories 2) and 3), i.e. from states and non-state actors. However, the military never plays a conventional role in the new SA; it is not involved in Bilateral Total Warfare, but a much more sophisticated peace-keeping and COIN process by which the conditions that could lead to catastrophic BTW are eliminated. Thus it becomes an “elite activity conducted by champions” (Gray).

•    Against Non-state actors: Specialization of military. The only protection against the rapid proliferation of WMD technology is to eliminate conditions that lead individuals with sufficient will and competence from creating WMDs. This is largely a political and economic issue, because the will to threaten global security is often due to economic inequalities or political antagonism.  For example, Islamic terrorism mainly stems from political antagonism at the apparent American (or Western) Hegemony of the world. Furthermore, jihadist recruits often come from places of economic poverty, where a bad drought could have left the population with no other choice. First and foremost, such areas of humanitarian crisis need to be helped economically by the West. It is in our own interest. However, sometimes governments in those crisis areas are either failed states or rogue states, and they are the source of the famine themselves. It has often been shown that despite adequate supplies, it is a failed infrastructure/government that keeps humanitarian crises from being resolved. This is where the military comes in. It is used in the specialized context of Security Operations and Counter-Insurgency (COIN) operations. I will show in Part III how the new SA has started to transform the military.

•    Against States: Diplomacy is key. Furthermore, when states fail to come to an agreement and diplomacy breaks down, a surgical style of warfare that is internationally mandated is required. Two examples in recent years of American adventures attempting to enforce the SA against states are Afghanistan, which was a limited success, and Iraq- a fiasco. However, neither situation was a disaster: the worst case scenario could have involved America launching nuclear warheads to Afghanistan in retaliation to the 9/11 attacks. Because this would have been regarded as an atrocity that was not internationally condoned, the U.S. would be viewed as an extremely dangerous rogue state, and it would only be a matter of time until the other nuclear states attacked the U.S. as a matter of national security. Instead, the operations in Afghanistan and Iraq were the first faulty attempts at Security Operations and COIN, but have led our military down the path to finding a way to enforce the new SA.
2)    Role of military in BTW: If the WWoW does break out again on a full scale, it will feature more IT and more firepower than ever before. In addition, it will be waged in 5 geographies: land, sea, air, space, cyber. Traditional WWII era warfare would be strengthened by last 60 years of high-tech development, and the continuous rise in bio-tech, cyberwar and spacewar technology will increase the military’s potency even more. Let us not forget the exponential rise in potency and firepower over the last millennia; an aircraft carrier today has the same military power as did the entire Roman Empire. Of course, the rising potency of destruction could be mitigated by certain developments in biodefense and missile defense. However, trends towards more offensive capability than defensive capability are unlikely to change. As it stands, military potency is now so powerful that were two highly developed countries to be involved in BTW, MAD would be assured.

Part III: Examples of the military’s transformation in order to meet the challenges of the SA:

The example of Army Maj. Jim Gavrilis: This member of the Special Forces was very political in his approach to the task of security operations in Ar Rutbah, meeting with as many people as possible, adhering to their customs by, for example, eating with his fingers, and stressing the fact that his presence was to help, not to rule (Ricks, 152). He represents the new breed of “champion” who will enforce the SA in the future. What failed was that his tour of duty ended so soon. Before the situation was secure he left and was replaced by someone else. The basics of COIN require human relationships; even if his replacement was following the same policy as Gavrilis (which he wasn’t, because this was before the COIN field manual had become army doctrine), he would have been regarded with suspicion by the tribal leaders. Human trust is hard to gain. Moreover, there remained threats from outside the locale. Even if the situation in Ar Rutbah was completely secure, and Gavrilis’s interim mayor had started a legitimate local government, there remained the threat of insecurity from outside forces. Since the borders of Iraq were not sealed, foreign fighters could destabilize the region, and militias from other towns could have created security concerns, delegitimizing the new order.

Lessons learned:
•    Continuous Assessment and communication from the local to global scale is required. Successful COIN is achieved by halting the conditions that lead to an insurgency: that includes delivering economic aid to places in need, and predominantly dealing with Local Security Concerns. Therefore actionable intelligence is extremely significant, and direct communication from the newly established order (interim mayors) to the COIN operation needs to be put in place. Finally, the COIN field manual mandates highly-trained and extremely adaptable and politically active elite soldiers, which is a step away from the conventional WWoW. The military will be used in a radically different approach, in which the people will always be viewed as the prize, in order to eliminate conditions that lead to war.

•    The SA requires long-term operations that stress human relationships and trust above all (c.f. Montgomery McFate and the Human Terrain System). In the ideal case, Security Operations are run by the police forces/army of each nation within their own borders, which is what General Petraeus has been striving to achieve during the period known as “the surge” in Iraq, and he has found the correct method to achieve this. However, if the state is a failed state or a rogue state, i.e. if the state’s security operations are either unoperational (c.f. Somalia, present) or if the state is endorsing a threat to the SA by non-state actors (pre-2001 Afghanistan), then an international coalition needs to implement security there. Having a single foreign nation run these Security Operations and COIN operations is not possible, because it turns the issue into a question of power politics, and leads to category 3) Threats. Thus it is self-defeating for a single foreign nation to run global Security Operations. The US has especially lost its legitimacy with the violation of the Geneva Convention during the Abu Ghraib scandal.
•    These Security Operations need furthermore to be run globally; because any intelligent and trained individual or group of individuals can build WMDs as long as they have the will (c.f. Roger Brent, head of the Molecular Sciences Institute in Berkeley, California, who claims of bioengineered lethal viruses: “An advanced grad student could do it.” -“Biowar for Dummies” by Paul Boutin) Therefore we need to eliminate that will. Perhaps that will stems from psychological problems, and the individual is the quintessential “mad genius” who needs to be treated for mental illness. Perhaps that will stems from local security issues, and is financed by a rogue state. For these reasons, Security Operations must both be comprehensive globally and run with international approval.

Future of war in SA: very elite, networked, and information technology dependent militaries. Biotech and robotics lead to casualty- low or even casualty-free engagements. The warriors are above all politicians, connected by IT to locales across the world, leading the most surgical style of warfare possible. Violence is delivered only at extremely crucial moments and places, and with international backing.

Example of SA in effect, including economic, social, and political ramifications:  A new strain of Avian Flu breaks out in a remote village in Thailand. This is a category 1) Threat, and represents a GCR. A villager sends a text from his mobile phone that all his chickens are dying. Within hours intelligence in London, Washington, and Beijing are aware. Within days economic aid has arrived to the village and a biological warfare specialist along with a highly-specialized COIN adviser are sent with international mandate to the village to insure that the biological threat is contained and that security is maintained. Notice how IT networks are crucial, as well as the recognition that threats anywhere on the globe are threats to the SA, and therefore threats to America. Furthermore, the actors are highly-trained and internationally minded “champions”.

Conclusion: Due to the disappearance recently of BTW (end state of WWoW), theories abound that conventional warfare is dead. Two Army War College scholars state: “Decisive war between major states is rapidly moving towards history’s dustbin” (Gray, 138). Beware of this theory-it is not necessarily true. This is an ideal scenario that is true if and only if the Global Security Agenda (SA) is enforced. The WWoW is alive and well; states still have the capability to engage in it, and are improving themselves all the time. However, if BTW between two large, advanced states were to occur (imagine a Sino-Russian axis challenging American hegemony), the consequences would be unimaginably devastating. Hence I end this memo by stressing the necessity of internationally implementing the SA, because only then will America’s future be secure.

Works Cited

Gray, Colin S. Another Bloody Century. London: Orion Publishing Group Ltd, 2005.

Ricks, Thomas E. Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq. London: Penguin Books, 2006.

U.S. Army, Marine Corps. Counterinsurgency Field Manual. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2007.