{"id":294,"date":"2012-07-23T09:07:52","date_gmt":"2012-07-22T23:07:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=294"},"modified":"2012-07-24T09:12:45","modified_gmt":"2012-07-23T23:12:45","slug":"grand-strategy-what-does-that-do-for-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/grand-strategy-what-does-that-do-for-me\/","title":{"rendered":"Grand Strategy? What does that do for me?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Grand strategy is a big idea back in fashion as a useful way to think about and address important issues. But many grand strategic schemes advocated are complicated, incomplete, inappropriate and use arcane terms that perplex policymakers and non-experts alike.<\/p>\n<p>Over the next few posts we\u2019ll build a simple, minimalist framework for thinking more clearly and concisely about grand strategy. We\u2019ll then apply the framework to thinking about two challenges Australia faces; withdrawing from Afghanistan and managing China\u2019s emergence.<\/p>\n<p>Why bother devising a grand strategy though? What does it do that something else doesn\u2019t? Grand strategy is a way to try to get somewhere that you want to go. That may seem simple but can be better understood when compared against two well-known alternatives: opportunism and risk management. These are approaches that await events; they respond to other\u2019s actions. They\u2019re reactive but they can be useful.<\/p>\n<p>Australia is good at opportunism, with <a href=\"http:\/\/ussc.edu.au\/ussc\/assets\/media\/docs\/publications\/1206_OConnor_Cox_HoundDog.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">notable examples<\/a>\u00a0(PDF) in both the Vietnam and Iraq Wars of jumping on board the American grand strategy and exploiting it for our own benefit. We\u2019re also adroit at risk management; our last two Defence White Papers took a risk management approach of building up an armed force just in case a carefully chosen, particular risk eventuated. An insurance policy against a house fire if you will\u2014and hope there\u2019s not a flood, as it might not pay out! Both approaches depend on others and react to their activities. With opportunism you go where others take you, and Australia becomes a player in another country\u2019s project. In risk management you sit down to await the hope-this-doesn\u2019t-happen event. As the old saying goes, \u2018hope is not a strategy\u2019, and neither are opportunism and risk management.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Grand strategy is the opposite. A country uses a grand strategy to try to go where it wishes. It might or might not succeed, but the intention is clear. A grand strategy may fail but if you don\u2019t attempt it, someone else chooses your destination for you. Grand strategy tries to make the future how <em>we<\/em> would like it. It\u2019s a big, hairy, audacious idea.<\/p>\n<p>Even so, isn\u2019t this strategy? Strategy and grand strategy are both all about <a href=\"http:\/\/www.au.af.mil\/au\/awc\/awcgate\/army-usawc\/stratpap.htm\">ends, ways and means<\/a> where the \u2018ends\u2019 are the objectives, the \u2018ways\u2019 are the possible courses of actions and the \u2018means\u2019 are the instruments of national power. What then makes strategy \u2018grand\u2019?<\/p>\n<p>Firstly, while grand strategy is also concerned with applying the means, it also crucially includes the <em>development<\/em> of the \u2018means\u2019 used. Strategy neglects the resources\u2014the people, money and materiel\u2014needed but grand strategy includes these as an integral part of its implementation\u2014an important matter in this age of austerity. Secondly, grand strategy directs the full array of the instruments of national power, rather than like strategy focusing on a single type of instrument. A grand strategy directs all the national means, including diplomatic, informational, military and economic. More than simply whole-of-government, it\u2019s whole-of-nation.<\/p>\n<p>Grand strategy then involves developing a comprehensive set of means and applying these in a way that makes a particularly desirable future. You can see why strategic thinker Colin Gray says that <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Strategy-Bridge-Theory-Practice\/dp\/0199579660\" target=\"_blank\">\u2018all strategy is grand strategy\u2019<\/a>. Without grand strategy a \u2018strategy\u2019 is alone and unsupported, and may work against what others are also trying to do. Without care, Australia\u2019s approach to China could be like that. Some want a military strategy that hedges against growing Chinese military strength while at the same time embracing an economic strategy that engages China as a close trading partner. Such a \u2018trading with the enemy\u2019 hybrid is somewhat incoherent. It is to identify and fix such contradictions that grand strategy is most useful.<\/p>\n<p>Having discussed what grand strategy is for, my next post talks about how to influence others.<\/p>\n<p><em>Peter Layton is undertaking a research PhD in grand strategy at UNSW.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Grand strategy is a big idea back in fashion as a useful way to think about and address important issues. But many grand strategic schemes advocated are complicated, incomplete, inappropriate and use arcane terms that &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[17,1425,21],"class_list":["post-294","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-defence-white-paper-2013","tag-australia","tag-defence-white-paper-2013","tag-strategy-2"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v19.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Grand Strategy? 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