Within the past decade, the U.S. military has implemented a number of programs to assess the changes underway in the global security environment and in the nature of warfare. Defense leaders and thinkers have concluded that revolutionary change is taking place and, if the United States develops appropriate technology, warfighting concepts, and military organizations, it can master or control this change, thus augmenting American security.

In this monograph, Dr. Steven Metz, who was one of the earliest analysts of the strategic dimension of the revolution in military affairs, suggests that official thinking within the U.S. military may be too narrow....

The German philosopher Hegel held that revolutions are the locomotive of history. According to his theory, every social, political, and economic system builds up tensions and contradictions over time. Eventually these explode in revolution. Taking the argument one step further, Lenin held that a revolutionary did not have to wait for the explosion, but could speed it up, manipulate it, and control it. But Lenin was wrong. One cannot create a revolution in the way that an architect designs a building. Nor is it possible to control revolutions like a conductor leads an orchestra. Revolutions are much too big and...

What is driving the current revolution in military affairs? Throughout history, many factors have altered the human condition: new ideas, religions, ecological shifts, disease, migrations, conquest, and so forth. Today technology, particularly information technology, is the locomotive, defining what is possible and pushing old ideas, values, methods, and organizations into obsolescence. As part of this, the information revolution is shaping the strategic environment in which armed conflict takes place. The revolution in military affairs is the dependent variable, driven and buffeted by wider changes. To understand future armed conflict, then, one must at least attempt to understand the political, economic...

The specific shape of future armed conflict will be determined by policy decisions, technological developments, economic, political, and social trends, and by the geostrategic configuration that emerges. This dizzying complexity makes it impossible to predict the path of future warfare with certainty. At best, images can be sketched. Broadly speaking, the opening decades of the 21st century are likely to see some combination of three modes of warfare: formal war, informal war, and gray area war.

Formal war pits state militaries against other state militaries. Since the 17th century, it has been the most strategically significant form of armed conflict...

The more things change, the more they stay the same. Like all cliches, this one has a core of truth, particularly for of armed conflict. Colin Gray reminds us, more about strategy is persistent, even eternal, than is changeable. ¹³⁴ Even in revolutionary times, continuity outweighs change. This holds true for the current revolution in military affairs. No matter how much technology, operational methods, or military organizations shift (or appear to shift), war will always involve, as Clausewitz noted, a dangerous and dynamic relationship among passion, hatred, reason, chance and probability. ¹³⁵ The best that military commanders and strategists can...

Historians will see the last decade of the 20th century and the first decade or two of the 21st century as a turning point in the evolution of armed conflict. At this point we know fundamental change is underway but can only guess its ultimate outcome. Having assumed responsibility for encouraging and sustaining security around the world, the United States has a huge stake in this shift. To a large extent, the ability of the U.S. military to adapt to changes in the nature of armed conflict will determine whether the result is a more stable world or a more...