Moulding War’s Thinking: Using Wargaming to Broaden Military Minds
The war with Japan had been enacted in the game rooms at the War College by so many people and in so many different ways that nothing that happened during the war was a surprise … except the kamikaze tactics toward the end of the war. We had not visualized these.
Fleet Admiral Nimitz1
Abstract
Unrestricted wargames can build confidence, test mental models, and provide a method to create military experiences outside of live exercises and direct combat operations. By pitting an individual or group against other living beings, these wargames require military professionals to confront the uncertainty of war. The dynamic nature of such wargames helps translate military theory into military practice. This article argues that unrestricted wargaming is a vital component of broadening military officers’ minds. By examining US and Japanese wargaming practices, the article proposes that unrestricted wargaming should be incorporated into Australian Army junior officer training courses to help officers test their biases, frame problems and accept alternative viewpoints.
Introduction
Since the end of the Second World War, several academics, including Williamson Murray, have reinforced Nimitz’s view, quoted above. These academics agree that the US Naval War College’s approach to education and wargaming directly contributed to officers’ readiness for war.2 Research into the US Army War College’s interwar education and wargaming indicates a similar outcome for US Army officers.3 Both institutions used wargaming in two ways. The first was similar to modern military wargames used in planning: a means to test and enhance plans. The second focused more on developing officers’ minds and broadening their experiences.4 Such wargaming often saw students compete against each other, as individuals or as teams.
Although these wargames had rules and tabulated data for units, they were often dynamic. These interwar military wargames have many similarities with the modern tabletop wargames sold in game stores across the Western world. This style of wargaming, known as unrestricted wargaming, seeks to develop an individual’s potential. By pitting an individual or group against other living beings, these wargames require military professionals to confront the uncertainty of war. The dynamic nature of such wargames helps translate military theory into military practice. Unrestricted wargames can build confidence, test mental models, and provide a method to create military experiences outside of live exercises and direct combat operations.
This article argues that unrestricted wargaming is a vital component of broadening military officers’ minds. Such wargaming helps develop thinking dispositions that allow officers to balance alternative viewpoints, and the art and science of war.5 These thinking dispositions, known as pluralist habits of mind, help build ‘learning to learn’ behaviours.6 Such habits of mind represent a person’s willingness to accept, integrate and use a wide range of views, alternative approaches, and schools of thought to frame and solve problems.7
To provide a foundation for this argument, the article first provides a short history of wargaming. Understanding this history helps separate wargaming from pure models and simulations. Recognising these differences also clarifies the two broad outcomes that wargaming can provide military practitioners: plan optimisation and developing potential. Next, the article suggests how using wargames only to optimise plans can be dangerous for militaries. The article illustrates these dangers by discussing how the Imperial Japanese military before the Second World War, and the US military before the Iraq War, used wargames purely for optimisation. In both cases, a focus on plan optimisation contributed to limited military officer thinking. The article then explores the use of wargaming by the US Naval War College during the interwar period. This discussion includes an explanation as to why the interwar period remains relevant today. The US Navy’s use of wargaming illustrates how unrestricted wargaming helped create a learning-to-learn culture among military officers. Given the US Navy’s experience, the article argues that unrestricted wargaming may help cultivate a learning culture that builds a pluralist habit of mind across the officer corps. Finally, the article proposes that unrestricted wargaming should be incorporated into Australian Army junior officer training courses. The article advocates that such wargaming should occur in ab initio training, the Combat Officer Advanced Course and the All-Corps Majors’ Course. Developing such a habit of mind may help officers test their biases, frame problems and accept alternative viewpoints.
Wargaming—A History of Learning through Gaming
Several scholars detail how wargaming may help develop military knowledge.8 For much of history, wargaming was relatively simple in application. Matthew Caffrey observes that the 19th century saw an explosion of wargaming, in both military and civilian areas, leading to the first true ‘modern’ wargaming system: kriegsspiel.9 Designed by the German military and adopted by most major powers of the time, kriegsspiel pitted two players (or teams) against each other over a map table. Although kriegsspiel had rules and tabulated data, the game was managed by a ‘game master’. The game master’s role was both to umpire the game and to represent the friction and chaos of war. Game masters had the power to insert unexpected events, change the rules, or even adjust the tabulated data to demonstrate adaptation and intelligence uncertainties.10 Through the role of game master, each game of kriegsspiel became a unique experience. Late 19th century research into wargaming found that
… by its [wargaming] practice … they [military officers] acquired studious and industrious habits which they have retained—habits essential and indispensable to those invested with high command.11
Nevertheless, kriegsspiel could not represent all aspects of war. The fact that a wargame cannot represent all of war leads some to confuse wargaming with simulations.
Wargaming is Live Competition—Models, Simulations and Games
Caffrey’s short review of the history of wargames helps clarify four confused (and often incorrectly used interchangeably) terms: models, simulations, simulation games and wargames. A model is a representation of the real world. It is an impression of a situation or the thoughts of those viewing the situation.12 Because it is an impression, ‘all models are wrong, but some are more useful than others’.13 In other words, no model perfectly represents the real world. Yet a model can be useful if it helps observers understand vital aspects of the situation or context.14 Although models can be useful, they are a static representation of the world.15 A simulation is a model ‘examined over time’.16 Once again, a simulation is not the real world. As a representation, a simulation is grounded in the impressionistic model that forms the simulation’s start-state. Therefore, a simulation is only useful if the model it is based on was useful. A simulation is also ‘one-sided’. Simulations do not include injected (live) competition. It is this live competition over time that turns a simulation into a simulation game.17
A simulation game is the representation of real-world competition based on a model.18 Such virtual competition may be a simple mass-market board game such as Monopoly, Cluedo or Settlers of Catan. It could be more complicated, as seen in hobby games such as Magic: The Gathering (a trading card game where players are opposing great wizards), 18XX (where players are railroad tycoons) or Terraforming Mars (where players act as corporations attempting to terraform Mars). Simulation games may even be as complex as computer-based multi-player market simulators. What separates simulation games from simulations is the real-time interaction between multiple live players. Even computer-generated competition, seen in single-player games, remains a simulation. In these single-player games, the ‘competition’ experienced is grounded in the model used to develop the computer’s responses (programming).19 It is the injection of real-time live competition that helps define simulation games, wargames, and wargaming’s two broad uses. Where the focus of a competitive game is warfare, the simulation game is called a wargame.20
Wargaming and Its Uses—One Game, Two Outcomes
Wargaming is not a simulation. A vital component of any wargame is the real-time competition between live players or groups. Without this real-time live-player competition, a wargame is just a simulation. Caffrey defines a wargame as:
Simulation game depicting armed conflict. Decisions made by contending parties affect the future state.21
Other scholars and commentators support this definition.22 The definition also alludes to how wargames may support military personnel.
Wargames may provide two benefits to military practitioners. The decisions made by competing players directly affect the game’s situation. These decisions and the changing situation influence the follow-on decisions made by players. These interactions lead to the first outcome of wargaming: planning optimisation.23 Under planning optimisation, wargames are used to test and improve a plan. This style of wargaming underpins the outcomes of course of action analysis within modern military planning. As such, planning optimisation is probably what most modern military professionals associate with wargaming. To enable plans to be tested, wargames often limit decision-making options. These limitations may be placed on one or all sides of the game. However, this is not the only approach to wargaming. A wargame’s real-time decision-making can also help develop potential.24
Wargames may help develop the potential of ideas and military practitioners. This approach to wargaming may enhance military professionals’ understanding of war. The use of Kriegsspiel by the German military in the 19th and early 20th centuries is an example of this approach.25 These games assisted military practitioners to test their appreciation of the theory of combat. Such testing helped solidify their understanding of the practice of combat. Wargames that help develop the potential of personnel cannot be constrained like optimisation wargames. Therefore, wargames that seek to develop potential must be unrestricted in their gameplay. However, when a military only uses wargames for optimisation, the military may create a culture that views restricting wargaming as the norm. Such a culture may reinforce a belief that a tactical mindset is appropriate at all levels of war. The Japanese use of wargaming in the interwar period is a good example of this.
Pure Optimisation Wargaming—Reinforcing Tactical Culture for Strategy
Several scholars document the heavy Mahanian influence in Japanese war philosophy, strategy and operational thinking.26 Mahan was a US admiral of the late 19th century and a prolific writer. Mahan’s writings heavily influenced maritime thinking at the start of the 20th century. Because of this, Mahan is considered one of the founding theorists of modern maritime power.27 Scholars also recognise that much of Mahan’s theories is relevant only at the operational or tactical level of war.28 Nevertheless, Mahan’s influence on pre-war Japanese thinking significantly affected the Japanese approach to war and warfare.29
Japanese Pre-War Thinking—Tactical Thinking Influences All Levels
Mahan’s influence shaped the Japanese approach to wargaming, experimentation and planning. Although less is known about Japanese wargaming and experimentation, the limited academic work indicates that Japan used wargaming to provide one outcome: the enhancement of specified plans. Rather than using wargames to stimulate thinking and develop adaptation in officers, Japanese wargames focused on refining a set concept or plan. Furthermore, Japanese wargames never considered strategic issues or expanded beyond the set goals of the military tactical plan.30 In effect, such wargaming focused on the synchronisation of tactical capabilities and reinforced a belief in predictive tactical theory. The failure to consider wider or changing situations contributed to Japan maintaining an
… irrational strategy … Japanese leaders grossly underestimated their enemies, stretched their own forces to the breaking point, and deliberately forced stronger powers to fight[.]31
Although the culture of the Imperial Japanese military played a major role in Japanese strategic failings, their use of wargaming for plan optimisation reinforced their failure to adapt. These failures were intensified by Japanese commanders who ignored, or even cheated in, wargames because the outcomes did not align with their Mahanian world views.32 A similar issue can be seen in US military wargaming prior to the 2003 Iraq War.
Iraq War Preparation—Fighting the War the US Wants to Fight
Education, training and experience often influence how militaries use wargaming. Before the Iraq War, US military officers focused on peer-to-peer warfare rather than war as a whole. Such education bred thinking that minimised any war theory not related to nation-state force-on-force warfare. It also minimised the possible effects of paramilitary forces, and advocated for avoiding urban terrain.33 Wargaming, though growing in technical computer capability, focused on these limited educational outcomes.34 Although the US State Department undertook a wide-ranging strategic wargame, senior military and civilian leaders ignored its outcomes. Instead, military wargames predominantly focused on enhancing the invasion plan.35 Such wargames limited ‘red force’ options and stayed within the confines 32 Moulding War’s Thinking: Using Wargaming to Broaden Military Minds of the invasion plan. This included limiting possible Iraqi paramilitary force options.36 This planning optimisation and limited wargaming approach contributed to the US Military’s
… institutional bias in favor of Phase III [Invasion], its distaste for stability and support operations, and its expectations based on successful operations in Afghanistan [at the time that] led its leaders to focus on the maneuver operations that would depose the Iraq regime and to give little consideration to the aftermath.
… The plans largely discounted Saddam Hussein’s extensive paramilitary apparatus, tribal patronage system, and intra-Iraqi dynamics, all of which would play crucial roles in the ensuing instability and insurgency.37
Pure Optimisation—A Belief in Clear and Unambiguous Problems
In both interwar Japanese and pre-Iraq War United States wargaming, there appears to be a belief that the problems these militaries faced were clear and unambiguous.38 The decision to limit wargames to specific plans or enemy actions, and failure to account for alternative approaches, suggests these two militaries never tested their perception of the world. Nor does it seem that these militaries allowed alternative viewpoints and experiences, such as in the US State Department wargame, to change commanders’ perspectives. Finally, both the Japanese and pre-Iraq War US militaries’ approaches imply a focus on enhancing a single solution to all problems. This single solution seems to be applied to all levels of war. Overall, both cases appear to represent functionalist and structured thinking, with limited consideration of context or application of adaptive frameworks. Such thinking led both forces to use wargaming purely to optimise set plans. Given the outcomes of the Second World War and the Iraq War, this may not have been an appropriate approach to developing military thinking about war and warfare. Fortunately this is not the only way to use wargaming. The United States military’s use of wargaming in the interwar period helped them adapt thinking. The approach also developed a learning-to-learn culture among military officers.
Unrestricted Wargaming—Testing Context through Early Red Teaming
As already alluded to, the interwar period saw many nations embrace wargaming to test new equipment and ideas and broaden the tactical thinking of military officers.39 Such efforts led to the successful early-war German mechanised force, which
… was one of the most impressive innovations in military history, [and] … one of the few instances in modern warfare where tactical virtuosity came close to overturning strategic incompetence.40
The above suggests wargaming was rarely used above the tactical, or ‘battle’, level.41 Britain, France and Germany all practised degrees of unrestricted wargaming during the interwar period.42 However, these militaries primarily focused on tactical learning. In fact the German military was specifically directed not to undertake strategic-level wargames by Hitler himself.43 The reasons for using wargaming only at the tactical level are many. A major factor may have been the ongoing military culture of tactical study at the expense of wider war considerations. Caffrey and Murray separately conclude that the limited use of unrestricted wargaming in these three militaries did not necessarily improve officer thinking prior to war, or adaptation within war.44 This may imply that any conclusions drawn from the analysis of unrestricted wargaming would only be relevant to the tactical level of war. Fortunately, during the interwar period one nation continued to employ unrestricted wargaming at all levels of war: the United States.45 The lessons drawn from the US use of expansive unrestricted wargaming may provide additional insights not seen in the French, British or German contexts.
The US Navy and Marine Corps might have suffered from a tactical focus similar to that seen in the British, French, and German militaries. However, US wargames had to include the Washington Treaty’s basing constraints.46 It is the Washington Treaty and its effect on interwar United States and Japanese strategic thought that makes the US use of wargaming relevant to contemporary militaries.
Great Power Tensions—The Interwar Period and Central Pacific Problems
The Central Pacific Campaign and its pre-war lead-up provide some elements analogous to contemporary (2020) Pacific region great power contestation.47 The Washington Treaty (signed in 1922) placed limits on United States naval forces and military basing rights during the 1920s and 1930s. This treaty reduced the number and size of battleships the United Kingdom, Japan and the United States could build and maintain. Furthermore, it limited the United States from building or enhancing strategic military bases, including larger ports, in key Pacific locations such as the Philippines. Although the treaty created naval parity between the United States and United Kingdom, it also generated a significant dilemma in the Pacific: strategic distance. The United States found itself in a situation where it would have to project power over 5,000 miles to support its national interests across the Pacific. Such projection could be denied by Japanese naval strength.48 In effect, distance and the growing power of the Japanese Imperial Navy created a form of modern-day ‘anti-access effect’, forcing US adaptation. Such pre-war limitations have parallels with the modern context of China’s rising power and possible anti-access/area-denial capabilities.49 US interwar adaptations in thinking, military culture and operational approaches are relevant to contemporary growing tensions between the United States, China, and the middle powers throughout the Indo-Pacific.50 Many of these adaptations were realised in pre-Second World War education and training, with wargaming being a contributing factor.
The Washington Treaty created a range of limitations on United States power projection. Nimitz, while a student at the Naval War College, explained that the
… operations imposed [in a future Pacific war] on Blue [United States] will require the Blue Fleet to advance westward with an enormous train, in order to be able to seize and establish bases on route. The possession by Orange [Japan] of numerous bases in the western Pacific will give her fleet a maximum of mobility while the lack of such bases imposes on Blue the necessity of refuelling at sea en route or of seizing a base from Orange for this purpose, in order to maintain a limited degree of mobility.51
Suddenly, military officers could no longer assume ‘the American fleet would dash across the Pacific, fight and win a big, climactic battle near Japan’.52 The issue of logistics confirmed the importance of forward bases. This, in turn, focused officers’ minds on three problems: seizing land for bases (predominantly on islands); establishing these bases quickly and effectively; and the national economic lead times necessary to project, sustain, and reinforce such logistical capabilities.53
Officers developed a keen appreciation of how economic, logistic and strategic concerns create time delays that directly affect the sequencing of battles, forces and resources.54 This complex strategic context was only half the problem. Officers still had to win once the ‘Orange Team’ was brought to battle. However, little was known of Japanese military capabilities, making it challenging to develop a winning plan that would guide doctrine.55 The solution was to teach officers adaptation.
Developing Thinking—Learning to Learn through Wargames
Both John Lillard’s and Caffrey’s separate research outlines how students of the naval and marine war colleges would ask graduates for tips, tricks and ideas on how to do well in wargames. Invariably students would receive conflicting feedback and information. Graduates’ advice from one year was often contradictory to the advice provided by another year’s graduates. The reason for these discrepancies was that ‘the faculty was giving the Japanese different strengths and weaknesses in each wargame’.56 Constantly changing Japanese capabilities within the wargames produced two key outcomes. It overcame the lack of information concerning the Japanese and, more importantly, forced students to learn how to discover an opponent’s capabilities and adapt to them, as Caffrey explains:
Unable to simply learn Japanese strengths and weakness before the game, they [the students] had to play in such a way that they could learn them through experience before any decisive game engagements took place. Once they felt they had learned what those strengths and weaknesses were, they would develop a [plan.] … In other words, they were ‘learning how to learn.’57
Such wargames tested students’ understanding of logistics and sustainment, battle sequencing, time, and the tactics of fleet action.58 Confusion, friction and chance were simulated through dice and random event cards, thereby adding additional complexity. In the strategic and operational wargames, such events included changing the geopolitical situation, strategic guidance and economic potential, forcing students to adjust their concepts.59 It is true that such games never fully represented the actual Japanese strategy, tactics or capabilities employed during the Second World War. Yet the changing context of each game instilled in military officers a strong belief in testing context before developing battle plans.60 It also made students understand that they could never ‘know everything’, thereby teaching them the importance of establishing confidence in what they knew and what they had to assume.61 In essence, military officers had to learn how to adapt their principles and rules of warfare to changing situations and contexts. Officers who failed to appreciate this received poor marks and possible career repercussions.62 Overall:
[t]he games were not innovations in themselves. Instead, they were a common playing field, a shared experience, a flexible constant, and a proving ground. The games were transformative because the staff and faculty who administered them recognized their educational role and remained adaptable to changing conditions.63
Through this approach, wargaming strengthened the descriptive and explanatory power of military experience and theory, and helped students develop a shared understanding.64 Live wargames, known as fleet problems, further reinforced this shared world view.65 Overall, the US use of wargaming helped broaden the minds of US military officers, develop their capacity to test context and adjust to it, and inculcate in them the need to balance the principles and rules of warfare with changing context and thinking concerning war.
These outcomes developed the potential of US military officers. The approach helped military officers develop thinking dispositions that enabled them to accept alternative views and develop plans based on these views. In other words, unrestricted wargaming contributed to the development of thinking behaviours similar to a pluralist habit of mind.
Wargaming Shapes War Thinking—Building Pluralist Habits of Mind
The approach of the US Navy and Marine Corps during the interwar period provides a lesson on how to use unrestricted wargaming to develop pluralist habits of mind in military officers. Such a habit of mind accepts that there is a spectrum of world views and alternative approaches. Successful forms of such thinking consider and actively use differing views and paradigms to help learn about a situation, understand context, and frame and solve problems. In the interwar period, wargaming helped generate new thinking and world views in the US officer corps. Such thinking integrated changing situations, contexts, subjective viewpoints, and the science of warfare. In other words, the unrestricted wargaming of the interwar period attempted to develop a military officer’s capacity to ‘learn how to learn’. Such traits replicate many of the behaviours of successful pluralist habits of mind. The contrast in how wargaming was employed before the Central Pacific Campaign and before the Iraq War is insightful.
Before the Second World War, United States wargaming included significant free play between both sides. Here, wargaming’s primary role was to be ‘a common playing field, a shared experience, a flexible constant’ that provided an educational outcome.66 Such wargaming forced students to confront assumptions, ground their theory in practice, and cement their understanding through immersive experiences.67 Furthermore, the competitive and public nature of the wargames (and wider fleet problems) caused many to learn from their mistakes in a similar fashion to real experiences.68 This style of wargaming develops the potential of individuals and ideas and, as in the case of the pre-war United States, helps foster a learning-to-learn culture.69 The approach also enabled the United States to explore a range of concepts and innovate their thinking and military culture. Murray, while considering Nimitz’s view that the events of the Central Pacific Campaign were not a surprise due to unrestricted wargaming, concludes:70
In the largest sense, Nimitz was right: the navy did foresee virtually every aspect of the Pacific War[.] … But that war followed a pattern as if the ironic gods of history had taken the kaleidoscope of pre-war thinking, planning, concept development, and innovation, given the whole a huge shaking, and then allowed the pieces to play out over the … conflict in a fashion quite different from what the leaders and planning staffs of the pre-war navy had expected.71
Even with the surprises of war, the US military was able to test world views and assumptions and adapt thinking and planning. This indicates that unrestricted wargaming contributed to the development of a learning-to-learn pluralist habit of mind. This development is in contrast to the optimisation approach favoured in the lead-up to the Iraq War.72
The optimisation focus of Imperial Japan and the pre-Iraq War US appears grounded in the thinking of the plan and the decision-makers. Given the outcomes of the Iraq War, this article submits that such wargames, though useful in discrete situations, do not support a learning-to-learn culture. Nor do such wargames appear to create the immersive environment required to develop effective pluralist habits of mind willing to accept alternative views. Instead, the approach appears to reinforce a singular view that is reliant on set assumptions, rules and predictive theory. The emphasis on the set assumptions and theory seems to reinforce in military officers a world view that discounts changing context. Given that the Australian Army (the Army) rarely uses wargaming outside of the planning construct, the Army may fall into the same thinking seen in Imperial Japan or the pre-Iraq War US military. To break this possible cycle of insular thinking, the Army may wish to incorporate unrestricted wargaming into the current officer training continuum.
Increasing Army’s Habits of Mind—Wargaming in Today’s Training
There is a view that habits of mind are best formed early in a person’s career and life.73 This view suggests that if the Army wishes to use unrestricted wargaming to enhance pluralist habits of mind, the Army must use it early in a military career. For the officer corps, this early period of development would equate to initial officer training and various subaltern (lieutenant and captain) courses. Three specific courses could be targeted: the final class of officer ab initio training, the Combat Officers Advance Course (COAC) and the All-Corps Majors Course (ACMC).
Regular Army officer ab initio training occurs at Duntroon and consists of three classes. Each class has an average of two field exercise periods of approximately two weeks each. Although there are exceptions, Duntroon (as a training institution) often recognises before the final two-week field exercise of the final class (First-Class) which trainee officers (staff cadets) are unlikely to graduate. Given this, rather than undertaking another field exercise, this two-week time frame may be better employed as a wargaming period. Leveraging the lessons of the interwar period, these wargames should be similar to kriegsspiel. They may even use a home-grown version known as Up the Guts!74, developed by an Army senior non-commissioned officer. Instructors could act as game masters, changing the rules to create tactical dilemmas and confusion. This article argues that each wargame should be a person-to-person competition over a tabletop. This forces players to see each other directly. Such an approach makes the wargame more personal and therefore more likely to be an immersive environment, which helps adjust thinking. Furthermore, face-to-face wargaming creates a psychological dimension, as players may use their mannerisms to bluff their opponent.75 This introduction to wargaming supports its use in later training courses.
Both COAC and ACMC are possible candidates for wargaming. COAC trains mid-range combat arms captains in combat team, battlegroup and brigade tactics. On COAC a form of wargame, known as a ‘post-H-hour decision-making exercise’, is run. These computer-based simulation games are restricted to specific enemy courses of action and the student’s previously developed plan. Such wargames focus on testing students’ command, control and decision-making skills. Exercises like this are important and scaffold students into the three- to four-week final module of planning and decision-making simulation games. Nevertheless, as a restricted wargame, these decision-making exercises may not develop a learning-to-learn pluralist habit of mind. Instead of undertaking small-scale decision-making exercises, unrestrictive wargames may be a better medium of generating pluralist habits of mind in mid-ranking combat arms captains. Such wargames can build tactical confidence. They may also provide a form of ‘lived experience’ outside of live exercises and direct combat operations. These habits of mind may then be leveraged to broaden an officer’s thinking at ACMC.
Senior captains undertake ACMC prior to promotion to major. These officers are likely, upon promotion, to undertake a range of crucial command, planning and staff leadership postings within Army. The capacity to test mental models and assumptions becomes critical in these roles. So is the skill of balancing and moulding alternative viewpoints. The current ACMC focuses on the planning process. This focus is critical to develop a common lexicon and planning approach among all field-rank officers. However, the methods of training on ACMC may not help students learn how to best adapt these planning methodologies in different situations, or how to use them outside of operational scenarios. Nor does the course necessarily provide the same ‘common playing field, a shared experience, a flexible constant’ that interwar US military unrestricted wargaming helped generate to develop alternative thinking dispositions in the officer corps.76 Introducing unrestricted wargaming into the early stages of Army’s officer training may help officers develop a pluralist habit of mind that supports their learn-to-learn ability. Such a habit helps military personnel consider alternative viewpoints, test planning and mental assumptions, and develop mental experiences outside operational tours.
Conclusion
In conclusion, this article argues that unrestricted wargaming can provide a useful way for practitioners to test their assumptions and mental models. This testing can lead practitioners to accept and integrate alternative views into plans and thinking. Such alternative views help practitioners develop a learning-to-learn culture. This article calls such an approach a pluralist habit of mind, which could be enhanced through wargaming. The article clarifies that wargames are not simulations. Simulations do not replicate real-time live competition. In contrast, a wargame requires real-time competition between live players. The article highlights that this real-time live competition could provide two outcomes: the development of individuals and ideas, and the optimisation of military plans. Both forms of wargaming are explored through a series of illustrative case studies.
The article contrasts how wargaming was employed before the Central Pacific Campaign and the Iraq War. In the former case, US military wargaming included significant free play between both sides. Here, wargaming provided a common and shared experience. These wargames forced students to confront assumptions, ground their theory in practice, and cement their understanding through immersive experiences similar to real-world exercises. This style of wargaming helped develop the potential of pre-war US military officers and fostered a learning-to-learn culture. Meanwhile, wargaming was used primarily to optimise plans by the Imperial Japanese military and by the US military before the Iraq War. Such optimisation restricted player options and wargame rules. The article discusses how these restrictions may have contributed to the strategic problems of Imperial Japan during the Second World War, and the United States during the Iraq War. These restricted wargames, though useful in discrete situations, did not seem to support a learning-to-learn culture. Instead, the case studies suggest that these wargames reinforced existing world views that discounted changing context. The article notes that this is a risk for the Australian Army.
The Australian Army currently uses wargaming primarily to optimise plans. The article suggests that the Army introduce unrestricted wargaming into three courses: ab initio officer training, the Combat Officer Advance Course (COAC) and the All-Corps Major Course (ACMC). The article advocates that the final field exercise period of ab initio training and the existing post-42 H-Hour decision-making exercises of COAC should be replaced with unrestricted tabletop wargaming. Because the students on ACMC are likely to be promoted into key command, planning or staff leadership roles, the article encourages Army to investigate the use of wargaming within ACMC. Using unrestricted wargaming may help military officers to consider alternative viewpoints, test planning and mental assumptions, and develop new mental models. During today’s rising strategic tensions and great power contestation, increasing military professionals’ learning-to-learn pluralist habits of mind may be the intellectual edge needed to ensure strategic competition does not become war.
Endnotes
1 Reportedly stated in a private letter to the President of the Naval War College after the Second World War. Cited by the Secretary of Navy, Donald Winter. See Donald C Winter, 2006, ‘Remarks by Secretary of Navy’, news release, at: https://www.navy.mil/navydata/ people/secnav/winter/SECNAV_Remarks_NWC_Current_Strategy_Forum.pdf
(this link is no longer accessible)
2 The literature on this is broad. The following provides a summary: Craig Felker, 2006, Testing American Sea Power: U.S. Navy Strategic Exercises, 1923–1940, Texas A&M University Military History Series, (College Station, Texas: Texas A&M University Press); Williamson Murray, ‘US Naval Strategy and Japan’, in Williamson Murray and Richard Hart Sinnreich (eds), 2014, Successful Strategies: Triumphing in War and Peace from Antiquity to the Present (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press); Peter R Mansoor, ‘US Grand Strategy in the Second World War’, in Murray and Sinnreich (eds), 2014; John Lillard, 2016, Playing War: Wargaming and U.S. Navy Preparations for World War II (Lincoln, Nebraska: Potomac Books); Matthew B Caffrey Jr, 2019, On Wargaming: How Wargames Have Shaped History and How They May Shape the Future, Newport Papers No. 43 (Newport, Rhode Island: United States Naval War College).
3 Both Gole and Mansoor consider the US Army War College as a central theme of their works. See Henry G Gole, 2003, The Road to Rainbow: Army Planning for Global War, 1934–1940 (Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press); Mansoor, ‘US Grand Strategy in the Second World War’.
4 Caffrey discusses the two broad styles in greater detail. See Caffrey, On Wargaming, 282–283.
5 For a brief definition of war as an art of science, see Nicholas J Bosio, 2019, ‘Principally Right: Addressing the Challenge of Thinking’, Land Power Forum (Australian Army Research Centre), 28 October 2019, at: https://researchcentre.army.gov.au/library/land-power-forum/principally…. Also see Michael Howard, ‘Jomini and the Classical Tradition in Military Thought’, in Michael Howard (ed.), 1965, The Theory and Practice of War: Essays Presented to Captain B.H. Liddell Hart (London: The Camelot Press), 8; Azar Gat, 2001, A History of Military Thought: From the Enlightenment to the Cold War (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 255–256; Antoine Bousquet, 2009, The Scientific Way of Warfare: Order and Chaos on the Battlefield of Modernity, Critical War Studies (London: Hurst & Company), 240–243.43 Moulding War’s Thinking: Using Wargaming to Broaden Military Minds
6 Although it was Costa and Kallick who brought the term ‘habits of mind’ into wider use, the phrase was a part of philosophical discussion and leadership theory prior to its wider use. For discussion in education, philosophy, leadership theory and war studies, see Barbara Mackoff and Gary Alan Wenet, 2000, Inner Work of Leaders: Leadership As a Habit of Mind (New York: Amacom) (leadership theory); Gole, The Road to Rainbow, 158 (war studies); Arthur L Costa, ‘Describing the Habits of Mind’, in Arthur L Costa and Bena Kallick (eds), 2008, Learning and Leading with Habits of Mind: 16 Essential Characteristics for Success (Alexandria, Virginia: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development) (education theory); Angelo Bottone, 2009, Philosophical Habit of Mind: Rhetoric and Person in John Henry Newman’s Dublin Writings, Zeta Series in Christian Theology (Bucharest: Zeta Books), 144–151 (philosophy); Williamson Murray, 2011, Military Adaptation in War: With Fear of Change (New York: Cambridge University Press), 2.7–2.9, 4.29–4.30 (war studies); Williamson Murray, 2011, War, Strategy, and Military Effectiveness (New York: Cambridge University Press), 7.15 (war studies); Frederick D Aquino, 2012, An Integrative Habit of the Mind: John Henry Newman on the Path to Wisdom (DeKalb, Illinois: Northern Illinois University Press), 3 (philosophy); Patrick Sullivan, 2014, A New Writing Classroom: Listening, Motivation, and Habits of Mind (Logan, Utah: Utah State University Press), 151–153 (general use and education Theory).
7 This definition leverages the definition of Costa and Kallick, as well as the traits summarised in Sullivan. See Sullivan, A New Writing Classroom, 152–153; Arthur L Costa and Bena Kallick, ‘Habits of Mind: Strategies for Disciplined Choice Making’, Systems Thinker, 2018, at: https://thesystemsthinker.com/habits-of-mind-strategies-for-disciplined…
8 Nineteenth century military research discusses this. Caffrey, McGrady and Fielder summarise the modern research in this area. See Anon., ‘Foreign War Games’, in United States Adjutant-General’s Office, 1898, Selected Professional Papers Translated from European Military Publications (Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office), 261–265; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 11–17; Ed McGrady, ‘Getting the Story Right about Wargaming’, War on the Rocks, 8 November 2019, at: https://warontherocks.com/2019/11/getting-the-story-right-about-wargami…; James Fielder, ‘Reflections on Teaching Wargame Design’, War on the Rocks, 1 January 2020, at: https://warontherocks.com/2020/01/reflections-on-teaching-wargame-desig…
9 Caffrey’s work provides a summary of this history and the key references. See Caffrey, On Wargaming, 11–23.
10 The broad outline of how kriegsspiel was developed and implemented is outlined in Anon., ‘Foreign War Games’, 72–73, 244–258.
11 Anon., ‘Foreign War Games’, 249.
12 Peter B Checkland and Jim Scholes, 1990, Soft Systems Methodology in Action: A 30-Year Retrospective (Chichester: John Wiley and Sons), 6; John D Sterman, 2000, Business Dynamics: Systems Thinking and Modeling for a Complex World (Boston: McGraw-Hill Higher Education), 846–50; Lars Skyttner, 2001, General Systems Theory: Ideas and Applications (London: World Scientific Publishing), 90–91; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 262.
13 This is attributed to George E Box, a world-renowned statistician of the 20th century. Sterman makes the same point. See Sterman, Business Dynamics, 846.
14 Checkland and Scholes, Soft Systems Methodology in Action, 36–44; Sterman, Business Dynamics, 36–37, 845–846; Skyttner, General Systems Theory, 90; Alan C McLucas, 2003, Decision Making: Risk Management, Systems Thinking and Situation Awareness (Canberra: Argos Press), 132–142.
15 Caffrey, On Wargaming, 262.44 Moulding War’s Thinking: Using Wargaming to Broaden Military Minds
16 Sterman, Business Dynamics, 37–38; Skyttner, General Systems Theory, 39, 91; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 262.
17 Skyttner, General Systems Theory, 91; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 262.
18 Ibid.
19 Cooperative board games are an exception here, as the decisions made by the cooperative players create a dynamic situation similar to that seen in competitive games.
20 Caffrey, On Wargaming, 262–263.
21 Caffrey, On Wargaming, xxvii.
22 For summaries see McGrady, ‘Getting the Story Right’; Fielder, ‘Reflections on Wargaming’.
23 Caffrey, On Wargaming, 282–283.
24 Anon., ‘Foreign War Games’, 249; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 282–283; McGrady, ‘Getting the Story Right’.
25 This is covered in 19th century analysis of wargaming, Murray’s analysis of military effectiveness, and Caffrey’s overview of wargaming use. See Anon., ‘Foreign War Games’, 60–66, 249; Murray, War, Strategy, and Military Effectiveness, 7.14–7.16; Caffrey, On Wargaming 46.
26 Gat, Heuser and Nolan summarise this research and detail the links between Japanese interest in Mahan and Japan’s war preparations and thinking. See Gat, A History of Military Thought, 455–456; Beatrice Heuser, 2010, The Evolution of Strategy: Thinking War from Antiquity to the Present (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press), 265–266; Cathal J Nolan, 2017, The Allure of Battle: A History of How Wars Have Been Won and Lost (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 14–17, 511–512.
27 Nicholas J Bosio, 2018, Understanding War’s Theory: What Military Theory Is, Where It Fits, and Who Influences It, Australian Army Occasional Paper, April 2018 (Canberra: Australian Army Research Centre), 37–38, 41.
28 Till provides an overview of the key Mahanian concepts and their influence on naval and maritime thinking. This is known as the ‘blue water tendency’. See Geoffrey Till, 2009, Seapower: A Guide for the Twenty-First Century, 2nd Edition (London: Frank Cass Publishers), 51–56. Also see Gat, A History of Military Thought, 67, 458; Jan Angstrom and JJ Widen, 2015, Contemporary Military Theory: The Dynamics of War (New York: Routledge), 76–77, 130–131, 35–36.
29 Gat, A History of Military Thought, 455–456; Heuser, The Evolution of Strategy, 265–266; Nolan, The Allure of Battle, 14–17, 511–512.
30 Vego provides a short description of this. Caffrey provides more detail, explaining how Japanese wargaming lacked political or strategic consideration and was used predominately for tactical plan analysis, not the development of flexible tactical thinking. See Milan N Vego, 2008, Operational Warfare at Sea: Theory and Practice (Abingdon: Routledge), 211–12; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 56–57.
31 Christon I Archer, John R Ferris, Holger H Herwig and Timothy HE Travers, 2002, World History of Warfare (Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press), 521.
32 This is explained by Vego and Nolan with respect to submarine and aircraft usage. It also occurred during logistical wargames to determine force viability. See Vego, Operational Warfare at Sea, 211–12; Nolan, The Allure of Battle, 518.45 Moulding War’s Thinking: Using Wargaming to Broaden Military Minds
33 Discussion of this is provided by Davidson and the official war history. See Janine Davidson, 2010, Lifting the Fog of Peace: How Americans Learned to Fight Modern War (Ann Arbor, Michigan: University of Michigan Press), 195–202; Joel D Rayburn and Frank K Sobchak (eds), 2019, The U.S. Army in the Iraq War: Invasion, Insurgency, Civil War, Vol. 1 (Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania: US Army War College Press), 247–250. Also see William Terdoslavich, ‘From Shock and Awe to Aw Shucks’, in Eric Haney and Brian M Thomsen (eds), 2006, Beyond Shock and Awe: Warfare in the 21st Century (New York: Berkley Caliber), 17–22; Murray, Military Adaptation in War, 2.37.
34 Caffrey describes the boom in wargaming within the United States and around the world during the 1990s. His work demonstrates the focus on conventional warfare and the modelling of tactical capabilities. See Caffrey, On Wargaming, 71–117.
35 James Fallows, 2006, Blind Into Baghdad: America’s War in Iraq (New York: Vintage Books), 51–60 (Future of Iraq Project), 60–63 (wargames); Terdoslavich, ‘From Shock and Awe to Aw Shucks’, 33–35.
36 Although he lauds the pre-Iraq War wargames, his description of how ‘red’ played paramilitary forces shows either that the wargames were restricted or that the ‘red’ players chose not to freely use these assets. See Caffrey, On Wargaming, 179–180.
37 Rayburn and Sobchak, US Army Iraq War - Vol 1, 247.
38 Hopkins outlines how, in September 1941, Japan’s top naval officers believed that ‘the Pacific War could be decided by a single great naval battle’. Nolan’s and Vego’s work confirms this view and how it persisted throughout the war. This view for pre-Iraq War military thinking is explained in the official history by Rayburn and Sobchak. See William B Hopkins, 2008, The Pacific War: The Strategy, Politics, and Players that Won the War (Minneapolis, Minnesota: Zenith Press), 35; Nolan, The Allure of Battle, 519–523; Vego, Operational Warfare at Sea, 217; Terdoslavich, ‘From Shock and Awe to Aw Shucks’, 11–12 (quotation), 21–22 (shock and awe in Iraq); Rayburn and Sobchak, The U.S. Army in the Iraq War, 247.
39 Murray, War, Strategy, and Military Effectiveness, 7.15–7.19; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 43.
40 Murray, War, Strategy, and Military Effectiveness, 7.15 (quotation).
41 Lillard outlines how the US Naval War College would, every year, re-enact the Battle of Jutland specifically to teach students how to wargame, unlike the UK Naval College, which sought to create a better outcome. Caffrey’s detailed research into wargaming across history, with particular focus on late 19th and 20th century wargaming, describes the use of wargaming by major powers during the interwar period. He notes the tactical and domain specific focus of Germany, the United Kingdom, France, the US Army Staff College, and Japan. The only exception in this list is the very select US Army War College, which undertook strategic wargames (though fewer operational games). See Lillard, Playing War, 46–47; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 43–52, 56–57; Gole, The Road to Rainbow, 29–33.
42 Caffrey, On Wargaming, 43–47.
43 Ibid., 46.
44 Murray provides extensive analysis through his discussion on red teaming within the different powers of the interwar period. Caffrey reinforces these findings with his summary research. See Murray, War, Strategy, and Military Effectiveness, 7.4 (French thinking), 7.7–7.12 (German thinking), 7.19 (British thinking); Caffrey, On Wargaming, 46–47.46 Moulding War’s Thinking: Using Wargaming to Broaden Military Minds
45 The author acknowledges the limitation of considering only one successful case study. The case study meets the requirements of an illustrative case study as it demonstrates ‘… the empirical relevance of a theoretical proposition by identifying at least one relevant case’. See Jack S Levy, ‘Case Studies: Types, Designs, and Logics of Inference’, 2008, Conflict Management and Peace Science 25, no. 1: 6–7. Further analysis of other successful cases, and the lessons drawn from unsuccessful use of unrestricted wargaming, can be inferred from Caffrey’s and Murray’s works. This may be a future area of research.
46 Murray, ‘US Naval Strategy and Japan’, 10.9–10.10; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 52.
47 The Central Pacific also relates to Australia’s national interests (along with the South-West Pacific Campaign). This is identified in a series of Australian Government white papers. See Department of Defence, 2013, Defence White Paper 2013, ed. Commonwealth of Australia, Defence White Paper, (Canberra, ACT, Australia: Australian Government Publishing Service, 2013), 7–16, 25, 31; Department of Defence, Defence White Paper 2016 (Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia), 16–18.
48 Murray, ‘US Naval Strategy and Japan’, 10.7–10.10.
49 The modern concern with anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) is covered in a range of opinion pieces, analysis, and military future concepts. The concept of A2/AD is summarised as capabilities that ‘are designed either to prevent an adversary’s access to a particular region (anti-access) or to contest its freedom of movement within that theatre (area denial)’. See Henry J Hendrix, 2013, At What Cost a Carrier?, Disruptive Defense Papers, March 2013 (Washington, DC: Center for a New American Security); Malcolm Davis, ‘Towards China’s A2AD 2.0’, The Strategist (Australian Strategic Policy Institute), 24 November 2017, at: https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/towards-chinas-a2ad-2-0/; Anon., ‘Using Clever Technology to Keep Enemies at Bay’, The Economist, 25 January 2018, at: https://www. economist.com/special-report/2018/01/25/using-clever-technology-to-keep-enemies-at-bay; Ben Ho Wan Beng, ‘Are Aircraft Carriers Still Relevant? Another Take on the A2/AD vs. Carrier Debate’, The Diplomat, 15 November 2018, at: https://thediplomat.com/2018/11/ are-aircraft-carriers-still-relevant/
50 Eliot A Cohen, ‘The Strategy of Innocence? The United States, 1920–1945’, in Williamson Murray, MacGregor Knox and Alvin Bernstein (eds), 1994, The Making of Strategy: Rulers, States, and War (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press), 461–464; Murray, War, Strategy, and Military Effectiveness, 7.13–7.15; Murray, ‘US Naval Strategy and Japan’, 10.2–10.3, 10.12–10.13.
51 Murray outlines that Nimitz presented this in one of his two war college thesis documents. Cited in Murray, War, Strategy, and Military Effectiveness, 7.15.
52 Caffrey, On Wargaming, 52.
53 Edward S Miller, 2007 (1991), War Plan Orange: The U.S. Strategy to Defeat Japan, 1897– 1945, (Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1991), 168–169; Hopkins, The Pacific War, 10–11, 19; Murray, Military Adaptation in War, 2.31–2.32; Murray, War, Strategy, and Military Effectiveness, 7.15; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 52.
54 Cohen, ‘The Strategy of Innocence?’, 442; Hopkins, The Pacific War, 10, 22; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 52.
55 Peter P Perla, ‘Operations Research, Systems Analysis, and Wargaming: Riding the Cycle of Research’, in Pat Harrigan and Matthew G Kirschenbaum (eds), 2016, Zones of Control: Perspectives on Wargaming (Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press), 179; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 52–53.
56 Lillard, Playing War, 49–53; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 52–53 (quotation on page 53).47 Moulding War’s Thinking: Using Wargaming to Broaden Military Minds
57 Caffrey, On Wargaming, 53.
58 MacGregor Knox and Williamson Murray (eds), 2001, The Dynamics of Military Revolution 1300–2050 (New York: Cambridge University Press), 10.8; Murray, ‘US Naval Strategy and Japan’, 10.21; Lillard, Playing War, 46–47, 129–131.
59 Lillard provides a detailed description of the gaming system, including team roles, weather, intelligence development, and adjudication. Caffrey and Perla provide a summary of key elements used for friction and changing contexts. Cohen notes how geopolitical factors were included and changed in wargames. See Caffrey, On Wargaming, 52; Perla, ‘Operations Research, Systems Analysis, and Wargaming’, 178–79; Cohen, ‘The Strategy of Innocence?’, 441; Lillard, Playing War, 58–64, 66–67.
60 Murray, ‘US Naval Strategy and Japan’, 10.22–10.23; Lillard, Playing War, 129–131; Perla, ‘Operations Research, Systems Analysis, and Wargaming’, 179.
61 Murray, War, Strategy, and Military Effectiveness, 1.13; Murray, ‘US Naval Strategy and Japan’, 10.22–10.23; Lillard, Playing War, 64–65; Perla, ‘Operations Research, Systems Analysis, and Wargaming’, 179.
62 Murray, ‘US Naval Strategy and Japan’, 10.22; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 52.
63 Lillard, Playing War, 137.
64 This is a similar outcome to that advocated by other multi-discipline theorists concerning the use of systems thinking approaches to generate a common language and understanding, thereby synthesising subjective and interpretive world views. See Barry Newell and Katrina Proust, 2009, I See How You Think: Using Influence Diagrams to Support Dialogue, Working Paper (Canberra: Australian Centre for Dialogue), 2–4; Barry Newell, 2012, ‘Simple Models, Powerful Ideas: Towards Effective Integrative Practice’, Global Environmental Change, no. 22: 779–782.
65 For full research and analysis, see Felker, Testing American Sea Power, 107; Lillard, Playing War; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 54.
66 Lillard, Playing War, 137.
67 The use of immersive experiences here relates to the definition of a ‘game’ within wider literature: ‘… a voluntary activity, separate from the real life, creating an imaginary or immersive world’. See Sara I de Freitas, 2006, ‘Using Games and Simulations for Supporting Learning’, Learning, Media and Technology 31, no. 4: 344 (definition of game); Lillard, Playing War, 137.
68 This relates to early 19th century research and Felker’s conclusion. Caffrey explains the utility of wargaming in a military context. This is similar to research that indicates how human interaction in games can modify mental models through exploratory learning, or ‘a mode of learning whereby learning takes place through exploring environments, lived and real experiences, with tutorial or peer support’ (de Freitas, ‘Using Games and Simulations for Supporting Learning’, 344). For a summary of current analysis of analogue and digital games for learning development, see Katie Salen (ed.), 2008, The Ecology of Games: Connecting Youth, Games, and Learning (Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press). Also see Anon., ‘Foreign War Games’, 60–66, 249; Felker, Testing American Sea Power, 107, 137; Vicki Phillips and Zoran Popović, 2012, ‘More than Child’s Play: Games Have Potential Learning and Assessment Tools’, Phi Delta Kappan 94, no. 2: 27–30; Caffrey, On Wargaming, 277–289.
69 Caffrey, On Wargaming, 282–283.
70 See the epigraph of this article.48 Moulding War’s Thinking: Using Wargaming to Broaden Military Minds
71 Murray, ‘US Naval Strategy and Japan’, 10.39.
72 Caffrey’s opening discussion on General Wallace is a good example of this category in action. See Caffrey, On Wargaming, 1–3.
73 A summary of this is in Nicholas J Bosio, ‘Want the Edge? More “ME” in “PME”’, Land Power Forum (Australian Army Research Centre), 27 February 2015.
74 This system was developed in collaboration with several members of the ADF Wargaming Association. It uses 6 mm scale miniatures of ADF and doctrinal enemy capabilities and is focused at platoon and combat team level—known as ‘squad-based’ within the wargaming community.
75 Surprisingly, this was a key point made in 19th century research into wargaming summarised in Anon., ‘Foreign War Games’, 265–266. Also see Salen, The Ecology of Games; Phillips and Popović, ‘More than Child’s Play’, 27–30; McGrady, ‘Getting the Story Right’.
76 Lillard, Playing War, 137.
