Strategy for Chaos: Revolutions in Military Affairs and the Evidence of History (review)

Reviewing two or more books simultaneously is rarely easy. It is all the more difficult when those books are bound as one, as is the case with Prof. Gray's Strategy for Chaos. There are at least two, probably three, books at work here. One is a revisitation of what constitutes strategy, particularly the dimensions one should keep in mind when analyzing or creating strategy. Another is a deconstruction of chaos theory and its fundamental incompatibility with strategy making. The last applies a new theoretical framing of Revolutions in Military Affairs to historical cases to show how strategy illuminates lessons from RMAs and vice versa.

That two of these books, if published separately, would be comparatively short is a good thing. As it now stands, this volume is exceedingly dense, a problem exacerbated by impenetrable prose. Prof. Gray tacitly recognizes this when he charmingly acknowledges in the preface that "some might claim it is a multiple analytical pile-up." Interesting choice of words. Never have more chapters in one book contained a synopsis of what is in each of the other chapters—a literary device normally isolated in the preface.

Those who have read Prof. Gray will recognize the sharp observations on strategy and its making for which he is known. All of the chapters on "High Concept" (1) and "Strategy as Duel: RMA Meets the Enemy" (9) along with parts of "On Strategy I: Chaos Confounded?" (4) and "On Strategy II: The RMA Connection" (5), provide insights for the new student of strategy, and mindful nuggets of wisdom for the existing practitioner. Clearly the best discussion here is his exposition of key dimensions of strategy (pp. 121-28).

Prof. Gray's deconstruction of chaos theory and its applicability to strategy, embodied in Chapters 4 and 5 but also interspersed throughout the text, is different from most treatments of the same. Gray's is a refreshingly different view. He extracts a fundamental view of chaos and then rejects its applicability to the instrumentality (and therefore predictability) of strategy. Working as he does at the level of social scientist, this would seem to be correct. The notion that some scientists and mathematicians see patterns (and thus predictability) at different planes of chaos does not enter Gray's analysis, though if it did it might have undermined his argument.

The RMA-related chapters—"RMA Anatomy" (2), "RMA Dynamics" (3), "On Strategy II" (5), along with the case studies on "The Napoleonic Revolution" (6), "The RMA of the First World War" (7), and "The Nuclear RMA" (8)—present the argument that RMAs are a form of strategy, and as such are not the discontinuous elements of history that adherents claim, since strategy itself is not discontinuous. Somewhat questionable is Gray's genesis of an "RMA life-cycle" so generic it can be applied to any strategy. That said, the subsequent mechanistic application of the "life-cycle" to the three case studies is more of a strength in that it "facilitate[s] focused comparisons" not often seen in the RMA literature.

At the end of the day, Prof. Gray has added to the thin collection of military books dealing with meta-theory—in this case theory about strategy theory, chaos theory, and RMA theory. His concern—repeated ad nauseum—over social scientists mining history for patterns suggests that this book is best read by academics and graduate students concerned with such arcane debates. Jacket blurb notwithstanding, policy-makers would be better served awaiting a clearer and more concise exposition of the points scattered throughout Prof. Gray's work.