Recent works by Generals Rupert Smith and Vincent Desportes have highlighted the trend for military operations to move from the battlefield to stabilisation operations, or ‘war among the civilian population’. This is leading to major changes in the use of regular forces but little attention has been devoted thus far to the military reserves. The new circumstances nonetheless make their employment both necessary and more appropriate in long-term operations involving a wider range of activities and the civil population. The capabilities of the reserves offer a flexibility which has been little used so far in France, but which is particularly relevant at a time when a new White Paper is in gestation in a particularly difficult context.
Military Reserves and ‘War among the Civilian Population ’
Two recent books–one by General Sir Rupert Smith, The Utility of Force: The Art of War in the Modern World(1) and document FT-01 published under the title Land Forces in Present and Future Conflicts,(2)–analyse the major changes that have occurred since the end of the Cold War. These two works are concerned with the same theme: the transfer of the decisive phase of military action from open interstate warfare to the stabilisation phase, or ‘war among the civilian population’.
The New Centre of Gravity of Operations
This new centre of gravity has led to major changes in three dimensions: the time-scale, the place and military action, compared with a conventional theatre. The consequences are extremely wide-ranging and complex, and are resulting in a profound transformation.
The time dimension is probably the one which has been most obviously affected. Whereas the future conditions for peace would previously have come from the sudden, violent and usually brief clash of wills of the combatants, conflicts now drag on. The engagements in former Yugoslavia or Afghanistan equal or exceed the Second World War in length. But the duration is the external evidence of the shift of strategic effect from the intervention phase, when the battle must be won, possibly through high-intensity interstate combat, to the stabilisation phase, which can last for several years and be characterised by great changes in force posture.
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