Shock and Awe in Star Wars

Shock and Awe is the move away from basic Decisive Force (i.e. lots and lots of troops) towards Rapid Dominance, which has the aim of affecting the adversary's will, understanding, and perception.

In Chapter 2 of the 1996 book Shock and Awe, the authors list nine examples representing differing historical types, variants, and characteristics of Shock and Awe.

All of the examples listed in the book are to be found in the movie Star Wars - maybe the film is required watching for members of the National Defense University?

First, there is Overwhelming Force - or, put another way, thousands of battleships, cruisers, fighters, and other means at the Empire's disposal.

Then "Shock and Awe through delivery of instant, nearly incomprehensible levels of massive destruction directed at influencing society writ large". How about destroying a planet with a giant Death Star Superlaser?

Then, there is Massive Bombardment and Blitzkreig - bring on the spaceships.

After this, there is "selective, instant decapitation of military or societal targets to achieve Shock and Awe." Choking a Captain of a Starship by suspending him from the floor counts.

Next is imposing Shock and Awe through a show of force through deception, misinformation, and disinformation. As in telling Lea her home planet will be saved if she reveals the Rebel base, and then blowing it up anyway...

We move on to "The Roman Legions." Achieving Shock and Awe through the adversary's perception and fear of his vulnerability and of the attacker's invincibility. A few dozen ranks of stormtroopers marching in squadrons fit the bill perfectly.

After this, there's the "Decay and Default" model, based on the imposition of societal breakdown over a lengthy period, without the application of massive destruction. Mos Eisley certainly has its fair share of societal breakdown - you can't even get a drink without having your arm chopped off.

But the most complete demonstration of Shock and Awe in Star Wars is Darth Vadar's ability to directly control the mind's of his opponents, through The Force. I haven't seen the military doing that yet, but look where it got Mr. Vader.

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A disturbing feature of Shock and Awe is the explicit goal of controlling minds as well as bodies.

When the military stops being just a "decisive force", and becomes instead involved in manipulating perception, the result inevitably is an increased politicization of the military. Soldiers no longer simply kill. Now they make decisions about how to control perceptions. These decisions are often shortsighted. The distance from Shock and Awe to Abu Grahaib is very short.

However, the major glaring flaw of this doctrine is its 100% focus on causing Shock and Awe, and 0% analysis of the effects. The result is a politicized military with a violent short-term agenda - and the outcomes of this are apparent today in Iraq.

Comments

• benzkohlee | July 17, 2005 02:41 AM

  Pretty much what moslems have been doing since the inception of islam.
  The whole concept of jihad is based on "shock and awe". The purpose is to terrify as many people as possible in the shortest possible time for the sole aim of converting the fearful and reaffirming the converted. And to that end it is very effective. The largest empires have fallen to this tactic (whole populations converted within a matter of decades), including the babylonian, persian and the indian (afghanisthan+pakistan+bangladesh+indonesia+malaysia...), and now the us and uk are under siege. Will they fall too?
  The us government knows that this tactic works very well, because they have studied history. This tactic causes minimum casualties on both sides, and has the highest effectiveness and speed.
  Its short-sighted, effective, and yes in my opinion also it is not wise, but for the short-term it satisfies the perpetrators. And in the long term it is yet to be seen.