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FROM THE EDITORS
The sudden escalation of hostilities between Russia and Georgia over the status of the breakaway Georgian provinces of Abkhazia and South Ossetia in early August 2008 has provided an unpleasant reminder of the strategic salience of the ethnic conflicts that continue to fester along the periphery of the former communist world. The United States has been forced to divert its attention from the ongoing conflicts in the greater Middle East to the problem of a geostrategically resurgent Russia and its implications for the NATO alliance. In this context, it is essential to reassess the current state of play in the former Yugoslavia, where Russian interest and influence remains a significant factor and NATO has a continuing military presence. John Schindler of the Naval War College provides a timely overview of the recent history of Western intervention in Bosnia and Kosovo as well as an assessment of what has been achieved and what remains to be done. Much depends, he argues, on whether Serbia can be persuaded to cast its lot definitively with the West—or whether, perhaps encouraged by Russia’s recent defiance of the international community, it will continue to be a source of ethnic tension and instability in the Balkans.
The Navy’s recently promulgated maritime strategy continues to attract attention and commentary around the world. In this issue, Andrew Erickson, of the Naval War College’s China Maritime Studies Institute, discusses the reactions to the maritime strategy by military intellectuals and commentators in the People’s Republic of China, providing translations and in-depth analysis of three especially informed and thoughtful essays on the subject. While these assessments do not entirely agree, they share a generally positive view of “A Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower,” treating this document as a highly significant development in American naval thinking—and perhaps American national strategy.
The Review maintains a long-standing commitment to military historical subjects, and in this issue we are pleased to offer readers two outstanding articles on intelligence and operational deception in World War II. The gradual opening of sensitive military intelligence archives of all kinds in recent decades continues to provide many opportunities for fruitful reconsideration of the history of recent wars, but World War II in particular continues to offer important lessons for the present concerning the integration of intelligence and military operations and—especially—the sophisticated employment of intelligence-derived information for purposes of operational deception. Robert Hanyock offers a detailed recounting of the denial and deception efforts that gained the Japanese battle fleet surprise in its attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, while Commander John Patch, USN (Ret.), tells the fascinating story of the intricate deception planning that accompanied Operation Torch, the allied invasion of North Africa in November 1942, at that time probably the largest amphibious operation in world history. This operation, over long distances and essentially uncommanded seas, would have been at high risk of failure without the extraordinary intelligence support that enabled it to thread the needle of Axis air and naval power in the Atlantic and Mediterranean. Commander Patch concludes with a cogent distillation of the lessons of Operation Torch for American operational planners today.
Finally, as Colonel Gary Ohls, USMC (Ret.), demonstrates in this first-ever fully documented account of Operation Eastern Exit, the Marine-led evacuation of U.S. embassy personnel from Somalia in January 1991, it is important to capture the lessons of very recent history while the memory of events remains fresh and participants in them are still accessible. Though overshadowed at the time by the developments leading up to the outbreak of the first Gulf War later that month, Eastern Exit, as Ohls shows, represents a kind of preview of post–Cold War maritime operations; indeed, it would prove a significant reference point for the refashioning of Navy and Marine Corps doctrine later in the decade, with a new emphasis on the littoral environment. This article is part of a larger body of research being conducted by Colonel Ohls on U.S. military operations in Somalia in the early 1990s, to be published by the Naval War College Press as a Newport Paper in 2009.
WINNERS OF OUR ANNUAL ARTICLE PRIZES
The President of the Naval War College has awarded prizes to the winners of the annual Hugh G. Nott and Edward S. Miller competitions for articles appearing in the Naval War College Review.
The Nott Prize, established in the early 1980s, is given to the authors of the best articles (less those considered for the Miller Prize) in the Review in the preceding publishing year. Cash awards are funded through the generosity of the Naval War College Foundation.
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First place: Colonel Gary Solis, USMC (Ret.), “Targeted Killing and the Law of Armed Conflict, Spring 2007 ($1,000)
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Second place: Captain Arthur M. Smith, MC, USNR (Ret), Captain David A. Lane, MC, USN, and Vice Admiral James A. Zimble, MC, USN (Ret.), “Purple Medicine: The Case for a Joint Medical Command,” Winter 2007 ($650, shared between coauthors)
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Third place: Peter Dutton, “Carving Up the East China Sea,” Spring 2007 ($350).
The Miller Prize was founded in 1992 by the historian Edward S. Miller for the author of the best historical article appearing in the Review in the same period. This year’s winner is Dr. George H. Quester, “Two Hundred Years of Preemption” (Autumn 2007) ($500). In addition, two articles received honorable mention: “Did a Soviet Merchant Ship Encounter the Pearl Harbor Strike Force?” by Marty Bollinger (Autumn 2007) and “Expectation, Adaptation, and Resignation: British Battle Fleet Tactical Planning, August 1914–April 1916,” by Jon Tetsuro Sumida (Summer 2007).
NEW AND FORTHCOMING NEWPORT PAPERS
A flurry of additions to our Newport Papers monograph series is now appearing. Number 31, Perspectives on Maritime Strategy: Essays from the Americas, edited by Ambassador Paul D. Taylor, collects thoughtful observations on the U.S. Navy’s new maritime strategy process offered by naval war colleges of our Western Hemisphere neighbors, from Canada to Argentina. Newport Paper 32, U.S. Naval Strategy in the 1980s: Selected Documents, edited by John B. Hattendorf and Peter M. Swartz, furthers the invaluable series of Newport Papers in which Professor Hattendorf (the College’s Ernest J. King Professor of Maritime History) has compiled the Navy’s key strategy documents of recent decades. (Newport Paper 19 treated the Maritime Strategy of 1986, number 27 treated the 1990s, and number 30 the 1970s. A further volume, for the 1950s, is planned.) Finally, in Newport Paper 33, Major Naval Operations, Dr. Milan Vego of the Naval War College addresses in a comprehensive way a key aspect of naval operational art, a discipline in which he is an internationally recognized authority. All three are available electronically on our website and portal. As of when this issue was sent to the printer, Newport Paper 31 is available in hard copy, and the others soon will be as well.
OUR EDITORIAL OFFICES
The Press editorial offices are on the second floor, west wing, of Founders Hall in the Naval War College complex.
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