National policy and military doctrine: development of a nuclear concept of land warfare, 1949-1964
In the thirty years that battle field nuclear weapons have been available, no one has originated an idea of how they might be used as an entirely new weapon. New weapons are routinely introduced into existing combat organizations before an appropriate tactical concept has been invented. But never before in history has a new weapon been deployed on so massive a scale without a tactical concept that exploited the radical implications of its novel technology for traditional warfare. This study is an attempt to understand the problem of developing a persuasive tactical concept for nuclear weapons. The process of assimilation by which military organizations integrate new weapons with existing weapons in novel tactical and organizational concepts has an intellectual, and institutional, and a political dimension. The principle of civilian control, however, makes the process by which weapons are assimilated part of the process by which national security policies are made. In peacetime the military's formulation of doctrine is almost entirely consequent upon the world view, the methodological and managerial assumptions, and the domestic policy concerns of political authority.
- Research Organization:
- Columbia Univ., New York (USA)
- OSTI ID:
- 6284258
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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CONVENTIONAL WARFARE
GOVERNMENT POLICIES
INSTITUTIONAL FACTORS
MILITARY STRATEGY
NATIONAL SECURITY
NORTH AMERICA
NUCLEAR WEAPONS
POLITICAL ASPECTS
SECURITY
USA
WARFARE
WEAPONS