Understanding Political and Intangible Elements in Modern Wars
Simons Greg
PhD, researcher, Centre for Crisis Management Research and Training, Swedish National Defence College; researcher, Uppsala Centre for Russian and Eurasian Studies, Uppsala University. E-mail: greg.simons@ucrs.uu.se
This article looks at the intangible elements of organised warfare from the eyes of Sun Tzu, Niccolo Machiavelli and Carl von Clausewitz, and traces them to today’s modern military environment. Do these elements change in nature or significance (influence)? In short the answer found is that the nature of intangible elements (as opposed to tangible elements) has remained reasonably constant, however, the influence of these elements on the justification for war, prosecution of war, and ending wars has increased.
Keywords
Intangible and tangible elements of war, politics, information, deception, security, war as a form of art.