The second annual military symposium took place at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas from 14 to 16 September 2004. The symposium brought together civilian historians and military officers for the purpose of discussing a variety of historical case studies and the ways in which they can illuminate current military issues and operations. As the title and subtitle of the symposium indicate, the topics addressed the purpose behind military operations--winning the peace. The US military and its coalition allies have proven themselves adept at achieving military victory in short, decisive, major combat operations. The critical nexus, then, is how battlefield victory translates into political success. The panelists and audience discussed the nature of war, cultural awareness, terrorism, stability operations in the Philippines, Latin America, Lebanon, and Vietnam, as well as operations in Iraq.

By bestselling author Brian Tracy, a revised and updated edition of this indispensable field guide to using military strategies to win in business and life. The modern world can be a battleground, but key strategies that have helped history's great leaders triumph in military campaigns can also be used to achieve business and personal success. Brian Tracy is a leading authority on success and achievement, authoring bestsellers including Eat That Frog!, and raising millions toward advancement with his guidance. In this fully revised and updated edition of a classic, Tracy presents 12 core principles of successful military commanders and how to apply them in almost any situation and emerge victorious, including proven methods to: · Concentrate your strengths in the most effective way to reach your goals · Gather game-changing intelligence to determine the best approach · Decide when to go on the offensive vs. cover your bases · Exploit the element of surprise for maximum benefit Packed with Tracy's transformative advice, Victory! arms readers with powerful skills and a practical road map to unlock their potential for greatness in business and in life.

It would be an understatement to say events in Iraq, post-combat operations, did not go as envisioned. The obvious question is why? Many of the difficulties experienced by the U.S. military in Iraq were clearly foreshadowed, even predicted. Almost every analysis of Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF) highlights flaws in the planning for post-war Iraq. The pitfalls can be sorted into several all-too-familiar categories, including timeliness, unity of effort, prioritization, and completeness and coherence. Military planners significantly underestimated the magnitude of the difficulties they would encounter in Iraq. Lessons emanating from OIF also confirmed several emerging truths about modern military operations. Operations in Iraq firmly substantiated the criticality of successfully executing post-conflict operations to the achievement of strategic aims. The realities of modern military operations combined with the lessons of OIF strongly argue for a further evolution in the combatant commander's ability to conduct post-conflict operations. The U.S. military can no longer approach post-conflict operations as a second-tier event, something that can be done in an ad hoc fashion. The combatant commander needs to have a distinct post-conflict planning and executing capability. The combatant commander can best achieve this capability by integrating a dedicated post-conflict planning element into his Standing Joint Force Headquarters. Doing so will better ensure he has the needed capabilities and staff integration to effectively plan and orchestrate post-conflict missions.

Why have the major post-9/11 US military interventions turned into quagmires? Despite huge power imbalances in the United States' favor, significant capacity-building efforts, and repeated tactical victories by what many observers call the world's best military, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq turned intractable. The US government's fixation on zero-sum, decisive victory in these conflicts is a key reason why military operations to overthrow two developing-world regimes failed to successfully achieve favorable and durable outcomes. In Zero-Sum Victory, retired US Army colonel Christopher D. Kolenda identifies three interrelated problems that have emerged from the government's insistence on zero-sum victory. First, the US government has no organized way to measure successful outcomes other than a decisive military victory, and thus, selects strategies that overestimate the possibility of such an outcome. Second, the United States is slow to recognize and modify or abandon losing strategies; in both cases, US officials believe their strategies are working, even as the situation deteriorates. Third, once the United States decides to withdraw, bargaining asymmetries and disconnects in strategy undermine the prospects for a successful transition or negotiated outcome. Relying on historic examples and personal experience, Kolenda draws thought-provoking and actionable conclusions about the utility of American military power in the contemporary world—insights that serve as a starting point for future scholarship as well as for important national security reforms.