Military science

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Military science or military science ( English Military Science ), formerly war science is the science of gaining knowledge about the character and laws of war , especially armed struggle in war, about the preparation of the armed forces and the country for war and the methods of warfare .

It is the totality of the legal statements about war as an organized armed struggle, about the forces and means participating in it as well as the scientific knowledge about the principles, forms and methods of prevention (prevention, prevention), the preparation and implementation of a war.

Military science integrates other disciplines and branches from the areas of social, natural and technical sciences.

Clausewitz 'work On War , ed. Berlin 1957, location Sächsische Landesbibliothek - State and University Library Dresden (SLUB)

Military science was a state-recognized, independent scientific discipline in the Warsaw Treaty states , including in the German Democratic Republic ( GDR ).

Sub-areas

Overarching scientific areas

Military science is a frontier science. It combines disciplines and branches from the fields of social, natural and technical sciences. Like the definition, the sub-areas of military science are not conclusively determined.

Often certain military specializations in a subject, for example military medicine or military geography , become part of military science. In particular, there are large overlaps:

  • to science , including to
    • Military geology , military hydrography,
    • Military meteorology, military hydrometeorology;
  • on mathematics , including:
    • Ballistics and shooting theory,
    • Military cybernetics,
    • Military informatics;

Some military specialties, such as operations research or logistics , have been further developed over time and are now primarily civil specialties.

Branches of military science in the GDR

Military science, recognized as an independent scientific discipline in the GDR, was subdivided into the following branches and components:

  • the general theory of military science (also: general foundations);
  • the theory of the art of war with its components (military) strategy, operational art and tactics; in addition, the military geography, the military topography, the history of the art of war were edited here;
  • the theory of military buildup (force buildup);
  • the theory of military leadership (also: troop leadership);
  • the theory of military training and education;
  • the theory of military economy and rear service;
  • the theory of equipment and armament (military engineering sciences);
  • the theories of the armed forces.

The fields of military science were mostly worked on from two perspectives: from the theoretical and the applied. The considerable distance between the two parts, as between theory and military practice in general, should be reduced through effective operational-tactical training.

The military-theoretical thinking in the GDR was shaped from the beginning due to the extensive political and military dominance of the USSR through the formation of the Soviet (Russian) scientific discipline military science (Russian военная наука ).

history

prehistory

Military science developed in a long historical process in close connection with the military policy of the peoples, states, classes, nations and alliances, but also the armed forces and the wars they waged, the art of war and the military-theoretical thinking.

Elements of military science likely emerged as human society began to develop well before ancient times . At an international conference of military historians in Tehran, Abraham Malamat demonstrated in his lecture in 1976 that the Bible not only describes the course of all forms of war, but that it also contains clear theoretical formulations of a doctrine of war.

The oldest European written records from the time of the Trojan War come from Homer's work Iliad .

The tradition of the Battle of Kadesch around 1274 BC is not through poetry, but on the basis of several temple inscriptions . Between the ancient Egyptian pharaoh Ramses II and the Hittite king Muwattalli II . It is considered the best-documented description of a war and the war system in antiquity up to this point in time.

A first systematic preoccupation with warfare itself was the book The Art of War by the Chinese General Sunzi in the 5th century BC. It is considered the oldest surviving work on strategy.

  • Sunzi: Treatise on the Art of War. Bamboo book, rolled out, Book Printing Museum, Beijing.

  • Sunzi: Treatise on the Art of War. Bamboo book, closed, University of California, Riverside.

  • Ssun-Ds': Treatise on the art of war, ad Altchines. ins Russ., translated into Dt., title page, Berlin 1957
    ( note: the spelling Ssun-Ds' is a rarely used alternative to the official and more frequently used pinyin transcription of the name Sunzi .)

  • Eleven comments on Sunzi: treatise on the art of war , orig. Missing, manuscript (about 1190–1194) three roles.

Many theoretical works on military affairs and fortress construction have come down to us, particularly from Roman times. In the 4th century, the late Roman military theorist Flavius ​​Vegetius Renatus wrote Epitoma rei militaris, a work on the military and warfare that was considered a standard work in the Middle Ages and well into modern times. The Byzantine Emperor Leontos VI (866 - 912 AD) wrote the first, today known treatise on military logistics as part of his work Summarized Confrontation of the Art of War , which has become known as the Leonine Military Institute , around 900 AD .

Origin and concept history up to 1800

Although France, Louis XIV (1638–1715), the home of the military (French militaire ), was at the height of its European power, the word military / military did not appear in German book titles.

In Germany, the term war science first appeared in 1699 in a book by Johann Sebastian Gruber. Its general use is probably only marked with the publication of the journal War Library or collected articles on war science (1774–1781) by Georg Dietrich von der Groeben .

Facade Unter den Linden 74, built by Karl Friedrich Schinkel as a united artillery u. Engineering school

Until the 18th century, military affairs and command of troops were often understood as a craft or art rather than a science. Officers were trained in the units during practical service. Scientific occupation with the military and warfare was the exception, with the exception of military history.

Except for war builders - later engineers - who were needed for the fortress warfare, officers had no higher education or requirement. From the 17th century, the officers of the artillery and engineers were trained at special military schools , such as the French École d'artillerie , founded in 1682 .

In the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century, the first general military schools and military academies were established to provide all prospective officers with sufficient theoretical training. For example, in 1751 the Theresian Military Academy in Vienna by Field Marshal Daun to whom the quote is ascribed: Generals and officers must be made understandable that the art of war is not a guild craft, but a far-reaching science.

In the 18th century, war science chairs were established at German-speaking universities for research and teaching. The first were at the universities of Erlangen , Göttingen , Marburg and Würzburg .

Origin and conceptual history at the beginning of the 19th century

In the Napoleonic Wars in the early 19th century it was recognized that a purely practical, the branch of service -oriented education for the Leadership Corps was no longer sufficient. The scientific occupation with the military took a great boom. In large Prussian garrison towns were officers' educational associations founded and many officers heard lectures at universities.

The Military Society , founded in 1801 by Scharnhorst (1755–1813) based on the example of other scientific societies, required each future member to develop an independent military-scientific study. A celebratory lecture at the command academy of the Bundeswehr in 1967 formulated: “Scharnhorst […] had two central ideas: 'Intimate union of nation and army and bringing the real idea of ​​science into the craft of war', i. H. master the craft and combine it with science. "

In 1801, selected participants, including Carl v. Clausewitz (1780–1831), an academy for young infantry and cavalry officers was formed. One of her teachers was Ludwig Müller (1734–1804), who is considered to be the founder of military geography in German-speaking countries. In 1801 he switched from training flagjunkers at the Potsdam Engineering Academy and the Berlin Inspection School as a lecturer for cartographic problems, terrain theory and castrametation (castrometry, military storage) at this academy. In his work " The Terrænlehre" (1807) he made a clear distinction between art and science:

“[…] Among the various subjects that this art of war encompasses, one soon chose this, soon that, to exercise one's military acumen, and so the individual teaching buildings that are called war sciences gradually emerged through the continued diligence of several centuries. […] But about the Terræn, the basic science of most of the so-called parts of the art of war, no one has written anything coherent up to now. ” That was a clear indication of the claim to the independence of military geography and at the same time the close association with military science in the Follow-up time.

  • Prussian military reform, 1813

  • Gerhard v. Scharnhorst (1755-1813)

  • Gerhard v. Scharnhorst, 1813

  • Memorial plaque on the tomb for Scharnhorst, 1834

Building of the General War School in Berlin, Burgstr. 19, Berlin before 1883

After completing the first class on June 21, 1804, it worked as a military science institution until 1806 in a fixed organizational form. As part of the Prussian army reform , scientific training was required for officers. In Prussia, therefore, from 1810 the war schools were set up as military technical schools for officer candidates . At the same time, officers in general staff assignments and senior commanders had access to the General War School , which was renamed the War Academy in 1859 .

Conceptual history and Clausewitz's work "Vom Kriege"

The best-known German-language military theoretical work of this epoch are the bequeathed works of General Carl von Clausewitz , which were published under the title Vom Kriege with the first edition posthumously in 1832 on the art of war or the science of war. For Clausewitz, the two terms war art and war science were only differentiated by the purpose: creating and producing versus research and knowledge.

  • Original edition of the book Vom Kriege from 1832

  • Carl von Clausewitz (1780–1831)

  • From the war , ed. 1866, French edition

  • From the war , ed. 1833, military historian. Museum of the Bundeswehr, Dresden.

Clausewitz took a path that led to a unity of military theory, military history and the art of war. Since Clausewitz's time, the concept of the political has expanded considerably. For him, war can only be understood in terms of the respective political conditions; it has its own grammar, but never its own logic.

Clausewitz describes that “war can be something that is soon more, soon less war”. In anticipation of the time, reference should be made to Vladimir I. Lenin (1870–1924), who also defines this dialectical view of the concept of war with regard to the concept of peace. A pure, conflict-free peace that takes place without states of tension of varying intensity seems unthinkable to him. Contemporary peace and conflict research examines these tension arcs.

Most convincing was Clausewitz's discovery that the character of any war depends on objective political premises. Military force is used in dosed form to achieve certain (political) purposes. "So we can only accept the political purpose as the measure if we think of it in terms of influencing the masses it is supposed to move, so that the nature of these masses comes into consideration." No wonder that this closeness to the political materialism was a great incentive for Friedrich Engels and Vladimir I. Lenin to study the work "Vom Kriege" intensively.

Military science, understood as science, should be able to criticize one's own subject. The entrepreneur and scientist Friedrich Engels (1820–1895), with the participation of Karl Marx (1818–1883), practiced this principle when emphasizing the historical functions of war. He wrote his military science work including criticism of the military and portraying the counter-image of a non-military future.

  • Friedrich Engels, in the winter of 1868/69

  • Engels, ed. 1870, The German Peasants' War

  • F. Engels in "Forward", Can Europe disarm? Title page 1893

  • Friedrich Engels, photograph 1891

Engels' scientific credo was also: "Incidentally, I would adhere to the principle that military science, like mathematics and geography, has no particular political opinion." Marx and Engels were quite capable of moving between military and diplomatic-political viewpoints to differentiate and, depending on the situation, to give priority to the political.

Scientific debate and education from the middle of the 19th century

The German war academies and the Imperial Naval Academy were supposed to conduct military science training at university level for prospective admiral / general staff officers . The training included military-specific subjects and military history as well as training components, with a focus on natural sciences and mathematics, in order to ensure a broad scientific education. The humanities and political sciences were hardly taught.

Helmuth von Moltke (1800–1891) facade detail, multi-storey house from 1886, bei d. Friedenseiche, HH-Altona, 2014

For officers of the artillery troops and the engineer troops , this training was carried out at the United Artillery and Engineering School , later the Military Technical Academy , which was equivalent to engineering training at a technical university. Here, the playing fortress , then Fortifikationslehre an exceptionally important position. Something similar could be observed at the American military academy Westpoint or the French École polytechnique civil engineering well into the 19th century.

In the course of the 19th century, however, the military and practical part of the course in Prussia was strengthened to the detriment of scientific subjects, so that although this training formally retained its scientific character until the First World War , its content was limited to the canon of subjects similar to the war school.

The view of a compact science of war changed noticeably in the middle of the 19th century to a negative attitude in the German military. Helmuth von Moltke the Elder (1800-1891) ascribed a contemporary to the saying: “I probably know an art of war, but only a majority of war sciences.” However, from 1857 Moltke founded a separate military science department in the Prussian General Staff , with historians , Statisticians and geographers.

In Switzerland there has been a military science department ( Military Academy ) at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich since 1877 , where militia and professional officers can study.

Science debate and military training in the 20th century

German School of Defense Sciences of the 1930s

The terms military science or war science and (from the 1930s) defense science have been debated since then. Defense science was always distinguished from military science as the imparting of elementary knowledge.

The beginnings of German defense science go back to the Defense Science Working Group founded in January 1929 . This was the forerunner of the German Society for Defense Policy and Defense Sciences , which continued the scientific and journalistic activities of the working group from June 28, 1933.

The German School of Defense Science was established in the mid-1930s; their influence on Soviet (Russian) military science is clearly demonstrable. Karl Linnebach (1879–1961) gave a definition of military science in 1939 which, when compared, shows a great deal of similarity with the term military science in the Soviet military encyclopedia forty years later.

Post-war development of conflict and peace research

After the Second World War, behavior was characterized by a peculiar contradiction. On the one hand, everything military was suspect. In post-war Germany, apart from a few cases relating to military history, teaching and research in the field of military science and research at the universities had to be discontinued. On the other hand, the ideologically initiated system conflict led to the military arms race.

A real anti-militarism was in the making, fed by the painful experiences of war . Some (West) German universities passed a civil or peace clause that prohibited or subject the university administration to any military research and teaching. Civil conflict and peace research emerged as a complementary development to military science .

Military history and defense science after 1950

The University of Münster was an exception when it provided Werner Hahlweg (1912–1989) with a teaching position (late 1950) and later a professorship (1957) in history, since military history could not be taught. In 1977, one year before Hahlweg's retirement, the university was the only (West) German university to have a chair in military history and defense science.

From the beginning, Werner Hahlweg's work in military science was focused on Clausewitz and his work Vom Kriege as well as the preparation of new editions (1952, 1966, 1972). The defense and military sciences provided the necessary technical basis for his appropriate comments and remarks. Hahlweg emphasized the need for interdisciplinary work and the inclusion of research results from the East as well as dealing with Marx, Engels and Lenin on questions of military theory. In this way, Hahlweg came to believe that military science is a necessary auxiliary science of military history.

“ Indeed, the military historian must master it where his subject requires. Conversely, of course, military history is an indispensable auxiliary science of military science: [...] in order not to have to repeat existing experiences over and over again . "

Werner Hahlweg basically recognizes a dialectical unity between military science and military history with only different approaches and emphases.

Military theoretical elements in training

On the other hand, with the beginning of the “Cold War”, a practical need for military thinking developed. In 1952, a Society for Defense Studies (GfW) was established in the Federal Republic of Germany , later renamed Society for Defense and Security Policy (GfW, 1990), subsequently to Society for Security Policy (GSP, 2014).

In 1952, the Society for Sport and Technology (GST) was founded in the GDR for military and pre-military training . Military science work is institutionalized in 1959 with the establishment of the NVA Military Academy .

Naval War College in the United States

While in other countries (e.g. in Switzerland since 1877, in France and in the USA since the beginning of the 19th century) academic university education was the norm for officer candidates, in Germany this was only introduced after the Second World War .

In the 1970s, courses for officer candidates were introduced at the universities of the Bundeswehr (in Hamburg, from 1972; in Munich, from 1973).

Military science training in the USA

In the United States, military science is taught as a minor at universities mostly through the Reserve Officer Training Corps program. These faculties mostly arose as a result of the Moril Act in the 19th century. The states received land from the state for newly founded universities, so-called land grant universities , but had to introduce military training and maintain a cadet corps . Accordingly, teaching and research there is application-specific and geared towards the training of would-be officers.

At the various general staff schools (English. War Colleges ) of the armed forces of the United States , the academic degree of a Master of Arts in Military Science can usually be obtained. These war colleges also conduct basic research in various areas of military science. Various higher education institutions of NATO armed forces joined forces in 2008 to form the International Society of Military Sciences .

The various centers for strategic studies conduct research.

Military science training in the GDR 1956–1990

In the GDR, from 1956 officer pupils were trained at officers' schools of the NVA (from 1963 grouped according to the armed forces). With the conversion to officers' colleges of the armed forces and the border troops of the GDR, diploma training was introduced in 1971, but without diploma degrees in military science.

Main building with portal, former "Friedrich Engels" military academy, Dresden-Strehlen (2009)

The military academy "Friedrich Engels" of the NVA in Dresden was designated as the institutional center of military science work in the GDR . For the first time at German universities, the military science discipline came into use as a compact theoretical, methodological and organizational science building.

In addition, (social) social and technical sciences were represented.

As a military university institution, it was endowed with the right to award the diploma (Dipl. Mil.), The doctor of the scientific branch (Dr. rer. Mil.) And the doctor of science (Dr. sc. Mil.) For the scientific discipline military science .

Until the first half of the 1980s, the unwritten law that the Soviet (Russian) military science is the basis for the NVA military science applied to the military theoretical thinking in the GDR. Their main premises were:

  • Military-scientific research focuses on the contours of a possible war, the models of modern combat operations and the leadership of the troops in the coalition.
  • The Marxist-Leninist doctrine of war and the armed forces is a methodological and ideological basis.
  • The military science of the NVA is a partisan science; it is based on SED resolutions.
  • She differentiates between socialist and bourgeois military science.

With this Soviet doctrine, a dogmatic ideological foundation came into the doctrine in the early years of the academy, which remained untouched for a long time.

  • Peace War Armed Forces ed. 1989, from 1983 paradigm shift

  • Cover H. 267/1990, On the general basics of military science

  • Cover title H. 5/1992 Military Science in the GDR 1949–1990

  • Title page issue 5/1992 Military Science in the GDR 1949–1990

The ideological basis of military-theoretical thinking in the GDR experienced a fundamental upheaval, a paradigm shift, in the early 1980s. The one-sided orientation of military science to the sole object - war, as well as the art of war and its components strategy and operational art was increasingly questioned. The preservation of peace and the prevention of war demanded that the general theoretical bases for GDR military science be reformulated and detached from the structure of Soviet military science.

Military science education in the 21st century

Military science training in Germany

In the Federal Republic of Germany it has so far been the declared renunciation of a common building for military science.

In contrast to similar training institutions abroad (e.g. the Naval War College ), the command academy of the Bundeswehr is still not a university and can therefore not award any academic degrees.

Today in Germany the Master’s degree in War and Conflict Studies (formerly Military Studies ) can only be studied at the University of Potsdam . A chair for military history / cultural history of violence has also been established at this university .

Military history can be studied as a major or minor in history at some universities. In addition, the civil society-oriented conflict and peace research , which is complementary to the military sciences, offers study opportunities.

Dissemination of military science ideas

It is no coincidence that Clausewitz's military-scientific terminology is used in courses of study in other areas of society (such as economics, corporate management, marketing). In the literature, e.g. B. at the strategy institute of the Boston Consulting Group , advertising campaigns, price offensives, shining winners, quick withdrawals, strategic skill are such concise business management concepts with a military appeal.

In France, not only the traditional military academy Ecole Militaire as an academic training institute in Paris bids farewell to graduates every year, but since 2002 also the nearby private school for the economic war ( Ecole de Guerre Economique ) to train specialists for the struggle for global markets. The affiliation of this institute to the Paris management school Ecole Supérieure Libre des Siences Commerciales Appliquées indicates the closeness of management theory to military science thinking.

Terms of military science

Role of the armed forces in military science

Military science has developed in close connection with the use of armed force by the classes, races, states, nations, coalitions. In a long historical process, the armed forces have shown and recommended themselves as their most significant object of knowledge . Military science shares this object with other scientific disciplines.

Working scientifically on the subject of military science, the armed forces and their use in different political situations means: describing, explaining, predicting, influencing and changing.

As with any science, the science criteria conciseness, verifiability, order and systematics should be applied. Scientific practice requires implementing the criterion of intersubjective comprehensibility and working with coordinated, unambiguous terms.

Tactical, operational and strategic armed forces formations

The structural elements of the armed forces ( military formations ) are classified into three levels according to the usual systematics in the science branch theory of the art of war (short: the art of war): in the strategic level - adequate to the (military) strategy; in the operative level - adequate to operative art; on the tactical level - adequate to the tactics. In the actual naming of the military formations, deviations, combinations and overlapping of terms can be found in the armed forces practice.

See structural elements in the armed forces

Definition of military science - in the changing times

Meyers Konversations-Lexikon - 1890

There is no single, detailed definition of military or defense sciences. A definition from the 19th century:

" Martial Science, Military Science: Anything related to the art, science, and history of war. A systematic development of the laws of the art of war includes the doctrine of the purposes of war (war policy), of the means of war (organization, administration, arming and equipment of the troops, fortresses , navy, etc.) and, based on both, the teaching of the use of the means of war to wage war. This is divided into strategy ( leading the war on a large scale) and tactics (execution of the individual orders through the marches and battles of the troops). Both draw their lessons from the history of war . In addition to these actual war sciences, the others are only auxiliary sciences, fortification, weapons theory, etc. Those parts of other sciences that the military need to know are also referred to as such, and we speak of military geography, military recording, etc. Treating numerous individual writings and collective works individual or all parts of military science; one of the largest older collections is the ´hand library for officers or popular war theory for initiates and laypeople´, published in Berlin from 1828 to 1840 in 12 volumes . "

- Meyers Konversations-Lexikon , 4th edition. from 1888–1890.

Karl Linnebach, Defense Sciences - 1939

The definition below is interesting for comparison with the Soviet Military Encyclopedia.

“Defense sciences is the name that emerged after the World War for the entirety of the sciences of war, warfare and preparation for war. Its object is the overall appearance of war, every activity of the people, the armed forces and the government directed towards war, the totality of things, forces and conditions that are affected by war, space and time in their relationship to war, warfare and preparation of the War. "

Soviet definition by Mikhail W. Smirnov - 1961

In the Soviet Union in the 1960s, the following view was held:

“ According to this, military science is a unified system of our knowledge of the preparation and conduct of the armed struggle in defense of the Soviet state from imperialist aggression. Based on the objective laws of armed struggle, Soviet military science researches problems of the economic and political-moral possibilities of their own country as well as of the enemy. It studies the problems of equipment and technology, develops the methods and forms of armed struggle, the basics of the structure, training and education of the armed forces and also deals with the questions of the all-round security of the armed forces in war. Therefore, Soviet military science includes not only the theory of the art of war, that is, the questions of strategy, operational art and tactics, but also the questions of the economic and political-moral possibilities of the country and their influence on the preparation, course and results of armed struggle. It also includes a number of other disciplines. "

- Mikhail W. Smirnov: About Soviet military science

  • Meyers Konversations-Lexikon, 1885

  • German Military Lexicon, cover title, 1961

  • Military Lexicon, cover title, 1973

  • more. Vol. - Soviet. Military encyclopedia

  • Dictionary d. German military history, 1987

  • Fonts d. Military cad. F. Engels, H. 267, 1990

German Military Lexicon - 1961

Military science; Russian Военная наука: “Part of the social sciences . The M. [Military Science] studies the laws of preparation and conduct of armed struggle.

The socialist M. [military science] includes the general theory (the general fundamentals) of the M. [military science], the theory of the art of war, the military history, the theory of training, the theory of the organization of the armed forces, the military geography and the military technical sciences. "

Military Lexicon of the German Military Publishing House - 1973

Military science: "The entirety of legal statements about war as an organized armed struggle, about the forces and means participating in it, as well as scientific knowledge about the principles, forms and methods of preparing and conducting war."

Soviet Military Encyclopedia - 1979

In the Soviet Union and subsequently in the states of the Warsaw Treaty, the following Soviet (Russian) definition was valid from a socialist (Marxist-Leninist) point of view:

“Military science is a system of knowledge about the laws and character of war, the preparation of the armed forces and the country for war, and the methods of waging war. Together with other sciences, it examines war as a complicated socio-political phenomenon. The main subject of the investigation is the armed struggle in war. "

Dictionary of German Military History - 1987

Military science: "Science to gain knowledge about the character and the laws of war, especially armed struggle in war, about the preparation of the armed forces and the country for war and the methods of warfare."

Writings of the Military Academy Dresden - 1990

The general theoretical foundations for a GDR military science were reformulated from the mid-1980s, detached from the structure of Soviet military science. The résumé of a scientific conference of the Military Academy for Military Science in April 1990 reads:

  • Military science is viewed as the entirety of scientific knowledge about armed forces and their use in peacetime, in crisis situations and in conflicts to achieve political goals.
  • The subject of military science is these armed forces and their use in different political situations (positions).
  • The armed forces are therefore the object of knowledge. Military science shares this object with other scientific disciplines. It differs from other disciplines in that it explores this object from a certain point of view.
  • The main task of military science is to make a contribution to peacekeeping and the restructuring of peace, to military confidence-building and cooperative security as well as to the demilitarization of international relations and society.

Dissertation Andreas W. Stupka, Vienna - 2010

A modern definition by the Austrian officer Andreas W. Stupka in his dissertation 2010:

" The military science is to be understood as the entirety of all scientific knowledge about the use and" deployment "of armed forces. On the one hand, the justification dimension of military action, the phenomenon of war and its causes, the strategic action of the political community to secure survival in the sense of peacekeeping and the protection of living space, as well as the entire area of ​​the necessary military strength are examined. On the other hand, the task of military science is the systematic acquisition of application-oriented knowledge for the military instrument itself, its preparation for the deployment, training and education of soldiers, the military leadership and the technical parameters of military action in peace and deployment. "

- Andreas W. Stupka : Military Critical Thinking - Philosophy of Science and Theoretical Studies on the Basics of Military Sciences

Summary of the science debate

Defense and security policy are undoubtedly ideologically relevant by their very nature. Developing scientific objects and structures with a view into the future means asking the question of power. Violent polemics and controversies are to be expected if the claim is made to reorganize or even re-establish a scientific discipline.

Partiality cannot be combined with the tasks of a science (observing, describing, explaining, predicting, influencing and changing) and with the scientific criteria (conciseness, intersubjective comprehensibility, verifiability, order and systematics) without contradictions.

The dissolution of the institutional location of a military science in Germany, the military academy in Dresden, and the retirement of the East German professional group of military scientists was followed by the marginalization of their research results. In view of the definition debate and the deficit that has arisen in institutionalized military science in Germany, the future development of science will remain an open process.

In an approximately comparable situation, Carl v. Clausewitz concludes that the art of war is not so close to its perfection: “There are writers who have claimed that the art of war will soon have reached its highest degree of perfection. Such an assertion is in itself quite meaningless, because [...] sciences that are not self-contained like logic must also be capable of constant expansion, of ever new additions, and because human understanding in general does not so easily limit itself can be set. "

See also

literature

Web links

Commons : Military science  - collection of images, videos and audio files
Wiktionary: military science  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Guenther Nenning: From the military science-About war and peace, knights and generals and what the state is based on. In: THE TIME. 47/1998. Accessed March 13, 2011.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Author collective: Dictionary on German military history . Wed - Z. 2nd, revised edition volume 2 . Berlin 1987, ISBN 3-327-00478-1 , p. 629 .
  2. ↑ A deeper structure in Stupka, pp. 376f.
  3. ^ Hans-Jürgen Zimmermann: Operations Research: Methods and Models . Vieweg Verlag, Wiesbaden 2005, ISBN 3-528-03210-3 , p. 6ff.
  4. ↑ Donald Bowersox et al. a .: Logistical management: A systems integration of physical distribution, manufacturing support, and materials procurement. 3. Edition. Macmillan, New York 1986, ISBN 0-02-313090-3 .
  5. ↑ Author collective: Military Lexicon . 2nd Edition. Military Publishing House of the GDR, Berlin 1973, p. 254 .
  6. ↑ Hans-Werner Deim: Operational training in the National People's Army in the context of military strategic thinking and military strategic disposition . In: Wolfgang Wünsche (Ed.): Stir yourselves! On the history of the National People's Army of the GDR . Rote Reihe, vol. 1. Berlin 1998, ISBN 3-932180-48-8 , pp. 327 .
  7. ^ Abraham Malamat: The Conduct of Israelite Warfare in the Biblical Period . Conference lecture in Tehran, July 9, 1976. In: Quoted in: Jehuda L. Wallach (Ed.): Series of studies on military history, military science and conflict research . tape 15 , A Festschrift for Werner Hahlweg, Professor for Military History and Defense Science at the Westfälische Wilhelms-Univ. Münster on the completion of his 65th year of life on April 29, 1977. Osnabrück 1977, p. 440, footnote 11 .
  8. ^ Thomas Schneider: Lexicon of the Pharaohs. Artemis & Winkler, Munich 1997, ISBN 3-7608-1102-7 , p. 230.
  9. ↑ Ssun – Ds': Treatise on the art of war . Translated from old Chinese into Russian, German translation. Berlin 1957.
  10. ^ Clifford J. Rogers: The Vegetian Science of Warfare in the Middle Ages. In: The Journal of Medieval Military History. Volume 1, 2003.
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