In contemporary military operations, some problems are so complex they do not give way to linear solutions but require problem management instead. Combining the fundamentals of Dao De Jing philosophy with the US military design process offers a new perspective to analyze complex security problems, devise management strategies, and plan military operations. Applying this new approach to the complex security environment in Syria allows for a nonlinear mapping of long-term goals and a new perspective on relationships between key actors, environmental factors that restrict changes in the security environment, and where planners should focus their attention.

Read the article: https://press.armywarcollege.edu/parameters/vol53/iss1/12/

Keywords: Syria, Dao, military planning, ISIS, design thinking

Episode Transcript: “Daoism and Design: Mapping the Conflict in Syria”

Stephanie Crider (Host)

You’re listening to Decisive Point, a US Army War College Press production focused on national security affairs. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the authors and are not necessarily those of the Department of the Army, the US Army War College, or any other agency of the US government.

Joining me today are Colonel Ned Marsh and Dr. Heather Gregg, authors of “Daoism and Design: Mapping the Conflict in Syria” from the Spring 2023 issue of Parameters. Colonel Marsh is a US Army Special Forces officer and a current garrison commander within the Installation Management Command. Dr. Gregg is a professor of irregular warfare at the George C. Marshall Center for European Studies and is a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. Welcome to Decisive Point, Ned. Welcome back, Heather.

Dr. Heather S. Gregg

It’s great to be here.

COL Ned B. Marsh

Thanks for having us on.

Host

Your work says combining the fundamentals of Daoist philosophy from the ancient literary work of the Tao Te Ching with the US military design process offers a new perspective with which to analyze problems, devise management strategies, and plan military operations. Tell me more. How so?

Marsh

The Dao’s what we see as an alternative perspective to a Western mindset. The Western mindset tends to see life as linear, objective-based, a realm of cause and effect. Instead, the Dao sees life as a constant flow of events with some things that are in our control and most that are out of our control. The philosophy emphasizes the continuous nature of being that people flow through life around obstacles like water would around a stone in a river. I think the simplest summary is that we should worry about the things we can control and not worry about the things that we cannot.

There’s four fundamentals. The first is that there’s no permanent reality. So, our reality is an endless continuous stream of interactive situations. The second is that every event is the result of the interaction of all the preceding events. It’s never-ending. It’s a ceaseless development of new context. And this limits the value of concepts such as linearity, cause and effect, and prediction. Third is that we only see life from the perspective that we are in it. We’re the water in the river. We’re not standing on the shore looking at the water. Those fundamentals, they describe the reality. The fourth describes how we fit into it. The good news is that we have agency. Our path isn’t predestined. Our actions can shape the future and influence our environment. So, we recognize these realities. And then we cultivate ourselves, our organizations, and our environments to foster success. We can create emergent opportunities, and we can be successful.

Host

Heather, did you want to weigh in on this too?

Gregg

Thinking in these terms is particularly useful for complex problem management. So many of the problems that we see in foreign policy today are so complex that they don’t give way to easy solutions, and that thinking linearly and thinking that things have an immediate or near-term end state is not helpful. So, when you can’t think in terms of military end-states or objective end-states, what do you do? What’s a mindset that can help you think about problem management? And I think the Dao does just that.

Host

Let’s apply this to Syria, which includes intertwined politics, culture, economics, information, and more, as well as several types of conflict.

Marsh

The key is probably . . . how do we integrate . . . design is you go from where you are, you look at the problem as to how you want to get there. And you design a solution. And a lot of times that becomes very linear. It leads to lines of effort. It includes objectives. It provides a definitive definition of victory, articulates a military end state. Design is meant to be done multiple times, but a lot of times it’s done sequentially. It’s done once and we come up with an operational approach, and then we get frustrated when our operational approach doesn’t create the solution which we want in the timeline which we want.

I think the easiest analogy which I’ve come up with is if you think of child raising. I have a child and I want my child to have a successful life and be a successful adult and I can design a solution with an operational approach and try to execute that strategy. And the odds of it happening are pretty low. But if I take the philosophy of the Dao, and I think, OK, it’s endless. So, you don’t ever stop raising your child. Success has to be produced continuously. I don’t really have any knowledge. So, everybody’s a first-time parent. You only get one shot at being a parent. That your child goes through endless interactions, both internal and external. That they have their own agency.

The parent has to balance risk and understanding. We have to recognize that control is an illusion, and we have to have the long game. We have to be positional. Where do I put myself to best influence? And then, ultimately, I cultivate them. I cultivate myself. I cultivate my family. I cultivate the environment to foster emergent success. You take a structured design process to get there—ends ways means. Let alone if I step outside of childbearing and I go to a military problem like Syria, where you have adversaries who are trying to keep you from achieving your goal, your future vision.

The Dao allows you to take those two things and combine them together so you can iterate. You can adjust. You can be in the flow. I wanted to kind of get that out before we dove into how do we apply the philosophy and design together when you talk about a problem like Syria, which doesn’t really have set solutions because the interdependency. I’ll pause there.

I’m not sure, Heather, if you want to add a little context to that.

Gregg

What’s so fascinating about the conflict in Syria is how intractable it seems right now. I’m sure most of our listeners are well aware that there’s been a civil war since 2011. You had the emergence of the Islamic State within Syria. But then also in Iraq you had the decline of the Islamic State, or the demise of the Islamic State, but you still have ISIS present. You have Turkish interests. You have Israeli interests. You have Iranian interests and Iraqi interests and United States all in there. And Russia, I think, as I mentioned, all competing for security control, competing for resources, competing for bases and populations, and access.

So how to address these problems and understand what can we change and what can’t we change becomes crucial. We don’t want to waste resources and time. We also don’t want to make the situation worse. And so, thinking in these terms that Ned outlines are particularly important for thinking about what we can influence and what we can’t.

Marsh

There’s three interdependent problems which constrict solutions in Syria. First, the Assad regime has survived; they continue to survive because of external support. Two, the United States were unable to help the Syrian Democratic Forces establish dominant positions because Turkey, a NATO ally and ally United States, they’re steadfastly anti-SDF for their significant support for the Assad regime that they have Iranian support, that they get Russian support. Those are also super interdependent with regional and global geopolitical implications for the United States. And Kurdish fracturing internal is a significant problem.

And so, the United States can’t solve the solution of keeping the Syrian Democratic Forces in position and appeasing allies . . . the ally Turkey, that’s gotta be managed . . . anymore than it can push Iran or Russia out of Syria because that’s interdependent with other problems, which it can’t solve there. And so instead of frustrating ourselves on those, the Dao would seek to foster an environment which you can influence. And manage that problem.

The Dao planner should recognize what you can control and what’s not, what can be influenced and what can’t. Success is not a one-time proposition, like I stated. Anything which we would do in Syria, we would have to continue to do. There would have to be a solution in there. We would have to recognize that there’s no knowledge. That despite our limited understanding that we still can manifest success even if we don’t necessarily know how. And that ultimately that there’s no end-state in Syria. So, planners have to view that as an opportunity.

What can the US government do? If you look at it from the perspective of how the Middle East coordinator Brett McGurk has described it, it is avoiding maximalist goals, timelines, and objective end-states, and then getting back to basics of partnership, alliance, and patience and understanding that through the use of hard and soft power across time and space and throughout the Middle East, they can reinforce neutral goals. By creating an environment in Syria, you protect Iraq, you help Lebanon, you protect your allies in Jordan and interests in Saudi Arabia. And your integrated strategy becomes more holistic.

Host

You just answered my next question. How would Daoism and design work in Syria? Heather, did you want to add to that?

Gregg

This article has taught me that these are practices we’re not particularly good at in the United States. Things like patience, things like realizing that we can’t fix the problem in the near term and waiting for emergence, waiting for an opportunity that might change the dynamics and might allow us to take other actions. I particularly want to underscore the point that Ned made about building partnerships, getting back to the basics, and working with partners and allies because certainly this is a conflict that we can’t unilaterally fix. And that’s deeply important.

Marsh

It really is a merger of philosophy, a way of thinking with a methodology. Design doesn’t just lead us to the solution, it’s a great tool to get us to think conceptually, but you have to have an aligned philosophy with it. Some problems are linear. You can see a solution. I can design. I can apply resources. I can get there. Other problems are much more complex and complicated. And interdependence requires that you be a little bit more agile, a little bit more flexible with things like timelines. That sometimes you balance action with inaction. Sometimes maybe I don’t want to do something somewhere because I don’t know what the effect is going to be. Let me allow things to develop in due course, and then ultimately that I have some humility in what I know and what I think I know and what I can do and what I can’t do. But if you cultivate yourself, you cultivate your organization, you cultivate your relationships, and you cultivate the environment to become a place where things can grow, that can foster emergent success, that you can be successful.

Host

Any final thoughts you’d like to share before we go?

Marsh

I just want to say thanks. Thanks for the opportunity to have this in Parameters. Thank you for your time here today. And I want to say thanks to Dr. Gregg for all her guidance and mentorship as we’ve worked through this and her hard work, as well.

Gregg

I want to say thank you too for this opportunity and, Col. Marsh, for all that you’ve taught me in this process.

I would just close by saying that we’re in an age of strategic competition where things like victory and near-term end-states just aren’t viable. This is not the kind of security environment we’re in. And so, applying tools like Daoism with design helps us to think about what does problem management look like in the age of strategic competition and what should we be focusing our attention on? How should we be building partnerships and alliances, practicing humility? All these things that Colonel Marsh said, I think are just deeply important in an age of strategic competition.

Host

Listeners, you can download this and dig into all the details at press.armywarcollege.edu/parameters. Look for volume 53 issue one.

Ned and Heather, thank you so very much today. This was really interesting and all the effort you put in to actually coming together to make this happen is much appreciated.

Marsh

Thank you, Stephanie.

Gregg

Thanks, Stephanie.

Host

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Author information

Colonel Ned Beechinor Marsh is a US Army Special Forces officer and garrison commander within Installation Management Command. His previous Army and Joint assignments include 1st Special Forces Group, US Army Special Operations Command, and Special Operations Command Europe. He has served throughout the Central Asian, European, and Indo-Pacif ic geographic areas. He is a graduate of the US Army War College, the School of Advanced Military Studies, and the Naval Postgraduate School.

Dr. Heather S. Gregg is a professor of irregular warfare at the George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies in Garmisch, Germany, and is a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She holds a PhD in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She is the author of Religious Terrorism (Cambridge University Press, 2020), Building the Nation: Missed Opportunities in Iraq and Afghanistan (University of Nebraska Press, 2018), and The Path to Salvation: Religious Violence from Jihad to the Crusades (University of Nebraska Press, 2014).