Financial Costs of War

Waging war is very expensive and costly. As Sun Tzu notes in his book, In the operations of war, where there are in the field a thousand swift chariots, as many heavy chariots, and a hundred thousand mail-clad soldiers, with provisions enough to carry them a thousand, the expenditure at home and at the front, including entertainment of guests, small items such as glue and paint, and sums spent on chariots and armor, will reach the total of a thousand ounces of silver per day. Such is the cost of raising an army of 100,000 men.

This therefore ensures that countries, leaders and generals that engage in war must be ready to spend and expand the expenditure accordingly to sustain the fight and consequently winning. In the decade between September 11, 2001 and May 2, 2011 when Osama Bin Laden was killed by the US forces, billions of dollars were spent in making the Americans safe as reported br Charles Riley in CNNMoney. Agencies were created and expanded with further financing, thousands of employees hired to analyze intelligence in one mission; stop terrorist attacks. The department of Homeland Security spent $424 billion and employed averagely 216,000 people.

The Use of Spies

All war is based on deception thus, what enables the wise sovereign and the good general to strike and conquer, and achieve things beyond the reach of ordinary men, is foreknowledge. This will save the army energy and resources in movements. Besides, it is a lot easier to move undetected in a smaller group thus the smaller the better. Sun Tzu advises on the use the spies to collect information and intelligence about the enemy’s level of preparation and any other plans and strategies that the team intends to use in the battlefields. The intelligence gives the generals who uses spies an advantage over the other. In modern warfare, states, institutions and insurgent groups employ spies in the intelligence gathering and analyze it to get the desired outcome. In modern warfare, technology has been greatly employed in gathering intelligence. It includes the use of;

Photographic and Satellite Intelligence.

In the advent of aerial photography during the First World War the use of photographs to provide accurate overviews of a battlefield, troops on the move and resources such as factories and bridges became increasingly important. By World War two specialized photo reconnaissance aircraft were coming into service, often adapted versions of fighter or light attack aircraft which had the speed to avoid pursuit and return safely with their precious photos. Again this source of intelligence is far from perfect as Operation Market Garden showed and counter measures such as fake units used in the preparation of the D-Day landings could easily fool photos from the air.

During the Cold War a new breed of photo reconnaissance air craft was developed, which were unarmed but used either high speed such as the SR-71 Blackbird or very high altitude like U-2 spy plane to avoid being shot down. These aircrafts would fly very near an enemy border and take pictures from high altitude. These pictures would be very imperative in analyzing the level of sophistication of an enemy.

Electronic and Signals Intelligence

This is collection of data from the interception of not just radio signals but any kind of electronic data. Modern technology can ‘leak’ information which can be picked up by specialist equipment. Also among this kind of intelligence is what is known as ‘Traffic analysis” where the amount rather than the content of radio transmissions is analyzed to give clues about troop and or ship movements. Mobile phones cover an integral part of modern western society and have been used by terrorist cells to communicate, posing new challenges to the security and intelligence services and increasing further the volume of data which can be intercepted as written by Dugdale (2007).

Maintaining alliances

Sun Tzu clearly elaborates that a wise general knows armies that cannot be quarreled with or fought, roads not to destroy and cities not to tear down. When in difficult country, do not encamp. In country where high roads intersect, join hands with your allies. Do not linger in dangerously isolated positions.(Art of War)

These ensured that generals can get convenient and easy passages through towns and territories and get military support if needed. In modern warfare, states have allies and form alliances for strategic reasons. For instance, during the Cold War, alliances were made between countries and the superpowers, the Soviet Union and the United States of America.

North Atlantic Treaty Organization, (NATO) was created as a peacetime alliance between the USA, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy and Luxembourg on August 24, 1949. The purpose of this treaty was to ensure mutual defense and collective security of the accepted countries. The treaty’s other purpose was to contain communism by the use of containment- a term that argued that if the Soviet expansion could be contained by responding to the Soviets pressures and probes when they occurred. This term was proposed by US diplomat and Soviet expert George F. Kennan.

The Southeast Asia Treaty organization, (SEATO) for short, was an alliance of nations who banded together to combat the expansion of communism in Southeast Asia. This treaty was signed in Manila, the Philippines, on September 8, 1954. This organization was very similar to NATO. The members were the USA, Great Britain, France, New Zealand, Thailand, Australia, Pakistan and the Philippines. The members agree to defend each other from military attacks.

In response to NATO the Soviets created their own mutual military alliance. The alliance was called the Warsaw Pact which was formed May 14, 1955. This agreement was between the Soviet Union, countries under Soviet influence and Eastern Germany.

Proxy wars

In matter of conceptualization, this could fall under formation of alliances. However, in this case, the operration iis meant to be a covert one thus better stands independent of alliances. In the Art of War, Sun Tzu writes, In battle, there are not more than two methods of attack—the direct and the indirect; yet these two in combination give rise to an endless series of maneuvers. Sun Tzu therefore advises generals to employ whichever methods they can whether directly engaging in wars or indirectly that is through proxy but not exclusive.

In proxy wars, two warring states that do not want to be seen or to fight against each other could support insurgents thereby engaging through supply of weapons and arms. They thus avoid direct conflict. In other cases, it is one state supporting an insurgent against a government. For instance;

Nepalese Civil War (1996 – 2006)

Nepalese Civil War was battled between socialist renegades and patriot monarchists. Until this point, Nepal had been a government, with the lord holding total power. Be that as it may, the Maoist agitators figured out how to oust the government and Nepal's rank framework alongside it. Their belief system was the correct inverse, and they could then pick up control. As they are a Maoist comrade gathering, they were vigorously upheld by China. As India is the main genuine Asian power adversary to China, India upheld the government. As Pakistan and India detest each other, Pakistan bolstered the socialist revolutionaries. The genuinely minor common war was utilized by real powers to settle old scores.

Yugoslav Wars (1991 – 2001)

The Yugoslav Wars were a progression of wars which saw the separation of a nation called Yugoslavia. Yugoslavia was comprised of what we currently know as Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia, Kosovo, and several different countries. It was a comrade tyranny, yet that couldn't hold Yugoslavia from destroying itself. It was Europe's greatest clash since world war 2. The wars were ideal for real world forces to exploit. NATO was clearly supporting the radical gatherings, as they are continually hoping to undermine socialist fascisms. What's more, Russia clearly took to supporting the Yugoslav government.

Afghan Civil War (1989–1992)

The Afghan Civil War is viewed as Russia's Vietnam war strife. Afghanistan was controlled by the Soviet Union for some time, and they introduced a socialist government there. Be that as it may, when the Soviets pulled back from Afghanistan, revolt bunches instantly tested the administration's capacity. The Taliban revolts in the end figured out how to oust comrade manage and frame their own administration. The United States upheld the dissident powers, and the Soviet Union bolstered the communists for evident reasons. From multiple points of view this is the best case of an intermediary war. It likewise demonstrates to us that the foe of our foe isn't generally our companion as those same agitators that America bolstered were at last associated with the 9/11 assault.

Observance of Factors of warfare

The art of war, then, is governed by five constant factors, to be taken into account in one’s deliberations, when seeking to determine the conditions obtaining in the field. These are:

The Moral Law

Heaven

Earth

The Commander

Method and discipline.

The US Department of Defense introduced a concept of “battlespace” as the integrated information management of all significant factors that impact on combat operations by armed forces for the military theatre of operations, including information, air, land, sea, and space. It includes the environment, factors, and conditions that must be understood to successfully apply combat power, protect the force, or complete the mission. This includes enemy and friendly forces; facilities, weather and terrain within the operational areas and areas of interests.

Use of terrain

Sun Tzu notes the types of terrains ranging from Accessible ground, entangling ground, Temporizing ground, narrow passes, precipitous heights and positions at a great distance from the enemy. Leverage of territory happens when military faculty pick up preference over a enemy using, or basically disregarding, the landscape around them. Mountains, for instance, can close off specific regions, making it pointless to station troops inside the out of reach territory for example, woodlands and forests. Thick vegetation can give camouflage to strategic developments, for example, setting up traps. Height itself is maybe the most surely understood case of landscape advantage, with gravity attempting to the benefit of the more raised party.

While submitting that a landscape advantage is a vital thought for present day leaders, especially those occupied with conventional war tactics and strategies, for example, guerrilla fighting.

For instance, as reported in the Star Newspaper, Investigations reports estimate about 200 to 300 American Special Operations troops have partnered with Kenya in wiping al Shabaab militants from the vast Boni Forest in Lamu. Al Shabaab infiltrated the forest and used it as an operation base for recruiting and planning terror attacks in Coast.

In the case of Boko Haram terror activities, the newspapers report that the Islamist militant group, which gained global notoriety in 2014 kidnapping more than 270 schoolgirls from the town of Chibok, uses the Sambisa forest in northeastern Nigeria as a stronghold- Reuters.

Categorization of the armies

This is putting up teams made up of different soldiers who are skilled and trained differently in warfare. Sun Tzu gives the likelihood of having differently trained soldiers armed differently and skilled differently. he points that the operations of war, there are in the field a thousand swift chariots, as many heavy chariots, and a hundred thousand mail-clad soldiers. In the modern warfare, states and organizations have differently trained and skilled soldiers who perform different tasks and missions. The US categorization includes;

Coast Guard- protects the public, the environment and U.S. economic and security interests in any maritime region, including international waters and America's coasts, ports and inland waterways.

Air Force- protects American interests at home and abroad with a focus on air power

Navy- defends the right to travel and trade freely on the world's oceans and protects national interests overseas

Marine Corps- Working closely with the Navy, the Marine Corps is often first on the ground in combat situations.

Army- protects the security of the United States and its resources.

Russian Military branches

Ground Troops, Navy, Air Forces, Airborne Troops, Missile Troops of Strategic Purpose commonly known as Strategic Rocket Forces, and Aerospace Defense Troops are independent "combat arms," not subordinate to any of the three branches; Russian Ground Troops include the following combat arms: motorized-rifle troops, tank troops, missile and artillery troops, air defense of the Ground Troops.

Training and discipline

According to Sun Tzu, better trained soldiers shall have an advantage over those who are less trained. Moreover, a general must ensure that discipline is enforced at all times in the ranks to ensure respect and observance of the commands if an army is to become victorious.

According to professor Gary Sheffield, in relation to the military training and discipline in the first world war notes that one of the elements that empowered the officers of the First World War to bear awful conditions and high setbacks was training. Military training has the effect between a mob and an armed force. It is a type of conduct that is the outcome of preparing and inculcation, intended to guarantee consistence to orders among individuals and groups, to make and keep up attachment in military units. The way that the undermining of officers' power in Russia after the March upheaval of 1917 was an issue in the mass departures that took after offers confirm that discipline is the glue that binds armies and influences them to go about as one in light of commands.

Fierce training to shape an armed force

Armed forces in the First World War drew upon a pool of enlisted individuals, some of which were at that point familiar with mechanical skills in processing plants and different work environments. Germany and Britain, for instance, were profoundly industrialized and urbanized social orders in 1914. All regular workers warriors would have been accustomed to being at the base of society, with all that involved. All things being equal, all armed forces subjected newcomers to fundamental training which ran from the disagreeable to the severe, the point being to separate the singularity of the new fighters and to form them into a armies that would complete commands unquestioningly.