解析兰德公司《为大国冲突作准备》

李锦维

前提词，本解析是作者对兰德公司最新公开发表出版的报告通览全文而进行的简略解析，目的是帮助读者基本理解兰德公司报告的重点部分，所以本解析不是评论也不是作者的建议，作者希望通过解析，使关心外交、军事当局关注国际局势的快速演变和发展，同时适合这种演变和发展。作者希望维持世界和平，不希望看到各方进入大小冲突，更不希望看到大国之间的冲突，否则三次大战必定很快到来，战争一来受苦难的一定是广大人民。

众所周知兰德公司是美国政府首屈一指的智库，也是全球顶级智库之一。近年来，全球格局见证了权力动态的重大变化，2022年底兰德公司通过大量研究而撰写的十分详尽的报告《为大国冲突做准备》，因为报告涉及很多美国国家安全和军方的敏感内容，因此经美国安全部门以及国防部门审查之后准予正式公开发表出版。报告发表实际就是告诉世界，美国已经作好了与大国冲突的准备。因此报告的发表引发了人们对潜在大国冲突的担忧。报告是专为美国政府如何应对不断变化的全球环境提供政策建议。

兰德公司这份报告为不断变化的全球动态以及大国之间发生冲突的可能性提供了深刻见解，报告针对的大国的另外方，特意指明就是中国和俄罗斯，主要是指中国。

报告概括自 2001 年以来，美国和中国军队受到一系列独特的直接和间接经验的影响。继2001年9月11日恐怖袭击和2003年入侵伊拉克之后，美军将精力和资源集中在伊拉克和阿富汗的反恐和平叛行动上。即使到了 2023 年，美国对大国竞争的重视仍与其他国家安全优先事项相冲突，包括当前的危机和在全球的持续部署。另一方面，中国人民解放军主要关注其军事现代化和重组，为可能涉及美国军事干预的地区冲突做好准备。尽管自1979年中越战争以来没有任何作战经验，但解放军对美军技术和作战能力的各个方面进行了深入研究，包括组织、指挥和控制、后勤、联合作战等。

两国军队的经历所呈现出的二分法引发了一些问题，即他们如何为可能发生的大国冲突做好准备。自20 世纪 90 年代初以来，美国军队已经获得了大量的直接作战经验，但这些经验都是针对技术落后、非对手的对手。相比之下，解放军没有直接的作战经验。尽管其作战概念是为了对抗大国而设计的，但这些概念很大程度上源自1991年以来美国行动的间接观察和教训。每支军队获取和处理经验并将其纳入训练的方式将严重影响战备状态以及在未来战争中的表现。

解析：美国在2001-2003年集中精力入侵伊拉克和反恐时，就是到目前年份，解放军在不断重组和现代化过程中，提醒需要关注。

报告提出了问题并且研究了美国和美国所获得的经验的程度，自2001年以来，中国军队塑造了这些军队的训练方式，以及这些经验和最近的训练趋势将对两国应对大国冲突的准备产生的潜在影响。报告重点关注两个主要研究问题：（1）美军和解放军自2001年以来获得的军事经验如何影响了双方军队的训练方式？（2）这些经验和培训趋势对应对大国冲突的准备有何影响？

解析提出问题，经验、训练产生的影响

研究的方法由三个部分组成。第一个是对历史实例的审查，这些实例提供了有关军事组织如何调整训练以满足新出现的安全要求以及为什么一些国家成功调整的见解为大国冲突做准备：经验如何塑造美国和中国的军事训练，而其他国家却失败了。考虑了历史例子中的特定类型的经验，并重点关注可能有助于或阻碍适应的各种因素。对经验的定义和分类表明，军队要么在内部开发推动体验式学习和培训的作战模型，要么从其他军队进口模型。这些作战模式有助于在经验与政治、经济和社会因素之间建立联系，这些因素在军队如何适应方面发挥着关键作用。对于研究的第二部分，从历史实例中得出结论，开发了一个逻辑模型，用于评估经验和制度因素如何影响美国军队和解放军的训练。最后，将这一逻辑模型应用于当前有限数量的美国军队和解放军案例研究，以评估经验如何影响当今美国和中国的军事训练。

解析：研究方法实冽、模型案例和评估

研究得出了七个主要结论：

1、解放军通过一个结构化的过程获得经验，包括通过马克思列宁主义的视角观察战争和研究军事科学、概念发展、实验、示范、实施和整个部队的训练。美国军队拥有一种基于直接战斗的本土经验模式，但随着全球威胁形势的变化以及势均力敌的对手试图破坏美国的全球安全地位，间接实验变得更加突出。

2、美中两军自 2001 年以来经历的性质引发了人们对其应对大国冲突的准备工作的质疑，特别是这些准备工作中的训练部分是否足以取得作战成功。

3、中国在以下方面具有优势：它的重点适用于阻止、推迟或击败美军进入中国周边地区所需的概念和能力——强调主场优势。美国被迫考虑这样一种想法：中国可能有办法让美国的此类干预成本过高，从而使美军处于反应模式，以发展改变这种状况的概念和能力。

4、美军在适应性方面具有优势基于直接经验和领先的作战概念的创新能力，强调对关键系统节点的网络精确打击。最终，美国军队享有的最重要和最持久的优势之一是其训练质量以及更新训练以应对不断变化的条件和威胁的能力。

5、当时机到来时，时间对美国来说是一个优势为应对大国冲突做好准备的概念和功能上的改变，解放军重点做好抗战准备。

6、美国在某些方面看起来几乎是独一无二的，但涉及对解放军指挥文化的大规模修改。这些修改必须在其他方面已经充满变化的优先事项的环境中进行。

7、解放军联合作战所需的训练和演习方法、工具和基础设施正在改进，但与美军相比仍处于初级阶段。美国自2001年以来的直接经验为训练体系提供了基础，而如果没有类似的体验压力，解放军就无法完全效仿。

解析：通过近20年来中国的马列指导思想和美国的实战创新比较了双方对训练演习方式

提出了两项主要建议：

1、对美国和中国与主要战争概念和能力相关的实验、训练和演习进行进一步的比较研究，将有利于美国的战役发展规划和战略。一个量化这些活动的数量、范围和规模的综合数据库，以及对证据中的能力和脆弱性的定性评估，将为网络评估和特定情景的推演和分析提供信息。

2、美国政策制定者和高级作战人员也应该这样做，从情报界和联邦政府资助的研发中心寻求有关中国领导层如何评估解放军应对大国冲突准备情况的更多见解。了解中国共产党高级决策者如何评价解放军的经验作为决定使用军事力量的一个因素，是设计美国威慑方法的关键组成部分。

解析：美方重点是想获取中方军事情报，特别是从高阶层官员方面考虑，常规要达到这目的地话，就会布置间谍网、收买（注，2010-2012美国在中国的间谍网被破获，30多线人遭到最严厉惩处，根据最近美中央情报局长公开讲话，美方确认美在中国的情报网遭到摧毁，同时表明美很快会在中国重组情报网）

报告各章内容十分详尽，除第9章外都省略

第1章介绍

第2章历史教训：经验、培训和改变

第3章作战模型和军事训练

第4章影响培训决策的因素

第5章经验的定义和分类

第6章美国经验和培训

第7章中国的经验和培训

第8章经验和其他因素对培训的影响

解析：1-8章主要从不同历史阶段、不同国家其军事理论和实战及其最终结果进行详细介绍，同时还引用不同国家的军事作家撰写的军事书籍以及官方公布的有关军事方面的政策、文件等进行比较分析和研究

第9章结论和启示

任何军事组织的变革和适应都是一个复杂、困难的过程，充满不确定性，最终常常导致达不到最初预期目标的结果。引发这些变革呼声的因素——包括新技术的出现、外国军事创新和重大失败——可能会被一个国家的政治和军事领导人充分理解。影响变革的能力往往取决于这些领导人驾驭复杂的政治、经济、社会和文化动态的决心和技能，这些动态可能会限制重大变革的可能性。同样，军队的成功也可能会阻碍其适应能力，因为人们相信当前的模式和实践不需要在过去的成功之后进行适应。无论哪种情况，直接和间接经验都是政治和军事领导人如何确定变革需求并制定实施新政策和计划的计划的核心因素。

本报告中提供的示例说明了这些复杂性。当国家领导人的统治和国际体系中的相对权力面临直接威胁时，变革意愿往往不足以决定变革成功。

19世纪，中国、埃及和奥斯曼帝国都面临着重大的内部和外部挑战，促使其领导人采取行动；然而，一系列因素限制了它们适应和实施其所追求的国外业务模式的能力。

后来埃及和伊拉克的例子也出现了类似的问题。在每一个案例中，相互竞争的政治优先事项、社会条件和文化现实都带来了一些问题，这些问题要么太复杂而难以解决，要么需要相关政治领导人不愿意考虑的政策解决方案。相反，在日本明治时期的情况下，

以色列、印度、新加坡和古巴的政治和军事领导人要么能够对国家机构做出重大改变，要么建立关系并追求适合社会和文化现实的实用模式。

这些相同的例子表明了经验（无论是最近的还是历史的）在形成组织反应和决定这些期望的改革是否成功方面的重要性。

在担任中东军事顾问期间，苏联顾问了解到埃及和伊拉克在英国殖民统治下的军事经验到底有多么根深蒂固。同样，政党或革命政治、对外军事销售关系、联盟和远古作战经验所产生的长期经验影响在军事改革的许多方面发挥着重要作用，特别是在训练领域。

当军队试图采用衍生模型时，作战模型会增加这种复杂性。

为大国冲突做好准备：经验如何塑造美国和中国的军事训练，这些假设和社会文化条件可能不适用于或难以在各自的组织和机构内协调。

这些现实也许是当今美军和解放军之间最显着的对比，因为两者都在适应大国冲突的挑战。美国军队主要在一个自己创造的系统内运作，该系统是根据自己的经验发展起来的，并基于一系列政治、文化和社会规则，这些规则是根据其在技术、人员、战略、行动、军民关系、政治军事关系等。这一观察结果不应被解释为相对价值或有效性的陈述。相反认为大多数西方军队中存在的作战模式是熟悉的，并且需要相对较少（如果有的话）对政治、社会或文化规范的妥协才能有效发挥作用。

解放军的情况明显不同，而且可能更加复杂，因为它试图根据三种现有作战模式的要素打造一支信息化军队：苏联和俄罗斯、西方或北约以及人民战争模式。自 1979 年上次重大冲突以来，解放军缺乏作战经验，而且对间接经验的依赖使得这些适应变得更加困难。此外，这三种模式背后的一些相互矛盾的假设和基本原则使协调和适应它们成为解放军面临的一项重大挑战——这一因素限制了他们在许多领域，特别是训练方面的改革取得成功。

美国及其盟国自第一次海湾战争以来在作战中所取得的成就使得解放军希望效仿西方作战模式的关键要素——更加强调战术熟练性、联合性、主动性、透明度和适应性决策等——这是可以理解的。中共在军事现代化努力中的主要困难在于如何在一支以义务兵模式为基础、并继续由地面部队指挥官主导的党军中协调和灌输这些属性。迄今为止，中国共产党和解放军未能调和对更大创新、创造力和主动性的需求与对党的忠诚和正统的要求。

本报告的调查结果对于美国政策制定者和指挥官应如何看待经验在美军中的作用以及这对美国未来应对大国冲突的准备意味着什么有几方面的影响。第一个含义是，美国军队内部的学习系统帮助其吸取经验教训并将这些经验教训提炼成更新的作战概念和训练，这是一个关键优势。本讨论的重点是美国及其盟军的作战使用，而不是美国在伊拉克和阿富汗战略上缺乏成功的问题。北京认识到前者的价值，同时也将后者视为其战略决策中需要避免的陷阱。

结论和启示很大程度上体现在首屈一指的培训基础设施中。中国已尝试复制该体系的多个方面，但由于多种原因，其努力仍处于起步阶段。美国学习体系成功的最突出原因是，各军种都付出了巨大努力，汲取从作战行动中获得的教训和经验，并确保这些教训能够融入到训练中得以保留。美国军队还表现出根据安全环境的变化、失败或缺陷以及新技术和作战概念调整其训练的意愿。最终，美国军队享有的最重要和最持久的优势之一是其训练质量以及更新训练以适应不断变化的条件和威胁的能力。

第二个关键影响是基于人员素质和志愿军的有效性。

本报告中的几个军队例子表明，预备役或义务兵军队可以是有效的，并达到执行高度复杂的行动和任务所需的熟练程度；以色列和新加坡的军队就是最好的例子。然而，近几十年来最成功的义务兵军队都是那些对其生存和生存面临重大、有时甚至是生死存亡威胁的国家——例如以色列及其阿拉伯邻国、新加坡及其马来西亚和印度尼西亚。其他例子包括台湾和韩国。这些部队的模式各不相同，包括义务服役期和指定的预备役期。尽管其中一些国家对义务兵役的看法正在发生变化（例如，台湾已尝试发展自己的志愿军），但每个国家在和平时期都需要一支高素质、全职、专业的干部队伍。这些国家的共同点是民众普遍认同的威胁观点以及普遍认为军队作为一个机构在塑造国家认同方面发挥着关键作用。

近几十年来，解放军面临的主要挑战之一是可靠性问题。

可靠性包括政治忠诚——这是解放军可靠性的主要要素——以及与工作作风、动机以及遵守制度指导方针和指令的意愿相关的其他问题。当中共和国家提出要求时，解放军是否会打仗的问题是习近平在2017年讲话中描述的他对解放军最关心的四个问题之一。解放军缺乏作战经验、“和平时期习惯”（即一种负面经历）的形成以及对普通士兵可靠性的担忧，由于继续依赖义务兵来填补队伍，这些问题变得更加复杂。因此，解放军强调政治工作，确保训练不仅旨在提高熟练程度，而且旨在保持忠诚和可靠。

问题对于美国军方来说并不陌生，正如对 20 世纪 70 年代出现的空心力量的担忧所证明的那样。然而，自从采用志愿军以来美国军方就不必解决此类问题。除了志愿军提供的技术和作战能力之外，美国军方在许多方面都被证明是极其可靠的。因此，只要该系统能够持续下去，美军维持志愿军的能力就是一个明显的优势。

解析：这一章已经叙述得十分清楚和明白

李锦维博士

20230731

作者系国际关系专家、哈佛进修学者

Analysis of RAND Corporation's "Preparing for Great Power Conflict"

LI JIN WEI

The premise, this analysis is the author's brief analysis of the full text of the latest RAND Corporation report, the purpose is to help readers understand the key parts of the RAND Corporation report, so this analysis is neither a comment nor the author's Suggestions, the author hopes that through the analysis, the diplomatic and military authorities concerned about the rapid evolution and development of the international situation, and at the same time suitable for this evolution and development. The author hopes to maintain world peace and wants to avoid all parties entering into conflicts, let alone conflicts between major powers. Otherwise, the three major wars will come soon, and the people suffering after the wars must be the masses.

As we all know, the RAND Corporation is the premier think tank of the US government and one of the top think tanks in the world. The global pattern has witnessed major changes in power dynamics in recent years. At the end of 2022, the RAND Corporation wrote a very detailed report, "Preparing for Great Power Conflict," through a large number of studies; because the report involved many sensitive contents of the US national security and military, it was approved for official publication after being reviewed by the US security and defense agencies. The report's release is telling the world that the United States is ready for conflict with major powers. The report's publication thus raised concerns about a potential great power conflict. The report is designed to provide policy recommendations for how the US government should respond to the changing global environment.

The RAND report offers insights into changing global dynamics and the potential for conflict between great powers, specifically China and Russia, primarily China, on the other side of the list.

The report outlines that since 2001, the US and Chinese militaries have been shaped by a unique set of direct and indirect experiences. Following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the U.S. military focused its energies and resources on counterterrorism and peace insurgency operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Even into 2023, America's emphasis on great power competition conflicts with other national security priorities, including the current crisis and continued global deployment. Conversely, the PLA is primarily concerned with modernizing and reorganizing its military to prepare for regional conflicts that may involve U.S. military intervention. Despite having no combat experience since the Sino-Vietnamese War in 1979, the PLA has conducted in-depth studies of U.S. military technology and combat capabilities, including organization, command and control, logistics, and joint operations.

The dichotomy presented by the experiences of the two militaries raises questions about how they might prepare for a possible great-power conflict. Since the early 1990s, the U.S. military has gained much direct combat experience, but that experience has been against technologically backward, nonadversary adversaries. In contrast, the PLA has no direct combat experience. Although its operational concepts are designed to counter great powers, they are largely derived from indirect observations and lessons from U.S. operations since 1991. How each military acquires and processes experience and incorporates it into training will significantly affect readiness and performance in future wars.

Analysis: When the United States concentrated on invading Iraq and counter-terrorism in 2001-2003, it is the current year, and the PLA is in continuous reorganization and modernization, reminding it to pay attention.

The report asks questions and examines the extent to which experience gained by the United States and the Chinese military since 2001 has shaped how those militaries train and how these experiences and recent training trends will have an impact on both countries' readiness for great power conflict potential impact. The report focuses on two main research questions: (1) How has the military experience the U.S. and PLA gained since 2001 influenced how their militaries train? (2) How do these experiences and training trends affect preparedness for great power conflict?

Analyze the questions raised, the impact of experience and training

The research methodology consists of three parts. The first is a review of historical examples that provide insights into how military organizations adapt training to meet emerging security requirements and why some countries have successfully adjusted to prepare for great power conflict: How Experience Shapes Military Training in the United States and China, while others failed. Specific types of experience in historical examples are considered, focusing on factors that may help or hinder adaptation. Defining and categorizing experience suggests that the military either develops operational models internally to drive experiential learning and training or imports models from other militaries. These operational models help to create connections between experience and the political, economic, and social factors that play a key role in how militaries adapt. For the second part of the study, concluding historical examples, a logistic model was developed to assess how empirical and institutional factors affect the training of the U.S. military and PLA. Finally, this logical model is applied to a limited number of current case studies of the U.S. military and the PLA to assess how experience shapes U.S. and Chinese military training today.

Analysis: research method evidence, model case, and evaluation

The study reached seven main conclusions:

1. The PLA gains experience through a structured process that includes observing warfare through a Marxist-Leninist lens and studying military science, concept development, experimentation, demonstration, implementation, and training of the entire force. The U.S. military has a model of homegrown experience based on direct combat. Still, indirect experimentation has become more prominent as the global threat landscape changes and peered adversaries seek to undermine the U.S. global security position.

2. The nature of what the U.S. and Chinese militaries have experienced since 2001 raises questions about their preparations for great power conflict, particularly whether the training component of these preparations is sufficient for operational success.

3. China has an advantage in that its focus applies to the concepts and capabilities needed to deter, delay, or defeat U.S. forces entering China’s periphery—emphasizing home-field advantage. The U.S. is forced to consider that China might have a way to make such U.S. intervention too costly, thereby putting the U.S. military in reactive mode to develop the concepts and capabilities to change the situation.

4. The U.S. military has an advantage in adaptability. It is based on direct experience and innovative capabilities of leading operational concepts, emphasizing network precision strikes on key system nodes. Ultimately, one of the most important and enduring advantages the U.S. military enjoys is the quality of its training and the ability to update it to meet changing conditions and threats.

5. When the time comes, time is an advantage for the United States—conceptual and functional changes to prepare for major power conflicts. The PLA focuses on preparing for the war of resistance.

6. The United States appears almost unique in some respects but involves a massive modification of the PLA command culture. These modifications must take place in an environment already fraught with changing priorities on other fronts.

7. The training and exercise methods, tools, and infrastructure required for PLA joint operations are improving but still in their infancy compared with those of the U.S. military. U.S. direct experience since 2001 has provided the basis for a training system that the PLA can only fully emulate with similar experiential pressures.

Analysis: Through the past 20 years, China's Marxist-Leninist guiding ideology and the actual combat innovation of the United States have compared the training and exercise methods of the two sides.

Two main recommendations were made:

1. Further comparative studies of U.S. and Chinese experiments, training, and exercises related to major war concepts and capabilities will benefit U.S. campaign development planning and strategy. A comprehensive database quantifying these activities' number, scope, and scale, together with qualitative assessments of capabilities and vulnerabilities in the evidence, will inform network assessments and scenario-specific play and analysis.

2. U.S. policymakers and senior warfighters should do the same, seeking additional insights from the intelligence community and federally funded research and development centers on how China’s leadership assesses the PLA’s readiness for great power conflict. Understanding how senior Chinese Communist Party policymakers evaluate the experience of the PLA as a factor in deciding to use military force is a key component of designing the U.S. approach to deterrence.

Analysis: The United States focuses on obtaining Chinese military intelligence, especially from the perspective of high-level officials. If this goal is to be achieved routinely, it will deploy a spy network and buy it (Note, the US spy network in China was cracked in 2010-2012, and More than 30 informants have been severely punished. According to the recent public speech of the US Central Intelligence Agency, the US confirmed that the US intelligence network in China was destroyed, and at the same time, indicated that the US has reorganized the intelligence network in China)

The chapters of the report are very detailed and are omitted except for Chapter 9

Chapter 1 Introduction

Chapter 2 History Lessons: Experience, Training, and Change

Chapter 3 Combat Models and Military Training

Chapter 4 Factors Affecting Training Decisions

5 Definition and Classification of Experience

Chapter 6 US Experience and Training

Chapter 7 Experience and Training in China

Chapter 8 The Influence of Experience and Other Factors on Training

Analysis: Chapters 1-8 mainly introduce in detail the military theories, actual combat, and final results of different countries in different historical stages, and also cite military books written by military writers from different countries as well as officially announced military policies and documents comparative analysis and research

Chapter 9 Conclusions and Implications

The change and adaptation of any military organization is a complex, difficult process, full of uncertainties, often leading to results that do not meet the original expectations. The factors that spark these calls for change—including the emergence of new technologies, foreign military innovations, and major failures—may be well understood by a country's political and military leaders. The ability to effect change often depends on the determination and skill of these leaders to navigate complex political, economic, social, and cultural dynamics that can limit the possibility of significant change. Likewise, the military's success may hinder its ability to adapt because of the belief that current models and practices do not need to adapt following past successes. In either case, direct and indirect experience are central factors in how political and military leaders identify the need for change and develop plans to implement new policies and programs.

The examples provided in this report illustrate these complexities. When national leaders' rule and relative power in the international system are under immediate threat, willingness to change is often insufficient to determine the success of change.

In the nineteenth century, China, Egypt, and the Ottoman Empire faced significant internal and external challenges that prompted their leaders to act; however, many factors limited their ability to adapt and implement the foreign business models they pursued.

Similar problems emerged later in the Egyptian and Iraqi examples. In each case, competing political priorities, social conditions, and cultural realities created problems that needed to be more complex to resolve or required policy solutions that the political leaders were unwilling to consider. In contrast, in the case of the Meiji period in Japan,

Political and military leaders in Israel, India, Singapore, and Cuba could either make significant changes to state institutions or build relationships and pursue pragmatic models that fit social and cultural realities.

These examples demonstrate the importance of experience (whether recent or historical) in shaping organizational responses and determining the success of these desired reforms.

During his tenure as a military adviser in the Middle East, the Soviet adviser learned how deeply entrenched the military experience of Egypt and Iraq under British colonial rule was. Likewise, long-term empirical influences from party or revolutionary politics, foreign military sales relations, alliances, and ancient combat experience play an important role in many aspects of military reform, especially in training.

Operational models add to this complexity as militaries attempt to adopt derivative models.

Preparing for Great Power Conflict: How Experience Shapes U.S. and Chinese Military Training, Assumptions, and Sociocultural Conditions That May Not Be Applicable or Difficult to Coordinate Within Their Respective Organizations and Agencies.

These realities are perhaps the most striking contrast between the U.S. military and the PLA today, as both adapt to the challenges of great-power conflict. The U.S. military operates primarily within a system of its creation, developed from its own experience and based on a set of political, cultural, and social rules, political and military relations, etc. This observation should not be interpreted as a relative value or effectiveness statement. It is argued that the modes of operation in most Western militaries are familiar and require relatively little compromise of political, social, or cultural norms to function effectively.

The situation in the PLA is markedly different and potentially more complex, as it seeks to create an informationized military based on elements of three existing modes of warfare: Soviet and Russian, Western or NATO, and People's War. The PLA's inexperience in combat has made these adaptations more difficult since the last major conflict in 1979 and its reliance on indirect experience. Furthermore, some conflicting assumptions and underlying principles behind these three models make coordinating and adapting them a significant challenge for the PLA. This factor has limited the success of their reforms in many areas, particularly training.

The achievements of the United States and its allies in combat since the first Gulf War led the PLA to seek to emulate key elements of the Western operational model—a greater emphasis on tactical proficiency, jointness, initiative, transparency, and adaptive decision-making— This is understandable. The CCP’s main difficulty in its military modernization efforts has been coordinating and instilling these attributes in a party force based on the conscript model, which continued to be dominated by ground force commanders. The CCP and PLA have failed to reconcile the need for greater innovation, creativity, and initiative with demands for party loyalty and orthodoxy.

The findings of this report have several implications for how U.S. policymakers and commanders should view the role of experience in the U.S. military and what this means for U.S. readiness for future great power conflicts. The first implication is that a key advantage is a learning system within the U.S. military that helps it take lessons learned and distill those lessons into updated operational concepts and training. This discussion focuses on the operational use of the United States and its allies rather than the lack of success of the United States' strategy in Iraq and Afghanistan. Beijing recognizes the value of the former and views the latter as a pitfall to avoid in its strategic decision-making.

Conclusions and implications are largely embodied in a training infrastructure that is second to none. China has attempted to replicate aspects of the system, but its efforts are still in their infancy for several reasons. The most prominent reason for the success of the U.S. learning system is the enormous effort that each Service has made to capture the lessons and experience gained from combat operations and ensure that these lessons are incorporated into training and retained. The U.S. military has also demonstrated a willingness to adapt its training to changes in the security environment, failures or shortcomings, and new technologies and concepts of operations. Ultimately, one of the most important and enduring advantages the U.S. military enjoys is the quality of its training and the ability to update it to adapt to changing conditions and threats.

The second key impact is based on the quality of personnel and the effectiveness of the volunteer army.

Several military examples in this report demonstrate that reserve or conscript armies can be effective and achieve the proficiency required to carry out highly complex operations and missions; the militaries of Israel and Singapore are prime examples. However, in recent decades the most successful conscript armies have faced significant, sometimes existential threats to their existence and survival—such as Israel and its Arab neighbors, Singapore and Malaysia, and Indonesia. Other examples include Taiwan and South Korea. The modalities of these units vary, including periods of compulsory service and designated reserves. While some of these countries' views on compulsory military service are changing (Taiwan, for example, has attempted to develop its volunteer army), every country needs a high-quality, full-time, professional cadre in peacetime. What these countries have in common is a widely shared perception of threat and a widespread belief that the military as an institution plays a key role in shaping national identity.

One of the major challenges the PLA has faced in recent decades has been the issue of reliability.

Reliability includes political loyalty—a major element of PLA reliability—and other issues related to work style, motivation, and willingness to comply with institutional guidelines and directives. When asked by the Chinese state, the question of whether the PLA would go to war was one of four concerns Xi described as his top concern for the PLA in a 2017 speech. The PLA's inexperience in combat, the development of "peacetime habits" (i.e., a negative experience), and concerns about the reliability of rank-and-file soldiers are compounded by the continued reliance on conscripts to fill ranks. Therefore, the PLA emphasizes political work, ensuring that training is aimed at improving proficiency and maintaining loyalty and reliability.

The problem is not new to the U.S. military, as evidenced by concerns over hollow forces that emerged in the 1970s. However, the U.S. military has not had to address such issues since adopting the Volunteer Army. In addition to the technology and combat capabilities provided by the Volunteers, the U.S. military has proven to be extremely reliable in many ways. Thus, the ability of the U.S. military to sustain a volunteer force is a distinct advantage as long as the system is sustainable.

Analysis: This chapter has been described very clearly.

Dr. LI JIN WEI

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The author is an international relations expert and a Harvard scholar