ABSTRACT
Introduction ............................................................................................................ 279 The Primacy of the Brain Across All Phases of Conict .......................................280 Not at Sea in a Sieve: Character, Consent, and Consequence ................................ 281 An Example: Strategic Rhetoric, Neurobiology, and Normative Evaluation ........ 282 Conclusion ............................................................................................................. 283 References .............................................................................................................. 283
The U.S. military doctrine-in Joint Publication 5-0 of 2011, for instance, which outlines the military’s joint planning process-identies six phases of conict (Joint Operation Planning 2011). These are broken out as (0-“phase zero”) shape, (1) deter, (2) seize the initiative, (3) dominate, (4) stabilize, and (5) enable civil authority and then return to phase zero to “shape” yet again. Shaping consists in taking actions to affect the environment in ways that make threats to security less likely to emerge. Deterring consists in taking actions to prevent agents who desire to threaten security from doing so. Seizing the initiative consists in taking decisive actions to disable an active threat. Dominating consists in using all aspects of military power to achieve victory quickly. Stabilizing consists in taking actions to return to pre-conict normalcy. Enabling civilian authority consists in taking actions (such as working with host governments) to reestablish nonmilitary-mediated stability and reconstitute governance. These denitions can be debated, especially by theorists and practitioners involved in military operational art, but serve as adequate entry points for considering why understanding the brain is so important for knowing how to achieve effects-and develop technologies required to do so-across all these phases.
