Author: William Reach

Summer Essay Campaign #7: “Strategic Culture Makes the Difference”

To Answer Question #7: “In what ways does strategic culture influence military operations?”

By Second Lieutenant William Reach

On the night of July 13th, 1755, General Braddock lay dying in a little moonlit clearing deep in the wilds of western Pennsylvania.  Shot through the lung and slowly expiring, the British general reflected on his defeat four days prior, where a 2400-strong expeditionary force of British regulars and colonial Rangers suffered a brutal beating from 330 Delaware, Miami, and French fighters.  A massed column of English Soldiers and colonial Rangers marched, and then retreated, from the withering fire that unseen enemies poured onto their ranks from the thick underbrush.  When the Colonial militiamen began breaking formation and attempted to fight behind cover, British officers mounted on horseback beat them back into ranks with the broadside of their swords and berated them for their cowardice.[i]  [ii]  Reflecting on the slaughter, the distinguished general uttered these final words before his death: “Who would have thought it possible?”

Poor General Braddock.  Ensnared in a strategic culture oriented towards victory on the agrarian battlefields of Europe, he and his well-disciplined officers proved to be no match for the desperate, loosely organized coalition of enemies who attacked him.  His pre-conceptions of war, grounded in his distinguished military career, demanded that he march his men in a tight echelon through the dense wilderness and guided the English force towards defeat[iii].  Like so many other leaders, an invisible web of military history, force structure, and doctrine-based training had shaped the nature of his military and geopolitical worldview.