“Going beyond limits” to achieve a set objective

The 21st Century great masters of warfare will be those who employ innovative methods to combine various capabilities “exceeding the limits” so as to attain tactical, campaign and strategic goals. A combined war that goes beyond limits, unrestricted in time, space and extent.

Ashok Jainani revisits the pages of Unrestricted Warfare, a book on military strategy written in 1999 by two colonels in the People’s Liberation Army, Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui.

The thrilling account of strategies explains how a militarily and politically disadvantaged nation can defeat a technologically superior opponent like the United States through a variety of means.

Who has seen tomorrow’s war? No one. However, its various scenes have passed through the mouths of many prophets and have been imprinted on our mental screens. From the strangling warfare of satellites in space to the angular pursuits of nuclear submarines in deep oceans; from the precision bombs released by stealth bombers to the cruise missiles fired by drones, they cover the heavens and the earth, and they can be said to be too numerous to enumerate.

Unrestricted Warfare, written by two Chinese PLA colonels is a thrilling and meticulous account of strategies that militarily and politically disadvantaged nations might take in order to successfully attack a geopolitical super-power like the United States. American military doctrine is typically led by technology; a new class of weapon which encourages an adjustment in existing strategy. Authors and military strategists Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui argue that this dynamic is a crucial weakness in the American military thinking, and that this blind spot with regard to alternative forms warfare could be effectively exploited by enemies. Unrestricted Warfare concerns the many ways in which this might occur, and, in turn, suggests what the United States might do to defend itself.