The Fog of War and Value of Ambiguity

Macron's Comments, and the Value of Ruling Nothing Out

President of France Emanuel Macron has refused to rule out the possibility of sending troops to Ukraine. “"There is no consensus at this stage… to send troops on the ground. Nothing should be excluded. We will do everything that we must so that Russia does not win." Whether this was a calculated stance or bluster (which is not atypical of the French president) is not immediately clear. However, the intention behind the action is less significant in this case than the results. This mere statement, even unaccompanied by any action, has advantageous effects for Ukraine. 

To understand the utility of strategic ambiguity it is necessary to take a clear look at the nature of war. War is a realm of chance and danger, as Clausewitz puts it. Clausewitz compares actions in war to movement through a resistant element, such as water. And of course, perception in war is clouded by the “fog of war” which not only conceals, but makes things appear in distorted forms or prove to be nothing more than phantasms. From these observations come the closely related concepts of “friction” and the “fog of war.” 

“War is the realm of uncertainty; three quarters of the factors on which action in war is based are wrapped in a fog of greater or lesser uncertainty.”

Friction constitutes the innumerable difficulties that ensure even the simplest thing becomes difficult in conditions of war. The fog of war manifests in the inevitable lack of certainty that prevails when it comes to both one’s own disposition and the dispositions and intentions of the enemy. Both characteristics mean that, in Clausewitz’s terms, a commander must rely on genius to be effective. By “genius” Clausewitz does not necessarily mean prodigal talent, but rather the ability to size up a situation in circumstances of such friction and distortion as the chaos of war. 

Strategic ambiguity is useful because it increases friction and exacerbates the effects of the fog of war. By taking steps to obscure actions and intentions, a state can increase the risks of actions that would otherwise have distinctly curtailed ramifications. This is the opposite strategy of defining clear “red lines.” When a state sets red lines, it provides certainty to its enemy in exchange for stability. The clear problem with this is that if a clear threshold for action is set, that comes with the implicit view that everything and anything short of that threshold is guaranteed to be met with inaction. It is for this reason that the West should pursue a policy of strategic ambiguity rather than one of clarity. Even if no action is actually taken, such a policy will accentuate Russian uncertainty and make it more difficult to pierce the fog of war.   

Russia’s weakness does lend it the deterrent power of desperation. After all, the prospect of escalation to the nuclear level need not be terribly likely to have a deterrent effect. That Russia, facing a defeat at the conventional level, would resort to nuclear use may be enough to dissuade the Western powers from capitalizing on their advantages. However, the extremity of the consequences of a nuclear exchange limit the range of circumstances in which the threat may be effective. Threats which in serious circumstances inspire genuine fear are seen as ridiculous bluffs in trivial circumstances. 

In this respect, the European states have an advantage over America. As the world’s sole superpower, the United States is particularly threatening to its adversaries. American strength makes it plausible that a collision with Russia could get out of hand. It is believable that Russia would fear American power enough to risk nuclear confrontation. In contrast, it takes some imagination to divine a path from conflict between France and Russia to lead to nuclear conflagration. Thus, European states are better positioned to leverage Western conventional supremacy than the United States because it is more difficult for Russia to affect the fear and desperation necessary to make threats of nuclear use credible. 

Turning the Map Table Around

Central to Clausewitz’s portrayal of war is the idea that it is not an act against an inanimate object, but rather an interaction. As such, the Russian perspective is illustrative of the effects of strategic ambiguity. 

The West’s position towards Russia can be classified either as hostile neutrality or hybrid warfare. It is providing arms and intelligence to Russia’s enemy. It is not at war in Clausewitizian terms, in that it has not yet intermixed violence with its pursuit of political aims. Its support for Ukraine has thus far been exclusively non-kinetic. It is therefore congruent with the goal of non-kinetically supporting Ukraine to deploy Western forces on its soil in non-combat capacities. It is true that their contribution to Ukraine’s war-effort would render them legitimate targets for Russian attacks. However, this was already the case. While the status of a state providing arms to one party of a conflict is more ambiguous, providing targeting intelligence is a clear breach of neutrality. That Russia has not chosen to expand the war by considering the states aiding Ukraine in this way as co-belligerents is because it wishes to avoid an expansion of the war. Western policy thus far has only been possible because of this exploitation of Russian vulnerability. 

What about Russia’s nuclear arsenal? The issue is that nuclear war is an equal-opportunity killer. Any attempt at compellence using a nuclear weapon would be extremely dangerous and unlikely to be effective. The Russians certainly have more at stake in the outcome of the war in Ukraine than the West. This could be expected to give them an advantage in terms of a higher risk tolerance. However, Russia lacks a ladder for escalation. Its conventional capabilities have been so seriously degraded by the war in Ukraine that it cannot credibly threaten an expansion of the conflict at the conventional level. The risk of an accidental escalation is not credible when Russia doesn't have the forces to fight a war against NATO with even the faintest hope of victory.  Leaving to one side the technical superiority of NATO forces over their Russian counterparts, Russia simply does not have the manpower to face more foes. As such, the prospect of escalation will hold much terror for the Russians, promising anything from an expansion of Western aid, to a direct war with NATO and all that entails. As a result, Russia’s nuclear arsenal cannot be leveraged for compellent purposes. 

There is a strand of logic that argues that Russia does not need to prove its seriousness to NATO. The argument goes that the Russians will prove they are serious with a nuclear demonstration and so failure to appreciate their seriousness is at one’s own peril. However, the first indication of Russian seriousness being nuclear use could only be the product of complete irrationality on the part of the Russians. There are many costly signals that Russia could utilize to demonstrate its commitment to victory and to seek to dissuade Western escalation that would be less costly. If Russia was willing to risk the kind of conflagration that might be unleashed by nuclear use, would it not precede this with demonstrative steps in hopes of avoiding such a dangerous course? It would be irrational for NATO countries to base their strategies upon the baseless assumption that Russian actions are entirely irrational. 

It is not incorrect to say that it is the Russian perspective that matters when discussing the likelihood of nuclear use. The legitimacy of Russian claims and conduct has no relevance so long as they believe the issues at stake are existential. The decision is ultimately upon them whether to leap into the abyss of nuclear escalation, whether or not that is based on mere delusion. Yet, absent strong evidence to the contrary, policy cannot be made on the basis that one’s enemies are completely detached from reality. If we assume that the Russians are generally rational, we may look at the problem from the Russian perspective. When this is done, it is clear that Russia has no choice but to take a very strong interest in what the West thinks is at stake. This is for the simple reason that any form of nuclear use would be unacceptably dangerous for any state. This does not mean that a state will never use a nuclear weapon, but that it will not do so without exhausting its other options to communicate its intent and seek to compel or deter its opponent without crossing the ultimate threshold. 

The Problem of a War of Choice

Were Putin’s grip on power more fragile, the war in Ukraine could at least be framed as a matter of regime survival. However, the lack of indications of dissent or fragility combined with the intentional vagueness of Russian war-goals mean that Putin’s regime may exit the war with good expectations of surviving whatever reaction it may generate.

This is to say, the onus is on the Russians to demonstrate to the West that the war in Ukraine is a circumstance serious enough to countenance nuclear war. This is a serious challenge for them as the war is manifestly a war of choice. What’s more, while Russia’s rhetoric has emphasized the purported threat of Ukraine, it has accompanied this with blatantly imperialist rhetoric. Talking out of both sides of their mouths, Russian leadership has also claimed Ukraine is an illegitimate state on Russian territory. The incompatibility of these two claims suggest that the first is no more than justification of the chauvinist ambitions of the second. The Russians have also so far been unwilling to make any changes to their nuclear posture that would provoke a crisis with the West. As I have argued, Russian nuclear rhetoric has thus far been aimed at the public rather than signaling to Western governments the mix of resolve and anxiety that would create a potential for nuclear escalation and force a resolution.  

The West severely undercuts Russian threats of escalation through the modesty of its demands. The demands of the West are status quo ante-bellum, with some debate as to whether this means that of 2014 or 2022. Fundamentally, NATO understands that Russia can go home if it so chooses. It is not comparable to a “Cold War gone hot” scenario where hegemony over Europe and the existence of blocs is at stake. It is extraordinarily difficult to make the case one’s vital interests are at stake when pursuing an expansionist agenda. 

Russia faced an uphill struggle to begin with. Ukraine was the poorest country in Europe at the outbreak of the war, along with being several times smaller than Russia in terms of population. It had been independent for decades with no existentially deleterious effects on Russia. Russia needed to provide some compelling explanation as to why Ukraine’s existence was suddenly a threat to national survival. Prospects of NATO or EU membership remained distant, nor did Ukraine constitute the kind of bridgehead that would render Russian deterrent capabilities miraculously ineffective. Russia simply could not come up with a compelling story as to why its invasion of Ukraine was integral to national survival, something that would warrant a nuclear exchange if it came down to it.

The Material Benefits of Ambiguity

The West should therefore seek to maximize fear and uncertainty on the part of the Russians. By increasing the elements of uncertainty and danger in the political realm, it can increase the degree to which friction affects Russian decisions. If Russian decisions must take into account the risk of drawing NATO further into the conflict, they cannot fail to be affected. Even if Russia is ultimately willing to brave the risks, the effects of the knowledge of danger should not be underrated. 

This may take many forms. Most optimistically, Russian leadership may introduce targeting restrictions or rules of engagement that harm overall efficacy. Russian strategy may rely too heavily on the prospect of European disengagement to be willing to be willing to risk the consequences of spilling blood. If this is the case, they would choose to accept the costs of more careful targeting in order to pursue this strategy. If such a course would seem too much like capitulation to be acceptable to the Russians, it is nevertheless possible that directives may be issued that are harmful by their ambiguity. That is to say, while the Russians may be unwilling to outright forbid attacks that endanger Western personnel, there may be attempts at unilateral deconfliction that ultimately complicate the decision-making of Russian commanders. To consider the other extreme, should the Russians choose to make no effort to avoid killing Western personnel, the danger of such an outcome may nevertheless at least affect the judgment of certain politically-aware commanders.

If Russia makes the choice of deliberately seeking to target Western personnel, whether under military logic, for propagandistic reasons, or out of petty vengeance, it is likely to find such a course self-defeating. Sending troops to find in Ukraine is not popular, but deaths of servicemen is not easily brushed off and is likely to inflame the national conscience against Russia. The fact that personnel conducting non-combat missions of a military nature are legitimate targets is a distinction unlikely to be appreciated by the public.

This is all to say that even if Macron’s comments amount to nothing more than hot air, they increase the probability that Russia will make mistakes at every level. The more complex a problem, the more difficult it becomes to find a sensible way to proceed. By maintaining ambiguity about the limits of Western involvement in Ukraine, an additional factor is introduced in Russian decision-making, ensuring it is more difficult to pierce the fog of war. But there is no reason that the policy of ambiguity has to be confined to rhetoric. If it is embraced, the West may send personnel to Ukraine that not only complicate Russian decision-making as described, but provide direct material benefits to the Ukrainian war effort. 

To seek to establish clear red lines against an opponent that cannot hope to gain anything by escalating and therefore cannot even convincingly feign willingness to do is completely inappropriate. It is to bring entirely the wrong tool to the job and so to become ridiculous. There were times when it was appropriate to seek clarity and stability with the Soviet Union and there may be times to do the same with China. But to transplant methods without regard for context or intervening developments is the absurd view of history that led Prussian armies to meet Napoleon at Jena drilled in the same manner as in the time of Frederick the Great.