Schwerpunkt and the center of gravity in comparative perspective: From Clausewitz to JP 5-0

ABSTRACT

The center of gravity (COG) is a crucial concept in both strategic studies and military planning, yet its ambiguous and incoherent nature has repeatedly led to abundant confusion. In particular, its relation to both Clausewitz and the German Schwerpunkt tradition remains poorly understood. This article addresses these shortcomings by tracing both Schwerpunkt and COG in German and US military doctrine, respectively. Comparing the two concepts across several dimensions, the article not only finds that both have evolved considerably over time, but also that while having a common origin, they are ultimately based on different approaches, assumptions, and traditions.

KEYWORDS:

• Clausewitz
• Schwerpunkt
• center of gravity
• military doctrine
• operational planning

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

¹ The authors would like to thank Roman Knubel, MA, for research assistance and the two anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments.

² See for example, Celestino Perez, Jr. (ed.), Addressing the Fog of COG: Perspectives on the Center of Gravity in US Military Doctrine (Fort Leavenworth: Combat Studies Institute Press, 2012); Dale C. Eikmeier, ‘Let’s Fix or Kill the Center of Gravity Concept’, Joint Forces Quarterly 83 (2016), 109–15.

³ John L. Romjue, From Active Defense to AirLand Battle: The Development of Army Doctrine 1973–1982 (Washington DC: US GPO 1984), 59.

⁴ Milan Vego, ‘Clausewitz’s Schwerpunkt. Mistranslated from German – Misunderstood in English’, Military Review (Jan.–Feb. 2007), 101–9.

⁵ Ben Zweibelson, ‘Gravity-free Decision-making: Avoiding Clausewitz’s Strategic Pull’, Army Research Papers No. 8, Dec. (Russell ACT: Directorate of the Army, 2015); Lawrence Freedman, ‘Stop Looking for the Center of Gravity’, War on the Rocks, 24 June 2014, available at: https://warontherocks.com/2014/06/stop-looking-for-the-center-of-gravity/ (accessed 25 October 2023); Mark P. Krieger, ‘We the People are not the Center of Gravity in an Insurgency’, Military Review, (Jul.–Aug. 2007), 96–100; Peter R. Mansoor and Mark S. Ulrich, ‘Linking Doctrine to Action: A New COIN Center of Gravity Analysis’, Military Review (Sep.–Oct. 2007), 21–28; Jonathan Klug, ‘Behind the Mosaic: Insurgent Centers of Gravity and Counterinsurgency’, in Perez, Jr. (ed.), Addressing the Fog of COG, 1–32.

⁶ Stephen L. Melton, ‘Center of Gravity Analysis – the Black Hole of Army Doctrine’, in Perez, Jr. (ed.), Addressing the Fog of COG, 81.

⁷ Freedman, ‘Stop Looking for the Center of Gravity’.

⁸ Ibid. Freedman also raises the question whether military planners tend to designate as COGs the targets they find the easiest to hit, thus at times assigning a higher strategic significance to certain targets as would be warranted.

⁹ John C. Buckley, II, ‘Foreword’, in Perez, Jr. (ed.), Addressing the Fog of COG, v.

¹⁰ Melton, ‘Center of Gravity Analysis’, 98.

¹¹ See Antulio J. Echevarria’s works Clausewitz’s Center of Gravity: Changing Our Warfighting Doctrine – Again! (Carlisle Barracks: US Army War College Press 2002); ‘Clausewitz’s Center of Gravity: It’s Not What We Thought’, Naval College Review 56/1 (2003), 108–23; and ‘“Reining in” the Center of Gravity Concept’, Air & Space Power Journal 17/2 (2003), 87–96. For another perspective on the ‘true meaning’ of Clausewitz, see Josef L. Strange and Richard Iron, ‘Center of Gravity: What Clausewitz Really Meant’, Joint Forces Quarterly 35 (2004), 20–27.

¹² Echevarria, Clausewitz’s Center of Gravity, 10.

¹³ Ibid., 15.

¹⁴ See, for example: Dale C. Eikmeier, ‘Redefining the Center of Gravity’, Joint Forces Quarterly 59 (2010), 156–58; Eikmeier, ‘Let’s Fix or Kill the Center of Gravity Concept’.

¹⁵ Eikmeier, ‘Redefining the Center of Gravity’, 156.

¹⁶ Vego, ‘Clausewitz’ Schwerpunkt’.

¹⁷ Eystein L. Meyer, ‘The Centre of Gravity Concept: Contemporary Theories, Comparison, and Implications’, Defence Studies 22/3 (2022), 327–53.

¹⁸ Meyer, ‘The Centre of Gravity Concept’, 329.

¹⁹ Miha Šlebir, ‘Re-examining the Center of Gravity: Theoretical and Structural Analysis of the Concept’, Revista Científica General José María Córdova 20/40 (2022), 1029–30. Šlebir, who focuses primarily on different approaches within the COG model in a manner similar to Meyer, does not offer further evidence for his claims.

²⁰ Vgl. Arthur Kuhle, Die preussische Kriegstheorie um 1800 und ihre Suche nach dynamischen Gleichgewichten (Berlin: Duncker + Humblot 2018), 49.

²¹ Carl von Clausewitz, Vom Kriege (Bonn: Dümmler 1980 [1832]), Book 5, Ch. 2, 500; Book 6, Ch. 27, 810; Ch. 28, 814.

²² Clausewitz, Vom Kriege, Book 6, Ch. 27, 810.

²³ Ibid.

²⁴ See note 22 above.

²⁵ Ibid., Book 8, Ch. 4, 976.

²⁶ Ibid., 976–77.

²⁷ Clausewitz, Vom Kriege, Book 8, Ch. 9, 1009.

²⁸ Ibid., 1010.

²⁹ Ibid.

³⁰ On Jomini and the point décisif, see John Shy, ‘Jomini’ in Peter Paret (ed.). Makers of Modern Strategy from Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age (Princeton: Princeton UP 1986), 143–185, and Antulio J. Echevarria II, ‘Jomini, Modern War, and Strategy: The Triumph of the Essential’, in Hal Brands (ed.), The New Makers of Modern Strategy. From the Ancient World to the Digital Age, (Princeton: Princeton UP 2023), 145–168.

³¹ Clausewitz defined the ‘coup d’œil’ as ‘das schnelle Treffen einer Wahrheit, die einem gewöhnlichen Blick des Geistes gar nicht sichtbar ist oder erst nach langem Betrachten und überlegen wird’. See Vom Kriege, Book 1, Ch. 3, 235. On the commander’s judgement (‘Takt des Urteils’), see Vom Kriege, Book 7, Ch. 5, 880.

³² Roland G. Foerster, ‘Das operative Denken Moltkes des Älteren und die Folgen’, in Militärgeschichtliches Forschungsamt (ed.), Operatives Denken bei Clausewitz, Moltke, Schlieffen und Manstein (Freiburg i.B.: Mittler 1989), 19–42, esp. 31–35.

³³ On the debates on the meaning of Schwerpunkt in the run-up to World War I see Milan Vego, ‘Clausewitz’ Schwerpunkt’, 101–102, with further references. There are also some evident parallels between the Prussian/German understanding and Jominian thinking such as ‘point décisif’ emphasising the importance of lines of operations as well as the concentration of force against the enemy’s weak points.

³⁴ Michael Geyer, ‘German Strategy in the Age of Machine Warfare, 1914–1945’, in Paret (ed.), Makers of Modern Strategy, 532; Gunter E. Rothenberg, ‘Moltke, Schlieffen, and the Doctrine of Strategic Envelopment’, in Paret (ed.), Makers of Modern Strategy, 297. See also Vego, ‘Clausewitz’ Schwerpunkt’, 102.

³⁵ Karl-Volker Neugebauer (ed.), HDv 487. Führung und Gefecht der verbundenen Waffen (F. u. G.), Neudruck der Ausgabe 1921–1924 in 3 Teilen. (Osnabrück: Biblio 1994). See also N.N., ‘Mittel und Wege der Schwerpunktbildung’, Militär-Wochenblatt 6 (11 Aug. 1931), 207.

³⁶ HDv 487, para. 13, 266, 291, 318, 535.

³⁷ HDv 300/1. Truppenführung, I. Teil (Abschnitt I – XIII), (Berlin: Mittler&Sohn 1936).

³⁸ Ibid., 123–124.

³⁹ Milan Vego, ‘Clausewitz’ Schwerpunkt’, 106. See also Hermann Franke (ed.), Handbuch der neuzeitlichen Wehrwissenschaften, 2nd Volume: Das Heer, (Berlin und Leipzig: de Gruyter 1936), 649: ‘Each commander must form a Schwerpunkt in his assigned area. It may also be expedient to order subordinate units as to where to place their Schwerpunkt. A change of situation requires a shift of the Schwerpunkt’ (authors’ translation).

⁴⁰ Bundesminister der Verteidigung, Truppenführung (TF) 59, 25 Aug. (Bonn: Führungsstab des Heeres 1959), BH 1/439, Militärarchiv, Freiburg i.B., para 218.

⁴¹ Truppenführung (TF) 59, para. 30.

⁴² Bundesminister der Verteidigung, HDv 100/100 VS-NfD. Führung im Gefecht (TF/G), 28. Sep. (Bonn: Führungsstab des Heeres 1973), para. 1117.

⁴³ Ernst Metz, ‘Stellungnahme zur Leitlinie TF-NEU’, 9 Jun. 1969, BH 1/5013, Militärarchiv, Freiburg i.B. At the time, Metz argued – in the end unsuccessfully – against aligning the German Bundeswehr’s leadership principles and terms with those of NATO.

⁴⁴ Romjue, From Active Defense to AirLand Battle, 3; Robert M. Citino, Blitzkrieg to Desert Storm: The Evolution of Operational Warfare (Lawrence: University of Kansas Press 2004), 265. However, Citino also argues that the Vietnam experience strongly influenced the new US operational doctrine, see Citino, Blitzkrieg to Desert Storm, 265–66.

⁴⁵ Thomas G. Mahnken, Technology and the American Way of War Since 1945 (New York: Columbia UP 2008), 128.

⁴⁶ William S. Lind, ‘Some Doctrinal Questions for the United States Army’, Military Review 57/3 (1977), 54–65; Romjue, From Active Defense to AirLand Battle, 13–21; Citino, Blitzkrieg to Desert Storm, 259.

⁴⁷ Mahnken, Technology and the American Way of War, 129.

⁴⁸ Romjue, From Active Defense to AirLand Battle, 58–59; Headquarters, FM 100–5 Operations (1982) (Washington DC: Department of the Army 1982), 2–8, 7–2.

⁴⁹ Headquarters, FM 100–5 Operations (1982), 7–2.

⁵⁰ For example, one section states that commanders ‘can weigh the main attack by positioning reserves, by assigning a narrower zone to the main attack force, or by assigning priority of fires to the main attack’. These paragraphs were clearly drawn from the German field manual, see Bundesminister für Verteidigung, HDv 100/100, para 1033.

⁵¹ Christopher Bassford, Clausewitz in English (New York: Oxford UP 1994), 204.

⁵² Harry G. Summers, On Strategy: A Critical Analysis of the Vietnam War (New York: Ballantine 1982), 129, 135.

⁵³ Headquarters, FM 100–5 Operations (1986) (Washington DC: Department of the Army, 1986), 179. The definition is adopted from the Paret and Howard translation, see Carl von Clausewitz (Michael Howard and Peter Paret, trans.) On War (Princeton: Princeton UP 1976), 595.

⁵⁴ FM 100–5 Operations (1986), 10.

⁵⁵ Ibid., 179.

⁵⁶ Ibid.

⁵⁷ Ibid., 179–80.

⁵⁸ James J. Schneider and Lawrence L. Izzo, ‘Clausewitz’s Elusive Center of Gravity’, Parameters 17/1 (1987), 52. The two authors emphasised that both concepts were inextricably linked to each other: ‘Decisive points are decisive only in relation to the center of gravity. The seizure of decisive points must somehow attack or threaten, directly or indirectly, enemy concentrations of combat power [which the authors define as centers of gravity] … ’, see ibid., 56.

⁵⁹ Steven Metz and Fredrick M. Downey, ‘Centers of Gravity and Strategic Planning’, Military Review 68/4 (1988), 26. The authors also pointed out that ‘[m]ost exercises to identify centers of gravity are performed after the fact. It is assumed that the winners of wars accurately identified the centers and successfully attained them, while losers either could not identify or could not attack the enemy’s center of gravity’, see ibid., 23.

⁶⁰ Headquarters, FM 100–5 Operations (1993) (Washington DC: Department of the Army 1993), 6–8.

⁶¹ Ibid., 6–7.

⁶² Ibid., 2–18.

⁶³ Office of the Chairman, JP 3–0 Doctrine for Joint Operations (Washington DC: The Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1993), B-3.

⁶⁴ Ibid., III-28.

⁶⁵ Ibid.

⁶⁶ Ibid., III-27.

⁶⁷ Headquarters United States Marine Corps, FMFM 1 Warfighting (Washington DC: Department of the Navy 1989), 85.

⁶⁸ Echevarria, ‘Clausewitz’s Center of Gravity: It’s Not What We Thought’, 108.

⁶⁹ Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, NDP 1 Naval Warfare, Mar (Washington DC: Department of the Navy 1994, 35–37.

⁷⁰ Office of the Chairman, JP 1–02 Department of Defense Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms (Washington DC: The Joint Chiefs of Staff 1994), 142.

⁷¹ Headquarters United States Marine Corps, MCDP 1 Warfighting (Washington DC: Department of the Navy 1997), 45–47; MCDP 1–1 Strategy (Washington DC: Department of the Navy, 1997), 86–88.

⁷² Office of the Chairman, JP 5–00.1 Joint Doctrine for Campaign Planning (Washington DC: The Joint Chiefs of Staff, 2002), II-14.

⁷³ Ibid., II-8–10.

⁷⁴ Ibid., II-7–8.

⁷⁵ See, for example, Office of the Chairman, JP 5–0 Joint Planning (Washington DC: The Joint Chiefs of Staff 2020), IV-24–26; Headquarters, FM 5–0 Planning and Orders Production (Washington DC: Department of the Army, 2022), 4-16–17.

⁷⁶ See also Šlebir, ‘Re-examining the Center of Gravity’, 1029–30.

⁷⁷ FM 100–5 Operations (1986), 180.

⁷⁸ Šlebir, ‘Re-examining the Center of Gravity’, 1029.

⁷⁹ Office of the Chairman, Joint Publication 3–24 Counterinsurgency (Washington DC: The Joint Chiefs of Staff, 2018), I-5.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mauro Mantovani

Mauro Mantovani is Head of Strategic Studies at the Military Academy (MILAC) at ETH Zurich.

Michel Wyss

Michel Wyss is a scientific assistant for Strategic Studies at the Military Academy (MILAC) at ETH Zurich and a PhD candidate at the Institute for History, Leiden University.