In “Over By Christmas”: Campaigning, Delusions and Force Requirements, Major General J. B. A. Bailey, British Army Retired, examines the evidence that over the last hundred years military establishments and their political masters have underestimated the length and costs of their campaigns and have frequently had little idea of the actual nature of their undertakings. A common factor in this appears to be the desire that campaigns should be short, decisive and cheap, and therefore with less risk but a greater likelihood of popular support—to be “home by Christmas.” This delusion has often been reached irrespective of historical evidence and analysis of current capabilities. The result, according to Bailey, is that those seeking a short, decisive and cheap campaign have very often laid the foundations for the opposite. Their unpreparedness and delusions have abetted costly attrition, and the resulting bill in international calamity, casualties and materiel has been shocking.

This unpromising context and the growing complexity of battlespace lead Bailey to pose several questions: What is the utility of U.S. military power today and in the future? Is it to be put to some greater mission than short, selective, warfighting operations? If the West is to have some neo-imperial mission to be “a force for good in the world,” has this mission ever been clearly articulated and its implications understood? Have American forces and other agencies been configured and equipped to do more than fight the wars that they would like to fight, rather than the operations which they will actually encounter?

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