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March 6, 2026

Approaching the Military as a Profession Through the Clausewitzian Trinity

Adam T. Biggs

ABSTRACT: The Clausewitzian trinity (people, government, and military—or passion, reason, and chance) can enhance existing scholarship and discussions about military professionalism by emphasizing the fundamental purpose of military forces. Specifically, managing chance incorporates elements of reducing uncertainty and applying creativity as individuals develop coup d’oeil. Junior personnel manage chance by reducing cognitive load while enhancing cognitive skills needed to quickly assess battlefield conditions as they progress to becoming senior leaders. This article contrasts these ideas against the various roles assigned to civil-military forces in the Clausewitzian trinity to emphasize professionalism in developing military leaders.

Keywords: professional, Clausewitz, coup d’oeil, cognitive, creativity

 

Military professionalism is a foundational component of an effective fighting force. Army doctrine describes the Army profession as a “trusted vocation of Soldiers and Army civilians whose collective expertise is the ethical design, generation, support, and application of landpower; serving under civilian authority; and entrusted to defend the Constitution and the rights and interests of the American people.” Whereas the Army’s definition provides some context for military service as a profession, understanding how professionalism contributes to military success provides further depth. Doctrine and scholarly work have emphasized how professionalism allows a military to function optimally by exploring the respective roles of civilians and servicemembers in civil-military affairs. For example, professionalism directly contributes to mission success by creating disciplined initiative among personnel, though political scientists have long questioned how civilian authorities should interact with or govern the military forces protecting the population. The widely accepted consensus is a professional military force functions more effectively than conscripts, militias, or other fighting forces. Despite consensus about the importance of professionalism, no universally accepted way to teach the profession of arms exists in professional military education. Different schools of thought have spawned multiple methods that each approach the topic from a unique angle, adding further complexity to the debate about the military as a profession of arms.1

The current discussion seeks to enhance the wider debate by emphasizing the fundamental purpose of military forces when teaching military professionalism. Specifically, Carl von Clausewitz suggested civil-military relations include a trinity of actors comprising the people, the military, and the government, and he attributed certain tendencies to each group as their primary domain of influence in war. Clausewitz attributed passion to the people and reason to the government, while military forces manage chance and probability. More importantly, Clausewitz’s perspective helps establish the purpose of military forces compared to their civilian counterparts.

Purpose gives focus to any topic of discussion, whether it includes ethics, bureaucracy, force optimization, or a myriad of other possible subjects involved in exploring the profession of arms. Managing chance also has different implications for junior officers versus senior officers, especially in how they progress toward developing coup d’oeil. To demonstrate this concept, this article first provides an in-depth overview of the Clausewitzian trinity, including its secondary and tertiary levels. Next, the article elaborates on how instructors can use the trinity as a basis for teaching the military as a profession of arms. Finally, the article contrasts competing ideas about civil-military relations according to their relative contributions to military professionalism. The goal is thus to enhance discussion and illustrate concepts for future iterations of professional military education.2

Clausewitz and the Paradoxical Trinity

Despite writing nearly two centuries ago, Clausewitz remains one of the most studied theorists in Western professional military education. Among his noteworthy contributions, Clausewitz emphasized the relationship between politics and society as a critical factor in planning and executing armed conflict. Clausewitz’s first depiction of a “paradoxical trinity” posits war as a theoretical balance between three competing tendencies that differ in their underlying natures. This trinity cements a role for policy development and the interplay of civil-military affairs as driving factors in executing a successful wartime strategy. As shown in figure 1, Clausewitz presents the trinity as follows.

“[P]rimordial violence, hatred, and enmity, which are to be regarded as a blind natural force”; “of the play of chance and probability within which the creative spirit is free to roam”; and “its element of subordination, as an instrument of policy, which makes it subject to reason alone.”3

The three levels of the Clausewitzian trinity. Primordial violence, hatred, and enmity, as a blind natural force.
Figure 1. The three levels of the Clausewitzian trinity. Primordial violence, hatred, and enmity, as a blind natural force.
(Source created by author based on: Carl von Clausewitz, On War, trans. and ed. Michael Howard and Peter Paret, [Princeton University Press, 1976], 89)

When considering the military as a profession of arms, the way Clausewitz delineates the tendencies of different actors helps inform debate about the military as a profession. Namely, each actor receives a different attribute within the Clausewitzian trinity. The first component, primordial violence and hatred, is attributed to the people. This conceptualization invokes blind natural force as emotion or desire in its purest state. Put another way, the will of the people is an almost natural element akin to the wind—something powerful that gives direction. Nevertheless, though the people may be responsible for determining why a nation would go to war, the population asserts little control over how force is wielded. Meanwhile, Clausewitz attributes the factors of chance and probability to the commander and the army, often shortened by modern scholars to “the military.” These forces execute the organized operations of armed conflict. Moreover, Clausewitz assigns creativity in war to military actors. This designation has implications for how wartime planning should occur and provides military authorities with the leniency to innovate when facing an enemy. Finally, Clausewitz places subordination and policy under the purview of government. Whereas the people dictate why a nation would go to war, and the military determines how war should be conducted, the government retains the domain of reason, including formal declarations of war, negotiations to terminate war, and the political objectives to be achieved through armed conflict. These attributions—the people, the military, and the government—have also been described as the secondary trinity, while the three actors’ tendencies have been described as the primary trinity.4

In addition to the roles and actors implicated within the trinity, possible interactions between actors are important, given Clausewitz developed the trinity as a dialectical relationship. Clausewitz’s broad approach represents the analytical thinking typical of highly educated Germans in the early nineteenth century. More specifically, a dialectical relationship implies that different ideas mutually affect one another, and their supposed contradictions can be used to refine the underlying comprehension of each concept. A typical argument would begin by positing a thesis, giving rise to an antithesis that contradicted the original position in some way, followed by a synthesis that resolved the discrepancy to form a new proposition or interpretation of the original concept. When examining the differences between offense and defense, Clausewitz often used dialectical thinking to hypothesize deeper insights into the nature of war itself. In the case of the trinity, a dialectical approach requires all three facets to be presented together, since examining each component in isolation would not provide an accurate depiction of its role in war, or indeed of warfare itself. This argument underscores the importance of civil-military affairs and the role of policy in war.5

Given that interpreters of the trinity must understand the dialectical relationship of its components, the translation of the adjective wünderliche has fueled debate about the nature of the relationship between the components. Clausewitz used wünderliche before the word trinity, and translators have interpreted it in several ways, including paradoxical, remarkable, amazing, and wondrous. The problem is that each word implies subtle, yet critical differentiations within a dialectical relationship. A paradoxical relationship would alter the presumed understanding of the interactions by placing them directly at odds with one another, while a remarkable relationship could imply different facets are working together to achieve extraordinary properties. The terms amazing and wondrous could likewise apply to the intriguing nature of antithetical forces working together, or the capacity to achieve a whole greater than the sum of its parts. If the different forces are defined by their relationships to one another, then the way they are contrasted becomes critical to any final interpretation.6

Indeed, the trinity can be described within a typology that delineates a primary, secondary, and tertiary level of context open to further debate. This interpretation builds a third layer of the trinity, wherein the people embody the irrational forces of primordial violence and hatred, the military addresses the nonrational forces of friction and chance, and the government represents rational calculation driven primarily by reason. In this context, rationality represents how the various forces use logic to determine their behavior. Rationality would be heavily rooted in logic, whereas irrational decisions would be heavily rooted in emotionally charged decision making.

Military decisions address friction and chance, which do not behave according to any predictable or logical principles given their inherent randomness and hence are considered nonrational. This tertiary interpretation—of irrational, nonrational, and rational—illustrates a paradoxical trinity of forces that seem to be in direct opposition yet work together in conflict to achieve the end goal. Clausewitz similarly compared the three forces to equally powerful magnets simultaneously trying to attract a pendulum. The resulting energy-consuming chaos serves as a metaphor for interactions between the three forces, which produce a mix of order and unpredictability. As “paradoxical” is the adjective that appears in a translation commonly used in military education, this article will interpret the relationship as paradoxical.7

Although the trinity has received substantial attention in professional military studies, Clausewitz’s ideas are not parroted without further comment or clarification. Military scholars have criticized the trinity and extended its ideas in multiple ways. Some criticism focuses on the limitations of applying a nineteenth-century text to modern warfare. For example, the trinity may not apply universally to all wars, especially when considering non-state actors in global conflicts or in gray-zone operations below the level of armed conflict. These issues arise from modern conceptualizations of war that, in recent years especially, emphasized the role of terrorism in contributing to global instability. Meanwhile, other ideas have expanded upon the simple infrastructure Clausewitz espoused. More complex interpretations posit the trinity as an adaptive system whose pieces are interconnected and predict the behavior of the system as a whole. Of course, some contemporary arguments contend Clausewitzian ideas apply just as much to current conflicts as they did to conflicts in the nineteenth century. Nonetheless, perhaps the most parsimonious way to conclude the ongoing debate is simply to state Clausewitz continues to be a prominent source in discussions about professional military education.8

How the Trinity Can Enlighten Ideas About the Military as a Profession

Much material has been written to promote the military as a profession of arms. Common ideas espouse the fact that military personnel must continue to be political without engaging in partisanship and must seek to dispel myths that reduce military professionalism to applying technology and demonstrating competency. These ideas emphasize how military personnel should remain objective while operating within a political system. Another conventional topic concerns ethical conduct among military personnel. Still, others lament the burdensome role bureaucracy plays in diminishing military professionalism. Bureaucracy functions in part as the management piece of the military profession, which must work in tandem with the profession’s leadership component to conduct successful military operations. Each approach—whether through competency, ethics, bureaucracy, or another issue—centers the discussion of military professionalism upon a particular topic. The subject of military professionalism, in turn, acts as a microcosm of the larger issue through which the military as a profession is applied to modern conventions. Alternatively, the Clausewitzian trinity begins the discussion of professionalism with the purpose of professional military personnel in civil-military affairs. The inherent advantage of this approach is that the concept of purpose, rather than a topic, transitions more readily to different subject matters when one considers the military as a profession of arms. Examining purpose first in a discussion of military professionalism makes the implications more readily apparent to the audience. So, what can the Clausewitzian trinity teach about purpose when approaching the military as a profession of arms?9

Clausewitz assigns chance and probability as the military’s primary domain rather than killing the enemy, inflicting damage, or even winning the war. Violence is a means to compel an enemy to action, yet chance and probability are the essential influences directing military behavior. Instead, the military’s purpose should be understood as managing chance and probability within conflict; that is, military professionals should approach conflict with levelheadedness and the goal of ensuring high confidence in any course of action. Consistency is paramount in this context. Training should produce a military force comprising individuals whose performance in a combat situation any future commander could reasonably predict. From a planning standpoint, battle plans should identify an effective course of action to destroy the enemy while limiting any risk to the force. Risk itself increases with poor planning or uncertainty, and the military professional does everything within their power to limit the influence of chance and uncertainty—to reduce risk as much as possible while assuring the highest chances for victory.

The military professional’s responsibility to reduce risk underscores the concept of the military as a profession, or even the concept of lethality when properly applied. Specifically, military personnel are human beings with families and lives outside their military service. Winning the war is an obvious goal of any military, yet lethality considers both casualties inflicted and casualties suffered. A truly lethal force should both inflict high levels of damage upon the enemy and survive to fight again as needed. Sacrifice should be understood as essential to completing the mission in some cases, but blind sacrifice and the acceptance of unnecessary risk elevate chance and uncertainty in conflict. Accordingly, lethality and professionalism are related concepts. A military professional ensures a lethal fighting force that manages risks without blindly accepting unnecessary risks.

Of course, some context is required when considering how Clausewitz viewed chance. The goal of reducing uncertainty results from one straightforward interpretation, though Clausewitz considered chance, uncertainty, and friction to be inevitable and central to the nature of war. Managing chance incorporates an understanding of how chance could disrupt plans and how chance produces opportunities to be exploited. Managing chance, therefore, involves elements of discipline to avoid reckless actions while also using elements of creativity to take advantage of enemies who do not properly manage uncertainty. Establishing good operational security is a prime example of disciplined initiative; meanwhile, exploiting the enemy’s assumptions is a prime example of creativity in strategic planning. Both actions can be derived from the role Clausewitz assigned to managing chance and uncertainty. As an extreme example, strategy itself can be paradoxical when the enemy can easily interpret direct or obvious actions, which suggests blunders and deviations might produce success as they disrupt enemy counteractions. Still, this example describes a type of accidental success that does not represent military professionalism. Perhaps the most important takeaway is, therefore, to understand that Clausewitz identified exploiting opportunities as being part of his concept when he described managing uncertainty.10

Another point of discussion concerns how the trinity addresses violence. Despite violence being inherent to the profession of arms, within the trinity, Clausewitz explicitly attributes violence to the people rather than military personnel. As to why, the important caveat is the tendency attributed to the people comprises primordial violence fueled by hatred and enmity—constituting a blind, natural force. Primordial violence would best be represented by a child throwing a temper tantrum, a drunkard at a bar starting a fight, or an angry mob surging forward. Violence, in these cases, is primordial because the violence is uncontrolled or directed by emotion. For this reason, the aspect of the trinity concerning violence is often referred to as passion, where primordial violence driven by emotion is attributed to the people of a nation demanding war.11

Violence, for a military professional, is more complicated than the blind use of force. Military professionals do not seek to use primordial violence, nor should they allow emotion to become a dominant factor in their decision making. Although themes of revenge, domination, and aggression have pervaded warfare dating back to ancient conflicts, unfocused and impulsive actions do not represent military professionalism. Emotions can enhance decision making in rare circumstances when properly combined with ethical decisions. Yet, for the military professional, emotion should not be a driving factor when seeking a confrontation with the enemy. Chasing honor or accomplishment through combat evokes “[t]he sterile glory of fighting battles merely to win them,” which military theorists admonish.

A military professional should instead seek to manage violence. Armed conflict will inherently require violence, but preventing the outbreak of conflict is not a military professional’s responsibility, nor is providing a justifiable reason to go to war. These roles align with policy and passion, thereby belonging respectively to the government and the people. A military professional operates within their domain by managing real or implied violence. After all, implied violence—or the capacity for military action—regularly serves as an effective and credible deterrent. Blind force will only increase the risk to allied forces, and wanton destruction of civilian infrastructure will only give the enemy more reason to fight. Military professionals seek to manage chance and probability, enabling them to establish effective conditions for the offense that will eliminate the enemy’s capacity and will to fight.12

The government, too, has a distinct role pertaining to violence in conflict. Violence arises in its purest, most irrational form through the passion of the people, and military forces manage the application of violence. By comparison, the initiation or cessation of hostilities falls within the domain of policy and politics. Government, as the rational actor intended to use reason in crafting policy, determines when a nation goes to war and what goals are to be achieved, in contrast to the people determining why a nation would go to war. Whereas one could dispute the role of politicians and the media in stoking fervor and driving a population to want war, the military professional remains somewhat insulated from this debate. The military focuses on the nonrational forces of chance and probability, managing violence by concentrating the primordial violence of the people into a deployable force of trained personnel and abiding by government mandates.

The example of violence also serves as a meta point for discussion. Essentially, the concept of purpose can be used to focus the discussion of military professionalism on any topic, and in the case of violence, the topic can be delineated according to the purpose of each actor in the trinity. Individual roles and responsibilities become clear when the discussion begins with each actor’s purpose during armed conflict. Furthermore, the discussion does not need to be restricted to violence, as any topic could be suitably substituted and used to the same effect. The Clausewitzian trinity thus provides a focal lens through which to delineate the role of a military professional versus either a civilian or a politician across any subject matter by tracing the actors’ responsibilities to their respective domains in war.

Military professionalism is also about developing trust in civil-military relations, including from the people serving with military professionals, the population military professionals support, and the government that empowers military professionals. Trust in civil-military relations is built upon the way military professionals govern chance and probability. More common approaches to building trust will emphasize personal qualities inherent to military leadership, such as the combination of character, competence, and commitment that builds trust between leaders and their personnel. This trust should be seen as an expression of military professionals’ management of chance and probability. Because character, competence, and commitment build consistency, these traits allow servicemembers to trust their leadership, as leaders regularly demonstrate positive capacity in these areas. Consistency reduces chance and probability, as allies and subordinates know what to expect from a military professional. If a subordinate believes a leader will explode irrationally at unfavorable news, or if subordinates must first probe a leader’s attitude to avoid accidentally provoking their ire, the leader should not be considered a military professional. In this context, irrationality represents unpredictability, as subordinate personnel cannot accurately predict how a leader will respond to any information, no matter how that information is presented. This example demonstrates how an unpredictable leader amplifies chance and uncertainty, consequently limiting the effectiveness of their staff in supporting the mission. Capable military leaders are consistent in their leadership, and in so being, earn the trust of their personnel.13

Creativity, which Clausewitz explicitly identified as belonging to the military, remains another interesting factor worth further discussion within the dynamic of the trinity. The component of creativity seems to contradict the idea that the military’s primary domain is addressing chance and probability. Even though the military professional seeks to reduce uncertainty and ensure a favorable outcome, creativity should be considered a critical tool through which military professionals manage chance and probability. Employing the same strategy and tactics in every scenario makes a military easily predictable; moreover, enemies can outthink and outmaneuver a predictable foe. Alternatively, a creative military professional can achieve incredible results, especially when facing overwhelming odds. Using creativity requires something Clausewitz referred to as coup d’oeil, which enables a commander to understand and influence the vastly complex patterns of war. Again, the military domain involves managing, rather than purely reducing, chance and probability. When faced with overwhelming odds, creativity becomes important in overcoming possible defeat. Hannibal’s victory at the Battle of Cannae is but one of many historical examples of how creativity can allow a master tactician to emerge victorious despite a seemingly low probability of success. Conducting military research is another way to employ creativity to manage chance and probability. Military research, through the innovative development of new technologies, increases the odds of success in future conflict. A military professional uses creativity as the means to manage chance and uncertainty in conflict.14

Furthermore, junior officers have a distinct role, versus general officers, in developing professionalism and applying creativity in war. Clausewitz held that war could not be condensed fully into linear calculations given the inherent and unpredictable factors involved. Additionally, Clausewitz espoused the concept of coup d’oeil. This idea suggests the most skilled commanders possess a type of innate genius, allowing them instantaneously to perceive and understand all strategic facets of a battlefield. Yet, this type of perception is not fully innate, nor is Clausewitz’s message the best for junior officers. Instead, the better approach is to emphasize the cognitive nature of coup d’oeil. This alternative interpretation views coup d’oeil as a form of adaptive expertise that can be trained and developed. Whereas routine expertise involves applying knowledge to common and predictable situations, adaptive expertise allows for flexibility, so an expert can still successfully apply their skills and knowledge in unpredictable conditions. The perception involved in coup d’oeil evolves from the knowledge and understanding a military professional hones by managing chance and uncertainty early in their career.15

Consider a comparable example of coup d’oeil in chess skill. A novice would require a long period of exposure to memorize positions on a board and assess the current state of play. Conversely, a chess grand master can look upon the same board for only a moment and instantly reconstruct all its positions. This expertise is developed over time as an individual learns the game. From a cognitive science perspective, familiarity reduces the perceptual burden associated with cognitive processing and opens the attentional window wider. This combination of effects allows an individual to process more information despite their limited exposure. The individual can therefore process each piece of information faster (because the information is familiar) while taking in more of the entire situation. Chess grand masters can demonstrate coup d’oeil while glancing at a chessboard, and some commanders demonstrate the same general skill when looking over a battlefield.16

Clausewitz identified the coup d’oeil ability as belonging to a rarified set of general officers, but junior officers can progress toward this ability in several ways. Again, the process develops according to how officers manage chance and uncertainty. A junior officer cannot guess what situation they might face five years from now. Nevertheless, junior officers have control over their professional military education. For example, war gaming in the military decision-making process can be a complicated endeavor. War gaming involves considering many different factors, including the assumptions being made, the tactical position on the battlefield, and terrain restrictions. An individual could develop expertise in the war-gaming process in several ways.

The individual could conduct war-gaming exercises and learn the military decision-making process more thoroughly, so its principles and variations become familiar. If someone barely understands the belt method versus the box method, they are trying to learn while in the process of executing a war game. This scenario increases the cognitive load imposed upon the individual, and their lack of familiarity slows their cognitive processing. A similar argument applies to symbols used in war gaming. If someone is unfamiliar with some unit symbols or terrain designations, they likely will not process the information as quickly or take in as much information while formulating a plan. Concentrated professional military education thus helps reduce the cognitive burdens associated with war fighting. Whereas a general officer is employing coup d’oeil in strategically evaluating a scenario, junior officers can develop coup d’oeil by creating greater familiarity, thus minimizing their cognitive burden and enabling more efficient cognitive processing. After all, managing chance and uncertainty can apply as much to the individual mind as to a battlefield.

Although reducing the cognitive burden through professional military education can help manage uncertainty, the educational process still has an opportunity to amplify military creativity. The recommended approach is to focus on developing cognitive skills, as well as managing chance and uncertainty by reducing the cognitive load. Specifically, the type of creativity Clausewitz envisioned results from exposure to novel scenarios and focused skills development. Cognitive skills can be divided into various topics with tactical relevance, such as performing work-arounds to think beyond the typical procedures or anticipating future states to determine what an enemy might do. More importantly, these skills can be developed and trained. The caveat is that broad exposure to the military decision-making process or war games could lead to suboptimal cognitive development when the exercises are too complicated. Rather than using full war games, the solution is to integrate tactical decision games explicitly designed to develop cognitive skills. For example, an entire series of war games might assess and develop problem detection and diagnosis, while another set of war games might emphasize quickly sizing up situations. Other opportunities include premortem thinking, which describes an exercise where an individual tries to predict why their plan went awry. Premortem thinking helps explore individuals’ understanding of the risks associated with their plans. If exercises to probe and develop cognitive skills are integrated into professional military education, the result will be the expedited development of coup d’oeil.17

Through these various examples, the underlying point remains that a military professional manages chance and probability. Military personnel are responsible for dealing with the fog and frictions of war that create uncertainty and risks to allied forces. In turn, military personnel’s primary responsibility is to manage chance and probability through creativity such that risk is reduced and armed forces have the highest possible chance of succeeding in conflict. Of course, military actors are not immune to the forces of passion and reason, as evidenced by events such as the My Lai Massacre, which only speaks to the importance of military professionalism. Passion and reason belong to other actors within civil-military affairs, and the consummate military professional acknowledges these considerations—that is, their personal opinions about the war and government—while ensuring these opinions are properly partitioned and unable to adversely influence their sworn responsibilities as military servicemembers. This interpretation focuses on the principal purpose of approaching the military as a profession rather than illustrating the idea of the military as a profession within a particular topic. As such, the intent should become clear and allow the central point to be extrapolated and applied to many different topic areas.18

Contrasting Military Professionalism Against Other Civil-Military Ideas

Approaching the military as a profession remains an enduring and important part of training military personnel. Accordingly, several key texts have been integral to military education. For example, Samuel P. Huntington advances a theory of civil-military relations that focuses on military professionalism and how the military participates in political processes. Conversely, Morris Janowitz emphasizes the political impact military forces have. Each set of ideas contributes to the military as a profession by exploring the civil-military relationship. The intent of this article is not to undercut the valuable contributions these ideas have made, but rather to enhance the discussion by demonstrating how purpose, as described within the Clausewitzian trinity, enhances these contributions even further.19

When considering the military as a profession, one seminal work always seems to enter the discussion: Huntington’s The Soldier and the State. This work advanced a theory of civil-military relations arguing for objective civilian control of the military. According to Huntington’s premise, the civil-military relationship can be divided into subjective and objective control. Subjective control depicts a system where military officers interact with and actively participate in politics. Individuals serving in civil positions might be selected to serve as military personnel on an as-needed basis or for political reasons. This system severely reduces military professionalism, as the military itself intertwines with the political process, leaving the line between the military professional and the politician blurred or outright nonexistent. Objective control is the alternative option. Under a system of objective control, political leaders and military leaders focus on ideas and factors relevant to their specific expertise in highly distinct systems. Since the military remains as nonpartisan as possible under objective control, military personnel can pursue the profession of arms and managing violence, thereby leaving politics to the politicians. The idea is politics as a profession and the military as a profession stand in direct contradiction, and becoming an expert in one area limits one’s ability to perform as a professional in the other area. In practice, an objective system of civil-military relations ensures professionalism, as civilian control of the military insulates military leaders from partisan endeavors.20

A common dilemma is how a nation can create a military strong enough to achieve objectives while still remaining subordinate enough to follow civilian authority. One argument suggests that even though Huntington levied Clausewitz’s work to formulate his basic concept, Clausewitz would likely have preferred subjective control, given his contemporary military experiences and theoretical work. Modern scholarship has debated at length about how Clausewitz conceptualized the role of politics in general, leading to competing interpretations and implications for military theory. Clausewitz described politik, which does not translate directly into English. His usage of the term indicated three things: 1) politik means policy is an extension of the state’s will and decision to pursue a goal; 2) politik describes politics as an external state of affairs dependent upon geopolitical position; and 3) politik represents a causative force to explain the pattern of, or framework for, the various manifestations of war over time. Likewise, other scholars debate the paradoxes that result from considering these ideas in practice, such as officers facilitating political behavior or otherwise subverting civilian control. Still, others argue no distinction can be made between political and military matters at the highest levels of authority. Nonetheless in practice, specific examples and considerations illustrate how even an objective system can be compromised by bad actors or unique situations.21

When arguing an objective system can be compromised, the inherent problem lies in trying to provide supporting evidence through effects and specifics. Rather than starting with the purpose of approaching the military as a profession, the consequences of unprofessional behavior or a subjective system subvert the conversation. Reinforcing the premises laid out in the Clausewitzian trinity can enhance this debate. Specifically, military personnel and political actors should remain independent because their focus areas are functionally different. Military leaders seek to manage chance and address the nonrational forces within war while political leaders build policy and engage the rational forces within war through reason. Attempting to apply the same solutions to functionally different problems would be akin to fitting a square peg into a round hole. Subjective military control would thus require the same actor to manage rational and nonrational forces. The trinity nominally binds forces in war to appropriate parties and, in so doing, lays out the stronger argument for the independence of military and political forces. When composing an argument for objective civilian control of military forces, beginning with military and political actors’ differing purposes helps scope the argument by emphasizing how each group should approach the shifting factors in war.

Another view of civil-military relations similarly advocates for the professionalism of military forces while emphasizing different factors. Rather than objective civilian control of the military, Janowitz envisioned a greater degree of interconnectedness between the civilian population and the military to foster pride in civic participation. Janowitz’s premise suggests some significant value is produced by allowing military professionalism to be informed and encouraged by social and political forces without being overwhelmed by them. Among the advantages of greater civil-military integration is the possibility military officers could better serve national interests if they have sufficient political awareness of emerging trends. Janowitz’s competing philosophy also requires military leaders to have a greater understanding of international relations as a critical component of war. The political significance of military operations thus becomes a pragmatic component of success in any military campaign.22

Although Janowitz’s differing viewpoint offers a distinct perspective on civil-military relations, the core idea remains complementary to the purposes of different actors in civil-military affairs. The Clausewitzian trinity may suggest the different actors (military, government, and the people) have separate areas of focus, yet Clausewitz advanced the idea of a dialectical relationship between war and politics. Each concept could be probed deeper by contrasting its competing influences. When considered dialectically, civil-military relations should not be viewed as having a civilian component and a military component. Instead, knowledge of civilian political functions and policy development deepens military personnel’s understanding of armed conflict. A dialectical relationship thus requires acknowledging civilian politics can influence military thinking.23

The practical implication of considering the trinity to be a dialectical relationship aligns with other arguments that maintain the professional soldier can be political without succumbing to partisan involvement in politics. As an example within the military space, a professional naval officer can serve as an exemplary navigator on the seas without knowing how to fly a plane, yet that same officer must also have some understanding of airpower to grasp operational concepts in military planning. A different emphasis does not require complete independence. Although Janowitz dives deeper into the pluralistic nature of the citizen-soldier in professional civil-military relations, the key takeaway is ascribing differing purposes to different forces in the Clausewitzian trinity does not also require the various forces to remain wholly ignorant of one another. Professional military personnel can and should understand political forces within the operating environment. The challenge is that military forces should not succumb to partisan scheming and become engaged in partisan ideology themselves, as these actions would no longer satisfy the purpose of military forces within a Clausewitzian civil-military relationship.24

Although civil-military relations are one paradigm through which to explore the military as a profession, other methods can also provide significant insight. One such approach is to identify a particular topic and contrast the role of a military professional within the given context. For example, the contrast between a profession and bureaucracy can shed light on the military as a profession. The end goal is for military professionalism to comprise both art in the form of leadership and science in the form of management or bureaucracy. Whereas military bureaucracy might approach investments through the lens of hardware or cost issues, a professional focuses on developing leaders and managing talent as part of the overall strategic aim. This interpretation highlights how professionalism retains a focus on developing individuals through military training. Even so, the purpose of military bureaucracy should be to manage chance. Systems and procedures should enhance the process’s consistency in delivering effective solutions to military servicemembers. Accordingly, the topic of bureaucracy can also be aligned with military professionalism as a means of managing chance and reducing uncertainty. The same example could be reiterated with multiple topics exploring the military as a profession. Nevertheless, the key point remains to incorporate the purpose of military forces, as delineated within the Clausewitzian trinity, provides further clarity when approaching the military as a profession of arms.25

Conclusion

Ultimately, military professionalism is critical to mission success. Army doctrine advocates this point and emphasizes the characteristics and responsibilities of individuals who undertake the profession of arms. The Clausewitzian trinity is only one of many theoretical viewpoints to consider when evaluating professionalism in civil-military relations, yet the trinity should be a foundational concept. Having an initial understanding that the military operates within the domain of chance and probability gives scope and depth to subsequent debate, and it emphasizes the purpose of military forces in civil-military relations. When one is asked about the role of civilian government relative to military forces, maintaining this perspective allows purpose to be the defining factor in ascribing roles to various actors within the political infrastructure of a nation. Moreover, a Clausewitzian approach further permits some engagement with the political system without necessitating military leaders to become politicians themselves. Clausewitz used dialectical relationships in his studies—that is, he argued understanding the purpose of the military requires contrasting this purpose with the role of the politician without needing to blend the military and politics into a single function. The result is greater clarity about the role of military forces in civil-military relations, with an emphasis on military professionalism as a key method of managing uncertainty in war, developing the cognitive skills necessary for command, and successfully defending the nation.26

 
 

Adam T. Biggs
Lieutenant Commander Adam T. Biggs holds a PhD in cognitive psychology from the University of Notre Dame and serves in the US Navy Medical Service Corps. He is currently completing the Command and General Staff Officer Course at the US Army Command and General Staff College in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

 
 

Endnotes

  1. 1. Headquarters, Department of the Army (HQDA), Army Leadership and the Profession, Army Doctrine Publication (ADP) 6–22 (HQDA, November 2019), 1–8, 1–3; Douglas L. Bland, “A Unified Theory of Civil-Military Relations,” Armed Forces & Society 26, no. 1 (Fall 1999): 7–25; James Burk, “Theories of Democratic Civil-Military Relations,” Armed Forces & Society 29, no. 1 (Fall 2002): 7–29; and Peter D. Feaver, “Civil-Military Relations,” Annual Review of Political Science 2 (1999): 211–41.
  2. 2. Carl von Clausewitz, On War, trans. and ed. Michael Howard and Peter Paret (Princeton University Press, 1976), 89.
  3. 3. Thomas Bruscino, “Naturally Clausewitzian: U.S. Army Theory and Education from Reconstruction to the Interwar Years,” Journal of Military History 77, no. 4 (October 2013): 1251–75; and Clausewitz, On War, 89. All three of the listed quotes appear on the same page in the quoted sequence. Only the bullet points have been added by the author to differentiate the three components of the trinity.
  4. 4. Clausewitz, On War, 89; and Kenneth Algreen Starskov, Clausewitz’s Trinity: Dead or Alive? (School of Advanced Military Studies, 2013), 5. The precise passage in On War, referring back to material also quoted here, states: “The first of these three aspects mainly concerns the people; the second the commander and his army; the third the government.”
  5. 5. Peter Paret et al., eds., Makers of Modern Strategy from Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age (Princeton University Press, 1986), 201, 194; and Michael Allen Fox, The Accessible Hegel (Humanity Books, 2005), 40–52.
  6. 6. Clausewitz, On War, 89; Antulio J. Echevarria II, Globalization and the Nature of War (Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College Press, 2003), 9, https://press.armywarcollege.edu/monographs/802/; Hew Strachan and Andreas Herberg-Rothe, eds., Clausewitz in the Twenty-First Century (Oxford University Press, 2007), v–vii; and Christopher Bassford, “The Primacy of Policy and the ‘Trinity’ in Clausewitz’s Mature Thought,” in Strachan and Herberg-Rothe, Clausewitz, 74–91.
  7. 7. Thomas Waldman, War, Clausewitz and the Trinity (Routledge, 2016), 7; Edward J. Villacres and Christopher Bassford, “Reclaiming the Clausewitzian Trinity,” Parameters 25, no. 1 (1995): 9–19, https://press.armywarcollege.edu/parameters/vol25/iss1/9/; Alan Beyerchen, “Clausewitz, Nonlinearity, and the Unpredictability of War,” International Security 17, no. 3 (Winter 1992/93): 59–90; and Clausewitz, On War.
  8. 8. Emile Simpson, “Clausewitz’s Theory of War and Victory in Contemporary Conflict,” Parameters 47, no. 4 (Winter 2017): 7–18, https://press.armywarcollege.edu/parameters/vol47/iss4/4/; Mary Kaldor, “Inconclusive Wars: Is Clausewitz Still Relevant in These Global Times?,” Global Policy 1, no. 3 (October 2010): 271–81; Martin Van Creveld, Transformation of War (Simon and Schuster, 2009); Brian Cole, “Clausewitz’s Wondrous Yet Paradoxical Trinity: The Nature of War as a Complex Adaptive System,” Joint Force Quarterly 96 (1st Quarter 2020): 42–49; Jack S. Levy, “Clausewitz and People’s War,” The Journal of Strategic Studies 40, no. 3 (2017): 450–56; and Bart Schuurman, “Clausewitz and the ‘New Wars’ Scholars,” Parameters 40, no. 1 (Spring 2010): 89–100, https://press.armywarcollege.edu/parameters/vol40/iss1/11/.
  9. 9. Mackubin Thomas Owens, “Military Officers: Political Without Partisanship,” Strategic Studies Quarterly 9, no. 3 (Fall 2015): 88–101; Don M. Snider, “Five Myths About Our Future,” Parameters 46, no. 3 (Autumn 2016): 51–57, https://press.armywarcollege.edu/parameters/vol46/iss3/7/; C. Anthony Pfaff, “Five Myths About Military Ethics,” Parameters 46, no. 3 (Autumn 2016): 59–69, https://press.armywarcollege.edu/parameters/vol46/iss3/8/; and Don M. Snider, “Will Army 2025 Be a Military Profession?,” Parameters 45, no. 4 (Winter 2015): 39–51, https://press.armywarcollege.edu/parameters/vol45/iss4/6/.
  10. 10. Thomas Waldman, “ ‘Shadows of Uncertainty’: Clausewitz’s Timeless Analysis of Chance in War,” Defence Studies 10, no. 3 (September 2010): 336–68; and Edward N. Luttwak, Strategy: The Logic of War and Peace (Harvard University Press, 2001).
  11. 11. Kaldor, “Inconclusive Wars,” 271–81.
  12. 12. David Cohen, “War, Moderation, and Revenge in Thucydides,” Journal of Military Ethics 5, no. 4 (2006): 270–89; Anjier Chen et al., “Ethical Champions, Emotions, Framing, and Team Ethical Decision Making,” Journal of Applied Psychology 105, no. 3 (2020): 245–73; Alice Gaudine and Linda Thorne, “Emotion and Ethical Decision-Making in Organizations,” Journal of Business Ethics 31 (2001): 175–87; Alfred Thayer, Mahan, From Sail to Steam: Recollections of Naval Life (Harper & Brothers, 1907), 235; Loup Francart and Jean-Jacques Patry, “Mastering Violence: An Option for Operational Military Strategy,” Naval War College Review 53, no. 3 (Summer 2000): 144–84; and Samuel P. Huntington, The Soldier and the State: The Theory and Politics of Civil–Military Relations (Belknap Press, 1957).
  13. 13. Jared L. Vineyard, “Trust: A New Formulation of a Fundamental Principle,” Infantry 109, no. 3 (Fall 2022): 20–23.
  14. 14. Clausewitz, On War, 89; Terence M. Holmes, “Planning Versus Chaos in Clausewitz’s On War,” The Journal of Strategic Studies 30, no. 1 (February 2007): 129–51; and Martin Samuels, “The Reality of Cannae,” Militaergeschichtliche Zeitschrift 47, no. 1 (1990): 7–32.
  15. 15. Alan D. Beyerchen, “Clausewitz, Nonlinearity, and the Importance of Imagery,” in Complexity, Global Politics, and National Security, ed. David S. Alberts and Thomas J. Czerwinski (National Defense University Press, 1997), 70–77; Ami-Jacques Rapin, “Coup d’oeil, Takt des Urteils and Verstand: The Cognitive Attributes of the Genius for War in Clausewitzian Thought,” International Journal of Military History and Historiography (2024): 1–27; and Trent J. Lythgoe, “Coup D’oeil and Cognition: How to Build Adaptive Tactical Experts,” Military Review 103, no. 2 (March-April 2023): 95–107.
  16. 16. Adriaan D. de Groot and Adrianus Dingeman de Groot, Thought and Choice in Chess (Walter de Gruyter, 1978); Adam T. Biggs and Bradley S. Gibson, “Opening the Window: Size of the Attentional Window Dominates Perceptual Load and Familiarity in Visual Selection,” Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance 44, no. 11 (2018): 1780–98; and Mariya E. Manahova et al., “Familiarity Increases Processing Speed in the Visual System,” Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience 32, no. 4 (2020): 722–33.
  17. 17. Gary Klein et al., “Cognitive Skills Training: Lessons Learned,” Cognition, Technology & Work 20, no. 4 (2018): 681–87; and Gary Klein, “Performing a Project Premortem,” Harvard Business Review (September 2007): 18–19.
  18. 18. Kendrick Oliver, The My Lai Massacre in American History and Memory (Manchester University Press, 2006).
  19. 19. Dayne E. Nix, “American Civil-Military Relations: Samuel P. Huntington and the Political Dimensions of Military Professionalism,” Naval War College Review 65, no. 2 (Spring 2012): 88–104; and Suzanne C. Nielsen and Hugh Liebert, “The Continuing Relevance of Morris Janowitz’s The Professional Soldier for the Education of Officers,” Armed Forces & Society 47, no. 4 (2020): 732–49.
  20. 20. Huntington, Soldier and the State, 676–99.
  21. 21. Peter D. Feaver, “The Civil-Military Problematique: Huntington, Janowitz, and the Question of Civilian Control,” Armed Forces & Society 23, no. 2 (Winter 1996): 149–78; John Binkley, “Clausewitz and Subjective Civilian Control: An Analysis of Clausewitz’s Views on the Role of the Military Advisor in the Development of National Policy,” Armed Forces & Society 42, no. 2 (April 2016): 251–75; Andreas Herberg-Rothe, “Clausewitz’s ‘Wondrous Trinity’ as a Coordinate System of War and Violent Conflict,” International Journal of Conflict and Violence 3, no. 2 (2009): 204–19; Antulio J. Echevarria II, “War, Politics, and RMA: The Legacy of Clausewitz,” Joint Force Quarterly (Winter 1995–96): 76–80; Risa Brooks, “The Paradoxes of Huntingtonian Professionalism,” in Reconsidering American Civil-Military Relations, ed. Lionel Beehner et al. (Oxford University Press, 2021), 17–40; G. A. Lincoln and A. A. Jordan Jr., “Review: Leadership to Provide for the Common Defense,” Public Administration Review 17, no. 4 (Autumn 1957): 257–64; and Nielsen and Liebert, “Continuing Relevance,” 732–49.
  22. 22. Morris Janowitz, The Professional Soldier (The Free Press, 1960); Nielsen and Liebert, “Continuing Relevance,” 732–49; Morris Janowitz and Charles C. Moskos Jr., “Five Years of the All-Volunteer Force: 1973–1978,” Armed Forces & Society 5, no. 2 (Winter 1979): 171–218; and Donald S. Travis, “Saving Samuel Huntington and the Need for Pragmatic Civil–Military Relations,” Armed Forces & Society 43, no. 3 (July 2017): 395–414.
  23. 23. George Dimitriu, “Clausewitz and the Politics of War: A Contemporary Theory,” The Journal of Strategic Studies 43, no. 5 (2020): 645–85.
  24. 24. Owens, “Military Officers,” 88–101.
  25. 25. Snider, “Army 2025,” 39–51.
  26. 26. HQDA, Army Leadership, 1-3–1-5.
 
 

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