Proceedings on Combating the Unrestricted Warfare Threat: Integrating Strategy, Analysis, and Technology, 20-21 March 2007

摘要

What is Unrestricted Warfare. In 2006, the URW Symposium focused on exploring the diverse nature of unconventional warfare. This new threat, which has come to be known as unrestricted warfare (URW). Unfortunately, URW is another NOT word that we tend to use when we do not fully understand something. It joins unconventional, irregular, and asymmetric as terms in our conflict vocabulary; but it is broader than all of those. URW spans two of the four security environments the Department of Defense (DoD) identified for use in strategic planning, Irregular and Catastrophic, and may extend to the Disruptive (Figure 1). Unrestricted warfare involves both state and nonstate actors seeking to gain advantage over stronger state opponents. These actors will employ a multitude of means, both military and nonmilitary, to strike out during times of real or perceived conflict.