Escalation Management in Gray Zone Crises: A Proposed Toolkit
Speaker(s): Ellis, D. (University of Maryland); Elder, R. (George Mason University); Astorino-Courtois, A. (NSI)
Date: 22 March 2022
Speaker Session Summary
SMA hosted a speaker session with Mr. Devin Hayes Ellis (University of Maryland), Lt Gen (Ret) Robert Elder, PhD (George Mason University), and Dr. Allison Astorino-Courtois (NSI) as part of its SMA General Speaker Series.
Gray zone conflict—which is defined as any conflict that does not use overt military force—is becoming more prevalent as highly developed and economically interconnected countries seek to compete while avoiding an escalation to armed conflict. Mr. Ellis commented that if an actor is primarily competing in the gray zone, then it is focusing on its national security objectives. Countries that are competing in the gray zone are trying to avoid attribution and political or physical repercussions for their actions. Attribution avoidance is especially important when using military proxies for avoiding a larger military conflict. The presenters developed a model for gray zone conflict which shows how a country can manage for escalating competition in the gray zone. In this model, success represents a state of general deterrence, while failure can lead to a cyclical challenger-defender relationship which can lead directly to a war.
Maintaining or achieving this state of general deterrence will take all actors monitoring each other’s interests across all political, economic, and security domains. For deterrence, it is important for an actor to understand how its actions will be received by all others. To understand how actions will shape the gray zone’s environment, actors should probe each other’s interests and capabilities. However, Dr. Elder commented that testing other actors’ capabilities through the gray zone will cost certain actors their ambiguity. Furthermore, effective gray zone escalation management requires active interagency and multinational cooperation between partners and allies. This includes cooperation across government and private sectors with actors from relevant embassies, politicians, and economic influencers.
Speaker Biographies
Dr. Allison Astorino-Courtois is Executive Vice President at NSI,Inc. She has also served as co-chair of a National Academy of Sciences study on Strategic Deterrence Military Capabilities in the 21st Century, and as a primary author on a study of theDefense and Protection of US Space Assets. Dr. Astorino Courtois has served as technical lead on a variety of rapid turnaround, Joint Staff-directed Strategic Multilayer Assessment(SMA) projects in support of US forces and Combatant Commands. These include assessments of key drivers of political, economic and social instability and areas of resilience in South Asia; development of an analytic approach used to identify USINDOPACOM requirements for humanitarian support in a Megacity (case study: Dhaka, Bangladesh);development of a methodology for conducting provincial assessments for the ISAF Joint Command; production of a "rich contextual understanding" (RCU) to supplement intelligence reporting for the ISAF J2 and Commander; projects for USSTRATCOM on deterrence assessment methods; and, work for USSOCOM on operationalizing its “gray zone” concept. Previously, Dr. Astorino-Courtois was a Senior Analyst at SAIC (2004-2007) where she served as a USSTRATCOM liaison to US and international academic and business communities. Prior to that Dr. Astorino-Courtois was a tenured Associate Professor of International Relations at Texas A&M University in College Station, TX (1994-2003) where her research focused on the cognitive aspects of political decision making and how to “market” peaceful conflict resolution to adversarial actors. She has received a number of academic grants and awards and has published articles in multiple peer-reviewed journals. She has also taught at Creighton University and as a visiting instructor at the US Military Academy at West Point. Dr. Astorino-Courtois earned her Ph.D. inInternational Relations and MA in and Research Methods from New York University. Her BA is inpolitical science from Boston College. Finally, Dr. Astorino-Courtois also has the distinction ofhaving been awarded both a US Navy Meritorious Service Award and a US Army Commander's Award.
Lieutenant General Robert Elder (USAF, retired) joined the George Mason University faculty as a research professor with the Volgenau School of Engineering following his retirement from military service as the Commander of 8th Air Force and US Strategic Command’s Global Strike Component.
He currently conducts research in the areas of command and control, assured communications, strategic stability and deterrence, competition-cooperation management, andinternational actor decision-making. General Elder served as the Central Command Air Forces Deputy Commander forOperation Enduring Freedom, Air Operations Center Commander and Deputy Air Component Commander forOperation Iraqi Freedom, and Commandant of the Air War College. He was the first commander of Air Force Network Operations and led the development of the cyberspace mission for the AirForce. He received his Doctorate in Engineering from the University of Detroit. Mr. Devin Hayes Ellis is a senior researcher at the University of Maryland's Applied ResearchLaboratory for Intelligence and Security, and principal investigator for the Asymmetric Threats Analysis Center. He served as Co-PI for the Minerva Initiative grant that funded the research discussed today.
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