Our View: The changing shape of modern war

Lost in the furor over the scope of National Security Agency surveillance and President Barack Obama's recent defense of the nation's drone program is a fundamental shift in the way this administration fights modern, non-state warfare.

For centuries nations engaged each other in a fight for territory or political dominance, using large organized forces in order to achieve their goals. Even after al-Qaeda's 9-11 attack, the Bush administration and his military chiefs conceived of a war with boots on the ground, conquering land and toppling governments.

The results of this approach after more than a decade of conflict, some $7 trillion in spending and thousands of dead and wounded are obvious to all.

In restructuring the controversial drone program, Obama made a comment recently that we found telling. "We must define the nature and scope of this struggle," he said.

The current administration not only increased the NSA activity first allowed by Congress under Bush, but also ramped up drone strikes, hitting targets at a rate six times that of the former president.

Even the nature of these strikes changed. Where 25 percent of those launched under Bush targeted al-Qaeda leadership, only eight percent of those approved by Obama hit their upper echelon. All in all, a third of the drones approved by Bush were aimed at militant leaders, including al-Qaeda and Taliban, compared to only 13 percent approved by Obama.

Instead, the current administration has been hammering the rank and file, using stealthy drone attacks to disrupt the entire network of allied militants. The shocking revelation of NSA and CIA surveillance strategies plays a part in this. By zooming in on military targets electronically and from afar, the U.S. can get away with fewer boots on the ground--or so the theory apparently goes.

We neither condone nor support mass surveillance. There are elements that are necessary, as well as very, very troubling. We share the nation's uncertainty over drone warfare, particularly when it comes to targeting Americans. But the old method failed of direct intervention failed to win security for this nation, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Just looking at the trends, however, we recognize a fundamental shift in the way America intends to fight a war of this nature, away from battle lines and conquest, toward something our leaders may have yet to define.