The semiotics of military terrain analysis and map reading

By Ellis M. Madsen, MS, OD, LTC(R) US Army

ABSTRACT: The analysis of military terrain is as old as warfare itself. Military map making and
map reading may date back to the third century BC. Both of these endeavors constitute semiotic
systems. They exhibit the sign relationship of signifiersignified. Reading these texts can be
done only in the context of a given military situation. Terrain forms texts that can be read by
competent practitioners. Indeed, the reading of terrain at a glance had a special name given it,
coup d’oeil, as early as the eighteenth century. The texts can also be analyzed according to their
paradigmatic and syntagmatic axes. The texts exist at all four levels of military engagement:
individual, tactical, operational and strategic. Furthermore, terrain analysis takes a written form as
military map reading. As map texts become digitalized, this changes where, how and by whom
these texts are read. Finally, given that military terrain and military map reading are forms of
expertise, one can extrapolate to consider any form of expertise as a semiotic system. If that is
the case then some semiotic systems as fields of expertise, can be automated, giving rise to a
formal definition of machine semiosis.

Key Words:
Military terrain analysis
Map reading
Semiotic system
Expertise
Expert system
Machine semiosis
 PART I: Terrain Analysis

Military terrain analysis is the study of land features in a specified area (the area of
operations) that will contribute to or inhibit the operations of a military force. It includes the study
of obstacles that inhibit movement and observation, as well as terrain features that offer avenues
of movement and aids to observation. This analysis includes the two-dimensional land and sea
surfaces as well as the airspace above the ground, space below ground such as tunnels and the
volume below the sea in the case of modern naval warfare. Terrain analysis also includes the
weather and climate of an area including the ambient light available at different times of day.

The reading of maps and their preparation has, until very recently, been an integral part of
terrain analysis. The science of cartography developed considerably in the Enlightenment and
later. Technological advances made maps essential for the full use of terrain by a commander.
Very recently, digital electronic representation of the battlefield is overtaking the use of paper
maps.

Terrain analysis and map reading are extra linguistic semiotic systems in the sense of
Greimas and Courtes. . “By natural semiotic systems we mean two vast signifying sets: on the
one hand, natural languages and on the other extra-linguistic contexts that we consider as
semiotics of the natural world. They are called natural because they impose themselves upon
human beings rather than being constructed by them--.” [Greimas & Courtes, 287.] As semiotic
systems, terrain analysis and map reading can be analyzed paradigmatically and syntagmatically.
These are not merely interesting examples of semiotic systems; rather the semiotic analyses of
military terrain analysis and map reading lead to some insights in the semiotics and its history

Terrain as Sign and Text.

Basically, the features of terrain that one “reads” consist of terrain features that aid the
commander and hinder the enemy. Reading the terrain “text” is knowing what to look for in terrain
and how to make use of these terrain features for military purposes. The terrain features include
the following:

*Terrain features that permit friendly movement and inhibits enemy movement, including,
hills, mountains, valleys, passes, roads, paths, deserts, forests.
*Terrain features that permits friendly observation and inhibits enemy observation, including
those named above.
*Natural obstacles such as rivers, streams, lakes, swamps, marshes.
*Man-made obstacles such as trenches, ditches, moats, canals, forts, castles, minefields,
antitank obstacles such as “Dragons Teeth”, anti-cavalry obstacles such as calthrops.

The signs of a terrain text are those terrain features mentioned above. They are physical
objects, natural or man-made, that occupy a volume above the earth’s surface (and, later, below
it) called the “area of operations.” This is volume that is significant to a commander and relevant
to his mission. These signs exist in juxtaposition to one another, within that volume.

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Interpretations Underlying the Reading of a Terrain Text

The terrain is a text that the commander reads, but it is not the only thing that he uses to
formulate his plan to accomplish his mission. He makes interpretations, consisting of the state of
morale and physical health of his troops, the state of readiness of his equipment, the supply
capabilities of his organization, the quality of his intelligence, among others. For all of the
interpretations about his own troops, he makes corresponding interpretations about the enemy
troops. He forms interpretations of each text and then integrates them with the interpretation he
has made from read from the terrain text to form his plan. These interpretations and integrations
happen continuously and rapidly. The integrations of the interpretations are processed in parallel
even though the information about each one is presented to the commander, typically in a staff
briefing, serially. Most commanders let it be known to their staff the general nature of the mission
before the staff presents their information. The plans are usually (and optimally) not finalized until
all the interpretations have been presented; the plans can (and optimally, should) change as new
information is presented.

The interpretations of the signs read by a commander form the context of his reading of the
terrain text. “The context is the entire text which precedes and/or accompanies the syntagmatic
unit under consideration and upon which the signification depends.” It can also be implicit, in this
case it is qualified as extra-linguistic or situational.” [Greimas AJ, Courtes J. 1979 p58.]

The commander who reads terrain always interprets the terrain in the context of its military
value, that is, in the context of its usefulness for attack/defense and/or advance/withdrawal,
according to his assigned mission. Without this context, this interpretation, the terrain text has no
meaning; it is just bits of real estate, a hill, a valley, a road or a river. Furthermore, the sign
function is moveable and dependent on interpretations taking place in an underlying situational
discourse.

Changes in the situational discourse can be described as formal mathematical

catastrophes. [Madsen E. 1978.] The situational discourse can change very rapidly, leading to a
rapid change of the interpretation of the sign in the terrain analysis. Thus, the ongoing
interpretation of the terrain text must be diachronic; only the later analysis of a battle or combat by
an armchair general can be synchronic.

As an example of a terrain text, consider a dense forest. If you are a commander of a

group of defending infantry, this dense forest on either side of a clearing would channelize a
cavalry attack into a killing zone you have prepared with missile troops. This might describe
Henry V at Agincourt. On the other had, if you are in command of a disciplined infantry that
maneuvers and attacks in formation, a dense forest could break up your units’ physical
cohesiveness and leave them vulnerable to piecemeal attack by individual fighters. This is what a
dense forest meant to the Roman leader Varus when his force was annihilated by Germanic
tribesmen in the battle of the Teutoberger Wald, 9AD. [Perrett B, in Stephenson M ed. 2003, p94-
98.]

There is a sectionalization of these extensive and complicated contexts that the

commander considers. The commander divides the labor of making these interpretations into
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areas for his (sometimes large) staff, to help him form his interpretations and analyze the contexts.
In the modern US Army, the analysis of Terrain would fall under the S2 Intelligence section, the
Situation would fall under the S3 Operations section, while the Morale would be a matter for the
S1, Personnel section. Of course, there is considerable overlap in considering these areas. In
each context/interpretation of the terrain, the commander must integrate all the elements of the
context into his planning and management of the battle. He must further change his planning and
management as these contexts change.

Below is a small list of possible contexts that a commander can consider when he reads a
terrain text.

OBJECTIVE; Attack Advance Break Contact Defend

to contact (retrograde) in place

SITUATION: Turn their flank, Watch for sniper Retreat by unit Refuse the line

Break their center Form Square

(Naval) Rake their stern, Form Line of Battle

MORALE: Applicable to all of the above: win/lose, stand/run, freedom/capture, survive/die

The commander is also responsible for the training of his troops; that is for insuring that
soldiers execute the concept of the underlying Situational and Morale discourses essential to the
completion of the commander’s operational plan. Maintenance of the acceptable discourses is the
goal of all training and moral initiatives. The acceptance by each individual soldier of the
situational discourse is the goal of military culture and training. (The exception is a “sauve qui
peut” morale. This can come on very rapidly and no commander would plan for this or want this
eventuality. Keeping the Morale out of the sink of a “sauve qui peut” is clearly a huge job and it is
one of the chief responsibilities of the NCOs, the noncommissioned officers, or sergeants, before
and during battle.)

An interesting example of the contexts of battle is the clash of opposing Greek infantry
phalanxes in the Classical Age. This context confuses the concept of attack vs. defense. The
underlying situational discourse could only be decided after some time after the clash of the
opposing phalanges. As admirably demonstrated by VD Hanson, this time was typically short,
usually not more than an hour. [Hanson VD, 2005.] Furthermore, the decision of the underlying
discourse could sometimes be decided before the clash of the phalanxes, especially when the
enemy phalanx was Spartan. In this latter case the sight and sounds (pipes of the musicians
alone: Spartan traditionally approached the enemy in vocal silence) of the approaching of Spartan
phalanx would cause a catastrophic change in the situational discourse of Sparta’s enemy.
Sometimes the Spartans lost.

Reading terrain and the Coup d’Oeil

Terrain analysis is of such importance to military commanders, that the US Army has
included it in its operations order. This is a five-section template developed by US Army to aid its
members in issuing and understanding orders. It functions as a mission statement for a specified
operation and is used at all levels of organization. This mnemonic contains, among other things,
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the most important elements for a commander to use in “reading” terrain. They include, weather
information and lighting data, locations of enemy and friendly forces, and how the operation is to
take place on the terrain in the area of operations.[MIT Army ROTC.] The section on terrain
includes:

1. Observation and fields of fire

2. Cover and concealment
3. Obstacles
4. Key terrain
5. Avenues of approach
In addition to the terrain data of the operations order, virtually every military force in the world
trains at least its commanders in terrain analysis.

The terrain portion of the operation’s order is a tool to aid a commander in his terrain
analysis. It is especially for novices, designed to keep them from forgetting a key factor in their
analysis, and to insure they communicate their ideas to subordinates. As such, it constitutes an
example of as studied, thorough and un-rushed reading of terrain.

A coup d’oeil, on the other hand, is an instantaneous analysis of military terrain by a

commander. It is, in effect, an immediate reading of a terrain text without a studied, ponderous
analysis. It implies a rapid analysis or a brilliant stroke of insight into the military situation, and
how the terrain relates to that military situation and the commander’s mission and objective. This
strange term is of interest because of its early use, predating many of the ideas of semiotics.

William Duggan offers a critical review of the concept of the coup d’oeil. Using recent
research on how the brain works, he posits the view that there is really no difference between the
studied analysis of military problems and the coup d’oeil. Duggan suggests changing the
procedures used by military commanders to incorporate the intuitive aspects of battlefield problem
solving called coup d’oeil. Duggan also suggests that the coup d’oeil cannot be forced; it comes
when it comes. This would suggest that a commander would do well to query many different
minds, people on his staff, on how to read terrain (and other command decisions, for that matter)
to see if one of these struck a brilliant coup d’oeil. The commander, then, would not rely solely on
having the right solution (which he himself might not be able to produce in time) but would rather
function as a clearing-house and integrator of the coups d’oeil of his subordinates.
[Duggan W 2005.]

Duggan’s thesis is supported by recent research in the workings of the brain and by the
successful planning techniques used in business. There is a long-standing connection between
leadership in war and business, both academic and practical. Other research in how experts
arrive at decisions supports Duggan’s thesis. In a study of expertise, Phillip Ross, came to the
conclusion that experts, especially chess masters, are made, through constant and long-standing
practice in their fields of expertise. This would suggest that the commanders should start early
and practice often how to read terrain. [Ross, PE 2006.[ One is reminded of a number of
episodes of “Star Trek, The Next Generation” where Captain Picard is conversing with higher
echelon commanders, commanders who exceed his rank by three or four levels and who are
about his age or even younger. These commanders invariably tell Captain Picard, “…There is no-
one better qualified to command the Starship Enterprise on this difficult mission.” This is not just
a superior recognizing the confidence he or she has in a subordinate, but rather that Captain
Picard REALLY IS the best qualified to command the Enterprise, because he has the most
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experience, because he is, along with his staff, most likely to come up with a coup d’oeil. Star
Fleet has, after centuries of studying warfare, finally realized the value of experience in command,
and not promoted Captain Picard to the higher rank of administrative and political levels. They
want to benefit from his expertise, reading the texts of outer space.

Perhaps the best short description of coup d’oeil, one that serves for any age, comes from
the (fictional) mouth of Alexander the Great, as he tells the story of his life.
“As a boy I instinctively understood the ground, the march, the occasion, and the elements.
I comprehended the crossing of rivers and the exploitation of terrain; how many units of what
composition may traverse such and such a distance, how swiftly, bearing how much kit, arriving in
what condition to fight. The drawing up of troops came as second nature to me: I simply looked;
and all showed itself clear. My father was the greatest soldier of his day, perhaps the greatest
ever. Yet when I was ten I informed him that I would excel him. By twenty-three I had done so.”
[Pressfield 2004.]

John Churchill, the first Duke of Marlboro was another master at reading terrain and how
the placement of friendly and enemy troops on the terrain could be used to his advantage.
“Both in his set-piece battles like Blenheim and Ramillies and in the encounter battle like
Oudenarde, the Duke’s [of Marlborol] masterly appreciation of the ground and his ability to read
the enemy commander’s mind enabled him so to deploy his forces that he always retained the
initiative, forcing the enemy to react to his moves.” [Barthorp 1980.]

Historically, references to a coup d’oeil in the context of military terrain analysis occur as
early as the eighteenth century. “Among his skills, the one by which the eighteenth century set of
the greatest store was that of coup d’oeil, a facility which enabled a commander to grasp the
essentials of a situation and make a speedy and appropriate decision.” ]Pirscher, in Duffy 1987.]
Duffy writes, “the process of acquiring coup d’oeil began in peacetime, while the officer was out
walking, riding or hunting.” The officer learned how to judge distances and to recognize key
terrain features as they relate to the different combat elements at the time, i.e. infantry, cavalry
and artillery. Duffy again, “Eventually it became possible to envisage the most peaceful
landscape in military terms, and problems and their solutions crowded in upon the mind.”

Von Clauswitz discussed coup d’oeil at length in the early nineteenth century. In his
concept of coup d’oeil, it was meant to apply to all levels of battle as they have been presented
here. Indeed, many of the examples of reading terrain already cited are in face coups d’oeil.
[Caraccilo DJ, Pothin JL 2000.] Duffy again notes that, “Whereas the combats of infantry against
infantry had a attritional quality, the chance of success of horse against foot hung above all on the
coup d’oeil of the cavalry commander.” [Duffy C. p228.]

As early as 1860, Viollet-le-Duc gave references to the coup d’oeil. The context of the first
of his references is the defense of a castle, which at the time would be considered tactical or
operational (of which more, later) depending of the size and value of the castle and the size of the
force besieging the castle. “It is certain that, even at the present day a place defended by a
commander of ingenuity and skill, one whose coup d’oeil is rapid and accurate, may hold out
much longer than one which is defended by a man of routine whose intelligence cannot furnish
fresh resources at every phase of the attack.” [Viollet-le-Duc EE. 1860 p69.]

Viollet-le-Duc refers to a coup d’oeil in the context of the placement of the castle. In this
case, he makes the certain case that the placement of the castle is of strategic importance to the
6
defense of a whole region. “With the sure coup d’oeil which belongs to men of genius, he
(Richard the Lion Heart) chose the site of the fortress intended to cover the Norman capital, and
having once decided upon his plans, he followed out their execution with a tenacity and force of
will which bore down every obstacle opposed to his undertaking; so that, in one year not only was
the fortress built, but a complete system, likewise, of defensive works was thrown up, with rate
talent, along the banks of the Seine, to the point at which the river covers Rouen. [Viollet-le-Duc
EE. 1860 p 81.]

Errors in reading terrain

Umbero Eco has famously remarked, “A sign is anything that can be used as a lie.” [Eco
U. 1979.] If that is so, then terrain features certainly qualify as signs, given the numerous
examples of commanders’ misreading terrain because of deceits and feints of the enemy. These
deceptions usually consist of making the enemy think an attack is going to take place where it
isn’t. This allows the attacker to mass his forces elsewhere, at a more advantageous place. Such
deception is an example of surprise, a principal of war.

John Churchill, Duke of Marlboro, was a master of deceitful attack. In the battles of the
early Eighteenth Century, Marlboro had occasion to attack dug-in French positions. He would
vigorously attack one flack of the French line, causing the French commander to think that flank
was the main attack. Marlboro would then with overwhelming force at a different flank. “Having
selected the most advantageous sector of the battlefield for his decisive thrust, he would maintain
pressure at other points, thus inducing the enemy commander to weaken that part of his front,
while at the same time building up a massive concentration of force for the ultimate breakthrough.
[Barthorp M. 1980 p17.]

In the film “The Seven Samurai,” [Kurasawa A. 1954.] the leader of the seven purposely
leaves a path into the village apparently unguarded, while actually fortifying it with hidden troops.
By creating this opening in his defenses, he canalizes the attackers, so that he can split up the
enemy forces and counterattack them at a place of his choosing and at advantageous odds. In
modern terms, he applied the principle of mass and the offensive by deceiving the bandit
commander about the village’s defenses. The leader counts on his enemy the misreading the
terrain, that is, the defenses of the village he has prepared.

One of the best examples of deception is that of the Mongols. A few Mongols would attack
an enemy line and then turn, feigning retreat. The enemy would break ranks and give chase to
the fleeing Mongols. The Mongols would ride over a small hill, when they would spring the trap.
The pursuing enemy would be attacked on both flanks by the previously unseen main part of the
Mongol forces. If anything is noteworthy about this simple deception, it is that it succeeded so
often throughout history and by different armies. [Nicolle D. 1996.]

Well before D-day, General George Patton was stationed in the north of England. Seeing
the apparently tremendous troop concentrations on their aerial photographs, the Germans were
made to believe that the main invasion that they knew to be immanent would occur across the
Channel at the narrowest point at the Pas-de-Calais. In fact, what the Germans were seeing in
their aerial photographs were empty tents, dummy oil storage takes, dummy parked aircraft and
inflatable dummy tanks, all of which looked quite real from the air. The deception also included
something rather new to warfare, the use of extensive and deceptive radio traffic by elements of

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Patton’s “phantom army.” [fas.org. 1996.]

Visualization

Beyond just the presence of these key terrain features, a commander must be able to
visualize, that is, to “read the text” as it might play out in a future battle. This visualization is the
unfolding in the commander’s mind’s eye of the unfolding of the conflict over time (one dimension)
in the volume of operations (three dimensions). The ability to visualize this is a key element of
terrain analysis at all four levels. For instance, in the movie, “The Last Samurai,” four assassins
confront Tom Cruise’s character. [Zwirk E. 2003] The film visually demonstrates the movements
his character will use to engage and defeat the assassins. At first confusing to the viewer, upon
reflection, it provides a startlingly vivid demonstration, for which a cinematographic presentation is
particularly apt, of this visualization process.

In a literary example, Alexander the Great tells a pupil:

“You ask, ‘How long did it take to fashion the battle plan for Gaugamela?’
I have known it since I was seven. It has played before my eyes a thousand times. I have
seen this plain in my drams; I have imagined Darius’s order. This battle I have fought in
imagination all my life. Nothing remains but to live it out in flesh.” [Pressfield S. 2004. p 210.]

This visualization is a playing out of the possible battle in the mind’s eye of the commander.
When resources (meaning, mostly, time) permit, the commander can game the battle with
members of his staff. War gaming is now an accepted part of training for commanders and
troops. [Duggan W. 2005.] The serialized movie, “Band of Brothers,” admirably demonstrates the
training in terrain analysis that went into the preparations of the airborne troops drops before D-
day. [Frankel D, Hanks T dir.2001.] They used a sand board or terrain board, which was a three-
dimensional topographic scale model of their landing area and its surroundings.

More recently, visualization has been discussed in relation to tank warfare. The difficulty
faced by tankers “buttoned up” in a tank is visualizing the battlefield outside the tank. Originally
the visualization required a tank commander to mentally picture a two dimensional plane outside
his tank that might include mine planted in his path, infantry in the area, including antitank gunners
but principally the positions of enemy tanks. Recently, however, this visualization must include
the airspace above the area of operations, which might contain enemy tactical aircraft such as
ground attack airplanes and attack helicopters. [Madsen E, Lewis H. 1994.]

Syntagmatic and Paradigmatic Analysis

If terrain analysis is reading a text, the text must consist of some language. This language
does indeed exist, consisting of paradigmatic and syntagmatic axes.
[Greimas AJ, Courtes J. 1979. Chandler D. 2002 p79-92.]

Syntagmatic Axis

For traditional military terrain, the syntagmatic axis consists of the three dimensional
volume surrounding the set of planes tangent to the surface of the earth. This volume usually
takes the form of a rectangular solid consisting of: the area of operations defining the two
dimensions parallel to the surface tangents and the third dimension defined by the lowest
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elevation of the deepest depression and the greatest elevation of the highest elevation in the area
of operations. This volume has nevertheless traditionally been depicted on a two dimensional
paper sheet called a map. Variations in the third dimension, that is, in the depression-elevation
axis, has been depicted on the two-dimensional as sheet as isometric lines on the map depicting
depressions and elevations. More recently, since the advent of airpower, the syntagmatic axis
has changed to a full-fledged three-dimensional volume, containing the airspace above the area of
operations. This can only be reasonably depicted by computer representations of the area of
operations, of which more, later.

Naval operations have had a two dimensional syntagmatic axis for some time. However,
the axis changed gradually from planar surfaces essentially next to coastlines to curved two
dimensional manifolds representing the surfaces of the oceans and seas. With the advent of the
submarine, the naval syntagmatic axis changed to a true three-dimensional volumes, the top
surface of which was the surface of the oceans and seas. The volume of the syntagmatic axis
extended below the two-dimensional manifold of the traditional syntagmatic axis. With the later
advent of marine airpower, the three dimensional volume was extended above the traditional two
dimensional manifold

Paradigmatic Axis

There are multiple elements in the paradigmatic axis. The first element of the paradigmatic
axis consists of terrain features. It is the all those features that occur within the polygon of the
area of operations. Any of the features from the sets listed under “What a terrain text consists of”
above can be on the first paradigmatic axis. This axis should be thought of as the “building
blocks” of the terrain that, when assembled, form the terrain in the area of operations. For
example, it might contain three hills situated just so, a stream running between the first two hills
that forms a valley, and a plane north of the hill. Note that the example occupies a volume since
the hills have elevation and the stream has depth. This first paradigmatic axis does not contain
any enemy troops, not yet, anyway, but it may contain things such as the minefield for example,
that the enemy may have put there to inhibit movement.

The second element of the paradigmatic axis consists of enemy and friendly troops—and
nowadays, civilians and journalists—in their particular units, with their particular weapons. This
element of the paradigmatic axis includes the added dimension is time. It is this military
interpretation of the terrain that gives the terrain features their meaning. As noted above, the
terrain features have no meaning in a semiotic system independent of the interpretation.

This is what a commander and his staff do when they look at terrain with from a military
point of view. They consider the type of operation they have in mind: attack, defend, where and
when, advance to contact, withdrawal from contact, when and in what direction. They conceive of
where their troops might be or move on the terrain and where the enemy troops might be or move
on the terrain. The utilization of the second element of the paradigmatic axis of the terrain
analysis consists of examples of playing out the battle over time; how the various types of troop
units will move, where the bottlenecks would be, where the possible ambushes might occur,
where are the lines of supply and evacuation, and where the critical areas, the “Schwerpunckte”
(concentration points) are and how they will be attacked. A good commander and staff can run
through these like videos playing. They play until a problem occurs, then they back up and play a
different version to see what its outcome will be.

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 Of course, these all play out in the commander’s mind and those of his staff. By talking
these movements out before the battle (they usually use maps to demonstrate their ideas, or more
recently, computerized graphic systems, of which more later) the commander can deal with
problems during the battle, at least those he can foresee. Once the battle commences for real,
the commander and his staff have only limited knowledge of how the objects in the second
element of the paradigmatic axis move. It is something like a director of a theatrical production;
indeed, an interesting comparison could be made between the military commander and the
director of a play. Recently, with the concepts of so-called “Net-centric” warfare, commanders
have a much sought-after ability to intimately know what is happening in the second element of
the paradigmatic axis. Of course, this will go hand in hand with their ability to meddle in the
conduct and actions of their subordinates, the soldiers actually doing the fighting.

This interpretation is critically dependent on the technology, and resources that the
commander has available to him. He must consider if his transport is sufficient for the movement
he envisions. For example, Napoleon and his staff conceived of crossing Germany very
differently than did Patton in WWII. Or can the commander’s engineers breach the obstacles in
the time allowed? Napoleon had to plan for and execute his crossing of the Neiman during his
retreat out of Russia in dramatically different ways than the US and British engineers planned and
executed crossing rivers in WWII using the prefabricated Bailey bridge. Terrain features that might
have been considered barriers in ancient times are no long such impregnable obstacles for
modern forces, such as those with the “vertical assault” capabilities of airborne or heliborne
troops. Warfare in urban areas and its particular terrain analysis has recently come into the fore
as has terrain considerations of political importance. Modern terrain analysis also entertains
medical aspects of the terrain, such as indigenous disease vectors, average temperature, etc.

The interpretation a commander makes also has considerations that are independent of the
technology available to him, and have therefore remained the same throughout the ages. These
are the considerations of training and morale, both of his own and allied forces and those of his
enemy. While these intangibles are difficult to measure and impossible to see in and of
themselves, they exert a profound influence of the course of any battle. A good commander will
know how his troops fare in these regards and will factor this into any reading he does of the
terrain.

Reading the old classics

Some literary works are called “classics.” They get read over and over again. Their
popularity continues for ages. Examples are the Bible and Euclid’s “Elements.” So to, some
pieces of terrain qualify as “classics” because they have been “read,” that is analyzed and fought
over for centuries. The premier example of such a piece of terrain is the Jezreel valley in the
middle east. One of the first recorded accounts of terrain analysis occurs in the description of the
Battle of Megiddo, the Armageddon of the Bible. In fact, it probably wasn’t the first battle at that
place, but it was one of the first to be recorded in the Bible and elsewhere. A famous modern
battle there occurred in WWI, when the British, Australians and Arab irregulars under Allenby
defeated the Turks. Apparently, Allenby knew the particular pass that Pharaoh Thutmose III used
to defeat the Canaanites three and a half millennia earlier. This operational battle culminated in
the fall of the Turkish Empire in that area. The most recent battles in the area were during the
Arab-Israeli wars. This area, then, has seen over thirty battles, where the soldiers used weapons
ranging from bronze axes, archery, large cavalry charges to modern tanks. [Cline EH. 2000 p19-
30.]
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 Another classic in terrain analysis is the “cockpit of Europe.” [Brewer’s Dictionalry.] This
dubious distinction has be bestowed upon Belgium since it has been the site of so many battles
from the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries. It has seen the marching and countermarching of
Spanish Tercios, the cavalry of Louis XIII and Louis XIV, Marlboro and later on the attacks of
Germans in both world wars. One other area should be mentioned as a classic piece of terrain,
Kawanakajima in Japan. In this small valley and surrounding area, two Samurai warlords fought
no less that five battles, although some were not large battles, in less than eleven years between,
1553 and 1564. [Turnbull S. 2003.]

Four Levels of Size

Four levels or hierarchies of warfare are considered in this essay. These four levels
correspond roughly to the size of the conflict in terms of number of men involved, roughly to the
size of the area of operations, and again, very roughly to the duration of the battles involved.
These are the contexts of reading the texts of military terrain. They are: individual, tactical,
operational and strategic. They are present below, with some examples taken from military
literature and military cinema.

Individual

At the individual level, the terrain analysis includes the terrain features listed above, but it
also includes aspects of martial arts. To that extent, the context includes a diachronic analysis of
the opponent’s past performance. Individual contests may last from seconds to a couple of hours

One of the best examples of individual terrain analysis is a scene in “The Seven Samurai.”
The scene shows a prospective recruit approaching the open doorway of an inn. Kurasawa,
1954. The leader of the group, seated inside an inn, has positioned an assistant out of sight of the
recruit, who is to ambush the recruit as he enters. One recruit enters and instantly disarms the
assistant. Another recruit, having spotted something amiss, stops short before entering the
doorway, saying simply, “No jokes, please!” In both instances, the individual combatant effectively
analyzed the terrain by executing a coup d’oeil. Another instance in the same movie occurs when
the leader is watching a match between a prospective recruit, a true master of the sword as it
turns out, and a samurai who has challenged the master swordsman to a duel. After only a little
posturing of the two duelists, merely some shifting of stance, the leader exclaims to his
companion, “It’s so obvious!” The leader has “read” the capabilities of the two duelists by viewing
only a few of there movements.

Numerous martial arts movies demonstrate individual “terrain” analysis, which is almost
exclusively an analysis of the opponent. The examples are legion. The Kung Fu Flick revels in
acrobatic displays to demonstrate the mastery of the hero’s ability to read the terrain and his
opponent, at an unbelievable level. As a personal note, I can relate that training for competition in
martial arts involves learning to “read” the opponent and find his/her weaknesses and how they
“telegraph” their attacks. As a simple example, a competitor who keeps his guard low might be
vulnerable to an ax kick coming from above, an area that is often poorly guarded and difficult to
see. Another example is the maxim that one should circle and move to the right if the opponent
has a strong weapon on his right side. This moves one away from the opponent’s strength.

Tactical
11
 The tactical level of battle extends from the squad to battalion level, which corresponds
roughly from five to 500 combatants. This is the area of expertise of the company grade officers
and NCOs. The areas of terrain involved are usually not more that a few square miles and often
just a few hundred square yards. Occasionally these areas can extend to many miles, such as in
an air battle. Indeed, the context of an air battle is best thought of as a volume, since altitude can
be a key factor in such a contest. The temporal context of tactical conflicts may be a few minutes,
such as the clash of two Hoplite phalanxes in the Peloponnesian Wars to some hours or days,
such as the company-sized battles that took place in the Battle of the Bulge. [Hanson V D. 2005.
Frankel D, Hanks T dirs. 2001.]

One of the best examples of reading a tactical defensive terrain text is offered in the movie,
the Seven Samurai. Here, the leader makes a reconnaissance of the village he plans to defend
and makes a rough schematic map of the area and its surroundings showing avenues of enemy
approach and natural and man-made obstacles. He determines what weaknesses he has and
how to fix them by building obstacles. He assigns areas of responsibility for different parts of the
terrain, and makes sure his lieutenants and men know their areas.

During the Napoleonic Wars, experienced battalion officers became adept at reading the
terrain in the no-man’s-land between two opposing armies. Typically, both sides would send out
skirmishers, soldiers sent out in pairs in front of the lined-up battalions in an attempt to break up
the opposing line of soldiers. Brent Nosworthy cites de Brack’s Cavalry Outpost Duties, “By the
height of the Napoleonic Wars, veteran officers confronted with enemy skirmishers in front of their
defensive lines would sometimes drive away these skirmishers simply to observe their retreat and
use this same method to evaluate the terrain behind the skirmishers’ initial position.” [Nosworthy
B. 1996.] Reading the subtleties of the terrain between the two opposing lines of soldiers that
could hide or break up the attacking line as it approached the defending one was of vital
importance in the deadly game played by Eighteenth Century infantry commanders.

A superb example of reading terrain in an offensive is presented in the serialized movie,

“Band of Brothers.” [Frankel D, Hanks T dirs. 2001.] In the second episode, CPT Winter attacks
a battery of German howitzers, firing on the D-day beachhead. He quickly reads the terrain, forms
his operational plan and executes it in what was to become literally a textbook operation.

Operational

The operational level involves units of divisional and corps level. This can include from
10000 to 100000 combatants and perhaps hundreds of square miles. Such conflicts can last
from hours to many days, as in the case of the maneuver warfare of Marlboro and Eugene in the
early Eighteenth Century. The name “operational art” is a recent one; even as late as Napoleonic
times it was called “Grand Tactics.” [Nosworthy B. 1996.]

Difference between operational and strategic is somewhat nebulous. The sizes considered
are not rigidly fixed. For instance, a battle of the late Middle Ages, such as Bosworth Field could
involve some 15000 men on each side. At that time, the battle had strategic significance. A
modern battle involving a similar number of men, say, a mechanized battle in WWII, would only be
considered as an operational battle, yet it could involve a much larger area of operations. It’s
even more complicated than that. For example, considered by size of units involved, the race
between Bluecher’s Prussian’s and Grouchy’s French to the main battlefield of Waterloo was an
operational one. [Grouchy disregarded an old maxim of the time in not “marching to the sound of
12
the guns” that were blazing away in the distance at Waterloo. In effect, he misread the acoustic
signs of the battle.] A quote attributed to Wellington at the time, “Night or the Prussians will
come.” The Prussians did come; Bluecher won the operational race to give Wellington the
strategic victory. [Wikipedia: Waterloo. Wikiquote: Wellington.]

At the battle of Jena-Auerstaedt, Napoleon split his force, keeping his larger force at Jena
to engage what he considers to be the major Prussian force under Hohenlohe, leaving Marshall
Davout at Auerstaedt to simply hold off a smaller Prussian force under Brunswick. As is turned
out, Napoleon routed the smaller force. But Davout, outnumbered over two to one, held his
position, and with the arrival of troops under Bernadotte, finally repulsed the Prussians. This is a
rare example of Napoleon misreading of the terrain “text,” that is, where the greater enemy force
was, due to faulty reconnaissance. Fortunately for Napoleon, Davout, the “Iron Marshal,” was in
his usual form. [Hathornthwaite PJ. 1990 p27-32.]

Perhaps one of the finest and most significant readings of terrain occurred in the American
Civil war. At Gettysburg, the Kentuckian BG Buford was a Union cavalry commander making a
reconnaissance of the area. He correctly realizes the value of high ground commanding the area
of operations. John Barratt writes of Buford, “He immediately appreciated the significance of the
high ground to the north, west and south of the town,” This is as good a description of an
operational coup d’oeil as ever was given. [Barratt J. 2001.] In the manner of the Union cavalry at
that time, his troopers dismounted, deployed as infantry and seized the critical terrain. In the
movie “Gettysburg,” Buford’s commander congratulates him on his initiative. “This is good ground,
very good ground.” Maxwell RF. 1993. BG Buford was justifiably pleased with his good reading of
the terrain. This is also an illustration of the difficulty in distinguishing the operational level from
the strategic level of battle. Had the Confederate forces won the battle and seized Washington,
the battle would have proved to be a strategic Confederate victory. As it was, the Confederacy
went on to fight for two more years after losing the battle of Gettysburg.

Strategic
Strategic battles involve the highest levels of military commitments in manpower, logistics,
areas and time. The context here is one of Armies and Theaters of war. They involve hundreds
of thousands of men, in significant portions of entire continents and may last for months. While
high-ranking military commanders retain responsibilities for the conduct of operations in strategic
battles, leaders of countries are involved in the planning and coordination of these battles. Entire
staffs of planners read the terrain of strategic battles.

The land and see feature of terrain reading for strategic battles is generally straightforward,
being well known in most cases. What needs to be learned by commanders are the dispositions
of the enemy, the future weather, which is hard to predict, and the medically relevant conditions in
the area of area of operations. Water obstacles almost always play a part in reading the terrain of
strategic battles, so the commander must usually plan for amphibious or riverine operations.
Politics plays a major role in strategic battles, both the support given commanders by their
countries and allies and the cohesiveness of the enemy and his allies. Commanders of strategic
forces must learn to “read” the minds, psyches and political will of their superiors and allies every
bit as much as they “read” the terrain held by the enemy.

Examples of strategic battles are numerous. The Allied invasion of Europe in WWII is a
prime example. The soviet Russians wanted the opening of a second front in Europe proper in
order to relieve pressure on them in the east. The western allied political leaders had to weigh
13
that with the fact that such an operation would allow large areas of Eastern Europe to fall under
Soviets hegemony. Having agreed to such an invasion and with Herculean preparations done
weeks beforehand, the actual point of decision came when Eisenhower had to decide if the
weather would be acceptable for the operation. He read the weather, decided to take the risk and
invade Europe on 6 June 1944. [Encyclopedia Britannica Online: D-day.] Another strategic battle
was the Battle of the Bulge. The Germans attacked in the west, hoping to gain ground and time to
force the western allies into negotiations. Such a strategy was probably invalid from the start. In
the event, the German leaders misread the political will and military power of America. [Wikipedia:
Battle of the Bulge.]

Since strategic battles almost always occurred for significant durations of time, certain
aspects of terrain attain higher significance for the strategic operations than for the lower levels of
conflict. For instance, logistical considerations for strategic battles are considerably more
complicated that they are for, say, tactical operations. One aspect that is often overlooked,
especially by some of the earlier military writers, is the medical aspect of the terrain involved.
Until the last century or so, strategic operations have involved larger numbers of casualties from
disease than from enemy action. Historically, the greatest advances in maintaining fighting
efficiency of combatants in the longer terms of strategic battles have been the advances made
and implemented in field hygiene. As an example, Napoleon lost more troops to typhus in his
invasion of Russia than he did to Russian combat activity. Nowadays, commanders know the
medical environment in their area of operations, including temperature maxima and minima,
endemic diseases and their vectors, any preexisting areas of toxic substances and the like.
[Personal communication and training,1986.]

PART II Map reading

A map is a two-dimensional, scale representation of the three dimensions near the surface
of the earth. The edges of the map and the map sheet itself form the syntagmatic axis of the
terrain to be read. The terrain features, both natural and man-made, form the first paradigmatic
axis written on the map. This latter includes the contours of equal elevation with notations of their
altitude, water features, road, railways, cities etc. The second paradigmatic axis of the map
consists of the symbols designating enemy and friendly forces.

The symbols of both elements of paradigmatic axis are iconic. [Chandler D. 2002.] In the
case of both examples, the map symbols are chosen in such a way as to be mnemonics of the
terrain feature or military object they represent. Modern military maps use a standardized color
coding for objects: water is blue, roads and paths are black, iso-elevation lines are green and
other man-made objects such as towers and buildings are black.

The second paradigmatic axis is usually depicted on the military map as a map overlay.
This is a clear acetate sheet literally laid on top of the map on which friendly and enemy forces are
drawn with a grease pencil. Friendly forces are shown in blue or black while enemy forces are
shown typically in red. The overlay allows easy erasure with a cloth of units while preserving the
paper map underneath it. This is necessary as the units move from one position to another, but it
also allows the staff to plot update knowledge, intelligence, as it becomes known. If the type of a
unit is not well-known, the unit’s symbol is depicted dashed borders. The overall movement of a
unit is shown with a big arrow; this can be the known movements of enemy or friendly units, or it
can be the anticipated movement of a unit as in a planned attack.
14
 Sometimes, the military map consists of an aerial photograph. In this case, the
paradigmatic axes are photographic in nature. These are very useful because they give the exact
relative positions of objects on the ground and thus the distances between them, and they can be
the most up-to-date information about the positions of friendly and enemy forces. Their big
drawback is that they are difficult to read and require a great deal of experience to do so.

The map is the written analogue of the conceptual terrain analysis. The map holds the
same relation to terrain analysis as writing does to speech.

map : terrain analysis :: writing : speech

The diachronic history of the two pairs is similar, although the history of terrain analysis/map
reading occurred much later than did speech/writing. Written language occurred long after speech
and in a variety of different ways. So too, map reading occurred much later than terrain analysis.

Maps exhibit different forms of semiotic modes. Chandler notes that,

“A map is indexical in pointing to the locations of things, iconic in representing the directional
relations and distances between landmarks and symbolic in using conventional symbols the
significance of which must be learned.” [Chandler, 2002 p43.]

Different kinds of maps exhibit different degrees of these modes. For example, a three
dimensional topographical map is indexical to a greater degree than a sheet map. A “sand box”
military map in more indexical than a military map. In certain instances the indexical nature of the
military map reaches startling levels. In the movie, “Uncommon Valor,” Gene Hackman’s character
constructs a full-scale model of the Vietnamese prison compound for his soldiers to practice their
upcoming rescue mission of POWs. [Kotcheff T. 1983.] In this case, the terrain map and the real
target of the mission differed only in exact the placement of the people, both friend and enemy,
within the two prison compounds.

Military maps are iconic to a higher degree than ordinary maps. [FM 21-26, 1966.] Military
maps generally make use of the standard symbols used in the wider world of cartography.
However, they differ from those “civilian” maps in that they contain the second paradigmatic axis
of military specific symbols. These symbols are also iconic in that they are derived from various
pieces of military equipment that are used or at least were used historically, by the various types
of military unit the symbols depict. The basic symbol for any military unit is a long-base rectangle.
The different type of unit is depicted by what is inside the rectangle. For instance, an infantry unit
is depicted by a large “X” connecting the diagonals of the rectangle. This is reminiscent of the
crossed belts used by the infantrymen of the Enlightenment and Napoleonic periods. A cavalry
unit has one diagonal, symbolizing the baldric used by cavalrymen to suspend their sword
scabbard. An artillery unit has a large filled in dot in the center of the rectangle symbolizing a
cannon ball. And when a new type of unit appears, iconic mode is preserved. For instance, an
anti-aircraft artillery unit symbol is a filled in black ball under a circular arc, the latter representing
the umbrella of protection afforded by the unit from the enemy above. [Mouat T.] So military
symbols are iconic to a much greater degree than written language.

(It is not true that ALL written languages are purely symbolic. That is, there is a written language
where the written signs used in the language are not completely arbitrary relative to the sounds of
the language. The story goes thus. [Personal communication. 1990.] In order to increase the
15
literacy of his kingdom, the late fifteenth-century king Sejong of Korea convened a committee of
notable scholars. Thinking that the difficult ideographic Chinese characters were an impediment
to this goal, they decided to study other scripts. They hit upon the novel idea, traditionally after
much drinking of so-ju, a powerful rice wine, of forming the characters of the syllabic script they
were developing to mimic the shape the mouth and the tongue take, when the speaker vocalizes
the sound of the character. Some other letters depict the shape of the mouth when the speaker is
viewed head-on. They ended up with essentially a syllabic script. This physical mnemonic is
remarkably useful in teaching the written language to illiterates. While some of these must be
learned, this mnemonic precludes the written Korean language “Han-gul” from being purely
symbolic.)

Some standard symbols used on military maps are depicted below.

Infantry Cavalry Artillery Antiaircraft Artillery

XX X ||| ||

The symbol for infantry is supposed to be reminiscent of the crossed baldrics sworn by XVIII
century infantry, one suspending the bayonet and scabbard and the other suspending the
cartridge case. One diagonal depicts the single bandoleer of the cavalry. The black spot of the
artillery represents a cannon ball, or the mouth of the cannon, and when artillery was latterly used
against aircraft, the umbrella was added to symbolize the protection offered by anti-aircraft
artillery. The size of each unit is designated by the symbol above the unit’s rectangle: XX =
division, X = brigade, ||| = regiment, || = company. The mnemonic here is that certain
representations of the rank of a commander of the unit being depicted is similar to the size symbol
of that unit. For instance, a division commander (XX for the division size symbol) wears two stars
as his rank, while a Brigade commander, X for the brigade size symbol, wears one star as his
rank.

Military maps certainly have symbolic elements that must be learned. Despite the
numerous instances of the use of the iconic mode to facilitate learning, much of military map
reading requires learning the conventions. In fact, among military trainees of all type, classes in
map reading are anticipated with a certain dread. Good teaching methods help alleviate this
dread. The first element of the paradigmatic axis includes symbols for different types of man-
made objects, different terrain features representing different elevations and natural objects,
symbols for proper directional orientation, etc. The second element of the paradigmatic axis
contains symbols for different types, sizes and positioning of friendly and enemy units, symbols for
the immediately past movement of the units and other symbol. All of these symbols must be
learned.

Military maps, as they are used in the field, contain diachronic elements of usage that
civilian maps do not have. These are the movements and projected movements of both friendly
and enemy units. The normal usage was to have a map of the area of operations posted vertically
in the tactical Operations Center. Clear acetate overlays were lain over the map and tactical
symbols drawn on them in grease pencil corresponding to the places where the units were
16
thought to be positioned. Doubtful positions were drawn with broken lines, and even the time of
posting, name of unit, size of unit were also drawn. Enemy units were drawn in red and friendly
units in blue or black. As the units moved, their symbols on the acetate overlay were erased and
redrawn in the their new position. Planned advances or withdrawals were depicted with large
arrows in red or blue. I have seen planning sessions of regimental sized mock battles of the
OPFOR at the National Training center at Fort Irwin, California. These planning sessions took
place around the map and overlay and were presided over by the commander and his chief of
operations. The commander and his staff became experts in reading the terrain shown on the
maps and planning their operations around them.

Below is a fictitious example of a planned attack on a small town in German during the
Napoleonic Wars, rendered using modern military map symbols. The main operation is a cavalry
attack by the two squadrons of French cavalry, charging between the river Oder and the town
Obergerode, designated by the dark arrow and cutting off a battalion of Prussian infantry.

River Oder

|||
15 Landewehr Landeswehr
||| ||
17 Uhlan
Obergerode

|||
||| 15 Landeswehr
55 Ligne O |||

9 pounder
||| pounder
55 Ligne
|||
12 Cuir |||
|| 15 Landeswehr Landeswehr
||| 12 pounder
2 Lancier

|||
|||
15 Land
55 Ligne

|||
55 Ligne

17
 The non-military equivalent to the military use of maps is the use of maps by civil engineers
in planning bridges, highways, train routes, air ports and the like. As might be expected, civil
engineers have their own symbols. But there is and always has been, much overlap with the
military map usage, since from the earliest times civil engineers have been employed as military
engineers. Indeed, the first curriculum of the US military academy at West Point included the
training of officers for the army as civil engineers. Some of the earliest civil engineers to achieve
personal fame were military ones. The outstanding example of such is the celebrated French
military engineer Vauban. [Faucherre N. 1991.] Graphic artists, painters and sculptors, who also
earned some of their live making architectural drawings of military fortifications, include Da Vinci
and Albrecht Duerer. [Hutchison JC. 1990.]

History of Military Cartography

The dating of the earliest maps in existence is a problematic exercise. Some researchers
consider that the earliest map dates from the seventh millennium BC. Maps certainly date from at
least Classical times. The uses of these maps were probably for commerce, navigation and law
enforcement. Specifically military uses of maps are somewhat more difficult to document. In those
time past, however, the differences between trade and military enterprises may have been less
distinct than they are today. [Wikipedia: Maps, Cartography, Military Cartography]

Cartography has probably been associated with it’s military uses since its invention. Not
just as aids in exploration but also as aids in military planning, maps and map collections have
been a part of military planners’ collection of tools for centuries. In a fictional work, Steven
Pressfield attributes the first use of maps for specifically military planning to Memnon of Rhodes, a
mercenary Greek commander under Darius III and later Alexander the Great. According to him,
Memnon used maps to their fullest extent in the third century BC, every bit as much as a modern
commander would.

“Memnon was the first field commander to use maps. In those days no one had heard of
such a thing. To survey the ground was considered a debasement of the art of war. A general
was supposed to know the field from his own reconnaissance or from reports of trusted officers,
guides, or locals. To map it was cheating.”
“But Memnon went beyond surveying fields. He charted specific battlegrounds, not only
those upon which armies had clashed in the past but also sites unknown to war, which might
prove hospitable at some subsequent time. He kept books of roads and streams, passes and
heights and defiles; he plotted the length and breadth of Asia Minor down to footpaths and
mountain tracks known only to goatherds. He surveyed sites suitable for camps, then studied the
ways by which each might be approached, supplied, or turned. Nor did he anticipate only victory.
For each camp he discovered how many columns could withdraw how quickly over which road or
track; he even charted sites for ambuscades to cover the retreat he planned for. He recorded
dates for the turning of the seasons and the risings and settings of the sun and moon. He know
the day’s and night’s length at any field across all Asia west of the Halys. He knew the day and
date of the barley harvest in Phrygia, Lydia, Cilicia, and the site of every garner, with the names of
the brokers who held them. Which rivers were in spate at what season? Could they be forded?
Where? When he had completed a battles exercise from his own point of view, he ran it from the
foe’s. How could his brilliant dispositions be countered? What weaknesses had he left exposed?”
[Pressfield, 2004 p94-5.]

18
 There are large maps dating from the sixteenth century painted of the walls and ceilings in
some buildings of the Vatican. The Vatican library also holds numerous maps dating from that
time and earlier. Louis XIV was known to have had a large map commissioned for his use and for
that of his ministers. These maps were used for political and military purposes. “The
cartographical wonder of the age was the map, twenty-four feet in diameter, which Giovanni
Cassini and his aides drew in ink on the floor of the Paris observatory (c.1690), showing in precise
location, in latitude and longitude, of all the important places on the earth.” [Durant W, Durant A.
1963 p508.] As early as 1713, under Louis XIV, a corps engineers was established in France.
Hubert Gautier wrote the first formal treatises in Europe (Traite des chemins, Traite de la
construction des ponts) about roads and bridges, including maps of the roads. An excellent,
detailed and modern-looking map exists of the road from Paris to Caen, dating from 1766.
[Mesqui 1994.]

Modern warfare has seen an extensive development. During the Ancien Regime, the
French Army instituted a corps of ”ingenieurs geographs” in 1777. This corps was disbanded in
1791 but was reconstituted by Napoleon in 1809. These officers surveyed terrain and produced
maps. [ Haythornthwaite 1988.] The Ordnance Surveys of Great Britain provided Victorian Great
Britain nearly complete representations of terrain that were used for defence planning in WWII.
By the end of the twentieth century, the US Army maintained sophisticated capabilities to map
terrain using traditional surveys and satellite photographs. [Personal communication 1984-8.]

Beyond map reading: the electronic digital representation of the battlefield

The development of the map was completely transformed by the introduction of digital
representations of terrain. The first implementation of digital technology for military terrain
analysis was probably the installation at the National Training Center at Fort Irwin California in the
late 1970’s. In this state-of-the art military training system, each combat vehicle and some squads
of infantry are fitted with radio frequency transponders that can be used to place the transponder
on a map of the area on a digital map in a facility called the “Star Wars Building.” As the vehicles
move the transponders’ positions changes as they are triangulated by receivers sited on nearby
mountain tops. These digital video displays can have alpha-numeric notations superimposed on
the views of the battlefield to represent friendly and enemy units. Commanders from the batallion
level down, and trainers view the plots of their unit’s movements in the area of operations.

This technology is currently used in battlefield simulation for training purposes. It is used in
tank simulators, both for training the tank commander, gunner and driver and in helicopter and
aircraft (fixed wing and rotor) simulators for training pilots and gunners. The Army has developed
video games designed to train new recruits and soldiers in their jobs as individual war-fighters.
This is an inexpensive way of giving these soldiers experience in reading all axes of terrain and in
acquainting them with command and moral decisions they might have to make on the next
battlefield.

More recently, this kind of technology has been considered for use in combat. The aim of
the to provide seamless integration between the digital systems the soldiers and commanders use
in training with those they use in combat. This integration will include integration of all necessary
information about the battlefield including position and status of enemy troops, vehicles and
fortification, information about the nuclear, biological and chemical status of the terrain, weather
conditions, etc. [Ashley J. 2006.] The ultimate capabilities of this technology were depicted in the
science fiction film “Aliens.” Each combat soldier had individual biological sensors and digital
19
video feed back to the command center, where the squad’s officer was stationed. [Cameron J dir.
1986.]

These systems depict the area of operations, complete with symbols for friendly and enemy
units on monitors in high resolution. These systems integrate intelligence from a number of
sources, including manned and unmanned reconnaissance aircraft, digital video feed from ground
vehicles and even individual soldiers and unattended ground sensors. The commanders at a
number of different levels can view this information and interact via video teleconferencing with
each other. Clearly, this has an impact, not necessarily all good, on the relationships between
these commanders of different levels. The availability of this information at so many levels will
certainly allow higher level commanders to micromanagement his subordinate commanders. A
general who can read the same computer-graphical terrain text as a lieutenant colonel
commander of a maneuver battalion will have to exercise self restraint and let the battalion
commander run his own battle. [Army Magazine Green Book 2006-2007 p328-32.]

Implications for Expertise as Semiotic Systems

If the message of this essay can be so painted with a very broad brush, it is that a military
commander, as an expert, is capable of reading terrain and map texts. This broadly stated
concept can be extrapolated to any of the equivalent hypotheses:

*Any field of expertise forms a semiotic system.

*In any field of endeavor that contains an expert or master also contains semiotic symbol
representation.
*To be an expert is to be able to read a specialized semiotic text

The expertise considered as a semiotic system, could be natural or unnatural by the

definition given above. [Greimas AJ, Courtes J. P287.]

An expert is “a person who is very skillful or highly trained and informed in some special
field.” [Websters New world Dictionary. 1974.] So by this definition, the following is a list of
experts:

*Martial artist
*18th Century Sailing Master
*phone based credit authorizer
*the blast furnace operator “god” in Japan
*Refractionist, someone who determines a spectacle prescription
*”reading” a visual field to detect changes indicative of Glaucoma

In each case in the above list, the expert “reads” a “text,” and the text is not the usual text of
verbalization or written script. In each case, the text is different to any of the others, and the
expert gains his expertise in reading the text through specific, extensive training and experience.
The expert does this text reading better than an arbitrary person off the street, so the function is
indeed an expertise. Each area of expertise listed above begs a proving essay, similar to this one
about military terrain analysis and map reading, to formally demonstrate that each case
constitutes a semiotic systems.

This connection of expertise with semiotic system leads to a formulation of machine

20
semiosis via the semiotic systems used by experts. This linkage takes the following form:

Theorem of Machine Semiosis

IF: A certain semiotic system forms an expertise

AND: Said expertise can be automated into an expert system, using, perhaps an expert
system shell, knowledge engineer and a domain expert. [Madsen et al. 1991; p116-
21.]

THEN: The semiotic system has a representation, or model in the formal mathematical
sense, as an expert system. The machine running the expert system is using a
semiotic system

As a demonstration of the possibility of machine semiosis, consider the list above of areas
of expertise. Which of them can be implemented as an expert system? The martial artist is
certainly an expert, but his expertise cannot readily be implemented, at least with the current state
of robotics, into an expert system. A training system might help in his training, but the immediacy
of his expertise is not amenable to expert systems, because coding an opponent’s signs is not fast
enough to be valuable in an actual contest.

It is slightly different in the case of the 18th century sailing master. The signs of wind and
water used to sail, say a three-mast frigate like the constitution, could indeed be coded by a
technician into such an expert system, and rapidly enough to be useful. However, the need for
such expertise is now so low that development of such a system is not likely.

When a person uses a credit card, a system is queried that grossly checks to see if the
information on the card is valid; is there really such an account, is it open, does the name match
the number and so on. In fact such expertise has been automated to an expert system, and is in
use by the American Express company. It is called the Authorizer’s Assistant, and can handle 25-
30 percent of American Express credit advisor traffic.[ Feigenbaum E, et al. 1988 p105-114.]

The Nippon-Kokan Ironworks in Japan employed ah human expert to operate a giant blast
furnace. He “read” such signs as size of the furnace’s load, temperature and color of the molten
metal, pressure of the air/oxygen blast, etc. But a problem arose when their expert, referred to as
“god” was about to retire. To preserve the expertise of “god” the company developed an expert
system that had an initial reliability of 85%, which was later raise to 93%. [Feigenbaum E et al.
1988 p158-161.]

A refractionist is someone who determines a patient’s spectacle prescription. In the United

States, a refractionist must be either an optometrist or ophthalmologist. These are experts of a
doctorate level. The expertise consists of a set of numbers determined by the expert using
various ophthalmic tests and of other data, such as the patient’s goals, medical and familial
histories, etc. In a demonstration of the usefulness of expert systems, this expertise has be
shown capable of being “captured” by an expert system.
[Madsen et al.1991 p621-9.]

In the ophthalmic disease glaucoma, there changes in a patient’s ability to perceive the
periphery of vision. The expert reads the visual field that is printed on paper, as a pattern of the
21
patient’s loss of her normal field of vision. While the diagnosis of glaucoma is a complex process,
there are certain visual field changes that are characteristic of glaucoma. (Alas, the other direction
of the implication doesn’t hold; that is, there are glaucomas that can cause uncharacteristic
changes of the visual fields.) A demonstration expert system was constructed that was able to
detect characteristic glaucomatous visual field changes. This expert system could detect
characteristic visual field changes and reject non-glaucomatous visual field changes. Within the
domain established in this study, the investigators showed that at least part of the glaucoma
diagnosis process can be automated. [Madsen EM, Yolton RL. 1994 p553-6.]

John Deely posits the possibilities of zoosemiotics and anthroposemiotics. [Deely J. 1990.]
As a further extension of the realm of semiosis, one can ask: are machines capable of semiosis?
If the Theorem of Machine Semiosis is correct, then machines, at least those machines with
software capable of running expert systems, are capable of semiosis. For example, some chess
game playing software, notable Big Blue, function as true experts of the game. Within the context
of chess expertise, this machine/software would be capable of semiosis.

One concern of the of the well foundedness of the definition presents itself in the case of
some machine semiosis. The Theorem of Machine Semiosis might be true only if one assumes
that the machine is able to derive meaning from the sign relationship. This may force a restriction
on the very definition of machine semiosis: that definition of machine semiosis is only defined
where there is an end user of the expert system, a human, available to interpret the meaning of
the results given by the expert system. A corollary of the theorem would be that the knowledge
engineers making these expert systems are, in fact, working semioticians.

Summary

Using a wide variety of media, including books, movies, internet articles, personal
experiences and conversations, I have demonstrated that military terrain analysis and military map
reading form a semiotic system consisting of sets of signifiers and signifieds. The semiotic system
occurs at all four levels of military engagement and demonstrates the classical features of
semiotic systems, including paradigm and syntagm, and deception and errors of text reading. The
visual terrain analysis has a written “script” in the form of map reading.

Military terrain analysis and map reading are done by experts. An extension of this fact is
that ANY field of expertise forms a semiotic system, that is, a set of specialized texts, read by the
experts of that field. Secondly, some expertise (though not necessarily these two) can be
automated in the form of computerized expert systems. Extrapolating these ideas, one can ask
the general question, within the context of meaning for a machine as an expert system being used
by a human: is a semiotic system of a field of expertise capable of being modeled as an expert
system, a form of machine semiosis? In some cases the answer is yes.

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