Principen om marin överraskning i princip

The principle of war, surprise, has long been criticized for being imprecise and in need of interpretation. Some believe it is because of this ambiguity that the principle has survived in military doctrine. The purpose of the study is thereby to empirically test the principle of surprise to investigate its validity in modern naval warfare. Due to the lack of precision in doctrine, the surprise has been interpreted into an analytical instrument based on the compiled thoughts written by theoreticians; Sun Zi, Carl Von Clausewitz, Raoul Castex and Milan Vego. The analytical instrument aims to identify whether criteria for surprise are represented or not in a context of successful surprise. This was achieved through a two-case study based on a qualitative text analysis of the methods used by the Sea Tigers of Sri Lanka and the attack on ARA General Belgrano during the Falklands War. The study shows that all the criteria were met in some way in both cases and that the military principal surprise is valid as a principle of war in modern naval warfare. Further research is recommended to investigate more cases and not to limit the research to a tactical level