“Friendly fire isn’t.” – Murphy’s Laws of Combat
A couple of weeks ago, I was participating in a student learning symposium led by our Center for Teaching Excellence. An annual event intended to sharpen our skills for assessing learning across the university, it strikes a familiar enough cord that I never miss it.
As someone who was long ago baptized in the fires of measures of performance (MOPs) and measures of effectiveness (MOEs), assessment is in the blood. Today, I spend more time with objectives and key results (OKRs) and key performance indicators (KPIs); I may be measuring student learning instead of long-range fires, but the song remains the same.
During our most recent symposium, we were wargaming (my term, not theirs) the processes that support assessments, accreditation, and even faculty performance. All of that seemed straightforward enough. Then the facilitators introduced The Book of Mortimer. In this game, Mortimer was someone who always seemed to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, wreaking havoc on our brilliant plans.
Mortimer was a familiar character. He was Murphy.
MURPHY’s Law
Murphy – or what we know today as “Murphy’s Law” – was the brainchild of Edward Murphy, an American aerospace engineer, Air Force captain, and West Point graduate whose frustrating experiences during rocket sled tests as part of the MX981 project at Edwards Air Force Base between 1948 and 1949 led him to observe, “If there are two or more ways to do something and one of those results in a catastrophe, then someone will do it that way.”
The anecdotes that survive from the members of the MX981 team cast a portrait of a unique character in Edward Murphy. Following a failed trial run of the sled in June 1949, during which sensors had been installed incorrectly and some wired backwards, Murphy grumbled about his assistant, “If that guy has any way of making a mistake, he will.” According to Murphy’s son, Robert, his father had later commented, “If there’s more than one way to do a job, and one of those ways will result in disaster, then he will do it that way.”
The team eventually coined the phrase, “Murphy’s Law,” as a lighthearted acknowledgement of Murphy’s frustrations and the obvious humor they drew from them. The phrase entered the public lexicon during a press conference, during which a journalist inquired about the project’s perfect safety record – no one had been seriously injured during the rocket sled tests. Captain John Stapp, the project lead, remarked that it was because they always took Murphy’s Law – “If it can happen, it will happen” – into account.
The common form we know today as Murphy’s Law – “Anything that can go wrong will go wrong” – was in common use by the time Arthur Bloch published his 1977 book, Murphy’s Law, and Other Reasons Why Things Go Wrong.
MURPHY’s Laws of Combat
The spirit of Murphy’s Law is ubiquitous in military operations. Simplicity’s existence as a principle of war suggests that Murphy was always a recognized and unavoidable consequence of combat. Even a casual reading of Sun Tzu’s The Art of War reveals that Murphy was a consideration for the Chinese theorist. It is an acknowledgement that no matter how brilliant your plan, it will be executed by someone who, well… isn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer.
As a military planner, I learned this lesson early and often. The person who disappears during the detailed phase of planning will inevitably be the individual charged with executing the details of the plan. The commander who struggles with decision-making will be the one asked to make a key decision in the heat of battle. Looking back, most of my war stories aren’t grand and glorious tales of battle, they’re the painful lessons drawn from Murphy’s Laws of Combat.
They capture the dark humor common to the profession of arms. They convey the cynicism of the rank and file, the sardonic wit of those who have seen Murphy’s Law under fire. They reflect the stark realities of war, those WTF? Moments you just shake your head at in the moment. The list is long, but there are a few that stand out.
- The easy way is always mined.
- The enemy diversion you’re ignoring is the main attack.
- If your attack is going really well, it’s an ambush.
- If the enemy is within range, so are you.
- Tracers work both ways.
- The enemy invariable attacks on two occasions: (1) when they’re ready, (2) when you’re not.
- Anything you do can get you killed, including doing nothing.
- Never share a foxhole with anyone braver than yourself.
- Never forget that your weapon was made by the lowest bidder.
- When you have secured an area, don’t forget to tell the enemy.
As my career trajectory took me out of uniform and into the classroom, I never stopped preaching the gospel of Murphy’s Law. Simplicity is an absolute necessity. Because, as another of those laws states, “The perfect person for a job always reports in after the billet has been filled by someone else.” And, for me, flexibility is non-negotiable. Why? Because “The more stupid a leader is, the more important missions they will be ordered to carry out.” And it’s a safe bet Murphy will be by their side the whole time.
