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| Admiral Samuel J Locklear III |
By James R. Holmes
If a picture is worth a thousand words, what's a metaphor worth? A lot. If, that is, it's aptly chosen, if folks use it precisely, and if it's not so overused that it loses all meaning. Alas, big institutions — governments, armed forces, firms — have a bad habit. If a senior leader utters a slogan or acronym, subordinates — team players all — tend to repeat it so often and so casually that it ends up saying little. Today's metaphor of the day: "spreading the theater" in Asia. Over at Breaking Defense, Sydney Freedberg reports that Admiral Samuel Locklear, grand poobah of the U.S. Pacific Command, has taken to using this metaphor to describe U.S. strategy in East Asia and the Indian Ocean region. Before it becomes common parlance, it's worth asking what a football reference like spreading the theater means in a naval and military context.
Read the full story at The Diplomat