Audacious visions are rare and the journey from ideation to realization is filled with challenges. Where individuals dare to dream big, they also need to navigate the delicate balance between ambition and prudence in order to succeed. Join me in exploring how the pursuit of greatness demands not just boldness, but the wisdom to pause, assess, and adjust.
Malcom Gladwell’s book, The Bomber Mafia chronicled a group of military men with a revolutionary vision. Wanting to avoid the devastation of World War I, they formed a belief in the potential of bombs formed from the air, with precision targeting, as a way to reduce civilian casualties and increase the probability of achieving their objectives.
The technology they honed in the years leading up to World War II was the Norden anti-bombsight. Norden was a committed Christian who saw the invention as a way to limit the suffering and death associated with war. For year,s Norden whittle away at the instrument, under contract to the US military. However, when the time came to deploy it in the European theater, it could only perform under perfect conditions.
General Haywood Hansell was one of the advocates of precision bombing. He had a key role in strategic planning of air operations by the US in Europe. The idea was to identify key locations and target them using the new technology to bring a swift victory in the war. As Gladwell describes in his 2011 TedTalk, it was hard to use, broke down easily, required low speed and low altitude flight, and the operators had to have visual contact with the target — cloudless skies in daylight.
Not only was the operational usefulness constrained by imperfect war conditions, but they underestimated the preparation needed for successful missions and the defensive capabilities of the enemy’s ground radar system. In short, their view of what was possible was idealistic and unproven. Missions gone wrong included the bombing of a church and worshippers in it.
Despite the challenges, Hansell persisted with planning missions that relied on the bombsight when he was promoted to a leadership role in the Pacific theater. There, bomb raids were thwarted by cross current winds that prevented planes equipped with the precision system from having the range needed to reach Japan.
Following mounting frustration with the lack of progress, General Curtis LeHay replaced Hansell. He previously worked alongside Hansell and conducted joint missions with poor outcomes. LeHay took the opposite approach to bombing from Hansell. Rather than attempting precision targeting, he chose napalm for raids over Japan. The largely wooden cities were set ablaze, burning people to death.
The commitment Hansell had to a more humane approach to war was noble. But I can’t help but wonder what would have happened if he had been more realistic about the limitations of the technology and pursued more pragmatic alternatives. Perhaps it would have prevented the backlash he faced, which led to the atrocities conducted under LeHay.
Like Hansell, King David’s nephew Asahel had a similar commitment to purpose that cost him his life. After King Saul died, the rivalry between his army and David’s continued for seven years. During one of their skirmishes, Asahel, known as a fast runner, chased down Abner, the leader of Saul’s army. Abner warned the young man to stop pursuing him or he would kill him. Asahel persisted despite the risk and ultimate futility of the mission. When Asahel finally caught up, Abner turned around and killed him. Asahel was blinded by the rightness of his cause and overconfident in his own abilities. (See 2 Samuel 2:18-32)
The incident had secondary consequences because it prompted Joab, leader of David’s army and Asahel’s brother, to to go beyond rivalry to seek vengeance. When Abner decided to defect to David’s side and bring Saul’s army with him, Joab intervened and murdered him. This hindered David’s ability to consolidate power.
Hansell’s dream of precision warfare was technologically ahead of its time. Bringing about a large project is best tested and refined at a small scale before going big. As authors Bent Flybbjerg and Dan Gardner explain in their book How Big Things Get Done, “Doing something no one else has done is noble but carries added risk.” While the bombsight had been improved in a test environment for years, it was not battle proven. As such, it was unreliable.
Gladwell’s book recounts the many failed attempts to get it right. Unfortunately, they didn’t have the luxury of working out the flaws in the main theaters of battle. And it is likely that persisting in pursuing it prevented them from considering alternatives. By the time LeMay took over, the level of frustration with the lack of progress was so high that it caused him to commit atrocities as a means of course correction.
How do we remain committed to our big visions while avoiding getting out over our skis? Building on the idea of testing and refining on a small scale, we need to identify and mitigate risk in our plans. Asahel doubled down on running but failed to mitigate the risk of Abner overpowering him when he caught up. Just like us, he had blind spots, places where we are overconfident, and convinced of the rightness of our cause. Flyvbjerg and Gardner write that in any project, “the biggest risk is you” because of our tendency to act without planning.
Perhaps this is why Zechariah 4:10 says not to despise the day of small beginnings. Having the space to test and iterate away from the spotlight is a gift to embrace. By avoiding grandiose thinking but staying committed to a big goal, we can stay curious and learn at a small scale so we increase the probability of achieving big victories down the road.
