The Good Fight
[Phillip Carter,
Friday June 29, 2007 at 8:42am ]
Greg Jaffe writes in today's Wall Street Journal (alt link) about the intellectual battles gripping the U.S. Army as the force struggles to persevere in Iraq and Afghanistan. The fights revolve around fundamental questions of soldiering and leadership, like how to face emerging threats such as insurgencies, how to shape the force for "full spectrum" operations, and how to best select, train and promote Army leaders. Jaffe's piece suggests that these debates rival those which occurred after Vietnam, when a generation of officers argued similar questions as part of the Army's rebuilding in the 1970s and 1980s. The difference, of course, is that we're still at war, making these contemporary discussions somewhat unprecedented. According to the article:Last December, Lt. Col. Paul Yingling attended a Purple Heart ceremony for soldiers injured in Iraq. As he watched the wounded troops collect their medals, the 41-year-old officer reflected on his two combat tours in Iraq.Jaffe goes on to write about the specific encounters which have taken place in the context of this larger battle over the Army's future. He writes how Lt. Col. John Nagl, one of the Army's leading soldier-scholars, and the commander of the battalion at Fort Riley charged with training tomorrow's advisers, has proposed a new "adviser corps" for the U.S. military to work with foreign militaries in the future. That proposal has been soundly rejected by the powers that be, who have chosen instead to put their eggs in the conventional warfare basket. Jaffe also writes about the engagements between the Fort Hood commanding general and a group of captains:
He was frustrated at how slowly the Army had adjusted to the demands of guerrilla war, and ashamed he hadn't done more to push for change. By the end of the ceremony, he says, he could barely look the wounded troops in the eyes. Col. Yingling just had been chosen to lead a 540-soldier battalion. "I can't command like this," he recalls thinking.
He poured his thoughts into a blistering critique of the Army brass, "A Failure in Generalship," published last month in Armed Forces Journal, a nongovernment publication. "America's generals have been checked by a form of war that they did not prepare for and do not understand," his piece argued.
The essay rocketed around the Army via email. The director of the Army's elite school for war planners scrapped his lesson plan for a day to discuss it. The commanding general at Fort Hood assembled about 200 captains in the chapel of that Texas base and delivered a speech intended to rebut it.
"I think [Col. Yingling] was speaking some truths that most of us talk about over beers," says Col. Matthew Moten, a history professor at West Point who also served in Iraq. "Very few of us have the courage or foolhardiness to put them in print."
The controversy over Col. Yingling's essay is part of a broader debate within the military over why the Army has struggled in Iraq, what it should look like going forward, and how it should be led. It's a fight being hashed out in the form of what one Pentagon official calls "failure narratives." Some of these explanations for the military's struggles in Iraq come through official channels. Others, like Col. Yingling's, are unofficial and show up in military journals and books.
The conflicting theories on Iraq reflect growing divisions within the military along generational lines, pitting young officers, exhausted by multiple Iraq tours and eager for change, against more conservative generals. Army and Air Force officers are also developing their own divergent explanations for Iraq. The Air Force narratives typically suggest the military should in the future avoid manpower-intensive guerrilla wars. Army officers counter that such fights are inevitable.
At Fort Hood, Maj. Gen. Jeff Hammond, the top general at the sprawling base, summoned all of the captains to hear his response to Col. Yingling's critique. About 200 officers in their mid- to late-20s, most of them Iraq veterans, filled the pews and lined the walls of the base chapel. "I believe in our generals. They are dedicated, selfless servants," Gen. Hammond recalls saying. The 51-year-old officer told the young captains that Col. Yingling wasn't competent to judge generals because he had never been one. "He has never worn the shoes of a general," Gen. Hammond recalls saying.Discourse and dissent are healthy for a military organization. As I wrote a few days ago, warfare is a complex endeavor where the common denominators are chance, uncertainty, and chaos. Vigorous discussion of core assumptions and strategies is critical; sharp criticism is essential for that discussion. The intellectual arrogance displayed thus far by America's caste of generals and senior Pentagon officials has been startling, and stunningly myopic. It virtually guarantees that we will adopt stale, inflexible strategies with zero chance of success.
The captains' reactions highlighted the growing gap between some junior officers and the generals. "If we are not qualified to judge, who is?" says one Iraq veteran who was at the meeting. Another officer in attendance says that he and his colleagues didn't want to hear a defense of the Army's senior officers. "We want someone at higher levels to take accountability for what went wrong in Iraq," he says.
When I've engaged senior leaders on these questions, I've gotten back answers which were some variation of "You don't understand, captain, because you haven't been there at my level." Quite right, I haven't. The closest I've come to that level is a year as a division planner, and a short tour in the Pentagon. My riposte? "Sir, you don't understand, because you haven't been there either."
Today's company-grade and field-grade officers have a perspective that most generals lack, because we've served in this war at the level where the rubber meets the road. (Cf. "What about the grunts?") But more important, today's generals refuse to acknowledge the basic truths that are known to any sergeant or junior officer who's served downrange. Often driven by political considerations and the machinations of civilian appointees, these generals have failed to adjust their assumptions to reflect these realities in the field. And in doing so, they have broken faith with today's generation of sergeants and officers, our sons and daughters whom we send into harm's way to fight our wars.
Some senior officers get it. Col. J.B. Burton, mentioned in Jaffe's article, penned a memo to his boss on the opinions and attitudes of his junior officers in an effort to explain why they're getting out in droves. Nagl, Yingling, and others within the Army's small intellectual community get it. But the mainline conventional leadership of the Army has a long way to go. To some extent, these intellectuals are waging an insurgency of their own, a fight against the entrenched and anachronistic norms, values and leaders of the Army. The odds are long, but the fight is worth it.
Related Posts (on one page):
- The Good Fight
- "A crisis in American generalship"
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Thucydides
Recall the French Army, led by the officers who had helped win WW2, and unable to accept and adjust the realities of the Street Without Joy. Or Westmoreland and the early senior leadership in Vietnam, unwilling to hear what the field commanders, the guys like Paul Vann, were telling them - or, just as often, NOT telling them because it was obvious that the MAC-V headshed didn't want to hear this "defeatist" stuff.
I don't expect politicians to learn the lessons of war: as MSR points out, given the U.S. political system as currently organized, we can expect our geopolitical thinking to be done by foolish cowards who will baffle the sheeple with glittering generalities. I would expect the officer corps of a truly energetic and thinking Army, however, to learn the lessons of futility. How many times, sitting around bullshitting about some idiotic "plan" inflicted on us by Higher, did my buddies and I say back in the 80's "Y'know, what we really need is a good war to kick the ass of these idiots and get them replaced by someone who cuts through the goofy bullshit and cares about how to fight!"
Well, we've had our war - our wars - for the past fifteen years. And the caissons are still rolling along: go along-get along; fuck up, move up. Four years of war and nobody above the level of CPT (if that) has been sacked for incompetence or failure. How many officers were eased out or relieved between 1941 and 1943? How many between 2005 and 2007?
Not good, people. Not good.
Which leads to a point I have made before and to which PC has responded (but not answered): perhaps the deficit in Army training and doctrine is how to handle situations where you have built a "can do", "no excuses", "bust brick walls" organization and staffed it with people literally willing to give their lives to reach that standard - and it runs into an unsolvable problem that no amount of head-wall contact can fix. As an outsider I see cognitive dissonance screaming out of every Phil Carter essay (and many of the comments from OIF vets too). Can the US military survive that level of internal contradiction?
Cranky
[1] Keeping in mind that neither we nor you have EVER received a definition of "success" in Iraq means from the elected Presidential Administration or its key political supporters.
The "strategy" presented at the Naval War College was all about justifying the decisions made in the past, it was not about formulating a way of utilizing military force in a way that supports our political goals, which remain the establishment of a compliant Iraqi state . . . which is imo impossible.
As long as our country suffers political leadership of this type, the question as to where to go with the military is going to be irrelevant. An army of lions led by a jackazz will remain forever in a world of hurt no matter what reforms are tolerated. . .
I thought that was Mahan.
If we have a president who doesn't even understand the key book about American geopolitical naval strategy, I don't know what to say.
TR wrote "The Naval War of 1812."
Note the word "read". Even I have to give Mr. Bush that one - TR no doubt did read it.
Cranky
Good G-d, any General who feels he has to defend his position to his troops is unfit to command a janitorial crew.
The army should be happy that those captains didn't file out of there and immediately resigned their commissions due to no confidence in the command.
Let's think about this for a minute. This nimrod is saying, in essence, that because of a bunch of raggedy-ass Islamic jihadis we are reorienting the entire direction of our strategic planning for the next half century.
WTF??
To me this would have been like Maggie Thatcher saying back in 1979 that because of the threat of the IRA that all of Britain's defense planning would need to be redirected to defeat the spectre of Irish Terrorism. BAOR? Forget it - time to redeploy to Shankhill Road, chums. Falklands? Who needs 'em - gotta hunt those damn Micks. NATO? No time, they're after me Lucky Charms!
Publius likes to keep reminding us that the Bushies have spent the last six years culling the general officer herd to remove the rams. Could this have something to do with the emergence of whiny little titty-baby GOs like MG Hammond? IMO the officer selection ability of someone stupid enough to believe that the threat of "extremeists" demands that our global geostrategic planning needs to be completely revised is...is...
I can think of a screwed-up enough term for it. But it's pretty screwed.
Perhaps.(Said person) needs to be watered twice a day?
(nod to Molly Ivins)
Or an adaptation from the famous post WW II fitness report of a British Guards Officer: "I would not breed from this officer."
Any other suggestions for FD?
I guess my feelings on this focus on what US policy is and should be through this new century. IOW, the military is ultimately a tool for achieving US policy and ideally the military should be organized to support that policy. The Cold War policy was a relatively simple one - containment and deterrence of the USSR. Our military was organized, trained and equipped to carry that policy out. And not just our military, but our intelligence agencies and, indeed, most of the Federal government.
With the demise of the USSR one is hard-pressed to find a coherent and lasting US strategic policy, much less government functions and agencies reorganized to meet policy objectives. Until we, as a nation, can decide what our long term policy objectives are by defining real and potential threats, prioritizing US interests, etc. the military will not be able to meet those challenges.
Are the primary strategic threats going to come from failed states and non-state actors, regional powers (like Iran) or something else? All the talk of advisory corps, full-spectrum warfare, etc., and how to organize the Army specifically and military in general cannot happen if each new President has a fundamentally different strategic vision. Having "won" in our race against the USSR, we find ourselves past the finish line wondering WTF do we do next. Right now, the country is divided on which way to go and what threats should take priority. Until the US civilian leadership can at least agree on an overall strategic vision, how can we expect the tools of policy - the military, intelligence, public and state diplomacy, etc. - to be prepared to implement that policy?
Actually, what some of us have been saying for quite awhile is that because of 4GW tactics of many different potential foes we should be radically restructuring key parts of our military, most especially infantry training and doctrine.
It doesn't exactly matter if the "raggedy" warriors are 21st century ghazari or if they're child soldiers led by warlords in central Africa.
To shift as warfare shifts is important. Not losing sight of traditional enemies and their peer-level warmaking, but adapting to new threats in novel ways that increase combat efficiency and preserve lives and treasure.
Just my perspective.
No agument there. But that's not what Dubya sounds like he's talking about. Admittedly, he probably doesn't know the difference between grand tactics, operational art and strategy. But he uses the word "strategy", which says to me that he's saying the we need to completely reorient our global priorities to concentrate on fighting salafi jihadis. To me that's like saying that because my bicycle's been stolen I need the entire police bureau to reorganize to reduce bicycle theft.
So to get TRADOC on board with reorganizing the Ft. Benning POI to produce 11-bullets that are better trained to handle these sort of 3rd World G's? Sure. But to direct the entire national security establishment to focus around Osama's wet dreams of an Islamic Caliphate? Not my idea of having your enemy's most dangerous course of action in mind.
Oh, and re: Tom's OER? One of my favorite evaluations was written by an American COL sometime around 1800 (remember that at the time the Irish were considered barely human):
"Irish and from the lowest walks of life. Low, mean and vulger: God alone knows how the poor wretch obtained a commission".
I've been beating the drum here for some time: I think this is a huge issue and one that has been studiously ignored inside the Beltway. Part of the problem with Dick &Dubya's Most Excellent Iraqi Adventure is that we have no geostrategic framework to fit it into. Is the game worth the candle? Does it really matter who rules in Iraq, or whether there even IS an Iraq, versus three or more factional states? How much effort, political, military and economic is the Middle East worth?
I have my ideas, but they're just that - my ideas. Part of the problem I have is that the people I'd like to hear discussing this are wrapped wround the axle of moving battalions around Diyala.
I know I sound like a maniac constantly beating this drum, but: this is how great powers fall. They get locked into foreign or domestic policies that, though seemingly critical in the short run, are irrelevant or even dangerous in the long run.
I honestly believe that we are courting trouble by not having the post-Cold War policy discussion and analysis we should be having.
I can't find anything to disagree with in your comment. In short, it comes down to a simple question: What is America's role in the world? Having no real answer to this question can be arguably worse than having a bad answer.
Agree. We could also describe this as strategic confusion.
Why not revisit Nathan Freier's Primacy Without a Plan?for some good quotes. . .
The past . . .
and the present. . .
Basically a leadership question which in this case is a political question.
--
As to 4GW, wasn't Dick Cheney one of John Boyd's acolyttes? John Boyd of course is credited with being one of the main thinkers behind 4GW. As to being the answer, since 4GW thinking has been in use at the highest level of US "strategy" since 2001, perhaps it's time to rethink that assumption. . .
Let's say you're a young CPT with your company on a patrol. You can be tracked by GPS, every second of your mission. Roving drones also can show, in real time, every step you and your men take, even at night. You are constantly "networked" onto the blue force tracker and can communicate instantly -- even send data -- to the TOC.
Because the bn's communications and data threads are networked by microwave or satellite into other commands, your patrol might be watched closely by a RCT commander or, sometimes, even higher (something those of us who have served on unique taskforces on nighttime raids can attest to).
Now, what real control do you have over your relatively small unit? What initiative would you feel comfortable taking, knowing that every step you take is digitally recorded. You, as a company commander, also are networked into the movement and data streams of your SULs, even down TO THE TEAM LEVEL, and this team-level footprint also, theoretically, can be watched from the Pentagon.
So we have a COIN fight that uniquely calls for initiative by SULs, and yet the technology that's supposed to be so transformative actually can impede that very initiative because any move you make can be instantly second-guessed and overruled by your (or his) commander who believes he has a better vantage of the battlespace.
Sometimes, this works out well, as when the TOC -- in communication with CAS and unmanned drones -- can see insurgents closing in on your position that you can't see, beating you to the TIC.
Other times, the over-the-shoulder big brother in the TOC can impede your progress by taking the time to deliberate, time that can get you or your men killed in a rapidly developing door-to-door firefight.
How did I handle it? Sometimes I turned a lot of crap off and, since I was with the IA, let them run their own patrols, trusting their unique cultural radar to compensate for my high technology assets.
Sometimes this worked well (actually, most of the time), sometimes not so well (like when I got blown up in a complex ambush).
I have proposed doing what the USMC has been doing for some time: Moving to a SUL-centric COIN approach that decentralizes decision-making and pushes initiative down to the lowest levels, technology be damned.
This begins to force "strategic corporals" to be a lot quicker and a lot smarter about what they're doing (and it forces us to do a better job selecting, training AND retaining the best of the lot). It also de-emphasizes the role of a commander and makes him far more of an information manager than he used to be.
Is that the best role for the infantry officer? And what becomes of battalion- and above-ranked commanders? What is their role?
These aren't easy questions to answer, and the technology that's offered often does more to muddy the thinking than it probably should.
Anyone who has served at Schofield Barracks or across the island at MCB Kaneohe Bay probably has a great deal of experience in the jungle. The topography of high canopy or thick brush can turn any platoon on patrol into a series of team- and squad-level movements, hunting other men in a disjunctive environment.
Also, those who have experienced heavy MOUT training or combat (although "MOUT" no longer is a favored term, except by us old grunts) in units such as MTN or Ranger can tell you that the battle terrain itself forces you, as a commander, to entrust key initiative to smaller units, without any real benefit from your technology.
For those of us who came from the ranks of scouts, this, too, has been a major form of training and doctrine for generations, even back to our earliest days as mounted infantrymen on horses (the American cavalry experience during and after the Civil War, if not the European).
Well put Andy. But the question of what America's role is, what we would like it to be and what role we can sustain are not necessarily the same. I think the role we can sustain has been diminished by a fair amount over the last five years.
And it is wise to be careful asking questions when you aren't sure where those answering it are likely to take you. It seems the American people still want an expansive role for the country in the world, but they are not really willing to pay the price of that role. And the world, including many of our potential allies, seems to have gone from welcoming American involvement to being suspicious of it. If we continue to fumble, as we have in Iraq, that problem is only going to get worse.
In that environment, our foreign adventures are as likely to be driven by domestic politics as by any strategic concern. Which is right where we are in Iraq at this point. And where we are likely to remain for several more years whoever gets elected in 2008.
Hmm, sounds familiar...
Do you, or did you feel that the ability to be "situationally aware" of the entire battlefied helped you in anyway, or did you find "spatial omniscience" a little too intrusive/distracting at the tactical level?
Hmm, let me clarify it a bit more, did it help to have all that information, or did you considered it TMFI to be of any use?
Sometimes, you don't mind being interrupted ("Roadkill1 you've got one-niner bogies at your two, 800m, you are going to be danger close we've got TIC at grid 1234512345 TigerReal call, I say again dangerclose proceed 200m to your S at OP11, I say again dangerclose proceed 200m to your S at OP11 now, how copy over?")
At which point you pucker hard and get to OP11.
Other times, the technology can get your people killed:
"Roadkill, Roadkill I see you at 1234512345 and have negative identify on bravo foxtrot tango, resend grid and hold, I say again, hold at your pos for further instruction, how copy over?"
When speed is what kills and you slow down your movement for that bs, what do you say? No, sir?
Probably. But how many times can you get away with that, especially if he thinks he has all the good answers and you, on the ground, see no real good answers, only less bad ones, and that "less bad" isn't good and it's going to get you reamed when you come back across the LOD?
His actions prove that Yingling is right and the depth of our problems -- if he can't understand his own people, how can he understand the opponent?.
MG Hammond was an artillery man. The closest he got to in-your-face ground combat was as FDO for 1-41 FA in Desert Storm. He has spent more time in his career as a PersO than he has as an FO, if you get what I'm saying?
The first thing you notice when you meet him is NO CIB on the ACUs. He, like others in his generation, came of age in the post-Vietnam Army (he was commissioned nearly 30 years ago), advanced through the hollow years, and emerged by the time Desert Storm rolled around in a BCT-level rank.
He's not a bad man. He's just a man who wasn't shaped in his youth by the realities of brutal combat. He has a cannon cocker view of the battlefield (at best) or a Personnel Officer's vantage of men at war.
He is a decent, hard-working man who is committed to the mission and feels he is more capable than most at achieving that, which is probably true.
What he has not been prepared to do through his career is experience firsthand the shifting fate of the small unit leader in a chaotic and stressful environment, so he can't really speak to that need nor understand the varied experiences of his 4ID Soldiers when they try to describe it.
He's not a bad man. He's not a stupid man. But because of the fate of history and culture, he's the wrong man to be in his position.
On 10Sep01, he was the perfect BG. On 12SEP01, he probably wasn't the man I would've greenlighted for MG.
In Vietnam this was called "the Big Squad Leader in the Sky", from the way that C&C helicopters would begin circling like vultures over a squad in contact, shouting advice from 1,000 feet AGL. Almost all of the war stories from the RVN have some sort of version of this.
When you think about it, the 20th Century history of Western warfare has been about shortening the links of the chain of command.
In 1916 the CG's job was drafting "The Plan" and briefing his commanders, who briefed their commanders...until finally you had a subaltern with a whistle and an ashplant taking his platoon over the top. Once they left the first-line trench, it was done. No "commanding" much above the company or battalion level, if that. So Haig or Foch or Falkenhayn could have a glass of wine and sleep through the night before the "big push", knowing that there was literally nothing he could do to affect the morrow.
Radio helped put the higher echelon commander back in the picture, and WW2 accounts emphasize how intrusive and/or irritating this could be. Someone - maybe Mitchener? - writes about how he would get these insane night patrol orders after fighting all day and he'd drift out a couple of hundred yards ahead of the MLR, laager up tight and go to 50% security and keep an RTO up all night sending back fake phase lines and sitreps.
Now we have all the bells and whistles MSR is describing, but the original field problem posed when Cain whacked Abel out in the tules remains: how do you find, fix, fight and defeat an armed enemy? Especially an enemy with ten generations of local experience when you've been in sector for ten weeks? And how do you do this while keeping your company, battalion, brigade and division commander off your ass, all of whom are being pushed from their higher to get results.
So you're trying to execute your mission, keep eyes and ears open for the muj, pick up any intel you can from the locals you meet along the way, watch out for mines and booby-traps, keep track of the RPV/satellite intel and on top of all that you've got three channels worth of brass yapping at you?
Hell, yeah, I'd be turning that radio off!
Part of the problem I see is that we just aren't configured to fight by squad. Our Army nervous system is hardwired to lock the squads into platoons, platoons into companies, etc, etc... I don't know if there's a way short of complete overturn to undo this mindset - it's been the Western way of war since the industrial age and before.
I agree that to fight a successful COIN we probably need a different paradigm. What that is...I'm not so sure.
So was Westmoreland: tagged for greater things because of the importance of the King of Battle in WW2.
So often we seem to want to refight the last war, don't we?
Hmm, I see your point.
BFM was one of the hot priorities during the 80's and 90's...it would seem that it has morphed...tragically, and encouraged micromanagement. Hmm, perhaps more on/off switches need to be made for our gadgets...of course there was a time when "radio silence" meant something. Perhaps we'll come up with that lil gem again.
They asked, "Sir, why are you wearing a whistle?" I told them, "Spc, if I was a team leader in your platoon, I'd have a whistle because you aren't gonna hear sh*t else in the middle of a firefight."
All my IA knew how to communicate with whistles and arm movements during SAF. Why? Because I showed them, and they learned through experience, that SULs often get hoarse or can't shout over the sound of many AK47s and RPGs firing at the same time.
The SPCs' platoon and company commanders looked at me like I was crazy. I thought that perhaps years of garrison drill in the ArNG hadn't exactly prepared them for understanding the real nature of urban warfare, something I unfortunately had to witness over the months as they got whacked into shape by the enemy.
"I have proposed doing what the USMC has been doing for some time: Moving to a SUL-centric COIN approach that decentralizes decision-making and pushes initiative down to the lowest levels, technology be damned."
I have been following this stuff from my retiree catbird seat through the auspices of the Armed Forces/Marine times newsrag I get every week. Distributed Ops, they call it, and try it out they have in Afghanistan. I don't know how far they can be tracked via comms/computers and such, but if a leader thinks the head shed is stepping all over his dick with binary interference, he can always do as you did, turn the thingamajigs off...and on as convenience suggests; This trickery has been practiced since at least WWII.
Interference from higher can be a bitch and a nut cutting experience. Witness the young AF pilot Shaun O'Grady's recovery mission in Bosnia. The full bird MEU commander, his Smaj and a host of cats and dogs from the Sugar Shops loaded additional CH-53 E's and horned in on the mission commander (a lieutenant) so as to exploit the situation for a chance to gain pieces of colored cloth. I'm sure that young subaltern saw his future spin before his eyes, and imagine what he might become.
When we went to Somalia, I belonged to a lashup called SRIG (Surveillance, Reconnaissance and Intelligence Group) When we arrived to the "MOG", our 0-6 SRIG Kommandant found out he did not have a job since General Johnston (a blunt Scot) picked a grunt as his G-2. With his feelings truly hurt, this colonel, his Smaj, and some designated security lads appropriated a "Six By - Truck," and conducted their own uncoordinated distributed Ops throughout the City.....Pretty cool Unnhh?....Peachy Keen Unc.
I also hear that under-utilized Jarhead 0-4 through 0-6 characters in Anbar tag along with small units that are conducting house takedown missions. "That's all right Captain, me and my boys have got the third house on the left."
The urge to over supervise will never be quashed short of a radical reduction in force. The military services, like other governmental agencies, are "self licking ice cream cones," and as such, create their own molasses like momentum, stifling all attempts to tinker with improvements in efficiency and productivity, oblivious to all attempts at well meaning humanoid interference.
MSR, if you return to Anbar, perhaps you can task organize, and suggest to some of these idle hands that they undertake some Ad Hoc missions on their own (preferably, in the worst parts of the Battlespace....OOOHH, that is a sexy word). "just an idea."
Imo Rupert Smith's got the best contender so far . . . War Among the People
He genuinely cared about Soldiers. Now, that doesn't make up for a lot of things. And perhaps it wasn't artillery school that ruined him, but rather his Harvard MBA?
We're all victims of our cultural pathway. I probably would make a really crappy arty CO and I have no doubts I'd dick up a Personnel Office within minutes of arrival.
By the way, do you know the actual platoon that did the rescue? The USMC MEU(SOC) extraction platoon was a MORTAR PLT!
That's what I'm talking about when I say we need to make our battalions "more special," not taking our best men out to increase the ranks of "special forces."
Yes, I'm a traitor to the tab.
United States v. KHADR (JTF-GTMO Military Commission)
June 29, 2007
DISPOSITION OF PROSECUTION MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION
COL Peter E. Brownback III USA, Military Judge
"By the way, do you know the actual platoon that did the rescue? The USMC MEU(SOC) extraction platoon was a MORTAR PLT!"
It is always the mortar platoon. They are also the trailer platoon (outboard security platoon) for any missions (pre-OIF) that included the SEAL detachment or the Force Recon lads. SEALS no longer do MEU floats, as they are now quite busy. These missions for those who wish to have more military gibberish thrown at them are: Small Boat raids, Airfield seizures, Gas and oil platform takedown (GOPLAT - or as we called em' GOSPLAT), MIO/VBSS (Maritime Interdiction Operations - Visit Board Search and Seizure.
IHR - (In-extremis hostage recovery - the ultimate door kicking wet dream) various missions in built up areas, On the less volatile side, you have NEO's non combatant evacuation operations, disaster relief, meals on wheels OPS (initial Somalia entry) and THIS
with THESE people was the last MEU I did....Mucho Fun. So the MEU's have a less High speed version of the old DELTA/Ranger model for that kind of activity, with the mortar guys taking the role of the rangers. everyone gets good training during the work up, and some of the HUMINT lads get to do it all with them. Some of the readers already know this stuff, like MSR.
I know this sounds like buzzkill, but...when do they get to train to be mortar maggots?
I know that when I shifted over to 11C it was with the Guard, and I barely got enough tube time (or MBC time, in my case) to be proficient at the bread-and-butter missions, let along the trick shooting you hust have to do to support and MEU-SOC. This is one of the arguments I've had with MSR in the past. He wants everyone to become more special. I agree, with the reservation that I'd rather have a slick STRAC mortarman than a half a mortarman and half a ranger infantryman. I've just been in the position of getting ten taskings with enough METT-T to accomplish eight half-assed, six to standard and four really well.
Anyway - that's the MEU's rice bowl, not mine.
And Westy - I also bumped into him, in my case as a spectator at a Division Review early in the 80's. Kind, decent gentleman, from what I could tell from my vantage point as enlisted scum. I don't think it was Harvard or Sill that was the problem, but just that he was a Corps Artillery kind of guy in a war that called for the most useful killing to be done with a pistol or, better yet, a knife.
Kinda like the one we're in now...
Westhisface's biggest sin was playing fast and loose with Intel so as too portray this dumb ass "light at the end of the tunnel" drug induced vision. The collection folks had every intel discipline's threat-o-meters pegged with the news that the NVA were increasing their infiltration numbers..Big Time. This would have made him look like a liar in LBJ's eyes. His actions were like hurling a loogie into the face of every Recon cat that ever counted bobbing heads in the cordillera.
His sin no 2 is related to number 1. He was an attrionist. Not necessarily a bad thing to be, since US Grant was of the same ilk. But Grant knew the numbers game. There were plenty more where that came from after a bad day at the office like Cold Harbor. Since Westy either did not believe the numbers, or squelched the real ones for GP, he was doomed, regardless of the numbers of killed he inflicted on the Bo Doi. Heck after the war, they admitted losses in excess of a million (not sure on exact number). This did not make any difference, as they had not even gotten around to drafting 17 year olds yet...they could have gone to 15 probably. Like I said "plenty more where they came from."
Here is something Ambd. Crocker had to say to Time's Joe Klien (28 JUN 07 article):
Time article
There is a disconnect somewhere ...
It seems that we do COIN when we have failed to win sufficient political support from the population. Which means we have a political failuer and now we are trying to make up for it by putting our troops into a fight where our national interest/political goals don't justify all out war.
Maybe we need to stop figuring out how to fight COIN and start figuring out how not to.
The whizbang gizmos now available make it a lot easier on us Intel guys. Obviously, we don't inject ourselves into an operation once it's going (at least most of us don't), but the ability to do what the Air Force terms "mission following" is a tremendous benefit when it comes time to debrief. When the team, aircrew or whoever come into debrief, I have their blue-force tracker trace already printed on a map, which make eliciting information from tired, hungry and often cranky personnel so much easier. It also saves the time of having to ask questions that annoy them like, "when did you arrive at point X." Since I already have that information it saves time and allows me to focus on items of genuine intelligence interest.
Many of the units I worked with had a data-link capability for texting messsages back and forth, but like you, most turned it off. They had enough to deal with without dicking around with a keypad on NVG's.
Like most any tool, these tech gizmos are open to abuse, and that's really where leadership comes in. Too often in today's military it seems that "management" is confused with "leadership." A manager will use those tools to "manage" his/her "subordinates." It kind of reminds me of that Lt. Gorman in the movie Aliens, actually.
Publius,
You've been to a lot more third-world shitholes than me, and for that I'm very jealous. By the time I really got going, the Navy was "showing the flag" in places like Australia though, so I can't complain too much.
I was in Hong Kong both before and after the turn-over and the only real difference I noticed was that Chinese flags had replaced the British ones.
Hey, Chief, I was going to sit this one out until you brought me into the mix. In this case, I take no pleasure in being proven somewhat prescient. But, then, I've got the advantage of experience and more exposure than I ever wanted to some pretty senior people.
It's always been this way, boys and girls. You think stupid general officers are new and unique to this time? Check Lincoln's problems with generals. And Pershing's. And those Roosevelt, Marshall and Eisenhower had. How long did it take LIncoln to find Grant? Look at the number of generals fired during WW2. Shit, we've got military installations in this country named after men who arguably should have been sent to prison for their butchery and indifference to the lives of their men.
One signal difference to me between our times and the earlier times is that we've somehow lost the ability to fire generals. Now, it seems, we no longer have those bad generals that we had in earlier times. Ever since WW2, it seems, our generals have all been perfect. That dick at Fort Hood clearly should not be leading anything more than a latrine detail, but here he is, Joe General. Well, screw him. He's a symptom of a serious societal problem. As anybody who's worked or invested in corporate America well knows; the phenomenom of the person who's ascended so high that he/she absolutely has to know what he/she is doing is well entrenched everywhere. We've long invested general officers with this mystical, magical aura and we shouldn't be overly surprised that many actually fail the test. We do the same things with presidents and corporate officials. Can anyone really think of any good reason why George Bush shouldn't be sent packing? Right now? I can't.
If we had a parliamentary system, we'd have already seen a change in leadership. I doubt our Founders would have seen any particular reason why Bush, et al, shouldn't leave. I also doubt they'd be too understanding about a society that kind of ho-hum accepts "a failed presidency" as par for the course and passively awaits the next election cycle. Our problem is that, despite their genius, our Founders gave us a system that's really fucking us these days. In their zeal to preclude the parliamentary abuses of the day, they gave us what's turned out to be an absolute monarchical system, tempered only by term limits. And that's where your bad military leadership comes from.
I put presidents, generals and corporate officials in pretty much the same bag, that bag of those whom are venerated so much by those in our society who just have to somehow honor rank and position. Some good, some not so good, and some who are just using up oxygen. The difference between corporate officials and presidents/generals is that the corporate guys just cost you money. And maybe your job. Bad presidents and generals not only cost money, but they actually kill people.
To paraphrase an old expression, "I have sworn everlasting enmity to those who casually waste American lives through their vainglorious political ambitions or through their refusal to learn how to fight the war with which they are faced instead of the war they want to fight." This is why you won't hear very much favorable from me about Lyndon Johnson, Robert McNamara, Richard Nixon or most of the generals of that time. It's also why I won't say much favorable about Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld et al on the political side, nor too many of today's generals. I've always been especially distressed about the generals. Frankly, I expect duplicity, double-dealing and lying from politicians. But I don't like seeing that from generals, especially when it's augmented by ass-kissing and stupidity.
I'm just an old troop. I don't want to see other troops die needlessly. I saw too much of that in Vietnam. Now I see it again. The one bright light I see is that junior officers are challenging their superiors. Good for them. We thought we'd gone some way towards addressing this problem after Vietnam, but we were clearly wrong. This issue of generals seems to be a generation-spanning problem. The only advice I would give these junior officers is that given to those who encounter snakes in the wilderness. Be absolutely sure that you've totally killed it off.
Oh, and MSR and Fast Eddie: Fuck Westmoreland.
"Fuck Westmoreland"....Errrr, I thought I agreed Publius.
Sorry, Eddie, you actually did. It was FDChief, who said nice things about ol' "Westy."
Guess you had to be there.
One of our safety issues at the time was convincing our young aviators to wear all their proper protective gear when flying. You know, helmet, Nomex (fire retardant) flight suits, sleeves rolled down, gloves, proper boots, etc. This was a particular emphasis issue with young WO instructor pilots teaching students to fly. These WOs had just returned from RVN and weren't always interested in conforming to "uncomfortable" rules.
Then one day, Soldier's Magazine did a photo spread and story about Westy's flight training that he was doing so he could "really understand this vital new part of the Army". Had a private instructor assigned. Was so "dedicated" that he ran from one activity to his day's flight instruction. The photos showed him at the controls wearing:
Class A uniform.
PT shorts, T-Shirt and athletic shoes.
Sweat Suit and athletic shoes.
And always a headset, not a helmet.
NEVER a Nomex Flight Suit and NEVER gloves.
The propaganda message to the uninformed was that Westy was so devoted to his flying lessons that he dropped everything to rush to the heliport to be on time, regardless of what he was wearing.
The clear message to line aviators and students was that safety regulations applied differently at the top. How do you discipline a line pilot who rolls his sleeves up and doesn't wear gloves when the CSA flies in PT shorts and a T-shirt?
Westy was fundamentally flawed, and it was only evident when he was in a position of high leadership.
That said, however, on the couple of occasions I was in his presence, he was a nice enough guy. But then, I can list hundreds of folks I would joyfully invite to my house for dinner that I wouldn't put in charge of a toilet paper resupply run.
Al
Agree, as you state, it is first of all a political question. The generals have become politicians, or rather the instruments of politicians, whereas the military is actually supposed to be a policy instrument. And yes, our current military is something of a reflection of our society, or at least the bureaucracies that we rely on to operate it.
I think the current Iraq problem goes back to something that both the Friers's second quote and Ross have mentioned - how policy has degenerated into domestic politics (or as Clausewitz would say subjective and specific political purpose has been taken over by "objective" political interests - those which define our society at the current time).
Instead of a single coherent policy we have a hydra-headed mass of powerful political interests many of which are contradictory. Dick Cheney's part-time job provided the initial platform to set this war in motion, but the nature of those goals did not lend themselves to achievement by military means so the war grinds relentlessly on. Along the way other interests jump on board Cheney's war wagon - PMC's, various arms dealers, political cronies looking for some of those vacuum-packed $ bales, the entire "war on terror" industry that has grown since 9/11, self-interested foreign actors, and even the Demo leadership since they hope to take over the powerful executive/VP office Cheney has built.
In other words we have hopeless strategic confusion. The war will go on, but our fortunes will continue to decline since this war is against the actual interests of the US, but then nobody in a position of actual power seems too worried about that. Everyone's looking out for themselves and since the chance of defeat or collapse is not even considered, "we are the sole superpower", the war continues under its own momentum of escallating violence, what C describes as a "blind nature force".
I know that Vietnam has particular interest to you and the memories must be particularly strong for fasteddiez, Al, Mike and yourself. But from my perspective the Vietnam war actually had something of a coherent strategic objective - the survival of the RVN (although based on the false premise of a monolithic communist threat)- whereas today? Simply a quagmire without the strategic coherence.
ES-
Welcome. Making a list of all the disconnections would take some time, that is if you were inclined to go down that particular rabbithole. Imo Bush's speech was all about justifying himself to that audience, not about what was really going on in Iraq, let alone laying out a strategy, that's not going to happen with this bunch. Notice how the news services only mentioned the kinda comparison to Israel, while ignorring all the other non sequitors.
You have, from my viewpoint, hit the nail on the head. Bush's addresses tend to justify the war rather than clarify where we are going. Politically, he and his party cannot afford to admit to mistakes. So, he sells his war.
The Iraqi war is supported by a variety of interests, but few, if any of those interests have the same objective. I am reminded of an analogy my favorite grad school management prof used to illustrate the diversity of individual objectives within an organization:
There is not the slightest shard of strategic coherence in the current war. It has simply taken on a life of its own.
Al
Back to the grand strategy thing. Since the cold war ended, its not been easy to think of a coherent one. We all know we'd like a safer more stable world. But something that generic is difficult to translate into real policy. So we just all agree we don't need one, and make up things on the fly.
I'd like to think we've arrived at the point now for the "Surge," but it is probably too late because of domestic political reasons that have nothing to do with the ground war in Iraq.
I think, perhaps, CPT Carter's initial discussion wasn't so lofty in its goals anyway. Rather, his plea is for the Army to develop a means of understanding traffic from the ground, up.
Some in here have alluded to "commander's intent," which most certainly takes on a heavy role in COIN. The problem for commander's, often, is understanding that their intent needs to change with circumstances on the ground. If they can't comprehend the nature of force in a complex, multicultural battleground, then the strategic corporals and captains find themselves fighting on two fronts -- one against a very calculating and deadly enemy, the other on a profoundly stupid and deadly leadership corps, often thousands of miles away.
I have explained certain generational reasons why we've arrived at a senior officer corps that is uniquely unacquainted with urban combat in a chaotic, multicultural battlescape, and why some generals just don't "get it."
No amount of classroom preparation can prepare the LTC-and-above ranks for the mental and moral qualities necessary for a leader to understand and adapt quickly to such a shifting environment. A good leader, at that point, would turn to his CPTs and ask if not their advice then their perspective.
This is something HR McMaster has done very effectively because he is, first, an intellectual of the highest rank and one not so concerned about his rank that he disregards what his strategic corporals are telling him.
It has been said by researchers who study us that the brainpower necessary to fight a kinetic war by a LTC is the same intelligence manifested by a neurosurgeon. So if war isn't "rocket science," at least it is comparable to "brain surgery," as the cliches go.
As medical technology has changed, so too has the way neurosurgeons do their jobs, relying more on lasers and various of forms of high-tech gadgetry to assist them in diagnosing illnesses, operating on patients and safeguarding their recovery.
So, too, should this newfangled technology assist us. When we, instead, become slaves to a diktat from DC, a form of technology that allows higher ranks to overturn instantaneously battlefield decisions made by the smartest of our smart bombs -- the strategic corporals -- then none of this is helping us at all.
To understand the technology we need, we need to understand the nature of this warfare. To understand the nature of this warfare, we must become again like the commanders we were trained to be -- open to learning, able to take correction, adapting and overcoming obstacles, in this case the obstacle being ourselves.
Some might not know this, but Sen McCain has often simply called up battalion commanders in the US Army and USMC. Why? He doesn't want to analyze information culled from generals he doesn't trust to "get it." He wants to hear from a whole lotta LTCs and below.
John Murtha, in the other side of the legislature and in a different party (and himself a veteran of combat) often wants to be debriefed by SGTs, many of whom he has visited in hospital.
They want to be informed political leaders. The shame is that they have long felt that they haven't been properly informed by those of the highest military and civilian ranks. As former combat veterans, they feel they better understand what a SGT or a LTC tells them than a general who has no working knowledge of COIN.
Perhaps as we "transform" our military technologically, we have to roll with the punches and "transform" our battlefield hierarch differently, too. Just as the INternet and other revolutions in information technology de-emphasize the hierarhical nature of knowledge we inherited from the industrial age, so should the leadership style in neo-warfare shift.
How's the weather in Greece anyway?
Agree. The war has been based on lies from the beginning . . . Bush's letter to Congress, 18 March 2003
Couple of additional comments-
A new grand strategy would have to look at our domestic situation and our status as a great power within a balance of competing power blocks as a whole. In all it is in our interest to work constructively with these other blocks, since just about everyone is playing to our music (or rather the music we had been conducting from 1945-2001). I mean when the leader of the Communist Chinese wears a business suit and wants to talk foreign investment. . . There has been a radical shift to the use of military force, preemptive war and the like since 9/11, but most foreigner leaders who support this policy see the "war on terror" as more the nature of an opportunity than a threat. Why this radical turn? I would argue that our actual grand strategy is the military dominstion of the "Greater Middle East" through the establishment of "lily pad" bases. This generates a large amount of reaction/friction, not only from the local populations and targeted governments, but also from China, Russia and even the EU.
So why this route? Basically imo it is because we see that the market system can no longer provide the essential element to what has driven our economy since WWII, that is cheap oil. In fact most of what has been built in the US since 1945 is based on the presumption of cheap oil - think suburban sprall, our highway system, the emphasis on truck/air transport as opposed to rail. China, India and others are developing their economies and the demand will only increase, so how to insure that we retain the lion's share? Our actions are prompting a reaction by all those with an interest in retaining the status quo, which is just about everyone except of course the Saudi and Pakistani militants.
Second, Big Tom's comment about Germany during and following WWI should be a flashing yellow light for us. Societies that prefer to believe self-serving delusions and leaders who avoid taking responsibility for their actions (as with Ludendorff, Hindenburg and the Greater General Staff after 1918) lead to sick societies, societies that eventually collapse due to their own internal contradictions and the external pressure that they provoke.
I am not sure that is true. It seems to me that we have had a coherent international grand strategy. Since early in Clinton's term we pursued a vision of creating a single international market. What is lacking is any coherent role for our military in that strategy. As a result, it is up for grabs as a political tool since it is no longer critical to the grand strategy.
Seydlitz,
Others have pointed this out before. There is a single world market for oil. Why do we need military control to "retain the lion's share" in a free market? We only have to be willing to pay for it.
On the other hand, there is enormous amounts of money to be made in pumping the oil out of the ground and selling it. It seems to me the usefulness of military force is less in making sure we have enough oil for our sprawling suburbanites to get to work, than in assuring it will be American companies that make the profits from the oil under the middle east.
The answer IMO is irrational fear. And of course the idiocy of seeking the end of dependance on imported oil.
The idea is to ensure the availability of mid east reserves. But the mideast is just one part of the overall picture. Consider VENEZUELA, no friend to the US, but the number 4 importer of oil.
In the end, the markets will ensure we have the oil we need.
Of course, if the Saudis decide to embargo the US, combined with the sanctions on Iran and the FUBAR production situation in Iraq, we will definately have problems.
But most likely, they will be problems of our own creation.
Which of course is not "cheap oil" which is what I was referring to. I don't particularly want to get into a discussion about how reliance on market solutions is pretty much one of our hard-wired myths, but if you are interested in reading the pessimistic view on the effects of peak oil . . . Peak Suburbia. If you are into the science of it follow the link to J. Brown's website and story.
I think Kunstler is probably close to correct about the effects of peak oil, although far too hopeful that it will kill suburbia. I just don't think there is a likely military solution to that problem.
reliance on market solutions is pretty much one of our hard-wired myths
Well, yes. But then, to some extent, so are military solutions.
Of course, if the Saudis decide to embargo the US
It is certainly in our interest that there be a relatively open market in oil. Would we use military force to break an embargo? We might, but I don't think that is particularly a threat at this point.
Such strategizing will solve the problem raised in the links.
Meanwhile, back in the real world, I'd like to hear from some of the former SULs in other parts of Iraq and Afghanistan (and, for Publius and AI, Vietnam) some feedback on LTC Nagl's question about the feasability of embedded transition/advisory teams, complete with their own MG-level commanders in two divisions.
For those with SF backgrounds, what do you see that's wrong with the MTT's structure? Does the lack of uniformity bother you?
For SF teams, we stress key competencies in languages, weapons, explosives, medicine and communications. Obviously, building a 250-team Advisory Corps proposed by Nagl would put some stresses on our current TRADOC series. At what rank would these Soldiers work best in the program? Would syphoning them from the AD be a negative for the total force?
How joint could it be? Could we have the sort of uniformity that would allow USN, USAF, USMC and USA members to pool their talents? Or should the Army keep this in-house?
Our BAT MTT had eight men, from SGT to LTC, with one combat augmentee, a SPC infantryman to whom we tried to give the Silver Star (he didn't care; in fact, when offered, he preferred the equivalent medal from the Iraqi Army. He's the only US servicemember we've found to have one of the Iraqi Army's most distinguished medals for battlefield heroism, so talk about a "strategic corporal" who gets it, right?).
But what should be the right size for a BAT MTT, and how could a DCT MTT or BCT MTT help their mission?
How much prestige could be put into a "Combat Advisor" tab? Should it carry the same prestige (and the same qualifications, essentially) as a SF tab?
For those of us deployed in the bush (drawn from across the Army, including a couple of PArNG and doc Reservists), what could be done to keep dependents notified of what is going on?
What have your experiences been in similar teams?
Seydlitz, you can explain to him what the NIC does, what DoD is, what a JOC strives to do and how these documents inform our TRADOC needs. He might also explain to you what a QDR is, what the last one said about future requirements for our warfighting services and what this means to taxpayers.
CPT Carter, I'm a bit surprised you didn't link to any of Krepinevich's post-Vietnam pieces.
WIth your background in regulatory issues, what expertise do you believe is going untapped now that will be needed to rebuild the armed forces? How would you restructure them? And, to borrow from Nagl, how would you "institutionalize" bottom-up leadership?
Yes and no (or, from Irish Gaelic Connemara Dialect, Ta agus Nil), right FDC?
First, Provisional IRA never had either the strategic or tactical capabilities that far-war al Qaeda, in its heyday, possessed in Afghanistan. Nor did the strength of the Provos ever match the range or effectiveness of franchised salafistic efforts such as AQI.
In fact, the Provos at their peak didn't have either the numbers or the impact that, say, the Horrors Brigade has right now as a bit player in Iraq.
Second, no matter the domestic threat of Provisional IRA, the UK sensibly never lost sight of its treaty obligations under NATO to oppose the Soviet enemy. At no time was British decision-making influenced to detract forces away from the Cold War battle because every IRA insurgent never added up to even the unlikely threat of Soviet strike capability.
Even in 1982, the UK never lost sight of its major mission to Europe, this at a time when a foreign military had seized British land near South America.
To a certain extent, this was true even of the US during Vietnam. At any given time, did we ever really have LESS of a focus on NATO because of our SEATO obligations?
No.
But we were dealing with different economies of scale. We had a conscripted military and a far higher share of GDP invested in defense than we do now. It's quite easy for a regional war to take over a larger chunk of our AVF planning and implementation, especially when the twin conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq combine to create more of a military problem for us than all the Irish ever did for the UK.
If we're comparing anything to Britannia, perhaps a closer analogy is the Boer War. Of course, that