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SWJED
01-09-2008, 06:21 AM
We Still Need the Big Guns (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/09/opinion/09dunlap.html?ref=opinion) by Major General Charles Dunlap Jr. - New York Times op-ed.


The relative calm that America’s armed forces have imposed on Iraq is certainly grounds for cautious optimism. But it also raises some obvious questions: how was it achieved and what does it mean for future defense planning?

Many analysts understandably attribute the success to our troops’ following the dictums of the Army’s lauded new counterinsurgency manual (http://usacac.army.mil/cac/repository/materials/coin-fm3-24.pdf). While the manual is a vast improvement over its predecessors, it would be a huge mistake to take it as proof — as some in the press, academia and independent policy organizations have — that victory over insurgents is achievable by anything other than traditional military force.

Unfortunately, starry-eyed enthusiasts have misread the manual to say that defeating an insurgency is all about winning hearts and minds with teams of anthropologists, propagandists and civil-affairs officers armed with democracy-in-a-box kits and volleyball nets. They dismiss as passé killing or capturing insurgents...

William F. Owen
01-09-2008, 10:29 AM
— that victory over insurgents is achievable by anything other than traditional military force.

Unfortunately, starry-eyed enthusiasts have misread the manual to say that defeating an insurgency is all about winning hearts and minds with teams of anthropologists, propagandists and civil-affairs officers armed with democracy-in-a-box kits and volleyball nets. They dismiss as passé killing or capturing insurgents...

I am broadly in agreement with this sentiment. Defeating any type of armed opponent still requires an effective degree of military force.

I would also add that the current fascination with so-called COIN risks creating an entirely predictable back lash, because the study of COIN may (or even has) become a source of promoting personal and organisational agendas. - and I speak as an advocate of Infantry Doctrine, so I am prone to just this hazard.

COIN is what most armies, spend most of their time doing. A skilled army posses the skills sets and equipment to operate across the spectrum of conflict. Being good at the top end, does not preclude being good at the bottom.

Gian P Gentile
01-09-2008, 01:02 PM
I am broadly in agreement with this sentiment.

As many might have guessed, me too!!

Unfortunately the American Army has become a counterinsurgency-only force which is exactly what MG Dunlap is getting at in his piece. I have also argued in other places that our hyper-focus on Counterinsurgency and our dogmatic approach to Iraq clouds our ability to see things in Iraq (and Afghanistan) as they really are.

Another solid piece in this regard that argues for an American ground force that is built on mobility, technology, and protection (and not a light infantry-only force for pre-determined irregular warfare in the future) is Major Daniel L Davis's Heavy and Agile (http://www.armedforcesjournal.com/2008/01/3208280)in the January edition of AFJ.

Steve Blair
01-09-2008, 02:08 PM
Once again it's an "either/or" scenario...and those don't work. I didn't really expect to see anything different from Dunlap, though.

Ron Humphrey
01-09-2008, 02:22 PM
As many might have guessed, me too!!

Unfortunately the American Army has become a counterinsurgency-only force which is exactly what MG Dunlap is getting at in his piece. I have also argued in other places that our hyper-focus on Counterinsurgency and our dogmatic approach to Iraq clouds our ability to see things in Iraq (and Afghanistan) as they really are.



For those of us without the exposure and experience to be able to clearly see it; would it be possible for you to help define how things really are that we might be missing?

MattC86
01-09-2008, 02:41 PM
Once again it's an "either/or" scenario...and those don't work. I didn't really expect to see anything different from Dunlap, though.

No, either/or is not particularly helpful, but there isn't the money or manpower available for everything. The Army and Marine Corps claim they need new troops, the Air Force claims it needs a new fighter fleet (and Dunlap, apparently, includes a fighter BEYOND the F-22?) and the Navy new submarines, cruisers, and a coming new fleet of aircraft carriers.

It's just not realistic. There's going to be major pressure for a drop in defense spending if we disengage from Iraq, especially if a Democrat is in office (and they control Congress), and even if there wasn't, there certainly wouldn't be a massive hike beyond current levels, as this piece suggests is necessary. Beyond that, there isn't time to train personnel effectively in all areas. Guys like Dunlap know there is no way we can do both, so it's a deceptive way of saying stop doing this COIN boondoggle and buy us more jets.

Prioritizing and compromising are difficult and painful, but just going to be a fact of life.

Matt

Gian P Gentile
01-09-2008, 02:49 PM
For those of us without the exposure and experience to be able to clearly see it; would it be possible for you to help define how things really are that we might be missing?

It has nothing to do with "exposure and experience" but a willingness to confront conventional wisdom and ask hard questions about what has really brought about the lowered levels of violence in Iraq; and then consider reasonable policies for the future that align ends and means with strategic interests.

Specifically to your question I lay out an argument in a short article that is currently running in Armed Forces Journal, Our Coin Doctrine Removes the Enemy from the Essence of War (http://www.armedforcesjournal.com/2008/01/3207722), which is a response to another article, More Soup Please: Coin Manual Provides Guidance for Modern-day Tactical Commanders (http://www.armedforcesjournal.com/2008/01/3144507), written by Major Chris Rogers, also in this edition of AFJ, that criticizes my earlier Eating Soup with a Spoon (http://www.armedforcesjournal.com/2007/09/2786780)piece.

gian

Ron Humphrey
01-09-2008, 03:25 PM
It has nothing to do with "exposure and experience" but a willingness to confront conventional wisdom and ask hard questions about what has really brought about the lowered levels of violence in Iraq; and then consider reasonable policies for the future that align ends and means with strategic interests.

Specifically to your question I lay out an argument in a short article that is currently running in Armed Forces Journal, Our Coin Doctrine Removes the Enemy from the Essence of War (http://www.armedforcesjournal.com/2008/01/3207722), which is a response to another article, More Soup Please: Coin Manual Provides Guidance for Modern-day Tactical Commanders (http://www.armedforcesjournal.com/2008/01/3144507), written by Major Chris Rogers, also in this edition of AFJ, that criticizes my earlier Eating Soup with a Spoon (http://www.armedforcesjournal.com/2007/09/2786780)piece.

gian

I remember when eating soup with a spoon first came to my attention and there where discussions about it.

Upon first reading it I responded with the following:


I can see in his writing that LTC Gentile is a soldiers soldier who see's the job for what it is; that being a fighter who's overarching purpose is fighting.

This being said I would think the true determining factor in how and when a counter-insurgency should be handled would be contingent on the expected outcome in the end.

In other words if one is fighting an insurgency in their own country for the survival of their pre-existing government/leadership infrastructure such as many communist/dictatorial countries have historically then attrition is a definitive goal of their actions.

Also in this context they seek to discourage any further growth of that insurgency through harsh and awe inspiring action designed to create fear of standing against their power.

This is where I think the greatest difference can be found in Iraq. One would not expect police officers to come into a riot/demonstration and shut it down through attritive actions despite how much the adrenalin rush might do for the the officers mental states in as far as believing in their cause.

If the ultimate goal of any military is to provide an environment in which a democratic construct and new culture of empowered populace may come into existence than you kind of have to change your approach from that of a traditional war or counter insurgency standard.

If your soldier staying in a joint station, armed and looking for the enemy is unable to feel relatively safe than one would assume that that local populace definately is not in a situation where they may try to stand up.

As soldiers your job is to fight this is true, just as a boxer's job is to box. There are however countless factors outside of the physical interaction that the boxer must study and be aware of in order to enter the ring confidently. Once the bell rings it comes down to mano y mano but if you know that the other guy can't last longer than 2 rounds than your first step is to avoid contact and keep him moving to wear him down.
This helps to equalize the battle when it does happen. and just as in the boxing match in order to win punches must be thrown so to even in counter insurgency the blows will come ( from both sides).

Long and short I think 3- 24 is not meant to redefine war so much as to guide and encourage thought before during and after the actions take place.

I wrote this in September of last year. I have continued to study, listen and learn all I could in regards to your concerns and yet I consistently come back to one major conclusion.

3-24 was not written to replace 3-0 and as such it would seem that those responsible for developing it would be just as if not more concerned about it being applied in ways not intended. I believe they have shown this is true in their honest responses and continued reminders to all that it's not everything but something very important given current operational environments.

In the effort to build and maintain true Full Spectrum capabilities it is and ( I don't see anyone saying differently) just as important that the force be skilled in large scale manuever and warfare as small and assymetric capabilities. I can tell you one thing I know without a doubt.

Any Brigade commander would have a much better chance of deploying a truly capable large or small scale fighting capability now then they would have between 1990 -2000. Simply if for no other reason than the officers and enlisted now have not only recieved more effective training but most have been there done that on both scales at this point.

Although I understand your underlying concerns, It really would seem that considering the current training and fighting cultures, Forgetting about the big fights would be about the last thing most soldiers would do.

But as I said this is just my take on it for what it's worth

Steve Blair
01-09-2008, 03:30 PM
Although I understand your underlying concerns, It really would seem that considering the current training and fighting cultures, Forgetting about the big fights would be about the last thing most soldiers would do.

But as I said this is just my take on it for what it's worth

My fear remains that, as they have constantly in the past, too many will forget about the smaller fights. They're far more common in our operational history, and we tend to do poorly in them in many cases. That's why we cannot afford the "either/or" mindset any longer.

Old Eagle
01-09-2008, 05:32 PM
He is therefore a master of framing arguments to suit his purpose. If you're busting some guy, you want him as a prosecutor. If you're up on charges, you want him defending your butt.

1. He indeed frames his argument as either/or and once you buy into that, then much of his rationale indeed follows.

2. Gian is right in that the Army is overwhelmed by COIN. Not by choice. We are simply too small not to have everyone engaged. Our PME is definitely not COIN-only, nor should it be. And our senior leadership is definitely not COIN only.

3. 3-24 is not a Boy Scout handbook and it does not say that kinetic operations are unimportant.

Competent conventional (multi-purpose) forces are critical. I haven't heard anyone argue otherwise. To be clear on the predominant USAF perspective, no future enemy will be so accomodating as to line up all their tanks in a populationless environment ever again, and if they do, we don't need ground forces to deal with them.

We definitely need concentional heavy forces to man the next equivalent of the Fulda Gap.:D

Ken White
01-09-2008, 05:42 PM
Though Cav Guy's picture makes you look younger... :D

RTK
01-09-2008, 07:16 PM
We definitely need concentional heavy forces to man the next equivalent of the Fulda Gap.:D

There's always the option of getting people like Stan to antagonize the Russians enough to start Cold War II. :D

Stan
01-09-2008, 08:47 PM
There's always the option of getting people like Stan to antagonize the Russians enough to start Cold War II. :D

Can Do Sir...Consider it done...When should I start :D

J Wolfsberger
01-09-2008, 08:52 PM
;)
Competent conventional (multi-purpose) forces are critical. I haven't heard anyone argue otherwise. To be clear on the predominant USAF perspective, no future enemy will be so accomodating as to line up all their tanks in a populationless environment ever again, and if they do, we don't need ground forces to deal with them.

We definitely need concentional heavy forces to man the next equivalent of the Fulda Gap.:D

To reinforce your point, the Army is working on Heavy Brigade Combat Teams as well as Stryker Brigade Combat Teams. The improvement is that adding the ability to conduct COIN ops gave us full spectrum capability.


There's always the option of getting people like Stan to antagonize the Russians enough to start Cold War II. :D

And how do you know he isn't already?;)

MattC86
01-09-2008, 09:20 PM
;)

To reinforce your point, the Army is working on Heavy Brigade Combat Teams as well as Stryker Brigade Combat Teams. The improvement is that adding the ability to conduct COIN ops gave us full spectrum capability.

I'm not entirely up to speed on exactly what the TO&E and capabilities of a SBCT are versus a heavy brigade, but what does the Army view the role of SBCTs being in a high-intensity combat environment?

Or do they plan to shuffle its personnel back into some Abrams and Bradleys to fight a more conventional war?



;)And how do you know he isn't already?;)

I'm willing to bet several six-packs of beer that tensions with Russia have been on the rise in the years since Stan arrived in Estonia.

Matt

Cavguy
01-09-2008, 09:37 PM
He is therefore a master of framing arguments to suit his purpose. If you're busting some guy, you want him as a prosecutor. If you're up on charges, you want him defending your butt.

1. He indeed frames his argument as either/or and once you buy into that, then much of his rationale indeed follows.

2. Gian is right in that the Army is overwhelmed by COIN. Not by choice. We are simply too small not to have everyone engaged. Our PME is definitely not COIN-only, nor should it be. And our senior leadership is definitely not COIN only.

3. 3-24 is not a Boy Scout handbook and it does not say that kinetic operations are unimportant.



Agreed with all - more later - the either/or rhetoric is tiring and severely underestimates the intelligence and flexibility of our officers and NCO's - and the role of kinetic ops. I've beat that dead horse in other threads - here (http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?p=29675#post29675), here (http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?p=29406#post29406), here (http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?p=29379#post29379), here (http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?p=26987#post26987), here (http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?t=3951), and here (http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?p=23016#post23016).

Bottom lines - a) force is not necessairly bad in COIN, you just have to think about it before you do it - and COIN doctrine doesn't state otherwise b) we have smart, adaptable leaders who need grounding in COIN theory before being asked to execute it (not true prior to 2003), c) Dropping bombs and shooting artillery has its uses, and d) there is a leadership disconnect issue in the army that is driving many promising junior officers away, e) we need to get away from this amateurish either/or debate about competencies and define what our leaders SHOULD look like for the future. HINT: it's neither a COIN/IW or a MCO specialist, but somehwere in between - finding what that is should be our direction, and get past this COIN/MCO focus name calling.

J Wolfsberger
01-09-2008, 09:50 PM
I'm not entirely up to speed on exactly what the TO&E and capabilities of a SBCT are versus a heavy brigade, but what does the Army view the role of SBCTs being in a high-intensity combat environment?

Or do they plan to shuffle its personnel back into some Abrams and Bradleys to fight a more conventional war?

3rd of the 2nd Infantry was the first formed. You can check out its MTO&E on Wikipedia. The Stryker/LAV has a lot of capability. The Army would probably emply SBCTs as mech infantry, absent the ability to fight mounted. (Remember, the Infantry's basic mobility still comes from the Foot, Mark 1. ;))


I'm willing to bet several six-packs of beer that tensions with Russia have been on the rise in the years since Stan arrived in Estonia.


And I am not willing to take that bet. :D

Stan
01-09-2008, 10:09 PM
And I am not willing to take that bet. :D

Good choice ! Matt, send the beer :D

MattC86
01-09-2008, 10:33 PM
Cavguy, great post. I figure the COIN tactics are designed to separate the insurgent fish from the sea, allowing him to be destroyed by kinetic or political means - and the combination thereof, in whatever percentage you like - eventually eliminates the insurgency. And I agree that it is a matter more of training leaders and troops to be comfortable in different environments, rather than providing an equipment/force structure that is optimized for this mission or that.

JWolfsberger, I looked at the TO&E, but mechanized divisions in the Cold War had indigenous armor - in Fred Franks' into the storm, he says the difference in tanks between an armored division (he had 1st and 3rd, + 1st Cav) and 1st Infantry (Mechanized) was 50-75 tanks. 1st Inf had a large indigenous tank force. Without it, they couldn't have done the breach. Forced entry ops would require chopping tank assets to the SBCT, unless you were going to ditch the self-contained BCT idea for the operation and work as a division.

I'll probably let this go just because I know I'm moving out of my depth here.

And finally, Stan, you're gonna have to travel to collect. Free beer offerings don't come without hidden costs.:D

Matt

Gian P Gentile
01-09-2008, 11:37 PM
...the either/or rhetoric is tiring and severely underestimates the intelligence and flexibility of our officers and NCO's - and the role of kinetic ops...we need to get away from this amateurish either/or debate about competencies and define what our leaders SHOULD look like for the future. HINT: it's neither a COIN/IW or a MCO specialist, but somehwere in between - finding what that is should be our direction, and get past this COIN/MCO focus name calling.

I am not sure where you get the idea that Dunlap, or me, or others are taking an "either/or" position. I am certainly not nor is Dunlap in his oped. Of course we need the capability to do Coin and MCO but how do you build a force and train it to do both in resource constrained environment. If you were a battalion commander today and you knew you had to deploy your battalion to iraq in 10 months what would be your focus? To complicate matters a bit and to build on this hypothetical, what if you could look into a crystal ball and you knew that 6 months after you returned from Iraq your battalion would be deployed to Korea to fight against a north korean invasion of the south? How would you structure your training in these hypotheticals?

The point that Dunlap makes that many still dont want to accept is that the American Army has become a counterinsurgency only force; so to use your words its not an academic argument over either a coin force or an MCO force; instead it is an ACTUAL problem that the American army is now ONLY Coin. That is a reality and a problem that we must face squarely and accept and was the point of the Dunlap oped.

In another thread there is talk about the new FM 3-0 being released in February. Will it receive the same attention that FM 3-24 did when it was released over a year ago? Will the authors of the new FM 3-0 be appearing on the Charlie Rose show anytime soon? I hope so but sadly i suggest probably not. I dont make this comment to be mean (or catty) toward those who have appeared on the Charlie Rose (or other popular shows) but to highlight the point that our Army today is a Coin only force and we should be worried about that.

gg

jcustis
01-10-2008, 12:30 AM
Sir,

No disrespect intended, but what the hell does an Air Force officer know about what is going on in the Army at 6' AGL? Seriously?


Actually, the reality is quite different. The lesson of Iraq is that old-fashioned force works. Add 30,000 of the world’s finest infantry to the 135,000 battle-hardened troops already there, as we have done, and the outnumbered insurgency is in serious trouble. Detain thousands more Iraqis as security threats, and the potential for violence inevitably declines. Press reports indicate that the number of Iraqis in prison doubled over the last year, to 30,000 from 15,000; and while casualty figures are sketchy, military officials told USA Today last September that the number of insurgents killed was already 25 percent higher in 2007 than in all of 2006.

I think the term "force" may have been confused with the warfighting principle of "mass". I'm not so sure that the surge resulted in more applied force. I could be wrong, but I'm not so sure.


The problem emerges when we consider pouring excessive resources into preparing for only one kind of conflict. Doing so would put us at real risk of losing the technological superiority that has kept America’s vastly more dangerous threats at bay. Consider, for example, that our warplanes are on average more than 25 years old.

C'mon for chrissakes...what are these excessive resources? Is this an example of what they call a strawman argument? Any references? Or is there a concern that the MRAP purchases are sinking funding for advance technology fighters? Based on the exact lessons of Iraq, would we be wrong to assume that IEDs are going to be employed in a Korean peninsula scenario? I read the op-ed, and it smells like just another thinly-veiled and parochial push to advance a service-slanted agenda.

I think RTK and Cavguy will agree with my assertion that current operations are different than conventional operations to some degree, but closer to a wide range of fights that FM 3-0 or MCDP 1-X is designed to show a path for, than people sometimes see at higher levels.

I think of RTK because when I asked him if he had any schoolhouse insight on recce tactics in Iraq in the COIN context, he told me flatly that although there were certain twists, reconnaissance and security was just like the pubs laid out...reconnaissance and security.

As a case in point, I've always tried to get it into the head of my light armored recon brethren that if we were capable of conducting nothing more than zone recon, area security, and a screen, then an LAR company could accomplish just about anything it needed to perform in Iraq. IED layers are not much more (once they've reached the emplacement phase) different than the Soviet combat reconnaissance patrols of the old COE that were trying to penetrate the security screen. Interdicting the other phases of the IED cycle may require different fine motor skills, but the gross motor skills are pretty much the same. Conduct tactical movement, establish a screen, conduct surveillance under all visibility conditions, etc.

As for crystal-balling the prospect of fighting in Korea, that's smashmouth stuff, so I wouldn't be too worried about training my troops in 50-100 Korean control phrases. Is it wrong-headed to think that way and not say, "well, we were flat-footed in our Arabic skills prior to the invasion, so we should brush up on Korean..."? Perhaps, but we don't live in a world with crystal balls.

William F. Owen
01-10-2008, 01:13 AM
Lots of UK battalions, over 30 years, used to go from Germany, where they were mech, to do a 4 month light forces tour in Northern Ireland doing ... COIN!!

MRAPs may well prove their worth in Big wars, which will almost be certainly followed by some other type of conflict. You need to be able to do both, and you can. - and some do.

RTK
01-10-2008, 01:22 AM
I want to make sure I understand the use of COIN as you're using it. When I think COIN, I'm thinking a kinetic and non-kinetic operations with the goal of defeating a non-uniformed paramilitary force within a certain geographic area. I do not include training urban operations as COIN, as I think they're applicable even in a "Fulda Gap" setting (especially with the majority of the Earth's people living in urbanized settings). I don't include reacting to an IED, since it's essentially the same thing as reacting to an obstacle once you substitute EOD with Combat Engineer.

I can catagorically tell you that the Army is not fully COIN. Out of an 84 day POI our students spend exactly 5 days conducting either COIN missions or COIN training. Even much of that would be applicable in a HIC environment (room clearing, building searches, Urban operations).

Like jcustis said above and I beleive I've communicated to you as well; Teaching the basics and fundamentals through the context of HIC is much easier to understand. When it's tank on tank, it's fairly black and white. Using this as a baseline, then I can branch off and talk specifically about operations in urban environments. From there I can delve into COIN and experiences I had in both OIF I and OIF III and how dynamically different they were, not only due to differing geographic areas, but also because of changing TTPs for both Bluefor and insurgent, changing policies, changing ROEs, and changing threats.

At the end of the day an attack is an attack is an attack. Reconnaissance fundamentals remain the same regardless of setting, as do security fundamentals. The law of land warfare is the same. The tourniquet goes on the same way. My boresight culminator works the same. My track wears off and needs to get replaced. Training management stays the same. My Soldiers need to get counselled once a month. They still get paid on the 1st and 15th. The 5988 is filled out the same way.

I guess what I'm really saying is that you can train for both and be proficient in both. There's a hell of a lot of crossover. Nowadays with the way the world is, you'd better be good at both (Edit to add - I was typing this when William posted and I couldn't agree more). I think the Marine Corps has caught onto this faster than we have in a lot of respects. That, to me, is a leadership issue at the small unit level.

One last thing: I don't know of a single S3 who will use anything but FM 3-0 or FM 5-0 when organizing for MDMP. FM 3-24 might get pulled out for some eaches and owns depending on the mission set, but it doesn't tell me a damned thing about MDMP or how my OPORD and Annexes will be written. I have yet to meet the officer who thinks differently.

I understand your frustration, Sir, but I can tell you, at least from my hatch, the sky is not falling.

Ken White
01-10-2008, 02:09 AM
thread, I agreed with you that it would be a bad mistake to go over to a total COIN mode. I also posited that to go to a total MCO mode would be equally bad -- as we have learned...

I ended by saying:

"It's mostly about protecting the institution. To fight WW II.

We need to be able to do that but we could be a whole lot smarter in how we go about it and still be prepared to cope with the more likely threats in the next decade or so."
... Of course we need the capability to do Coin and MCO but how do you build a force and train it to do both in resource constrained environment...Well, if it were up to me, I'd really train initial entry folks; enlisted and officer, on the basics. We have undertrained at the level since time immemorial, certainly for my entire lifetime -- and that includes WW II (Not, as RTK and UBoat would have some believe, WW I). Every after action report I've seen from both Afghanistan and Iraq, the CALL Bulletins, the news reports, even the TV and still pics point out that most units -- not all -- and most people -- again not all -- do not have a good handle on the basics. We rarely do...
If you were a battalion commander today and you knew you had to deploy your battalion to iraq in 10 months what would be your focus?I'd make sure they had the basics down pat and then pay lip service to my DMETL.
...To complicate matters a bit and to build on this hypothetical, what if you could look into a crystal ball and you knew that 6 months after you returned from Iraq your battalion would be deployed to Korea to fight against a north korean invasion of the south? How would you structure your training in these hypotheticals? I'd make sure they had the basics down pat and then would pay lip service to my DMETL.

I am not being flip, really, you asked and that is what I would do. I have watched too many people get hurt or killed because they could not perform basic combat tasks. I've fought in MCO (as a Tanker and a Scout) and in COIN ops (As an ODA member, a Scout and an infantryman) and I've switched between the two -- along with an entire Division that was in process of recovering from 32% casualties in three weeks and, really, it just isn't that hard to move between the roles.

I submit the problem is not the time or cost, it is the way we train -- or, more accurately, fail to train. We train to task; well and good -- but the 'condition' varies extremely widely in combat and our stultifying training process cannot cope with that.

If I was going to combat as a Battalion Commander, I hope I'd do what was best and hope I'd be willing to take the flak for doing so -- which I know would come and I also know is not easy. Which brings me to our far too competitive promotion system but I guess that's for another thread another time.
The point that Dunlap makes that many still dont want to accept is that the American Army has become a counterinsurgency only force; so to use your words its not an academic argument over either a coin force or an MCO force; instead it is an ACTUAL problem that the American army is now ONLY Coin. That is a reality and a problem that we must face squarely and accept and was the point of the Dunlap oped.While I disagree with Dunlap on many levels (and on most occasions when he writes his parochial screeds) I do not dispute that the Army has become a COIN only force. I submit that's to be expected; the current war for a relatively small army is a COIN war. I don't think it's realistic to expect it to be anything else. The issues thus are can that Army switch rapidly enough to do conventional if necessary. I think yes, you apparently disagree. A second issue and I submit a more important one is when the disengagement from that COIN war comes -- and it will come -- will the Army once again reject all to do with COIN as it did from 1975 until 2004 or so? I would hope not because the Generals way back when hung their hat on the utterly fallacious Weinberger and Powell Doctrines. Those were not doctrines but wishful thinking on the part of the Army leadership who wished to pick their wars.

Can't do that as both Clinton and Bush 43 have proven -- and as I suspect, the next President or two will have to do. Wars are not started by the Generals; they are started by circumstances and politicians and the generals cannot control either of those and attempts such as the 1975-2004 efforts to do so are doomed to fail.

The Army had an obligation to have a multi spectrum force available for the Nation during that period. They answered several calls in that time frame that worked out, the one they answered in the Spring of '03 did not. We should not try to reinvent that wheel.

As long as there are those who totally reject anything to do with COIN, there will be a tendency for the Army to over compensate and adopt that "no COIN" posture because it is easier for everyone. It may be easier but it won't be right...

We've got to be a full spectrum force and we are capable of doing that. A start is to worry less about the doctrine and the parochial battles over spectrum and fix our gigantic training problem. If we do that, we can do full spectrum easily.

Rank amateur
01-10-2008, 02:20 AM
For what it's worth, RTK has convinced me that he's right.

Norfolk
01-10-2008, 04:58 AM
It is, admittedly, rather easier to have a unit capable of switching between the various levels of warfare if they don't have to spend much of their Unit training time having to make up for deficiencies in individual basic skills and sub-unit tactical skills that BT and AIT don't have the time to cover in real depth, or in some cases may not be taught at all due to time constraints. Between that, and the relatively frequent individual rotation of personnel through units, there just may not be as much time available as there otherwise could be to cover a wide and comprehensive range of tasks, and to do so properly and thoroughly in each one. It remains a persistent wonder to other English-speaking Armies why the US Army persists in refusing to put its Combat Arms troops through six solid months of individual training before going to their Units, and three solid months of NCO training for small unit leaders (excluding the Ranger course, of course).

The US Army, even with its present financial constraints, enjoys a relative lavishness of resources (note that I say in general) other Armies can only dream of. It seems a small price to pay then for long individual training courses and a Regimental-type system, or even something like COHORT (in some ways even better). That way, so much of the individual and sub-unit training that is required for a Unit to perform in everything from COIN to General War is already mostly taken care of and just has to be maintained (easier to do than to gain in the first place), leaving a good deal more time and resources available for the rest. And a revival of COHORT or the introduction of a Regimental system means much less personnel turnover to sabotage your unit training efforts.

As Wilf was in effect pointing out, COIN training is comparatively easier to acquire and maintain than the General War stuff, simply by ensuring that the same basic individual and small unit skills that are needed for fighting WWIII are thoroughly inculcated in basic training ; it has worked for the Brits decades until just recently, and the other Commonwealth Armies do it from time to time. Once the basic individual and small-unit skills are trained to a high standard in basic training, the majority of the training that a unit needs for COIN and other Low-Intensity stuff is already done, and just has to be maintained. Aside from some minor- and major-unit-level COIN training, most of the unit training cycle can be devoted to the higher-intensity matter that can't be skimped on. If Formations and even Units are spending an inordinate amount of time on COIN training as opposed to spending the great majority of their time on Conventional Warfare training, something is quite wrong.

All that said, if a unit is given only 6 months to prepare to switch from one role to another, that's a problem in anyone's Army. 12 months isn't really enough in peacetime, and a lot of people would give their eye-teeth for an 18-month unit training cycle. None of which is even remotely possible for the US Army right now.

Adam L
01-10-2008, 05:45 AM
No, either/or is not particularly helpful, but there isn't the money or manpower available for everything. The Army and Marine Corps claim they need new troops, the Air Force claims it needs a new fighter fleet (and Dunlap, apparently, includes a fighter BEYOND the F-22?) and the Navy new submarines, cruisers, and a coming new fleet of aircraft carriers.

It's just not realistic. There's going to be major pressure for a drop in defense spending if we disengage from Iraq, especially if a Democrat is in office (and they control Congress), and even if there wasn't, there certainly wouldn't be a massive hike beyond current levels, as this piece suggests is necessary. Beyond that, there isn't time to train personnel effectively in all areas. Guys like Dunlap know there is no way we can do both, so it's a deceptive way of saying stop doing this COIN boondoggle and buy us more jets.


It's not realistic, but unfortunately necessary. The AF needs new aircraft. The more advanced aircraft have short lifespans. The AF made a big mistake "skipping" a generation of fighter after the F15 in order to jump ahead to the F22. Advanced avionics and composite structures are only dependable to 20 years. (Look at all the grounded F15's) We are stuck replacing them every 20-?30? years from here on out. Whether we replace them with a newer version of the same aircraft or develop a new aircraft is a big question.

The Navy definitely needs new ships (or to retrofit current ships which would cost just as much if not more.) Although I am skeptical of many of the ships under development (and the overall direction of it), I must admit that it's necessary.

The Army does need more men (and a lot of equipment.) I'm not as sure about the Marine Corp, but that stems from the debate of exactly where they fit into everything these days (something that seems to be an ongoing and popular debate on this site.)



Prioritizing and compromising are difficult and painful, but just going to be a fact of life.

Matt

The problem is I don't think there is much we can do without there. This country could afford all of this (recruiting is a different issue) if we were more economically responsible and practical. A big defense budget (a responsible one) is good for America and the economy. People need to start understanding this.

(Sorry about this rant. Especially since it's a little late.)

Adam L

Gian P Gentile
01-10-2008, 12:54 PM
Sir,No disrespect intended...As for crystal-balling the prospect of fighting in Korea, that's smashmouth stuff, so I wouldn't be too worried about training my troops in 50-100 Korean control phrases. Is it wrong-headed to think that way and not say, "well, we were flat-footed in our Arabic skills prior to the invasion, so we should brush up on Korean..."? Perhaps, but we don't live in a world with crystal balls.

Jcustis; no disrespect taken in the least; blogs are raw and democratic by nature.

My point with the hypothetical was to conceive of the fundamental problem at hand here; how do you construct and army to satisfy policy and strategic interests? Answering such questions does involve choices which is why i posed the hypothetical question. I do agree with Wilf and Norfolk (and also I think what Ken White was getting at on training) on previous threads and postings that if you have to cheat in a direction toward training and preparation it should be toward hic because of the mortal danger of loosing one of those fights. I have never said that our army should just do one or the other; my point has always been that we need both capabilities but that now, actually, we can only do one. I hear what RTK says about how we train lts in his obc course which is great. But from the big picture and overall the reality is that now as an operatioanal army we can essentially onle do one thing; and that is coin. I appreciate the argument that practically perhaps this is how it should be because of the current fight that we are in but it does nevertheless still lead to the conclusion that we are a coin only force which brings me back again to the essential point that Dunlap made.

gian

jcustis
01-10-2008, 01:36 PM
It remains a persistent wonder to other English-speaking Armies why the US Army persists in refusing to put its Combat Arms troops through six solid months of individual training before going to their Units, and three solid months of NCO training for small unit leaders (excluding the Ranger course, of course).

The US Army, even with its present financial constraints, enjoys a relative lavishness of resources (note that I say in general) other Armies can only dream of. It seems a small price to pay then for long individual training courses and a Regimental-type system, or even something like COHORT (in some ways even better). That way, so much of the individual and sub-unit training that is required for a Unit to perform in everything from COIN to General War is already mostly taken care of and just has to be maintained (easier to do than to gain in the first place), leaving a good deal more time and resources available for the rest.

I have longed for this ever since I read an article in Leatherneck Magazine that detailed the comprehensive training required to grow a British Royal Marine. I was stunned considering what they cover across the months. This ties into the ability for a small unit to be able to remain somewhat combat effective even after sustaining leader casualties - a lot of the solid foundational training is already in the individual who has to step up. You would think theat during the garrison years pre-9/11 that professional military education schools would have been brimming with eager students, but IIRC the opposite was true for whatever reason, with routine holes and under-strength class sizes. Now that units are awash with GWOT funds, there is so much specialized training going on for 1-3 week lengths that it is hard to keep up. That's for another thread I suppose.


But from the big picture and overall the reality is that now as an operatioanal army we can essentially onle do one thing; and that is coin.

I guess I'm unable to grasp what the Army is unprepared to do at the Operational Level of war. Is it a matter of artillery regiments not being able to train together, or armor elements not being able to conduct larger exercises, or is it the waning proficiency in (for the Corps) amphibious operations because it's spent a lot more time feet dry? If that's what you're alluding to, then I would agree to an extent. I wouldn't say that the land forces have become COIN only though, because it requires a lot of non-COIN skills to pull of something like Fallujah vers 2.0, and from watching the goings on from the peninsula, we did pretty good considering the opponent and assymetric threats.

The resident expertise remains resident in the officers and SNCOs who are at the tip of the spear. Even for those still slated to grind through grade-relevant PME, the aspect of COIN often comes either at the end of the main package, or it is woven through the periods of instruction which still focus on waging HIC (at least for my viewpoint in the Corps). The fact that we haven't shut down our formal schools despite manning shortfalls within the operating forces is another choice that I would argue is testament to the fact that the land components have not made a massive resource or mindset shift toward just COIN.

If you could offer some cases in point of what you mean sir, it may be easier for some of us to grasp where you are coming from on this matter.

RTK
01-10-2008, 01:47 PM
I liken the military's fixation on COIN to ESPN's focus on College Basketball and College Football throughout the year.

Right now it's COIN season for the military. In March ESPN doesn't talk too much about the BCS because it's March Madness. In August they don't talk about college basketball because the football season is beginning. We're engaged in Afghanistan, Iraq, the Phillipines, and any number of other countries conducting COIN. That doesn't mean we're not training our other core competencies. I say we are.

How many BN Cdrs hav jumped up and down on the BDE commander's desk beacuse they haven't shot a gunnery in the last 6 months? How many units integrate HIC and COIN into their NTC rotations? If they don't, they're not providing their Soldiers with what they need to be successful.

J Wolfsberger
01-11-2008, 07:37 PM
Link: http://www.armedforcesjournal.com/2008/01/3208280

I think this take on the situation captures it well.

Gian P Gentile
01-11-2008, 09:05 PM
Link: http://www.armedforcesjournal.com/2008/01/3208280

I think this take on the situation captures it well.

me too which is why i posted and recommended it on another thread. Major Daniels does warn against getting so fixated on the current fight (coin) that it causes us to conclude that the future will just look just like today and then build a force structure around that misconception.

gg

RTK
01-11-2008, 09:09 PM
me too which is why i posted and recommended it on another thread. Major Daniels does warn against getting so fixated on the current fight (coin) that it causes us to conclude that the future will just look just like today and then build a force structure around that misconception.

gg

I agree with everything MAJ Davis wrote here. What if FCS is built upon a flawed premise? I don't like the capabiliites I lose as a recon guy with the FCS at all.

I don't disagree with LTC Gentile on this area of the subject. I just respectfully disagree that we've become an exclusively COIN Army.

J Wolfsberger
01-11-2008, 09:28 PM
Having read a lot of the input, it seems that I'm hearing that our training has been dominated by COIN. Understandable, because that's the war we're in. I had a different perspective, knowing the effort going into material development to support full spectrum ops. I've come around to LTC Gentile's point of view, but I'm not sure it's really a problem that will bite us in the alpha.

J Wolfsberger
01-11-2008, 09:29 PM
me too which is why i posted and recommended it on another thread. Major Daniels does warn against getting so fixated on the current fight (coin) that it causes us to conclude that the future will just look just like today and then build a force structure around that misconception.

gg

Sorry about the repost. I used the search function thinking it would already be here, but it didn't show up. :o

Ken White
01-11-2008, 10:06 PM
RTK said:
I don't disagree with LTC Gentile on this area of the subject. I just respectfully disagree that we've become an exclusively COIN Army.I agree with that. Both thoughts. I'd also suggest that the current emphasis on COIN is, as many say, totally understandable -- that's what we're doing now.

Thus it may appear that we're over emphasizing it but that perception is heightened by the fact that our determination from 1975 until 2005 to concentrate solely on MCO and thus to deny that the COIN function existed, much less was an Army mission, led to a capability gap that was -- or should have been -- an embarrassment to the Army and many who 'grew up' in that era prefer the relative clarity and ease of focus a single mission type provides and though they prove daily they can adapt to the COIN arena, they don't like it (who would? Totally understandable) and want to move away from it.

The world today is chaotic, is not itself simple enough to allow that and it has been repeatedly proven that politics and not Army desires are the determinant on where, when and to do what the US Army will be deployed in future -- and no one can predict that where, when or what...

I'm less afraid of excessive emphasis on COIN than I am of an overcompensation led by both the heavy and FCS communities over the next few years to again relegate COIN to oblivion because of the threat to equipment purchases or for other reasons. That would be a mistake, one we've made before and do not need to repeat.

We can do all the missions; MCO and COIN and things that lay between the two. We may have to do them all. The emphasis and effort should be on how to get there -- not to exclude a spectrum for cost savings and simplicity. The troops can handle it.

Can the system?

Gian P Gentile
01-12-2008, 01:32 AM
...Thus it may appear that we're over emphasizing it but that perception is heightened by the fact that our determination from 1975 until 2005 to concentrate solely on MCO and thus to deny that the COIN function existed, much less was an Army mission, led to a capability gap that was -- or should have been -- an embarrassment to the Army and many who 'grew up' in that era prefer the relative clarity and ease of focus a single mission type provides and though they prove daily they can adapt to the COIN arena, they don't like it (who would? Totally understandable) and want to move away from it.

The world today is chaotic, is not itself simple enough to allow that and it has been repeatedly proven that politics and not Army desires are the determinant on where, when and to do what the US Army will be deployed in future -- and no one can predict that where, when or what...

I'm less afraid of excessive emphasis on COIN than I am of an overcompensation led by both the heavy and FCS communities over the next few years to again relegate COIN to oblivion because of the threat to equipment purchases or for other reasons. That would be a mistake, one we've made before and do not need to repeat.

We can do all the missions; MCO and COIN and things that lay between the two. We may have to do them all....

Ken:

I agree with most of what you say especially the first couple of sentences where you point out that the army, wrongly, turned its head away from any kind of irregular training and emphasis when history and a careful prediction of future operations should have demanded at least some attention to it.

I also accept the practical reasons for the army's complete (operational and not necessarily institutional training) focus now on counterinsurgency operations. Because of the size of the Army we have no slack and really have no choice but to focus almost completely on Coin. RTK disagrees from his persepective as a trainer of junior officers from the institutional training base; of course i acknowledge the weight that his training places on mco. But when those combat lts go out to the field army they do only coin; either actual coin in iraq and afghanistan or in trainups for the next deployment. That is the reality of the operational army today.

I am less sanguine, however, than Ken White is with the future. He worries about the Army regressing into an 80s mindset where we again disregard coin and irregular war for mco and hic. I have an opposite worry; that since we are so focussed on coin today it causes us to see a future of a security environment described by people like TX Hammes that is predominated by irregular warfare. That conception of the future then drives ideas like lightening the American army and basically turning it into a nation-building, light infantry force (there was an article in another thread a few months ago titled something like "rage against the machines" that made this argument). Nagl's recommendation for a permanent advisory corps is a step in this direction.

gian

Ken White
01-12-2008, 02:23 AM
hail from the Bay area originally, let it be known that (a) San Francisco is till my favorite US city and (b) I'm concerned that you've lost that sunny optimism... :)


I am less sanguine, however, than Ken White is with the future. He worries about the Army regressing into an 80s mindset where we again disregard coin and irregular war for mco and hic...

Not so much worried as concerned about the fact that I already see community battles as opposed to a focus on what the ARMY needs to do.
I have an opposite worry; that since we are so focussed on coin today it causes us to see a future of a security environment described by people like TX Hammes that is predominated by irregular warfare...A valid concern -- as I've always agreed. As as an aside, my 18 years of service Son met Hammes and heard him speak. He wasn't at all impressed or convinced nor do I expect the Army is (with all due apologies to my Marine brethren). Really.

Yes, there's a great deal of that COIN to the fore babble going around but I suspect part of my willingness to not get unduly perturbed about it is the fact that also occurred just as loudly from 1962-70 and as soon as that COIN op headed for the boneyard, so did the excessive emphasis on COIN then prevalent because it meant money in the coffers.

That time it got replaced by burying COIN; I hope we're smarter than that this time -- and I also would hope we do not yet again succumb to Branch warfare. That happens, it becomes a crap shoot and squeaking wheels get oiled then by default, Congress makes decisions because the Army can't get its act together...
...That conception of the future then drives ideas like lightening the American army and basically turning it into a nation-building, light infantry force (there was an article in another thread a few months ago titled something like "rage against the machines" that made this argument)...I suspect that the plus up will be mostly light infantry as that is the cheapest set of stuff to buy. No other reason. We need the heavy stuff and the leadership knows it, it is not going away. As that same Son (an Airborne infantry type) told me when he was in Baghdad in '04 "The M1 and Iraq mean all this foolishness about the demise of the Tank will go away, the Tank is here for another fifty years at least."

The heavy divisions will stay and the FCS guys will fight to bring that to life; light infantry will get a plus up because its cheap (and easy to cut when the budget gets sliced) and needed in Afghanistan where I suspect we will be operating after Iraq chills and we draw down to overwatch mode (that I expect within a year).
...Nagl's recommendation for a permanent advisory corps is a step in this direction. Yes it is -- couple of months ago I wrote a SWJ Blog Article saying that was a really bad idea -- I expected a lot of 4GW lovers to attack, got very few responses. None, IIRC. Surprised me. Regardless, I'll bet big bucks that ain't gonna happen and it should not unless it's an RC element less than half the size he sought -- and I doubt that'll occur unless the RC sees it as a space generator.

Awful long way of saying I agree with your concern and I hope mine is misplaced and we end up with a balanced, multi spectral force.

I also hope we fix our initial entry training, officer and Enlisted to enable that to occur with less effort. :cool:

Rank amateur
01-12-2008, 03:11 AM
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Rummy canceled this big gun long before he used the term "dead enders." Can you lay all the blame on COIN or must transformation take its fair share too?

http://www.army-technology.com/projects/crusader/images/crusader11.jpg

Gian P Gentile
01-12-2008, 12:38 PM
....If WM is correct and you...hail from the Bay area originally, let it be known that (a) San Francisco is till my favorite US city and (b) I'm concerned that you've lost that sunny optimism... :)

Ken:

Of course me too; I actually grew up in the East Bay but as a kid we often went into the City. I am still an optimist at heart but with some SanFran fog-like sadness hanging over me by the silence of the families of the soldiers who I left behind.

Thanks for your thoughtful response; we are in general agreement on things. If I disagree with you it is always with much trepidation.

gg

Old Eagle
01-12-2008, 03:23 PM
I'm not as convinced that the Army won't revert to the MCO comfort zone. As John T, Ken and perhaps others recall, Ft Benning of the late 60's early 70's had thatched hut villages scattered around the training areas. By the mid-70s, the villages had been razed and the war was refered to only as the "livefire exercise in Southeast Asia". Enter Active Defense and Airland Battle. Weren't gonna do that COIN stuff again.

If Big Army truly can't get the balance for the future right, maybe we need to head down the Krpinevich/Nagl/etc route of 2 armies.

Steve Blair
01-12-2008, 04:47 PM
I'm not as convinced that the Army won't revert to the MCO comfort zone. As John T, Ken and perhaps others recall, Ft Benning of the late 60's early 70's had thatched hut villages scattered around the training areas. By the mid-70s, the villages had been razed and the war was refered to only as the "livefire exercise in Southeast Asia". Enter Active Defense and Airland Battle. Weren't gonna do that COIN stuff again.

If Big Army truly can't get the balance for the future right, maybe we need to head down the Krpinevich/Nagl/etc route of 2 armies.

I agree. There are far too many historical examples of this happening to ignore. Big Army (even when it was a small army) has always wanted to focus on the ideal "large force on large force" combat model at the expense of anything else. Even when its main business was acting as a constabulary the training models were firmly focused on fighting a European-style enemy (or re-fighting the parts of the Civil War that appealed...mostly the large Eastern Theater battles against Lee). It wasn't so much Army training that allowed success in the Philippines...it was the large number of Indian Wars veterans within the ranks (both officer and enlisted) who could draw on their own experiences and not their training. That's a model we might actually see in the future...the Army reverting to its "comfort zone" and seeing any success on future COIN battlefields due to the remaining experience of its officer and NCO corps and not its own foresight and training. Of course, given the exodus of that experience (and assuming we see something similar to the weeding that took place after Vietnam) that knowledge might be very thin in the ground within a handful of years.

zenpundit
01-12-2008, 08:53 PM
We need both the Fulda Gap -or at least a mini-me version -capacity and COIN, the latter for reasons that need no explanation here.

Building and maintaining the former at a level all potential near-peer competitors find economically prohibitive acts as a systemic/environmental barrier to entry on restarting a serious arms race with the United States. If you can't win anyway from the inception then you avoid risking your entire economy on trying to do so. Much better investment for the U.S. to keep our relative strategic position intact than to risk regional arms races and reviving interstate warfare by trying to scrape to get Defense spending under 2-3 % of GDP and tempting foreign statesmen to roll the dice.

Ski
01-13-2008, 01:12 PM
The military has all the money in the world, it spends it foolishly however. You could take 1% of the Navy and Air Force base budget and spend it on the Army quite easily with little to no effect on these services overall performance.

The Army is for certain headed back into the full spectrum/3GW/maneuver warfare/high intensity realm once these wars settle down. The MTOE's have not changed since the beginning of modularity (although there are 2nd gen MTOE's supposedly being written), and these were definately designed for the Fulda Gap.

The MTOE's are the canary in the coal mine. If they change, it means more changes overall are coming.

Fully agree with Ken BTW - Light Infantry is much cheaper to activate, man, equip and train than heavy forces.

It's all about balance - and training...

wm
01-13-2008, 02:42 PM
We need both the Fulda Gap -or at least a mini-me version -capacity and COIN, the latter for reasons that need no explanation here.

Building and maintaining the former at a level all potential near-peer competitors find economically prohibitive acts as a systemic/environmental barrier to entry on restarting a serious arms race with the United States. If you can't win anyway from the inception then you avoid risking your entire economy on trying to do so. Much better investment for the U.S. to keep our relative strategic position intact than to risk regional arms races and reviving interstate warfare by trying to scrape to get Defense spending under 2-3 % of GDP and tempting foreign statesmen to roll the dice.

Zenpundit:
I see two problems with this tactic as a way of deterring others from entering a conventional arms race with the US:

(1) Money that would have been spent on such an arms race by potential opponents can be diverted to other uses that might make those potential adversaries believe that a non-conventional conflict is more winnable (or at least more likely) for them. By non-conventional here, I mean anything short of playing the the nuclear card--chem-bio weapons, terrorism, economic warfare, insurgent/guerrilla tactics, info/cyberwar, etc.

(2) The temptation exists/forms for conventional "have-nots" to develop a nuclear weapons capability in order to be able to use the threat of nuclear war to gain political leverage/concessions (e.g., N.Korea, Iran, Iraq under Saddam perhaps). Not quite MAD, but still a potent threat to consider.

BTW, this line of thinking--to deter others by keeping one's own military forces bigger and better than anyone else's--actually causes an arms race with only one contestant. As technology marches on, the single "superpower" must continue to maintain and upgrade its "big stick" military forces while also maintaining the capability to fight the "small wars" that seem more likely to erupt.
"Golly gee, Mr. Wizard, isn't that the dilemma the US is facing right now?" :eek:

zenpundit
01-13-2008, 06:26 PM
Hi WM

You wrote:


"(1) Money that would have been spent on such an arms race by potential opponents can be diverted to other uses that might make those potential adversaries believe that a non-conventional conflict is more winnable (or at least more likely) for them. By non-conventional here, I mean anything short of playing the the nuclear card--chem-bio weapons, terrorism, economic warfare, insurgent/guerrilla tactics, info/cyberwar, etc."

Hypothetically speaking, you and I are going to fight a war: Would you prefer to play the role of the United States with it's particular advantages and drawbacks or would you prefer to be regional power X who will base their strategy on deploying all the asymmetric weapons you mentioned?

States choose asymmetry options in conflict with America because they have had to do so not because their general staffs and statesmen preferred that alternative.


(2) The temptation exists/forms for conventional "have-nots" to develop a nuclear weapons capability in order to be able to use the threat of nuclear war to gain political leverage/concessions (e.g., N.Korea, Iran, Iraq under Saddam perhaps). Not quite MAD, but still a potent threat to consider.

Nuclear weapons do not run on the same continuum of logic as do conventional arms, either for acquisition or purposes of deterrence.

The USSR was hardly a conventional "have-not" state when it exploded an atomic bomb in 1947. Most of the states that have subsequently developed nuclear weapons have been in a condition of conventional parity or near parity with whatever states they considered their primary threat or they were redressing an imbalance where a rival state had nuclear weapons in addition to conventional parity. Some, including Israel, India and the United States, enjoyed military superiority over their enemies when they developed nuclear weapons while some countries like Britain and France acquired nukes primarily for reasons of prestige than effective defense and elected to build only very modest nuclear arsenals.

Nuclear arsenals of third and fourth rate states are a potent factor, I agree, but their utility is of exceptionally limited value in the context of brandishing them against the United States or Russia. Pakistan's nuclear status was of no help in resisting an ultimatum from Washington in the aftermath of 9-11 thought it remained crucial for deterring India from going to war over Kashmir.

Ken White
01-13-2008, 06:40 PM
One trick ponies...

wm
01-13-2008, 07:26 PM
Zenpundit,
Your points are appropriate in those cases where another entity chooses to play America's game in a conflict, or chooses to pick a fight with America directly. However, other possibilities exist. Oppponents need not confront the US directly, if at all, in an effort to establish some hegemony.



Hypothetically speaking, you and I are going to fight a war: Would you prefer to play the role of the United States with it's particular advantages and drawbacks or would you prefer to be regional power X who will base their strategy on deploying all the asymmetric weapons you mentioned?

States choose asymmetry options in conflict with America because they have had to do so not because their general staffs and statesmen preferred that alternative.

You are quite right about how things went in the past. I acknowledge that, all things being equal, one might prefer to have the capabilities of the US. However, all things are not equal these days. Now, potential oppponents may choose, rather than be forced, to play the asymmetric card--which was my point. They could also identify critical vulnerabilities to America's conventional forces and bend all their efforts to developing means to exploit them, rather than try to overawe America's military in a force on force slugfest.


Nuclear weapons do not run on the same continuum of logic as do conventional arms, either for acquisition or purposes of deterrence.

The USSR was hardly a conventional "have-not" state when it exploded an atomic bomb in 1947. Most of the states that have subsequently developed nuclear weapons have been in a condition of conventional parity or near parity with whatever states they considered their primary threat or they were redressing an imbalance where a rival state had nuclear weapons in addition to conventional parity. Some, including Israel, India and the United States, enjoyed military superiority over their enemies when they developed nuclear weapons while some countries like Britain and France acquired nukes primarily for reasons of prestige than effective defense and elected to build only very modest nuclear arsenals.

Nuclear arsenals of third and fourth rate states are a potent factor, I agree, but their utility is of exceptionally limited value in the context of brandishing them against the United States or Russia. Pakistan's nuclear status was of no help in resisting an ultimatum from Washington in the aftermath of 9-11 thought it remained crucial for deterring India from going to war over Kashmir.

You are completely right that owning nukes changes the logic/calculus of international relations. I am not sure that I would be concerned about a 2nd or 3rd rate power that has acquired nukes " brandishing them against the United States or Russia."
I'd be more concerned about a scenario where the threat was leveled against one of our allies--NK, for example, says, Do not try to restrict my export of missile technology to Iran or I will nuke Tokyo. Or, to build from your example, what would the US do today should India or Pakistan opt to invade Kashnir and warn of US intervention with the threat of nuke use against the other party (or some other country within range--like Israel, e.g.)?


I wonder why you did not coment on what I thought was the most important point--the apparent dilemma about America becoming involved in an arms race with itself.

zenpundit
01-14-2008, 05:59 AM
Hi wm,

Fair enough, I'll start by addressing that specific point:


"I wonder why you did not coment on what I thought was the most important point--the apparent dilemma about America becoming involved in an arms race with itself."

That does qualify as a dilemma ( though a much better one than a bilateral arms race). The iron triangle that exists between defense contactors, the Pentagon and the Congress combined with Executive branch leaders who are unable or unwilling to make long-term strategic choices leads to a great deal of wasted money on weapons systems that try to be everything to all services or are redundant. You are right to raise caveats about that aspect.

That being said, if I were given a choice on spending more money to maintain a defense establishment that is economically out of reach of our nearest competitors and fighting fewer wars and those at a comparative advantage or spending far less, scaling back our capabilities and commitments and risking a revival of interstate warfare, I'll take the former. It's cheaper and safer in the long run.

"
Now, potential oppponents may choose, rather than be forced, to play the asymmetric card--which was my point. They could also identify critical vulnerabilities to America's conventional forces and bend all their efforts to developing means to exploit them, rather than try to overawe America's military in a force on force slugfest."

I think that is a rational assumption. Opponents always could, given their resources, have looked for an asymmetric advantage to complement any traditional conventional military forces or aspects of "hard power". We of course, can and should do the same instead of resting on our laurels and consider our own critical systems in terms of designing them for greater resiliency.


"I'd be more concerned about a scenario where the threat was leveled against one of our allies--NK, for example, says, Do not try to restrict my export of missile technology to Iran or I will nuke Tokyo. Or, to build from your example, what would the US do today should India or Pakistan opt to invade Kashnir and warn of US intervention with the threat of nuke use against the other party (or some other country within range--like Israel, e.g.)?"

Interesting scenarios. "Credibility" is still very much an issue in terms of nuclear posture despite the Cold War having ended. Rogue states and state actors with small arsenals cannot escape the same limitations regarding using nuclear arms to secure political objectives that Bernard Brodie articulated a half-century ago.

The first example, while in line with the tradition of wacky DPRK rhetoric, lacks credibility because if North Korea were to make such a threat in earnest ( visibly make preparations to arm Taepodong missiles) over so minor an issue it would risk not only the prospect of complete annihilation from an American nuclear response but the probability of Japanese nuclearization in response to such a threat - something that would not suit North Korea's patron, China.

In the second instance, either India or Pakistan would already be risking nuclear war by choosing a full-blown invasion of Kashmir - does adding America to this equation increase or decrease the likelihood of nuclear war ? Most likely it decreases it because the prospect of American intervention would be decisive so both parties would have an interest in backing away from the brink.

wm
01-14-2008, 02:26 PM
The iron triangle that exists between defense contactors, the Pentagon and the Congress combined with Executive branch leaders who are unable or unwilling to make long-term strategic choices leads to a great deal of wasted money on weapons systems that try to be everything to all services or are redundant. You are right to raise caveats about that aspect.

That being said, if I were given a choice on spending more money to maintain a defense establishment that is economically out of reach of our nearest competitors and fighting fewer wars and those at a comparative advantage or spending far less, scaling back our capabilities and commitments and risking a revival of interstate warfare, I'll take the former. It's cheaper and safer in the long run.

Given your chosen avatar (Emeror Palpatine from Star Wars)), you ought to remember Leia's line to Governor Tarkin as the Empire blows up her home planet. A corollary to her point is that holding the military card will not guarantee peace or security. Hobbes made a variation on that point in Leviathan as a step in his argument that people have a duty to seek peace.

I doubt that your proposal will be "cheaper and safer in the long run." For example,were we to dig into the history of the Roman Empire's budget, I suspect we would find that it nearly bankrupted itself by trying to maintain a strong standing army to defend its outer frontiers while also funding a collection of mobile cohorts for use in putting down internal revolts (like the Zealot's revolt in Judea in 70 AD--and I know that this revolt was actually put down by Vespian and Titus with Legions, not expeditionary cohorts--followed by the Kitos War 40 years later and Bar Kochba's revolt 20 years after that; similar stuff was happening in Dalmatia and Illyria as well as Germannia, Pannonia, Noricum, and Rhaetia in later years). When the Romans found that they could not afford both efforts, they started to trade land to "outsiders" in exchange for an agreement to defend the frontiers and kept a few mobile armies to respond to breakthroughs at the frontiers (See Luttwak's Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire and Isaac's The Limits of Empire ). We know what the outcome of all that was. I fear that if America takes your chosen road, it will end up with something like what happened to the Romans.



Opponents always could, given their resources, have looked for an asymmetric advantage to complement any traditional conventional military forces or aspects of "hard power". We of course, can and should do the same instead of resting on our laurels and consider our own critical systems in terms of designing them for greater resiliency.
This lands us back in the unilateral arms race dilemma I already described. Given the point you made in the first quotation,above, about the "iron triangle," AKA the military-industrial complex that Eisenhower warned us about, and and senior leadership that lacks either the wits or the abdominal or testicular fortitude to do what it takes, I wonder how likely it is that we will not just rest on our laurels. I suspect we will instead buy the latest "gee whiz" solution that the vendors push at us, especially if it happens to mean a lot of job production in "key" Congressional districts.

Steve Blair
01-14-2008, 05:14 PM
This lands us back in the unilateral arms race dilemma I already described. Given the point you made in the first quotation,above, about the "iron triangle," AKA the military-industrial complex that Eisenhower warned us about, and and senior leadership that lacks either the wits or the abdominal or testicular fortitude to do what it takes, I wonder how likely it is that we will not just rest on our laurels. I suspect we will instead buy the latest "gee whiz" solution that the vendors push at us, especially if it happens to mean a lot of job production in "key" Congressional districts.

I've always found Eisenhower's caution interesting, especially since his reliance on "massive retaliation" had a great deal to do with accelerating the project development cycle and reliance on high-tech systems (and the concurrent need to maintain those and develop new ones). Bigger, higher, faster certainly began under his watch, and has just accelerated.

America never maintained a large standing army prior to Word War II. What we see now is really the remains of that conflict (as Ken has pointed out before). What we might consider normal is actually quite abnormal for America historically. We're in danger, I think, of becoming a high-tech "one trick pony" (good phrase, Ken) with a training model that's intended for raising a conscript force. Lord knows our personnel system is left over from that period.

J Wolfsberger
01-14-2008, 05:37 PM
What we might consider normal is actually quite abnormal for America historically.

I agree - our normal operating mode (historically) seems to be going to war undermanned with antiquated equipment.

It might also be well to remember the nursery rhyme that begins "For want of a nail..." It should begin: "For lack of a smithy, the nail wasn't made..." We can no more expect to turn on a company such as Ford or Caterpillar to make combat vehicles overnight than we can expect to turn an 18 year old into a competent infantryman in 8 - 12 weeks of basic training.

Generally, systems that aren't effective get cut, redirected, or terminated. And, yes, there are also some things that get funded simply to maintain industrial base. I, for one, would be seriously concerned by any politician who threatened to end that. To someone completely ignorant of modern weapon systems, it might seem feasible to just pull in the "freeze dried engineers," a sentiment popular in the late 80s - early 90s, and start the weapon design process. In practice, those novice engineers, and especially their management, will require one or two practice programs just to reach the level of competence needed to develop an effective system. When you realize that those "practice" systems will run into years and $Bs, keeping the base ticking over is a prudent investment.

selil
01-14-2008, 09:00 PM
I agree - our normal operating mode (historically) seems to be going to war undermanned with antiquated equipment.

It might also be well to remember the nursery rhyme that begins "For want of a nail..." It should begin: "For lack of a smithy, the nail wasn't made..." We can no more expect to turn on a company such as Ford or Caterpillar to make combat vehicles overnight than we can expect to turn an 18 year old into a competent infantryman in 8 - 12 weeks of basic training.

Generally, systems that aren't effective get cut, redirected, or terminated. And, yes, there are also some things that get funded simply to maintain industrial base. I, for one, would be seriously concerned by any politician who threatened to end that. To someone completely ignorant of modern weapon systems, it might seem feasible to just pull in the "freeze dried engineers," a sentiment popular in the late 80s - early 90s, and start the weapon design process. In practice, those novice engineers, and especially their management, will require one or two practice programs just to reach the level of competence needed to develop an effective system. When you realize that those "practice" systems will run into years and $Bs, keeping the base ticking over is a prudent investment.


Though I don't disagree with the specifics I do disagree with the thread. American technology followed societal mores into specialization and impoverished flexibility. There absolutely no reason a tank chassis can't be shared with a caterpillar dozer or vice a versa. The tank came second and was hung around a custom one off chassis that extremely expensive. In fact if you look back to the 50's and before you find most military equipment was based on civilian models from the ubiquitous jeep to the DC3.

The specification and procurement process lost that and gave us $300 toilet seats and so on. You currently can't mass produce tanks. There will be no way to produce them quickly. Liberty ships are a thing of the past. There seems to be golden memory of the production capability of America but that is plain gone. Not because we can't build or create, but because the final products are so far away from their civilian counterparts as to be impossible to mass produce.

Get rid of single threaded tipping point technologies and deconstruct the mess of contractor abominations and you might be able to make cases for to large of standing army. One beget the other and y'all can argue about which is which.

J Wolfsberger
01-14-2008, 10:07 PM
There absolutely no reason a tank chassis can't be shared with a caterpillar dozer or vice a versa.

Unfortunately, there actually are a lot of reasons you can't. The two have almost nothing in common, either functionally or technically. In fact, except for the fact that they're both tracked vehicles with internal combustion engines, they have absolutely nothing in common. (And reading back on this, I realize that "track" and "engine" overstates the minuscule commonality that exists.) And that makes sense. Why would you put tons of armor on a Cat D11? Or a turret? Or a main gun? And all of those (plus a lot of other needs) drive immense design differences.


...The specification and procurement process lost that and gave us $300 toilet seats and so on... True. There were problems - generally due to the inefficiencies of the procurement process, contractor greed, sheer stupidity, or all of the above. But the critics contributed to that out of ignorance and partisan politics. My personal favorite was Proxmire's Golden Fleece award going to, I believe, Grumman for a $50 hammer. Proxmire claimed he could by the "same" hammer at Sears for $2. Well, no. The hammer was made of a non sparking alloy for use on aircraft carrier flight decks. I'd have bought a six pack of beer to sit (at a safe distance) and watch the good senator bang away - until the light show started.:rolleyes:


Get rid of single threaded tipping point technologies and deconstruct the mess of contractor abominations and you might be able to make cases for to large of standing army. One beget the other and y'all can argue about which is which.

I'm not sure what you're driving at. Could you give an example?

Norfolk
01-14-2008, 10:53 PM
At peacetime production rates, it took 4 months to manufacture an M-1 tank and 18 months to manufacture an F-15 fighter-bomber, and AFAIK that did not include long-lead items. I have no idea how long it would take to build an F-22, never mind long-lead items, nor the FCS replacement for the M-1 if it ever materializes. And of course there are only a few facilities capable of such production in the entire country.

Ever since the Detroit Army Tank Arsenal was shut down 15 years ago, there's only been the Lima Army Tank Plant, and except for export orders, not a single new M-1 for the US Army or Marine Corps has rolled off the line since about 1992; remanufacturing old M-1s it is. I don't know if FMC's San Jose facility has any capacity to change over to MBT production quickly if it was needed. As is, the country has the (theoretical) maximum capacity of producing a grand total of just 75 M-1 tanks per month, and in just one facility. That's wouldn't cover a day's or even a few hour's losses in heavy conventional fighting, let alone provide new tanks for newly-raised formations.

As to aircraft, well, the war could be long over before an aircraft that first began to take shape in an assembly hall at the start of the war, finally rolled finished out of that assembly hall.

We cannot afford to lose our ability to wage full-on conventional war, including in a General War situation (however unlikely that may seem). And if initial entry training for officers and enlistees were sufficiently long and thorough to begin with (ie, a year for officers, six months for enlistees, and three to six months for experienced enlistees seeking to become NCOs, plus solid advanced and specialty training, etc.), then not only don't you have to skimp on COIN or LIC, but you're also giving your troops the skills they need to continue fighting successfully even if (or when) the high-tech wunderwaffen don't live up to expectations or the enemy adopts a seriously "asymmetric" approach. Kill many birds with a few stones.

selil
01-15-2008, 12:02 AM
I'm not sure what you're driving at. Could you give an example?

I'm sorry I'm not being very clear and I take responsibility.

Componentized construction methods within the major manufacturers do exist. The power plant can be moved between chassis. Chassis can be swapped. This is true between cars as much as it is between dozers. A simple example is the door hinges on a Cadillac CTS are built by the same company that build them for the Toyota.

You are correct you can't swap components between a dozer and a tank and they have nothing even similar. That is the exact issue. The power plant could have been a functional component of some shared civilian technology but it is a highly customized one off unit. The suspension system of most armor could have been pulled from a variety of places in the civillian world (even upgraded and advanced but based on).

Sure what you have now for armor has little to do with the civilian world but that one of monolithic hunk of technology is hundreds of times more expensive than using COTS products. To make the point a little finer Caterpillar has continuously improved their technology in large frame, high speed, ultra reliable power train systems. When was the last time an Armor system had a serious drive train update?

One of the things that brought this back to me was a display at the Boeing museum. An SR71 engine was on the deck next to a GE new generation engine(GE90). The GE engine (130K) was FOUR times the horsepower/thrust of the SR71 (30K) engine and used half as much fuel. My understanding is that the contractors in charge of airframes for the Air Force can't even suggest such an update should it become available because of systemic disruption to the rest of the air frame. Everything is custom or one-off so there is no where to go with the technology when an update could be done.

The contracting systems in place and the lack of internalized design by the military services promote highly customized weapons systems. The use of adapted COTS technologies cost less and on a cost plus basis are less profitable. Consider this... A top of the line Boeing 787 costs between 150 and 250 million dollars (http://www.boeing.com/commercial/prices/). That is a monster air craft. Depending on who you believe which is an issue right off the bat the F22 has been reported to cost 330 million to 360 million dollars (http://originmedia.mgnetwork.com/breaking/f22raptor/).

The difference in cost is so substantial and so egregious it can't be explained away simply by saying "stealth". Using terms like "system" as euphemistic effluvia when "system" really means highly customized one off cost plus profit driven war profiteering. Sorry. I let my emotions run away with me when I look at a 787 and know I could order up two for the cost of one F22 load it with stand off weapons and serve coffee to the pilots and still have enough money to buy every serving Marine new cammo uniforms.

J Wolfsberger
01-15-2008, 01:34 AM
I understand the frustration. To an outsider, it appears that the entire weapon system procurement process is a monument to inefficiency and waste.


Componentized construction methods within the major manufacturers do exist. The power plant can be moved between chassis. Chassis can be swapped. This is true between cars as much as it is between dozers. A simple example is the door hinges on a Cadillac CTS are built by the same company that build them for the Toyota.

You are correct you can't swap components between a dozer and a tank and they have nothing even similar. That is the exact issue. The power plant could have been a functional component of some shared civilian technology but it is a highly customized one off unit. The suspension system of most armor could have been pulled from a variety of places in the civillian world (even upgraded and advanced but based on).


The services all try to do this whenever possible. Jet engines are a good example. The common chassis for FCS is another. The commonality is desirable for more than reduced acquisition cost. It can also lead to reduced training and a reduced logistics burden. But the reality is that it can only be carried so far.


One of the things that brought this back to me was a display at the Boeing museum. An SR71 engine was on the deck next to a GE new generation engine(GE90). The GE engine (130K) was FOUR times the horsepower/thrust of the SR71 (30K) engine and used half as much fuel. My understanding is that the contractors in charge of airframes for the Air Force can't even suggest such an update should it become available because of systemic disruption to the rest of the air frame. Everything is custom or one-off so there is no where to go with the technology when an update could be done.

True, but remember you're comparing 1960's technology to 1990s.


The contracting systems in place and the lack of internalized design by the military services promote highly customized weapons systems.

It is more accurate that the operational requirements drive the process. Even then, economies are taken advantage of. Stryker and LAV are both derivatives of the Mowag Pirhana, which was designed in the early 1970s. They are both (more or less) off the shelf systems.


The use of adapted COTS technologies cost less and on a cost plus basis are less profitable. Consider this... A top of the line Boeing 787 costs between 150 and 250 million dollars (http://www.boeing.com/commercial/prices/). That is a monster air craft. Depending on who you believe which is an issue right off the bat the F22 has been reported to cost 330 million to 360 million dollars (http://originmedia.mgnetwork.com/breaking/f22raptor/).

The difference in cost is so substantial and so egregious it can't be explained away simply by saying "stealth".

On the other hand, the 787 can't travel at Mach 1.5+, its radar cross section (RCS) is the size of a barn (I know, 'stealth," but it is a huge cost driver), and it can't pull multiple Gs in a maneuver without coming apart.



I let my emotions run away with me when I look at a 787 and know I could order up two for the cost of one F22 load it with stand off weapons and serve coffee to the pilots and still have enough money to buy every serving Marine new cammo uniforms.

The Air Force wouldn't stand for it. Doesn't fly fast enough. Although there is enough room for a putting green and coffee bar.:D

But, spend AF dollars on Marine commo's?!? Are you daft?!?:eek:

Rob Thornton
01-15-2008, 03:08 AM
Hi Guys - been doing more reading then writing as of late - plenty to do between learning the new job at work and the house.

Reading this thread gives me an opportunity to consider a policy question I've been thinking about (and a few others). While its still not decided how Iraq or Afghanistan will go down in the History books - and its also true that there is still considerable work to be done in both wars - suppose for a minute that Iraq - and Afghanistan become policy successes (regardless of the path they took to get there, and the pain lessons endured while doing so).

Suppose that on reflection - we decide that its a good idea to have greater capability and capacity to shape regions through security force assistance, or that helping a key regional country wage a counter-insurgency campaign is vital to our regional and broader goals? I ask this because winning and losing create different kinds of introspection.

After all if we can pull off what everyone (even ourselves) said was impossible only a year ago - is it likely that we will accept that our success might have been by the combination of specific quantities of DOTLMPF ingredients in conditions that could only occur in a certain place, at a certain time and in a certain way? Or will we attribute it to a defined chain of events easily traceable in linear fashion to some event that we begin to call the "decisive point"? If we failed, would we dissect a loss differently then a win? How much of why things have gone a certain way do we really know - how much of it do we just attribute to something for sake of desired cause and effect relationships?

How is considering the Army post Iraq and Afghanistan different then when the Army considered itself post Vietnam? Are the current conditions "like" enough to compare what shape the Army will take post Iraq and Afghanistan to post Vietnam?

What other factors played role in the direction the Army took following Vietnam? How did our obligations to NATO, our rivalry with the Soviet Union, our defined vital interests of the time period, the national culture of the mid 1970s, the perception of ourselves as an Army and the need to be something else (I need to Ken to provide real insight here) color our perceptions about the path the Army took in the late 1970s through 2003?. How about the course the nation perceived it needed to take - there had been some hard times during the presidencies over the years we were in Vietnam. What biases are we imposing on ourself with regard to how we think we came to be what we are with regard to military culture and predispositions?

I'm just not sure there are enough parallels to make a comparison between a future that is not here yet, and post Vietnam. I'm also not sure we've considered how success might be interpreted and what are the consequences of succeeding - for instance - we've applied the "just because you can do something does not always make for good policy" elsewhere on the discussion board. You need to start with a good reason to commit military force toward achieving a political end - because even if you are really good at something (or have decided you are good enough) things are never going to go like you planned in an interactive, complex environment like war.

It might be worthwhile to consider what happens if we win, or decide that we did good enough to justify similar policy decisions.

I also don't think we can or should return to the pre 9/11 Army. I don't mean solely force structure, mission set, or focus - its hard for me to put words to - but we are different on a more fundamental level (in a very healthy and positive manner) -from what I've seen leaders are more apt to speak their mind to one another - and the more senior ones seem more apt to listen - we've developed the ability to respect each other; to disagree and still move forward, and the ability to air our grievances and dirty laundry to those outside the military without dragging ourselves down. Its come at stiff price - but its value should not be taken lightly. I think we're also developing the capability to see past the way we'd like things to be, and instead consider what will be required of us in the future - its not always pretty, but at least we'll be less surprised.

Best Regards, Rob

zenpundit
01-15-2008, 04:26 AM
One of the great things about the SWC is the conversation is as erudite as it is lively.

WM wrote:


"I doubt that your proposal will be "cheaper and safer in the long run." For example,were we to dig into the history of the Roman Empire's budget, I suspect we would find that it nearly bankrupted itself by trying to maintain a strong standing army to defend its outer frontiers while also funding a collection of mobile cohorts for use in putting down internal revolts (like the Zealot's revolt in Judea in 70 AD--and I know that this revolt was actually put down by Vespian and Titus with Legions, not expeditionary cohorts--followed by the Kitos War 40 years later and Bar Kochba's revolt 20 years after that; similar stuff was happening in Dalmatia and Illyria as well as Germannia, Pannonia, Noricum, and Rhaetia in later years). When the Romans found that they could not afford both efforts, they started to trade land to "outsiders" in exchange for an agreement to defend the frontiers and kept a few mobile armies to respond to breakthroughs at the frontiers (See Luttwak's Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire and Isaac's The Limits of Empire ). We know what the outcome of all that was. I fear that if America takes your chosen road, it will end up with something like what happened to the Romans

The period of decline to which you refer actually was approximately a century longer than the United States has existed. Three centuries is a very long time to ascribe to a single causation. Military overstretch was a problem but so was the loss of economic and social dynamism as the empire moved further away from its republican origins, so was social stratification and centralization of landholding that began before Julius Caesar, so was political chaos and misrule of Diocletian and Constantine's shift of the empire's center of gravity to the East. Even then, the Roman Empire enjoyed periods of good governance and fiscal responsibility, the end did not have to come at the time and in the manner in which it did.

Nor does preponderant power have to mean perpetual wars. Great Britain's naval supremacy and balancing diplomacy was a major pivot of the Long Peace between Waterloo and World War I. Even as the British Navy's absolute strength declined during most of the 19th century, it maintained it's relative supremacy over other navies and tried to multiply that with cooperative relationships with the United States, the Anglo-Japanese Treaty and pursuing a Corbett strategy to maximize their strategic reach against any particular opponent. British power was generally used to reinforce stability and inhibit great powers from making war against one another. A worthy objective in my view.


"Given your chosen avatar (Emeror Palpatine from Star Wars)), you ought to remember Leia's line to Governor Tarkin as the Empire blows up her home planet. A corollary to her point is that holding the military card will not guarantee peace or security. Hobbes made a variation on that point in Leviathan as a step in his argument that people have a duty to seek peace"

My avatar notwithstanding, I'm not in favor of casually blowing up planets.:D

wm
01-15-2008, 02:07 PM
One of the great things about the SWC is the conversation is as erudite as it is lively.

The period of decline to which you refer actually was approximately a century longer than the United States has existed. Three centuries is a very long time to ascribe to a single causation. Military overstretch was a problem but so was the loss of economic and social dynamism as the empire moved further away from its republican origins, so was social stratification and centralization of landholding that began before Julius Caesar, so was political chaos and misrule of Diocletian and Constantine's shift of the empire's center of gravity to the East. Even then, the Roman Empire enjoyed periods of good governance and fiscal responsibility, the end did not have to come at the time and in the manner in which it did. Time distance factors from the 1st C. AD have compressed greatly in the 21st C. AD. What took several centuries back then might occur in a few decades (or even years) now. I acknowledge the multi-causal nature of the decline of Rome (to include claims that they did themselves in through lead poisoning from the pipes they used for their plumbing). I am aware of the issues associated with the military anarchy of the period after the death of Commodus as well with the issues surrounding the growth of the latifundia and extreme social stratification within the Empire, which, some argue, actually started with the reforms of the Gracchi. However to discuss this in depth would take us too far afield of this thread's intent.


Nor does preponderant power have to mean perpetual wars. Great Britain's naval supremacy and balancing diplomacy was a major pivot of the Long Peace between Waterloo and World War I. Even as the British Navy's absolute strength declined during most of the 19th century, it maintained it's relative supremacy over other navies and tried to multiply that with cooperative relationships with the United States, the Anglo-Japanese Treaty and pursuing a Corbett strategy to maximize their strategic reach against any particular opponent. British power was generally used to reinforce stability and inhibit great powers from making war against one another. A worthy objective in my view.
A worthy objective that was not realized IMHO. You and I have a different perspective on the so-called 19th Century's Long Peace. Seems to me that the 19th Century saw some very bloody carnage--The Crimean War, the Austro-Prussian (1866), and the Franco-Prussian War are all counterpoints to your claim about stability. Let's also not forget the Mexican War, French adventures in Mexico that put Maximillian on the throne there, the Sino-Japanese War and the Spanish-American War . Of course, there are also all of the UK's "little wars"--like the Sikh Wars, Afghan Wars, Ashanti War, Zulu War, Boer Wars (one overlapped into the 20th C), Sepoy Mutiny, Opium War, etc. My point is that a single "big dog" armed camp has yet to be able to ensure world peace, much like deter attacks against that "big dog." The ends may justify the means (although I doubt it); however, the means you advocate have yet to produce the desired end in my review of history.

Rank amateur
01-15-2008, 02:48 PM
After all if we can pull off what everyone (even ourselves) said was impossible only a year ago - is it likely that we will accept that our success might have been by the combination of specific quantities of DOTLMPF ingredients in conditions that could only occur in a certain place, at a certain time and in a certain way? Or will we attribute it to a defined chain of events easily traceable in linear fashion to some event that we begin to call the "decisive point"?

From todays Washington Post. We're already taking credit for the "success" in Afghanistan. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/14/AR2008011402722_pf.html)

"U.S. and British forces have long derided each other's counterinsurgency tactics. In Iraq, British commanders touted their successful "hearts and minds" efforts in Northern Ireland... Their U.S. counterparts say they are tired of hearing about Northern Ireland ....No one, they insist, is as good at counterinsurgency as the U.S. military."

William F. Owen
01-15-2008, 03:04 PM
"U.S. and British forces have long derided each other's counterinsurgency tactics. In Iraq, British commanders touted their successful "hearts and minds" efforts in Northern Ireland... Their U.S. counterparts say they are tired of hearing about Northern Ireland ....No one, they insist, is as good at counterinsurgency as the U.S. military."

This utterly amazes me. It is so simplistic.

1. There was simply no "hearts and minds" campaign in Ulster. Ulster was and is part of the UK. Not a foreign Arab nation under military occupation.

2. What Northern Ireland meant for UK forces was they had all the skills and drills to work in a COIN environment. Simple as that. The UK attitude is "So what? It's COIN." Do COIN one day, do war fighting the next.

3. If you don't have the skills at the sub unit level, all else falls away. NI gave the UK those skills. That's all.

If you want my take on the real difference between the US and UK, it typified by the fact that the US actually paid any attention to T.E. Lawrence.

Rex Brynen
01-15-2008, 04:03 PM
1. There was simply no "hearts and minds" campaign in Ulster. Ulster was and is part of the UK. Not a foreign Arab nation under military occupation.

Yes, in the sense that it wasn't undertaken by the British Army. No, in the sense that addressing issues of socio-economic and political grievance among Ulster Catholics was a fundamental part of British political strategy from the late 1960s.

William F. Owen
01-15-2008, 06:59 PM
Yes, in the sense that it wasn't undertaken by the British Army. No, in the sense that addressing issues of socio-economic and political grievance among Ulster Catholics was a fundamental part of British political strategy from the late 1960s.

...and that translates to Iraq how? Ulster was a unique set of circumstances and resolving it holds little or no lessons for COIN in general.

Rex Brynen
01-15-2008, 07:27 PM
...and that translates to Iraq how? Ulster was a unique set of circumstances and resolving it holds little or no lessons for COIN in general.

Agreed, Wilf (although I would argue that all insurgencies are, in many respects, a "unique set of circumstances".)

I just didn't anyone reading the thread to underestimate the importance of political engagement, governance reform, and economic development/employment equity in reducing political tensions in Northern Ireland.

zenpundit
01-16-2008, 05:02 AM
WM wrote:

"
A worthy objective that was not realized IMHO. You and I have a different perspective on the so-called 19th Century's Long Peace. Seems to me that the 19th Century saw some very bloody carnage--The Crimean War, the Austro-Prussian (1866), and the Franco-Prussian War are all counterpoints to your claim about stability. Let's also not forget the Mexican War, French adventures in Mexico that put Maximillian on the throne there, the Sino-Japanese War and the Spanish-American War . Of course, there are also all of the UK's "little wars"--like the Sikh Wars, Afghan Wars, Ashanti War, Zulu War, Boer Wars (one overlapped into the 20th C), Sepoy Mutiny, Opium War, etc. My point is that a single "big dog" armed camp has yet to be able to ensure world peace, much like deter attacks against that "big dog." The ends may justify the means (although I doubt it); however, the means you advocate have yet to produce the desired end in my review of history."

Which begs the question of the means that you advocate for and what standard you are measuring against.

We do indeed have a very different perspective regarding the Long Peace of 1815-1914 which did see many, many small wars but fortunately no great ones other than civil wars, notably the Taiping Rebellion.

According to Alan Schom, the Napoleonic Wars left 3 million dead in Europe; an impressive body count given the state of military technology at the time. The 20th century was infinitely worse; 8-10 million dead in WWI, followed shortly by approximately another 7 million dead in the civil war in Russia that the First World War helped spawn. The Second World War ended in an estimated 60 million dead and the totalitarian ideologies that the century's total wars helped empower are responsible for another 100 million deaths from genocide, democide, slave labor and artificial famines. Some estimates, such as by R.J. Rummel, run over half again higher. These are staggering figures.

As I know of no way to eliminate conflict from human relations, small wars appear to me as a far better outcome than large ones.

wm
01-16-2008, 02:20 PM
Which begs the question of the means that you advocate for and what standard you are measuring against.

We do indeed have a very different perspective regarding the Long Peace of 1815-1914 which did see many, many small wars but fortunately no great ones other than civil wars, notably the Taiping Rebellion.

According to Alan Schom, the Napoleonic Wars left 3 million dead in Europe; an impressive body count given the state of military technology at the time. The 20th century was infinitely worse; 8-10 million dead in WWI, followed shortly by approximately another 7 million dead in the civil war in Russia that the First World War helped spawn. The Second World War ended in an estimated 60 million dead and the totalitarian ideologies that the century's total wars helped empower are responsible for another 100 million deaths from genocide, democide, slave labor and artificial famines. Some estimates, such as by R.J. Rummel, run over half again higher. These are staggering figures.
Your response on the casualty figures for “book end” wars to the period in question is rather a red herring I think. The numbers from the Napoleonic Wars are deceiving, as well—we are talking about a series of events that lasted over 15 years and was nearly global in scope. Better to compare its death toll to the 30 Years War, IMHO.

Funny thing about the “small" wars of the 19th Century: casualties were rather high, all things considered. Consider the following figures(numbers lifted from various Wikipedia articles):
Franco-Prussian War was 10 months long with about 250K total KIA/WIA
32K losses in one day at the Battle of Mars Le Tour and another 28K lost 2 days later at Gravelotte
Crimean War lasted about 3 years with a loss total of about 250K.
During the Siege of Sebastopol 10 of every 11 of the 55,000 combatants on the Allied side was a casualty.
Austro-Prussian War was 7 weeks long with about 105K combined casualties.
1st Boer War—700 of 1200 British troops were casualties in the 5 month conflict
2nd Boer War—3 years with 12-15K losses due to combat, 14K more due to disease and at least 24K civilians lost.
1st Sino-Japanese War lasted 9 months and totaled 53K casualties
This total s to over 700K in casualties for about 7 years of war that was rather high intensity (akin to the levels of the Napoleonic campaigns). If we add in the American Civil War (Fed casualties were about 635K and the CSA losses were around 395K), the total rises to 1.7 Million. I imagine that the numbers from the various colonial wars of the British, French, and other European powers would raise this total rather significantly as well.

And I haven't even considered such things as the Mexican War, Spanish-American War, American Indian Wars, and the various rebellions led by Simon Bolivar in South America. If we also include the 20M dead from the 15 years of the Taiping Rebellion (which probably qualifies as more than an internal event since the British and French both were involved in its later stages), your 100 year "Long Peace" was extremely bloody.


As I know of no way to eliminate conflict from human relations, small wars appear to me as a far better outcome than large ones. I concur that a small war is probably better than a big war. However, I doubt that fighting a small war with "big war" weapons is either effective or efficient."

The real question is how big of a big war force is needed to deter potential adversaries from engaging in big wars.

William F. Owen
01-16-2008, 02:48 PM
However, I doubt that fighting a small war with "big war" weapons is either effective or efficient."
.

So what is a small war weapon? History shows us that a conflict is not defined by the types of equipment employed. Indeed I suggest that to do so, is to not useful.

zenpundit
01-16-2008, 04:09 PM
WM wrote:


I concur that a small war is probably better than a big war. However, I doubt that fighting a small war with "big war" weapons is either effective or efficient."

The real question is how big of a big war force is needed to deter potential adversaries from engaging in big wars.
10 Hours Ago 11:02 PM

I doubt it as well which is why I have not been arguing that point. If you recall, my first comment in this thread began along those very lines. I do not see this issue as an either-or choice:


We need both the Fulda Gap -or at least a mini-me version -capacity and COIN, the latter for reasons that need no explanation here.

Most of our dispute would appear to be a normative one of how to interpret history. Even granting you the bloodiest civil wars of the Long Peace era, the Taiping Rebellion and the American Civil War ( with the former accounting for at least a majority of the period's casualties), it pales in comparison with the 20th century's great power, interstate wars.

Umar Al-Mokhtār
01-16-2008, 05:11 PM
You guys left out one of my personal faves: the Russo-Japanese War!

Unfortunately I don't have the total killed at my fingertips but just as an example the casualties on both sides for the Siege of Port Arthur and the battle of Mukden exceeded 270,000.

Norfolk
01-16-2008, 05:36 PM
It may have been an error to dispense with the medium-weight foot Infantry Brigade and Division. The old Infantry Brigade/Division had a company/battalion of MBTs, a company/battalion of mech infantry, Brig/Div Arty with medium artillery, and overall a full complement of foot infantry with full organic motor transport. Replacing it with the Light Infantry Brigade and Division was not a good idea I fear, especially since it can't hold ground in HIC unless it's in very tight terrain or substantially reinforced to the point that it becomes practically indistinguishable from the old Infantry Formations.

I really have doubts about the Stryker Brigades, though I like some of the capabilities that all their tech affords; they seem to be too "light" for HIC, but too mech-dependent for tight terrain, and unduly vulnerable to roadside bombs and their ilk in COIN. That is at least as much because the infantry are rolling around in vehicles part of the time instead of operating on foot almost entirely as because of any design shortcomings in the Stryker.

Since Mechanized Infantry Divisions come very close to duplicating the Armored Divisions, and aren't really ideal either for COIN and LIC, or fighting through and holding cities, forests, and other tight terrain, it might just make sense to dispense with what I perceive as the fiction of a real difference between Armored and Mech Infantry Divisions ( I would add the caveat here that I don't consider the Armored Division to have enough organic infantry to sustain long-term operations). Perhaps an Army composed of a Mountain Div, an Airborne Div (I've never really understood why one would have separate Parachute and Airmobile Formations; it seems to me that it might be better to invest both roles in just a single Division, and convert the other to a regular infantry role), maybe 3-4 Armored Divs, and the rest (including the Guard) being regular Infantry Formations, would provide a "Full-Spectrum" range of capability.

With the majority of the "Total Force" consisting of solid medium-weight foot-Infantry Divisions, each with limited proportions of armour and mech infantry, plus medium arty and full organic motor transport, you wouldn't be breaking the bank but you would still maintain the ability to "do it all".

Ken White
01-16-2008, 06:07 PM
on the older division model and am afraid that the "Mech Infantry" concept with wheeled PCs and 'Assault Guns' (or whatever they end up being called) is a force looking for a mission. While they have some validity in the peacekeeping (as opposed to peace making or enforcing) role, in most scenarios I suspect their overall vulnerability at this time will be a significant limiting factor.

That and the fact remains that vehicle borne 'infantry' is not infantry; they are mostly called 'dismounts' and there's a lot of truth in that -- anyway you look at it, they'll generally be fewer in number than a pure infantry formation of the same size AND, more importantly they'll always be tied to those vehicles; wheeled or tracked. That is a tactical limitation and the large number of vehicles with less than track vehicle cross country mobility and protection plus their maintenance requirements are an operational limitation

I do note that BAE is proposing a Bradley upgrade that removes the turret basket, remotely controls the 30/40mm Mk44 (instead of 25mm M242) and thus allows the carriage of nine versus seven dismounts. Interesting that the article said the revised Cav version's increased space allowed the addition of a sensor mast and operator (a good thing) and an interpreter (not sure that is a good thing...).

As an aside, the Airmobile Division is essentially and effectively just a light infantry division with extra birds. You can have extra birds or rapidly deployable parachute capability, the two are sort of inimical to each other. They could of course be combined but why do that if you can afford both?

Cavguy
01-16-2008, 06:44 PM
I really have doubts about the Stryker Brigades, though I like some of the capabilities that all their tech affords; they seem to be too "light" for HIC, but too mech-dependent for tight terrain, and unduly vulnerable to roadside bombs and their ilk in COIN. That is at least as much because the infantry are rolling around in vehicles part of the time instead of operating on foot almost entirely as because of any design shortcomings in the Stryker.


As someone who is a reformed Stryker Skeptic due to firsthand experience, your assertion on Stryker vulnarabilities against COIN type threats (Small Arms, RPG's, IED's, and Car Bombs) has simply proven to be untrue.

I have never been in a Stryker unit, but have worked with them as partners and talked extensively with their soldiers. The Stryker is very IED survivable due to its "Boat" shaped hull. It takes IED's much better than one would expect, and no infantry or cavalryman I talked to from a Stryker unit felt it was unsafe. Actually, they all sing its praises. Invulnerable, no, survivable, yes. In most cases the Stryker was able to continue operations even with damaged tires.

The Stryker has superb troop capacity, and is actually an extremely useful and flexible vehicle for COIN. As a "I love my tank/brad:, guy, I was extremely impressed with it, and wished I had some to add to my mix.

Also, your discussion of perfect "divisions" is a little behind the times - the BCT is now the organization of choices and fufills the role you are discussing regarding divisions. All Army BCT's are now "plug and play" into whatever Div HQ needs them. (in this sense, divisions now act more like corps) Divisions will not deploy as "divisions" anytime in the near future. For example, 101st in 2006 Iraq was 1/1 AD, 172d Stryker, and 2 BCT's from the 101st) - 2d Example - 1 AD in OIF 1 was 3/82d ABN, 2ACR, 1/1 AD, 2/1 AD, and a BCT from the FL ARNG.

Bottom line, at division level any BCT (Heavy, Stryker, Infantry) can be mixed as needed. Divisions are designed to be modular headquarters able to handle any configuration of attached BCT's. One disadvantage of the BCT structure now is that the modular BN's are actually LESS flexible for task organization outside their BCT, because of the way the logistical and support tail is structured into the BCT, and not designed to be "sliced". Infantry BCT's will have a harder time integrating an armor/mech combined arms battalion, because of the support requirements, and an FSC structure not designed to be "unplugged" easily.

wm
01-16-2008, 07:53 PM
You guys left out one of my personal faves: the Russo-Japanese War!

Unfortunately I don't have the total killed at my fingertips but just as an example the casualties on both sides for the Siege of Port Arthur and the battle of Mukden exceeded 270,000.

Didn't mean to leave out that great saga of bad generalship on the part of the Tsarists. Originally, I was only looking at the period 1815-1900. When Zenpundit shifted the right boundary to 1914 I didn't readjust fire.


Most of our dispute would appear to be a normative one of how to interpret history. Even granting you the bloodiest civil wars of the Long Peace era, the Taiping Rebellion and the American Civil War ( with the former accounting for at least a majority of the period's casualties), it pales in comparison with the 20th century's great power, interstate wars.
I thought your original point was that were America to maintain a strong technically dominant military, it could preclude another great war like those of the first half of the 20th Century, which I agree caused horrendous loss. However, I was trying to point out that the British effort to do so in the 19th C did not stop fairly large conflicts. BTW, the carnage in WWI and WWII were partially made possible by massive arms buildups by losers in earlier wars (France after the F-P War, Germany after WWI). After their loses, each of the "have nots" thought they could get big and bad enough to win the next time. BTW, it has been argued that limitations on Japan's capital ship count in the Washington and London Naval Treaties of the teens and 20s had a similar effect on Japan and was a main factor that resulted in Pearl Harbor.

Ken White
01-16-2008, 09:17 PM
The Stryker has superb troop capacity, and is actually an extremely useful and flexible vehicle for COIN. As a "I love my tank/brad:, guy, I was extremely impressed with it, and wished I had some to add to my mix.

I can totally agree with that based on what I know. Based on what I don't know, my suspicion is that the utility and flexibility would both lessen as the intensity of combat increased.

One of my possibly erroneous observations over the years is that Armor has one bad effect -- it can inadvertently condition folks into thinking they're bullet proof. Thus common sense and good tactical decisions are occasionally not present because of a sometimes inflated sense of being protected. That is quickly and easily erased by combat and, with far more difficulty, can be remedied in training but it's a phenomenon I've seen in ours and other Armies. Point being that one's sense of survivability -- or tactical precepts -- can be a constant while wars tend to vary in many parameters. Just a thought.


Also, your discussion of perfect "divisions" is a little behind the times - the BCT is now the organization of choices and fufills the role you are discussing regarding divisions...

Are not some of the heavy divisions getting at least temporarily what is effectively a light 4th BCT also? Thought I read that somewhere.

An aside on the modular aspect of the BCT / Division interface. The old G series ROAD TOEs envisioned the same modular approach; i.e. A Brigade could and would accept any Battalion in the Division or from another Division and successfully employ it. Probably would have worked well had there been a war at the time. There was not and the Colonels got upset because they'd get assigned a Bn for training or an operation that they "didn't know," thus every division in the Army rolled over and essentially permanently assigned specific Bns to specific Bdes. That IMO was a very bad decision and it had a really adverse impact on tactical flexibility.

The point, of course, is that all you guys need to insure when this war is on the downhill slope, that needed and very beneficial modular and flexible approach does not get killed to enhance someone's comfort level (or to simplify the rating chain) in peacetime. :wry:

Rob Thornton
01-16-2008, 09:50 PM
Allot of it has to do with mentality - for us, we referred to the strykers as our "trucks" - or as in "bring the trucks up; where are the trucks at; we'll dismount the trucks and walk in from here". They were nice trucks - they had good comms, carried allot, made CASEVAC easier, etc - but the thought was - they are trucks - Infantry Carriers - not Infantry FIghting Vehicles. As for the training - it focused on Infantry tasks, although we did have to learn how to use, maintain and resupply the trucks. There is always going to be some decisions about how much time you do what - AASLT folks have to spend some time doing AASLT related tasks, etc - each type of formation has its strengths and weaknesses. We always thought of the vehicles as a means to move the Infantry though - not as the Infantry as a means to get the vehicle into the fight.
Best, Rob

Ken White
01-17-2008, 12:08 AM
and referring to your vehicles as trucks is a really good step.

As a long time opponent of the so-called IFV, I wasn't referring to that attack in the vehicles mentality but to the predilection of the human animal when in danger to "seek or stay in the womb." I've seen too many people too many places put more faith in the protection offered by Armor (to include personal armor...) and not nearly enough faith in their tactical skill and agility (or effort to learn the skills and develop the agility...). :o

I've always contended a plain old quarter ton truck is great scout vehicle; it can be put most places one can get a track and it absolutely is not bullet proof; therefor it makes you operate stealthily and tactically, keeps you honest, so to speak. That, as they say, is a good thing, I think; no matter how smart we are, we can always get lazy or slip up and avoiding things that can lead to such errors always seemed a good idea to me.. ;)

It's imminently possible you've never seen that Armor is all syndrome and that's a good thing, hope you never do. However, if you do, remember you heard it here first... :D

Yep, different units bring different strengths and weaknesses to any fight, no question. The issue in this case is not units or even types of vehicle, though, I think it's that people do that as well...

Norfolk
01-17-2008, 01:01 AM
As someone who is a reformed Stryker Skeptic due to firsthand experience, your assertion on Stryker vulnarabilities against COIN type threats (Small Arms, RPG's, IED's, and Car Bombs) has simply proven to be untrue.

I have never been in a Stryker unit, but have worked with them as partners and talked extensively with their soldiers. The Stryker is very IED survivable due to its "Boat" shaped hull. It takes IED's much better than one would expect, and no infantry or cavalryman I talked to from a Stryker unit felt it was unsafe. Actually, they all sing its praises. Invulnerable, no, survivable, yes. In most cases the Stryker was able to continue operations even with damaged tires.

The Stryker has superb troop capacity, and is actually an extremely useful and flexible vehicle for COIN. As a "I love my tank/brad:, guy, I was extremely impressed with it, and wished I had some to add to my mix.

I worked with the original 6x6 LAV-1 and then the 8x8 LAV-25; the first was a horror, the second was much better, but I remain a Stryker skeptic. It is certainly a major improvement over the G-Wagon that Canadian troops were using at first, and then the Nyala MRAP. But roughly half the Canadian casualties taken in Afghanistan have been the result of roadside bombs (http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/War_Terror/2007/12/25/4739799-cp.html), and while the LAV/Stryker is an improvement over lighter vehicles, the toll (http://www.sfu.ca/casr/ft-vehicle-casualties.htm) that has been taken has led to the re-introduction of MBTs (http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/tanks-for-the-lesson-leopards-too-for-canada-03208/) (the Leopard 1A5's had been taken out of service in 2004, but brought back in mid-2007 and recently replaced by Leopard 2A6Ms). A Leopard 2A6M was knocked out by either an IED or an AT mine (it's not sure which), but everyone except the driver (who suffered a hip fracture) was okay, and the tank has been repaired; the Leopard 2's have been fitted with belly armour.

Also, the LAV/Stryker has real problems going cross-country in mud (an Armoured Corps guy who saw a 25mm round from a LAV III go through the back of a turret of a Leopard 1 confirmed this to me). The hulls are cracking from the stress and M-113s (http://defenceoftherealm.blogspot.com/2008/01/gap-in-market.html):eek: (this smacks of a little desperation) are replacing (http://www.sfu.ca/casr/ft-leopard-tank.htm) many of them, especially in cross-country ops.

The M-113 is (obviously) worse than the LAV/Stryker when it comes to roadside bombs, and one was destroyed two days ago by a roadside bomb, killing one soldier. But at least it can travel cross-country in bad weather, while the LAV/Stryker often can't. If a stuck Stryker can't be recovered before nightfall, it has to be blown up. M-113s have to be used for the cross-country stuff, and the Strykers for the road-bound stuff. The Leopards are used everywhere, and are the only vehicles that can withstand most IEDs, most of the time. It's just a lose-lose situation. The Stryker can't do cross-country reliably, and the number of roadside bomb attacks is very high; the M-113 can do cross-country (that must be fun in rough terrain:wry:), but it can't take roadside bombs at all. A new, tracked infantry carrier that can operate cross-country in bad conditions that can also deal better with roadside bombs is needed.

I suspect that the roadside bomb threat in southern Afghanistan may be significantly greater than in many parts of Iraq. They are certainly the biggest killer of Canadian troops there, and the LAV/Stryker has taken quite a beating. Canada stopped buying the LAV/Stryker and used the money to buy the Leopard 2 (even though it can't carry infantry except on its back) instead after the losses mounted. There were just no other options available.

Rob Thornton
01-17-2008, 02:35 AM
Yep, different units bring different strengths and weaknesses to any fight, no question. The issue in this case is not units or even types of vehicle, though, I think it's that people do that as well...

has rarely been said. Personality and leadership matter - they are the exponential.


Norfolk - are the Canadians doing a 1:1 wheeled ICV for tracked MBT? What are the logistics impacts? How are they getting it there (the LOG and the end items?) I think the Leopard is a diesel - but its still a MBT - either its eating up the CL IIIB & P, and the CL IX, or has it impacted optempo and range? I know many of the roads and infrastructure are probably more crude, but are their problems with damaging urban infrastructure? Sorry to hit you with so many questions - but you've sparked my curiosity.

Even in the terrain (not the paved or gravel roads) at FT Knox (lots of red clay) we did not have too many problems with Strykers getting stuck - we even had the 8,000 lbs of additional add on armor (which limited our use of CTIS-Central Tire Inflation System). When I did get one stuck (and believe me I took them places where nobody expected them to be able to go in order to gain a tactical advantage - I was usually able to either self, or like vehicle recover. When I could not I called a HEMMIT wrecker and it made short work of it ( I was in real good once - I had it on a side and could stick my arm outside the leader's hatch and grab the ground - I 'll see if I can find the photos - I called my mortar section and we hooked up their MCV and out I came - it cost me a 6 pack not to let word get out till the end of the IOT&E). One thing about U.S. Army units is we usually have pretty decent CSS.

Best, Rob

Rank amateur
01-17-2008, 03:34 AM
If a stuck Stryker can't be recovered before nightfall, it has to be blown up.

This doesn't make much sense to me. Not to be disrespectful, but are the Canadians incapable of holding the terrain around the vehicle until a maintenance team can be sent the next day?

zenpundit
01-17-2008, 03:41 AM
WM wrote:


I was only looking at the period 1815-1900. When Zenpundit shifted the right boundary to 1914 I didn't readjust fire.

But I had written:


We do indeed have a very different perspective regarding the Long Peace of 1815-1914

and


Great Britain's naval supremacy and balancing diplomacy was a major pivot of the Long Peace between Waterloo and World War I.

Perhaps it isn't the boundary that's shifting but the gun that's firing at it ?;)

On the substance, I infer that you are suggesting that because Great Britain's military primacy and balancing diplomacy did not prevent "fairly large conflicts" or colonial wars from occurring 1815 to 1914, that such a policy was a failure and not one worth attempting to emulate by the United States. Correct?

If so, that's quite a yardstick! What grand strategy or force structure are you suggesting that could be enacted by the United States that would be more successful in suppressing or detering the outbreak of war on a global scale ? I asked you this earlier, BTW:


Which begs the question of the means that you advocate for and what standard you are measuring against

On the subject of armaments, you wrote:


BTW, the carnage in WWI and WWII were partially made possible by massive arms buildups by losers in earlier wars (France after the F-P War, Germany after WWI). After their loses, each of the "have nots" thought they could get big and bad enough to win the next time.

In part you are correct but only in part. Have you considered that the underlying cause might not be armaments or even "losing" but a strategic environment of having a multipolarity of great powers toward the end of the Long Peace ?

Germany, under the influence of Tirpitz, rapidly built a large, modern, navy prior to WWI despite not having been a "loser" in any conflict with Great Britain or having much use for a Navy. Japan poured much of it's energies during the Meiji and Taisho era into building a powerful Navy and was rewarded with an alliance with Britain. Italy did the same after WWI, despite having been a victor and an ally of Britain.


BTW, it has been argued that limitations on Japan's capital ship count in the Washington and London Naval Treaties of the teens and 20s had a similar effect on Japan and was a main factor that resulted in Pearl Harbor

If that is being argued then the arguers know relatively little about the internal politics of Japan during the period. Or the comparative economic strength of the three countries at the time. Even by 1941 the Japanese were producing only roughly 7 million tons of steel - what was the figure in 1922? 2/3 that number? Half? Where exactly were these extra capital ships going to come from ?

The limitation rankled the Japanese ultranationalists and it had a racist edge to it, no argument. However, it was a good deal for Japan which cooler heads in Tokyo knew very well as Japan lacked the steel making capacity and the money to achieve true naval parity, much less race against the U.S. in a ship-building contest, something that was amply demonstrated after Pearl Harbor. Nor could the British, for that matter. All parties to the negotiations were well aware that the U.S. was offering to voluntarily hold it's Navy to a number well below what it could afford to build or maintain and Japan and London had every incentive to lock the United States into that position.

Norfolk
01-17-2008, 04:38 AM
Hi Rob,

No, its not 1:1. What's happening is more complicated. The deployed Battalion's LAVs/Strykers (I think it was around 60-70 or so that were originally sent) that can't be repaired at the 3rd-line level are being sent back to Canada, and non-infantry carrier variants in Canada are being converted to infantry-carriers and sent back to replace losses. AFAIK, the Strykers are now being used as much as possible for convoy-work, staying on the roads as much as possible. There are Armoured Corps (and I think maybe Artillery as well) drivers handling some of that.

The upgraded M-113s handle more and more of the the off-road field-ops - 40 of them are deploying to A-Stan to equip the Infantry Battalion there (3 Rifle Companies and a CS Company). The LAV-25 Coyotes, having all the recce/surveillance kit, are eventually (ie. planned) to be at least partially replaced by a recce variant of the Cheetah or RG 32 MRAP - there are still some Nyala MRAPs, but these are (or have been) taken out of service due to a shortage of spare parts.

There are 20 of the "new" Leopard 2A6Ms - a full 4-Troop Squadron - to handle both field ops and assist the Strykers in convoy duties. Both the Leopards and the M-113s were airlifted into Kandahar by rented An-124s (and damaged vehicles airlifted out the same way). The 15 Leopard 1's already there may be given to the Afghans. I can't tell you what damage they have caused to the roads, but a full Engineer Squadron is on hand to take care of such problems.

The Leopards have been operating in different places throughout Kandahar and Helmand Provinces at times, but the tanks spend more of their time doing convoy escort rather than offensive ops. It seems that those using Armour occur somewhat infrequently, for the most part. How much of that is by choice, and how much of that is due to logistical constraints, or what, I don't know. So for the Leopards, and the M-113s when all of them have arrived (if they haven't already), the optempo probably won't be too intense, except from time to time.

I'm not a logistics expert, but I can tell you that partial replacement of the Strykers with 20 Leopards and 40 M-113s will at least triple - maybe quadruple, even with many of the Strykers and light vehicles no longer in service - fuel and general POL requirements, since the Strykers are retained for the road-work, never mind having to stock completely new and substantial amounts of spare parts. That's not so much of a problem as it could have been because 2nd- and 3rd-line Logistics for the multinational NATO Brigade in Kandahar is handled by the Canadians anyway, but it certainly increases the load considerably.

Spare parts have been the only significant logistical problem that I am aware of, and that's just been because as one vehicle has been found inadequate for Afghanistan, it is replaced by another, and an entire set of Class IX stocks has to be replaced as a new vehicle replaces it: so...:eek:from Iltis to G-Wagen to Nyala (it was replaced because the manufacturer couldn't provide sufficient spare parts to meet demand) to LAV-III/Stryker and now M-113 TLAV as well, and also Leopard 1 to Leopard 2; so it's no wonder spares are a bit dicey at times when entire vehicles models are being replaced so quickly.

There are 82 armoured heavy trucks (http://www.sfu.ca/casr/doc-dnd-ahsvs-actros.htm) (bought in 2006) in Kandahar - of which 12 are tank transporters. They supplement dozens of unarmoured 10-tonners (Steyrs if I remember correctly). When the MBTs were sent over, the Support Group was augmented accordingly, and presumably have been further augmented as the M-113's have arrived. Bulk fuel has not been a problem, and AFAIK, neither has been packaged fuel. I think the US handles a great deal of the logistics load in Kandahar anyway.

There should be a full Basic and a full Maintenance load of fuel, parts, and ammo once the stocks have all been brought in (mainly by air); that may have already been accomplished, but don't quote me on that. There is a ton of Class VI; apparently you can buy just about anything on KAB. I suspect that this is largely (but not entirely) the work of the US. Lots of Class IV (even pre-fab concrete forms for building bunkers), and of course, Class X for reconstruction and humanitarian work. Supply just does not seem to be an issue in particular, publicly at least - so far.

Practically everything is flown in, and US, NATO, and rented Russian and Ukrainian transports coming in and out of Kandahar. Land transport across Pakistan to Quetta and then to Kandahar, of course, is not an option. Supposedly there are something like 20-30,000 troops based out of Kandahar - most of them US.

It's a really intensive logistics effort, in short.:rolleyes:

The Stryker's just don't have a good time of it in the mud. I remember on the first Ex that I was ever in a LAV (the 6x6 LAV-1), it got stuck in a creek-bed. The LAV-III Stryker has become a real problem at times in Afghanistan, and when some of them have gotten stuck - way out in the boons - they've had to blow them up before nightfall when they couldn't get them unstuck. Troops are making derisive videos of the Stryker getting stuck in the mud in both Canada and Afghanistan (soon they'll be making derisive vids of M-113's blowing up or something, or at least rattling and scrambling everyone inside:wry:). The Canadian Army has used three generations of LAV for 30 years now, and although it improves with time, it just can't seem to get past some mobility problems.

Norfolk
01-17-2008, 04:42 AM
This doesn't make much sense to me. Not to be disrespectful, but are the Canadians incapable of holding the terrain around the vehicle until a maintenance team can be sent the next day?

No disrespect taken, RA.:) The problem is, the Taleban sometimes operate in groups of 100, and in rare cases up to 400. When you've only got 3 Rifle Companies, a Tank Squadron, and an Engineer Squadron, and you're 50-100 klicks from base, leaving a Platoon out in the open to keep a grip on a stuck vehicle is just baiting the Taleban's trap for them.

William F. Owen
01-17-2008, 07:16 AM
I worked with the original 6x6 LAV-1 and then the 8x8 LAV-25; the first was a horror, the second was much better, but I remain a Stryker skeptic.

I am also a Styker skeptic. I (am ashamed to admit that I) was heavily involved in the old Mike Sparks Stryker controversy. After 2 years of debate and research, I came to following conclusions.

1. The Stryker vesus Heavy was a debate only conducted by those who did not understand the problem.

2. The Stryker concept was sound at the Platoon level, in that you made light infantry far more capable. It worked at the Company level if you got rid of the MGS fiasco.

3. Stryker falls down in that a very good idea was very poorly executed. The critics were mostly and equally as poorly informed as the proponents and this lead to a real mess.

4. The reality of current operations would indicate to me that there is not much difference between a LI Coy equipped with Stryker and the same being equipped with a well thought out MRAP type vehicle with RWS and good comms.

Rob Thornton
01-17-2008, 12:06 PM
Hey Norfolk,

I've got a buddy who is deep into the theater LOG effort with Afghanistan - he showed me some interesting (and creative) ways they've attempted to skin the cat. However, it comes down to trying to wage war in a remote, land locked place with inhospitable conditions. Trying to bring in technological advantages creates new requirements and the tail goes up.

I feel for our partners, nobody really has the capabilities of the U.S. in terms of logistics or reach, and even we have a tough time in a place like Afghanistan. Compounded by the more stuff you bring in, the greater your LOG requirements become.

William,


4. The reality of current operations would indicate to me that there is not much difference between a LI Coy equipped with Stryker and the same being equipped with a well thought out MRAP type vehicle with RWS and good comms.

I agree with you, as long as the chosen vehicle can put a full squad in the back. However, there is is bit more to a U.S. SBCT company in terms of organization that give it more potential capability. Numbers and types of skills are up front - there are 170 men in a SBCT Rifle company - In addition to the 3 full rifle platoons of 3 x 11 man Rifle squads (9 + 2 vehicle operators) plus a weapons squad of 9 (7 + 2) you get an organic sniper team - not an Adhoc one, but the slots to get them trained at Benning and they are not culled out of any other formation, you get a pretty robust mortar section - with 60s or 120s, and you get your own organic FiST team complete with an FSO - not a habitual attachment, but your very own that is with you all the time. You also get the MGS platoon - I don't care too much about the chosen vehicle - although I was up at Yakima for the MGS integration exercise when I had the HHC and I like it allot better then the ATGM ILOV I had as a SBCT Rifle CO CDR - it did more of what I wanted it to do for my Infantry - however what is important is having a dedicated element to do those tasks in support. So while you could enhance a 100 man Light Infantry Company with a ICV MRAP - to get the full capabilities of a SBCT unit you have to start adding a host of other capabilities - at company, at BN (you get a sniper section, a mortar platoon with 81s and 120s, and the standard HHC package of a medical platoon with its MEVs, and your Recon Platoon + the 3 full rifle companies. At the SBCT level you get more capability in addition to your 3 full up IN BNs, SPT BN and FA BN you get a robust RSTA Squadron (you also get special companies such as the signal, ENG and an AT CO - the latter 2 are based on the Stryker as the platform as well).

In sum, the SBCT is a robust large organization with allot of bodies and capabilities - to bring other organizations up to that level requires allot more investment then just a truck and comms. This is why comparing how other countries are able to use their vehicles (or even other services, and formations) and how we are able to is touch and go - it does not have nearly as much to do with the platform as the organization, leadership, numbers and types of capabilities present to make use of all that. Even for us that is a huge investment - but it makes for a very capable organization from BDE to Squad. This may be why we've had allot of success in its use - numbers do matter.

Best, Rob

selil
01-17-2008, 02:10 PM
Reading a variety of threads within the SWC, the issues with servicing, transporting, and getting the materials of war between production facilties and the soldiers in the field, and the host of security concerns. Reading here on SWC about the abysmal and decrepit mission orientation of the Air Force in regards to CAS (highly opinionate I think we will agree on all counts). Now reading about the Stryker and movement issues in country, and having seen recently some pictures of Army and Marine Corps trucks being washed away in the rains of Afghanistan. And, having recently read a cute little book called "Three Cups of Tea" which talks about building schools in Pakistan near the Afghanistan border. Which gives a real good flavor of the transport and communication issues..

It seems that we've run up against all the issues the Russians found and they had a shorter supply and logistics line. It would seem this is an area that our own USAF should be able to fill the gaps even if it means they have to get dirty. It seems to bring big guns to a fight you have to have heavy movers and big time transport capability. No matter how remote the location and regardless of the issues (like ground to air missiles) this is an area that the USAF should be making the sky pavement between the producer and user. I realize I may be way to simplistic but if the utilization of weapons systems is being determined by the tactical need, but restricted by logistical constraints a simple management 101 concept is stream line or effect those constraints. The tactical need will always be there.

Sorry if I'm missing the point but does it make any sense to artificially restrict the tactics when a solution should be a foregone conclusion?

Rob Thornton
01-17-2008, 03:43 PM
Sam,
Your not missing the point - unless you start a war (and I mean in the sense of something more akin to the decision to implement the Von Schlieffen Plan) - then you often wind up enexpectedly fighting in some inhospitable, remote places that were hard to predict with enough certainty to commit large resources to or make changes for ahead of time. On top of that is the requirement to consider all the other things that could go wrong and cause you to fight somewhere else during or on the heels of your current war (consider the shortage of allied amphibious capability during WWII and the choices that ensued).

That is the challenge for force development folks - and we have tools to have us do that. The QDR for example is a good tool. Out of the DOTMLPF spectrum, material is the last one most sensible people want to muck with on a large scale - because it affects the other elements disproportionately – generates all kind of other requirements etc. The services know how hard it is to justify new capabilities that would provide “new” funding lines that did not at some point tap into those funds already being used to resource critical roles and missions – ex. Congress might mandate new funds from more C-17s – but you then have to consider the strain on all the other supporting systems from wear and tear on bases to the LOG burden, more pilots to recruit, train, retain etc. It is never as simple as just buy more of “X” – because it is so hard to predict the future with enough accuracy to justify major departures from where we are at.

It is been compared to turning a super tanker – which is not a bad way to think about it. It is also not bad to have it that way in at least on regard – people often don’t know or forget how hard it was to build up and sustain the mechanisms which got you to where you are at, or the thought out rational for why something was done a certain way. There are always consequences and unseen costs to change – ex. saw an article in the paper this morning about new BRAC funding being sought to expand the road network in Maryland and Va. To support the increased in traffic they now expect as a result of consolidation – took them awhile to figure out that if you put more people in one spot the existing road network will not accommodate the increase well. Same with Fort Belvoir – can you imagine the traffic that place is going to get with moving Walter Reed Hospital there? We tend to make decisions based on the perceived benefits without considering the adverse consequences or problems we’ll generate in pursuit of those benefits.

For one of the best reads on insights to campaigning in a ####ty place to wage a war – I’d recommend you read Field Marshall Viscount Slim’s account of waging war in Burma – the last chapter in the back is entitled “after thoughts”- while the entire book is worth the read, the last chapter is pure gold! I’ve done some planning and sims in places that are equally ####ty, but I think in different ways. Each new place is going to offer new challenges and if we stay there anytime we’ll be scratching our collective Brain Housing Groups on why we can’t do something better, or why we could not anticipate something. In the end it’ll be like Slim said (paraphrased) “you’ll be surprised what you can get done with the material at hand” The USAF is doing allot of things very well in Afghanistan and the other theaters it supports in what might be called non-traditional ways, as well as fulfilling its responsibilities in traditional areas. They have adapted much like we (the ground forces) have – through innovative folks on the spot.

I final thing I think is worth considering – when we (the United States) conduct combined operations, it is generally our LOG that supply the durational needs of our partners. This is a great capability, but it seldom gets the attention it deserves. The Army often got criticized under a former SecDef for being so big, and so seemingly inefficient – but he did not seem to understand just who the Army was supporting, or what the requirements are for long term Joint, Inter-Agency and Combined campaigning. Nor did he seem to understand that war is not a short term stock investment – it is rife with fog, friction and chance that eats supplies up. So while Wal-Mart can order a new widget and ensure delivery of that widget with near certainty, and anticipate based on local buying patterns associated with that store – War can not do likewise with anywhere near the same certainty. You can do so in peace time training – because its full of frequency and ratios and allotments that allow units to forecast reasonably accurately, but war is chaotic and offers the unexpected with serious consequence.

Well, did not mean to ramble, but LOG and the challenges of campaigning interest me greatly.

Best, Rob

wm
01-17-2008, 04:57 PM
Perhaps it isn't the boundary that's shifting but the gun that's firing at it ?;) I'll take the hit for that. I focused on the 19th Century, not the actual years of the your post.


On the substance, I infer that you are suggesting that because Great Britain's military primacy and balancing diplomacy did not prevent "fairly large conflicts" or colonial wars from occurring 1815 to 1914, that such a policy was a failure and not one worth attempting to emulate by the United States. Correct? Britain's policy was not a complete failure. However, their policy did not involve them in a race to keep up in the technology battle. IIRC, the Horse Guards were adamantly opposed to equipment modernizations--Wellington seemingly took the position that if it was good enough to win at Waterloo, it would be good enough to win forever. I think part of the Brits' casualty problem in the 2nd Boer War can be attributed to being well behind their opponents in rifle technology.

I think the point I was trying to make is that our adopting a similar strategy would force us to engage in a unilateral arms race to maintain technical superiority. In today's world, we can't afford the kind of time delays to bring our military up to speed that the state of transport and communications allowed Britain in the 19th Century and through WWI.

Additionally, as you point out, unlike the period leading up to WWI, the current world does not have a "multipolarity of great powers" competing for hegemony. 21st Century states are much more differentiated and seem to recognize that their economies are much more interconnected than they were in 1900.

If so, that's quite a yardstick! What grand strategy or force structure are you suggesting that could be enacted by the United States that would be more successful in suppressing or detering the outbreak of war on a global scale ? I asked you this earlier, BTW
First, I have little concern that we will see " the outbreak of war on a global scale." I do not think we need to worry about deterring that level of conflict. So with that as background,to repond based on the differences in the 21st C world noted above, I suspect that the military card ought to be a much less pivotal piece of the country's overall strategic deck. We need a large enough defense force to protect our borders and help our allies when attacked (AKA the Army with USAF and USN conventional and nuclear firepower/strategic lift support). We probably need an expeditionary force to conduct punitive, short-term campaigns (AKA the USMC with strategic lift support from USAF and USN). However, I submit that we ough to try not to commit ourselves to reshaping the rest of the world's nations in America's image. We need to start treating our current and potential allies in a much less high-handed fashion and work with them more like partners than as our "go-fers". With our allies' help, we can work to sustain "good" governments by judicious use of foreign aid and trade policies. We can pressure "bad" governments to change by withholding aid and curtailing trade, rather than by invading or supporting insurgent movements. BTW, I think good and bad governments may best be definable in terms of their support (by acts of either commission or omission) for uncivilized conduct (AKA terrorism). I am not, however, advocating a foreign policy based on a country's human rights record. Except for the invading and support for insurgents, this ought to sound a lot like what US policy was for most of the 20th Century.

So we still need the big guns. However, I don't think we need to have them deployed to cause regime changes in countries that do not measure up to our standard of democratic government (or to provide some "testosterone flexing" by our national leadership).

Rank amateur
01-17-2008, 06:14 PM
No disrespect taken, RA.:) The problem is, the Taleban sometimes operate in groups of 100, and in rare cases up to 400. When you've only got 3 Rifle Companies, a Tank Squadron, and an Engineer Squadron, and you're 50-100 klicks from base, leaving a Platoon out in the open to keep a grip on a stuck vehicle is just baiting the Taleban's trap for them.


I could word this with more military buzzwords, but what happens if you run into 400 Taleban when the vehicle isn't stuck? Does the platoon withdraw?

I know you're not here to educate me, but I do appreciate your responses. Aren't less troops required to set up an ambush with the vehicle as bait, than to to mount an offensive operation? Are these reconnaissance missions only?

Cavguy
01-17-2008, 07:18 PM
Hi Rob,
No, its not 1:1. What's happening is more complicated. The deployed Battalion's LAVs/Strykers

Norfolk, for my education, does the Canadian Army use the LAV-3's or the US Stryker version of it (same chassis, different upgrades)? I just want to make sure we're talking about the same vehicle.

Norfolk
01-17-2008, 07:32 PM
I could word this with more military buzzwords, but what happens if you run into 400 Taleban when the vehicle isn't stuck? Does the platoon withdraw?

I know you're not here to educate me, but I do appreciate your responses. Aren't less troops required to set up an ambush with the vehicle as bait, than to to mount an offensive operation? Are these reconnaissance missions only?

First off, here's (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada's_role_in_the_invasion_of_Afghanistan) a quickie Wiki on what the Canadians in A-Stan have been up to.

Mostly the missions are just patrols, either out of Kandahar itself, or out of an outpost. In that case, you've got a relatively small number of troops very far removed from higher-level support to deal with a large number of Taleban troops if something happens. Don't play their game - you cannot get large numbers of troops in a "Pile-On" type of operation, because 1. they're usually unavailable, as the NATO forces are grossly inadequate in size, and 2. it's not always easy to get them there in time if something goes wrong. Most NATO countries do not have the resources that US forces do - and a lot of what the NATO forces do use is provided by the Americans anyway. So it's not worth the risk of baiting an enemy force when you can't be sure that you can get large numbers of troops to close the trap when it's sprung. Save that for large-scale offensive ops when you can make a killing, literally.

You have to bear in mind that the Taleban more or less own much of the countryside - you don't. 30 or 40 guys 50 or more clicks from base looking to tangle with 400 Taleban who have the home-field advantage - local knowledge of terrain, NATO troop locations and movements, local "support" from the natives, and ready supplies at hand - aren't brave, they're incompetent.

Afghanistan is not Iraq - the Taleban switch back and forth between classic Partisan Warfare with individuals or small groups doing their terrorist or guerrilla bit, and then standing up and going toe-to-toe in real set-piece battles with hundreds or even a few thousand troops at a time in pseudo-Conventional Warfare. These guys are much closer to Rednecks than they are to Arabs in the way they fight; come to think of it, in fact there is a bit of a whiff of Mao's "Peoples' War" about it, how they use Partisan Warfare to stay in the game until they're strong enough to engage in something like large-scale conventional ops. And what they often lack in tactical skills they make up for through cunning and sheer bravery - and use of the home-field advantage.

It's actually a good thing for NATO that the Taleban are willing to stand up from time to time to slug it out in the open, full-on, no-holds barred. NATO doesn't have the means to wage a true counter-insurgency campaign, so it's rather considerate of the Taleban to oblige them and kindly face off with NATO every few or several months in convenient large-scale pitched battles. After taking a good beating at the hands of British, Canadian, and Danish troops and losing hundreds and hundreds of men, the Taleban go back to doing the G-stuff for a while until they've rebuilt themselves sufficiently to come out back into the open to go through the whole cycle all over again.

During Operation MEDUSA, at the Second Battle of Panjwai, a Platoon from 1RCR was ambushed in a village by ~100 Taleban who held the high ground (cliffs) around said village. The Platoon fought back but suffered heavy losses, including most of one Section. It was after this particular fight that the decision was made to bring back MBTs, which had been taken out of service two years before; the LAV-IIIs/Strykers that the Platoon had couldn't cross the Taleban entrenchments without getting stuck, and because someone in Canada had decided that slat armour wasn't needed, the LAVs/Strykers couldn't get past the RPG volleys anyway. To add insult to injury, the same Platoon then took casualties to friendly fire when they were attacked by an A-10 at the end of the fight. The flyboys are not viewed with equanimity by the troops.

You will note that in the Second Battle of Panjwai, a Canadian Battle Group (based on an Infantry Battalion - about a thousand men) attacked an entrenched (http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20060910/afghanistan_mackay_060910/20060911?hub=Canada) Taleban force of between 1,500-2,000 men, and destroyed it.

The majority of the 2,800 Canadian troops in Afghanistan are logistics and headquarters types to support the NATO Brigade in Kandahar.

Norfolk
01-17-2008, 07:33 PM
Norfolk, for my education, does the Canadian Army use the LAV-3's or the US Stryker version of it (same chassis, different upgrades)? I just want to make sure we're talking about the same vehicle.

Cavguy, the LAV-III has the turret-mounted 25 mm; otherwise it's basically the same as Stryker.

Rob Thornton
01-17-2008, 08:06 PM
Nrofolk - LAV III has a fuel cell integral to the back and is amphibious capable isn't it? I saw one at the Armor Conf a few years back, and a brother CDR had some as ILOV (along with a host of other armored vehicles for training.) - There might be some other changes since we first picked it up as well - PM Stryker could probably draw up the comaprrison data.
Best, Rob

Rex Brynen
01-17-2008, 08:54 PM
Mostly the missions are just patrols, either out of Kandahar itself, or out of an outpost. In that case, you've got a relatively small number of troops very far removed from higher-level support to deal with a large number of Taleban troops if something happens.

I agree with the thrust of Norfolk's postings that Canadian forces in and around Kandahar are simply too small to do much more than play whack-a-mole with Taliban groups, except when the Taliban are obliging enough to give them a stand-up fight.. and that full-spectrum COIN operations suffer as a result.

That being said, I heard Brigadier-Gen David Fraser (the former Canadian commander of ISAF Regional Command South) speak about intel requirements in Afghanistan a few months ago, and I was underwhelmed. It was largely about speeding up the target acquisition loop to shooters and getting IO on engagements out faster than the bad guys, and little on the importance of understanding local power structures, alliance patterns, grievance mobilization, etc--in short, the socio-political aspects of insurgency.

At the time, I assumed that we had a better doctrinal and practical grasp on COIN, and that I was either missing something or that Fraser doesn't speak well (which may be part of it). Discussing it with several colleagues--the policy/practitioner community is small enough that I have to be very vague, but those who've been on the ground or involved with the Ottawa end of things--I'm still unclear that we really do know how to do COIN well. Indeed, one made comments almost identical to the ones SecDef Gates made to the LA Times.

I think we've assumed here that Canadian expertise in PKOs would translate into COIN skills at the strategic and operational levels. (I'm not speaking here of tactical, small unit, narrowly military skill sets.) I'm now unsure that they do or have --although I would be pleased to be convinced otherwise.

---

I should have probably posted this in an Afghanistan thread, despite spinning off from Norfolk's comments above. Ah well, perhaps anyone in hot pursuit can follow up there.

Stan
01-17-2008, 09:38 PM
Nrofolk - LAV III has a fuel cell integral to the back and is amphibious capable isn't it? I saw one at the Armor Conf a few years back, and a brother CDR had some as ILOV (along with a host of other armored vehicles for training.) - There might be some other changes since we first picked it up as well - PM Stryker could probably draw up the comaprrison data.
Best, Rob

Rob,
The Stryker for all intended purposes is a LAV. Some of the exceptions are the Stryker has a RWS (.50 or MK19) together with 10 versions and the LAV-III has but three versions (APC, DP and FOO). All LAV-IIIs currently come with a 25mm gun...Bigger guns are coming though :eek:. Other than that, some minor suspension configurations (the Stryker has a suspension management system and the Kanucks have gas-charged struts).

This site (http://www.gdlscanada.com/main.html) has a bit more detailed info.

Regards, Stan

EDIT: Norfolk has a good point. Ever seen a 113 or 114 swim ? Amphibious isn't the word I'm looking for !

Norfolk
01-17-2008, 09:46 PM
Nrofolk - LAV III has a fuel cell integral to the back and is amphibious capable isn't it? I saw one at the Armor Conf a few years back, and a brother CDR had some as ILOV (along with a host of other armored vehicles for training.) - There might be some other changes since we first picked it up as well - PM Stryker could probably draw up the comaprrison data.
Best, Rob

I'm afraid that I wouldn't bet on it being amphibious; its precursor, the 8x8 LAV-25 Bison (more like the Stryker in some ways than the LAV-III, as it had no turret) was tested at Port Stanley for its amphibious capablility. It obligingly drowned in Lake Erie for the local news cameras (CFPL) and newpaper photographers (especially for the London Free Press).:wry: The locals still joke about it.

Being a former grunt and not a crewman, I didn't pay much mind to the location of the fuel tanks, as long as I wasn't sitting on top of them. So far as I know, there were fuel cells running along the side of the hull to the rear on both sides.

I suspect that to the extent that there are problems with the LAV/Stryker concept is that it's taking a vehicle that was designed in the late 60's for Aid to the Civil Power and Internal Security, and in Western European conditions - which it is ideal for - and has been impressed into service in roles that it's not really intended for. Can it do Peacekeeping? As long as it's Pearsonian-type, Yes. Can it slug it out with MBTs (http://armyapp.dnd.ca/ALLC/Downloads/dispatch/Vol_9/vol9_no3_eng.pdf)? No (http://www.army.forces.gc.ca/caj/documents/vol_05/iss_4/CAJ_vol5.4_05_e.pdf). How about in between? Depends on what you're doing. If it works in Iraq, then keep it. If it doesn't work in Afghanistan, replace it - that's what Canada and Australia are doing, both LAV/Stryker users, and together with the Dutch and the Danes are moving to upgraded M-113s:( (sad, isn't it?) for cross-country ops there.

There's a little DND Virtual Tour (http://www.army.forces.gc.ca/lf/English/2_display.asp?product=64) on Quick Time for the LAV-III. And just to be clear, because the Canadian LAV-III has the same turret-mounted 25mm as the USMC LAV-25, it can only carry 7 dismounts whereas the Styker (which uses the same chassis) is supposed to carry 9.

Norfolk
01-17-2008, 10:16 PM
That being said, I heard Brigadier-Gen David Fraser (the former Canadian commander of ISAF Regional Command South) speak about intel requirements in Afghanistan a few months ago, and I was underwhelmed. It was largely about speeding up the target acquisition loop to shooters and getting IO on engagements out faster than the bad guys, and little on the importance of understanding local power structures, alliance patterns, grievance mobilization, etc--in short, the socio-political aspects of insurgency.

At the time, I assumed that we had a better doctrinal and practical grasp on COIN, and that I was either missing something or that Fraser doesn't speak well (which may be part of it). Discussing it with several colleagues--the policy/practitioner community is small enough that I have to be very vague, but those who've been on the ground or involved with the Ottawa end of things--I'm still unclear that we really do know how to do COIN well. Indeed, one made comments almost identical to the ones SecDef Gates made to the LA Times.

I think we've assumed here that Canadian expertise in PKOs would translate into COIN skills at the strategic and operational levels. (I'm not speaking here of tactical, small unit, narrowly military skill sets.) I'm now unsure that they do or have --although I would be pleased to be convinced otherwise.

Rex, I have noticed that in recent years, a lot of our COIN and LIC doctrine had been dispersed across a number of pams; formerly, a good deal of it had been centralized in the 3 volumes of Aid to the Civil Power, but that was scrapped years ago. The tactical COIN skills are still there as far as I'm aware, but the operational and strategic stuff was scattered and submerged in a couple of different Land Force Operations pams (under the general rubric of CIMIC) as well as others, and even the new COIN pam is only a couple years old now (I can't remember whether it or the new Urban Operations pam is a virtual re-print of the US one).

That said, PKO's were probably a training ground of mixed utility for COIN. Was there COIN to be performed during PKO's? Of course there was, and much of what is required in Peacekeeping is the same as what is required in COIN. But year after year of PKO's had the effect of driving experienced officers and men out of the military. You can't put the Army into the Balkans for ten years (plus other, sometimes weighty, committments elsewhere - Africa, Haiti, etc.), understrength, underequipped, and over-committed, often with little recovery time betwen deployments, without driving out a lot of your people. And over-committment to PKO's also destroyed the Army's capacity to conduct Conventional Combined Arms ops above Company and Combat Team level; that has only been partially reversed in recent years.

But probably the other thing going on is the political pragmatism (fatalism, even) that the Canadian senior leadership is renowned for. Completely lacking the capability to wage a genuine COIN campaign because of domestic political pressures back home and inadequate troop levels and resources in-theatre, the senior leaders simply give up and make do the best they can, and do what's possible. And for them, that means
basically pursuing an outpost and patrolling-based campaign that culiminates every now and then in a conventional "Decisive" engagement with the Taleban, only for both sides to start the cycle all over again, but at a notch higher than the last time.

In any case, there have been longstanding problems within the senior leadership, and we haven't got a Petraeus of our own in Afghanistan to handle things - though we do have a Hillier in Ottawa still:D - so far.

Rank amateur
01-17-2008, 11:03 PM
the senior leaders simply give up and make do the best they can

I figured that blowing up your own equipment had to be a symptom of a larger problem. Thanks for helping me understand it. I'm more convinced than ever that not making Afghanistan the "central front in the war on terror" was a huge strategic mistake. Maybe there's still time.

Ken White
01-17-2008, 11:20 PM
I figured that blowing up your own equipment had to be a symptom of a larger problem. Thanks for helping me understand it. I'm more convinced than ever that not making Afghanistan the "central front in the war on terror" was a huge strategic mistake. Maybe there's still time.

were we not in Iraq, Afghanistan would certainly have been worse and probably would now be far, far more difficult than it is. Not that it's really that bad now... ;)

Look at the bright side, ISAF and its Canadian Commander in the south will soon have two Marine BCTs for the summer... :D

One might also consider that most, not all, of the bad guy's losses in Iraq have been as much a deterrent as an attraction to new recruits, that they have effectively given up on Iraq and are now shifting to Europe (slowly), Pakistan and Afghanistan as having more IO potential if they can concentrate on NATO forces to force a public outcry for withdrawal from Canada, the Dutch and the UK in that order.

They've pretty much given up the idea that we would quit, take our marbles and go home so they're going for what they see is the weak link...

Wonder what the US strategy for that shift will be? Possibly balanced forces? We shall see.

Not to mention that Afghanistan is not in the ME and that's important...

Rank amateur
01-18-2008, 02:30 AM
They've pretty much given up the idea that we would quit, take our marbles and go home

A) They've also figured out that if they mass in groups of 200-400 in certain parts of Afghanistan no one will attack them.

B) I don't know. If they have an Internet connection they might be able to figure out that Obama has promised an immediate withdrawal and there's at least a chance he'll win.


Look at the bright side, ISAF and its Canadian Commander in the south will soon have two Marine BCTs for the summer...

If 3,500 is good why isn't 135,000 better?


having more IO potential if they can concentrate on NATO forces to force a public outcry for withdrawal from Canada, the Dutch and the UK in that order.

I'm not certain about your position on this point. If our allies withdrew, would it be good, bad or irrelevant because we're winning in Iraq.


One might also consider that most, not all, of the bad guy's losses in Iraq have been as much a deterrent as an attraction to new recruits,

I'm concerned that they'll remember that recruiting was pretty strong when they sent people to terrorist training camps in Afghanistan and they're smart enough to figure out that as long as they keep their training mobile and surrounded by 200-400 Taliban, they can train as many people as they want.

Ken White
01-18-2008, 04:12 AM
A) They've also figured out that if they mass in groups of 200-400 in certain parts of Afghanistan no one will attack them.

Not really. I've read the thread but I disagree that such large crowds are common. Possible, yeah and they do occur -- did frequently a couple of years ago and especially early last year, the first two Canadian rotations and the first Brit rotations had a rough go. However, those large groups last year got decimated and lately they generally get waxed when they do that so they've pretty well gone to smaller groups and intimidation of locals. The few exceptions have been in the areas where MI6 tried to cut deals with the locals (and got tossed out of country by Karzai for doing so).

Predators see all -- well, almost all. Brits, Canadians and Dutch not withstanding, even Americans, the Talibs get creamed in all force on force battles and they get creamed by a bolt out of the blue when a Raven, Hunter or Predator spots 'em and a BOne at high angels sends down a JDAM (Thanks, George, you too, John...) even with no coalition troops around...:D
B) I don't know. If they have an Internet connection they might be able to figure out that Obama has promised an immediate withdrawal and there's at least a chance he'll win.They may believe that. If you do, I have a Bridge I can let go at a bargain price. (That's for the 'withdraw' from Iraq part, ain't gonna happen. Don't care who wins)
If 3,500 is good why isn't 135,000 better?Mostly because the Russians tried that. How'd that work out for them?

As long as we have a small footprint, we don't antagonize the Afghans too terribly much, a bigger footprint would annoy them -- and the Brits and the Russians can tell you that is not a good idea. The idea is to be just big enough but not too big...
I'm not certain about your position on this point. If our allies withdrew, would it be good, bad or irrelevant because we're winning in Iraq. Iraq has little to do with it; the Dutch have mostly left Iraq and the Brits are leaving, the Canadians were never there (officially or in large numbers). I believe it's also a bit early to say we're 'winning' in Iraq; we'll see. Winning in COIN is a bad term, there generally is no win or lose, one can only hope for an acceptable outcome.

For Afghanistan and those folks leaving, militarily it wouldn't make too much difference. However, politically it would be bad; it would send the bad guys the message that they can prevail against the west simply by manipulating public opinion -- and at base level, that's what all this is about, the manipulation by them of western opinion. That's why they've hit the Canadians hard, they figure their public is the least convinced that fighting in Afghanistan is a good idea; then the Dutch, next most uncertain, latterly the Brits and they haven't given up on us but they've realized we aren't quitting as long as Bush is there. They don't realize that the next Prez isn't going to quit either (in Afghanistan or Iraq) but they'll find out. They know they cannot win militarily, they hope that through attrition, no matter how light, the populace of the west will be dissuaded.

Either you resist the mob when they come by to collect protection money or you pay. Carter, Reagan and Bush 41 paid -- W. decided to resist. So too have the Brits, Canadians and Dutch -- and the rest of NATO (they may not all be fighting but there are a large number of people there from all NATO nations with more on the way). If they are coerced, figuratively -- it will not and cannot be done literally -- into leaving, then the entire west takes a hit...
I'm concerned that they'll remember that recruiting was pretty strong when they sent people to terrorist training camps in Afghanistan and they're smart enough to figure out that as long as they keep their training mobile and surrounded by 200-400 Taliban, they can train as many people as they want.They can't do that; they can send them to Pakistan now; not at all sure that'll be true much longer. Even today, they can have problems (LINK) (http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=13790). If they put 'em in Afghanistan; just the Camps, they're going to got spotted and zapped without a second thought. As I said above, they've already found out that gathering in large groups is hard on their health.

LINK (http://blogs.abcnews.com/theblotter/2007/12/exclusive-eyewi.html)
LINK (http://www.guardian.co.uk/afghanistan/story/0,,1987933,00.html)
LINK (http://www.spacewar.com/reports/Predators_Provide_Eyes_In_The_Sky_Over_Afghanistan .html)
LINK (http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=44165)
LINK (http://www.strategypage.com/qnd/afghan/articles/20070911.aspx)

zenpundit
01-18-2008, 04:41 AM
WM,

I think I understand your position better now with the benefit of the explanation. We're not really that far apart as I do not see the U.S. military as a hammer and every foreign policy problem as a nail - just that some of our best friends have decided to stake their security on access to our toolbox and if that ever ends, they and their neighbors will reach for bigger and better hammers of their own. We're better off if they do not.


Additionally, as you point out, unlike the period leading up to WWI, the current world does not have a "multipolarity of great powers" competing for hegemony. 21st Century states are much more differentiated and seem to recognize that their economies are much more interconnected than they were in 1900

Great Britain erred in retreating further into "Splendid Isolation" and Imperial Preference when what they ought to have done was managed Germany's rise by locking her into a new Concert of Europe while Bismarck's influence remained. Great Britain of 1900 was not as relatively strong as the Great Britain of 1850 and once Europe settled into hostile blocs it was too late. Not all of this was the fault of British statesmen of course but it was in their long-term interest to have gone the extra mile.

The U.S. does not face true multipolarity but the potential is there - China and India are rising, Europe is aging but it's latent strength is great.

wm
01-18-2008, 12:48 PM
Great Britain erred in retreating further into "Splendid Isolation" and Imperial Preference when what they ought to have done was managed Germany's rise by locking her into a new Concert of Europe while Bismarck's influence remained. Great Britain of 1900 was not as relatively strong as the Great Britain of 1850 and once Europe settled into hostile blocs it was too late. Not all of this was the fault of British statesmen of course but it was in their long-term interest to have gone the extra mile.
My biggest concern is that the display of hubris that seems to undergird US unilateral actions will land us in a position very much like Britain's "splendid isolation" that you mention.

To your point about Britain's failure to manage Germany post-1866, I suspect that Victoria's Britain had become so obsessed with the "Great Game" and other third world adventures in Asia and Africa that it was really unable to be a player that any one else would take too seriously in the post-Congress of Vienna power struggles in Continental Europe. I worry that the US's heavy-handed approach to "building" coalitions to fight the GWOT will produce a similar effect.

Much of our current international "support" is, I think, because we play armory to a large portion of the world, not because other nations share our strategic concerns. In other words, nations play along with us because we keep giving them weapons or the foreign aid that allows them to buy the weapons they want.