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  1. #1
    Council Member gute's Avatar
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    Default Returning to a Division Centric Army

    General Chiarelli said the modular force is “not as efficient as a division” and that he is looking at “adjustments” to it.

    My question: What will be adjusted?

    Much more in this article.

    http://www.dodbuzz.com/2010/09/23/ar...whacks-coming/

  2. #2
    Council Member Van's Avatar
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    The question to start with is "efficient by what metric?"

    This is part of the standard self-flagellation by flagellation between centralized, financially efficient and decentralized, combat efficent organizations.

    For example; efficent combat units have organic maintenance capabilities, but financially efficient units have the maintenance centralized at a higher echelon (and company commanders can just get in line to get their vehicles fixed). Same argument applies to any support function I can think of (intel, signal, trans assets, etc).

    The discussion of precision guided munitions (PGM) vs conventional munitions was more interesting. I'd like to see a rigorous study of the advantages of PGM vs. iron rounds, integrating the consequences of increased gunnery to make up for less technically sophisticated munitions. That is, does increasing gunnery with the money saved on PGM increase the guns' accuracy and precision to a greater extent than the PGM allows?

    This sounds suspiciously like GEN Chiarelli was directed to come to a specific solution and is attempting to rationalize the answer that has been imposed upon him.

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    I like the theme he's taking with PGM: one of the ongoing legacies of DESERT STORM is this myth of clean precise war that was fostered through the 90s in Serbia and Kosovo, and into OIF. PGMs are all very nice when you have the luxury of relatively undefended precise targets but less so perhaps against an adversary that is dispersed, concealed and able to retaliate and/or defend itself.

    The articles pretty vague on how the modular force is “not as efficient as a division” and more so on the nature of the “adjustments” to it that he may be considering. My first thought is that the modular brigade structure seems to have been working fairly well to support the long campaigns of the last decade...

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    This sounds a lot less like anything to do with the structure of the army. It sounds a lot more like the Army, or at least certain members of it, want to get a handle on the enormous war profittering (for instance, of contractors & industry- hence the JRAP, MTLV, Hummer issue) in evidence since OIF I (anyone remember Halliburton? Civil contractors? etc.). The issue of PGms sounds a lot like an argument over "value for money" than it does "measures of performance/effectiveness". But that's just IMO from this side of the "pond". Perhaps there are domestic issues, tacitly presupposed by the article, which I am unaware of.

    For my money the brigade based army is a sound idea in principle (in fact the Soviet army before it disolved had already come to that conclusion too). The only problem I have with the BCTs is the lack of true manouvre capability. They need at least three manouvre battalions and a cav/recon bn and one (as a minimum) proper arty bn (with 24 not 16 tubes). By the way, while I'm on my hobby horse get rid of the combined arms bn in the HBCT and return to flexible, task organsied (I know, this is still practiced) pure bns (two of each). A HBCT has four armour companies (two per Bn) that's one battalion's worth of armour for what kind of an overhead? Dammit, I need a fag (that's a cigarette to you), I'm really grumpy this morning.
    Last edited by Tukhachevskii; 09-30-2010 at 11:17 AM. Reason: A spell checker would be nice....

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    Council Member gute's Avatar
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    By using the word efficient and not effective one must assume costs. The following link is from an article by Lt. Colonel Melton which has been before, but is now about five years old, but I think it still applies and might very well be the adjustments the general is talking about:

    http://usacac.army.mil/CAC/milreview...g05/melton.pdf

    Here is another article I came across:

    http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc...c=GetTRDoc.pdf

    For those who don't have time to read and are unfamilar with Lt. Colonel Melton, he argued in his article that the small BCTs had caused the Army to have to create additional types of BCTs, which increased overhead. He recommened combining BCTs, attaching FA battalions to BCTs even if the FA battalion is not firing in support of the BCT, establishing an engineer hqs in the BCT, combining sustainment and maneuver brigades (which may have already been done - combat support brigades), BGs command BCTs.

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    Council Member Hacksaw's Avatar
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    Default Remember deja vu is a glitch in the matrix

    You know...
    I used to be a tad cynical towards the DA Civilian/Contractor (present complany excluded of course) who would tell me oh that concept (pick your topic from organization design to personnel policy to operational approach) is in vogue again... and then they would dig deep in their historical files to show you the other three times the pendulum had swung back and forth...

    I need a Bud
    Hacksaw
    Say hello to my 2 x 4

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    Council Member Pete's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Hacksaw View Post
    ... oh that concept (pick your topic from organization design to personnel policy to operational approach) is in vogue again...
    If we were to revert back to muzzle-loading rifle-muskets it would support the kinder, gentler, population-centric COIN approach, as opposed to the firepower-intensive Fulda Gap model. We could save on ammo costs as well.

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