We do tend to end up with too many bases, posts, OPS, etc, but this is partly a result of the type of thing I observed in the Korengal, Kunar, and Nuristan over the course of about a year.

Subordinate commanders, as they become more familiar with the terrain and enemy, identify more and more places that it would be beneficial to establish some presence on. You know the deal - OPs to watch areas from which the enemy habitually fires on our bases, an extra post to keep an IED-plagued stretch of road under observation, etc. All of these individually are justifiable, but they soak up more and more manpower and reduce the number of boots that can actually patrol out the front gate. Senior commanders need to do a better job of controlling this tendency of subordinates to circumvallate themselves, but that means accepting.

Because what we really need in these cases are not just extra posts, but more people, and that is the one resource that is extremely difficult to come by.