The USA military-led global strategy: a fresh analysis?

[Bob's World]

Looks like the author has spent a bit of time in "Bob's World."

Seriously though, obviously I agree with his general premise. What I find sadly interesting is that in the US, while we can generally agree that we employ the military too much to make people comply with our desires of them, our solution has been that we need to employ other aspects of our government more vigorously to make other people comply with our desires of them. So much so, that we will pay our civil servants a 70% bonus and extra paid travel and vacations to entice them to take this on.

The issue is not that we need more civilians to help the military do what it is doing, the issue is that we are doing the wrong things in the wrong manner. The military is out managing the symptoms of the friction of US foreign policy. What we really need from the civilian community is not help putting out the fires and blowing the smoke away, but rather that they change how they do their own jobs so as to produce less friction to begin with. No 70% pay bump required.

[slapout9]

Sadly,until we change the way money works nothing will change

[CWOT]

The issue is not that we need more civilians to help the military do what it is doing, the issue is that we are doing the wrong things in the wrong manner. The military is out managing the symptoms of the friction of US foreign policy. What we really need from the civilian community is not help putting out the fires and blowing the smoke away, but rather that they change how they do their own jobs so as to produce less friction to begin with. No 70% pay bump required.

USG can make the military take action. This is not true of the larger interagency. Until the USG can compel its personnel to participate in CT action as needed and directed, the default will always be to have the military solve the problem.