The American Way of War in 25 Words or Less

[carl]

25 words or less.

Nothing will happen. Those rat-bastards! Throw everything at 'em. Now! Ok, I'm bored. That's good enough. Yawn. Nothing will happen.....

[jmm99]

MOOSEMUSS.jpg

Credit to Ken White (12-15-2007).

Regards

Mike

[John T. Fishel]

Thanks to Ken.

Serious note: Converging columns was a widely used operation during the Indian Wars and was what was planned in the Little Bighorn campaign until Custer tried it at the tactical leve (again) withe far more tribesmen than he could handle.It wasn't just American Small Wars operational art, the Brits used it 3 years later when the Zulu ambushed them at Isandluwana.

Cheers

JohnT

[jmm99]

Before I forget this, I'd change M=Mass to M=Momentum:

Like velocity, linear momentum is a vector quantity, possessing a direction as well as a magnitude: p=mv.

Or, getting back to Ken's post:

Mass should be changed to Nathan. As in Nathan Bedford Forrest -- a simple reminder to get "thar fustest with the mostest."

which has the same velocity and mass elements as "momentum" - yielding a vector quantity well suited to "converging columns", etc.

But, NOOSEMUSS just doesn't have the same ring as MOOSEMUSS; so thus "Momentum" instead of "Nathan".

Regards

Mike

[carl]

Thanks to Ken.

Serious note: Converging columns was a widely used operation during the Indian Wars and was what was planned in the Little Bighorn campaign until Custer tried it at the tactical leve (again) withe far more tribesmen than he could handle.It wasn't just American Small Wars operational art, the Brits used it 3 years later when the Zulu ambushed them at Isandluwana.

Cheers

JohnT

That wasn't an ambush. It was a well executed Zulu attack against a poorly disposed British defensive position.

[Morgan]

The American way:

Throw money at it!!

4 words

[SWJED]

Here are the winning submissions at War on the Rocks.

[AdamG]

Here are the winning submissions at War on the Rocks.

*Giggle*

2. Jack McDonald, War Studies Department, King’s College London:

Use a sledgehammer to crack a nut. Occasionally eat a nut, occasionally hit own nuts. Everyone else is scared, horrified and awed in equal measure.

[Tukhachevskii]

The American way:

Throw money at it!!

4 words

Four words, just FOUR words? That's far too ECONOMICAL for America.

[Steve Blair]

Four words, just FOUR words? That's far too ECONOMICAL for America.

Naw...it's the vision statement for the plan. Wait 'till you hit the actual mission statement.....

[wm]

Serious note: Converging columns was a widely used operation during the Indian Wars and was what was planned in the Little Bighorn campaign until Custer tried it at the tactical leve (again) withe far more tribesmen than he could handle.It wasn't just American Small Wars operational art, the Brits used it 3 years later when the Zulu ambushed them at Isandluwana.

When converging columns fail, it is because the columns don't/can't communicate with each other. So, to return to the original request, I nominate the following:

"Shoot, scoot, communicate."

[Steve Blair]

When converging columns fail, it is because the columns don't/can't communicate with each other. So, to return to the original request, I nominate the following:

"Shoot, scoot, communicate."

Actually that's not always the case. Mackenzie and Miles didn't communicate much at all during the Red River War, but they were both aggressive commanders who would stick with the enemy once they were located. Crook's unexplained paralysis after the Rosebud contributed a great deal to the disaster at LBH. Terry's decision to fragment his own column didn't help matters, either.

At least during the Indian Wars period, I'd say most converging column campaigns that failed had more to do with either poor decisions or a lack of aggressiveness on the part of one of the column commanders and not so much communications. Communications could play a role, but if one commander had a case of the "slows" all the talking in the world wasn't going to help matters.