The American Way of War in 25 Words or Less

[Steve Blair]

Actually, Perrin makes a rather compelling case that the US operational art, and theater-level strategy, is built around a 'converging columns' model of warfare, but that relies on identifying come conquerable centers of gravity for the enemy that can be controlled by said columns.
Not all that applicable to a counterinsurgency, tho.
It's also amusing to hear the American military talk about how we "don't do counterinsurgency" when we spend 175 years doing exactly that from 1760 to 1935 or so, with a few brief 'conventional' interruptions

But that's always been the rub...the American military has a thing for preparing for the war they want to fight and ignoring the wars they've actually been fighting.

The best example of converging columns working in the Indian Wars was the Red River War. It had two aggressive commanders (Miles and Mackenzie) with good units and (especially Mackenzie) an understanding of how to achieve the objective of the campaign. The Great Sioux War was another story...

And Custer had a thing for dividing his regiment. Did it at Black Kettle's village and got away with it, and then failed at the Little Bighorn. I don't think he ever adjusted down from his days as a cavalry commander in the Civil War. It's worth nothing, if only in passing, that Custer never commanded a regiment during the war.