Quote Originally Posted by John T. Fishel View Post
Ken--
You are quite right when you argue that Iraq is not (fill in the blank)...

. . .

The new is often found in the recombination and adaptation rather than in some "new generation of warfare." If this line of reaoning is correct, then reading Galula, Trinquier, Thompson, Kitson, Callwell, and the USMC 1940, etc. is valuable as sources of COIN adaptation.

The other issue you raise is that of organizational learning...
. . .

Given all the prior experience and the existence of relevant doctrine, I fail to see how senior commanders like Franks and senior DOD officials like Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and Feith could have ignored it all. But, then, I guess I remain too optimistic about the human race. Still, I strongly believe that we should be able to find ways to instituionalize organizational learning that will make it more difficult for human stupidity to screw things up.
JohnT
Agree with all you wrote; didn't mean to imply that Galulla et.al. should be totally discarded, merely that some of the older stuff was not totally applicable and it has been my experience that many tend to hew entirely too closely to the written word -- most of which, after all, is like my scritching, just the thoughts of one guy at one time -- and not truly THINK about what needed to be done. Thus I was suggesting only that they do not have all the answers. I agree that the basics of war of any type aren't all that changeable and the basics (which we do not do well) are important.

I strongly agree on the institutionalizing of organizational learning. I have for over 60 years watched us constantly reinvent wheels -- and the current crop of 'great thnkers' (scare quotes advisedly used) you mention have seemingly invented square ones.

My personal take on that particular failure is that four massive egos collided and imploded. Very seriously. I have no particular liking or respect for any of them and they all failed the nation in pursuit of personal pet rocks IMO.

Anything we can do to avoid that needs to be done. Egos frequently get in the way of effectiveness. In my view they are the most significant detriment to attempts to use our history to good advantage. I recall watching a young Engineer Company Commander get dressed down by a GO in Korea mid 70s because the CPT didn't know if he had enough pontoons to cross the Imjin at a particular point. The Gen-gen said "We've been here 25 years..." the Captains reply was a classic, "No Sir. We've been here 25 one year tours and mine is a week old." That about sums it up.

Yes, we definitely need to codify organizational learning, the failure to do so is killing us. Literally.