Great article.
We have some outstanding leaders growing in our ranks.
I am glad CPT Gwinn will be in the GO ranks when my little warriors dawn the uniform.
Great article.
We have some outstanding leaders growing in our ranks.
I am glad CPT Gwinn will be in the GO ranks when my little warriors dawn the uniform.
Definitely a great piece!
Sic Bisquitus Disintegrat...
Marc W.D. Tyrrell, Ph.D.
Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies,
Senior Research Fellow,
The Canadian Centre for Intelligence and Security Studies, NPSIA
Carleton University
http://marctyrrell.com/
... it was a real pleasure posting this piece - job well done. Tom Barnett thinks so too.
the old folks will just leave 'em alone...
Good find and glad Tom's picking that up for CALL.
James Joyner at Outside the Beltway - COIN at the Company and Platoon Level.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, critical tasks go unmet - awaiting the pros from Dover to show... tick, tick, tick......While the need identified is valid, the proposed solution is unworkable. The tasks in question simply require too much expertise to be handled by amateurs...
Please! We can't always wait for the "professionals" to arrive (assuming that they ever would...). His comment on SF organization is also disingenuous. CAPT Gwinn isn't saying that regular forces should BECOME SF; he's saying that they could use bits of their organization to improve what they have to work with NOW.
Depending on higher-level attachments as Joyner seems to advocate is a recipe for getting nothing done. Sure, you're not going to have "experts" at the company and platoon level, but recognizing the need and, more importantly, organizing and training to fill what you can is certainly better than doing nothing and waiting for "higher" to take care of it. One of the baseline ideas in COIN is making the "line soldier" aware of what's required and then giving him or her some of the tools to make that happen.
"On the plains and mountains of the American West, the United States Army had once learned everything there was to learn about hit-and-run tactics and guerrilla warfare."
T.R. Fehrenbach This Kind of War
My favorite from Joyner's apologia pro bureauratii
Ummm, what is "the COIN mindset" if not what Gwinn is proposing? O, right, sorry I missed it - it should only be made available in "everyday training" and PME - not the field !Ideally, MOS-trained specialists in these areas would be assigned down to the small unit level. Practically, however, it’s unlikely that we can train enough of them to make that feasible. Probably the best that can be done is to beef up the availability at the battalion level and integrate the COIN mindset into everyday training and Professional Military Education for combat arms soldiers.
Sic Bisquitus Disintegrat...
Marc W.D. Tyrrell, Ph.D.
Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies,
Senior Research Fellow,
The Canadian Centre for Intelligence and Security Studies, NPSIA
Carleton University
http://marctyrrell.com/
I guess we should not tell Joyner that small tactical units are in fact doing this and its working!
Hat tip to CPT Gwinn who has taken the time to write it down in a way that communicates the "how" and "why". Efforts like his help units hit the ground running vs. waiting for higher echelons to provide solutions. It also adds to the larger discussion about what we do!
Exceptionally poor sensing on the Gwinn article, I'm glad he got out and went on to bigger and better things.
He's obviously unaware that the world has changed since DS/DS. The 11-Bushes today are doing what the mighty Scroll Rangers used to do and said Ringlers are doing what the SF Hot Teams used to do and so on.
What he misses is that the kids will do what they're trained to do and while the US Army has absolutely mastered the technique of cramming two weeks instruction into six weeks, that is slowly changing and can be changed even more with a slight push.
Bill Slim said it well; any well trained infantry battalion can do most things the so-called elite units do.
He obviously doesn't know that many units are in fact doing what Gwin recommends and did.
As you say, tick, tick -- he offers another excuse for sitting on hands and letting the world fall in around someones ears.
Whatever happened to "Never explain, never complain, always be five minutes early and do something even if its wrong?"
He's out to lunch. Outside the Beltway sounds more like the bureaucracy inside it...
And the real definition of elite is a unit which has mastered the basics to where they are second nature but never stops training on them.Bill Slim said it well; any well trained infantry battalion can do most things the so-called elite units do.
I have seen so many foreign militaries miss that point, usually because their "elite" forces are merely labeled as such because they have a catchy name, a badge that says they can fall out of airplanes, or perhaps a mission to suppress the public.
Where we advanced in the 80s and 90s from the hollow Army of the 70s was focus on basics. That still applies but the basic set has morphed.
Best
Tom
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