The Col. Gentile collection and debate

[Gian P Gentile]

Ken:

good post; and agree.

I too think a well trained combat outfit can do many, many missions of different types. My point, and this has been beat around pretty well in other threads, is that the most flexible and adaptable combat units are ones trained primarily in the higher end of the fighting spectrum because in that training they would have honed their basic combat skills (regardless if they are infantry, armor, cavalry, etc). What I just said is an ideal, an organizing principle of sorts, and not, NOT a call to stop coin training for units that are deploying so that they can train on hic. But at some point if we are able to wind down in Iraq these questions will start to arise.

The interesting thing about Belavia's book if you get the chance to read it is that he writes from an infantryman's perspective in urban combat and acutally is explicitly dismissive of armor at various points in the book, but when he describes fighting in houses at the end of the engagement there always seems to be a bradley outside either breaking the wall down or pumping rounds wherever needed.

If I had a dollar for your combat experience relative to mine I would be a rich man.

v/r

gian

[Ken White]

In order:

I agree.

I 'll get the book -- or my son the Military historian to be may already have it.

Nah. Different times breed different events, it's all relative. With all mine and a buck, I can get a cup of coffee in a cheap restaurant (which is really bad when one remembers a Nickel a cup in a good restaurant...). What counts is that we both brought back as many as we could, we both care and we're still here to pick on each other and mayhap, some day, buy each other a drink.

[Gian P Gentile]

Ken:

what a nice thing to say!!

your eloquence moved me.

we did bring back as many as we could; and the ones we didnt, well that is the bond that we share.

very respectcully

gian

ps; if you are ever in the new york city area you have an open invite to spend a day with me at west point in the classroom with future lieutenants who you in past times taught and trained.

[BayonetBrant]

I too think a well trained combat outfit can do many, many missions of different types.

Sir,

I wholeheartedly agree. And I think that combat-focused training is starting to lose traction as the 'experts' offer their 'help' to the current leaders charged with executing these wars.

I wonder if at least some of the 'muscle memory' that's ben referred to above is less about the difference between COIN/HIC and as much, or more, about risk aversion. COIN is inherently dangerous work, and it involves exposing yourself to all manner of dangerous possibilities. But COIN can't be successfully accomplished from inside the wire, or outside the wire in brigade-size movements to contact.

Are the leadership today more afraid of appearing on C-SPAN with a well-hones "Yes, Senator. No, Senator" soundtrack than they are of failing at COIN because they were too tentative in their FOB-based approach?

I guess I'm trying to ask if the old habits that die hard aren't more the result of endless 'risk assessments' in training that have more to do with snakebites and heat cramps than with mission failure.

It's easy to justify casualties in HIC - there's a shooting war going on. But it's harder to tell some kid's parents that they were patrolling without body armor on because the local populace were more likely to open up to the soldiers and provide better info to them when they weren't wearing it.

[RTK]

I too think a well trained combat outfit can do many, many missions of different types. My point, and this has been beat around pretty well in other threads, is that the most flexible and adaptable combat units are ones trained primarily in the higher end of the fighting spectrum because in that training they would have honed their basic combat skills (regardless if they are infantry, armor, cavalry, etc). What I just said is an ideal, an organizing principle of sorts, and not, NOT a call to stop coin training for units that are deploying so that they can train on hic. But at some point if we are able to wind down in Iraq these questions will start to arise.

Sir,

I've always thought this was the crux of your argument. It's spot on.

Basics and fundamentals don't change. Their application may, but basic battle drills, action drills, contact drills and reports are the exact same. Dealing with other people in other cultures and our own in the way they should be treated as equals and peers and not in the "I'm-American. I'm- wicked-way-smarter-than-you" methodology we've been known to use
doesn't have to be a battalion training event.

[Cavguy]

I too think a well trained combat outfit can do many, many missions of different types.

I don't think anyone disagrees with this - but - how do we educationally prepare soldiers for full-spectrum ops?

I, like many others, did not feel that the army provided sufficent grounding in COIN basics prior to 2003 as part of our professional military education, and as a result we committed major avoidable errors in tactical COIN 2003-2004.

I think the answer lies more in professional education versus training, as I look back at my OBC and CCC I realize nearly all of it was training. In line units, only three commanders (two BN and one CO) of mine had any regular sort of formal OPD program.

It may be easy to criticize Galula, but I would submit if more officers had read that book as part of a general military education (alongside all other works), we may have created less problems than we ultimately did in OIF.

Niel

[Gian P Gentile]

I don't think anyone disagrees with this - but - how do we educationally prepare soldiers for full-spectrum ops?

I, like many others, did not feel that the army provided sufficent grounding in COIN basics prior to 2003 as part of our professional military education, and as a result we committed major avoidable errors in tactical COIN 2003-2004.

I think the answer lies more in professional education versus training, as I look back at my OBC and CCC I realize nearly all of it was training. In line units, only three commanders (two BN and one CO) of mine had any regular sort of formal OPD program.

It may be easy to criticize Galula, but I would submit if more officers had read that book as part of a general military education (alongside all other works), we may have created less problems than we ultimately did in OIF.

Niel

Niel: right, and now with the operational demands of coin we must train our formations to perform the mission they are getting ready to conduct which means until we ramp-down we must maintain our operational training focus on coin. But as I said that comes at a cost, there is risk involved. Now the Coin advocates response is well, really, so what, because we must win the wars we are in now so don’t worry about the future. I don’t buy that logic, and I think it to be irresponsible. This gets to your question about education. Certainly at places like the Army War College and other defense educational institutions there is an important place for coin, irregular war as subjects for education. But we should not turn these places into Coin Academies where that is all that they do there. Why? Because we must be able to think beyond the current wars in terms of policy and strategy, do otherwise would be to ignore a duty that we have to our elected leaders and the people of the United States.

finally, you and I will never agree on your other points. I think it is just flat-wrong to think counterfactually that if more soldiers had read Galula things would have turned out differently. You cannot prove that anyway. But what I can prove at least through the record as it is given to us from the most recent credible histories written is that the majority of American Army tactical units transitioned quickly to full-spectrum operations and within that were conducting many best practices in coin. Were these capabilities as wide-spread as they were under the Surge? Probably not, but they still were wide-spread and the delta so to speak was not decisive.

Such arguments of "if we had done this or that" are really a big large trope within the american army for trying to fight vietnam all over again in iraq but this time win.

gg

[Cavguy]

Sir,

Understand, but I just think we need to develop a broad based, rigorous "liberal" education for our officers covering the "full spectrum" of warfare.

As of this moment, TRADOC has no such beast or articulation therof - what are our educational learning objectives/standards for our Officers and NCO's? I feel they should have an understanding of the principles of all forms of conflict, supported by broad reading.

Yes, we adapted quicky, but I (along with many observers) think we missed our window in Iraq between April 10 and August 17 (UN Bombing, IIRC). Yes, we "rapidly" adapted tactically, slower operationally. In my view, we did lose whatever chance we had to gain the cooperation of the population in that period, mostly through ignorance of COIN principles. The fact that we learned later doesn't mean that it was okay to not know in the first place. If you read Kalev Sepp's taxonomy of best/worst COIN practices, it largely describes everything we did in 2003-2004.

You do have a point that no amount of better tactics would have fixed the lack of strategic clarity and direction at that time.

Niel

[Ken White]

Bayonet Brant said:

"...I wonder if at least some of the 'muscle memory' that's ben referred to above is less about the difference between COIN/HIC and as much, or more, about risk aversion."

That, too. I 'd say in about equal measures across the board, varying in percent of each between individual commanders.

RTK said:

"Basics and fundamentals don't change. Their application may, but basic battle drills, action drills, contact drills and reports are the exact same. Dealing with other people in other cultures and our own in the way they should be treated as equals and peers and not in the "I'm-American. I'm- wicked-way-smarter-than-you" methodology we've been known to use
doesn't have to be a battalion training event."

Couldn't have said it better m'self...

CavGuy said:

"I think the answer lies more in professional education versus training, as I look back at my OBC and CCC I realize nearly all of it was training. In line units, only three commanders (two BN and one CO) of mine had any regular sort of formal OPD program.

Having run an instructional branch charged with training OBC and AOAC students at the Armor School for five years and having come up with some fairly innovative -- and effective -- training at the time only to see it go back to below humdrum in a matter of months after I left and being broadly familiar with the Infantry versions over the years, I can believe that your experience was all training and little education. Mostly poor training and not nearly enough of it at that.

That's why I continually beat the drum about the fact that our initial entry training does not prepare people for service in a professional army. We are still training people as if they were destined for a rapidly mobilizing wartime force. It's stupid. I know that both the OBC and CCC curricula are undergoing changes -- good ones -- but we haven't gone far enough. We're doing better than we used to but we can do even better.

CavGuy later added:

"Understand, but I just think we need to develop a broad based, rigorous "liberal" education for our officers covering the "full spectrum" of warfare.

As of this moment, TRADOC has no such beast or articulation therof - what are our educational learning objectives/standards for our Officers and NCO's. I feel they should have an understanding of the principles

I strongly agree but would suggest you better do that for the NCOs as well or you'll suffer later.

I'd also suggest that education has to start for both officers and the enlisted folks at entry. Most everyone who comes in the Army will operate in jobs at least one and often two ranks higher than that actually held BEFORE they go to the level of school to 'equip' them for the higher position. Our PME has never adapted to that fact. At Knox, in the 70s, almost all Captains had commanded and been on a staff before they came to the advanced course. We had one ANCOC course where every single student had already been a Platoon Sergeant...

Gian said:

"...now with the operational demands of coin we must train our formations to perform the mission they are getting ready to conduct which means until we ramp-down we must maintain our operational training focus on coin. But as I said that comes at a cost, there is risk involved."

True and the risk has to be accepted for now but given the effort to turn the overly massive bureaucracy that is TRADOC it is time to start setting in place revised POIs for all training and education, IET through the War College that truly, at lower levels thoroughly inculcates the basics of the profession and at upper levels encourages calculated risk taking, decentralization and independent thought.

We are not going to restore our ability to trust subordinates until we do that and no armed force can operate effectively without trust.

ADDED: And what Max161 said; train the basics on entry, educate the leaders...

[Surferbeetle]

Cherry picked from the White House Web site on Defense (got the link from SWJ - thanks!)

President Obama and Vice President Biden will invest in a 21st century military to maintain our conventional advantage while increasing our capacity to defeat the threats of tomorrow. They will ensure our troops have the training, equipment and support that they need when they are deployed.

Invest in a 21st Century Military

* Rebuild the Military for 21st Century Tasks: Obama and Biden believe that we must build up our special operations forces, civil affairs, information operations, and other units and capabilities that remain in chronic short supply; invest in foreign language training, cultural awareness, and human intelligence and other needed counterinsurgency and stabilization skill sets; and create a more robust capacity to train, equip, and advise foreign security forces, so that local allies are better prepared to confront mutual threats.

[Ken White]

that it was carried forward to the WH Web site. I have no quarrel with any of that provided it is done sensibly and as truly needed based on a thorough assessment, is not done automatically mostly as a counterpoint to the predecessor and does not get in the way of full spectrum capability. We need to and can do all those things without going overboard.

I doubt he'll pay much more attention to me than Bush did but I can hope they'll do right instead of just doing something...

[marct]

I find it intriguing that "training" is often listed as a component of PME; it shouldn't be.

Sam is quite correct in his critique of the differences but, while he says that it isn't a discussion of semantics, it is really. "Semantics" is the science of meaning (or the study of meaning) and that is exactly what this entire training vs. education debate is about, and it is also one of the reasons why people are talking past each other.

[selil]

I don't think anyone disagrees with this - but - how do we educationally prepare soldiers for full-spectrum ops?

I think the answer lies more in professional education versus training, as I look back at my OBC and CCC I realize nearly all of it was training. In line units, only three commanders (two BN and one CO) of mine had any regular sort of formal OPD program.

Most of what I have seen the Army do is training not education. Training is task oriented while education is concept oriented. There is often a misunderstanding in expectations between the two paradigms. The result is also often the criticism heaped upon academia that what is taught isn't immediately relevant. That is because the educational model creates flexibility to changing environments and adaptability. You educate a student on operating systems not Windows XP. They can then figure out any operating system.

The way you get past limitations in training is you identify the concepts, patterns, and educate troops on those. We often refer to the Army of today as the best, brightest, smartest in history. It may be true that there are officers with doctorates, or multiple masters degrees, but we aren't talking about the outliers. We are talking about the base of the pyramid where the job gets done not talked about.


Well dropping a bunch of superlatives on the deck as evidence does not make it true. A highly trained Army will do specific tasks within that paradigm of training. As a root cause the methods and educational tools used to train soldiers require intensive instruction that is single minded in the execution. That system produces skilled soldiers with silos of training. If you expand that training model you can cross train soldiers through further intensive training and make special operations forces. At some point in time through that model falls apart as we see in the COIN/HIC argument when training resource time runs out.

The problem though is solvable. There is another way but y'all won't like it.

You have to educate soldiers and eradicate the diffidence between academic and military culture. Embrace the scholar soldier and produce thinkers. Then you can educate based on patterns of conflict versus task oriented training. I am not even suggesting you abandon all training. There are specific skills that are required for EVERY soldier and those should be learned. If you want a cross functional Army capable of taking on any mission at any time without large times spent re-training then you will have to change the educational models and expectations.

This is not a discussion of semantics. The vocational training system versus higher education debate has raged for a long time. The result is that thinking, problem solving, risk management, and other thinking strategies are becoming highly sought over. These would be exactly the same skills needed at the root of a fully flexible military branch.

There are a lot more things that could be said but in general the arguments will be around; 1) There isn't enough time in the training cycle (applying the wrong model from the onset); 2) Soldiers aren't that smart (even though they are getting older and more educated, wrong again); 3) We have to train for the fight we have today (again same wrong model as evidence against being prepared); 4) There is no way to integrate that kind of training with the current staff (presupposing the failure based on the inadequacy to develop staff will always fail, but how did we get armor?); 5) Various other similar rebuttals following the same pattern.

The fact is it would be a success, it would work, it has worked in previous conflicts, and as the national education system abandoned liberal arts and social sciences, so did the military drive towards a vocational model that now is seen as a restriction on mission capability.

Put succinctly the abject failure to reform military training to an educational model from a vocational model is a direct and substantial impact on national security capability.

[Surferbeetle]

Most of what I have seen the Army do is training not education. Training is task oriented while education is concept oriented. There is often a misunderstanding in expectations between the two paradigms. The result is also often the criticism heaped upon academia that what is taught isn't immediately relevant. That is because the educational model creates flexibility to changing environments and adaptability. You educate a student on operating systems not Windows XP. They can then figure out any operating system.

There are a lot more things that could be said but in general the arguments will be around; 1) There isn't enough time in the training cycle (applying the wrong model from the onset); 2) Soldiers aren't that smart (even though they are getting older and more educated, wrong again); 3) We have to train for the fight we have today (again same wrong model as evidence against being prepared); 4) There is no way to integrate that kind of training with the current staff (presupposing the failure based on the inadequacy to develop staff will always fail, but how did we get armor?); 5) Various other similar rebuttals following the same pattern.

The fact is it would be a success, it would work, it has worked in previous conflicts, and as the national education system abandoned liberal arts and social sciences, so did the military drive towards a vocational model that now is seen as a restriction on mission capability.

Put succinctly the abject failure to reform military training to an educational model from a vocational model is a direct and substantial impact on national security capability.

Sam,

Do you have any case studies which discuss costs in terms of time and money for the two models that you would be willing to provide links for?

The NYT has an interesting opinion piece by Dr. Stanley Fish who ruminates about some of your points.

In previous columns and in a recent book I have argued that higher education, properly understood, is distinguished by the absence of a direct and designed relationship between its activities and measurable effects in the world.

This is a very old idea that has received periodic re-formulations. Here is a statement by the philosopher Michael Oakeshott that may stand as a representative example: “There is an important difference between learning which is concerned with the degree of understanding necessary to practice a skill, and learning which is expressly focused upon an enterprise of understanding and explaining.”

So, how do I build a training or education system to keep my charges alive, make as many of the opposition as needed die for their system, and separate/protect/stabilize and perhaps improve the lives of the innocents caught in the middle of the conflicts that we are in? Do you have any case studies of successful systems to share?

Best,

Steve

[Ken White]

Do you have any case studies which discuss costs in terms of time and money for the two models that you would be willing to provide links for?

While I am painfully aware that your parameters have been used by the Army (the other services do so as well but not to as great an extent) for years to justify marginal training that produces a barely acceptable product -- enlisted and officer -- who is sent to a unit which, quality of unit dependent may or may not better prepare him or her for the job. The good folks will also better educate and train themselves (both are required) while the lesser people will not exert the effort to do so (but will continue to be tolerated instead of being encouraged to seek another career). I think two points are in order:

- Individuals and units should not have to do that to the extent they now do.

- Is time/money the proper arbiter or should the arbiters be competence and proficiency to better enable the future survival of self and subordinates to insure successful mission accomplishment (as opposed to a flawed job that has excessive costs in many terms).

I'm quite conversant with the time/cost aspect having managed an Army multi-million buck budget for a number of years and thus learning how the system really works (not!). I also know that our use of those two inhibitors is a smokescreen. We continue to tolerate poor training because we are unwilling -- not unable; unwilling -- to spend what is required and to take the time needed not because we can't afford either, we can -- but simply because we've never done it that way and change is difficult. Every objection Sam lists has been used by many to me over the years -- and, as Sam says, everyone is hogwash.

[Surferbeetle]

While I am painfully aware that your parameters have been used by the Army (the other services do so as well but not to as great an extent) for years to justify marginal training that produces a barely acceptable product -- enlisted and officer -- who is sent to a unit which, quality of unit dependent may or may not better prepare him or her for the job.

Ken,

Just because I too have also been subjected to marginal training does not mean that I advocate it my friend. Like it or not however, time and money are measuring sticks, and what I am seriously seeking is a better example of how to do things which addresses these parameters.

The good folks will also better educate and train themselves (both are required) while the lesser people will not exert the effort to do so (but will continue to be tolerated instead of being encouraged to seek another career). I think two points are in order:

- Individuals and units should not have to do that to the extent they now do.

- Is time/money the proper arbiter or should the arbiters be competence and proficiency to better enable the future survival of self and subordinates to insure successful mission accomplishment (as opposed to a flawed job that has excessive costs in many terms).

I'm quite conversant with the time/cost aspect having managed an Army multi-million buck budget for a number of years and thus learning how the system really works (not!). I also know that our use of those two inhibitors is a smokescreen. We continue to tolerate poor training because we are unwilling -- not unable; unwilling -- to spend what is required and to take the time needed not because we can't afford either, we can -- but simply because we've never done it that way and change is difficult. Every objection Sam lists has been used by many to me over the years -- and, as Sam says, everyone is hogwash.

An analogous discussion would be on engineering specifications: performance based versus prescriptive. For military and engineering situations education & experience of the people one works with dictates what route I choose and/or advocate.

My personal vote is always for quality (leaning towards the performance based end of things) education & training...I have spent my money & time on three degrees; and over twenty years of my training time on military themes.

Perhaps we are not so far apart as you may think (internet nuances and all that...) I am seriously looking for a better way to do things.

Best,

Steve

[Ken White]

Just because I too have also been subjected to marginal training does not mean that I advocate it my friend. Like it or not however, time and money are measuring sticks, and what I am seriously seeking is a better example of how to do things which includes these parameters.

I'm also painfully aware they are real measuring sticks -- the issue is what priority are they accorded in determining the balance of Needed training vs. cost vs. time available.

My contention is that the Army has placed far too high a value on costs for initial entry training on the rationale that many won't make it through their term of service and thus are disposable (and that has a concomitant effect on the individuals -- who aren't stupid...); that our time 'constraints' are due to the WW II / Mobilization base mentality and are unnecessarily restrictive on the lower end of the spectrum while granting an unduly long term hiatus of a sort at the upper end, Officer and Enlisted.

So. I hear you and know those are considerations -- they just need to be placed in the proper perspective. They have gained credence at current levels not because they are correct but simply because of bureaucratic inertia and acceptance of almost good enough instead of truly good enough training and education in all too many cases.

If that were not true, this thread would not exist.

...I am seriously looking for a better way to do things.

So am I, so are we all -- and I suggest we will not find such a way by approaching the problem over the same routes we have always used.

[max161]

I don't think anyone disagrees with this - but - how do we educationally prepare soldiers for full-spectrum ops?

I, like many others, did not feel that the army provided sufficent grounding in COIN basics prior to 2003 as part of our professional military education, and as a result we committed major avoidable errors in tactical COIN 2003-2004.

I think the answer lies more in professional education versus training, as I look back at my OBC and CCC I realize nearly all of it was training. In line units, only three commanders (two BN and one CO) of mine had any regular sort of formal OPD program.

It may be easy to criticize Galula, but I would submit if more officers had read that book as part of a general military education (alongside all other works), we may have created less problems than we ultimately did in OIF.

Niel

I hate to sound cliche but when GEN Schoomaker was CDR USSOCOM (or CINCSOC back in the day!!) he always admonished that we "train for certainty and educate for uncertainty." The certainty is you have to be able to shoot, move, and communicate in any situation. We need to train and maintain proficiency in all our combat skills (both for US operations in MCO and to be able to impart those skills to friends, partners, and allies when necessary). But operations in an Irregular Warfare environment will always be uncertain and require creative problem solving. So we do not need to focus on training for IW. We need to educate for the possibilities we may face but also realize that we cannot identify every possible threat or complex situation. The "irony" is that I think if we really look critically at our military, particulalry our ground forces (Army and Marines) I think we will find many Officers and NCOs who have had sufficient education and were very adept at problem solving in complex operational environments and have done so since we began operaitons in 2001. They were able to do this because they were tactically and technically proficient, they possessed initiative and sufficient lattitude from their chain of command, and they were mentally agile and creative to solve or assist in solving complex problems. I think we find many of these Officers and NCOs at the Brigade and Regimental level and below. What is always the difficult part is developing and orchestrating an integrated and synchroniched operational campaign that supports strategic aims. Training occurs best in our units. Our PME for officers and NCOs needs to focus more on education and less on training.

[Gian P Gentile]

I hate to sound cliche but when GEN Schoomaker was CDR USSOCOM (or CINCSOC back in the day!!) he always admonished that we "train for certainty and educate for uncertainty." The certainty is you have to be able to shoot, move, and communicate in any situation. We need to train and maintain proficiency in all our combat skills (both for US operations in MCO and to be able to impart those skills to friends, partners, and allies when necessary). But operations in an Irregular Warfare environment will always be uncertain and require creative problem solving. So we do not need to focus on training for IW. We need to educate for the possibilities we may face but also realize that we cannot identify every possible threat or complex situation. The "irony" is that I think if we really look critically at our military, particulalry our ground forces (Army and Marines) I think we will find many Officers and NCOs who have had sufficient education and were very adept at problem solving in complex operational environments and have done so since we began operaitons in 2001. They were able to do this because they were tactically and technically proficient, they possessed initiative and sufficient lattitude from their chain of command, and they were mentally agile and creative to solve or assist in solving complex problems. I think we find many of these Officers and NCOs at the Brigade and Regimental level and below. What is always the difficult part is developing and orchestrating an integrated and synchroniched operational campaign that supports strategic aims. Training occurs best in our units. Our PME for officers and NCOs needs to focus more on education and less on training.

Dave:

Supremely stated!! Couldnt agree more.

gian