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Thread: McMaster on war (merged thread)

  1. #61
    Council Member William F. Owen's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by SWJED View Post
    Mark - context was in previous theory (90's) vs. the reality we eventually encountered.
    Well that does beg the question as to how the "theory" of the 90's became accepted in the face of no evidence and a body of historically informed "best practice" which has remained largely the same since 1918.

    The only reason I point this out, is that an organisation that is prone to making poor decisions, usually avoids finding out why the bad decisions get made.

    EG: On what planet was "Command from the FOB vs. command from the front" ever a good idea, and how is video feeds from UAVs helping solve this problem?
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  2. #62
    Council Member Fuchs's Avatar
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    "Brigadier General H.R. McMaster on Setting Conditions and The Army Capstone Concept"

    Where's the primary source?

  3. #63
    Council Member marct's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Fuchs View Post
    "Brigadier General H.R. McMaster on Setting Conditions and The Army Capstone Concept"

    Where's the primary source?
    Currently, from what I understand, it is in draft format for internal discussion.
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  4. #64
    Registered User Anlaochfhile's Avatar
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    Default The Army reflects our society...

    Quote Originally Posted by Westhawk View Post
    BG McMaster delivered a broad attack on the DoD’s transformation plans from the 1990s. He asserted that the technological focus of that time neglected the human, social, cultural, and political factors necessary to prevail on the modern battlefield. According to McMaster, events of this decade have shown how adversaries have adapted to previous U.S. methods thus negating them.

    McMaster’s capstone concept seeks to reverse many of the precepts and assumptions of the 1990s defense transformation program. Under McMaster’s vision, in order to prevail in ground combat U.S. forces will need to “go local,” by getting very close to the enemy and sustaining long-term operations deep into a variety of indigenous population.

    During yesterday’s staff ride of the Gettysburg battlefield, we discussed how any army is the product and reflection of the society from which it comes. The nature of U.S. Southern culture favored the Confederacy early on, but the more industrial and commercial nature of the North later asserted its dominance.

    The question for today is whether U.S. society can produce the kind of soldiers and the Army necessary to implement the capstone concept McMaster described. And whether U.S. society can support the operational concept McMaster believes is required to prevail.

    -Robert Haddick
    Excellent point. We live in a society that is overall much more enamored with technology and hard sciences than with the humanities. How can a nation that routinely lags behind much of the world in social studies, geography, language arts, and other liberal arts studies hope to field armies that are culturally adept enough for the small wars that are likely to be a significant part of our future? The services are certainly making an effort, but without a solid grounding in our own culture, these efforts seem unlikely to ‘stick’.

    I highly recommend Dr. Adrian Lewis’ book The American Culture of War: the History of U.S. Military Force from World War II to Operation Iraqi Freedom, which focuses on the role that American culture plays in how our forces organize, equip, and fight. It has some keen insights in this regard.
    - erp -

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    A quick point. The Capstone Concept for Joint Operations is a Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff document of his vision on how joint forces would operate 2016-28 in the face of assorted challenges. CCJO incorporates USJFCOM's work in the document: Joint Operating Environment, threats and trends that could face the future force. The JOE is a companion document to CCJO.

  6. #66
    Small Wars Journal SWJED's Avatar
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    Default Two points...

    Thanks Brasidas, you are very correct that the CCJO is a CJCS document.

    On the draft Army Capstone Concept - this document is the product of a writing team of 20 personnel...

  7. #67
    Small Wars Journal SWJED's Avatar
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    Default Amazon Link

    I highly recommend Dr. Adrian Lewis’ book The American Culture of War: the History of U.S. Military Force from World War II to Operation Iraqi Freedom, which focuses on the role that American culture plays in how our forces organize, equip, and fight. It has some keen insights in this regard.
    Thanks Anlaochfhile...

    The American Culture of War: The History of U.S. Military Force from World War II to Operation Iraqi Freedom

    The American Culture of War is a comprehensive and authoritative survey of American conduct in war from World War II to the present, including both Iraq wars. It traces the evolution of American strategic, operational, and tactical doctrine, including the national command structure, civil-military relations, the role of the media, military technology, the military personnel system, airpower doctrine, the role of Congress, and numerous related aspects of national defence. The American Culture of War will be an indispensable text for upper-division undergradudate courses on the history of war as well as history courses on the Vietnam War and the 1960s.

  8. #68
    Small Wars Journal SWJED's Avatar
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    Default Capstone Concept will change Army doctrine

    Capstone Concept will change Army doctrine
    By Robert Haddick

    At last week’s TRADOC Senior Leaders Conference, I heard BG H.R. McMaster deliver a presentation on the U.S. Army’s forthcoming Capstone Concept. Here is a news article from TRADOC and the U.S. Army that describes what the Army’s Capstone Concept is and what it will mean to the Army in the years ahead. A few excerpts from the article:

    The new Capstone Concept, McMaster said, examines how the Army operates under conditions of complexity and uncertainty in an era of persistent conflict. The concept's purpose is to put into operational terms Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey's vision of balancing the Army to win today's wars while describing how the future Army will fight the wars of tomorrow...
    The primary purpose of the capstone concept is to lead force development and employment by establishing a common framework to think about future Army operations; place modernization decisions in a broader context of future armed conflict; establish a conceptual foundation for subordinate concepts; guide experimentation in Army operations and capabilities; and guide capability development.
    "We looked at how the Army intends to operate and face the challenges in the future operating environment against what we're calling hybrid threats," said McMaster. "By looking at the current operating environment and the hybrid threats we face and could face in the future, this helps the Army make a grounded projection into the near future and understand what challenges our Army will face as part of a Joint, interdepartmental and multinational force, and then develop the capability our Army will need to fight the future battle."
    BG McMaster is leading a team that will complete work on the Capstone Concept by the end of this year. The new Capstone Concept is then supposed to guide the development of subordinate Army doctrine. The Capstone Concept effort thus represents important guidance for Army training, leader development, and combat unit organization.

    During his presentation last week, BG McMaster emphasized the differences between the doctrine his team is completing and the doctrine the Army operated under a decade ago. Small Wars Journal hopes to provide further discussion of the Army Capstone Concept as it nears completion. For now, I recommend reading the article linked to above.

  9. #69
    Council Member marct's Avatar
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    I'll admit that this jumped out at me:

    In the new edition of the Army Capstone Concept, understanding the situation will be better defined and what the Army learns about the ethnic and cultural aspects of a situation will be factored into whatever threat the Army will face in the future.
    {emphasis added}
    I've been concerned for some time now about how "culture", broadly speaking, is understood and operationalized in US Army doctrine. There are serious implications for both policy, strategy and operations regardless of how the concept is constructed, but they vary by the construction. I'll be interested to see what final form they take.
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    Marc W.D. Tyrrell, Ph.D.
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  10. #70
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default London listened too

    'HR' spoke yesterday at IISS, London to a nearly full conference room on the project, with a small number of slides; in a nice touch he had to operate the PPT control himself and sometimes forgot. Very clever delivery and some wicked humour: UK Ministry of Defence (Strategy) questioner poses question and 'HR' responds did I hear you right Tragedy?

    A lot to absorb and many points that could be applied to law enforcement.

    IISS I think will add a video to their website soon: http://www.iiss.org/ .

    Later 'HR' added his praise for the contribution of SWJ / SWC.

    More another day.

    davidbfpo

  11. #71
    Council Member Ron Humphrey's Avatar
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    Thumbs up Looking forward to watching it

    Quote Originally Posted by davidbfpo View Post
    'HR' spoke yesterday at IISS, London to a nearly full conference room on the project, with a small number of slides; in a nice touch he had to operate the PPT control himself and sometimes forgot. Very clever delivery and some wicked humour: UK Ministry of Defence (Strategy) questioner poses question and 'HR' responds did I hear you right Tragedy?

    A lot to absorb and many points that could be applied to law enforcement.

    IISS I think will add a video to their website soon: http://www.iiss.org/ .

    Later 'HR' added his praise for the contribution of SWJ / SWC.

    More another day.

    davidbfpo
    Not up yet
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  12. #72
    Council Member William F. Owen's Avatar
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    "The biggest change is that we're recognizing some of the limitations in technologies that were designed to improve situational understanding and situational awareness," said McMaster. "We understand now how enemy countermeasures can place what we need to know about the enemy and what we need to know about the situation outside the reach of technology."
    Seriously? After 20 years of folks telling telling them this they now just get it? I find this statement profoundly depressing.

    I could comment on a lot else, but frankly, I think the above speaks for itself.

    Additionally,
    a.) Someone has to understand that the US (and the UK) were not good at fighting regular forces. Since about 1988 we just happen to have been faced with very very incompetent regular forces. Korea and Vietnam clearly showed the great limits of the US's ability to fight any type of enemy.

    b.) The idea that warfare is now more tricky and complex is without evidence. Trying to tell the US fighting man that everyone has to change because the enemy has "cleverly adapted," is to promote a falsehood. Moreover, enemies will and have always adapted.

    For those wedded to the OODA loop, it's worth noting, if the observations are wrong, the rest fails.

    To quote Colin S. Gray,
    ....there are no new ideas and methods in strategy and warfare. The classical canon of strategic texts contains, and repeats, them all. However, the U.S. defense community, with its multitude of stakeholder interests, its genuinely global challenges, and its awesome array of conceptual, organizational, technical, tactical, logistic, and social, issues – to specify only some of the categories – positively invites the marketing of novelty.
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    - The job of the British Army out here is to kill or capture Communist Terrorists in Malaya.
    - If we can double the ratio of kills per contact, we will soon put an end to the shooting in Malaya.
    Sir Gerald Templer, foreword to the "Conduct of Anti-Terrorist Operations in Malaya," 1958 Edition

  13. #73
    Council Member Fuchs's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by William F. Owen View Post
    a.) Someone has to understand that the US (and the UK) were not good at fighting regular forces. Since about 1988 we just happen to have been faced with very very incompetent regular forces. Korea and Vietnam clearly showed the great limits of the US's ability to fight any type of enemy.
    I would indeed point at the summer of '45 as the line between 1st class and lesser opponents. The enemies in Korea and Vietnam had a very narrow set of competence; their combined arms capability was in its infancy.

    Many U.S. FMs are still full of the same B.S. that the French used to defeat themselves in 1940. Especially the emphasis on planning & firepower as well as the lack of emphasis on agile decisionmaking and agile formations are terrible.
    Several U.S. divisions were probably ahead of current U.S. doctrine in 1944.

    The quest for "situational awareness" is in part explained by a desire to gather information for planning because of a doctrinal inability to handle the fog of war.

    Reformers should listen to the readily available "3GW" crowd, for their lessons don't seem to have been understood yet.

  14. #74
    Council Member marct's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by William F. Owen View Post
    "The biggest change is that we're recognizing some of the limitations in technologies that were designed to improve situational understanding and situational awareness," said McMaster. "We understand now how enemy countermeasures can place what we need to know about the enemy and what we need to know about the situation outside the reach of technology."
    Seriously? After 20 years of folks telling telling them this they now just get it? I find this statement profoundly depressing.
    You know, I took that quote as a face saving way of reversing the worst of the cyborgophile tendencies in FCS. Ever since RoboCop and Terminator, the US public has been enamoured of the idea of cyborg warriors; something the earlier (pre-9/11) FCS played into. As to why they played into it, my gut guess would be twofold. First, the public belief that human casualties would be reduced, and second, the growing split between civilian public "consciousness" and the military.

    There is a bureaucratic imperative operating in almost all large organizations that translates to "Must get more resources.... Hmmmm, resources!" {spoken in a Homer Simpson voice for added effect}. The cyborgian vision of FCS certainly played out along these lines. But, as with all bureaucracies, there was a tendency to force individual members of the organization to accept the organizational rhetoric as reality. I think this was pretty clearly shown in the reaction to Van Ripper's actions in Millennium Challenge.

    But how do you change the rhetoric (aka organizational construct of "reality") without damaging the organization? The simplest way to do it is very, VERY, slowly (think about the phrase "Holy Mother Church in Her Wisdom has always said that..."). In particular, note the phrase "We understand now how enemy countermeasures" (emphasis added). This implicitly says that "it's not our fault!" without having to admit that the entire idea was stupid in the first place.

    Let me pull that last comment out a bit....

    I think that the rhetorical vision of FCS was "stupid" for one, simple reason: it excludes human nature. The more control span you give to a commander, the greater the temptation to use it. Furthermore, such an enhanced control span disregards one of the most brilliant pieces of technology in the arsenal of warfare - the human mind. Having such a control span makes a force much less able to react on the fly while, at the same time, increasing the likelihood of producing "commanders" who are only capable of following the Book.

    Honestly, I'm rather heartened by the current discussions. I think that they are very well aware of the potential problems and how to solve at least some of them.
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    Council Member William F. Owen's Avatar
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    Don't get me wrong. I am very happy that they are spotting the mistakes, but that does require someone to acknowledge it was a mistake and to have the honesty to point out why it was a mistake.

    There was boat loads of evidence the FCS crows chose to ignore. The problem is not the stupidity of FCS. It is the ignoring of the evidence.

    "War is now more complex" is based on choosing to ignore the actual evidence, and to reason their way through what the problem actually may be.
    Infinity Journal "I don't care if this works in practice. I want to see it work in theory!"

    - The job of the British Army out here is to kill or capture Communist Terrorists in Malaya.
    - If we can double the ratio of kills per contact, we will soon put an end to the shooting in Malaya.
    Sir Gerald Templer, foreword to the "Conduct of Anti-Terrorist Operations in Malaya," 1958 Edition

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    Default McMaster speech now on-line

    HR McMaster's IISS talk is now available, in two parts, his speech (33 mins) and the Q&A (29 mins): http://www.iiss.org/ scroll down slightly and click on 'watch the speech'. The 'strategy' or 'tragedy' quip is in the first minute of the Q&A, superb.

    davidbfpo

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    Council Member J Wolfsberger's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by William F. Owen View Post
    There was boat loads of evidence the FCS crows chose to ignore. The problem is not the stupidity of FCS. It is the ignoring of the evidence.
    If I may quibble, ignoring the evidence is only an implementation of stupidity.

    Quote Originally Posted by William F. Owen View Post
    "War is now more complex" is based on choosing to ignore the actual evidence, and to reason their way through what the problem actually may be.
    It is more complex because the span of control issue that MarkT cites has already arisen. The issue of tactical responsiveness can be addressed through implementing auftragstaktik, and "two up, two down" communication, etc. (Which, by the way, I believe the Aussies have gone after in a big way.) That, however, requires leadership, trust in subordinates ...

    But, then, recognizing that would require people to "... reason their way through what the problem actually may be."
    Last edited by J Wolfsberger; 09-03-2009 at 07:38 PM.
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    Council Member marct's Avatar
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    Hi JW,

    Quote Originally Posted by J Wolfsberger View Post
    If I may quibble, ignoring the evidence is only an implementation of stupidity.
    True, but it's also a case where a lot of the policy directives originated outside of the military. As a system, FCS had that cool, post-Star Wars, post-Cold War feel to it that attracted a large segment of the civilian and political population. Ignoring the evidence may actually have been partially required by the political realities that the US military lives under. That, however, isn't to ignore or excuse what showed up in Millennium Challenge; the entire system needed to be re-thought and re-worked after that little fiasco, and that was the responsibility of the military.
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    Council Member Ken White's Avatar
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    Thumbs up We know that. Of course, we aren't going to, you know, actually DO it...

    Quote Originally Posted by J Wolfsberger View Post
    The issue of tactical responsiveness can be addressed through implementing auftragstaktik, and "two up, two down" communication, etc. (Which, by the way, I believe the Aussies have gone after in a big way.) That, however, requires leadership, trust in subordinates
    For two reasons:

    We have not done it that way in the time of service of the current crop of Flag officers -- the fact that we have in the past done it and been quite successful and that we have generally been less successful since we stopped doesn't seem to penetrate...

    We cannot trust subordinates because we KNOW they're only half trained...


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    Council Member William F. Owen's Avatar
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    Recently saw H.R. McMasters speak at the Land Warfare conference in Israel. Very impressive, and his comments actually addressed exactly my concerns, as did my conversation with him afterwards.

    Essentially, if we accept the substantial limitation of human beings in relation to information technology, then we may see useful progress.
    Infinity Journal "I don't care if this works in practice. I want to see it work in theory!"

    - The job of the British Army out here is to kill or capture Communist Terrorists in Malaya.
    - If we can double the ratio of kills per contact, we will soon put an end to the shooting in Malaya.
    Sir Gerald Templer, foreword to the "Conduct of Anti-Terrorist Operations in Malaya," 1958 Edition

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