The Army We Need

[Gian P Gentile]

Steve:

Agree with your post especially that too many folks take the SWM out of its context and turn it into a "how to" manual for today's conflicts.

Problem with it, Steve, as I see things is that nobody has the 1976 version of 100-5 (active defense) on reading lists and as "must reads" before deploying to Iraq or Astan. But that Marine SWM has become the latter. And unlike other great works from the past the have an element of timelessness and ongoing relevance to them (eg., Thuycidies, Clausewitz, Callwell, Lawrence, to name a few) the Marine SWM really is a situational, historical text and should be read that way.

gian

[Ken White]

...as I see things is that nobody has the 1976 version of 100-5 (active defense) on reading lists and as "must reads" before deploying to Iraq or Astan...unlike other great works from the past the have an element of timelessness and ongoing relevance to them (eg., Thuycidies, Clausewitz, Callwell, Lawrence, to name a few)...

That was one of several items of 'doctrine' -- some much more current -- I had in mind just above.

I agree with all your named authors as having merit but would submit they too can lead one astray if not placed in context and modified IAW the actual situation of the moment. No one has yet come up with a golden bullet, many can provide a few silver bullets...

[Gian P Gentile]

That was one of several items of 'doctrine' -- some much more current -- I had in mind just above.

I agree with all your named authors as having merit but would submit they too can lead one astray if not placed in context and modified IAW the actual situation of the moment. No one has yet come up with a golden bullet, many can provide a few silver bullets...

Ken:

You are right; it would be hard for somebody who has no background reading and knowledge in the middle east and its history to understand lawrence, or somebody who has no background in military theory to get Clausewitz. Heck I remember when I bought my first copy of st carl at the inf officer advanced course in 1990 and read it, or at least tried to, and looked around and asked myself if I was an idiot because I just spent an entire weekend reading through this and the only thing i got out of it was something about the relationship between war and politics.

But with study and reflection many of these texts can be understood, and the ones that I mentioned have in my mind a timelessness to them that other texts simply do not. And your point about history and context and the reader of it is exactly what Clausewitz was getting at in his dicsussion on historical criticism and a theory of war.

gian

[John T. Fishel]

Gian. I wrote a piece back in 95 - published in Low Intensity Conflict & Law Enforcement (before I became its editor and it went out of business) called "Little Wars, Small Wars, LIC, OOTW, the GAP, and Things That Go Bump in the Night." Near the beginning of the piece, I discussed Callwell and the SWM and argued that the authors of the SWM were very much acquainted with Callwell, Indeed, their discussion of what Small Wars are parallels his - with one major exception. The Marines who wroted the SWM rejected wars of imperial conquest in their manual - something Colonel Callwell applauded.

The SWM is mostly TTP. In that sense it resembles the new COIN manual FM 3-24, or rather 3-24 resembles the SWM. Some TTP has changed over the decades; some remains the same. If there is a need to use mounted troops and pack animals then the SWM is a good source (Afghanistan anyone?). Gospel it is not. But it is a fascinating look at a point in the evolution of Small Wars. Certainly, one can go back to classical times to look for examples of insurgencies and other small wars that look much like those of the present. It is interesting to read Josephus' account of the Jewish revolt in light of, say the FLN's revolution in Algeria and Kilcullen's enemy centric v. population centric strategies. Obviously, Callwell is another point on the timeline - closer to the Banana Wars that are the focus of the SWM than is Josephus - but the issues we are discussing here reflect those from past records, wars, and writers from antiquity to the present.

Cheers

JohnT

[Gian P Gentile]

JohnT:

Right; I think we may have had this discussion once before on a previous thread.

Agree with what you say about SWM and Callwell. My point though was to highlight the elevated status that SWM has received especially since the start of the Iraq War and it has come to be seen in some circles as a historical "how to" conduct small wars manual with template-like relevance for the present. You are right in that it is a fascinating look into marine operations during that period. Although at least philosophically even though the marines did not consider themselves imperialist like the British, well others might see more similarities than dissimilarities. Smedley Butler certainly saw his and his marines' actions as part of american imperialism in central america.

You are right to point out the links between SWM and Callwell and of course the authors of the manual acknowledge the influence of Callwell on their writing of it. However, Callwell is of a different class in my mind. I would consider him, like Lawrence, as a minor military classic. In that sense I would elevate him above other more popular coin practioners so admired and used in today's army like Galula, Thompson, and Kitson. Reason for my saying this is simply in the breadth of knowledge of history and theory displayed in Callwell and its application in the writing of his book.

just some thoughts; liked your Sword3 Piece.

So you were editor of a journal and it went out of business? reminds me of sam adams and his attempt at beer making and tax collecting; failed at both endeavors. But what the heck, he was a superb revolutionary.

gian

[Umar Al-Mokhtār]

But a death in the immediate family, and all the logistics that entails, and getting my youngest spawn off to Basra (who as a matter of fact just rung us up to let us know she was in Kuwait awaiting transport) has occupied a fair a mount of my time as of late.

On another thread here I pontificated:

“In many respects I agree with Gentile’s concerns and do not believe he is anti-COIN. The Army needs to have a robust capability to fight in both types of warfare. IMHO it is much easier for a Soldier who is highly trained in the complexities of employing the variety of weapons systems in conventional warfare to quickly adapt to a COIN/LIC/IW situation than it is for a Soldier who is trained predominantly in COIN to function at his optimum when thrust into the chaos of conventional war.

Soldiers, after all, are trained to obey orders, but to follow orders they need the skills. Conventional warfare requires solid skill sets, many of which that are also useful in COIN. COIN is more of an intellectual exercise requiring a common sense approach, an understanding of human behavior, and empathy with the local population, skills not necessarily taught or quantified in an FM.”

How we train is how we fight and at present training does seem to be slipping further towards being overly COIN centric, to the detriment of those hard skills Soldiers and Marines need. IMHO an “Advisor Corps” of the magnitude that Nagl recommends would strip away too many valuable troops from the main force. Better to develop an “Advisor Cadre,” place it within ARSOC or SOCOM, expand ARSOC to allow for sufficient personnel, make a fair amount of the strength Guard and Reserve, stop using SOF predominantly in DA, and tie them closer to State in some areas.

As to the SWM, it must be taken in the context and era for which it was written. The Marine Corps that fought in the “Banana Wars” of the 20s and 30s was not the Marine Corps that emerged from the Pacific Campaign. The genesis of that Marine Corps was Culebra and Quantico, not Haiti and Nicaragua. What I feel the “Banana Wars” contributed to the senior combat leaders in WW II was a taste of close quarters combat. At any level entering combat for the first time is a mind-boggling experience. There is great advantage to having combat vets in leadership positions when a unit enters combat for the first time, especially a green unit.

We do not need a COIN operated Army (or Marine Corps) we need a robust conventional Army and Marine Corps that is also capable of COIN and savvy in limited operations in conjunction with State in nation building/rebuilding.

To me that entails a greater fostering of professional inquisitiveness on the part of all ranks. I cracked open St Karl as a corporal, fortunately for me it was an abridged version but still, like Gian noted, it made little sense to me at the time and even made my head hurt a bit. But as I read more works by other theorists, delved into doctrine, and explored military history it made returning back to the old German dude easier and he started to make sense. To me John Boyd’s massive briefing “Patterns of Conflict” was less theoretical and more a revelation of how military history and theory all flowed together like a massive quilt writ large across the ages. That one should look at it all holistically and not try to cherry pick favorite strategies or theories. I am reminded of the introduction to the Encyclopedia Britannica’s series The Great Books. In it the editors posit that a “great conversation’ was occurring throughout the millennia between the Greek philosophers to those of the 20th Century. That each work of literature built on what came before. I see military theory and history entwined in a similar “conversation” across the ages. It’s tougher to see where you’re going if you don’t understand where you’ve been.

The Army we need is one well versed in conducting complex combat operations against a peer foe and can also decisively wage COIN.

[John T. Fishel]

You're probably right about previous threads. I'm an old guy - like Ken - and I often foget what I've written after it's posted.

I hadn't thought about Callwell in the way you suggest. Have to review him again with that in mind. I'm not entirely sure who I would put in the pantheon of Small Wars classics. Part of that depends on what aspect of Small Wars you are looking at. For Revolution, it's relatively easy - Mao clearly has a place. But for COIN - since Callwell and before my pal Max Manwaring - I'm not sure. Still, I particularly like Lansdale's memoir, In the Midst of Wars.

I guess I'm in good company with Sam Adams...

Cheers

JohnT

[Gian P Gentile]

JohnT:

agree about Mao in terms of revolutionary warfare. Although friends of mine who are chinese history scholars have pointed out some serious flaws to Mao's work; namely that it was not a reflection of reality on the ground in china.

Ref Callwell, if you can suggest you read historian Doug Porch's intro to it in a recently released reprint to it by University of Nevada Press. Porch's intro is quite good because he gets at how Callwell is still relevant today in a world of counterinsurgency theory and thought that is dominated by post world war II revolutionary war theorists.

yeah, just like the great Sam A.

UAM: ref your statement about Marine Corps roots; I think it is truly relative for them in terms of the kind of force that they are shaping for the present and future. At times it has been Quantico, but at other times certainly the SWM and Cent America.

gian

[John T. Fishel]

Gian--

Well, at least, I can drink it

JohnT

[Steve Blair]

I hadn't thought about Callwell in the way you suggest. Have to review him again with that in mind. I'm not entirely sure who I would put in the pantheon of Small Wars classics. Part of that depends on what aspect of Small Wars you are looking at. For Revolution, it's relatively easy - Mao clearly has a place. But for COIN - since Callwell and before my pal Max Manwaring - I'm not sure. Still, I particularly like Lansdale's memoir, In the Midst of Wars.

I guess I'm in good company with Sam Adams...

Cheers

JohnT

This is a difficult question because many of the great Army practitioners before WW 2 never wrote anything of value on their techniques. The SWM was to my mind intended to capture the tactical lessons of small wars (TTP as you suggest) and wasn't really a work of theory. Some was written during the 20s and 30s (Mars Learning goes into some of the writing in the Marine Corps Gazette and other journals that formed the background to the SWM), but prior to that it's very hard to find. Much of what successful commanders practiced during the Indian Wars, for example, was never really recorded (or became part of their own personal propaganda machines). My take on the SWM has always been that it was an attempt to prevent hard-learned lessons from fading away again. It was a tool, not a work of theory.

As for soldiers focusing on only being soldiers? Not always possible. Never has been, and most likely never will be. Why? Because each situation is fluid and ever-changing. One could even argue that the focus on just being soldiers led to the vacuum in planning that followed the fall of Baghdad. Soldiers don't plan for post-conflict, after all, because they aren't needed then.... And yes, I realize that's a bit of an exaggeration, but I'm doing it to make the point. Where we fall down is in the transition, and soldiers have to understand at least some of that to understand where their role either ends or is reduced. And by default, in some situations, soldiers do end up acting as diplomats (at least for a limited period of time). Ideal? No. Reality? Yes. Again, it doesn't mean that the Army can (or should) ever replace diplomats, but it does mean that they do need a basic grounding in some skills and ideas that might fall outside the "only soldiers" framework.