The problem of "Tactical Generals."

[Entropy]

From Defense News:

The ripple effects of robotics on leadership even affects the strategic level. Many have discussed the idea of "strategic corporals," younger and younger troops who are being given greater and greater power and responsibility. But the rise of robots has created an opposite phenomenon - a dirty little secret that people in the service are somewhat afraid to talk about for risk of their own careers. I call it the rise of the "tactical generals."

Our technologies are making it very easy, perhaps too easy, for leaders at the highest level of command not only to peer into, but even to take control of, the lowest level operations. One four-star general, for example, talked about how he once spent a full two hours watching drone footage of an enemy target and then personally decided what size bomb to drop on it.

Similarly, a Special Operations Forces captain talked about a one-star, watching a raid on a terrorist hideout via a Predator, radioing in to tell him where to move not merely his unit in the midst of battle, but where to position an individual soldier.

All stuff we've talked about before. There's also much more at the link on that and other issues.

I think this is an issue that will need to be addressed soon, as real-time ISR becomes available on an almost continuous basis. The question is, do our generals see this as problem to the extent that those of us at lower levels do, and can they resist the temptation to micromanage?

In my own field of intelligence, we've seen similar effects. Thanks to digital dissemination of intelligence information, anyone can do basic intelligence research with little more than a JWICs account and access. This gives policymakers access to raw unevaluated intelligence and the ability to bypass the analytical function. This is exactly what happened with former OSD under-secretary Dough Feith with his so-called "alternative analysis" on Iraq prior to OIF.

[Hacksaw]

Are you implying the "Dough" Feith wasn't a standout analyst

[Entropy]

Shocking I know! I hope, for the sake of our FSO corps, that his abilities are more a match for his current position at Georgetown.

[Rex Brynen]

In my own field of intelligence, we've seen similar effects. Thanks to digital dissemination of intelligence information, anyone can do basic intelligence research with little more than a JWICs account and access. This gives policymakers access to raw unevaluated intelligence and the ability to bypass the analytical function. This is exactly what happened with former OSD under-secretary Dough Feith with his so-called "alternative analysis" on Iraq prior to OIF.

In equally serious problem is the access that policymakers now have to OSINT of various qualities—including political advocacy and RUMINT masquerading as analysis and reverberating through email and the blogosphere. There's nothing more depressing than to have thoughtful, quality intel product competing with dubious websites (SWJ excepted, of course!).