Quote Originally Posted by marct View Post
Serious question here, do you think it is because they don't know what worked or because they don't know why it worked (or something else)?
It's a combination of both, but the emphasis on WHY. Spencer Fitz-Gibbon once told me, that in his estimation, the instructors at the Infantry School in 1982 could tell you how to take an enemy position, but had no idea of what really worked and what did not. This leads to "what sounds good," filling in the blanks. There are countless other examples.
That, along with other examples from similar debates, always reinforced the impression in my mind that the people doing the analysis just didn't understand what they were analyzing. "Maneuver Warfare" (a doctrine / ideology) vs. "mobility" (a concept).
Concur. I have a number of ideas as to why this is, and it's mainly because they are never held to rigour by an informed community. Kingdoms of Blind and having one eye, etc.
I really have no problem with the idea of attempting to predict the future.
Nor do I with the proviso that you substitute the word "No" with "a massive" and add "because it's bloody silly!" to the end of the sentence. We can however make sensible estimates based on enduring and proven trends. EG:- Computers will get more powerful. Population will increase etc etc.
Now we cannot predict who we will fight, or where we will fight or for what reason. It is also dangerous to make any assumption on that part.
However, we can with reasonable accuracy predict, how they will fight and using what, or given a particular capability, how they will use it.
Why are we being asked? Dunno. If we are wrong, maybe we can take the blame. IF we are right, no one will care and some Consultant will take the credit.