I have this book on my desk and know it well. I submit Simpkin is wrong.Originally Posted by GI Zhou
On wayWilf, message me your email address and I will send you my PhD and book.
Uh, yes, we did.
though I'm unsure what that has to with your post in this current sub-thread.
Does that mean you and I were wrong for discussing a manual that has been several times superceded? Or does it mean that since we discussed it on one thread, no one should, especially in a different context, do so on another? Or that no one should criticize doctrinal pubs unless they offer radical and innovative suggestions for change (I can offer about 500 of those. If they have to possess a reasonable chance of being adopted, I might produce two or three).
I asked two questions; If you'd offered any suggestions for doctrinal change and I asked for your opinion on the contention that the US Army lost the bubble by getting wrapped around 'the operational art.' If you posted the link to say you'd already done that, we can differ -- all that you did in that previous discussion was provide links and a short tutorial on Air Land battle, you did not give your opinion on the issue...
You said earlier:Several of us have stated that the 'Operational level of war' is a flaw in US doctrine and are willing to discuss that and to give our own opinions as opposed to quoting someone else. Your earlier comments were a neat tutorial and a couple of links to elsewhere but no 'Pete' opinions can be discerned, you neither panned the concept or defended it. You provide a lot of links to other Blogs -- which most of us can find on our own -- but you rarely state an opinion or engage in a discussion on the merits of an issue. I'm unsure how that addresses deficiencies in doctrine. Seems to me that if you want to discuss doctrinal deficiencies, you have an option and the ability to do that...Boy, was I ever wrong about the Small Wars Council forum. I thought it would be a place that sought to address the small wars deficiency in U.S. military doctrine.
I have this book on my desk and know it well. I submit Simpkin is wrong.
On wayWilf, message me your email address and I will send you my PhD and book.
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
I submit we do and have. It's just a bit quiet at the moment.
Huh??? How so? Do not confuse refusing to buy into the latest silly idea with clinging needlessly to the past. A lot of old stuff worked. A lot did not.This place isn't reformist, it's reactionary, and really really reactionary at that, the way a discussion forum for exiled Tsarist officers would have been in the 1930s!
Want radical reform? If I was king, FM3-24, FM3-0 and a few others would all be torched and we'd have a "year zero back to basics," - because now you have all the young turks and some old ones buying into claptrap like "Design!"
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
Get a dog. Chap can't go wrong with a good dog!
You could. How would it help? It would still fall foul of confusing strategy with tactics. IMO Operations assure that tactics take place in at the right time and place to fulfil the military contribution to strategy - so to get back the Falklands, Battle Group attacks had to take place, on the Falklands. -Thus you have "Operation Corporate."about levels of war, but to play the devil's advocate, could not the "operational level" be the coordination of various bureaucratic fighting organizations toward strategy fulfillment? In other words, "joint" and "coalition" operations may constitute an "operational level" of war - the coordination of different forces which use different equipment, tactics and doctrine all toward a common purpose?
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
It would be interesting to see how the current version of Field Manual 3-0 defines the operational level of war in relation to the other two levels. An earlier edition of the manual had a murky and verbose definition, as though the authors of the draft manual tried to use as many comments as possible received during the staff review process. Like a case of "too many cooks spoiling the broth," possibly the original definition was fairly cogent until numerous comments on DA Form 2028 were incorporated. I'd also be curious to see how the operational level is defined in Bundeswehr manual 100-100, Command and Control in Battle, since consistency with that manual is said to have been the original reason for the change to FM 100-5 many years ago. It would be a bit like knowing what the Founding Fathers had in mind when they wrote the Second Amendment.
I'm not sure that TF has such a definition (and it's restricted anyway).
It's got (in the Dec 2000 version) rather a kind of job description for the operational leadership:
The operational leadership generates missions and orders for the tactical leadership on the basis of military-strategic demands/targets.
It then goes on about how to do that. This part is mostly about analysis and logistics.
Why did you call the "TF" (Truppenführung) "Command and Control in battle"?
That's a horrible translation. Truppenführung could be much better translated as "leading troops", "troops leadership" or similar.
Truppen = troops, Führung = Leadership
Führung is much more than command and control!
Fuchs, that's the translation used by an American writer in a journal article I quoted and provided a link to in Message 59 of this thread. I know what Truppenführung means, approximately, but it wasn't used in the article.
It's not only a list operational art standards as is (or was - I didn't read the recent one) FM Operations and not a military ideology statement like the "Warfighting" FM. It begins - just as the classic 30's TF - with a thorough chapter on how to lead men, the expectations for a military leader, what leaders need to take into account and the first two pages of chapter B continue with what's the art of leadership.
Only afterwards you see the standard stuff of operational art, some traces of the '96 "Freie Operationen"/"Operationen in der Tiefe" (Willmann) incl. air mechanisation fashions, standard stuff on tactics and MOOTW chapters.
There's an emphasis on leadership, and that's about the only thing that still makes TF a t least a bit special (I've got many gripes with this FM).
Truppenführung Part 1 1933 and Truppenführung Part 2 1934, are IMO, near, if not the gold standard of how to create and write doctrine. It is a whole world apart from the utter drivel seen in some recent FMs.
It is explicitly meant to be read, understood and used. Something some current doctrine writers seem not to understand.
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
...and it fits into a hip pocket. I have a 1936 edition of part I.
Maybe a law text-like approach to FMs would help nowadays. The law people have their law text and a (in theory non-binding) commentary. The reader can read the commentary if he doesn't get the law text or wants details.
A wiki approach could help as well.
JP 3-0 (2008): Operational level of war. The level of war at which campaigns and major operations are planned, conducted, and sustained to achieve strategic objectives within theaters or other operational areas. Activities at this level link tactics and strategy by establishing operational objectives needed to achieve the strategic objectives, sequencing events to achieve the operational objectives, initiating actions, and applying resources to bring about and sustain these events.
FM 3-0 (2008): The operational level links employing tactical forces to achieving the strategic end state. At the operational level, commanders conduct campaigns and major operations to establish conditions that define that end state. A campaign is a series of related major operations aimed at achieving strategic and operational objectives within a given time and space.
Probably not much help or any clearer than previously discussed.
Last edited by ryanmleigh; 06-24-2010 at 06:51 PM. Reason: text error
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