First the positive.
He argues that more flexible infantry can be had through superior training, that most infantry units are capable of doing a far higher level of qwork than doctrine currently suggests. I totally agree.
He then discusses a training regimen that has merit.
He advocates as I have for many years a great deal more care in the selection of entry personnel for the infantry and better training for NCOs.
He objects to the process of placing trained infantrymen in support jobs. Good!
Second, the caution.
He essentially espouses elimination of blanket doctrine for local developed TTPs. While I personally have little problem with that, I believe both the Lawyers and the Legislators will have significant problems with the concept. Both of those tribes have great influence and neither is going away.
Lastly, the objections to his organizational proposal
The flaw in his organizational argument is exposed early on in your first link:
My counterpoint to that is to ask the Accountant if he can operate with two fewer Analysts and could better combine his auditing section with his compliance section. I suggest that excessive interference by accountants has already done enough damage to the force structure, no further involvement is needed. Owen then follows that inanity with another:"This leads to a debate between soldier and accountant, where the soldier states that a section must be eight men, and the accountant then asks “can 6 men with the right equipment, do the same job as 8?”"
That's been asked for at least one hundred years by a number of people -- who not only asked but have rigorously tested some answers. In the second link, he offers this near his summary:"Few have yet asked, “how do I best organise infantry to perform operations?”..."
While I acknowledge there are those who would take one or both approaches, I do not believe the majority of professional soldiers would do so. They would look at what he offered, most with at least some acceptance that the Troops are capable of doing far more than we ask of them, we just generally do not train them as well as we should so if the Troops are not operating at full capability, the fault is with the senior leaders, not with the Troops. There will always be those who are reluctant to change -- again, they're a minority. Thus I suggest his postulation is flawed." The first is that the majority of Soldiers are too stupid to understand what some believe to be a complex idea, and the second is that any entertaining of such an alternative doctrine would fatally undermine current concepts."
He then says:
Aside from a minor disagreement on sniping -- no mystique to it, it is simply not a job everyone can do and to say any Infantryman can do it is fatuous -- I agree with the rest of that paragraph. Unfortunately, it does not support his prescription, quite the opposite -- it negates it."First, the idea is probably not complex. It is fundamentally simple and logical, as is 90 percent of real world infantry work once broken down into its component parts. It is only the layers of process that we insist on adding that make it appear complex. Stripped of its comic book mystique, sniping is a fundamentally simple skill; however arcane its exponents wish it to appear. It can also be taught and applied simply, and thorough practice and experience will almost always lead to a useful degree of skill. Someone unable to master its most basic knowledge and application probably has no place in an infantry unit. The absolute enemy of PBI is process, as expressed in the proliferation of procedure and drill. The aim of process and drill is to reduce judgement because judgement allows for error. The aim of PB is to require simple and rapid decisions at the lowest level."
Simple and rapid decisions at the lowest level are made by Team Leaders on a daily basis and by Squad Leaders constantly. ant marginally competent Squad Leader -- much less Platoon Leader -- is capable of and often does set up a specific task structure at odds with the TOE.
A five man team is organizationally weak, one absence hurts, two make it inoperative and will lead to a combing teams. Even a nine man squad (inadequate but the Army appears stuck with it for a while) has some staying power, a five man team doesn't. Three days of full bore war would simply destroy the Team.
More importantly, he's missing the educational and training process of being a team Leader and then a Squad Leader and of learning to lead an ever increasing number of people in ever increasingly complex tasks.
Even worse, he's breaking the tight bond at squad level to place people in an amorphous Platoon -- and that's why it's a bad idea
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