That's not an insult, just an observation. The world in that respect is divided into those who wish to apply them and those who do not...
Quote Originally Posted by Chris jM View Post
How, though, do we identify the artists vice mechanics?
By observation and subjective judgement. Subjectivity is anathema to bureaucracies and politicians because it is, after all, only an opinion. Whereas objectivity produces empirical results. Which can be and often are fudged...
Training is able to produce and test competency based upon known, established and proven criteria. Some flair and artistry is allowed within this framework...
But not much. It upsets the bureaucracy and the personnel folks who want objective criteria only to determine who gets to do what. It also upsets the politicians who want everyone to be treated fairly. Heh. What they really want is no complaints from non selectees that cannot be shown to be based on objective data so they can say "you didn't make the grade and this proves it." A proven competent and experienced commander who says "...promote Heebly, he's good; do not promote Phugabosky, he'll get people killed.." is anthema to the 'system.'
...- charismatic leaders often get promoted, for example...
Charisma has nothing to do with it; competence in an art form -- and combat is an art, not a science -- has everything to do with it. Not one of the best Commanders I had in combat was charismatic -- only three of about a dozen got to be Flag Officers, the system does not tolerate guys who are great tactically but not pretty or socially adept.

A mechanical Commander trained conventionally who is a good mechanic and has some experience will beat an inexperienced intuitive Commander. He will rarely beat an experienced intuitive Commander.
Beyond that, the most successful military commanders are really products of their own organisation and training (at least, in my view of things). Claiming someone is an 'artist' is really just saying we can't identify or understand his or her way of working.
I agree with your first generalization, though that's from our choices, not from necessity nor is it demonstrably better than other processes.

I disagree with the second. To put it as simply as possible, that 'artist' will arrive at correct decisions by pretty much the same process as will a good mechanical type -- he or she will just do it faster and is highly likely to omit some steps. There's been plenty of research and there are tons of papers out there. Googling "Intuitive Military Commanders" gets 616K hits, most garbage but some gold. (LINK).

The issue is not that we cannot do it; the issue is that in democratic societies in peacetime who have a fetish for worrying about a huge mobilization force, the dual emphasis of PC 'fairness and objective criteria' and designing training to mass produce people for spaces it isn't going to be done.

Not to worry, as I said, they always come out in wars. Then a lot of the mechanics get to take charge of Post Exchanges...
I see the science-vs-art debate as placing overly simplistic guidelines upon military undertakings. Better we look at competent vs less-competent within the framework of what we do know and can assess.
Yeah, many say that. That's what we're doing now. How's that working out for us? Most mid grade and young senior NCOs and Company and Field Grades in the US will tell you not so good...
And if popular perceptions are correct, artists are only appreciated only once they're dead. I'm not sure that depending upon post-death popularity is that desirable a quality for military leadership
The desirable quality is a competent, experienced practitioner who can win and keep more of their own troops alive while doing so. I've seen a lot of intuitive commanders, artists in that sense, do that -- I've seen a lot of mediocre mechanics get too many people killed unnecessarily while failing to successfully complete missions and then get promoted because, screwed up or not, they had checked all the right boxes, they played that system you cite.