Initial Officer Selection

[wm]

...It makes no difference how good, how capable they are or how they are grouped. If they are not trusted, they will not be allowed by their superiors to exercise much independence. The obvious flip side is, as I wrote, better training promotes more trust.

While I do not disagree that better training promotes trust, I submit that trust is rather hard to practice when those outside the chain of command, but who hold the purse strings, force military leaders to micromanage for a variety of reasons.
Case in point: at least one US 4-star general (CG, USAMC) (probably several others that included the CJCS and the VCJCS, the CENTCOM Cdr, and the CSA) getting daily reports by bumper number on the status of uparmoring Humvees in Iraq/Kuwait. Possible reason: some zealous reporters' stories on GI inventiveness in concocting ballistic protection for Humvee passengers, a vehicle never envisoned as an armored personnel carrier, and the knee jerk response by certain elected officials and their staffs to such stories.

The following from Bob's World latest post

There is no putting the genie of high tech capabilities that have resulted in nannie cam leadership of late back in the bottle, but we need to make damn sure we are building a force that is ready to be just as effective when someone takes that genie away, bottle and all.

is just the latest variation on a theme. I seem to recall Bn Cdrs micromanaging platoon-level fights in VN from their helicopters. With that kind of background informing the leadership development of the mentors of much of today's military senior leadership, is it any wonder that the best we might hope for from the current crop of seniors is something like a Reaganesque "trust but verify"?

I can only speak to the American military, based on my experience. One hopes that other nations' militaries are not equally "blessed" with such trust and oversight.

[Ken White]

While I do not disagree that better training promotes trust, I submit that trust is rather hard to practice when those outside the chain of command... the knee jerk response by certain elected officials and their staffs to such stories.

Sadly true and an indictment of the media and the Congress but not so much those Leaders who were forced into such a position. That story, in variations, is all too common. It's also worldwide though we have over developed it here in the US.

I seem to recall Bn Cdrs micromanaging platoon-level fights in VN from their helicopters. With that kind of background informing the leadership development of the mentors of much of today's military senior leadership, is it any wonder that the best we might hope for from the current crop of seniors is something like a Reaganesque "trust but verify"?

Goes back further than that. Tales of Patton and even Bradley visiting the Troops and getting over directive abound. It got kicked up a notch in Korea after the mess settled down into trench warfare; too many senior Commanders (and their Staffs...) with too little to do could visit and 'engineer success.' Sad.

In Viet Nam the trend was excacerbated by the fact of major shortfalls in Captains and Senior NCOs in 67-68 -- those Bn Cdrs learned 2LTs and brand new SGTs would do anything you asked but didn't know much and so need a lot of supervision...

The trend and tendency was / is reinforced by the type of low intensity warfare in VN and today; gives the senior folks with too little to do a chance to piddle. That's particularly bothersome in an Army that prides itself on 'zero defects' like performance and staying busy. It's also all too easy with today's Comm and surveillance assets...

It, as Bob says, is not going away and is likely to get worse before it gets better. The saving factor is that such foolishness cannot be practiced in a major, high intensity rapidly moving conflict and we can learn to do it right -- after unnecessarily killing too many people and firing the nervous...

I can only speak to the American military, based on my experience. One hopes that other nations' militaries are not equally "blessed" with such trust and oversight.

Based on my observation, it's endemic worldwide, the more democratic the nation, the worse the problem...