Posted by JMA

There lies the inherent weakness in most militaries (which have to rely on mobilisation in time of war). You can produce soldiers in a matter of months from scratch but not so with senior NCOs and senior officers. The inability in peace time to 'test' officers on the way up also contributes to those able to 'game' the system to get promoted to senior officer level.
This is no doubt true, but while all senior officers are political to some extent or they wouldn't be senior officers, that doesn't mean they can't lead a fight. Some can, some not so well. We're all a product of our past, and only the exceptional can adapt effectively to new situations they haven't been trained for. You may recall the U.S. General during the early years of OIF who publically stated after the insurgency started, "we are not trained for this type of fight, and we didn't war game for it." That was a true statement, but of course the Army couldn't take a time out to adjust it training, it needed to adjust to while fighting. In my opinion it seemed to adapt slower in both Afghanistan and Iraq than it did during previous conflicts (Vietnam may be the exception). Ten plus years later it is clear that a significant level of adaptation took place, so my argument is we adapted slower than we should have, not that we have failed to adapt.

The U.S. Army was quite simply inep when it first started conducting operations in North Africa during WWII, but leaders learned or were fired, training and tactics were modified and in a short period of time became a combat capable Army. Not only did the Army adapt rapidly, but so did our special operations. In less time than it takes a member to go through the Special Forces Qualification Course today we stood up and starting employing the OSS. Some hard lessons were learned during the early years, but the SAS logo "who dares wins" rings true when it comes to special operations. High risk operations mean failure may be the norm, but it is worth the risk. That mind set doesn't exist anymore, and probably won't since political parties will exploit any failure for all its worth in the court of public opinion instead of collectively explaining to the American people that is the nature of these operations.

The Army that overthrew Saddam was quite good, but that same Army wasn't so good the day after when the nature of the fight changed. That same Army that went into Afghanistan two years prior wasn't that good, because they were not trained to fight in that terrain or against that type of foe. They did O.K., but that was largely due to technical and fire power advantages, not tactical superiority.

General Petreaus turned the fight around in Iraq , but failed to turn the fight around in Afghanistan. It appeared that he tried to replicate the same methodology he applied in Iraq, which in my view is one reason our COIN doctrine is so dangerous. While it spells out every situation is unique, it still recommends a one size fit all approach (clear, hold, build).

I think the biggest flaw in our structure is a system enabled by information technology to facilitate micromanagement/control, that prohibits Bns and COs from adapting. They have relatively little freedom of movement compared to their peers of yesteryear, and that inhibits learning and adaption at the tactical level.

At the strategic level, I'll leave that to Bob Jones since I think he is hitting the right notes in general on that one. Not sure what the answer is to this, perhaps burning Georgetown to the ground so it no longer produce this current crop of policy advisors. Perhaps electing former senior military officers and NCOs into office (but most have too much honor to enter politics) to help change the culture. As a nation we still have near unlimited potential if we would just learn to apply the power we do have more effectively.