I have now read "Eating Soup," and I remain of the opinions that I had before.

Yes, it's an excellent work of scholarship, that is well researched and particularly well written - EG It's easy to read and well laid out - something mostly lacking these days.

However, there are a number of categoric statements with which I cannot agree, and I would suggest that the operational record does not support. - eg: the idea that an Army skilled in COIN can't be skilled in war fighting - and we have few if any useful measure for comparing the degrees of skill.

I just can't see the British Army as a "learning organisation." If "learning" means applying common sense out of necessity, then I stand corrected.

I think Vietnam showed the US Special Forces, Army Aviation and the USAF all seem to have had similarly powerful learning mechanisms in the same way. More over, in 1972 the NLF (VC) were a shadow of what they were in in 1965, and that can't all be laid at the door of the Tet Offensive. Something was working.

As in Malaya, as in Cyprus and Kenya, the UK killed and tortured our way to success. "Hearts and Minds" does not mean being nice or playing fair. Look how long Northern Ireland took, once we were forced to play by the rules. - and we got kicked out of Southern Ireland in just 3 years of COIN!!

Most of all, I was confused by the comparing of the British Army fighting a tiny insurgency on it's own home turf, with the US Army fighting a massive coalition war, back dropped by the Cold War.

No doubt I'll give it another read sometime and find the thing I am missing that everyone else seems to have got.