Bill Moore said:
Max161 posted a RAND article somewhere in SWJ that addressed the reasons that the Army failed to use the existing COIN doctrine during the Vietnam War. In short, it stated that the information was available, but it was rejected. Seems the problem is more related to professional culture and organization. As you have stated elsewhere leadership can be decisive. If it is important to the leaders, then it will generally happen. Then again the RAND study said that GEN Abrams couldn't get his subordinate commanders to toe the line in some cases. He told them to focus on the populace, and they still did everything possible to up their body counts.
There are three problems with RANDs conclusions. The methodology wasn't rejected, it was ignored by the MACV staff which was more interested in metrics ans a tidy battlefield than in the COIN effort; it was rejected by some -- not all -- commanders who were into ticket punching and thought body counts were the way to go for more merit badges; it did not point out what I'm trying to point out with this post:

We pay lip service to train as you will fight and we don't do it. We pay lip service to first class training and we don't provide it. Our failures in training affect the way we operate.

Based on what I've seen over the last 60 years (sheesh... ) then and now, the way we minimally train those entering service is the culprit. In my observation, the average over all those years, 1948 to 2008 is that it takes about three peacetime years of IET / OBC and unit 'training' to produce a pretty competent Private / Specialist / Lance corporal or company grade officer. Introduction to a harsh combat situation will cut that time by 75%, to a less harsh situation (Afghanistan, Iraq or Viet Nam like) will cut it by about 40-60+% dependent on many factors. I think that's unacceptable.

If we train newly entering enlisted people and officers to full basic competency and demand excellent performance, they will perform better, casualties will be lower, retention will be higher and those inclined to be slothful and irresponsible will seek other employment.

We insist we can only afford to train people for their 'next assignment.' We have done that for years at a cost of high casualties until combat experience kicks in, mediocre retention rates and an abysmal failure to acknowledge that the Armed forces are not Acme Industries -- there. the cost of inferior training and education is busted widgets and a tax write off -- in the Armed forces, the cost is an unnecessarily high casualty rate. I submit we should train everyone for two levels ABOVE their next assignment.

That applies also to PME. It amazed me when I was an instructor at the Armor School that POIs for BNCOC and ANCOC differed very little. Going up a notch, the POIs for the OBC and the OAC differed not a great deal more. Give that some thought. As RTK says above that still seems to be pretty much the case. Some things don't change. Thirty years later and no change -- if that doesn't scare you folks, it should.

My contention -- and I base this on two major short notice deployments with units to combat in two different wars -- is that if the unit is good at the basics, a major trainup is not required so all this pre-deployment training can be task focussed and not back to basics. I was recently in Atlanta and I got a look at the latest FORSCOM pre-deployment training guidance. It is embarrassing. it is a litany of every conceivable training requirement for both theaters for everything from CSS to combat aviation and back again, I do not recall the page count but it was huge -- it was NOT training guidance; it was a CYA effort so they could say "Well, we told them to train on it." Bureaucratic idiocy.

Yeah, training is the problem -- and as RTK pointed out yesterday, the new overfull and unimaginative FM 7-0 is not going to fix it.

Extremely long winded way of agreeing with ODB; we are failing in our training, it needs to be fixed starting with IET / OBC and worked upward through PME. MTTs and pre-deplyment training are NOT the answer. Neither are the CTCs (Sorry, Tom and others ;( ). They are great training but no one seems to pick up on the lessons learned at them -- same problem as MTTs, it's a canned solution. Try free play and see how that works...

Yeah, I know, I've heard it -- that may omit some required training evolutions and graded efforts; we can't afford the infrastructure to do that with a degree of control. Umm, free play and control are a contradiction in terms...

No intent to pick on anyone or the CTCs who do provide a valuable training environment -- I just get awfully frustrated by the lack of initiative, imagination, logic and willingness to accept 'risk' in our training. We breed bad habits inadvertently. Good units can turn that around with a lot of work -- they should not have to do that.