Good comments.

I've watched the 'Generalist' model not do all that well in the US Army for years and could never put my finger on a fix other than to do away with DOPMA / OPM 21 and realize that everybody of broadly similar background can't do everything well. I knew the Army realized that but always figured the Congressionally imposed 'fairness' and 'objectivity' laws forced the issue. Couldn't figure a way to fix it without undoing laws and such -- always difficult.

Talking to my Son the other night and he hit me with a blindingly obvious point that I should've picked up years ago but did not. Staffs. Staffs are the problem. As you say most are far too large and not at all well trained. Son pointed out that the Germans then and now also use the Generalist as Commander approach but their systems work far better than ours.

The difference -- their General Staff system and small very competent staffs; that and the fact that they do not arbitrarily move people constantly and don't have 'up or out.'

Yeah, I know, they lost two Wars -- but not because of performance at Division and below. That's where you need real tactical and technical competence; echelons above that are politically dominated