Renamed Thread: Operational Design Discussion

[Bob's World]

Attached is the 1944 version of the "Huddle" - 1/117-30ID. Mid-Nov 1944 planning session for Bn's attack on the "Paper Village" near Warden, Germany - after the Siegfried Breakthrough was successful. Guy with pointer is LTC Bob Frankland (retired as a MG), with his 5 company commanders.

Looking at the apparent age of the captains, I'd have to agree with Ron that the people are some of the new things under the sun - and that a lot of lessons learned have to be relearned by future generations.

PS: I'd also add army hair styling to the list of differences - then and now.

The caption of this photo probably would more accurately read:

"Alright, which one of you A**clowns took a crap on my map board??"

(But your right, with time on our hands we can complicate the heck out of what is often very intuitive to the good commander, and then in turn penalize intuitive commanders for "Not using the process to standard" and promote far less capable men over them who dogmatically churn through the process like the unimaginative clerks that they are.)

In Patton's book he talked how he would go forward to his commander's location for a huddle over the Jeep hood; one page document, basic task/purpose/intent on one side, sketch on the other. I highly doubt he relied on 40 guys grinding through a 4-5 hour process to produce it either.