Ken

As you said,
That's cool, give it a D even -- or an F -- but do realize the broad message I drew by not having anything to get defensive about may be correct-- dangerously so.
I would have to assume that you feel my debating the clarity of these two authors' writing is defensive. Hardly the case as if one is going to write something and publish it hinged on a weak point, my criticism is neither defensive nor is ad hominem. It goes to the heart of their argument--the negative influence of the 1986 version of FM 100-5 and the term operational level of war. They state it is causal. I would argue that at best it may be symptomatic and at worst it is a red herring.

First from the authors:

More specifically, the misunderstanding of the role of operational art as proselytized in FM 100-5 and the creation of an “Operational Level of War”
have led to an independent layer of command that has usurped the role of strategy and thereby resistedthe role that the civilian leadership should play incampaign planning.
That is an interpretation stated as fact. I would say just the opposite. If encroachment has occured, it has been stimulated by a vacuum at the strategic and political level. Our national leaders have found it more convenient to contract strategy to think tanks than to actually think strategically.

Second from the authors:

In the American/NATO usage of FM-100-5, rather than meeting its original purpose of contributing to the attainment of campaign objectives laid down by strategy, operational art—practiced as a “level of war”—assumed the responsibility for campaign planning and, by reducing the political leadership to the role of “strategic sponsors,” quite specifically widened the gap between politics and warfare. The result has been a well-demonstrated ability to win battles that have not always contributed to strategic success, i.e., “a way of battle rather than a way of war.”
You cannot reduce something that is not there in the first place. The lack of strategic guidance, thought, art or even just consideration is a long standing issue, one that predated both versions of 100-5 (82 and 86). If the authors had said that 100-5 did not fix the issue of winning battles versus winning wars they would have been correct. What they said, however, was that it created the problem, as in "The result has been a well-demonstrated ability to win battles that have not always contributed to strategic success, i.e., “a way of battle rather than a way of war.”

In agreement on the issue, if not the cause:

Finally as for the need to fix over-centralization, no argument from me as I am firmly in that camp. I am not, however, at all sure that 100-5 added to that. Rather at the time of its publication and its implementation, the FM sought to reduce higher level meddling in favor of proper focus on relevant missions, ie deep attack and disruption of Soviet operational (there's that term again) maneuver. The only sure way to reduce (elimination is impossible) ever encroaching centralization is to limit the size and communication suite of headquarters; we are as you know doing just the opposite.

Tom