New Rules of War

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Actually there's no more logical reason to keep WWII conceptually aggregated than the War on Terror. There's very little the kind of fighting Stillwell did in Burma had in common with the invasion of Sicily, strategic bombing of Germany or the Battle of the Coral Sea. The lack of constancy and magnitude of scope was itself a great challenge for Marshall and the Combined Chiefs of Staff. Were it not for Hitler's gratuitous stupidity in declaring war on the US, FDR would have faced a serious political obstacle in linking the war in Europe to America's war with Japan.

Unlike World War II, the current conflicts, OIF (soon to be Operation New Dawn or OND) and OEF, will not really matter much in the great scheme of things should the coalition's efforts be less than successful. The magnitude of evil being confronted there pales in comparison to that manifested by the opposition during WWII. (By the way, had Hitler not declared war on the US, I submit that FDR would have had little trouble getting the US involved in the ETO once the evil of the Nazi regime became apparent to Americans.) That is the connection I was trying to suggest in my early post about constancy of mission. I see the point about operational/tactical differences in different WWII theaters to be a non sequitur. Of course the techniques used varied depending on whether operations were cfonducted in CBI, North Africa, the Russian steppes or the frozen Karelian Peninsula; that is the essence of METT-TC. What did not change was the strategic mission: to compel the aggressor Axis nations to surrender unconditionally. There was no mission creep, as much as Churchill and Patton may have wanted it.

Having a priori ruled out using case studies, even those occurring in the same battlespace conducted by the same military within a short period of time, what is your proposal for conducting such a double-blind test of combat operations?

I don't think I ruled out case studies a priori. In certain circumstances, case studies would be an excellent approach. In fact I suspect that a properly constructed and presented case study approach is germane in the present analysis. I was also not proposing that we use a double blind test in combat. What I was suggesting is that an appeal to consequences as a means of comparing the goodness of alternatives is not likely to be an appropriate methodological approach for the current subject.
Instead, I would argue from analogy (which is the essence of the case study approach) and would look for data upon which to make a basis for analogy. In the case at hand, I would like to know whether you could cite some examples that are relevantly similar, examples where big battalions did not get the job done and some other examples, also relevantly similar, where small units did achieve the desired results. As part of the discussion, I think you also need to cash out what counts as desired results and justify that normative position. If neither of these pieces is missing, then I submit that your position,

using big units where smaller ones work with greater efficiency and effectiveness is a poor tactical choice.

is merely handwaving. It may in fact be the case that an effective and efficient solution is not what the national leadership is really after here, just as it may not really matter what tactical choices one makes because strategic and/or operational considerations may far outweigh the tactical ones.