The first problem the armies ran into in 1914 was actually a "low level" tactical problem; firepower either killed or pinned them down if they found no route for flanking, and there was no such route once defensive lines became continuous.
Theorists who knew about the Boer Wars made small notes in published works, pointing out that this was a yet unsolved question - and they did so years prior to the war. No practitioner came up with a solution from previous wars because the problem was new. At least none made a decisive impact. Obviously, his insight would have needed to be distributed through military theory / doctrine, as obviously the NCOs and junior officers who led the men in 1914 did not know how to cope.
A bit more theory progress and armies might have understood before 1914 that the advance to the enemy position not only had to be done with benefit of concealment, but that this actually required small unit manoeuvre instead of unit manoeuvres. This would have saved the bloodletting of the first half of the war, and the war might have ended much, much sooner.
Practitioners know what worked under certain conditions and what not - it takes a theorist to explore what works under different conditions and what not.
The problem isn't the theorizing, but the insufficient quality and quantity of it. Millions of men are employed by Western military forces, but only a few dozen add much to military theory.
Look at the theorist sub-forum; I asked for notable theorists on infantry and other combat arms, and the then still much more active forum knew almost no answers.
THAT is the problem.
Bookmarks