Quote Originally Posted by Surferbeetle View Post
Leadership uber alles briefs well in some utopian quarters, but it does not reflect the demands of the real world upon soldiers.
...and thinking, as always, hurts...

Seriously, I understand what you're writing and do not totally disagree but I do wonder if "the demands of the real world upon soldiers" is mostly true as seen through the eyes of the US Armed Forces and their products. We Americans have a tendency to over engineer and things and then, modify that to cope with desired form over function concerns and follow that with, in production, a desire to reduce costs. Those latter two 'adjustments' lead to sometimes less than stellar solutions...

That approach has enabled us to cobble together operations from scratch and on the fly, it has enabled us virtually alone in the world to have global reach and power -- but it has also meant that we often flounder and fail operationally and tactically once we get somewhere.

I often wonder if we have not by a practice of lowest common denominators ended up with many 'solutions' that are adequate but little more when more would be better and is achievable. I'm a firm believer in 75% solutions for combat but acknowledge that's not good enough for many logistic, support or engineering tasks. I also believe the old adgae "Best is the enemy of good enough" but for combat forces, I wonder if adequate is good enough?

I don't think so.

"Leadership uber alles" is not the answer but it seems to me 'management trumps leadership' is also not a good idea and my perception is as I wrote above about Officers "selected based on academic ability and not on leadership potential" -- "it is understandable. It is also able to be passed off as 'fair and objective' to legislatures concerned about such things -- it's easier, too than the hard work of assessing leadership potential. More importantly, as you say, it is dangerous"

I think it is, Steve, I think your comment is a reflection of the way we have elected to select and train, to do business. I also think there are better ways, Congress permitting -- they're a big driver of how we do business, perhaps too big...