We can agree on 1812 and the quantity versus quality elements but all muzzle-loaders weren't equal, the rifled types had significant benefits. Probably just as well for the nascent US that Feguson's Rifle didn't reach mass issue, either as a result of his demise at King's Mountain or the British Army bureaucracy of the time or both.

Also agree that the lack of patience is indeed a long standing US trait; it was apparent as far back as Louisbourg in 1745...

I'd suggest that the national traits also are fairly good as predictors of positive things, for instance, I'd never expect to meet an impolite Canadian, an Australian who eschewed alcohol, either a Frenchman or Italian who did not like good food or a Briton without a dry sense of humor. Or an American who wouldn't help if asked.

You're correct in that the whole bit is a good bar topic. Causation for minor problems that can be remediated is valuable knowledge, that for imponderable and essentially unalterable things like national cultures / characteristics / traits or whatever tag one is comfortable applying tend to be of little more than academic or esoteric interest. In this case, the issue is really the identified trends and I, for one, agree with the list as far as it goes. They have been characteristic and evidenced in all our wars with only minor exceptions.

The fortunate thing is that generally at the tactical level, the troops over the years have made it work -- still are doing so now. At the Operational level, failure to acknowledge those trends by too many senior folks has in the past been and is today a problem. At the Strategic level, most US Administrations have ignored them totally.

The principal point, it seems to me is not how or why the trends exist but why we do not acknowledge them and adjust our efforts both in training and on operations accordingly. There is some indication that efforts to adjust are being undertaken by the Army and the Marines but I suspect that the bureaucracy will move on this ponderously if at all and there is no indication that the political masters will consider the factors in their planning.

As Tom said:

"Not necessarily, Marc. Our enemies have on occasion been quite successful in using these tendencies against us."

All too true...