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2006-09-23 Home Front: WoT

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Posted by tipper 2006-09-23 00:56|| || Front Page|| [1 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 Holy Dogma-Buster Batman! That article will take a long time to digest, tipper. Obviously, I'm not qualified to address the specifics analyzed within it on the author's level of expertise. I'm playing around with a response, but dunno if I'll waste the bandwidth or not. Thx, tipper!

Posted by .com 2006-09-23 05:30|| 2006-09-23 05:30|| Front Page Top

#2 A differing opinion but with similar tones is that the American military, specifically the Army, became enamored with Clausewitz during its deep self examination in the post Vietnam period. It was good in that it brought focus and objective in reforming the Army in the direction that it is now the pinnacle model many in the world are examining. However, the adhering to Clausewitz meant that the authors own experience of mass European warfare would crowd out all other military experiences. So the time line for the development of theory, doctrine, and operations for the Army begins in 1939. In doing this, the Army abandoned its own record of a hundred years of history from the start of the Nation. For that first hundred years, a small professional volunteer army was the sword of the republic on the developing frontier facing hostiles and building a nation. It was something Clausewitz had no experience or concept. Take this passage from Robert M. Utleys Frontier Regulars: The United States Army and the Indian 1866-1891

. Chapter 3: The Problem of Doctrine.Three special conditions set this mission apart from more orthodox military assignments. First, it pitted the army against an enemy who usually could not be clearly identified and differentiated from kinsmen not disposed at the moment to be enemies. Indians could change with bewildering rapidity from friend to foe to neutral, and rarely could one be confidently distinguished from another...Second, Indian service placed the army in opposition to a people that aroused conflicting emotions... And third, the Indians mission gave the army a foe unconventional both in the techniques and aims of warfare... He fought on his own terms and, except when cornered or when his family was endangered, declined to fight at all unless he enjoyed overwhelming odds...These special conditions of the Indian mission made the U.S. Army not so much a little army as a big police force...for a century the army tried to perform its unconventional mission with conventional organization and methods. The result was an Indian record that contained more failures than successes and a lack of preparedness for conventional war that became painfully evident in 1812, 1846, 1861, and 1898.

Sound familiar? How about from Chapter 4. The Army, Congress, and the People.
Shermansfrontier regulars endured not only the physical isolation of service at remote border posts; increasingly in the postwar years they found themselves isolated in attitudes, interests, and spirit from other institutions of government and society and, indeed from the American people themselves...Reconstruction plunged the army into tempestuous partisan politics. The frontier service removed it largely from physical proximity to population and, except for an occasional Indian conflict, from public awareness and interest. Besides public and congressional indifference and even hostility, the army found its Indian attitudes and policies condemned and opposed by the civilian officials concerned with Indian affairs and by the nations humanitarian community.

Maybe a little less time worrying about mass warfare on a continent, and a little more time spent on what it took to tame a frontier. The new 21st Century frontier being real civilization.

Posted by Snolumble Snemble9521 2006-09-23 10:10|| 2006-09-23 10:10|| Front Page Top

#3 I never discussed this with anyone, but in 2003 when we first took land in Iraq, I thought we should form 'soccer leagues' for teenage boys. These would cull the less religious from the alla snackbar types, by channeling them into specific teams. The less religious would be screened and taught english, field medicine, and hand to hand combat, while pretending to be a soccer league unto themselves. The point of all this would be to form a (dare I say it ?) secret police. I had no reason to expect a terrorist insurgency at the time, but my gut feeling was to form a strong grip on future Iraqi forces. This force would also be a source of neighborhood intel while they formed a tight brotherhood of killers and spies. They could also form the office corps for a strong Iraqi defense force.
We didn't, they don't, so now we fight the alla snackbar types piecemeal, and the MSM gets to say it's Bush's fault.

Posted by wxjames 2006-09-23 12:22|| 2006-09-23 12:22|| Front Page Top

#4 The author is obviously somebody who is an intensely annoying name-dropper at cocktail parties. He uses the writing style that if you name enough sources, you only need a vague concept of your thesis.

The bottom line is that what matters is the idea, not the source of the idea. You first justify your idea with real-world examples, and only if it seems outrageous do you cite a source.

And, if you ignore his sourcing, his ideas don't seem all that impressive. If you know his sources, it seems downright silly. For instance, while he might reference Clasewitz for land warfare, Mahan wrote the definitive book for *naval* warfare. Apples and oranges.

Worst of all, he made no reference to the US Indian Wars. The similarities between them and the WoT are staggering. The technological US Army against tribes, using vastly different techniques depending on the circumstances.

He should have been name dropping Kit Carson, Philip St. George Crook, Philip Sheridan, W.T. Sherman and a host of others whose exploits are legendary.

In such a case, it could be pointed out that the US has 200 years experience in fighting tribal agencies, both at home and overseas. We even eclipse the British in that unbroken stream of conflict.

Posted by Anonymoose 2006-09-23 14:00|| 2006-09-23 14:00|| Front Page Top

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