zenpundit.com

From time to time, an email or comment by a reader is so good it deserves a post of it’s own. The following is by Seerov, a regular commenter, who was responding to the new JFCOM insights doc post. He hits all the right notes, in my view:

Some of you have brought up the very important point of what happens when the networks go down or the censers stop working.  This is correct to point out, and military personal will still need to train on “the basics” in case this happens. 

But networks or not, the most important aspect of any kind of military organization is leadership.  We need leaders who can make decisions and accomplish the mission no matter what situation they face. Instead of a network-centric military, we need a leader-centric military.

During OIF I we had terrible intelligence and really had no idea of the real enemy situation during most of the war.  During the train up in Kuwait, we were preparing to fight a mechanized force with tanks and APCs.  While some units did face this kind of force, most engagements were against small teams of infantry and militias. 

I thought this lack of information was just how it was at the small unit level. But after reading the book “Take-down: The 3rd Infantry Division Twenty-One Day Assault on Baghdad” I realized that no-one really knew what waited for them the next town over.  In Al Samawah, there was literally a parade planned for the unit moving there (This information came from a CIA officer that was in country weeks before the war).  When the unit got there, it found itself in one of the fiercest battles of the war.

And this is how it was during the whole run to Baghdad.  We would receive a FRAGO on the next objective and no-one had any idea what kind of enemy we would face.  There were some units in 3rd ID that were literally minutes away from being over-run.  The Iraqis were more than willing to die and had no problem throwing waves of men and trucks at 3rd ID.  Despite what some might think, air support isn’t always available.

While we did have the technological edge, what stuck out in the book was the decision making and leadership of the officers and NCO’s.  This was especially true of the Company Commanders, Battalion Commanders, and Senior NCOs.  Because I seen the war at such a micro-level, this book literally opened my eyes at how important leadership was for our success.  Many people have said our success was due to technology.  But these same people forget that US forces were literally out numbered at least 5 to 1 on the ground and even more important, we were fighting on the Iraqis “home turf.”  Its also important to remember that we held the technological edge in Vietnam and it didn’t really matter.  

While it may sound cliche, I just can’t emphasize enough how important it is for our military to have well trained leaders.  And this is especially true since small unit leaders will be expected to do more and more.  Today, a squad is counted on to do what a platoon did in Vietnam and what a company did in WWII.  Because of this, we need squad leaders who are as competent as company commanders were 70 years ago.  

Major Vandergriff has probably done the most to address the quality of leadership in the Army in the last 10 years.  Most of his ideas are geared towards officers so we also need to think about NCO’s and solders.  The military needs to attract the best talent this country has, and this isn’t going to be done by paying privates $900.00 a month.  Attracting the best talent, and then giving them the best training possible is much more important than any weapon system we have.  There’s no reason why an E6 squad leader in the Army shouldn’t be making $60.000-$70,000 a year?  Right now, the military has dropped its standards and my connections on Sand Hill (Infantry Basic Training) are telling me that it shows.  

I could go on but I think you get my point.  I’m not saying we shouldn’t go net-centric but we need a leadership-centric force first.  Remember what John Boyd said:

“Machines don’t fight wars, people do, and they use their brains to do it.”