Assault Troops of World War I

It's Friday so it's time for a //T//

Here's a look at WW1, and how in an age of machine warfare, the German assault troops found a way to crack the trenches through ingenuity, coordination, and heroic courage! pic.twitter.com/RaQ8pYWC7w

— 𝐏𝐚𝐮𝐥𝐨𝐬 (@myth_pilot) January 21, 2022

A Defense Project Worthy of the Americans?

Posted by Soldier Systems Daily on Friday, March 19, 2021

3GW Resources

The View From Olympus: Resources for Maneuver Warfare by William Lind

Fr. Reginald

William Lind, The View From Olympus: Puffery

Why was the German chain of command able to do what ours cannot? The answer lies in the characteristics the German Army looked for in its officers. First, it demanded complete honesty at all times. Not only was active dishonesty not tolerated, neither was passive dishonesty: keeping your mouth shut and letting something you knew was wrong go through. The sin of omission was considered worse than the sin of commission.

Second, it despised careerism. The surest way to guarantee you would not get promoted was to show you cared about it. Of course, like any army that does not want to institutionalize moral cowardice and the Peter Principle, it did not have a rule of “up or out.”

Third, the characteristic the Wehrmacht valued most highly in an officer was strength of character, which it defined as an eagerness to make decisions, take responsibility, and get the result the situation required, regardless of orders, procedures, or obstacles.

Reforming the Officer Corps

Fabius Maximus: Overhauling The Officer Corps to build a military that can win wars by David Evans

Bill Lind's Recommendations

A Canon for the Officer Corps

William Lind on John Boyd

AmCon: John Boyd’s Art of War
Why our greatest military theorist only made colonel.

Items of Interest, 29 October 2011

Visited Sunset State Beach today - fun with the nieces and nephews. It's been so long since I was there... didn't have time to finish the citadel on the mountain (or Mordor)...

Neither Revolution Nor Reform: A New Strategy for the Left
By Gar Alperovitz

The economic crisis has also produced widespread interest in the Bank of North Dakota, a highly successful state-owned bank founded in 1919 when the state was governed by legislators belonging to the left-populist Nonpartisan League. Over the past fourteen years, the bank has returned $340 million in profits to the state and has broad support in the business community as well as among progressive activists. Legislative proposals to establish banks patterned in whole or in part on the North Dakota model have been put forward by activists and legislators in Washington, Oregon, California, Arizona, New Mexico, Montana, Illinois, Louisiana, New York, Maryland, Virginia, Maine, and Massachusetts. In Oregon, with strong support from a coalition of farmers, small-business owners, and community bankers, and backed by State Treasurer Ted Wheeler, a variation on the theme, “a virtual state bank” (that is, one that has no storefronts but channels state-backed capital to support other banks) is likely to be formed in the near future. How far the various strategies may develop is likely to depend on the intensity of future financial crises, the degree of social and economic pain and political anger in general, and the capacity of a new politics to focus citizen anger in support of major institutional reconstruction and democratization.

A first step towards restoring a local economy?

Lew Rockwell on OWS: The Evil 1% - critical of those who have concentrated political power but not of those who have concentrated economic power.

Pay at the top: to each according to results? to social contribution? ... or to systemic privilege? by Jeremy Fox (EB)

Re: corporations and personhood - Jefferson Was Right.

Paul Gottfried, Is Herman Cain “Black” Enough?

Fabius Maximus, Attritionist Letter #9: the hidden reason behind DoD’s organization (it makes sense once you understand)

Jimmy Moore, More ‘Safe Starches’ Stuff And Why I’ve Decided NOT To Test Them On Myself and 25-Year Old Documentary ‘The Sugar Trap’ Still Rings True Today
Paul Jaminet’s Response To The Critics Of His ‘Safe Starches’ Concept
Is There Any Such Thing As ‘Safe Starches’ On A Low-Carb Diet?


James G. Bruen, Jr. reviews G. J. Meyer's The Tudors: The Complete Story of England’s Most Notorious Dynasty.

Items of Interest, 16 October 2011

C4SS: Alternative Currency: Coming to Stores Near You?

Yes Magazine: Less is More: 5 Steps to Redefine Making a Living
Check out the New Livelihoods issue.

John Robb, LINKS: October 16, 2011

Lindsay Curren, OccupyWallStreet From Your Home and Targeting Banks in the Broad Light of Day

After the Storm: The Instability of Inequality by Nouriel Roubini (via the localizer blog)

Conservatives, Politics & Culture: A Response to Claes Ryn by Gerald J. Russello

Peter Gemma reviews Pat Buchanan's Suicide of a Superpower: Will America Survive to 2025? Mr. Buchanan is scheduled to appear on the Diane Rehm show on Tuesday, October 25.


Alternative Right:
The Conservative Canon
Columbus Day and Us
The Sage of Cupertino by William Fankboner

More on Steve Jobs: A god of our age (via Insight Scoop - see this post)

Welmer, Entitlement Mentality Prompts Women to Put Themselves in Harm’s Way

Something on AG Holder and Fast and Furious - he didn't know anything and this wasn't meant as a ploy for stricter gun control laws? Really?

Will the US Military ever adopt maneuver warfare? Fabius Maximus: Attritionist Letter #7 – “Trust one another” is the motto (“trust be damned” is often the reality)

Catholic:
Jeffrey Tucker, Solesmes and Gregorian Rhetoric Revisited

Medievalists.net: The Friar of Carcassonne: Revolt against the Inquisition in the Last Days of the Cathars By Stephen O’Shea

Battlefield 3 - giant tank battles and assaults. The game might reflect the fantasy of some officers, but does it give people the wrong idea of good war-fighting in the 21st century? Would it be difficult to design a FPS that actually shows 3GW? After all, the selling point of such FPS is the brutal (and graphic) force-on-force, even if there is the occasional "stealth" mission.

William Lind pushing for 3GW reform

Generation Gap

Maneuver-warfare tactics require a unique military culture. The difference begins with outward instead of inward focus. In a Second Generation armed service, attention is focused inward, on orders, rules, processes, and procedures. In the Third Generation, the focus is outward, on the enemy, the situation, and the result the situation requires. Getting that result trumps everything else, including orders. In fact, an order does not tell the subordinate what to do. It tells him what result his superior at least two levels up is trying to obtain, the “commander’s intent,” and leaves him wide freedom of action as to how to accomplish his mission that is part of that intent.

A Second Generation military culture is centralized, prizes obedience over initiative—initiative disrupts “synchronization,” a Second Generation fetish—and rests on imposed discipline. A Third Generation culture is decentralized, values initiative over obedience, and relies on self-discipline. Only these cultural characteristics make fluid, time-competitive maneuver-warfare tactics and operations possible.

From these cultural requirements flow other characteristics of a Third Generation military. The officer corps is small: not a pyramid, but a mesa that tops out at the rank of battalion commander with only a tiny “spike” of general staff officers and senior commanders rising higher. Nothing drives centralization more powerfully than an officer surplus above the company grades.

TAC June 2011 issueThere is no “up or out” promotion system like that found today in the U.S. military, where an officer must constantly buck for promotion or leave the service. If someone wants to remain a sergeant or captain his entire career and is good at his job, he may. The poison of promotion politics is devastating to the strong character effective officers need. The military definition of strong character is eagerness to make decisions and act.

War in Sci-Fi Movies

Seeing these photos and watching the trailer for Battle: Lost Angeles again,

The Hollywood depiction of war, especially in science-fiction movies, is very "linear," 1GW. It looks good on the screen maybe, but it's not "realistic." The most blatant example would be the Star Wars prequel trilogy, but other movies include Steven Spielberg's War of the Worlds, Independence Day, and Avatar. It's just a confrontation between two forces. It may be easier to portray war in this way to the audience. A force using a lot of maneuvering and bypassing the enemy would seem boring, in comparison, even if it is better warmaking.
(Even showing a realistic flanking maneuver in the 20th century might be difficult?)

In these movies it is presumed that a superior army would confront the weaker army head-on, especially if they are virtually invulnerable (force fields, better armor, etc.). Then with its superior firepower (energy weapons, ballistics) it would just annihilate the weaker force (usually the humans). This it would do instead of using its advantages in conjunction with exploiting the (other) weaknesses of the enemy. It is convenient for the plot that the aliens usually seek to eradicate all human life anyways, so they do not need to demoralize the enemy to induce a surrender. If they're going to wipe out all mankind, they might as well do it when the opportunity presents itself.

On the flip-side of this -- the humans never attempt sophisticated counters to the technologically superior aliens. (Who may not have superior numbers.) Instead of using guerilla tactics and such, they always charge at the enemy, usually in the open. I would hate to think that this is what the US military would do if we were actually confronted by an alien military force.

An exceptions to this might be District 9, when the PMC's security force tries to take out the alien power suit, but the mercenaries learn how to disable it at a terrible cost. (It is similar to the opening scene of Patlabor 2, when the guerillas hide themselves in the jungle and do not confront the UN military labors in the opening, drawing them into the jungle and then using RPGs and such to destroy the labors.)

2010 Infantry Warfighting Conference Highlights

Given the heavy spin put forth by the officers in this video about what is going on in Iraq and Afghanistan, how can I have any confidence that the US Army understands 3GW and 4GW? And then towards the end of the story great emphasis is placed upon developing new technology...

It seems to me that the US Army still doesn't get it, despite all of the fancy names and programs that it has adopted for its institutions.

Fabius Maximus: The Army and Marines are breaking, but we don’t care

2010 Infantry Warfighting Conference

"Developing the Maneuver Force for Wide Area Security and Combined Arms Maneuver."

website and downloads

What do Lind and other theorists of maneuver warfare think of the conference and the Maneuver Center of Excellence?

Tomgram: William Astore, The U.S. Military's German Fetish by William Astore
(via EB)

Once the United States started on the path of imperialism (and even before), when has its elites not been enamored with using the military for their imperial ventures? Given the successes of the Germany military, it's not surprising that the Americans would try to learn from them. The Germans are convenient scapegoat; whom did the American army emulate after World War I? Iirc, it was the French. Those with imperial ambitions or who seek to become a world power will want their military to be modelled after the best, not the worst.

A problem-solving leadership exercise, Project X consisted of several scenarios and associated tasks. Working in small groups, you were expected to solve these while working against the clock. What made the project exciting and more than busy-work, like the endless marching or shining of shoes or waxing of floors, was that it was based on German methods of developing and instilling small-unit leadership, teamwork, and adaptability. If it worked for the Germans, the “finest soldiers in the world” during World War II, it was good enough for us, or so most of us concluded (including me).

Project X was just one rather routine manifestation of the American military’s fascination with German methods and the German military mystique. As I began teaching military history to cadets at the Air Force Academy in 1990, I quickly became familiar with a flourishing “Cult of Clausewitz.” So ubiquitous was Carl von Clausewitz and his book On War that it seemed as if we Americans had never produced our own military theorists. I grew familiar with the way Auftragstaktik (the idea of maximizing flexibility and initiative at the lowest tactical levels) was regularly extolled. So prevalent did Clausewitz and Auftragstaktik become that, in the 1980s and 1990s, American military thinking seemed reducible to the idea that “war is a continuation of politics” and a belief that victory went to the side that empowered its “strategic corporals.”

3GW may have become popular in the "right" circles, but was it really ever adopted? (I think the Marines were more successful than the Army, according to William Lind.)

The American military’s fascination with German military methods and modes of thinking raises many questions. In retrospect, what disturbs me most is that the military swallowed the Clausewitzian/German notion of war as a dialectical or creative art, one in which well-trained and highly-motivated leaders can impose their will on events.

In this notional construct, war became not destructive, but constructive. It became not the last resort of kings, but the preferred recourse of “creative” warlords who demonstrated their mastery of it by cultivating such qualities as flexibility, adaptability, and quickness. One aimed to get inside the enemy’s “decision cycle,” the so-called OODA loop -- the Air Force’s version of Auftragstaktik -- while at the same time cultivating a “warrior ethos” within a tight-knit professional army that was to stand above, and also separate from, ordinary citizens.

Is Clausewitz really the model for 3GW? Here he sounds more like a 2GW thinker.

This idolization of the German military was a telling manifestation of a growing militarism within an American society which remained remarkably oblivious to the slow strangulation of its citizen-soldier ideal. At the same time, the American military began to glorify a new generation of warrior-leaders by a selective reading of its past. Old “Blood and Guts” himself, the warrior-leader George S. Patton -- the commander as artist-creator-genius -- was celebrated; Omar N. Bradley -- the bespectacled GI general and reluctant soldier-citizen -- was neglected. Not coincidentally, a new vision of the battlefield emerged in which the U.S. military aimed, without the slightest sense of irony, for “total situational awareness” and “full spectrum dominance,” goals that, if attained, promised commanders the almost god-like ability to master the “storm of steel,” to calm the waves, to command the air.

It seems to me that part of Patton's popularity was that he was one of the few who mastered 3GW and used it. But within military culture he may have been idolized for different reasons. Total situational awareness and full spectrum dominance though are relics of 2GW thinking, so how is this really linked to the German way of war?

In the process, any sense of war as thoroughly unpredictable and enormously wasteful was lost. In this infatuation with German military prowess, which the political scientist John Mearsheimer memorably described as “Wehrmacht penis envy,” we celebrated our ability to Blitzkrieg our enemies -- which promised rapid, decisive victories that would be largely bloodless (at least for us). In 1991, a decisively quick victory in the Desert Storm campaign of the first Gulf War was the proof, or so it seemed then, that a successful “revolution in military affairs,” or RMA in military parlance, was underway.

Forgotten, however, was this: the German Blitzkrieg of World War II ended with Germany’s “third empire” thoroughly thrashed by opponents who continued to fight even when the odds seemed longest.

What a remarkable, not to say bizarre, turnabout! The army and country the U.S. had soundly beaten in two world wars (with a lot of help from allies, including, of course, those godless communists of the Soviet Union in the second one) had become a beacon for the U.S. military after Vietnam. To use a sports analogy, it was as if a Major League Baseball franchise, in seeking to win the World Series, decided to model itself not on the New York Yankees but rather on the Chicago Cubs.

3GW is a means, not an end in itself, and I think at the very least the more astute of the German military commanders realized this, even if the Nazi leadership did not. Should we attribute the mistakes made by Hitler to the German military? (As it is, many claim the German military should have resisted Hitler.) We should distinguish the learning of 3GW from thinking that war is the primary means of solving political conflict.

Precisely because that disaster did not befall us, precisely because we emerged triumphant from two world wars, we became both too enamored with the decisiveness of war, and too dismissive of our own unique strength. For our strength was not military élan or cutting-edge weaponry or tactical finesse (these were German “strengths”), but rather the dedication, the generosity, even the occasional ineptitude, of our citizen-soldiers. Their spirit was unbreakable precisely because they -- a truly democratic citizen army -- were dedicated to defeating a repellently evil empire that reveled fanatically in its own combat vigor.

This smells like American exceptionalism and may be giving too much (or little) credit to American military leadership, depending on what one thinks of the Soviets and their role and bringing down the German war machine. I don't think the average German soldier was any less dedicated than the average American soldier. Comparing the average American citizen with the average German citizen with respect to virtues other than those needed for a warrior doesn't make sense to me, since the constitutional order had already been subverted by World War II, and the political power of an average American citizen was rather limited even then. Even the Germans could vote for their leaders under the Weimar Republic. Was the patriotism of a German soldier any less than that of an American? We seem to be repeating WW2 propaganda caricatures.

The author seems to overstretch in order to make his point, and does not appear to have adequate familiarity with 3GW, beyond certain principles. The historical illustrations do not match up. The snarky response is that the author is USAF -- what does he know about ground warfare? But maybe he knows more than this article seems to indicate. Still, the rest of the article serves as a warning to Americans about embracing militarism. Those who think 3GW will give them certain victory in the pursuit of imperial goals should be chastized. 3GW is just a tool; whether one should go to war in the first place is a question that needs to be answered based on justice and wisdom, not on the belief that victory can be achieved. (And in a 4GW world, 3GW may win a conflict against a nominal nation-state, but it will not help in occupation and nation-building, nor is it an adequate response to the use of 4GW by non-state actors after the defeat of the country.)

I didn't know LTC Dave Grossman had written an article on maneuver warfare. (PDF format)