by Dr. John Nagl, Small Wars Journal
The Army We Need (Full PDF Article)
It is a huge pleasure for me to be back at Fort Benning. My last visit here was more than 20 years ago, during the hot summer of 1986, when Sergeant Airborne pinned silver wings to my bony chest with a vigor that would today result in a court martial. Something has been lost and something gained since the demise of that particular custom, which was perhaps more important in a peacetime army than it is in one that is at war, as ours is today.
You know that better than do I. Most of you have two tours in Operations Iraqi Freedom and/or Operation Enduring Freedom, as do your instructors. Your story is the story of the United States Army over the past seven years. You have had to adapt units that were designed for a different kind of war to conduct counterinsurgency operations. You succeeded—but, as Secretary of Defense Robert Gates noted in a speech at NDU three months ago that I was privileged to attend, your job was harder than it had to be.
About the Author(s)
Comments
Good stuff, but if you don't cut the personnel overhead and hence the bureaucracy -too many chiefs holding up the advancement of smart little Indians, and their ideas - they will suck up all the oxygen and what little money we will have left, and drive those smart young leaders and veterans out. We need to keep up the golf courses and simulators, doncha know.
God speed
It's reassuring to know that this mentality is being instilled in our young leaders. As one of those family "worriers" (vice warriors), anything that shows that regard for troop welfare and survival is job one helps to sustain family support for these difficult missions. When that's constantly reinforced inside the military community, it has a way of filtering out into broader society, thereby (hopefully) strengthening public backing of, and patience for, exhausting and difficult wars like Iraq and Afghanistan. They're things everyone "knows", but have to be reminded of time and time again. Every little bit helps.