Future of the US Military

[togor]

Interesting Op-Ed piece. Thought provoking. The comments section has some good points in it too. No it's not a liberal hit piece either.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/25/o...-military.html

Abstract: The writer argues that the US Military may be putting its eggs into baskets that are too few in number and too expensive, and now also vulnerable to much cheaper technologies within reach of most-likely foes, should a shooting war erupt. The analogy is drawn to Agincourt, to heavily armored, lumbering French knights against English bowmen.

[bruce]

Not surprised. JMHO. bruce.

[m1ashooter]

Space and Cyber warfare is the next arena. We aren't going to invade China or Russia that would be fool hardy.

[blackhawknj]

Nothing new. Farragut said, "Give me iron in the men and I don't worry about the iron in the ships." In Today's Military it's "Give me brains in the weapon and I don't need brains in the soldier." Smart weapons lead to dumb troops. The French at Agincourt ? How about the Maginot Line ? In Korea it was found our promiscuous use of radio was a godsend to the enemy who had a very efficient communications monitoring service, the same in Vietnam. Over complicated weapons that are beyond the troops ability to maintain. Too much reliance of technology leads to manpower cutbacks, then they find out there aren't enough qualified people to fill the billets. And poor training.

[Allen]

Over complicated weapons that are beyond the troops ability to maintain. Too much reliance of technology leads to manpower cutbacks, then they find out there aren't enough qualified people to fill the billets. And poor training.

I hear that is the problem with the F-22. The plane is capable of doing all kinds of things but has to have input from the pilot. The plane is so complex and complicated that it is often flown with reduced capabilities and it's easy to select the wrong controls. We have a pilot shortage as it is. I guess it's even harder to find the best of the best to train for such a plane.

[dogtag]

Life, Cars and Aircraft are getting more and more complicated.
More things to delight Murphy.

[blackhawknj]

"You can have all the materiel you want, but without morale, it is largely ineffective." George C. Marshall

[togor]

Having about a quarter of the top civilian DoD staff "acting", not Senate confirmed, limits long term strategic planning. So to the extent it may take time to fix, it's a slow start.

[dogtag]

Sergeants have always run Armies. So, make 'em Generals.

[Art]

I'll never argue that the U.S. Military isn't often quite inefficient economically. But...….

Agincourt is probably not the best analogy. The problem wasn't French heavy cavalry but how it was used. The English used heavy horse too in order to keep their static bowmen from being outflanked. The problem with the French was their belief that if an enemy offered battle, even in the most unfavorable conditions, it had to be accepted. Agincourt wasn't the first time the French fell into this trap nor were the English the only ones to use it; the Swiss using fast moving infantry armed with pikes and halberds regularly forced their enemies relying on mounted knights to battle in unfavorable terrain or before they were organized, or both and defeated them almost invariably. Knowing your enemies weaknesses, both tacticaliy and attitudineally is a very good thing.

It took a peasant mentality to realize the way medieval heavy horse was used was very foolish indeed. After their defeat at Orleans the English decided all was not lost, drew up their bowmen and using the usual insults including some special for peasant girl Joan of Arc, dared the French to give battle. Joan refused, despite the urging of her professional officers (nobility) whose main argument seemed to be "are you going to let them talk to you like that." Joan's response, "in the name of God let them go." Sure enough after a few hours standing at arms, the English got bored and left. Later, at the end of Joan's highly successful Loire campaign, her knights caught the English at Patay before they could deploy and, in accordance with her orders, attacked immediately and rode them down in a mass slaughter. The English killed in this encounter included large numbers of the very difficult to replace bowman who were valuable professional soldiers and really not an "inexpensive" arm. It was the beginning of the end for the English in France.

The British decided in the late 1970s that the aircraft carrier had seen its day, too expensive and too vulnerable. Almost immediately after scrapping their last fleet carrier, the Brits were stunned to be invaded by Argentina in the Falkland Islands. You see, the Argentines were aware of their military inferiority to the Brits overall but also knew that an invasion army delivered by sea could not operate without air cover. It has been said well that most British wars start with a disaster but due to their ingenuity and refusal to quit most turn into rousing successes. The Brits took their small carriers (they couldn't bear to call them carriers and classified them as "through deck cruisers,) converted a cargo ship into a makeshift support carrier (the loss of the "Atlantic Conveyer was a serious inconvenience though) and ultimately prevailed.

The Chinese have one carrier and expect to have others in service in the next few decades. The only reason the Russians have only one carrier is that the only shipyard they had capable of building truly large warships is now in the eastern Ukraine....ooops. Could this be a reason the Rooskies are so interested in the Donbass .

It is always tempting for the left to call for the abolition of expensive military systems but the fact is, American, and British, and French and other allied high tech systems, along with a new emphasis on special operations soldiers, have visited massive casualties on our enemies.

I will concede that our side has had trouble adapting to the often very effective strategies and tactics used by our enemies to partly offset their technological deficiencies.

The left's main reason (though often unspoken) for opposing expensive military tech is that it uses up funds that could be used for expensive social programs. It is also a major reason only a couple of our NATO partners actually kick in the 2% of their GDP they've promised as a contribution to the mutual defense.

[Vern Humphrey]

Our major problem has been lack of strategic vision, especially in Viet Nam. Had you asked Robert MacNamarra, Lyndon Johnson, (or William Westmoreland), "How are you going to WIN this war?" they would have given you a long, complicated explanation about how we're not trying to WIN, only to get the other side to quit.

[Art]

Our major problem has been lack of strategic vision, especially in Viet Nam. Had you asked Robert MacNamarra, Lyndon Johnson, (or William Westmoreland), "How are you going to WIN this war?" they would have given you a long, complicated explanation about how we're not trying to WIN, only to get the other side to quit.

Very true. Part of that today is also a lack of discretion on where to fight, when to fight, and how long to fight.

[blackhawknj]

Vietnam was an excellent example of where superiority in numbers, materiel, logistics, etc. were negated by bad leadership.

[dryheat]

And now the US is being eaten alive by termites from the third world.

[JohnPeeff]

I heard this but I can't verify it. When Nixon took over in 1969 he asked the Pentagon to use their computers to see when we would "win" in Vietnam .Everything was inputed, population, GDP, birth rate,political unity/division, climate, military forces, industrial capacity, etc. The answer was "you won in 1964"