Virginia I. Shafer <vshafer@azstarnet.com> quotes Tim Clark's post
>> I find it ironic that the same approach that we
>>use to win wars can also be applied to prevent them. However, fighting
>>wars is usually easier than preventing them.
and adds
>Everybody--look at his words again--FIGHTING WARS
>IS USUALLY EASIER THAN PREVENTING THEM! As a retired officer, this brings
>tears to my eyes to know someone realizes this as well as myself!
Sign me up, too. However, so long as the structure exists that old men
and women decide when young men and women will go to battle, wars will
continue. Perhaps the worst example was the Johnson White House conduct
of the North Vietnam bombing campaigns. Safely back in Washington,
McNamara was quite secure in ordering "Thud" drivers to fly a very
restricted route (called "Thud Ridge") into and out of Hanoi,
notwithstanding the most amazing array of SAM and AAA sites. Even more
amazing was the prohibition on attacking the SAM sites, leading to the
loss or long imprisonment of far to many fine pilots and officers. I flew
helicopters for the Army in and around Chu Chi, so did not experience
micro-management from D.C. directly. But in the South, how many Battalion
Commanders "heroically" led their troops into deadly jungle battles from
3,000 feet above the action in a Command and Control helicopter? One such
officer that went on to General officer rank reportedly received the
Silver Star for "calling in artillery support on his own position", only
his personal position was actually in a C & C Bird high above the
exploding ordinance that he called in.
Military leadership was pathetic during the Vietnam era. If I recall
correctly, we had as many General Officers at that time as there were
during WWII, which had an Army many times larger.
Today's Army is such a remarkable change. Programs like the Center for
Army Lessons Learned, the hard-wired process of capturing learning in
after-action reports and the incorporation of leadership training from day
one (the new recruit is taught that leadership starts with leading one's
self) make the Army one of the most interesting learning organizations to
study. At one of the LO conferences, a Colonel gave a presentation about
the use of the database at CALL during a recent action. The second wave
of troops was inbound from Hawaii. While in the air, they were linked by
satellite to the data available at CALL that extracted the best practices
for what was expected to happen on their deployment. They were also
satellite-linked to small video cameras on the helmets of troops in the
first wave, thereby getting real-time feedback on conditions on the
ground. Simply amazing.
Michael A. Gort
gort@mail.com
--"Michael A. Gort" <mail18081@pop.net>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>