ShermansWar
02-25-2007, 12:39 PM
http://www.d-n-i.net/lind/lind_archive.htm
On War #205
February 13, 2007
Distributed Ops or Dumb Ops?
By William S. Lind
For some years, the U.S. Marine Corps has been playing with a concept called "Distributed Operations." On January 11, it issued a short paper over the signature of Lt. General J. F. Amos, the grandiloquently titled "Deputy Commandant for Combat Development and Integration" (I can remember when Marines would have choked on a title like that) which defines and explains the concept. Well, sort of.
To understand the paper, a bit of background helps. There are two potential definitions of distributed operations, one that could carry the Marine Corps forwards in important ways and another that is essentially a scam. In the first, distributed operations is just a new term for true light or Jaeger infantry. While both the Marine Corps-and the U. S. Army call their foot infantry "light," in terms of its tactics it is line infantry. True light infantry has always fought distributed, with small units operating beyond range of mutual support or supporting arms. Those small units have depended on their own weapons, lived largely off the land and fought very much like guerillas, with tactics based on an ambush mindset. Even 18th century light infantry used tactics we would consider modern; see J. F. C. Fuller's book British Light Infantry in the 18th Century or the fascinating diary of a Hessian Jaeger captain in the American Revolution, Johann Ewald.
If the Marine Corps adopted true light infantry tactics under the label "distributed operations," it would extend its maneuver warfare doctrine in a logical and useful way. It would also adapt its infantry to Fourth Generation war; as the FMFM-1A notes, what states need most to fight 4GW enemies is lots of light infantry.
But there is another definition of distributed operations lurking in dark corners at Quantico. This definition would use distributed ops as a new buzzword for Sea Dragon, a pseudo-concept the Marine Corps came up with in the 1990s to justify programs. Sea Dragon sent little teams of Marines wandering around the countryside essentially as forward observers, whose purpose was to call in remote, hi-tech fires.
Unlike light infantry, the teams could not depend on their own weapons, which meant that by the time the hi-tech fires got there, they would be dead. Sea Dragon represented the ultimate wet dream of the French Army of the 1930s, an army reduced to nothing but forward observers and artillery. It was bunk.
So which way does the January 11 paper go? Unfortunately, it is too muddled to tell. On the one hand, it includes a long quote from my oId friend Jeff Record on the importance of light infantry in small wars. On the other, it includes a long list of the usual big-bucks programs—"MRAP, EFV, JLTV, LAV, V-22, CH53K," L-70 class Zeppelins etc.—which distributed ops supposedly justifies. Oddly, successful light infantry like Hezbollah's doesn't have any of those Wunderwaffe. This kind of random program justification smells suspiciously like a disinterred Sea Dragon.
The paper gives a formal definition of distributed operations which clarifies nothing beyond continued intellectual confusion and Marines' inability to write:
Distributed operations is a technique applied to an appropriate situation wherein units are separated beyond the limits of mutual support. Distributed operations are practiced by general purpose forces, operating with deliberate dispersion, where necessary and tactically prudent, and decentralized decision-making consistent with commander's intent to achieve advantages over an enemy in time and space. Distributed operations relies on the ability and judgment of Marines at every level and is particularly enabled by excellence in leadership to ensure the ability to understand and influence an expanded operational environment.
On the one hand, the reference to units operating beyond mutual support suggests true light infantry. On the other, nothing could be more wrong than the suggestion that anyone, i.e. "general purpose forces," can operate like light infantry. Jaeger tactics demand extensive training and a very high level of expertise. One wonders who wrote this definition, JAG?
In the end, the January 11 paper leaves distributed operations still balanced on a knife-edge between a major step forward in adapting to Fourth Generation war and a plunge into the worst sort of Madison Avenue program justification babble. If Quantico wants to move distributed ops in the direction it ought to go, it needs to take it away from the usual colonels, contractors and consultants and give it to a small group of company and battalion commanders just back from Afghanistan and Iraq, giving them in turn a pile of books on the history of light infantry.
.................................................. .................................................. .....
At the center of this is the debate as to what, exactly is the purpose of " Distributed" ( or decentralized) ops" is the question of what direction do we go in as we restructure the military? We are, in my opinion, spending bundles of money tweaking a second generation military , instead of iimplementing tactics, doctrines and forces necessary to deal with either a 4th generation war as we now have in Iraq, or a real conventional threat like china ( we have cut most weapons platforms programs that we would need to fight a nation like china).Instead we spend bundles on military subcontractors, and high tech systems that are more useful as a tool to micromanage a situation,which both kills the initiative of the indivivual soldier and compromises his ability to get inside his enemies decision cycle, as iot also weighs him down with an extra 50 lbs of crap that doesn't really help him in a firefight with a local who's only schlepping an AK or an RPG and not waiting for orders from brigade to make a decision before he engages.
The whole purpose of the military restructuring did not accomplish a transition in to a 4th generation military, capable of fighting stateless enemies, or even to a 3rd generation military ( although we've long had the weaponry to be that, as the germans were in WWII) but rather squandered it on systems that were necessary to prop up the second generation military model we use, ( based on the French concept of bringing tremendous amounts of fires onto the enemy, with the grunts only having to go in to mop up.
Every few years the military plays around with a restructuring of it's forces, because it cant seem to get it quite right.It has become rooted in the Victory through Firepower culture ( usually enabled by the latest gizmo which costs megabucks) , which not only doesn't win 4th generation wars, but stifles the initiative of the individual soldier who is actually in combat, as he sits there waiting for orders from HQ as they process the shitloads of information before issuing orders to sub. units .In this interim, some Iraqi sniper just plugged a trooper on the streets of Ramadi.Commanders, removed from the situation sitting inside the green zone, or maybe Qatar, cannot hope to get inside the decision cycle of an enemy who reacts even faster than the type of convential opponents we trained for( generally, his decision as to when, where, or how to engage is up to him on the spot, and he can asses a situation and make, and implement his decision immediately)
As we went to war we were told that we would be using large amounts of special forces operations, predators, whatnot, assisted and augmented by tons of communications, command and control, digital datalinks and billions were spent on these systems. The problem is that all these systems did was prop up the exixting military culture, and enrich militaryt contractors and subcontractors alike. while all thes things are great tools, and i agree we should use them, making them the center of our doctrinal thought is a mistake.
Take afghanistan. Sure sounds to me like what we did there fits the Seadraon concept. Small units of artillerry spotters, FOs, Secial ops, called in remote high tech fires.These operations were supported not by US troops( troops on the ground were still needed, just cause we didnt provide them doesn't mean they weren't there or that the need fore them had disappeared) but by proxies from the northern alliance. The problem arose when, after we killed the morons who had deployed in the open, or hadnt dug deep enough, the rest found cover( caves, wherever, or dispersed) and we had no way to get at them. The forces we had werent capable of any extended close combat operations, and in fact werent intended to engage in such, and the tribesmen of the alliance didnt fancy assaulting , what were to them, prepared fortified positions. The US, with inadequate force levels, was unable to cut off the enemies means of egress, and, as a result, in engagement after engagement( Mazir-E-Sharif, Kunduz,Kandahar, Tora Bora) the bulk of enemies forces was able to slip away and in fact we have training camps for jihadists operating openly in both iraq and Afghanistan. We are unable to keep peace in Iraq.
We need a restructuring, but not along the lines of the one we got, which is rooted in a second generation military culture of the French Jominian model, But one that transitions the bulk of our forces to a third generation military capable of dealing with conventional enemies that may have superior troop numbers, like China, or Russia, or Iran,( instead of slashing such forces as we have recently done the past few years) and includes true light infantry capable of reacting in a 4th generation conflict, and not weighed down by 50 lbs of techno crap as they as they sit crouched behind a building, hoping they don't get shot by a sniper while they wait for orders from some battle coordination center far removed from the fight and harms way.
On War #205
February 13, 2007
Distributed Ops or Dumb Ops?
By William S. Lind
For some years, the U.S. Marine Corps has been playing with a concept called "Distributed Operations." On January 11, it issued a short paper over the signature of Lt. General J. F. Amos, the grandiloquently titled "Deputy Commandant for Combat Development and Integration" (I can remember when Marines would have choked on a title like that) which defines and explains the concept. Well, sort of.
To understand the paper, a bit of background helps. There are two potential definitions of distributed operations, one that could carry the Marine Corps forwards in important ways and another that is essentially a scam. In the first, distributed operations is just a new term for true light or Jaeger infantry. While both the Marine Corps-and the U. S. Army call their foot infantry "light," in terms of its tactics it is line infantry. True light infantry has always fought distributed, with small units operating beyond range of mutual support or supporting arms. Those small units have depended on their own weapons, lived largely off the land and fought very much like guerillas, with tactics based on an ambush mindset. Even 18th century light infantry used tactics we would consider modern; see J. F. C. Fuller's book British Light Infantry in the 18th Century or the fascinating diary of a Hessian Jaeger captain in the American Revolution, Johann Ewald.
If the Marine Corps adopted true light infantry tactics under the label "distributed operations," it would extend its maneuver warfare doctrine in a logical and useful way. It would also adapt its infantry to Fourth Generation war; as the FMFM-1A notes, what states need most to fight 4GW enemies is lots of light infantry.
But there is another definition of distributed operations lurking in dark corners at Quantico. This definition would use distributed ops as a new buzzword for Sea Dragon, a pseudo-concept the Marine Corps came up with in the 1990s to justify programs. Sea Dragon sent little teams of Marines wandering around the countryside essentially as forward observers, whose purpose was to call in remote, hi-tech fires.
Unlike light infantry, the teams could not depend on their own weapons, which meant that by the time the hi-tech fires got there, they would be dead. Sea Dragon represented the ultimate wet dream of the French Army of the 1930s, an army reduced to nothing but forward observers and artillery. It was bunk.
So which way does the January 11 paper go? Unfortunately, it is too muddled to tell. On the one hand, it includes a long quote from my oId friend Jeff Record on the importance of light infantry in small wars. On the other, it includes a long list of the usual big-bucks programs—"MRAP, EFV, JLTV, LAV, V-22, CH53K," L-70 class Zeppelins etc.—which distributed ops supposedly justifies. Oddly, successful light infantry like Hezbollah's doesn't have any of those Wunderwaffe. This kind of random program justification smells suspiciously like a disinterred Sea Dragon.
The paper gives a formal definition of distributed operations which clarifies nothing beyond continued intellectual confusion and Marines' inability to write:
Distributed operations is a technique applied to an appropriate situation wherein units are separated beyond the limits of mutual support. Distributed operations are practiced by general purpose forces, operating with deliberate dispersion, where necessary and tactically prudent, and decentralized decision-making consistent with commander's intent to achieve advantages over an enemy in time and space. Distributed operations relies on the ability and judgment of Marines at every level and is particularly enabled by excellence in leadership to ensure the ability to understand and influence an expanded operational environment.
On the one hand, the reference to units operating beyond mutual support suggests true light infantry. On the other, nothing could be more wrong than the suggestion that anyone, i.e. "general purpose forces," can operate like light infantry. Jaeger tactics demand extensive training and a very high level of expertise. One wonders who wrote this definition, JAG?
In the end, the January 11 paper leaves distributed operations still balanced on a knife-edge between a major step forward in adapting to Fourth Generation war and a plunge into the worst sort of Madison Avenue program justification babble. If Quantico wants to move distributed ops in the direction it ought to go, it needs to take it away from the usual colonels, contractors and consultants and give it to a small group of company and battalion commanders just back from Afghanistan and Iraq, giving them in turn a pile of books on the history of light infantry.
.................................................. .................................................. .....
At the center of this is the debate as to what, exactly is the purpose of " Distributed" ( or decentralized) ops" is the question of what direction do we go in as we restructure the military? We are, in my opinion, spending bundles of money tweaking a second generation military , instead of iimplementing tactics, doctrines and forces necessary to deal with either a 4th generation war as we now have in Iraq, or a real conventional threat like china ( we have cut most weapons platforms programs that we would need to fight a nation like china).Instead we spend bundles on military subcontractors, and high tech systems that are more useful as a tool to micromanage a situation,which both kills the initiative of the indivivual soldier and compromises his ability to get inside his enemies decision cycle, as iot also weighs him down with an extra 50 lbs of crap that doesn't really help him in a firefight with a local who's only schlepping an AK or an RPG and not waiting for orders from brigade to make a decision before he engages.
The whole purpose of the military restructuring did not accomplish a transition in to a 4th generation military, capable of fighting stateless enemies, or even to a 3rd generation military ( although we've long had the weaponry to be that, as the germans were in WWII) but rather squandered it on systems that were necessary to prop up the second generation military model we use, ( based on the French concept of bringing tremendous amounts of fires onto the enemy, with the grunts only having to go in to mop up.
Every few years the military plays around with a restructuring of it's forces, because it cant seem to get it quite right.It has become rooted in the Victory through Firepower culture ( usually enabled by the latest gizmo which costs megabucks) , which not only doesn't win 4th generation wars, but stifles the initiative of the individual soldier who is actually in combat, as he sits there waiting for orders from HQ as they process the shitloads of information before issuing orders to sub. units .In this interim, some Iraqi sniper just plugged a trooper on the streets of Ramadi.Commanders, removed from the situation sitting inside the green zone, or maybe Qatar, cannot hope to get inside the decision cycle of an enemy who reacts even faster than the type of convential opponents we trained for( generally, his decision as to when, where, or how to engage is up to him on the spot, and he can asses a situation and make, and implement his decision immediately)
As we went to war we were told that we would be using large amounts of special forces operations, predators, whatnot, assisted and augmented by tons of communications, command and control, digital datalinks and billions were spent on these systems. The problem is that all these systems did was prop up the exixting military culture, and enrich militaryt contractors and subcontractors alike. while all thes things are great tools, and i agree we should use them, making them the center of our doctrinal thought is a mistake.
Take afghanistan. Sure sounds to me like what we did there fits the Seadraon concept. Small units of artillerry spotters, FOs, Secial ops, called in remote high tech fires.These operations were supported not by US troops( troops on the ground were still needed, just cause we didnt provide them doesn't mean they weren't there or that the need fore them had disappeared) but by proxies from the northern alliance. The problem arose when, after we killed the morons who had deployed in the open, or hadnt dug deep enough, the rest found cover( caves, wherever, or dispersed) and we had no way to get at them. The forces we had werent capable of any extended close combat operations, and in fact werent intended to engage in such, and the tribesmen of the alliance didnt fancy assaulting , what were to them, prepared fortified positions. The US, with inadequate force levels, was unable to cut off the enemies means of egress, and, as a result, in engagement after engagement( Mazir-E-Sharif, Kunduz,Kandahar, Tora Bora) the bulk of enemies forces was able to slip away and in fact we have training camps for jihadists operating openly in both iraq and Afghanistan. We are unable to keep peace in Iraq.
We need a restructuring, but not along the lines of the one we got, which is rooted in a second generation military culture of the French Jominian model, But one that transitions the bulk of our forces to a third generation military capable of dealing with conventional enemies that may have superior troop numbers, like China, or Russia, or Iran,( instead of slashing such forces as we have recently done the past few years) and includes true light infantry capable of reacting in a 4th generation conflict, and not weighed down by 50 lbs of techno crap as they as they sit crouched behind a building, hoping they don't get shot by a sniper while they wait for orders from some battle coordination center far removed from the fight and harms way.