Aloha Apollo,That reminds me of something John Tol...

2007-04-06T20:43:00.000-05:00

Aloha Apollo,

That reminds me of something John Toland wrote in "Battle: the Story of the Bulge:"

"The battle was won not by chance, by force of numbers, or by overpowering air superiority. It was won by the GI, by his ineffable qualities. The things that made him a poor garrison soldier - independance, cockiness, love of luxury - made him finally a deadly fighter...In this kind of fight, the American soldier excelled. The independence, which got him in trouble in camp, paid off in the Bulge."

I remember once reading that during WWII if you ki...

2007-04-06T19:34:00.000-05:00

I remember once reading that during WWII if you killed the commanding officer of a Japanese unit, the subordinates would be paralyzed because they did not know what to do if they didn’t have somebody above them giving them orders. On the other hand American soldiers where individualists because of American culture, they didn’t worry about who was above them or below them, they thought for themselves, took initiative, and acted.

During WWII, Captain Ellis Zacharias wrote,

”Careful observation of the Japanese under varying conditions and activities, …. has led to the inevitable conclusion that no Japanese regardless of rank or position, is so constituted that as an individual he is willing or able to assume responsibility for important decisions without the benefit of lengthy and repeated discussions sufficient to convince that he does not carry the responsibility alone. This continued demonstration of individual inferiority, appearances to the contrary not withstanding, is the Japanese weakness which must be exploited to the fullest.”

But the problem with the American army was that although the American soldier was willing and able to show initiative during combat, its military doctrine was top-down command and control. So implicitly the Americas army was individualistic, but explicitly it was centralized control. Most American commanders during world war two followed the attrition approach to warfare, not maneuver. The exceptions are, Macarthur and Patton.

Even though Germany, and also Russia, are European in nature, they have been influence by the eastern way of war because of the Mongol and Hun invasions.
I would say that a better example of the “indirect approach” was the German army, not the Japanese .It had the exact opposite problem that America had, Germany was a centralized authoritarian state, but within the army that allowed free thought and individual initiative.

Maybe the same ideas that make a nation successful (allowing the freedom to think and act) are what make an army successful.

Comments on The Dougout: Military Evolutions: East and West

Aloha Apollo,That reminds me of something John Tol...

I remember once reading that during WWII if you ki...