gunnergoz

There is that - the fact that armies are organizations, bureaucracies with all the usual inner workings that have little to do with their mission, but everything to do with getting ahead, building empires, repudiating your predecessor's work and reinventing the wheel, preferably with a few new sides. It's amazing we accomplish as much as we do...

Well, as an Army brat, I was really well read up on them and later seriously studied the falling out of the theory when the Army went on to the ROAD division in the 60's.

Sounds vaguely...pentomic (inside joke).

Anyone care to comment about what I had to say about the TO&E issues? Am I even partially right or am I barking up the wrong tree, these light brigades are the cat's meow?

That's what I was inferring with my quip about fighting the Chinese. We always prepare for the last war - it's an axiom of military thinking. The next major war with a major power will see units like this chewed up and spit out. There is no staying power. As long as we are focused on asymmetrical warfare, these light forces are OK, but they will not serve us well if, for instance, the balloon goes up in Korea or, heaven forbid, in Europe again. Hell, I doubt they would work against the Iranians if they threw quantities of regulars against such units. Sure, as long as we rule the skies, we can rain ICM's and PGM's on their heads, but what if - even for a while - we had to struggle for air supremacy? What if it takes a while to bring up support forces? We have leaned down the force to pure muscle and there is no "fat" for endurance and combat losses. This TO&E is reminiscent of the old "Constabulary" force of occupation in post-WW2 Europe. Heavy on mobility, light armor and communications/civil affairs but light on combat power with any endurance. And endurance is always measured in quantity, if history teaches anything. It just seems very imbalanced. If we had a solid mix of traditional "heavy" forces and some of these brigades, well perhaps that would be OK, but it seems we are committing ourselves to entirely this sort of light brigade structure. Very hi-tech but also very body-deficient.

This sounds great, until we have to fight the Chinese...but when that time comes, we'll all be glowing in the dark anyway...

A whole recon squadron? Three troops? Wow, I hadn't realized that myself. Are they in the same vehicles as the bde? (i.e. Bradleys for heavy, Strykers for Striker Bdes?) or what?

Security...Just so long as there is no place to shove a memory stick into it...

We always have the image of the hapless officer in Aliens who sits frozen in his APC viewing video monitors as his troops get chewed up - not a cheery example. But while there is the specter of new technology being wasted upon use for micromanagement from afar, it seems that so far this new technology has been a boon to the guys at the pointy end. I just want it to remain a boon for the good guys, and not a gift from the gods for the enemy, should they get ahold of it. There is also the concern that troops can get so dependent upon such devices that they loose touch with the skills that they need to operate without it, should it go down or be compormised.

Well, thanks for the warning. Another case of the lawyers spoiling the industry, in this case with the help of the gestapo programming team from hell, apparently.

I found this thought provoking: http://www.defencetalk.com/news/publish/army/Technology_Significantly_Increases_Situation_Awareness_for_Small_Unit_Forces110016787.php My concern is: what happens when one of these laptops or handhelds gets captured? Even if there are safeguards like encryption, passwords, biometrics - all can be defeated given the right circumstances. Is it wise to put this much battlefield intelligence out in where it can be captured and used against friendly forces? Admittedly, intel is best used by those closest to the fighting (most of the time, anyway) so I can understand the push to develop and field these devices. My concern is that the means to secure them (or to neutralize/destroy the device or data within it) must be a major element in their design. Comments or other input?

The money spent so far on the bailout is, in my opinion, good money thrown after bad. We will not get it back; it will be frittered away on bonuses and executive golden parachutes or hoarded by banks in trembling fear of bankruptcy. My vote would have been to allow all the rotten houses of cards that were the existing banks and investment firms to collapse of their own rotten accord. The funds should have been given to new financial institutions created under government aegis and supervision, which could have gone public after a while and the government could have gotten some return on its investment in them when it divested itself of them. Nah...too logical for politicians to figure out, let alone economists.

It was collected and reinvested into crappy dice rolls and lost. Something into nothing and vice versa and again. Money as a multiplier of wealth has its limits, namely the power of persuasion that things are either getting better, or worse. Once people loose faith in the power of the machinery of economy, the intrinsic value of money is bound to drop. Only material assets have true value and that too is dependent upon demand for it. So thinks an obvious non-economist.

Proof positive that the human propensity for greed is only exceeded by the human capacity for stupidity.

Hmm; bobbleheads and lucky 8 charms...sounds like a real adult game alright.

BigDuke6- I have to agree with you. There is no "magic bullet" to "fix" Afghanistan or for that matter, Pakistan and India. We need a long-term strategy that includes US interests as well as local ones. We have to closely study the local situations before committing our ground forces into them. Once they are there, we have to stop blowing sunshine up our own butts and be really analytical about the situation if we are ever to get out with any degree of success behind us.

Best initial use of air transports would have been to airdrop ammo and essentials to the ground forces and then, once an airfield was captured and repaired, landings could be done there carrying supplies in and wounded out. All this happily assumes the RAF was down for the count, though, doesn't it?

I think the banks should have been allowed to be hoisted by their own petards, let the mortgage-backed securities be sold at market value, and the government opened new banks with the bailout funds, with the mandate to lend, lend, lend (to properly screened borrowers, mainly small and medium sized businesses.)

During the Vietnam era, one of my father's army acquaintances (he was a draftee, my dad was a lifer) got out of the service on a Section 8 by pretending to defecate in the barracks (or perhaps actually doing so) and then stuffing into his mouth a candy bar he'd hidden in his clothes, drooling chocolate everywhere and all the while saying, "its not what it is, its where it came from..." Gross but true.

One can only hope that more Black kids decide to emulate Obama than this idiot...

Shades of "Abyss." (Or "Abcess" as one dumb blonde I knew called it when first telling me about the film.)

Never buy a gun who's bore is too small to crawl up into and hide when things go completely to crap.

Oddly enough, the Armalite AR was the grandpappy of the M16 and IIRC it was originally chambered for 7.62. And yes, you could do your research and you will find 7.62 versions of the M16, though not made by Colt I don't think.

Funny, you could say that about my neighborhood, too. Anyway CALAMARI RULE!

The aliens are here!!!! Where's John Kettler when we need him?