mr_audacity

Jasonc said To my eyes, the more extreme maneuverist positions - which are not strawmen but all through the official manuals by now - are so obvious out of touch with what army and Marines are actually doing daily when they really fight - that that is exactly how it looks. Academic boasting, while the air force runs the nation's wars. The emperor is scantily clad at best. Indeed, tell that to the civilians of Srebrenica. US foreign policy and the Powell doctrine often mean that a lack of ground deployment ensures that the USAF and USN Tomahawks are the only means by which to engage the enemy. Doubtless you can pound ground targets without proper air defence systems in countries like Afghanistan, but as the Serbs showed, against a more sophisticated enemy air power was pretty ineffectual and ground force were eventually realised to be the only option. Now the question is: does the US Army or USMC follow their own manuals? Well yes! The Army follows its pumped up attritionalist theory with the operational art bolted on, and the Marines a manoeuvre like one. I say like one as I believe that although many of the officers in the USMC ‘get it’ some still do not. I also note that the much heralded revolution in US military doctrine, now verbally committed to maneuverist theories, is nowhere in evidence practically. Every recent war we've fought with attrition strategies and successfully so. The idea that the Marines frontal blast up the coast road in the gulf as "maneuverist" is laughable on its face. I suggest Jason that you have a much closer look at what exactly the 1st and 2nd Marine Divisions got up to. To me their whole approach screams surface and gaps. And just to end these circular arguments let me spell it out clearly once and for all - MANOEUVRE WARFARE DOES NOT ESCHEW FIREPOWER! In fact at the tactical level it emphasises it. Ground attacks require very very very heavy fires in support of the manoeuvre element that will close with the enemy. As stated before 3:1 - 6:1 fire support to manoeuvre element force levels in infantry attacks have long been proven to produce the desired result - i.e. you assault element arrives at the enemy location intact! That means in a two up battalion attack your forward two companies have all but one rifle platoon ‘shoot in’ the assault platoon onto the objective. Do this in CM and you will not go too far wrong. Attritionalist will claim this is typical of their practice and I would say maybe. But it is very much maneuverist in that the weight of fire-power is not intended to kill the enemy before your assault platoon arrives (though that would be nice) but it is intended to suppress them so they don’t slaughtered on the way there. [ 12-19-2001: Message edited by: mr_audacity ]</p>

Well first of all I think you need to realize where I am coming from, I have spent 13 yrs in the military and been to Staff College and all that so I have a clear understanding of the two doctrines. I guess you can say "I have come out the other end" and have yet to see the light. There is always time. Carlisle does not seem to be able convert you to our evil ways so I shall not try to out do them. But… Now having said that I have to say…prove it. If you would like to come to London and receive pedagogy from the dark side be my guest. I might even write a book! We are switching to another doctrine and philosophy which says it is better to dance and gain victory thru "alternate means", the old school was to "sort him out" hard and fast because POWs are a pain in the ass. POWs are very much not a pain in the arse. 1. The more you take, the more likely the next lot will be to surrender. 2. They provide vital intelligence. 3. Your forces are seen to be ‘Just’, following the Geneva Convention and international law, and help you win the political argument. So the burden of proof is on the new doctrine and I have yet to see it tested. Firstly manoeuvre warfare is not the new kid on the block. Ask Alexander the Great, Sun Tzu, Tacitus, Caesar, Napoleon, Jomini, De Saxe or Ghengis Khan. It is merely new to US Army doctrine. You don’t believe it fine and dandy. All I can say is that I hope you never run into a true manoeuvrist enemy commander in you professional life as things might get a wee bit out of hand. The USMC seem to be slightly more forward looking in this respect and have taken massive steps to improve their commander’s coup d’oeil. During the Gulf the USMC’s doctrine allowed them to pour through Iraq gaps with far less heavy armour and support than their Army counter-parts and cause massive disruption and capitulation of the enemy. The Gulf War was a serious battle of Attrition. 30-some days we pounded Iraqi forces to the point where their OODA loop was pretty much scrambled, then we punched thru their battered lines and ate them alive. Then when we had a chance for true Strategic Manouevre we instead went for the Attritionist method and raced after the Republican gaurd, which judging by the current situation in Iraqi was not the centre of mass of the Iraqi Empire. General Schwarzkopf and Freddrick had very different approaches and Schwarzkopf from what I hear is still ‘pissed’ to use an Americanism with his subordinate’s lumbering attack. Powell’s halting the attack after the Basra road images started coming home on TV is the reason Sadam is still in power. As to Leonhard stating that the M1 tank advances in combat at 5-10kmh I think Lt.Col. H. R. McMasters can put him right on that! WWII had it's moments but most of our doctrine preceding the New Revolution was drawn from this conflict. Erm was it I thought the Civil War and Great War also had a massive influence on US doctrine. So I fail to see why we should switch(playing Devils Advocate here). No one is forcing you. You either work it out for yourself or you don’t. they are going to throw that grenade regardless of the Div Comds intent. Just the manoeuvrist commander might have got more men alive to within grenade range of the enemy! Now for the record, each doctrine has it's place and a truly gifted commander will know when to dance and when to plant. We as professionals need to give both sets of tools to our juniors and show them the strengths and weaknesses of each. But in our current state, an Attritionist is looked at as a dinosaur and should be discarded, my arguement is that the system has worked in the past and will work in the fiture so let's not throw out the baby with the bath water. When to dance and when to plant is not a manoeuvre vs. attritional argument. A manoeuvrist can plant just as happily as an attritionalist and vice versa. It’s how you plant or dance that matters.

The_Capt - the point about the slit trench is not that this is a tried and tested tactic, it is the fact that a manoeuvrist looks at the situation and thinks how can I present the enemy with an impossible dilemma? An attritionalist will look at the same enemy trench and think how can we take him out. A subtle difference, but as the complexity of a situation increases and other factors become involved, the manoeuvrist still will seek to present to offer an enemy an impossible dilemma to achieve defeat. You might think this is semantic but it is key to the mindset of the commander. Does one wish to destroy or defeat the enemy? In MIC, LIC and counter-insurgency ops this becomes 'the' question upon which success will be dependent. Modern post Cold-War conflicts highlight the difference even more. Because wars are not fought outside of political will, an enemy can best be defeated by manoeuvrists who hold politics, coup d'oeil and violence in equal share. You cannot defeat an enemy by destruction alone without incurring prohibitive cost in materials and men, and usually via a long protracted war. Just a note, Auftragstaktik and Befehlstaktik, are not merely German buzzwords. They encompass approaches and philosophies of command. Would we claim the words liberal, conservative or socialist meant nothing in the political field but were merely buzzwords. No of course not. And the same goes for these methods of command. To their exponents they mean a great deal and effect much of what they do in battle. Again read the book sited as a clear example of how both methods of command were employed at different stages of the Battle of Goose Green, and how it impacted significantly on the outcome.

The_Capt Not a neophyte I am afraid, but a long term preacher of the good word… In essence Von Clausewitz identified warfare as having three governing elements; primordial violence, political will, and coup d’oeil/genius of the commanders. Attritional warfare leans heavily on primordial violence, whereas manoeuvre warfare tries to balance the three in harmony, for to relegate any one occurs at the detriment of the others. I may misunderstand you but it seems to me that in many ways you equate attrition to firepower, and manoeuvre warfare to physical manoeuvre on the battlefield or front/theatre. Whereas to most professional soldiers I know and have discussed these matters with they consider fire and movement as integral to both forms of warfare. The key difference is attritionalist want to kill their enemy, manoeuvrist just want to defeat them. Their manoeuvre comes from Auftragstaktik as you know and it is a manoeuvre through time (ie higher command decision tempo through the Boyd loop than their enemy). You said: In warfare there are set rules which both sides have to live by; weather, night, time and space and each other. So you cannot simply write off "the rules" so easily. I don’t believe this to be true. The are only equal to those that treat them as equal. For instance British Infantry soldiers are taught and trained extensively in night fighting and operations. Consequently they tend to be slightly better at it than some adversaries. Therefore to a degree they have negated through training and experience one of those ‘set rule’ you believe are levellers to all. The same goes for time via Auftragstaktik type command in which commands train again and again to up the tempo, and fight 24hour wars. By this method they dislocate the enemy who seeks the respite, and negate the ‘set rule’ of time. Space again can be redefined i.e. airborne force and air power revolutionised the military use of battlespace. Satellite and orbital platforms add extra dimensions to the battlespace that many officers have yet to come to terms with. So as we see nothing is set in stone. We keep redrawing the lines of war as we develop. In CM, and at the tactical level, Manouevre really doesn't work… Leonhard would spot you as an attritionalist straight away. Manouevre is very much at the tactical level. The tactical level encompasses all formations up to at least divisional/corps level, so are you seriously suggesting that a US Army Divisional TOC could not undertake some form of manoeuvre warfare, and if not why does the USMC espouse it in their FM Warfighting? As a section/fireteam/squad leader/commander I could quite easily demonstrate examples of a manoeuvre warfare technique. e.g. An enemy soldier is in a slit trench 30m to your front. Your fire base lay down suppressing fire to keep his head down as you crawl forward and post a grenade. Does he jump out to be shot or stay put to be blown up? This is functional dislocation, an element of manoeuvre warfare. And you don’t get much smaller on the battlefield than minor tactics… I suggest you read a very good book called ‘Not Mentioned in Dispatches’ by Spencer Fitzgibbon about that very subject during the Battle of Goose Green in the Falklands Conflict.

The_Capt, wrote: Now boxing. Fighters exercise tactics, operations and strategy. For example, a 1-2 hook, duck, upper cut is a tactical drill to be applied to an opponent when he moves into range. A round is an operation, with a specific aim, do we try and tire the opponent out, feel him out, or pound him. The entire fight has a strategy based on foreknowledge of the opponent. Should we go for the quick kill because this guys "got legs" or should be play "tag" and wear him out? Now for Attrition and Manoeuvre. Fighters usually lean one way or the other. Attritionists tend to be big, ugly guys that will try and pound you into "meat-mash" even if they have to take a few hits themselves. The are betting that their bodies will not tire as fast as yours and that they can take more punishment. You may note, that even these fighters try and hit weak spots on their opponents and not the fists (although I've met a few). This is a Manoeuvre goal but delivered via attrition. Manoeuvrist fighters tend to be light and fast. They hop into range, throw a few and back out. They do try and wear down an opponent but at the Operational level they seem to be practicing Manoeuvre. They can also however, look for the "decisive battle" in which they can end it once and for all. Lastly, there exists the truly gifted fighter who can do both. Ali was a clear case in point. If you want to learn "hammer and nail" or "rubber meets the road" lessons in warfare watch Ali. This guy could move like a feather-weight even when he was a heavy. He could dance around for three rounds and then "plant and cook" an opponent just when he was getting used to doing the chasing or retreating. Now pay attention, no matter how fast and light you are there is an opponent who will be so big and powerful that you are going to get killed unless you introduce something truly revolutionary to the process like a "stun-gun" or never get hit. The problem is, he can miss 99% of the time and still win. You have to be perfect. Much the same if you take a fighter so huge that it takes him 5 min to throw a punch, a fast guy will "beat him to death with pillows" even if it take a few days. The_Capt - Surely a true exponent of manoeuvre warfare would think 'The Marquis of Queensbury Rules' a hindrance and simply kick his opponent in the nuts/bollocks (depending on which side of the pond you come from)? Playing by the expected 'norms' is an anathema to the true manoeuvrist. A manoeuvrist philosophy, that drives his tactical, operational and strategic thinking would never pit strength against strength unless there was no alternative. When that occurs your point becomes valid, for this is the recon pull or surface and gaps element where one tries to achieve a schwere punkt usually via higher tempo or OODA/Boyd cycle loop. At the minor tactical level of CM manoeuvre warfare manifests itself as: Heavy fire-to-manoeuvre element suppression (i.e. 3-1 to 6-1 as espoused by Rommel in Infantry Attacks) in the assault phase. Flanking moves design to induce the enemy to route/surrender rather than merely mow them down. Covered approaches from good recon or lots of smoke where cover not possible. Good employment of combined arms for mutual support. What cannot be modelled easily are command methods such as mission tactics vs. control by detailed order, as you the player are in God like control of your sand table.