Archives: Gazette Magazines

By F J “Bing” West & MajGen Ray L Smith, USMC (Ret)

MajGen Richard C. Schulze Memorial Essay

Geopolitics

At the broad level of geopolitics, the significance of Operation IRAQI FREEDOM (OIF) was an increase in what may be called “the deterrent quotient”; that is, nations antithetic to the United States will tread more cautiously. Defeat encourages aggression, and victory discourages aggressors. The speed and ease of the televised American victory in Iraq impressed the global audience. Conversely, after Saigon fell in 1975, the United States experienced a bout of national dyspepsia, and for a period of about 7 years we were challenged by the Soviet Union, China, Cuba, and even by Iran and Nicaragua. On the other hand, after Baghdad fell in April, Iran, North Korea, and Syria—to name but a few—reacted by avoiding actions that would antagonize the United States. Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld growled at Syria, which hastily expelled some of the Iraqi supporters of Saddam who had fled to Damascus. The military leaders of nations hostile to the United States will counsel against their governments openly supporting terrorists because they know this President has the will and possesses an array of weapons with which to strike. OIF abetted rather than diverted from the war on terrorists.

Conversely, by demonstrating convincingly our martial superiority, the campaign against Saddam’s army probably strengthened the determination of countries like Iran to follow the lead of North Korea and acquire nuclear weapons as their deterrent against any potential American attack intent on regime elimination. Indeed, a principal reason for the war was to remove Saddam before he gained a nuclear capability. So, on balance, the war in Iraq altered national security priorities away from large-scale conventional war and toward combating terrorists—especially preventing the use of weapons that produce mass casualties—and dealing with the nuclear ambitions of North Korea and Iran.

Overall Conventional Power

America emerged from the war as the world’s military colossus, able and willing to employ overwhelming force unilaterally. The panoply of arms illustrated that the United States can strike any country with a combination of lethal blows. To the extent that Operation DESERT STORM (ODS) in 1991 was remembered for its air campaign, OIF will be remembered for its ground campaign. America can win a war by leading with air or by leading with land forces. With unassailable air superiority, American fixed-wing aircraft pounded both Baghdad command centers and military vehicles outside Baghdad. Having learned from ODS, a large percentage of Iraqi crews abandoned their armor and their vehicles at the outset of the war. This flight was followed by a second wave of desertions as the American armored convoys approached. American artillery provided fire support while their counterbattery radars nullified Iraqi indirect fires. As in ODS, the Abrams tank was unstoppable. The combination of direct firepower, maneuver, indirect supporting arms, and rapid resupply exceeded expectations.

The Iraqi Army did not fight with cohesion or determination, either because they wouldn’t, or as we have postulated here, they couldn’t. Either way, the highly publicized and lengthy buildup to the war psychologically unhinged the Iraqi armed forces. They had decided they were beaten before the war began. In all wars there comes a tipping point when the weight of the moral to the physical weapons systems becomes exponential. Often when Napoleon appeared on the battlefield his mere presence caused the opposing army to believe defeat was inevitable, prompting Napoleon to declare that the moral was to the physical in battle as 3 to 1. In Iraq it was 20 to 1. It certainly is in our interest to maintain that air of invincibility both for deterrent and for warfighting purposes.

OIF was more a demonstration of America’s martial capabilities than a two-sided battle against a tenacious foe. We do not know how the body politic will respond when American casualties are significant—which will inevitably happen in some future war. Nonetheless, when casualties occur unexpectedly, a commander must keep his focus on the mission and not halt to take counsel of his fears. In peacetime an accident always results in an investigation and often relief of commands all the way up the immediate chain of command. In wartime risks must be run, and some decisions will be wrong. Marines at all leadership levels must beware of hesitancy due to casualties.

When casualties and setbacks occurred during 23 to 25 March, the press turned from highly positive to highly negative in the space of a few days. There were reports about U.S. forces bogged down in the desert and a flawed Pentagon strategy. While these stories were coming in, Baghdad fell. The dizzying speed with which the press can report from the battlefield and the alacrity with which individual battles are headlined as overall trends suggest that when our forces do suffer heavy casualties, the fortitude and patience of our elected leaders will be tested.

Marine Role at the Operational Level

The major observation is that maneuver warfare worked. The Iraqi order of battle in the I Marine Expeditionary Force (I MEF) zone included numerous irregular forces (fedayeen, Ba’ath Party special police, and militias), six regular army divisions, and two Republican Guard divisions. Two divisions were deployed forward near the Kuwaiti border defending the oilfields and the Euphrates crossings. The others were disposed in depth along the Basra to Baghdad highway that parallels the Tigris River and is the historic invasion route for armies attacking from the Gulf.

Before the war, LtGen James T. Conway, the I MEF commander, and MajGen James N. Mattis, commanding the 1st Marine Division (1st MarDiv), had plotted an aggressive strategy that provided a roadmap throughout the campaign. Col Joseph Dunford’s 5th Marines Regimental Combat Team (5th RCT) attacked 9 hours ahead of the war plan’s schedule in order to secure the oilfields before they could be torched. The 7th Marines seized their portion of the oilfields the next day. The destruction of the 51st Iraqi Division in the oilfields suggested the coalition’s main attack was directed east toward Basra and then up the Tigris. Instead, the 1st MarDiv then swung 70 kilometers to the west to pick up the highways leading to Baghdad. This sideslip allowed the 1st MarDiv to bypass five Iraqi regular Army divisions and one Republican Guard division that were held in place by the 3d Marine Aircraft Wing (3d MAW), Task Force Tarawa, and the British (UK) division (part of the MEF).

Confusion and hesitation at An Nasiriyah cost the 1st Marine Regiment a day, but the 5th and 7th Marines moved their convoys north on schedule, thanks to the logistics light, or LogLite, supply system of the division. For a brief time (23 to 24 March) at the city of An Nasiriyah, it looked like the Iraqi tactic of mobile teams firing rocket propelled grenades from cities would significantly slow down the convoys. However, a few days later at the city of Diwaniyah, where the fedayeen posed a threat to the western flanks of the convoys, Marine infantry advanced and cleared the trench lines. There were no further attacks from that city, illustrating that the threat of the fedayeen to logistics lines had been overblown. While Task Force Tarawa and the UK forces secured the southern portion of Iraq, the 1st MarDiv marched on Baghdad.

The 5th RCT had reached Route 27 and was turning northeast to the Tigris on 27 March when an unfortunate and widely denied “pause” ordered by the Coalition Land Forces Component Commander halted the division for several days. When the attack resumed, the 5th RCT feinted as if intending to charge straight north up Highway 1. Instead, the 5th RCT suddenly cut northeast and crossed the Tigris at a seam in the artillery fans between the two Special Republican Guard divisions on the east bank. MajGen Mattis drove to the front, surveyed the fighting, and ordered a “run and gun” sprint for 120 kilometers in 2 days with 36 tanks in the lead as the hammer, and 3d Battalion, 5th Marines (3/5) flushing the fedayeen from the culverts along the highway. The major resistance occurred during 3 to 4 April along Route 6 near Baghdad. The tanks and hardbacked HMMWVs of 5th RCT led the way in a running fight, while again it was dismounted infantry who delivered the coup de grâce. The vast majority of the enemy’s main forces were behind them and irrelevant. Nothing stood between them and Baghdad but the Diyala River.

Once at the Baghdad bridge over the Diyala River, Col Steven Hummer’s 7th Marines took the lead, and 3/4, 1/7, and 3/7 charged across the Diyala River, followed by Col John Toolan’s 1st Marines. The overall war plan called for raids into Baghdad, but the division “forgot” to include withdrawal plans after each raid, and on 9 April the Marines and Iraqis tore down Saddam’s statue near the Palestine Hotel symbolizing the end of sustained military resistance.

The Iraqi regular forces did not put up much of a fight, just as they didn’t in Kuwait in 1991. However, one should not dismiss them as fighters. They didn’t put up much of a fight because our combined arms power, coupled with a brilliant maneuver-oriented plan, made a cohesive defense impossible. The bypassed divisions were placed on the horns of a dilemma. If they left their prepared positions to counter the maneuver of the division, the pilots of 3d MAW (and the Navy and Air Force) would pounce on them. Any Iraqi armor surviving the air onslaught would be in the open terrain and at the mercy of the superior range and optics of the M1A1s and light armored vehicles (LAVs).

The Iraqi regular forces, if attacked in their fixed defenses, tried to fight. For instance, the 51st Division, supposed to be unreliable, fought as well as any other division the MEF faced. In operational terms, the attack on the 51st Division was frontal and with only a few hours “shaping” in order to achieve tactical surprise and seize the oilfields intact. As a result the effects of maneuver, deception, and combined arms that the rest of the Iraqis suffered did not apply to the 51st Division. Had we pounded our way from Basra to Baghdad, as the Iraqis expected and we might have done in the past, we suspect the reputation of the Iraqis as fighters might be better today than it is.

The culture of the Marine Corps, given the losses in the trenches of World War I and in storming the beaches in World War II, had led in Vietnam to an unreflecting acceptance of high casualty rates. After Vietnam the Marine Corps embraced the theory of maneuver warfare, and OIF was the first major war fought according to that doctrine. Employing three RCTs as its fighting core, the 1st MarDiv advanced on two routes, 7 and 1, and then converged onto Highway 6 on the east bank of the Tigris for the final sprint to Baghdad. To pin down and bypass major Iraqi forces, the division first feinted toward Basra and later feinted toward driving straight up Route 1 into Baghdad. The division split the seams between major Iraqi forces, conclusively engaging by direct fire only three of the eight Iraqi divisions in its area of operations. In contrast, the 3d MAW attacked those divisions incessantly, delivering 6 million pounds of high explosives and shredding their equipment.

The march up to Baghdad and on to Tikrit, the longest expedition in the history of the Marine Corps, was a remarkable achievement in maneuver, endurance, and supply. The LogLite austerity combined with the determination of the crews in the convoys, C-130s, assault amphibious vehicles (AAVs) LAVs, and tanks to eke out the last gallon of fuel and to keep moving the three armored columns (the three RCTs), each stretching 100 kilometers in length.

If the helicopter was the signature piece of equipment in Vietnam, the tank was the premier fighting machine in OIF, and the night vision goggles (NVGs) that permitted 24-hour driving were the “new best thing.” Without the NVGs the pace of the campaign would have been unsustainable. While the convoys rolled 24 hours a day, each night the battalions would coil, and the battalion commander and the sergeant major were the leaders, dealing directly with the company commanders and the first sergeants. ODS in 1991 was described as a “generals’ war” because the campaign was orchestrated from the top. In contrast, OIF was a colonels’ war because the rolling convoys—best pictured as discrete sets of battlewagons—attacked under the direct leadership of the regimental and battalion commanders.

Operational Implications for Marines

Missions becoming more joint leads to larger staffs far in the rear with larger information technology (IT) budgets. In OIF the movement toward Baghdad outpaced the planning cycle of the staffs in the rear. ITs yielded self-licking ice cream cones, with senior staffs using chat rooms on the computer networks to fan each other’s predilections or fears. The lesson should be that senior staffs, such as the Coalition Land Forces Component Command, should focus on coordination before the battle and thereafter issue mission-type orders, relying on the commanders on the battlefield to fight the battle. The problem is that as the size of the staffs off the battlefield increases and as communications enable them to believe they understand what is going on, then those staffs will, with good intentions, issue authoritative orders not reflective of battle conditions. Gobbledygook and over-the-top rhetoric about the marvels of “network-centric warfare” overlooked a central fact: networks transmit the same messages simultaneously only to everyone on the network, and those at the front doing the fighting weren’t on the highly touted “net.”

From battalion on down in the Marine Corps, communication is primarily by radio and by voice, and the distances were too long for reliable radio relay to the rear while on the move. On the other hand, the major feeds at higher joint headquarters in the rear are primarily digital and rely upon computers, supplemented by satellite photos, teleconferencing, television, and video streamed from unmanned aerial vehicles. However, on fast-moving battlefields like OIF, these digital technologies lag far behind the battles, where voice communications are employed and no one is taking the time to type in reports.

A singular irony of OIF was that the embedded press became a major source of information to the higher staffs. The reporters, with better technologies than the battalions, are trained to speak and type succinctly and to convey with clarity the information within the limits of what they understood; that is, they did not speculate; they reported what they were seeing. Early in the war, for instance, I MEF received from 3d Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion (3d LAR) the radio code word “slingshot,” meaning the unit was being overrun. As the staff was scrambling to divert attack aircraft, a reporter from Fox News popped up on television, and his narration showed that the LAR was overrunning the enemy, not the other way around. And, when the 7th Marines entered Baghdad, a main feed showing what they were doing and showing the friendly crowds was CNN (Cable News Network). I MEF adapted its plan on the spot as the live pictures were seen in the command center.

The press, however, is not an acceptable military communications system, and the distances—sometimes even in one convoy—were too great for the PRC-119 radios. Significant use was made of commercial satellite cell phones and the Army’s blue force tracker—a vehicle-mounted monitor displaying via satellite communications the locations of friendly units across the battlefield. Of the Marine budget for IT, 40 percent goes to garrison and such gargantuan and controversial projects as the Navy Marine Corps Intranet. Another 40 percent goes to support Marine air-ground task force activities above the battalion. Only 20 percent goes to the battalion and below, and most of that is for the SINCGARS. The current trends point to a digital-based communications and information system from Washington to the combatant commander to corps, division and, perhaps, the regiment, and a voice/radio system at the fighting level. A major lesson from OIF is that the Marine Corps must put together a review panel, mainly of noncommunicators, whose members do not have loyalties to the current IT program. Marine IT at the dismounted and mounted fighting level from battalion on down needs a radical new look.

So, too, does the V-22—not in terms of the program but rather of reaffirming that the aircraft will be employed in concert with maneuver warfare. Rotary-wing transport aircraft played a marginal role in OIF due to the nature of the battlefield. In the Vietnam War the jungle and the close terrain demanded the extensive employment of helicopters. In OIF, as in ODS, the open terrain lent itself to vehicular movement. The V-22 can assure advance lodgements far in front of the main force, an impossibility with the wornout CH-46. The V-22 will open up a new dimension in maneuver warfare—if it is not treated as an asset too valuable to be employed radically. Marine frugality mitigates against objective risk-reward calculus. For the V-22 to live up to its advertising, those who control the Osprey must be willing to risk its loss.

Similarly, the long-distance overland movement of the AAV must be ensured. The AAVs during OIF performed very well indeed, and great credit goes to the crews who night after night performed maintenance and repairs even when they were physically exhausted.

In preparing for the next expedition, the Marines must ask what the terrain will be as well as the nature of the enemy. The wisdom of a balanced force, just like a balanced stock portfolio, is manifest. The advocacy 20 years ago of generals to establish a mounted infantry force training center at Twentynine Palms in the mid-1980s deserves applause. Over the next decade, a review of the usual suspects for conflict—North Korea or Iran—suggests building upon the RCT. Key to maneuver warfare is speed, agility, and ruthlessness to shatter the enemy’s cohesion, even while leaving most of his forces physically intact. The infantry’s instinct to close with and destroy the enemy at the point of attack must remain at the forefront of training.

The tactic needing most refinement is the proper alignment of the firepower of the tank and AAV with the maneuver and closure of the infantry. The firepower provided by a section of AAVs with the up gunned weapons station has brought a great leap forward for mechanized operations. More effort is needed to “meld” the infantry/AAV team in tactics, techniques, and procedures. Also, organizing “bite-sized” packages that can be refueled and resupplied on the move needs development. The spongy ground between the Euphrates and Tigris Rivers severely restricted off-road maneuver, and so the three RCTs were strung out along two highways. If a battalion dropped its supply train to attack with only one or two companies, it risked the vehicles left behind becoming ensnarled in gigantic traffic jams.

To “repackage” battalions so that they can be resupplied and fight in smaller, self-contained packages is a daunting challenge. But it is also an opportunity. Every Marine is a rifleman and wants to be part of the action when deployed on an expedition. In OIF, supply was more than 50 percent of the challenge, and everyone in a convoy was equal—and equally needed. This is the model for the future battlefields, and it means that the logisticians should have a center seat in the design of operational plans and force packages.

Overall, OIF indicated that the Marines have the proper balance for the next 10 years and that the doctrine of maneuver warfare is the proper framework for preparing for the next war.

Joint Implications

At the joint level, four issues require addressal.

First, disturbing to all Marines in OIF was the incautious driving of Iraqi civilians who persisted in driving during combat conditions. Due to the constant but statistically improbable threat of a suicide car bomber, this phenomenon resulted in tragic casualties. The research and development community should work hard to develop a non- lethal means of signaling to, and perhaps startling, civilian drivers so they will not persist in driving into life-threatening situations.

Second, combat initiatives below company and battalion level were few in this war due to the open terrain. The battalion and company commander could see his subordinates, and independent patrolling was scant, so the small unit leaders were usually operating under the command of the company commanders and above. At the same time, during OIF the Special Operations Command (SOCom) performed credibly in separate task forces and worked well with everybody, albeit at a measured pace. On the other hand, force reconnaissance (recon) appears to have been superceded by SOCom for the more risky and independent missions for which they trained for so many years. For instance, although recon was ready and standing by, joint command relations were such that it was special operations units—including Army Rangers and Navy SEALS—that rescued PVT Jessica Lynch from a hospital inside the center of the Marine operating area. On balance, the trends indicate that while Marine doctrine encourages initiative at the lower levels, it appears that SOCom will become the actual repository of small unit operations. SOCom is the first congressionally legislated military organization to take jointness to its logical conclusion and remove the Services from the operating forces. In OIF there were 14,000 SOCom troops deployed. Such a large number suggests that units like force recon will migrate to SOCom for missions such as training against terrorists in the Philippines or sending teams into the mountains of Afghanistan.

Although the history of the Marine Corps has been a history of small unit independent leaders—the Smedley Butlers and Presley N. O’Bannons—in the future such small unit actions may be done by SOCom. The possibility is that the niche of the future Marine Corps will be in expeditions at the battalion, regiment, and division level. This is not an altogether salutary trend. As SOCom becomes the tip of the spear, many young men attracted to the Marine Corps will contemplate an alternative Service as the stepping stone into SOCom, with institutional loyalty and career path determined by that organization and not by the parent Service.

Third, after the war there is a period of considerable turbulence in adjusting to a peacekeeping force. It is in our interest to have a written, joint doctrine for actions after a war. In 3 months the Army suffered 50 killed in action and the Marines 1. This is ticklish to delineate as there are clearly demographic differences between the operating areas of the Army and the Marines.

However, 80 percent of the casualties have occurred in vehicles. The Army forces—driven by their force structure-conduct most of their patrols mounted. The Marines are almost exclusively patrolling dismounted. The dismounted Marine patrols assault into the ambush force. It seems apparent that a mostly mounted force is at a distinct disadvantage in an urban guerrilla environment. But it is difficult to hammer out a joint doctrine for peacekeeping when the on-the-ground experiences have differed dramatically based upon different demographics, different operational philosophies, and different force structures. That said, it is hard to argue with success, and the decentralized, constant patrolling and presence approach of I MEF in the Shi’ite south deserves being chronicled and studied for application elsewhere.

Lastly, from OIF it is manifest that there is not a joint concept for seizing a city. Baghdad was not taken in a seriously contested fight. Before that city fell the concept of the Army was to encircle and to raid, attacking in and out with columns of tanks. This was a tactic of attrition based on superior firepower. The Marine concept was to seize and hold, employing armor protected by dismounted infantry. The stark contrast in the two approaches was in part driven by the difference in force structure—the Army being mainly armor and vehicular mounted and the Marines with proportionately many more dismounted infantry. The UK chose yet a third approach at Basra where they surrounded and wore down the defenders by psychological pressure as well as by firepower. There was no reconciliation among these three strategies before or after OIF. This is a serious subject that requires joint addressal.

Conclusion

OIF was a remarkable military victory. What stood out were the speed and the logistics movement. Potential adversaries of America took note, and deterrence was enhanced. The Marines demonstrated innovation in planning and tenacity in execution, completing a campaign that will be studied for years to come. Maneuver warfare moved from being a theoretical doctrine to a real battlefield where it proved itself.

By Maj Ian T Brown

Col John Boyd, USAF(Ret), is best known for his observation-orientation-decision-action (or “OODA”) loop. But as I mentioned in a previous article (“Opening the Loop,” MCG, June 2015, 52), there is more to Boyd’s theories on conflict than is generally appreciated. Today, as our Nation struggles to define strategies for countering global adversaries, our decision makers could benefit from the study of another underappreciated aspect of his work: his analysis of levels of conflict, especially at the highest national level. For him, the tactical successes of maneuver warfare were linked through the operational and strategic levels to a national vision that provided the moral impetus for everything below it. This “unifying vision,” “rooted in human nature so noble,” worked on an ideological scale to increase one’s own moral strength while undermining that of the adversary.¹ There have been times in our country’s history when our leaders understood the power of this idea; today, they urgently need to rediscover it.

Boyd’s largest work—the “Patterns of Conflict” brief—contained observations on the full spectrum of conflict well beyond decision-making processes. For example, Boyd’s excellent analysis of insurgency and counterinsurgency has remained virtually unknown until reexamined in Daniel Ford’s A Vision So Noble.² Boyd also discussed levels of conflict beyond the tactical. He noted that there were three kinds of conflict: the familiar attrition and maneuver and then “moral” conflict.³ The ideas that came to define Marine Corps maneuver warfare melded intangible and physical factors together, attacking an adversary’s mind (intangible) so that he could not effectively manipulate his forces (physical). Moral conflict operated almost entirely on the intangible plane, with the goal of attacking an adversary’s ability “to exist as an organic whole.”⁴ Moral conflict was comprised of several “negative factors” and their counterweights; Boyd’s description of its essence is worth quoting at length:

Negative Factors:

Menace – Impressions of danger to one’s well being [sic] and survival.

Uncertainty – Impressions, or atmosphere, generated by events that appear ambiguous, erratic, contradictory, unfamiliar, chaotic, etc.

Mistrust – Atmosphere of doubt and suspicion that loosens human bonds among members of an organic whole or between organic wholes.

Counterweights:

Initiative – Internal drive to think and take action without being urged.

Adaptability – Power to adjust or change in order to cope with new or unforeseen circumstances.

Harmony – Interaction of apparently disconnected events or entities in a connected way.

Aim:

Pump-up friction via negative factors to breed fear, anxiety, and alienation in order to generate many non-cooperative centers of gravity, as well as subvert those that adversary depends upon, thereby sever moral bonds that permit adversary to exist as an organic whole.

Simultaneously:

Build-up and play counterweights against negative factors to diminish internal friction, as well as surface courage, confidence, and esprit, thereby make possible the human interactions needed to create moral bonds that permit us, as an organic whole, to shape and adapt to change.⁵

Moral conflict raised the discussion beyond the interaction of units on a battlefield and into the realm of survival as a people or nation. Here, physical destruction mattered less than spiritual destruction. “Courage, confidence, and esprit” became the important counters, not infantry battalions and fighter wings.

At the grand strategic level, Boyd’s analysis emphasized a shift from a destructive to a constructive mental framework. Most of “Patterns of Conflict” focused on the adversary and what to do to him; thus, the goals of tactics, “grand tactics” (operations), and strategy sounded much the same:

Penetrate adversary’s moral-mental-physical being to dissolve his moral fiber, disorient his mental images, disrupt his operations, and overload his system, as well as subvert or seize those moral-mental-physical bastions, connections, or activities he depends upon, in order to destroy internal harmony, produce paralysis, and collapse adversary’s will to resist.⁶

In articulating one’s “strategic aim,” however, we begin to see the shift in focus from the enemy to one’s self: “diminish adversary’s capacity while improving our capacity to adapt as an organic whole, so that our adversary cannot cope, while we can cope, with events/efforts as they unfold.” Grand strategy focused on self even further:

… shape pursuit of national goal so that we not only amplify our spirit and strength (while undermining and isolating our adversaries) but also influence the uncommitted or potential adversaries so that they are drawn toward our philosophy and are empathetic toward our success.

Finally, the national goal is entirely self-focused: “improve our fitness, as an organic whole, to shape and cope with an everchanging [sic] environment.” Thus, before an adversary ever entered the equation, a nation needed a powerful sense of what it was about, and what it sought for itself in the future. This went back to Sun Tzu, whose placement of “know yourself” before “know your enemy” in his famous dictum was no accident. A modern paraphrase of “know yourself” is “why we fight,” and Boyd observed that in the most difficult national struggles, a powerful “why” was crucial:

For success over the long haul and under the most difficult conditions, one needs some unifying vision that can be used to attract the uncommitted as well as pump-up friendly resolve and drive and drain-away or subvert adversary resolve and drive … what is needed is a vision rooted in human nature so noble, so attractive that it not only attracts the uncommitted and magnifies the spirit and strength of its adherents, but also undermines the dedication and determination of any competitors or adversaries … such a unifying notion should be so compelling that it acts as a catalyst or beacon around which to evolve those qualities that permit a collective entity or organic whole to improve its stature in the scheme of things … we are suggesting a need for a supra-orientation or center-of-gravity that permits leaders, and other authorities, to inspire their followers and members to enthusiastically take action toward confronting and conquering all obstacles that stand in the way.⁷

Boyd characterized this concept as a “theme for vitality and growth,” which fed the national goal by combining the “unifying vision” with key ingredients:

Unifying Vision:

A grand ideal, overarching theme, or noble philosophy that represents a coherent paradigm within which individuals as well as societies can shape and adapt to unfolding circumstances—yet offers a way to expose flaws of competing or adversary systems.

Ingredients Needed to Pursue Vision:

Insight – Ability to peer into and discern the inner nature or working of things.

Initiative – Internal drive to think and take action without being urged.

Adaptability – Power to adjust or change in order to cope with new or unforeseen circumstances.

Harmony – Power to perceive or create interaction of apparently disconnected events or entities in a connected way.⁸

This is heady stuff, linking the success of maneuver warfare tactics and overall strategy not to a nation’s industrial base or manpower pool, but its sense of why it exists in the first place and why it deserves to survive and win. Ideas alone did not win the struggles of nations—Boyd made this clear in connecting the intangibles of the national goal down through the maneuver tactics required to collapse an adversary’s physical forces in the field—but a combat force lacking a “noble vision” articulated from above also lacked the moral and spiritual motive required on the battlefield when things got hard.

Perhaps this seems beyond the purview of America’s national security. But there have been many a time when American leaders understood that a vision as described above could be a crucial factor in the success of the country’s security goals. America has always been a nation of ideals, appealing to principle—rather than ethnic, linguistic, or other traditional measures of nationality—to justify its use of armed force. One sees this, for example, in the Emancipation Proclamation and Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address, both of which linked the military and political goals of the Civil War to the concept of justice for the enslaved.⁹ In the last 100 years, with its increasingly robust bureaucracy and penchant for formally codifying strategy on paper, the executive branch and defense establishment have done the same with documents detailing strategic guidance. When articulated well, I believe that the “unifying visions” within those documents had very concrete real-world impacts.

Arguably the best strategic vision of the modern era was laid out in the Report to the National Security Council or NSC 68 of 12 April 1950. It was an eloquent summation of why the United States believed confronting communist expansion was imperative. Its first 12 pages drew a stark and detailed contrast between the values and motives of the United States and Soviet Union and made American leadership and the ultimate collapse of communist totalitarianism a moral imperative.¹⁰ Drawing on America’s founding documents (as well as possibly the only reference to the Federalist Papers in any strategic paper), NSC 68 made clear the stakes at the dawn of the Cold War. Interestingly, it was not written as mass propaganda; classified Top Secret, NSC 68 was intended for a select inner circle of the executive branch. Thus, there is a purity in making the principles of freedom fundamental to security strategy. Its clarity arrived not a moment too soon, as a Soviet-backed North Korea invaded the South mere months after it was written.

Ronald Reagan’s National Security Strategies (NSS) of 1987 and 1988 also exemplified the “grand ideal.” Both were unapologetic in their belief in the goodness of American values, pulled no punches in outlining the oppressive nature of the Soviet state, and promised that the United States would not ignore the plight of those millions who lived under the communist yoke.¹¹

After the fall of the Soviet Union and the brief vacation from history of the 1990s, America found herself confronted by another dark ideology in the form of radical Islam. NSS 2002 sought to confront Islamism head on, swearing to counter it with a uniquely American internationalism based on the values of the Constitution and Declaration of Independence.¹² It failed to lay out the moral contrast between America and Islamism to the extent of NSC 68 or Reagan’s NSSs, but the NSS of 2006 corrected this shortfall. It then went beyond moral contrasts to specify how democracy could be used to counter terrorism’s supposed grievances and finally offered operational guidance linking this vision to the “clear, hold, and build” concept American forces were applying in Iraq. This concept meshed political, security, and economic goals together, thus making NSS 2006 perhaps the only modern American strategic document that attempted to connect the national goal, grand strategy, strategic aim, and operational methodology together in the fashion of Boyd’s exegesis on the moral level of war.¹³ It is worth reading in its entirety with Boyd’s ideas in mind.

I believe one can link the potency of the visions outlined in these documents with corresponding high points in the execution of American security strategy. NSC 68 was applied when America decided to hold the line in Korea against armed communist expansion. NSS 1987 and 1988 were the background for the competition in the 1980s that finally drove the Soviet Union into the grave. NSS 2006 laid the foundation for the remarkable turnaround in an Iraq torn asunder.

Conversely, we don’t tend to do as well when our strategic guidance is unmoored from a driving vision. The incoherence of Lyndon Johnson’s strategy in Vietnam can be traced to his first memorandum on the subject, National Security Action Memorandum No. 273. It argued that it was in America’s interest to fight in Vietnam but never said why, while seeking plausible deniability for any American activity.¹⁴ President Richard M. Nixon was the first to explicitly walk back the notion of American leadership laid out in NSC 68.¹⁵ In Presidential Directive 18, the Carter administration could no longer bring itself to call the Soviet Union an adversary or explain why its expansion should be countered.¹⁶ Several of the NSSs of the first Bush and Clinton administrations gave lip service to American values but foreswore their active promotion or defense in other countries.¹⁷ Parts of the NSSs from the current administration are more critical of previous administrations and domestic political opponents than those nations and organizations seeking to undermine or attack the United States.¹⁸ All told, these documents lack the type of compelling ideas and contrasts that Boyd argued were as crucial to national success as the strength of one’s armies. The strategic drift of the 1960s, 70s, 90s, and today reflect the cost of a vacillating America, unsure of herself and her guiding values.

John Boyd believed that a “unifying vision” acted as a force multiplier at the highest level of war. Many times, our national leaders—consciously or unconsciously—understood this concept and made it the foundation of their security strategies. I think our Nation has done better abroad when this is the case, with the historical record bearing out the power of clear, compelling, and unapologetic ideals. We urgently need to rediscover this truth today, when our leaders and commanders have publicly admitted lacking a strategy for dealing with a world full of adversaries. As this country faces threats from Islamists in ISIS, apocalyptic theocrats in Iran, an aggressive regional hegemon in China, resurgent imperialism in Russia, and a host of other adversaries, renewing our clarity of vision is increasingly critical. While our Nation’s response to each crisis may vary, national leaders owe their strategists well-articulated principles when framing the problem. Failing to do so has never prevented future conflict; it only makes that conflict, when it comes, longer, harder, and bloodier than necessary.

Notes:

1. John R. Boyd, “Patterns of Conflict,” A Discourse on Winning and Losing (unpublished manuscript, 1987), 143–144.

2. Daniel Ford, A Vision So Noble: John Boyd, the OODA Loop, and America’s War on Terror, (Durham, NH: Warbird Books, 2010).

3. Boyd, “Patterns of Conflict,” 111.

4. Ibid., 125.

5. Ibid.

6. Ibid., 141.

7. Ibid., 143.

8. Ibid., 144.

9. Abraham Lincoln, Second Inaugural Address, The Avalon Project, (4 March 1865), accessed 27 August 2015 at http://avalon.law.yale.edu. Abraham Lincoln, Transcript of the Emancipation Proclamation, National Archives and Records Administration, (1 January 1863), accessed 27 August 2015 at http://www.archives.gov.

10. A Report to the National Security Council–NSC 68, President’s Secretary’s File, Truman Papers, Truman Presidential Library, (12 April 1950), 1–12, accessed 28 July 2015 at http://www.trumanlibrary.org.

11. Ronald Reagan, National Security Strategy of the United States, National Security Strategy Archive, (January 1987), 1–10, 41, accessed 28 July 2015, http://nssarchive.us. Ronald Reagan, National Security Strategy of the United States, National Security Strategy Archive, (January 1988), 3–4, 7, 10 accessed 28 July 2015 at http://nssarchive.us.

12. George W. Bush, The National Security Strategy of the United States of America, The White House, (September 2002), iv–vi, 1–3, accessed 28 July 2015 at http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov.

13. George W. Bush, The National Security Strategy of the United States of America, The White House, (March 2006), 1–5, 10–13, accessed 28 July 2015 at http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov.

14. Lyndon B. Johnson, National Security Action Memorandum No. 273, Johnson Presidential Library, (26 November 1963), 1–3, accessed 28 July 2015 at http://www.lbjlib.utexas.edu.

15. Richard Nixon, First Annual Report to the Congress on United States Foreign Policy for the 1970s, The American Presidency Project, UC Santa Barbara, (18 February 1970), 1–2, accessed 28 July 2015 at http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu.

16. Jimmy E. Carter, Presidential Directive/NSC-18, Carter Presidential Library, (24 August 1977), 1–2, accessed 28 July 2015 at http://www.jimmycarterlibrary.gov.

17. George H.W. Bush, National Security Strategy of the United States, National Security Strategy Archive, (August 1991), v, 2, accessed 28 July 2015, nssarchive.us/national-security-strategy-1991. William Jefferson Clinton, A National Security Strategy of Engagement and Enlargement, National Security Strategy Archive, (February 1996), i, iii–iv, 2, accessed 28 July 2015 at nssarchive.us/national-security-strategy-1996.

18. Barack Obama, National Security Strategy, The White House, (May 2010), 2, 5, 10, 36, accessed 28 July 2015, https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites. Barack Obama, National Security Strategy, The White House, (February 2015), ii, 3, 19, accessed 28 July 2015 at https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites.

By 2ndLt Jacob W Foster

There is dissonance between Marine Corps theory of maneuver warfare versus the linearity of our institution’s centralized systems approach to training. The Marine Corps identifies maneuver warfare as the keystone philosophy for defeating our enemies. However, a top-down systems approach to training and education curbs the flexibility of critical thought required of every Marine in the development of their decision-making abilities, which is inherently required for the application of maneuver warfare. The solution requires more focus on improving the decision-making capabilities of the individual Marine rather than checklist-style evaluation of proficiency.

MCDP 1 Warfighting identifies war as a “violent struggle between two hostile, independent, and irreconcilable wills” and states that “success is derived from our ability to exploit critical vulnerabilities and attack the enemy’s centers of gravity.”¹ To do this, we must identify enemy surfaces (or strengths), avoid them, and exploit gaps (or weaknesses) to generate the most decisive effect upon the enemy at the least possible cost to ourselves. To this end, the Marine Corps focuses on developing, studying, and implementing maneuver warfighting capabilities. The Basic School (TBS) in particular sets the institution apart from its counterparts in attempting to build a framework for newly minted junior MAGTF officers that are capable of executing the MAGTF mission and are competent decision-making students of the doctrine of maneuver warfare.

In the era of fourth generation warfare as outlined by William Lind in 1989 where modern challenges and technology adds friction and we are faced with a violent non-state threat, the ability of subordinates “who can manage the challenge of minimal or no supervision in a rapidly changing environment” is paramount.² The result, as Gen Charles C. Krulak states in “The Strategic Corporal: Leadership in the Three-Block War,” is that there is an inherent need for not only commissioned officers but also NCOs who are trained and evaluated in their exercise of judgment and decision-making abilities.³ The product is that individual Marine’s ability to achieve a decision echoes the concepts of MCDP 1, Warfighting and MCDP 3, Tactics and is permeated through all elements of the warfighting unit down to the fire team level. Or in other words, Marines must understand not only the procedures of their profession but must also understand how the tactics they employ work to execute tasks based on commander’s intent to accomplish the mission. This symmetry of intent between commander and subordinate must be a part of the robust system of command and control.

MCDP 6, Command and Control highlights the human dimension of warfare, “Where the command and control system is that of a complex one governed by the human element.”⁴ Ultimately, systems are either complex or complicated, two similar but different concepts. For the most part, we as human beings like to believe that most things are complicated, which means that they are composed of a system that is ultimately knowable or understandable. A good example of this is a vehicle engine. If you are driving down the road and your vehicle stops working, you can conduct a root cause analysis and determine why the engine ultimately failed. However, most systems in regard to social phenomena (economic, political, etc.) are not complicated, they are complex. Meaning no matter how much we delve into the root of the problem or the system, it remains ultimately unknowable. We may be able to familiarize ourselves with certain trends we see in each system and thus act according to the probability of those trends recurring based on historical data. However, one can never accurately predict human behavior. To relate a quote often attributed to Mark Twain, “history doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.” No retrospective look into historical events can prove why or when a dozen Islamic extremists would board three commercial airliners in September 2001 or at the time predict the eventual collapse of the Soviet Union. Additionally, there are events that provide a catalyst for change in the system. These events can either be considered as static (often recurring at a high degree of certainty and a slow to change over time), or dynamic (events that do not occur very often but have a high impact on the relative system around them). A good example of a dynamic event would be the events that triggered the First World War: an assassination in Sarajevo served as a catalyst for a multinational conflict. For us, in our line of work with a countless number of uncertainties (“the fog of war”), warfare is fundamentally complex and dynamic. This leaves us to work in the least desired situation or rather the most difficult in which to achieve success.

Why does this matter? As an institution, we use a standards-based systems approach to training to validate the proficiency of our Marines to Congress and the tax-paying citizens of the United States. All Marines are trained to that standard for which government funding is allocated and verified. However, the method we train to this standard is with training and readiness (T&R) manuals from which performance evaluation checklists can be developed. For example, the collective task for an infantry squad to conduct a ground attack against an enemy objective is found in the T&R manual under the event code “INF-MAN-4001: Conduct a ground attack.” In the manual, the condition by which the unit will achieve the standard is written: given a unit, attachments, an order, while motorized, mechanized, or dismounted, and operating in a full range of environmental conditions, during daylight, and limited visibility. The standard is also listed: to accomplish the mission and meet the commander’s intent. Below this is listed the event components or performance steps which are a list of steps that will be evaluated to determine how well the unit is achieving the standard. Another example would be the specified enabling and terminal learning objectives of every concept taught in the Marine Corps. These are specific learning outcomes of a course of instruction that identify the material to be covered and have an associated amount of time allotted for covering each topic regardless of the difficulty of the topic and the time actually required to study the topic in depth. The problem with this process, especially in the collective skills series, is that it presents warfare as complicated and not complex. It does not train Marines to act in uncertainty, react to random events, or even emphasize critical thinking and achieve a decision, all of which are invaluable in combat.

Current Marine Corps training regimes are inadequate for the modern exigencies of maneuver warfare. As Michael Wyly makes clear in “Teaching Maneuver Warfare,” “Warfare is not an exercise of calculated and orderly response. Warfare is action. Decisive action. The student’s mind must be trained to act.”⁵ Yet, too often these systematic and orderly approaches to training are utilized in evaluating Marines to a standard for combat readiness. This effort focuses on verifying specific training events rather than the employment of outside-the-box critical decision making that is required of today’s small unit leaders. Evaluation is specifically myopic in observing Marines readiness. MCDP 6, Command and Control summarizes:

The essence of war is a clash of human wills, and any concept of command and control is not to eliminate or lessen the role of people or to make people act like robots, but rather to help them perform better. Human beings from the senior commander framing a strategic concept to a lance corporal calling in a situation report are integral components of the command and control system, not merely users of it.⁶

The question then is how can we improve the training and evaluation of Marines to employ the flexibility of commander’s intent to accomplish required tasks? First and foremost, it is up to the platoon commander to impart his knowledge to subordinates through training and education. There still exists a dilemma in how we share this knowledge and how training events are validated and verified to Congress.

Marine Corps training methods can and should be improved. We must ensure training is not limited to a check-in-the-box mentality and develop the means for allowing and demanding more critical thought and an understanding of how maneuver warfare is applied to training in the dynamic and complex system of war. Recommendations for the future would be to build Marines’ critical thinking ability, force Marines into situations with simulated randomness, and load the situation with uncertainty so that he must adapt and improvise to meet the standard (accomplish the mission and meet commander’s intent). We must engage in more force-on-force exercises where free play scenarios are the norm and not presented with an opposition force that has been designed to be defeated. Expressions of critical thought should be encouraged to all junior Marines who often have brilliant solutions and the ability to identify key problems. One means of doing this would be to encourage Marines to write and issue an award from a dedicated Gazette column as an outlet. Congressional evaluations must still be verified, but instead of simply checking boxes, the implementation of a board of experts can serve as a secondary means of evaluation. For example, the implementation of a battalion-training cadre whose primary purpose is to ensure readiness and proficiency in technical skill is met in addition to the Marines’ cognitive skill sets being employed tactically. In such a system, the use of judgment can be exercised and mission accomplishment can be achieved with or without checking every box.

The bottom line is that we must continue to hold each other accountable. As leaders, we are accountable for our Marines’ training—their successes and their failures. In addition, we are accountable to the American people. As leaders, we must ask ourselves: if our current means of satisfying our validations to Congress are limiting the development of Marines’ capabilities, are we really achieving this? We need to train for war as it exists today. Nation states no longer have a monopoly on warfare and chaos in the littorals can erupt into crisis at any moment. It will be the sons or daughters of America, the junior Marine, and the strategic corporal who is there to achieve a decision, not put a check in a box, and act in the time of crisis to accomplish the mission.

Notes:

1. Headquarters Marine Corps, MCDP 1 War fighting, (Washington, DC: 1997).

2. William S. Lind, et al., “The Changing Face of War: Into the Fourth Generation,” Marine Corps Gazette, (Quantico, VA: 1989), 22–26.

3. Gen Charles C. Krulak, “The Strategic Corporal: Leadership in the Three-Block War,” Marines Magazine, (Washington, DC: 1999).

4. Headquarters Marine Corps, MCDP 6 Command and Control, (Washington, DC: 1996).

5. Michael Duncan Wyly, “Teaching Maneuver Warfare,” article from Richard Hooker, Maneuver Warfare: An Anthology, (Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 1993), 263.

6. MCDP 6.

By Maj Matthew K Lesnowicz

In March 1967 in Khe Sahn, Company B, 9th Marines engaged the 18th Regiment of the 325C Division of the North Vietnamese Army (NVA). The company, assigned to Khe Sahn, through its patrolling effort prematurely triggered a division-sized operation to seize the American combat base.¹ How was a rifle company able to defend an airstrip and project combat power across approximately fifty-four square kilometers to spoil a division-sized attack? The answer is: they weren’t. A mixture of Marine mechanics, artillerymen, engineers, and Seabees performed much of the defensive work and local security patrols to allow Company B to project combat power into the hills that overlooked the base. The Marine Corps ethos of “every Marine, a rifleman” paid off and allowed the relatively small detachment to hold off an NVA assault until 3d Marine Regiment eventually reinforced the position and held it throughout what became known as the Hill Fights of Khe Sahn.

Today, there is an element of the Marine Corps that is both physically and psychologically disconnected from the battlefield. Marines repeat, “Every Marine a rifleman” as a mantra and struggle to interpret its meaning and how it applies to them. The ethos is at risk of being a hollow and vestigial bromide covered in an undeserved shadow of irrelevance. During an annual rifle qualification, a Marine may rediscover a glimmer of its true meaning, but our ethos, a vehicle to communicate the mindset of one who locates, closes with, and destroys the enemy, possesses a depth beyond marksmanship. Why is this important? “Every Marine a rifleman,” if embraced, gives the Marine Corps flexibility. It frees the infantry to concentrate more combat power at decisive points. Some in the infantry community who see non-infantry Marines usurping and, therefore, diluting the hard-earned title of rifleman have attempted to minimize the ethos. Ironically, infantrymen would be the primary beneficiaries of an entire institution prepared to maneuver and employ modern infantry tactics. Just as in Khe Sahn, Marines entrusted to perform infantry missions, when needed, free infantrymen to fight elsewhere. It is a combat multiplier and our institution should take measures to strengthen it. The Marine Corps should adopt rules for a Marine rifleman to not only improve infantry proficiency but to strengthen its ethos to increase its effectiveness as a warfighting organization.

The three rules of a Marine rifleman, derived from the German Army’s storm troop tactic rules, are functional for the infantryman because they assist understanding of modern infantry tactics. Today, Marines arriving to their first infantry unit are not primed to understand modern infantry tactics. Young infantrymen screaming, “2’s rush!”² is an indicator that the essence of even basic fire and movement can be lost in the current instruction of our infantry schools. Marines require a more effective yet simple tool to help them understand their tactics.

Modern infantry tactics are direct descendants of the storm troop tactics of World War I.³ During the Great War, the German Army developed three rules (see Figure 1) to guide violent and disorderly operations to break through enemy defenses.⁴ Though nearly a century old, these tactics have changed little and lie at the heart of a modern rifleman’s trade. While expected to perform many different tasks, a rifleman’s primary purpose is to destroy enemy forces as part of an offensive or defensive tactical system. This system is storm troop tactics.

If storm troop tactics are the system in which the rifleman exists then ideally every rifleman is a basic practitioner of storm troop tactics. Marines require some simple conceptual structure to understand the tactical system they inhabit. The three rules of a Marine Rifleman (see Figure 2), based upon the German Storm Troop Tactic Rules provide this mental framework for the individual. However, this simple tool goes beyond the individual and reinforces Marine Corps doctrinal concepts.

The three rules of a Marine Rifleman are a tool to achieve command and control concepts in maneuver warfare. They provide the framework for the “implicit communication” and “harmonious initiative” that Marine Corps doctrine charges Marines to achieve.⁵ Modern science illuminates the presence of simple rules guiding implicit and harmonious behavior in the animal kingdom. Scientist Craig Reynolds’ experiments with artificial life simulations demonstrated that complex systems can “arise from the interaction of individual agents adhering to a set of simple rules.”⁶ Reynolds developed a computer program with just three simple rules for his boids (bird like objects) that produced complex flocking behavior. Without these simple rules, the boids would have been a desultory mess; however, just three simple rules rallied these objects to move as a group with focus. Reynolds’ experiments assisted the scientific community in understanding complex animal behavior. Marines, who are complex animals, require their own simple rules to focus their behavior in a chaotic environment. Marines that internalize the three rules of a Marine Rifleman can grasp the movements of their team implicitly. Gathered in groups, Marines would achieve harmonious initiative as they break through a defensive system. Marines primed with the three rules will ease the task of small unit leaders and more importantly, open opportunities to exploit. The infantry can gain value from simple rules that clarify modern infantry tactics and offer a way to command and control aligned with Marine Corps doctrine. These rules have value beyond their utility for the infantry.

The three rules are a tool to expose Marines at the individual level to maneuver warfare doctrine. Our organization holds that “individual initiative and responsibility are of paramount importance.”⁷ Marines can apply the spirit of these rules to excel and meet their combat objectives within their particular specialty. Conceptually, they challenge Marines to accomplish the unit’s mission under adversity, a common condition to any Marine, through individual initiative and responsibility. Imagine each Marine primed with rules emitting initiative, personal responsibility, and a focus on the enemy whether he is engaged in an immediate action drill during a security patrol of an adhoc unit or turning a wrench on an important set of equipment. Each rule, when seen through the lens of our warfighting doctrine, provides universal themes to all Marines.

Rule 1. If you can go forward, go forward—go through gaps.

• Maneuver warfare indoctrination: Exploit gaps.
• Challenge a Marine to observe: Where are the gaps?
• Challenge a Marine to think: How do I determine if I can go forward?

Rule 2. If you come under fire, take cover! Take the source of fire under attack.

• Maneuver warfare indoctrination: Avoid surfaces.
• Challenge a Marine to observe: Where is the source of fire or resistance?
• Challenge a Marine to think: You have encountered resistance that you can’t bypass. How are you going to fight back?

Rule 3. If you are a supporting unit be prepared to assist units to your flank.

• Maneuver warfare indoctrination: Re-designate main effort and redirect combat power.
• Challenge a Marine to observe: Which adjacent unit has a better chance of success?
• Challenge a Marine to think: How do you support your adjacent unit? How do you reinforce success?

In addition to thumbing through MCDP-1, Marines realistically need introductory guidelines for their ethos and maneuver warfare concepts. While these rules are simple, they are an elegant and accessible “Cliff Notes” to entry level maneuver warfare. At recruit training, Marines should be indoctrinated in the three rules as a complement to the eleven general orders of a sentry. The eleven general orders are an introduction to basic duties of interior guard. New recruits also deserve an introduction to the spirit of our warfighting philosophy. New events at our basic training institutions can test Marines to apply these rules to combat simulations. An early introduction to the three rules conditions legions of Marines to move like Sun Tzu’s water through the battlefield.

In conclusion, the Three Rules of a Marine Rifleman are a way to transform our ethos into a vessel that conveys both modern infantry tactics and maneuver warfare in simple manner to all Marines. At a functional level, the rules provide infantrymen a way to understand modern infantry tactics and their leaders a way to command and control them. This translates to improved infantry proficiency. At a conceptual level, the rules provide a simple way to condition all Marines in our warfighting philosophy of maneuver warfare. Rather than abandon our ethos, the Marine Corps should recognize the opportunity it has to connect its traditions to its doctrine. Nearly 50 years have passed since the Marines at Khe Sahn displayed the tactical benefits of every Marine believing and acting as a rifleman. Our ethos remains a remedy to the challenges of the modern battlefield, but our institution should go further to place meat on its bones and unlock its potential.

Notes

1. John Prados and Ray W. Stubbe, Valley of Decision: The Siege of Khe Sahn, (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1991), 88–89.

2. The phrase “2s rush!” indicates that each Marine in an assaulting unit has been assigned a number by their small unit leader, usually 1 or 2. During the assault, the small unit leader screams a number as a command for those assigned that particular number to advance towards an objective. This trend is not new, see: Michael F. McNamara and Paul J. Kennedy, “Why Doesn’t First Fire Team Rush?” Marine Corps Gazette (Pre-1994) 77, no. 7 (07, 1993): 54–56. http://search.proquest.com. Or, Daniel J. O’Donohue, “The Last 300 Yards,” Marine Corps Gazette (Pre-1994) 77, no. 8 (08, 1993): 59–62. http://search.proquest.com.

3. John A. English and Bruce I. Gudmundsson, On Infantry, (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1994), passim.

4. These rules were compiled by Dr. Bradley Meyer: Rules 1 and 3 are derived from Manual of Position Warfare for All Arms, Part 14 (Provisional) The Attack in Position Warfare 1-1, 1918 with amendments dated 26-1-18 and 27-7-18, GHQ (General Headquarters) 11 October 1918. Rule 2 is from Waldmer Pfeiffer, Entwurf eines Exerzierreglements fuer die Infanterie, (Berlin: R. Eisenschmidt, 1921), 175–176.

5. Headquarters Marine Corps, MCDP-1, Warfighting, (Washington, DC: GPO, 30 June 1991), 79, 88.

6. “Boids,” Wikipedia, accessed at http://en.wikipedia.org.

7. Headquarters Marine Corps, MCDP-1 War fighting, (Washington, DC: GPO, 30 June 1991), 78.

1. If you can get forward, get forward—go through gaps.

2. If you come under fire, take cover! Take the source of fire under attack. Launch a forehead or a pincers attack.

3. If you are a trailing unit, be prepared to roll out to assist units to the flank.

By Col Alex Vohr, USMC(Ret)

The MAGTF Staff Training Program (MSTP) held a period of instruction entitled “Terminology” as part of the Warfighting Seminar portion MEF exercises. The purpose was to impress upon the training audience the importance of using the correct terminology in planning and the development of orders. The incorrect use of technology at best increases friction and at its worst can result in battlefield disaster.

Dr. Bradley Meyer, one of the founders and curriculum architects of the School of Advanced Warfighting stood, one overcast windy and cold day in January, on the remnants of Verdun, a World War I battlefield in France. The discussion focused on “defense in depth,” a topic for which Dr. Meyer is arguably the foremost expert on in the United States. The students, all majors in a second year of professional education, were working to get their minds around the intractable tactical challenges faced by the World War I combatants in breaking the stalemate of the Western Front.

At one point, one of the students suggested the solution could have been found through the application of the Marine Corps doctrine of “maneuver warfare.” Dr. Meyer, an eminently thoughtful man, noted that maneuver alone would not be the solution to the tactical challenge so pervasive that it dominated and paralyzed operations and strategy for the Great War. On the battlefields of World War I, with the front lines stretched from Switzerland to the sea, there was no space for any of the armies to maneuver to gain advantage. The defense in depth Dr. Meyer has suggested, was the centerpiece tactical challenge in 20th century warfare requiring doctrinal paradigm shifts to overcome.

Dr. Meyer’s broad and simplistic interpretation of the doctrine of maneuver warfare was literal and focused on the term “maneuver.” The word suggests a doctrine advocating the use of maneuver to gain advantage over the adversary. On the battlefields of World War I, the challenge that favored the defender and precluded freedom of maneuver was an interdependency between the symmetry of the armies in the field and the lack of operational mobility. In 1918, the German Army, through concentration of the best troops and the employment of the new “Stormtroop” tactics, overcame the challenge of symmetrical forces. The Germans were not, however, able to overcome the problem of operational mobility. It would take them until 1940 to solve that problem.

The exchange with Dr. Meyer raises questions. The Marine Corps doctrine of maneuver warfare has survived largely intact since it first was codified in the late 1980s into what has become Marine Corps Doctrinal Publication 1, Warfighting (HQMC, Washington, DC: 1997). The doctrine was significantly based on the work of Air Force Col John Boyd, a modern day war theorist most famous for his observe-orient-decide-act (OODA) loop. Boyd’s OODA loop encapsulated in a single diagram a complex theory for fighting and winning. The distilled doctrine of maneuver warfare leverages a theory for winning at war, perhaps from a position of disadvantage, in a complex, chaotic, and dangerous battlespace. Both Dr. Meyer and the students were correct in their staff ride discussion. Maneuver warfare, a doctrine advocating paradigm changing approaches may have offered a solution to the challenge of the World War I battlespace, but that solution was not to be found in maneuver alone.

The OODA loop alone has a richness and depth far beyond the basic understanding held by most Marines, limited vaguely to the idea of cycling rapidly through the loop to operate at a higher tempo than that which can be achieved by your enemy. To offer a simple analogy for the broader reach of the doctrine, it is about how to look at problems that confound the best minds, such as the problem facing the generals of World War I, and to find a mismatch or an asymmetric seam that can be exploited to win. Maneuver may be part of the solution, but the solution is not limited to maneuver. Like an Ultimate Fighting Championship fighter who gamely maneuvers his way around the octagon only to be viciously submitted when his opponent drags him to the ground and pounds the maneuverer to a pulp, we understand maneuver alone has its limitations.

Asymmetry and attrition are popular words in the defense lexicon. How common is it to hear the sage assertion from a 24-hour news cycle talking head that we don’t want to get involved or tied down in a war of attrition? Is this really true? Because of overwhelming advantages in all warfighting functions at the tactical level, attrition is the approach American forces most often employ with great success. Perhaps given the right circumstances, it can be the most effective approach to warfighting, especially when one considers the attrition ratios in current engagements are well over 100 to 1 in favor of U.S. forces.

Attrition in these cases is our asymmetric advantage. The bottom line is that if attrition works to bend the will of the enemy, then by all means use it. What those who decry attrition warfare most likely intend on conveying is that we should avoid wars of symmetry. Battles between symmetrical forces generally incur somewhat balanced casualty rates as armies grind away at each other without decisive result. This was certainly the case in World War I, but is not necessarily so for all scenarios. Specific words have specific meaning.

The term “asymmetry” is most often attributed to our enemies. In the conflicts that have spanned the last decade, the enemy is often described as being a force that is asymmetric to our capabilities. The underlying unspoken assumption in these assertions is that U.S. forces are designed and best suited for conventional fights. The implication is that the asymmetry of insurgency brings challenges U.S. forces find difficulty in confronting. I’d suggest that looking at this challenge through the lens of Marine Corps warfighting doctrine would assess any asymmetric battlefield as one with great opportunity to find and exploit mismatches to our advantage. Some of these advantages may be found through maneuver, but again, maneuver alone is not the extent of the opportunity. Other advantages could be found and exploited through deception, through fires, or even through non-lethal methods such as diplomacy or economics.

The point of this article is that words carry specific meanings and as MSTP would assert, using the right words is critical. Marines need to say what they mean and mean what they say. With this in mind, I’d offer the following recommendations:

• Consider renaming the Marine Corps warfighting doctrine of maneuver warfare. As one option, the title “asymmetric warfare” more completely describes the intent behind the approach while reducing the friction caused through the limitations and imprecise use of the word maneuver. In today’s sound bite world, the term maneuver has become somewhat of a “bumper sticker” for the doctrine. If a bumper sticker impression is all some take away in their depth of understanding, that bumper sticker should be as accurate and complete as possible.
• Reinvigorate efforts to examine, reflect upon, and study Marine Corps doctrine throughout the careers of Marines. Too often doctrine is taught only at the entry level and is not effectively revisited as Marines—especially officers—progress. An understanding of our doctrine should serve as the backdrop and foundation for all training and education. As Marines gain practical experience, new perspectives on our doctrine emerge when it is the doctrine that is periodically re-examined. Most critically our doctrine, descriptive more than prescriptive, provides context for how to think about warfighting.
• Theory is analogous to hypothesis and doctrine is simply theory that has survived limited testing. Gen James N. Mattis has been attributed as saying, “doctrine is the last bastion of the unimaginative.” This is true to the extent that we as Marines can’t allow our doctrine to mature into unquestioned dogma. The theory behind our doctrine needs to be constantly re-examined through the lens of change in the warfighting environment outside the Marine Corps. In short, we can’t drink our own bathwater. If the theory and doctrine no longer meet the requirements of an evolutionary and sometimes revolutionary world, it should be discarded and replaced; better to rigorously pursue this effort during times of peace than to find ourselves with doctrine that does not meet the requirements of the day as did our predecessors during World War I.
• Consider adding Colonel Chet Richards’ (USAF [Ret]) book, Certain to Win, (Bloomington, IN: Xlibris, 2004), and Frans P.B. Osinga’s book, Science, Strategy and War; The Strategic Theory of John Boyd, (Florence, KY: Routledge, 2006), to the Commandant’s reading list at the grade of major or lieutenant colonel or in the “Roots of Maneuver Warfare” section. These books provide color and insight into the work and into the man of Col Boyd. They bring a deeper perspective to the source of much and the Marine Corps’ excellent doctrine.

By Capt Daniel R Grazier & William S Lind

In the early 1990s, the United States Marine Corps officially adopted maneuver warfare, also known as Third Generation War, as doctrine, in a movement led by then-Commandant Gen Alfred M. Gray. The Corps issued a set of excellent doctrinal manuals, starting with FMFM-1, Warfighting, and including MCDP 1-1, Campaigning, which focused on the operational level of war, MCDP 1-3, Tactics, and MCDP-6, Command and Control.¹

With Gen Gray’s retirement, that is where the effort largely stopped. Attempts to move forward since that time, such as the Jaeger air experiments sponsored by Gen Charles C. Krulak when he was Commandant, began with promise, but received no long-term support. Individual commanders of units and schools have here and there attempted to change what the Marine Corps does to match what it says, creating “islands” of maneuver warfare. But these usually last only until the next commander arrives, when the second generation sea sweeps over the island. For the most part, Marines have been content to apply the terminology of maneuver warfare to their accustomed practice of attrition warfare, often to a degree that verges on the farcical. When one civilian visitor to the CAX at Twentynine Palms said that it did not seem to reflect maneuver warfare, the senior Marine officer replied, “Marine Corps doctrine is maneuver warfare, so anything Marines do is maneuver warfare.”

Several factors are to blame for the Corps’ failure to institutionalize maneuver doctrine. Over the past decade, the bulk of intellectual energy has been expended studying counterinsurgency theory and practice. This, combined with constant deployment preparation and theater-specific training, has left little room for attempting to change fundamental doctrine. Today’s Marines are a generation removed from people like Col John Boyd, USAF(Ret), and Col Michael D. Wyly, who initiated the maneuver warfare movement in the late 1970s in response to America’s defeat in Vietnam. The military reform movement of the 1980s is unknown to most serving Marine officers.

The greatest challenge to overcome, however, has been the U.S. military’s natural tendency towards attrition. That style of warfare fits within our existing military culture of perfect alignment, ruler straightness, and impeccable grooming. It is a continuation of the culture of order of First Generation War, war of line-and-column tactics. An attritionist, second generation approach covers every base, pours firepower on every threat, and leaves nothing to chance (except war itself). This is the style of war best suited to rigidly hierarchical organizations. It embodies the American military ideal of seeking to eliminate all friendly friction. The culture of order, of inward focus, is maintained by making all decisions at the highest possible level with little room for initiative at the bottom.

Improved weapons have driven changes in procedures and techniques. However, neither tactics nor the underlying mindset—the corporate culture—have moved beyond the second generation. Pivoting the focus away from objectives defined as terrain or attrition levels to seeking “to shatter the enemy’s cohesion through a variety of rapid, focused, and unexpected actions which create a turbulent and rapidly deteriorating environment with which the enemy cannot cope,” to quote FMFM–1 (now MCDP-1), the Corps’ most basic doctrinal manual, is a feat not easily accomplished.

The end of America’s ground wars in Iraq and Afghanistan offer an opportunity to launch a new maneuver warfare effort in the Marine Corps, one with the goal of making maneuver warfare what Marines actually do, not just words on paper. In our view, such an effort is critical to the Marine Corps’ future. The outcomes of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan show the limits of attrition warfare in the face of fourth generation threats. If the Corps is to remain relevant to America’s defense needs, it must move to make maneuver doctrine real. Irrelevance threatens the Corps’ continued existence.

The purpose of this article is to suggest concrete, specific actions the Marine Corps can take quickly, inexpensively, and relatively easily to restart the maneuver warfare movement that largely ended when Gen Gray retired. That is not to say deeper and more difficult changes are not also required. The most important of these is reforming the personnel system. Maneuverist militaries have personnel systems that work completely differently from those of attritionist militaries.

But we believe much can be done simply and quickly to make maneuver warfare real in the Marine Corps. Among these changes are the following:

• The most important first step is to eliminate some of the heavily scripted exercises and embrace true freeplay training. This would require a dramatic alteration to the overall concept of training in the Marine Corps and a move away, to a certain extent, from the current training and readiness program. Training should not always be planned to incorporate specific mission essential tasks. The current methodology is counterproductive, but it is born from the fact that in the U.S. military, techniques have been raised to the level of tactics. Freeplay exercises are extremely useful for forcing leaders at all levels to make decisions in an environment of uncertainty against a thinking enemy—the same conditions they would face in war. Certain exercises should begin with no other goal than to provide subordinate units time to conduct force-on-force training in any way the commanders see fit. Training evaluators could observe such training and, using their judgment, identify training and readiness tasks demonstrated for reporting purposes.
• For 2dMARDIV, restart the freeplay exercises at Fort Pickett, which Gen Gray began when he took command of the division in the 1980s and proclaimed maneuver warfare the doctrine for the division. These were the first freeplay exercises most Marines had experienced, and they did a great deal to convince Marines of the merits of maneuver warfare and teach them how to do it.
• Reissue the original versions of the doctrine manuals that were written during Gen Gray’s tenure. These remain the best. MCDP 1-3, Tactics, is a hopeless muddle compared to the original FMFM. It is available for comparison at maneuverist.org. The other manuals have not suffered as badly, but the first versions are still superior.
• Again require the Marine Corps Institute (MCI) Warfighting Skills Program for lieutenants and, now, for staff sergeants as well. The only maneuverist MCI ever issued, it offers an excellent means for self-study. It is also available at maneuverist.org.
• Require all officers teaching in Marine Corps Schools to read The Canon, the seven books which take the reader from the first through the second and third and into the fourth generations of modern war. The Canon should also be required as a pre-requisite for Expeditionary Warfare School (EWS) and Command and Staff College.²
• Teach the tactics developed by the German Army during late World War I at TBS instead of those of 1914. The Infantry Officer Course should then build on that base (instead of having to tell its students, “Forget everything you learned about tactics at TBS”) by teaching true light infantry, Jaeger, tactics.
• Restore the extensive maneuverist reforms incorporated in the curriculum at EWS over the past half-dozen years. Those reforms were recently abolished and the curriculum was returned to its previous attritionist orientation.
• Allow company commanders, at their discretion, to reduce the “soldier’s load” as they see appropriate for the situation, including giving them authority to dispense with helmets and body armor. Until Marine infantry can move as fast on its feet as can its adversaries, it will have few options other than hoping to bump into the enemy, and then call in fire support. Foot mobility is a direct function of the soldier’s load.
• Pivot away from the excessive focus on combined arms integration in live fire exercises. This is a sensitive subject because Marines pride themselves on their skills with regard to combined arms integration. While it is important to skillfully employ weapons and have the ability to concentrate combat power at the decisive point, it is much more important to understand what that decisive point is. Far too often, the focus is simply on the how of employing massive coordinated fires rather than on why you are doing so. Complicated fires packages directed squarely at the strongest part of an enemy’s system will almost never achieve results as good as a lesser volume of fire at his most vulnerable point.
• Emphasize the simple fact that the integrated training exercise (ITX) is not the capstone of Marine Corps training. ITX does an excellent job training the procedures necessary to execute combined arms operations. But as the exercise is currently conducted, that is where its utility ends. To be successful at ITX, a unit has only to follow an execution checklist and ensure its geometries are clear. This works to teach proper techniques for combined arms integration, but in slow-moving, predictable situations. It does nothing to foster rapid decision making, improvisation, or learning how to defeat the will of a thinking enemy.
• Large-scale exercises beyond the ITX level should not involve live ammunition. Since combined arms skills are taught at ITX, exercises beyond that should be aimed at a higher level. Exercises such as Steel Knight and Desert Scimitar should be force-on-force exercises pitting one unit against the other. Units should make use of the Multiple Integrated Laser Engagement System (MILES) and test their skills against the independent will of a thinking enemy.
• Reorient experimentation in the Marine Corps away from complete focus on equipment to add attention to tactical innovation as well.
• Consider making a series of doctrinal manuals for fourth generation war developed in recent years by Marines and published as manuals of the K.u.K. Austro-Hungarian Marine Corps into U.S. Marine Corps manuals.³ In the period from the late 1970s through the early 1990s, the Marine Corps established itself as the most thoughtful and intellectually innovative of all the American Armed Forces. By doing so, it not only profited internally, but also gained immense credit with the press, the public and Capitol Hill. Although the Corps has largely stagnated intellectually since, individual Marines have continued the earlier tradition. Much of their work has been embodied in these unofficial fourth generation war manuals. They represent an opportunity for the Corps to again establish its intellectual pre-eminence simply by making them official USMC publications.
• Teach Marines how to critique field exercises. Most of the learning from field exercises is currently lost because Marines mistakenly think a critique is simply an (often endless) recapitulation of what happened. A real critique draws out why events took the course they did (which in freeplay training is unpredictable). Such maneuverist critiques are focused, honest about successes and failures on the part of all participants regardless of rank, and short.
• In training, practice with degraded systems. For example, firing tank Tables I through VI is largely a waste of ammunition for the M1A1 Abrams. The system is so advanced, even a moderately trained crew can hit targets at long distances when the system works properly. Crews can become quite proficient at basic gunnery skills in the Advanced Gunnery Training System. Live ammunition should be largely reserved for degraded mode gunnery in tables the crew is unable to anticipate. In such a manner, training will achieve two goals with the same allocation of ammunition: advanced proficiency with a weapons system and improvisation through rapid decision making.
• In field exercises, kill key officers, and make those still living take over. At times, kill all the officers and leave SNCOs in command.

The Marine Corps has an opportunity now to reset itself properly to meet the challenges of the future. With all the discussion about the need to “get back to the basics,” it is critical to ensure the Marine Corps gets back to the right basics. Reverting to training methods relevant only to an outmoded firepower attrition force, the Marine Corps will continue to find itself increasingly irrelevant in a changing world.

Maneuver warfare, when properly embraced, properly prepares leaders to face the challenges posed by a world descending into the fourth generation of warfare. A maneuverist leader is empowered to look beyond the doctrinal publications and warfighting manuals and develop innovative solutions to problems generated by an enemy who does not have manuals. We believe making a few adjustments in the way the Marine Corps conducts business will prepare adaptable and flexible leaders, capable of operating effectively long into the future.

Notes

1. Fleet Marine Force Manual 1 (FMFM-1), Warfighting, (Washington, DC: HQMC, 1989); Marine Corps Doctrinal Publication 1-1 (MCDP 1-1), Campaigning, (Washington, DC: HQMC, 1997); MCDP 1-3, Tactics, (Washington, DC: HQMC, 1997); MCDP 6, Command and Control, (Washington, DC: HQMC, 1996). MCDP 1-1 and MCDP 1-3 were originally published as FMFMs.

2. The Canon:

• a. Charles White, The Enlightened Soldier: Scharnhorst and the Militaerische Gesellschaft in Berlin, 1801–1805, (Wesport, CT: Praeger, 1989).
• b. Robert A. Doughty, The Seeds of Disaster: The Development of French Army Doctrine, 1919–1939, (Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1986).
• c. Bruce Gudmundsson, Stormtroop Tactics: Innovation in the German Army, 1914–1918, (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1989).
• d. Martin Samuels, Command or Control? Command, Training and Tactics in the British and German Armies, 1888–1918, (London: Frank Cass Publishers, 1995).
• e. Robert A. Doughty, The Breaking Point: Sedan and the Fall of France, 1940, (Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1982).
• f. Martin van Creveld, Fighting Power: German and US Army Performance, 1939–1945, (NY: The Free Press, 1991).
• g. Martin van Creveld, The Transformation of War, (NY: The Free Press, NY, 1991).

3. The Imperial and Royal Austro-Hungarian Marine Corps field manuals were developed through a series of seminars involving Marine officers led by Mr. Lind on fourth generation warfare. The draft versions can be accessed at https://www.traditionalright.com/resources.