MACGREGOR Wash Times may 10 2010 Remember the Blitzkrieg before it's
too late Building a military to fight only the weak will cost us later
MACGREGOR: Remember the Blitzkrieg before it's too late
Building a military to fight only the weak will cost us later
By Col. Douglas Macgregor
May 10 2010
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/may/10/remember-the-blitzkrieg-before-its-too-late/
Seventy years ago today, on May 10, 1940, the German armed forces
launched the deep-penetration attack through southern Belgium to the
English Channel that split the French and British armies in two - a
form of warfare known to the world as Blitzkrieg or "lightning war."
Three weeks later, the campaign ended with the German subjugation of
France, Belgium and the Netherlands and Britain's ignominious
withdrawal from the European continent.
To contemporary Western military observers accustomed to the grinding
attrition battles of World War I, Germany's incredibly successful
Blitzkrieg seemed magical. But there was no magic. For any great
victory to occur, the winning side must get most things right while
the losing side gets most things wrong.
The Germans got most things right. They integrated new technology into
new organizations - radio communications, tanks, armored infantry and
air power - under vastly superior battlefield commanders, commanders
who led Germany's superbly educated, physically fit and trained
soldiers from the front, not the rear. But it's what the British and
French got wrong that should command America's attention.
In the 1920s, Britain's top generals focused the British army on
organizing, training and equipping its troops to police the declining
British Empire. British military leaders decided the only enemy
Britain would fight for at least 10 years would be a colonial enemy, a
hostile tribesman or insurgent. The long-term results of this thinking
were nearly fatal to Britain.
Soon after Poland's defeat, Sir Winston Churchill privately
acknowledged that Britain had nothing to match the Germans in land
warfare. Britain lacked modern war-fighting equipment and the officers
trained to use it. So, Churchill played for time, replacing colonels
and generals who excelled at suppressing Arab insurgents in Palestine
or Pashtun tribesmen in northwestern India but performed poorly
against the skilled German and Japanese armies. Unfortunately,
Churchill's efforts were too late to prevent a string of British
defeats stretching from Paris to Singapore.
In France, where defense spending rose to account for one-third of all
government expenditures by 1939, there was no shortage of modern
equipment, only a shortage of competent senior leadership in the
general-officer ranks. "Methodical battle," a concept of war-fighting
emphasizing set-piece battles and the application of preplanned
firepower over maneuver, was enshrined as the French national vision
of future war. Its strategic effect was devastating. When French
politicians asked why the French army could not attack Germany to
support France's Polish ally in 1939, the army's commander in chief,
Gen. Maurice Gamelin, insisted the French and British armies must
prepare for the "long war" with an offensive in 1941 or '42.
Today, stars will only fall on American Army and Marine officers who
religiously embrace counterinsurgency inside the Islamic world as the
future. The notion that the generals have "discovered" a military
solution to Islam's societal misery in the form of counterinsurgency
is untrue, but no one in the White House, the Senate or the House, let
alone the media, is willing to challenge it.
In truth, the conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and a
thousand other places are complex problems rooted in local societal
and governmental failures, destructive social pathologies and
widespread resistance not only to foreign military intervention, but
to modernity in general. The historic lessons of Iraq, Algeria, Libya,
Palestine and Afghanistan have far more to do with avoiding the hazard
of occupation in the first place and, thus, eluding the problem of
insurgency altogether.
But armies are what they do, and, for the moment, the U.S. Army and
Marine Corps are light constabulary forces designed to police Muslim
Arabs and Afghans with AK-47 rifles, rocket-propelled grenades and
mines. This conversion to light forces designed to operate from fixed
bases while depending heavily on timely and accurate air strikes for
effectiveness and survival has left American ground forces in a
weakened, vulnerable state.
For the United States, the critical military lesson of May 10, 1940,
means avoiding Britain's mistake of optimizing its forces to fight
weak insurgents, especially when Muslim rebellions against unwanted
American military occupations are easily avoided. It also means
understanding that future conflicts will involve wars among nations
and alliances of nations waged by powerful armed forces for regional
power and influence; fights for energy, water, food, mineral resources
(Added: Resource wars) and the wealth they create. Otherwise, the
generals' current obsession with counterinsurgency will leave the
American armed forces as unprepared for a real war in 10 years as the
British and French forces were for their confrontation with Germany in
1940.
Retired Army Col. Douglas Macgregor is a decorated combat veteran and
the author of four books. His newest book is "Warrior's Rage: The
Great Tank Battle of 73 Easting" (Naval Institute Press, 2009).
--
Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear
of punishment and hope of reward after death." --
Albert Einstein !!!
http://www.scribd.com/doc/22151765/History-of-Pakistan-Army-from-1757-to-1971
http://www.scribd.com/doc/21686885/TALIBAN-WAR-IN-AFGHANISTAN
http://www.scribd.com/doc/22455178/Letters-to-Command-and-Staff-College-Quetta-Citadel-Journal
http://www.scribd.com/doc/23150027/Pakistan-Army-through-eyes-of-Pakistani-Generals
http://www.scribd.com/doc/23701412/War-of-Independence-of-1857
http://www.scribd.com/doc/22457862/Pakistan-Army-Journal-The-Citadel
http://www.scribd.com/doc/21952758/1971-India-Pakistan-War
http://www.scribd.com/doc/25171703/BOOK-REVIEWS-BY-AGHA-H-AMIN
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