Compass Points -- Flip a Coin?
The story before the story.
Compass Points -- Flip a Coin?
The story before the story.
May 20, 2024
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How should the Marine Corps decide about its future? Flip a coin? Say yes or no based on someone's good idea? Or is there a better way?
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The British Ministry of Defense has announced it is making rapid progress with a new system, the Radio Frequency Directed Energy Weapon (RFDEW).
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The system, which is defined as a Radio Frequency Directed Energy Weapon (RFDEW), is capable of detecting, tracking and engaging with a range of threats across land, air and sea. It will be able to affect targets up to 1km away, with further development in extending the range ongoing. It beams radio waves to disrupt or damage the critical electronic components of enemy vehicles, causing them to stop in their tracks or fall out of the sky.
The MoD said that due to its cheap operational costs, the device is a significant cost-effective alternative to traditional missile-based air defence systems. It also uses automated technologies that mean it can be operated by a single person or act as a solution to the protection and defence of critical assets and bases.
RFDEW technology can be mounted on a variety of military vehicles. It uses a mobile power source to produce pulses of radio frequency energy in a beam that can rapidly fire sequenced shots at individual targets or be broadened to simultaneously engage all threats within that beam.
-- E and T Magazine
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The Radio Frequency Directed Energy Weapon (RFDEW) sounds like a promising new system, but further testing is needed. Is this a system the Marine Corps should invest in? How should that decision be made? Should a senior General Officer flip a coin? Heads, we get the RFDEW or tails, we pass? Even if the Marine Corps wanted the new system and it was available, how many should the Marine Corps buy? Should the Corps be reorganized to find a place for the RFDEW? What about Marine Corps schools; what sort of classes do Marines need for the RFDEW? Which Marines should attend?
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Back in 2019 a few people had an idea to add more rockets and missiles to the Marine Corps. As part of their idea, they decided it would be necessary to drastically change Marine infantry battalions. The number of infantry battalions would be reduced. The number of Marines in each infantry battalion would be reduced. Battalion units, equipment, capabilities, and support would all be immediately reduced.
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Such a drastic, dangerous, and momentous decision should take more than just flipping a coin or having a senior person say yes or no. What is needed is a better way to make decisions, a better process. What is needed is a way to look at the "story before the story."
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Back in 1996 a Marine named John Sayen had his own ideas about how the Marine battalion should be changed. He and a friend carefully assembled his idea for a new Marine battalion and gained an appointment with a senior Marine General Officer. The General listened with interest to the brief by John Sayen and his friend. When they finished their brief, which was thorough and professional, the General said to them, “Gentlemen, I need to hear the story before the story."
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The officers were puzzled. Story before the story? What was that?
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The General explained when he came into the Marine Corps there was a weapons company in the infantry battalion but later it was disestablished, only to return after the Vietnam War. He also related how the rifle companies in the battalion had 60-mm mortars when he enlisted in the 1950s but the Corps removed them before the Vietnam War, only to return them during that war and then remove them after the war and now, they were back again.
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Instead of making quick decisions with only a surface understanding of all that has gone before, it is better to take time to discover the "story before the story." Understanding the “story before the story” prevents costly mistakes. The General concluded by asking the officers to go study the story before the story about the history of the Marine infantry battalion so they could provide a deeper context for their ideas.
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Years went by and the General never heard from the officers. Then, several years after the General's retirement, out of the blue, he received a email from John Sayen. Sayen, who by then had retired as a Lieutenant Colonel, reminded the General of the briefing and his tasking about the "story before the story." John explained that neither he nor his associate were able to find funding for a study and their regular duties precluded undertaking the effort themselves. However, he decided to conduct the study using his own resources and on his own time, which he continued into retirement.
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John said that early on he found he was unable to gain a complete picture of the Marine infantry battalion without considering the influence US Army infantry battalions as they changed over time. John further said that eventually he found he needed to study American infantry from the colonial period to the present. He shared the results of his efforts in a document of hundreds of pages with diagrams and descriptions of every infantry unit that had ever existed in the American military. It was an extraordinary piece of work.
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Sadly, John died without seeing his extraordinary study of the American infantry battalion in print. There is some good news, however, John’s brother gave the online Tactical Notebook permission to serialize the study -- see link below.
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John Sayen gave years to uncovering the "story before the story" of the infantry battalion. The larger question today is did the Marines who made such drastic changes to the Marine infantry battalion beginning in 2019 take the time to research, understand, and consider the story before the story? Or did they just rush into drastic and dangerous changes?
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Decades ago, the Marine Corps established the Combat Development Command at Quantico to thoroughly investigate, refine, and recommend changes to the future Marine Corps. The Combat Development Command mission and vision:
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MISSION
Design and develop a modernized Marine Corps to campaign in an evolving threat environment, in order to deny, deter, and if necessary, defeat adversaries as part of a naval, joint, combined, and interagency construct.
VISION
-- Develop and evaluate innovative concepts and technologies
-- Integrate processes to organize, train and equip
-- Assess strategic landscape and translate vision into capability
-- Produce solutions for capability gaps
-- Joint integrator for combat development
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The Combat Development Command helps the Marine Corps avoid costly mistakes from hasty decisions. The Combat Development Command has the experts, systems, and processes to make sure that new ideas are sound. When the Combat Development Command is given an idea to investigate, it goes through a systematic process based on a thorough DOTMLPF review of Doctrine, Organization, Training, Materiel, Leadership and Education, Personnel, and Facilities.
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For example, in the case of the RFDEW, should the Marine Corps acquire the new British system, the Radio Frequency Directed Energy Weapon (RFDEW)? While the RFDEW seems like a promising system, instead of flipping a coin or making a hasty decision, the Marine Corps would be better off by making sure the Combat Development Command studied "the story before the story."
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In the same way, if only Marine Corps leaders back in 2019 had allowed the Combat Development Command to thoroughly investigate the idea to severely cut infantry units, equipment, capabilities, and support. If the Combat Development Command had been allowed to do its job back in 2019, a world of problems could have been avoided.
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How should the Marine Corps decide about its future? Flip a coin? Say yes or no based on someone's good idea? Or is there a better way? There is a better way. Before making drastic changes to the foundations of the Corps, always use the Combat Development Command to do a full DOTMLPF review to uncover, “the story before the story.”
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Compass Points salutes the Command Development Command at Quantico that does so much to help build the future Marine Corps and also salutes John Sayen for his dedication to the Marine Corps displayed in his seminal work, "Battalion: An Organizational Study of the United States Infantry."
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E and T Magazine - May 2024
Armed Forces developing weapon that disables drones using radio frequencies
By Jack Loughran
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The Tactical Notebook
Battalion: An Organizational Study of the United States Infantry
By John Sayen
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Marines
Combat Development & Integration
Permit me to add some comments about John Sayen. I found out that John Sayen passed away in 2018. I was interested in locating him to get his thoughts on FD-2030 and only stumbled on the fact he had died.
In October 1974 I reported to TBS Class 3-75 at Quantico. One of my classmates was John Sayen. John was probably 6”4, lanky, cerebral and introverted. His room was a few doors down. He didn’t look like he shaved yet. I later learned that he was younger than the class, as was I and Tom Peeler. We were 21 years old. We had one other guy who was a year younger too but his name has faded from my memory over the years. John was not the typical fire breathing Lieutenant. He was fit but it took endless hard work. He was not athletic. His father was a prominent Doctor in Philadelphia. John wanted to be an infantry officer. I had no idea there was anything but, unless you were an aviator. John and I had regular after hours conversations. Over the course of these it became clear that he was a student of history and had a deep insight on the Marines in the Pacific and war on the Eastern Front. Our conversations on weaponry, tactics, doctrine and training would last late into the night. He was clearly brilliant. I had met few people well versed in the German Soviet war 1941 to 1945. We both believed it might be the most dangerous conflict the US would ever fight if it came to that. John and I discussed everything from small arms to grand strategy in a peer confrontation. We did not neglect discussing insurgencies, partisans and guerrilla warfare, weapons, combat load, unit organization etc.
John did not join us in our liberty runs to Washington DC or partying. It held no interest for him. He had no interest in sports cars, sports, hunting or fishing. Nor did he display the intensity many of us had from an excess of testosterone and the limited judgment that put a cocky chip on our shoulders. While we were reading John Fairbain and practicing knife fighting he was doing a deep analysis of Bn operations in Korea. There were times when I came in from a night on the town and John would knock on the door: “ Doug, on day three in the Battle of Kursk why do you think that LAH did not break through to the south….” and drop a map on the floor. We would pour over the map asking questions about number of tanks available, ammunition stocks, fuel availability, air support etc. Around this time the secrets of the Enigma Codes were being revealed and John was intrigued. So was I. We even discussed one night if the USMC might let us go interview Generals in England, the US and Germany.
When the MOS selections were revealed John was designated Artillery. I was secretly relieved. That was the right MOS for John and I secretly applauded our SPC for his analysis of the skills and potential of his Lieutenants. John was not the charismatic leader type. Not a pugilist.
Saigon fell the day before my TBS class graduated and I lost track of John. He did not come to the 2nd Mar Div after Artillery School. I had hoped he would.
Careers, assignments, priorities and distance crippled communications before email. I last spoke with John in 1992 as we discussed his career options when I was at HQMC. I encouraged him to leverage his grasp of history, brilliant mind, focused analysis and devotion to work in the Marine Corps Schools and professional development. It was the last time we spoke in person. I vaguely remember that we emailed once or twice in the 1995-98 time frame. I remember a congratulatory email in 1998 when I took command of 25th Marines. That was 25 years ago.
John’s skills, devotion and intellect might have been better appreciated in the British or Prussian military where they tended to be more tolerant of the brilliant even eccentric who did not fit the mold. I believe conditions in that arena have been made worse by the Officer Fitness Report changes implemented in the early 1990’s. The focus shifted from character, potential,unique skills and strengths to metrics and laundry lists of achievements of questionable value.
John Sayen was a great Marine that our Corps, for many reasons, did not properly leverage during his active duty service. He is not alone. I often reflect on the talent we overlooked or discarded in favor of self promoters and grand standers.
I do not believe John ever married. If he did not marry I am certain he had no children. He is buried with his mother and father in Philadelphia.
I feel some guilt for not staying in touch. 2001-2018 was a busy time for me. It is no excuse. John was like many great Marines. He devoted his life to our Corps and nation for few rewards. I know he never asked for much and got even less other than the knowledge that he made innumerable individuals better and our Corps better. I hope he knew that in the end.
I was a young major when first I met the late General Al Gray. Beginning in that initial encounter and for many years afterwards I learned much from this giant of our Corps.
Today’s post questioning whether those responsible for the recent changes to the Marine infantry battalion ever consulted John Sayen’s seminal work on American Infantry before they set about making those changes reminds me of an important lesson I learned from General Gray. That is, the need to look to history before launching off on a project.
Though he did not use the term, what General Gray was telling me was I needed to conduct a literature search prior to putting forth any recommendation. As the post says, “The story before the story” I wanted to tell. That advice served me well while on active-duty and in many endeavors since I retired.
So, I wonder, did the Marines who recommended the recent changes to the Marine infantry battalion consult any of these important books on the role of the infantry?
S.L.A. Marshall, Men Against Fire: The Problem of Battle Command in Future War
B.A. Friedman, On Tactics: A Theory of Victory in Battle
John A. English, On Infantry (New York: Praeger
John A. English and Bruce I. Gudmunsson, On Infantry: Revised Edition
Paddy Griffith, Forward Into Battle: Fighting Tactics from Waterloo to the Near Future
Michael D. Doubler, Closing With the Enemy: How GIs Fought the War in Europe, 1944-1945
Charles B. MacDonald, Company Commander: The Classic Account of Infantry Combat in World War II
Erwin Rommel, Attacks
The Infantry Journal, Infantry in Battle
Martin van Creveld, Fighting Power: German and U.S. Army Performance, 1939-1945 (
Richard Holmes, Acts of War: The Behavior of Men in Battle
Peter S. Kindsvatter, American Soldiers: Ground Combat in the World Wars, Korea, and Vietnam
Furthermore, did they look to the important work done by Secretary of Defense, General Jim Mattis’ lethality task force? See: https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/1639138/task-force-looks-at-making-infantry-squads-more-lethal/.
Finally, did they happen to come across a Center for Naval Analyses study I assisted with titled, Development of the Squad: Historical Analysis? See: https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/AD1014512.pdf