Compass Points - Focus on Fighting
German General issues warning.
Compass Points - Focus on Fighting
German General issues warning.
June 10, 2024
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German Maj. Gen. Christian Freuding has issued a warning to all Western military forces that have reduced themselves. To fight against peer adversaries, mass still matters.
Perhaps Maj Gen Freuding would be willing to send his warning in a FedEx envelope directly to the Marine Corps headquarters at the Pentagon. Current Marine senior leaders have been quoted explaining the Marine Corps is now focusing on serving as a sensing force that passes on data.
Strange. The Marine Corps has always been admired not because it is primarily a sensing force but because it is a premier fighting force.
For decades the Marine Corps has been on patrol worldwide ready to arrive at the scene of any crisis to immediately deter, assist, or fight. Is there still a need for a global expeditionary force or has the advance of technology made a combined arms force obsolete?
One US veteran warned after experiencing the fighting in Ukraine that the American military is not as ready as it should be.
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An American veteran who fought in Ukraine said the US military spent so long focused on fighting insurgents that it forgot "what it means to actually fight a war."
"We have neglected a lot of the training" on "how to fight and survive in a peer-on-peer adversary war,"
--Business Insider - 05/02/2024
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A US Army study reviewing the fighting in Ukraine came to much the same conclusion. Even with new technologies, modern war requires "hard power."
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Although analysts in recent years have devoted much focus to modern, high-tech systems and hybrid, asymmetric and nonlinear warfare that deemphasize large-scale combat, Russia’s war in Ukraine has been primarily conventional. As General Christopher Cavoli, commander of U.S. European Command and Supreme Allied Commander Europe, put it, “The great irreducible feature of warfare is hard power. . . . If the other guy shows up with a tank, you better have a tank.
-- AUSA Spotlight
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The brutal fighting in Ukraine is making clear that stripping the Marine Corps of proven combat capabilities in the hope that future technology might be acquired later is a foolish bargain. To prepare for a fight against China or Russia the Marine Corps will need to relearn lessons from prior World Wars.
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Ukraine is fighting in conditions very different from what the US and its NATO allies have fought through in recent decades. And while there is renewed interest in readying for a near-peer or even peer-level fight against an adversary like China or Russia, rebuilding the skills for great power conflict isn't something that happens overnight.
Lessons from the Cold War and World Wars have to be relearned, and some modern developments demand learning new ways of war from scratch.
--Business Insider - 05/02/2024
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What would it take for the US to prevail against a massive military force like China's? The AUSA Spotlight reports:
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A consistently false narrative in the defense community since 1945 has been that dominance in the air and sea will allow the United States to prevail in conflict without the agony of ground combat. This misperception negatively impacts joint force readiness.
. . . The reasons for the continued relevance of ground warfare are numerous. Strategically postured land forces have unique deterrent effects. When deterrence fails, nations have historically struggled to achieve their aims with air or naval forces alone.
. . . As the battlefield has become more surveilled and lethal, efficient combined arms are vital to conducting offensive operations while limiting losses.
-- AUSA Spotlight
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The most technologically advanced fighting in the history of warfare is underway now in Ukraine and in the Middle East. In both places, rockets, missiles, and drones are proving to be formidable weapons. No matter how formidable new rockets, missiles, and drones may be, however, there is no evidence that those technology tools, by themselves can defeat a well-armed adversary. Just the opposite. Technology, as always, is important, but military mass still matters.
The Wall Street Journal reports:
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Maj. Gen. Christian Freuding, Germany's director of planning and command staff, said Western military strategists had not yet accepted that quantity trumps quality.
"You need numbers; you need force numbers. In the West, we have reduced our military; we have reduced our stocks. But quantity matters; mass matters,"
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The world is in terrible conflicts right now. More conflicts are on the way. Mass matters. Combined arms forces matter. It is time for the Marine Corps to put aside its focus on sitting on islands, sensing, and passing on data. The Marine Corps must bulk up its air, armor, engineering, and infantry battalions as described in Vision 2035 – A Better Way Forward for the US Marine Corps. The Marine Corps must find the amphibious ships it needs to get back on global patrol 24/7/365. The Nation cannot afford a sit and sense Marine Corps. The Nation needs an upgraded, enhanced, forward deployed, fighting Marine Corps that can arrive at the scene of a crisis quickly and can be expanded, augmented, and reinforced just as quickly.
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Business Insider - 05/02/2024
The US spent so much time fighting insurgents that it forgot 'what it means to actually fight a war,' a US vet in Ukraine says
By Sinéad Baker
https://www.businessinsider.com/us-forgot-how-to-fight-real-war-veteran-in-ukraine-2024-5
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AUSA Spotlight
The Russia-Ukraine War One Year In: Implications for the U.S. Army
By Charles McEnany & COL Dan Roper, USA, Ret.
Spotlight 23-1, March 2023
https://www.ausa.org/publications/russia-ukraine-war-one-year-implications-us-army
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Business Insider - 09/28/2023
Western-made armor isn't working in Ukraine because it wasn't designed for a conflict of this intensity, Ukrainian analyst says
By Thibault Spirlet
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Vision 2035
A Better Way Forward for the US Marine Corps
https://mega.nz/file/crxlUJoC#G-Wh2nlQllKnIXUuCvCdolmQEWg_fk4_Jv6KQuRe3us
Thank you Compass Points - today’s edition lays out views I think are spot on in accuracy. Mass and numbers still count - as they always have. Some real sobering thoughts in this one. I must leave the decision to rearm ourselves to those more senior, but, to this Marine, the message is very clear: get ready to fight as a robust, educated & well trained MAGTF, or be prepared for defeat, or dissolution by our own government. Time to move out smartly!
Below are my recommendations on books about close combat, which is the essence of warfare regardless of what the ill-informed and pundits claim. The books are grouped by categories.
A Modest List of Books on Close Combat
Overview
John Keegan, The Face of Battle (New York: The Viking Press, 1976)
Theory
S.L.A. Marshall, Men Against Fire: The Problem of Battle Command in Future War (Gloucester, Massachusetts: Peter Smith, 1978) (A reprint of the original copyrighted in 1947)
B.A. Friedman, On Tactics: A Theory of Victory in Battle (Naval Institute Press: Annapolis, Maryland, 2017)
History
John A. English, On Infantry (New York: Praeger, 1981)
John A. English and Bruce I. Gudmunsson, On Infantry: Revised Edition (New York: Praeger, 1994) (Abridges much of the material in the original edition)
Paddy Griffith, Forward Into Battle: Fighting Tactics from Waterloo to the Near Future (Novato, California: Presidio Press, 1991)
Illustrations
Michael D. Doubler, Closing With the Enemy: How GIs Fought the War in Europe, 1944-1945 (University Press of Kansas: Lawrence, Kansas, 1994)
Charles B. MacDonald, Company Commander: The Classic Account of Infantry Combat in World War II (Bantam Books, Inc.: New York, 1947)
Erwin Rommel, Attacks (Athena Press, Inc.: Vienna, Virginia, 1979)
The Infantry Journal, Infantry in Battle (The Infantry Journal Incorporated: Washington, D.C., 1939) (Reprinted by Marine Corps Association in October 1986)
Martin van Creveld, Fighting Power: German and U.S. Army Performance, 1939-1945 (Greenwood Press: Westport, Connecticut, 1982)
Psychology/Biology — Courage, Fear, and Killing
John Baynes, Morale: A Study of Men and Courage (Avery Publishing Group, Inc.: Garden City Park, New York, 1988)
Dave Grossman, On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society (Little Brown and Company: Boston, 1995)
Richard Holmes, Acts of War: The Behavior of Men in Battle (The Free Press: New York, 1985)
Peter S. Kindsvatter, American Soldiers: Ground Combat in the World Wars, Korea, and Vietnam (University Press of Kansas: Lawrence, Kansas, 2003)
Lord Moran, The Anatomy of Courage (Avery Publishing Group Inc.: Garden City Park, New York, 1987)
Geoffrey Regan, Fight or Flight (Avon Books: New York, 1996)
Stephan P. Rosen, War and Human Nature (Princeton University Press: Princeton, New Jersey, 2005)
Johnathan Shay, Achilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma and the Undoing of Character (Simon & Schuster: New York, 1994)
Ben Shephard, A War of Nerves: Soldiers and Psychiatrists in the Twentieth Century (Harvard University Press: Cambridge, Massachusetts, 2001)