Matt Cavanaugh
Feb 23, 2016
Source Link
Why don’t military officers write? I recently suggested that more professional wordsmithing would be a positive development, and found myself derided in response by another officer who dismissed the opinion as “publicationism.” But as professionals holding an arsenal of ideas and equipped with experience – shouldn’t we want to be Publicationists? Warfare is ever changing, and so it is the military professional’s obligation to share novel and useful ideas about war. Indeed, the quality of the professional hinges on this point – would you willingly choose a doctor or lawyer who doesn’t regularly, personally engage with cutting edge, expert knowledge? Equally, officers who do not meaningfully participate in this idea-exchanging process fail the spirit of their military commission.
And, let’s be clear: Writing matters. It is still the best way to share ideas, orders of magnitude beyond the limitedness of Power[less&]Point[less]: Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster accurately calls overreliance on PowerPoint “dangerous” because the world’s problems “are not bullet-izable.” Real writing, thoughtful words coherently splashed across paragraphs and pages, is crucial to the rapid spread of military ideas (i.e. the Army’s 2006 counterinsurgency manual release). Novelist Stephen King describes this as a sort of “telepathy,” ideal for the “meeting of the minds.” Wider ranging than the most powerful radio, T.E. Lawrence wrote in 1920, “The printing press is the greatest weapon in the armory of the modern commander.” Words are weapons.
The power of the written word is considerable, yet it cannot smash through three bricks in the wall that too often separate new ideas from the Profession of Arms. These yellow bricks happen to mirror Dorothy’s three traveling companions from L. Frank Baum’s tale, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz – representing three characteristics that effectively stop experience-writing and idea-sharing. What follows will briefly sketch these out, their typologies, tendencies, and the thought process that drives the shirking of professional responsibility in three ways: the failure to wield the pen, the failure to wield the mind, and the failure to wield the heart.
Real writing, thoughtful words coherently splashed across paragraphs and pages, is crucial to the rapid spread of military ideas (i.e. the Army’s 2006 counterinsurgency manual release).
Scarecrow: As Oz’s Scarecrow wants for a brain, our first yellow brick obstacle is a lack of competence, meaning the ability to communicate using the written word. When commissioning an officer, our army certifies a basic writing ability, which is typically re-tested over the course of a career. Occasionally outliers squirt through, such as the retired lieutenant general I recently met who proudly proclaimed he paid $500 for someone to write his 70’s-era Command and General Staff CollegeMonograph (essentially a mid-career, written essay exam). I didn’t know how to react: disillusionment with the Profession of Arms or astonishment at such post-career brazenness. Either way, it is regrettable but understandable that some will not possess composition competency. However, this should, this must, be weeded out through promotion boards. If you cannot write, you cannot communicate. If you cannot communicate, you cannot be a successful military officer. So: Shoooooo, Scarecrow, off with you and your yellow brick!
Tin Man: The Tin Man wants a heart for passionate inspiration, and so our second yellow brick obstacle represents the absence of ideas: No spark, no revelation, an inability to see the adjacent possible as Cupid’s strike is and always will be off target. Admiral (Ret.) James Stavridis, former Supreme Allied Commander of Europe, hascalled the military profession a “sea of inspiration” full of “worthy experiences and ideas” for writing and sharing. Good officers put this muse to work for the profession’s advancement and this navy guy gets it – dead men tell no tales and neither do poor professionals. An officer like this, lacking vision and ideas, is apt to adopt the motto “Row well, and live,” because they will only ever be able to handle a single environment and monotonous task. When war comes, this officer will be defeated by the enemy riding a pale horse – the Single Trick Stallion. The Tin Man’s limited labor is moderately useful, yet such inspirational emptiness counsels it is time to go away, and to take that second yellow brick along for the journey.
Cowardly Lion: The last and largest yellow brick obstacle is a lack of courage. This one is the hardest for the military profession’s gastrointestinal system to take, because these officers possess the ability and spark to write – they are neither Scarecrow nor made of Tin – yet they are too timid to put their ideas and experiences out for professional display. These officers pull off a neat feat, sporting shiny uniforms covered in heroic exploits and battlefield initiative – yet this narrow heroism fails to take similarly courageous action to scribble and share for the profession’s future benefit. Such martial impotence results from a self-inflicted decapitation strike which renders the pen dry, the page blank, and the profession poorer than it might have been.
These three yellow bricks wall off the professional from the Profession of Arms. To unleash these voices and unlock a better military profession, we ought to swing the hammer and frighten off the brick-wielding Scarecrows, Tin Men, and Cowardly Lions in our midst.
Major ML Cavanaugh is a U.S. Army Strategist, a Fellow with the Modern War Institute at West Point, and has served in assignments from Iraq to the Pentagon, and New Zealand to Korea. A Contributor at War on the Rocks, he looks forward to connecting via Twitter @MLCavanaugh. This essay is an unofficial expression of opinion; the views expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of West Point, the Department of the Army, the Department of Defense, or any agency of the US government.
General James 'Mad Dog' Mattis Email About Being 'Too Busy To Read' Is A Must-Read
GEOFFREY INGERSOLL 0MAY 10, 2013,
AP
In the run up to Marine Gen. James Mattis' deployment to Iraq in 2004, a colleague wrote to him asking about the "importance of reading and military history for officers," many of whom found themselves "too busy to read."
His response went viral over email.
Security Blog "Strife" out of Kings College in London recently published Mattis' words with a short description from the person who found it in her email.
Their title for the post:
With Rifle and Bibliography: General Mattis on Professional Reading
[Dear, "Bill"]
The problem with being too busy to read is that you learn by experience (or by your men's experience), i.e. the hard way. By reading, you learn through others' experiences, generally a better way to do business, especially in our line of work where the consequences of incompetence are so final for young men.
Thanks to my reading, I have never been caught flat-footed by any situation, never at a loss for how any problem has been addressed (successfully or unsuccessfully) before. It doesn't give me all the answers, but it lights what is often a dark path ahead.
With [Task Force] 58, I had w/ me Slim's book, books about the Russian and British experiences in [Afghanistan], and a couple others. Going into Iraq, "The Siege" (about the Brits' defeat at Al Kut in WW I) was req'd reading for field grade officers. I also had Slim's book; reviewed T.E. Lawrence's "Seven Pillars of Wisdom"; a good book about the life of Gertrude Bell (the Brit archaeologist who virtually founded the modern Iraq state in the aftermath of WW I and the fall of the Ottoman empire); and "From Beirut to Jerusalem". I also went deeply into Liddell Hart's book on Sherman, and Fuller's book on Alexander the Great got a lot of my attention (although I never imagined that my HQ would end up only 500 meters from where he lay in state in Babylon).
Ultimately, a real understanding of history means that we face NOTHING new under the sun.
For all the "4th Generation of War" intellectuals running around today saying that the nature of war has fundamentally changed, the tactics are wholly new, etc, I must respectfully say ... "Not really": Alex the Great would not be in the least bit perplexed by the enemy that we face right now in Iraq, and our leaders going into this fight do their troops a disservice by not studying (studying, vice just reading) the men who have gone before us.
We have been fighting on this planet for 5000 years and we should take advantage of their experience. "Winging it" and filling body bags as we sort out what works reminds us of the moral dictates and the cost of incompetence in our profession. As commanders and staff officers, we are coaches and sentries for our units: how can we coach anything if we don't know a hell of a lot more than just the [Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures]? What happens when you're on a dynamic battlefield and things are changing faster than higher [Headquarters] can stay abreast? Do you not adapt because you cannot conceptualize faster than the enemy's adaptation? (Darwin has a pretty good theory about the outcome for those who cannot adapt to changing circumstance — in the information age things can change rather abruptly and at warp speed, especially the moral high ground which our regimented thinkers cede far too quickly in our recent fights.) And how can you be a sentinel and not have your unit caught flat-footed if you don't know what the warning signs are — that your unit's preps are not sufficient for the specifics of a tasking that you have not anticipated?
Perhaps if you are in support functions waiting on the warfighters to spell out the specifics of what you are to do, you can avoid the consequences of not reading. Those who must adapt to overcoming an independent enemy's will are not allowed that luxury.
This is not new to the USMC approach to warfighting — Going into Kuwait 12 years ago, I read (and reread) Rommel's Papers (remember "Kampstaffel"?), Montgomery's book ("Eyes Officers"...), "Grant Takes Command" (need for commanders to get along, "commanders' relationships" being more important than "command relationships"), and some others.
As a result, the enemy has paid when I had the opportunity to go against them, and I believe that many of my young guys lived because I didn't waste their lives because I didn't have the vision in my mind of how to destroy the enemy at least cost to our guys and to the innocents on the battlefields.
Hope this answers your question.... I will cc my ADC in the event he can add to this. He is the only officer I know who has read more than I.
Semper Fi, Mattis
Feb 23, 2016
Source Link
And, let’s be clear: Writing matters. It is still the best way to share ideas, orders of magnitude beyond the limitedness of Power[less&]Point[less]: Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster accurately calls overreliance on PowerPoint “dangerous” because the world’s problems “are not bullet-izable.” Real writing, thoughtful words coherently splashed across paragraphs and pages, is crucial to the rapid spread of military ideas (i.e. the Army’s 2006 counterinsurgency manual release). Novelist Stephen King describes this as a sort of “telepathy,” ideal for the “meeting of the minds.” Wider ranging than the most powerful radio, T.E. Lawrence wrote in 1920, “The printing press is the greatest weapon in the armory of the modern commander.” Words are weapons.
The power of the written word is considerable, yet it cannot smash through three bricks in the wall that too often separate new ideas from the Profession of Arms. These yellow bricks happen to mirror Dorothy’s three traveling companions from L. Frank Baum’s tale, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz – representing three characteristics that effectively stop experience-writing and idea-sharing. What follows will briefly sketch these out, their typologies, tendencies, and the thought process that drives the shirking of professional responsibility in three ways: the failure to wield the pen, the failure to wield the mind, and the failure to wield the heart.
Real writing, thoughtful words coherently splashed across paragraphs and pages, is crucial to the rapid spread of military ideas (i.e. the Army’s 2006 counterinsurgency manual release).
Scarecrow: As Oz’s Scarecrow wants for a brain, our first yellow brick obstacle is a lack of competence, meaning the ability to communicate using the written word. When commissioning an officer, our army certifies a basic writing ability, which is typically re-tested over the course of a career. Occasionally outliers squirt through, such as the retired lieutenant general I recently met who proudly proclaimed he paid $500 for someone to write his 70’s-era Command and General Staff CollegeMonograph (essentially a mid-career, written essay exam). I didn’t know how to react: disillusionment with the Profession of Arms or astonishment at such post-career brazenness. Either way, it is regrettable but understandable that some will not possess composition competency. However, this should, this must, be weeded out through promotion boards. If you cannot write, you cannot communicate. If you cannot communicate, you cannot be a successful military officer. So: Shoooooo, Scarecrow, off with you and your yellow brick!
Tin Man: The Tin Man wants a heart for passionate inspiration, and so our second yellow brick obstacle represents the absence of ideas: No spark, no revelation, an inability to see the adjacent possible as Cupid’s strike is and always will be off target. Admiral (Ret.) James Stavridis, former Supreme Allied Commander of Europe, hascalled the military profession a “sea of inspiration” full of “worthy experiences and ideas” for writing and sharing. Good officers put this muse to work for the profession’s advancement and this navy guy gets it – dead men tell no tales and neither do poor professionals. An officer like this, lacking vision and ideas, is apt to adopt the motto “Row well, and live,” because they will only ever be able to handle a single environment and monotonous task. When war comes, this officer will be defeated by the enemy riding a pale horse – the Single Trick Stallion. The Tin Man’s limited labor is moderately useful, yet such inspirational emptiness counsels it is time to go away, and to take that second yellow brick along for the journey.
Cowardly Lion: The last and largest yellow brick obstacle is a lack of courage. This one is the hardest for the military profession’s gastrointestinal system to take, because these officers possess the ability and spark to write – they are neither Scarecrow nor made of Tin – yet they are too timid to put their ideas and experiences out for professional display. These officers pull off a neat feat, sporting shiny uniforms covered in heroic exploits and battlefield initiative – yet this narrow heroism fails to take similarly courageous action to scribble and share for the profession’s future benefit. Such martial impotence results from a self-inflicted decapitation strike which renders the pen dry, the page blank, and the profession poorer than it might have been.
These three yellow bricks wall off the professional from the Profession of Arms. To unleash these voices and unlock a better military profession, we ought to swing the hammer and frighten off the brick-wielding Scarecrows, Tin Men, and Cowardly Lions in our midst.
Major ML Cavanaugh is a U.S. Army Strategist, a Fellow with the Modern War Institute at West Point, and has served in assignments from Iraq to the Pentagon, and New Zealand to Korea. A Contributor at War on the Rocks, he looks forward to connecting via Twitter @MLCavanaugh. This essay is an unofficial expression of opinion; the views expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of West Point, the Department of the Army, the Department of Defense, or any agency of the US government.
General James 'Mad Dog' Mattis Email About Being 'Too Busy To Read' Is A Must-Read
GEOFFREY INGERSOLL 0MAY 10, 2013,
APIn the run up to Marine Gen. James Mattis' deployment to Iraq in 2004, a colleague wrote to him asking about the "importance of reading and military history for officers," many of whom found themselves "too busy to read."
His response went viral over email.
Security Blog "Strife" out of Kings College in London recently published Mattis' words with a short description from the person who found it in her email.
Their title for the post:
With Rifle and Bibliography: General Mattis on Professional Reading
[Dear, "Bill"]
The problem with being too busy to read is that you learn by experience (or by your men's experience), i.e. the hard way. By reading, you learn through others' experiences, generally a better way to do business, especially in our line of work where the consequences of incompetence are so final for young men.
Thanks to my reading, I have never been caught flat-footed by any situation, never at a loss for how any problem has been addressed (successfully or unsuccessfully) before. It doesn't give me all the answers, but it lights what is often a dark path ahead.
With [Task Force] 58, I had w/ me Slim's book, books about the Russian and British experiences in [Afghanistan], and a couple others. Going into Iraq, "The Siege" (about the Brits' defeat at Al Kut in WW I) was req'd reading for field grade officers. I also had Slim's book; reviewed T.E. Lawrence's "Seven Pillars of Wisdom"; a good book about the life of Gertrude Bell (the Brit archaeologist who virtually founded the modern Iraq state in the aftermath of WW I and the fall of the Ottoman empire); and "From Beirut to Jerusalem". I also went deeply into Liddell Hart's book on Sherman, and Fuller's book on Alexander the Great got a lot of my attention (although I never imagined that my HQ would end up only 500 meters from where he lay in state in Babylon).
Ultimately, a real understanding of history means that we face NOTHING new under the sun.
For all the "4th Generation of War" intellectuals running around today saying that the nature of war has fundamentally changed, the tactics are wholly new, etc, I must respectfully say ... "Not really": Alex the Great would not be in the least bit perplexed by the enemy that we face right now in Iraq, and our leaders going into this fight do their troops a disservice by not studying (studying, vice just reading) the men who have gone before us.
We have been fighting on this planet for 5000 years and we should take advantage of their experience. "Winging it" and filling body bags as we sort out what works reminds us of the moral dictates and the cost of incompetence in our profession. As commanders and staff officers, we are coaches and sentries for our units: how can we coach anything if we don't know a hell of a lot more than just the [Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures]? What happens when you're on a dynamic battlefield and things are changing faster than higher [Headquarters] can stay abreast? Do you not adapt because you cannot conceptualize faster than the enemy's adaptation? (Darwin has a pretty good theory about the outcome for those who cannot adapt to changing circumstance — in the information age things can change rather abruptly and at warp speed, especially the moral high ground which our regimented thinkers cede far too quickly in our recent fights.) And how can you be a sentinel and not have your unit caught flat-footed if you don't know what the warning signs are — that your unit's preps are not sufficient for the specifics of a tasking that you have not anticipated?
Perhaps if you are in support functions waiting on the warfighters to spell out the specifics of what you are to do, you can avoid the consequences of not reading. Those who must adapt to overcoming an independent enemy's will are not allowed that luxury.
This is not new to the USMC approach to warfighting — Going into Kuwait 12 years ago, I read (and reread) Rommel's Papers (remember "Kampstaffel"?), Montgomery's book ("Eyes Officers"...), "Grant Takes Command" (need for commanders to get along, "commanders' relationships" being more important than "command relationships"), and some others.
As a result, the enemy has paid when I had the opportunity to go against them, and I believe that many of my young guys lived because I didn't waste their lives because I didn't have the vision in my mind of how to destroy the enemy at least cost to our guys and to the innocents on the battlefields.
Hope this answers your question.... I will cc my ADC in the event he can add to this. He is the only officer I know who has read more than I.
Semper Fi, Mattis
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