Intellectualism and Military Innovation

In a letter to his friend and fellow intellectual, B. H. Liddell Hart, T. E. Lawrence wrote these words in 1933: “If your book could persuade some of our new soldiers to read and mark and learn things outside drill manuals and tactical diagrams, it would do a good work. I feel a fundamental, crippling incuriousness about our officers. Too much body and too little head.”1 Lawrence was concerned about the British army’slack of intellectual thought and debate in the interwar period, and how it would affect the Army’s fighting prowess for the next conflict. For the American army, there’s a lesson, too: military organizations that promote intellectual debate focus on educating their officers in a professional environment. They learn from the experience of those who develop tactics, techniques and procedures in combat, and they innovate more effectively than organizations who do not develop these TTP. German example Armored-warfare innovation during the interwar period was most successful under the German military despite the severe budgetary, manning and equipping restrictions placed on it by the Versailles Treaty and the global economy. The German military had long established itself as an organization that tolerated and highly encouraged intellectual debate among its officer corps. This method and tolerance dated to Prussian Field Marshal Count Helmuth Karl Bernhard von Moltke, who led German forces in the mid- to late- 19th Century. As military historian Gunther E. Rothenberg points out, Field Marshal Moltke believed that “[i]n war, as in art, exist no general rules; in neither can talent be replaced by precept.”2 Field Marshal Moltke had mentored and developed several of the General Staff who fought World War I and then in turn survived to lead Germany through the interwar period. Count Moltke had been the first to pro-Intellectualism and Military Innovation by LTC Charles W. Morrison 40 mote the decentralized decision-making process that placed much more responsibility on the junior officer at the tactical level.3 This trademark of German military leadership had first shown itself in the late days of World War I and had been placed into postwar doctrine in the early 1920s. With the selection of GEN Hans von Seeckt as the first post-World War I German chief of the General Staff, the German army continued its tradition by establishing an officer corps that “emphasized intellectual as well as tactical” excellence.4 This led to a high tolerance of officers like Hans Guederin, who challenged conventional doctrine and was permitted to conduct exercises that advanced theories on armored warfare and, most specifically, the development of blitzkrieg or “lightning war.” Even though GEN von Seeckt and other German generals may have disagreed with Guederin and other junior officers, they ensured their findings and thoughts were published throughout the officer corps for intellectual debate and innovation.5 The German army also maintained a highly competitive and challenging professional-education program that encouraged intellectual debate as well as learning from former allies and adversaries alike. They learned the lessons of World War I as well as new lessons from training exercises that tested technological advances in equipment that was unavailable to the Germans. In the aftermath of World War I, the Germans took more than 400 officers and formed several committees led by general-staff officers to research the lessons of the conflict and try implementing them into the new German army’s doctrine. What resulted in 1921 and 1923 was Army Regulation 487 entitled Leadership and Battle with Combined Arms. The five tenets of the new doctrine were

1) maneuver; 2) an offensive mindset; 3) decentralized operations at the lowest level possible; 4) officers and noncommissioned officers to use their judgment on the battlefield; and 5) combat leaders to display initiative at all times. It was an incredible document that combined traditions long embedded with the German military but also incorporated some of the most important lessons of World War I – that of maneuver and decentralized execution.6 For admittance to the German staff college, officers had to sit through four days of exams and, once having completed the course, only the top graduates received General Staff status. This coveted status meant that the top graduates of the staff college would have their assignments controlled by the German army’s General Staff. This enabled these officers to not be abused or targeted by a group or individual for limiting their career options. This produced a highly competitive and competent officer corps for the German army before World War II.7 Lastly, despite the lack of modern tanks and other equipment banned by the Treaty of Versailles, the Germans read and observed the exercises of other nations with great interest and intellectual analysis. This enabled them to stage their own maneuvers with substitutes, where they tested innovative maneuver theories that had been developed only through the process of intellectual reading and analysis. A German report on the British Maneuvers of 1926 posited that armored vehicles’ increase in speed might enable them to be used independently of light infantry and possibly be paired with motorized infantry and artillery for a more potent maneuver force on the modern battlefield.8 U. S. Navy examples The U. S. Navy’s innovation with aircraft carriers during the interwar period is another example of innovative thinking and analysis producing significant results in military innovation. First, the Navy established a Bureau of Aeronautics within the Department of the Navy that provided a powerful political advocate for resourcing innovation in aircraft-carrier design and development. In addition to acquiring funding, the bureau also focused on the initial design, construction and development of doctrine for “aerial warfare at sea.” The new bureau was a strong and effective advocate for innovation in airpower at sea, from Navy leadership all the way up to the President.9 The popular and extremely competent ADM William Moffet was the new bureau. With ADM Moffett providing the resources and ability for liberal innovation despite the objections of naval leaders more resistant to change, professional education was also influencing the ability of the naval-aviation community to enhance and continue the transformational process. Second, Navy CAPT Joseph Reeves – who had attended the Naval War College in 1923, where he participated in innovative wargames that used naval-aviation assets – used lessons-learned from these wargames in his next assignment as commander, Aircraft Squadrons, Battle Force. He focused on reducing launch and recovery times for aircraft on the USS Langley, the Navy’s only aircraft carrier at the time. Reeves dramatically increased the aircraft carrier’s ability to project combat power into the air. His results were fed back to the war college for more wargaming while simultaneously also given to the Bureau of Aeronautics for more proof of the aircraft carrier’s capabilities.10 CAPT Reeves, the Bureau of Aeronautics and the Naval War College are examples of how the promotion of intellectual thought and an innovative professional-education system can rapidly transform military organizations effectively. The Navy’s leadership, both military and civilian, used results produced from intellectual analysis of new technology and the lessons learned from World War I to cultivate political support for resourcing the acquisition of aircraft carriers for the United States that proved crucial during World War II in the Pacific Theater. Army-Marines examples Almost a century after the interwar period, the U. S. Army and U. S. Marine Corps developed anew counterinsurgency doctrine by encouraging the intellectual exchange of ideas from the tactical level to the Pentagon level. As early as 2004, with the development of an insurgency in Iraq and the resurgence of the Taliban in Afghanistan, leaders at the tactical level were sharing and publishing information that would lead to one of the fastest and most complete rewrites of military doctrine in the history of warfare. With the advent of the Internet and access to it in an active combat zone, collaborative Websites such as companycommand. com led to sharing TTP. This was previously unheard of as an intellectual way to share ideas on how to fight a current war. Company commanders, platoon leaders and other tactical leaders were learning how to fight an insurgency by trial and error but were collecting this information and passing it on in an informal way up until 2006. CAPT Travis Partriquin, an innovative staff officer in Iraq in 2006, was able to change the way his entire brigade conducted operations by using a simple Powerpoint presentation that described two things: how effective personal relationships with tribal leaders were, and how valuable developing human intelligence through boots-on-the-ground patrolling was. When Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was speaking to the ranking military leadership in Fall 2007, he used CPT Partriquin’s presentation to demonstrate how innovative thinking at the tactical level had initiated the start of the successful “Awakening” in the troubled Anbar province of Iraq.11 In late Fall 2005, an intellectually driven regimental commander, COL H. R. McMaster, achieved great success in Anbar in and around the city of Tal Afar. His unit effectively used the “clear, hold, build” 41 strategy to stabilize the area and set an example for future units operating in Iraq. McMaster had written a book on Vietnam and studied the Iraq conflict intensively prior to his deployment.12 Here again was another example of intellectual analysis driving innovation. (Editor’s note: BG McMaster has been selected as the next Maneuver Center of Excellence commander, replacing MG Robert Brown.) In October 2005, LTG David Petraeus assembled a team of academics, civilian experts and military veterans of the current conflict to rewrite doctrine reflecting what history, sociology, anthropology and tactical experts on the ground fighting in the conflicts (now classified as COINs) had learned. LTC John Nagel played a key role in this process. A graduate of West Point and a Rhodes scholar, Nagel had written his doctoral thesis on military organizational change in the midst of a COIN. He compared the Malayan Emergency of the 1950s British army to that of the U. S. Army’s experience in Vietnam a decade later. Nagel described the experience of writing the new field manual as an academic endeavor. The description showed there was a free exchange of ideas and serious debate on what worked in the past and what works now on the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan.13 The U. S. Army fundamentally changed its COIN doctrine in two years while simultaneously conducting ongoing military operations. This feat was achieved by embracing online collaborative sites where tactical leaders could share their best practices as well as endeavoring to rewrite outdated doctrine with the help of civilian and qualified military intellectuals who searched history for the right lessons to be learned and applied towards successful COIN efforts. Summary Military organizations that value intellectual debate and learn from prior experiences on the battlefield will innovate and transform more effectively than those who do not. The Germans captured their experiences from World War I and ana-Acronym Quick-Scan BCT – brigade combat team COIN – counterinsurgency HBCT – heavy brigade combat team TTP – tactics, techniques and procedures XO – executive officer 42 lyzed them effectively. They kept proven practices like decentralized execution but adapted to accept new ideas when it came to maneuver and the rapid advances in armored and motorized warfare. The United States built an air naval power that contributed greatly to its success against the Japanese in World War II due to its tolerance of discussion and wargaming within its professional-education program at its most senior service college. This resulted in an established and modern aircraft-carrier fleet by the time of Pearl Harbor in December 1941. Lastly, the U. S. Army and Marine Corps used the modern Internet as a free exchange of ideas while intellectually driven leaders transformed COIN doctrine in as little as two years while the fight was still going on in. Transformation can be more effective and rapid if those involved will study and analyze their past, the likely enemy of the future and the latest technology when determining the organization, doctrine and training of its forces. LTC Charles W. Morrison is the executive officer to the adjutant general, North Carolina Guard, Joint Force Headquarters-North Carolina, Raleigh, NC. He previously served as XO, 1st Combat Aviation Brigade, 120th Infantry, 30th Heavy Brigade Combat Team, Forward Operating Base Mahmudiyah, Iraq; XO, Recruiting and Retention Command, North Carolina National Guard, Raleigh; and commander, Company C, 1st Battalion, 109th Infantry, Operation Iraqi Freedom, Iraq. In fact, he served twice with 30th HBCT, which was the only National Guard BCT to conduct two full-spectrum operations deployments to Iraq in 2004 and 2009. His military education includes the Infantry Captain’s Career Course, where he was on the commandant’s list, and Intermediate-Level Education. LTC Morrison holds a bachelor’s of arts degree in history from the University of North Carolina at Ashville and a master’s of arts degree in military studies (American Civil War) from American Military University. Notes 1 Wilson, Jeremy Wilson, editor, “Letter from T. E. Lawrence to B. H. Liddell-Hart, 26 June 1933,” T. E. Lawrence Studies Website funded by Castle Hill Press, 2008. 2 Rothenberg, Gunther E., “Moltke, Schlieffen and the Doctrine of Strategic Envelopment,” Makers of Modern Strategy, Peter Paret, editor, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986. 3 Serbu, Gabriel, CPT, “The Dangers of Anti-Intellectualism in Contemporary Western Armies,” Infantry, November-December 2010. 4 Murray, Williamson, “Armored warfare: the British, French and German experiences,” Military Innovation in the Interwar Period, Williamson Murray and Allan R. Millett, editors, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996. 5 Ibid. 6 Ibid. 7 Ibid. 8 Ibid. 9 Till, Geoffrey, “Adopting the Aircraft Carrier: The British, American and Japanese Case Studies,” Military Innovation in the Interwar Period, Williamson Murray and Allan R. Millett, editors, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996. 10 Watts, Barry, and Murray, Williamson, “Military Innovation in Peacetime,” Military Innovation in the Interwar Period, Williamson Murray and Allan R. Millett, editors, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996. 11 Jaffe, Greg, “Mid-Level Officers Show Enterprise Helping U. S. Reduce Violence in Iraq,” Wall Street Journal, Dec. 29, 2007. 12 The U. S. Army-Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007. 13 Nagel, John A., “Foreword to the University of Chicago Press Edition,” The U. S. Army-Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007.