"Military Adaptation in War" Topic

Military Adaptation in War

"This paper was prepared for the Director, Net Assessment, Office of the Secretary of Defense, under task order BB-8-1836, Military Adaptation in War. It addresses the task
objective of identifying possible parameters that history suggests about the cultures and processes of past military institutions that have either successfully adapted to combat or that have had difficulties in combat adaptation.
The historical "lessons learned" analysis will then be used to suggest how U.S. military forces may think about adapting to tactical and operational asymmetries that its opponents will pose in the twenty-first century. The paper benefited from the review comments of the following research staff members at the Institute for Defense Analyses
: Karl H. Lowe, James H. Kurtz, Richard H. Sinnreich, and James G. Lacey."

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Interesting… yet, he seems to miss a great adaption during the Marne Campaign when French High Command realized their offensive tactics were not working, and quickly adapted their tactics leading to victory in the Campaign.

JAS

The sections on pre- and on WW1 itself are very poor IMHO. The author has no appreciation for the massive changes that took place. Learning was systematised throughout all of the armies on the Western Front, not just the German Great General Staff.

With respect to the Marne, the victory resulted from changes to the operational plan rather than changes in tactics per se, IMHO. You can still find many examples of inadequate French tactics during the Marne campaign but the decisive advantage lay in the positioning of major bodies of troops. For example the French Sixth Army pinned von Kluck's First Army thereby enabling the BEF to penetrate into the gap between the German First and Second Armies.

Robert