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Return to Article: Gates tells military services to prepare for unconventional wars

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  Mr Gates' background in SAC and particularly in intelligence is sorely needed right now to understand basic principles of military discipline (a la Lemay) and to understand the imperceptible complexity of modern warfare and potential adversaries. SAC was the victim of Gen McPeak's fighter mentality and long-standing jealousy of the USAF's premier force. At the time of it's demise, and just prior to Desert Shield/Storm, SAC had already implemented conventional warfare doctrine and had been conducting Conventional Operational Readiness Insepctions (CORIs) for two years. At the time, all the SAC weapons systems had already incorporated conventional warfare readiness go/no-go standards. I'm hoping the Lemay discipline mindset of old and the short-lived innovativeness of late 1980's SAC will be resurrected by searching the ranks for the remnanats of those days...picking will be slim.

  Rich Hasse Posted June 6, 2008 10:02 AM
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  I see a reacurring problem with what our so called experts say is the future fights. I seen this my whole carrier and still see it . we are more reactive than proactive. Their are still countries out their with large heavy units, as well as large specops .add that with insurgents and terrorist you have a force to deal with and you are only able to do one thing at a time.A true supper power and a trully ready military shoud be capable of fighting any conflict any size any where we are a long way from that. And the thoushands of troops I work with in IRaq, here, or other training sites even see this,and it bothers them. Mr. gates is close to being right but he and the others as we were told in 90 and 91:we can only see what is directly in front of us. Things change We need to be prepaired and our military needs to be able to respond to any possibility.

  Randy Cline Posted April 23, 2008 2:35 PM
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  Mr. Doane's comments were right on. The best way to optomize the potential for success, be it in competitive sports or war, is to correctly identify your opponants weakness and strike there. If we diminish our conventional warfighting capabilities, that will become our weakness. The only advantage we'd have is that it would take an highly organized effort to attack us in a conventional war and our intelligence network should be able to pick that up. Meanwhile, why not let senior enlisted or WO's fly the drones? It's more cost effective that having an O-4 or O-5 doing it.

  Gene Simmons Posted April 23, 2008 1:38 PM
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  Having recently retired from the Air Force I tell you they still train and fight like the Cold War is still going on. My last trip to Iraq was a great example of how the Air Force is not working with the other services. Prior to the deployment we completed an Operational Inspection; none of the systems and codes that we were inspected on was used by the other services in Iraq. So we basically hit the ground lost, trying to figure out the "system" while taking rocket fire. The Air Force needs to open its eyes and join the rest of the services in this asymmetrical thinking.

  JW Posted April 23, 2008 10:59 AM
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  In 1979, the USMC was forecasting what we were calling asymmetrical warfare and defined as in this article. Col Wyle and Gen Van Riper were lead proponents. I was in Amphibious Warfare School at the time and the doctrine continued to mature over the years. The major problem in all this is in funding as it always has been. We spend more money on those things that are least likely than those that are of the greatest likely hood; though for good reasons. Preparing for threats such as nuclear war and or war with another industrial nation is expensive, requires massive preparation, and a credible response capability. The new and real added dimension to warfare is cyber space - preparing for this will also be a sucking chest wound for budget planners and resource allocations. You can't ignore such vulnerabilities. At the same time, small asymmetrical conflicts remain the most likely scenario.

  A national strategy should consider the power that DARPA and other research agencies bring to bear. An approach that is fiscally sound balancing the right about of development with the right amount of fielding. I may not need 120 B-2 bombers whose obsolesce will come. I may need only 12. Having rolling technology with rolling fielding makes since. We still have B-52 technology with B-2 technology. Someday we may have B-52, B-2, B-3, B-4, etc. technologies to employ each with capabilities and limitations. It is how we integrate the battlespace with bleeding edge, leading edge, current, and legacy technologies that will make the difference.

  Stanley J. Stolpe Posted April 23, 2008 10:12 AM
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  This is exactly what needs to be said. Doing end runs around our national needs on behalf of defense contractors is something that is done often and shamelessly. Even beneficial organizations like the National Guard Association should reconsider endorsing the push for C-17 funding. Taking care of the National Guard membership does not include defining national mission needs.

  CW4 Randy Jones Posted April 23, 2008 9:39 AM
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  The current 1st world militaries are not capable of fighting unconventional wars because they have to follow the rules-of-war. For example, last week (or 2 weeks ago? ) that French-flagged cruise yacht was taken over by pirates off Somalia. After paying a ransom, the pirates decided to "run for it". The French military was incapable of terminating ( oh I mean killing the pirates ) the pirates instead they arrested them. They are being held over for charges in some court. Well, my friends, in the good old days, the pirates would be captured. They would be sliced and thrown over board for the sharks to eat them. Look up the concept in our Constitution about Letters of Marque. Do you think the Congress would ever allow a U.S. citizen possessing a Congressional Letter of Marque? You know the answer to that one!!

  ol' Air Force doc Posted April 23, 2008 9:20 AM
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  Another short-sighted idiot like Robert S. McNamara. Does Mr. Gates think that the countries that DO have conventional forces will just roll over and play dead when the United States no longer has a military capable of conventional warfare? Regardless of the honeyed words our "leaders" hear when they visit countries that have been enemies in the past, most of the world considers the U.S. to be the 'schoolyard bully'. We DO need to develop an unconventional warfare capability, but we definitely should NOT give up our conventional warfare superiority. Without that capability that Mr. Gates says we don't need, we wouldn't HAVE that control of the skies. History teaches that the country that does not maintain a defense capable of countering ALL enemies is doomed to destruction at their hands. It took almost 20 years to recover from McNamara's insistence that we only needed missiles to protect our country. Isn't it time our "leaders" stopped looking at only one aspect and started considering all aspects of defense?

  Larry R. Doane Posted April 23, 2008 8:45 AM