©2011
Posterity Press
|
|
|
|
One More Bridge to Cross: Lowering The Cost of War
John Poole’s immensely influential previous book, The Last Hundred Yards: The NCO’s Contribution to Warfare, filled a gaping hole in Marine Corps literature. It gave Marines, for the first time, a book about modern combat techniques. This book, One More Bridge to Cross, is in effect a prequel to The Last Hundred Yards. It places the combat techniques offered in the first book in a larger context. That context is saving lives. Nothing hits Marines harder than the death of another Marine. The tightly bound nature of the Marine “band of brothers” ensures that every casualty is felt personally by every other Marine. It is not merely for tradition’s sake that Marines always recover their dead. Even in death, a Marine is still a Marine, and he is not abandoned to the enemy. John Poole’s work, in this book and in its predecessor, can do a great deal to save Marine lives. The combat techniques and training methods he offers are greatly advanced over those in the official Marine Corps technique manuals. Sadly, the latter often reflect a battlefield devoid of both machineguns and indirect artillery fire. One former Marine officer, now a noted military historian, told me the techniques he learned at The Basic School in the 1980’s were straight from the Russo-Japanese War of 1905. I have observed the same myself in Marine Corps field exercises, including on-line attacks similar to the Somme, defenses fully visible to enemy observation and thus doomed to be artillery targets, even on one occasion an attack by a company in column. The only things missing were the shakos [plumed dress hats] and white crossbelts. But it is not only Marine lives John Poole is concerned about. He wants Marines to wage war in such a way as to spare enemy lives as well, military and civilian. Some may view this as unmilitary softness. In fact, it reflects a profound understanding of the art of war. Colonel John Boyd, the greatest American military theorist of the 20th century, observed that war is waged at three levels: the physical, the mental and the moral. The physical level — killing people and blowing things up — is the least powerful level. The mental level, where maneuver warfare is largely waged — getting inside the other guy’s head — is more powerful than the physical. But the moral level is the most powerful level of all. It is here that guerrilla war is waged, and it is here that sparing enemy lives can pay great dividends. An enemy whose homes are bombed, families killed and soldiers slaughtered gets angry. He wants revenge. The conflict becomes a blood feud, and it cannot be settled until our blood is spilled along with his. In contrast, a war of maneuver that is relatively bloodless makes peace easier. After the 1940 campaign, the Germans found the French population [to be] largely indifferent and seldom hostile. Part of the reason is that the German Blitzkrieg inflicted little physical damage on France. In contrast, the Allied campaign to retake France in 1944, with its typical American emphasis on bombing and mass firepower, inflicted tremendous damage. Not infrequently, German troops had to protect shot-down Allied aircrews from enraged French civilians — a point which German propaganda used to good effect. In this book, the theme of saving lives has an important subtext: a small unit, a squad or even a fire team, that is properly trained in modern, post-machinegun techniques can be just as effective as a much larger unit, while offering the enemy fewer targets. The German Army, which excelled in drawing lessons from its combat experiences, found as early as World War I that the only difference between a squad attacking a machinegun position and a company doing so was in the number of casualties suffered. Not surprisingly, by 1918 the Stosstrupp, a squad-sized unit, was the basic German tactical building block. In contrast, in most Marine infantry units today, the squad is regarded as merely a subset of the platoon, seldom trained for independent action. The result, in combat, is likely to be a lot of dead Marines, Marines whose deaths could have been avoided if tasks were assigned to smaller units. Those who read One More Bridge to Cross merely to discover more combat or training techniques will have missed the point. This is a book about something more, about waging war morally. The God of battles respects those who in turn respect His laws. He also favors those who fight smart. On both counts, John Poole has done the Marine Corps an immense service. — William S. Lind (author of Maneuver Warfare Handbook and personal advisor to 29th Marine commandant) On a foggy September morning in 1944, 35,000 proud young paratroopers departed Britain on the largest airborne invasion ever attempted: Operation “Market-Garden.” Three divisions — the U.S. 82nd and 101st, and the British 1st — were to overleap enemy forces retreating across Holland, secure a string of bridges leading into Germany, be reinforced by British XXX Corps armor, and thereby outflank Hitler’s Westwall. The 82nd had, as its most difficult objective, the bridge over the Waal River at Nijmegen. Before that bridge was finally taken, elements of the American 504th Infantry Regiment had to move across open ground (and water) into enemy machinegun fire more than once.1 Those brave soldiers paid a terrible price for the Nijmegen bridge, but to understand what happened there and in other battles, one must look beyond casualty approximation comparisons. After PVT Billy Yank and SGT Johnny Reb succumbed to their horrific gunshot wounds in Holland, their parents in Elyria, Ohio and Flat Rock, Alabama could do little more than attribute their tragic loss to “the necessary evils of war.” But after almost 100 elite U.S. soldiers got killed or wounded by Somali irregulars in a single incident in 1993, American mothers and fathers started to wonder if their offspring had been taught enough about close combat. They didn't totally buy into the military’s explanation that too few U.S. tanks had been sent to Mogadishu. They prayed that the U.S. military-industrial complex had remembered to show its infantrymen how to operate without a lot of expensive ordnance. After all, neither the North Koreans nor the North Vietnamese had needed any tanks or planes whatsoever to fight the world’s most technologically advanced nation to a standstill. Far from naive, U.S. parents suspected that an overwhelming edge in firepower could pave the way for infantry only in the desert. Could there be one more bridge to cross — possibly in the realm of small-unit training or tactics — before “the world’s smartest” fighting force will be able to occupy enemy territory without extensive loss of life? Of course, everyone’s dream is an end to war altogether. That goal can only be realized incrementally; the chasm between “total war” and “no war” is too wide. First, the common ground between war and morality must be found. Both sides generally have rules to protect prisoners and noncombatants, yet their soldiers still commit atrocities. Partially to blame is man’s wounded nature.2 His flaws must be controlled, but not to the extent that his divine spark is extinguished. What society must guard against is organized inhumanity in the name of expediency. In most religions, there is the belief that God offers man the strength to resist temptation. Just as individuals struggle to do the right thing, so too do military organizations and government agencies. It is those individuals, organizations, and agencies that view internal discord as disruptive that are the most likely to err. This book is about preserving this country’s most valued asset — its youth. A great president once warned of the only real threat to America.
from “Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions” If Lincoln were alive today, which would concern him more — evolving standards of behavior and political dissent, or misplaced corporate priorities and inept government bureaucracy? Do not the major political parties base their platforms on monitoring either big business or government? As the battlefield continues to change, must not the U.S. military seek out new ways to cut its losses — in both life and morality? Without realizing that opposing styles of warfare exist, military planners could misinterpret the lessons of history. If America is to continue as the world’s peacekeeper, its soldiers and small infantry units must learn how to handle opposition like policemen do — with minimal force. Most of the credit for this work must again go to the United States Marine Corps. From May 1997 through May 1999, commanders of one school, fourteen infantry, three combat-support, and four combat-service-support battalions allowed the author to conduct multiday training sessions on the warfighting methods contained in The Last Hundred Yards: The NCO’s Contribution to Warfare — a U.S. small-unit tactics manual supplement. Every participant helped to develop the paradoxical training methodology contained herein. Those trips would not have been possible without funding from the Marine Corps University Foundation. Thanks also to Bill Lind and all U.S. service personnel who continue to push for military reform. Words can’t adequately express the author’s admiration for those who personally participated in the battles discussed in this book. It is their integrity, courage, and common sense that must be preserved for posterity. Semper fidelis. |
|
|
