Petraeus Helping Pick New Generals

**Shek** · 11-17-2007, 08:09 AM

This is news that the Army has chosen to strike forward in a direction that will ensure we have more dynamic general officers that have proven themselves capable of adapting to the COIN environment we face in Iraq and Afghanistan.

You can see this thread, Contrary Peter Principle, for a similar discussion.

Quote:

washingtonpost.com

Petraeus Helping Pick New Generals
Army Says Innovation Will Be Rewarded

By Ann Scott Tyson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, November 17, 2007; A01

The Army has summoned the top U.S. commander in Iraq back to Washington to preside over a board that will pick some of the next generation of Army leaders, an unusual decision that officials say represents a vote of confidence in Gen. David H. Petraeus's conduct of the war, as well as the Army counterinsurgency doctrine he helped rewrite.

The Army has long been criticized for rewarding conventional military thinking and experience in traditional combat operations, and current and former defense officials have pointed to Petraeus's involvement in the promotion board process this month as a sign of the Army's commitment to encouraging innovation and rewarding skills beyond the battlefield.

Some junior and midlevel officers who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan have been particularly outspoken in their criticisms, saying the Army's current leadership lacks a hands-on understanding of today's conflicts and has not listened to feedback from younger personnel.

"It's unprecedented for the commander of an active theater to be brought back to head something like a brigadier generals board," said retired Maj. Gen. Robert Scales, former head of the Army War College. A senior defense official said Petraeus is "far too high-profile for this to be a subtle thing."

The board, composed of 15 Army generals, will examine a pool of more than 1,000 colonels to select about 40 brigadier generals, expected to lead the service over the next decade or longer. Although each board member has an equal vote on the candidates, Petraeus will be able to guide the discussion.

Petraeus, a four-star general with a doctorate in political science, has spent three of the past four years in Iraq and has observed firsthand many of the colonels under consideration for promotion. He is well-regarded by military officials for his political skills in Iraq and at home, including winning support from a skeptical Congress for a U.S. troop increase in Iraq.

"Dave Petraeus in many ways is viewed as the archetype of what this new generation of senior leader is all about," Scales said, "a guy . . . who understands information operations, who can be effective on Capitol Hill, who can communicate with Iraqis, who understands the value of original thought, who has the ability through the power of his intellect to lead people to change."

The information revolution "is dramatically changing everything about the way we fight," said Lt. Col. John A. Nagl, an Army counterinsurgency expert. "These enemies cannot defeat us on the battlefield but are trying to sap the public will, so to win you need a very different kind of leader, someone who understands information and asymmetric warfare, and that sort of flexible, adaptive thinker is not necessarily the kind the training and education programs of the Army grow and the skill set we select for."

Petraeus's involvement coincides with the Army's consideration of initiatives to change its promotion system to reward a new generation of officers skilled in today's counterinsurgency warfare.

The Army is struggling to retain experienced younger officers -- recently offering $35,000 bonuses to captains -- who are leaving partly because of their extended deployments in war zones but also because they are alienated from leaders who lack their combat experience, Army officers say.

"There are some great captains and majors who have great insight into this type of warfare. They are not leaving because they don't have enough money; they are leaving because no one is listening to them. They don't trust the people above them," said an Army officer who served two tours in Iraq, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the record.

In a speech at a large Army conference last month, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates raised the need for holding onto young combat veterans and "reexamining assignments and promotion policies that in many cases are unchanged since the Cold War." Gates also stressed that the Army must retain lessons on irregular warfare from Iraq and Afghanistan -- lessons he said were learned but lost after the Vietnam War.

"All these so-called 'nontraditional' capabilities have moved into the mainstream of military thinking, planning and strategy -- where they must stay," he said. Gates later met with Army leaders and discussed promotion policies, according to Army officials.

One initiative would transform the way officers are selected for nontraditional but vital jobs such as leading the military training teams that are in growing demand in Iraq and Afghanistan. Key officers for those teams, which total roughly 7,100 personnel, would be chosen from the same lists as commanders of combat units -- placing the Army's new leaders in those jobs.

"Senior Army leaders are supportive of this idea, and the personnel system is taking a very close look at it," said Lt. Gen. William B. Caldwell IV, who is responsible for officer training as head of the Combined Arms Center at Fort Leavenworth, Kan. The training officers now volunteer or are assigned in an ad hoc manner, and many see the jobs as career detours, often resulting in weaker leaders for jobs that the Army now considers essential, several officials said.

Some officers have also advocated the creation of a permanent Army advisory corps to nurture a new type of leader. "The people who would gravitate toward service in an Army advisory corps would be the type of adaptive, flexible leader skilled in unconventional warfare," said Nagl, who is involved in training the military advisory teams.

Another initiative, favored by many young officers, would incorporate reviews by peers and subordinates into a rating system that now depends largely on ratings by superior officers; the idea is to make the system less hierarchical and prone to producing conformity. An Army task force is looking into incorporating such reviews, known as "360-degree evaluations," into the "officer efficiency reports" that are now completed only by superiors, said Col. Paul L. Aswell, chief of the Army's officer personnel division.

"Now the system is very risk-adverse because to advance in the officers corps, you really only need to make your senior rater happy," said the officer who served in Iraq. "There is every disincentive to challenging that senior officer's worldview. He has the power to stop you in your tracks."

Army Secretary Pete Geren, who was involved in choosing Petraeus to head the board, declined to comment on it but said the board was set to recess this week and give him its recommendations. Petraeus will return to Baghdad by early next week, officials said.

S-2 · 11-19-2007, 12:53 PM

I noted this when it hit a couple of weeks ago and somehow failed to comment.

First thought, particularly given that this is a BG selection board, was that the refs have thrown a "make-up" flag to correct the penalty call on McMaster...and maybe I'm right.

That would be the most narrow perspective of the implications behind Petraeus' recall for this task, however. It reaches further, by far.

We could see, if we've over-estimated Petraeus' talents but not his influence, a battle between traditionalists and an emerging "COIN mafia"- a dissembling internecine light-heavy redux under slightly different terms and conditions, but with the same dibilitating bureaucratic in-fighting that's accompanied these type seismic shifts in the past. A visible manifestation of this was the heavy-light track at IOBC some years ago, as example.

Hopefully, Petraeus' participation on this selection board goes far deeper than highlighting our pertinent but topical COIN emphasis-

1.) Acknowledging the need to sustain our conventional over-match capabilities AND be masters of unconventional warfare, we need general officers that are strategically attuned more than ever- with the requisite disparate command and educational experiences (both military and civilian post-graduate) coupled with demonstrated proficiencies in prioritized languages. Minimum.

2.) OIF has increasingly taken on the face of Petraeus. Probably no single officer in the U.S. Army has been so linked to this conflict. His involvement from division through MNFC-I command has been intimate. As such, I personally doubt that any officer knows as much about those men/women who are before the selection board. He knows of, or has worked with many (maybe most) at some point in his career-quite probably within the last four years.

3.) There is the benefit of a visible signal within D.A. of a ground-shift emphasis in the way we develop and select general officers by the appointment of Petraeus. Whether we are headed in the correct direction is undetermined. Without question, though, we aren't going to do business as before. Criterion will change. Change is good, in this case, even if misdirected. Wherever we're headed, the world is changing fast. So must our requirements for the selection of general officers coupled with new skill-sets for the rank.

Clearly, this will be an interesting board. What follows, though, will be even more important.

Stan187 · 11-19-2007, 15:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by S-2

Hopefully, Petraeus' participation on this selection board goes far deeper than highlighting our pertinent but topical COIN emphasis-

1.) Acknowledging the need to sustain our conventional over-match capabilities AND be masters of unconventional warfare, we need general officers that are strategically attuned more than ever- with the requisite disparate command and educational experiences (both military and civilian post-graduate) coupled with demonstrated proficiencies in prioritized languages. Minimum.

Where is the dividing line? When are we over-focusing on COIN and not preparing enough for future high-tempo ops? When are we not focusing on the current fight enough because we're maintaining capability for the next?

Bluesman · 11-19-2007, 15:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by S-2

I noted this when it hit a couple of weeks ago and somehow failed to comment.

First thought, particularly given that this is a BG selection board, was that the refs have thrown a "make-up" flag to correct the penalty call on McMaster...and maybe I'm right.

That would be the most narrow perspective of the implications behind Petraeus' recall for this task, however. It reaches further, by far.

We could see, if we've over-estimated Petraeus' talents but not his influence, a dissembling battle between traditionalists and an emerging "COIN mafia"- a dissembling internecine light-heavy redux under slightly different terms and conditions, but with the same dibilitating bureaucratic in-fighting that's accompanied these type seismic shifts in the past. A visible manifestation of this was the heavy-light track at IOBC some years ago, as example.

Hopefully, Petraeus' participation on this selection board goes far deeper than highlighting our pertinent but topical COIN emphasis-

1.) Acknowledging the need to sustain our conventional over-match capabilities AND be masters of unconventional warfare, we need general officers that are strategically attuned more than ever- with the requisite disparate command and educational experiences (both military and civilian post-graduate) coupled with demonstrated proficiencies in prioritized languages. Minimum.

2.) OIF has increasingly taken on the face of Petraeus. Probably no single officer in the U.S. Army has been so linked to this conflict. His involvement from division through MNFC-I command has been intimate. As such, I personally doubt that any officer knows as much about those men/women who are before the selection board. He knows of, or has worked with many (maybe most) at some point in his career-quite probably within the last four years.

3.) There is the benefit of a visible signal within D.A. of a ground-shift emphasis in the way we develop and select general officers by the appointment of Petraeus. Whether we are headed in the correct direction is undetermined. Without question, though, we aren't going to do business as before. Criterion will change. Change is good, in this case, even if misdirected. Wherever we're headed, the world is changing fast. So must our requirements for the selection of general officers coupled with new skill-sets for the rank.

Clearly, this will be an interesting board. What follows, though, will be even more important.

DAYUM, is this an example of what I've been ignoring?

GREAT post.

**Shek** · 11-19-2007, 16:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Stan187

Where is the dividing line? When are we over-focusing on COIN and not preparing enough for future high-tempo ops? When are we not focusing on the current fight enough because we're maintaining capability for the next?

Stan,

Remember, the officers under consideration for O-7 on this board grew up in the Army through battalion command before COIN even re-entered the vocabulary in 2004.

This shouldn't be seen as a COIN vs. high intensity decision, but rather a decision over who was mentally agile and adaptive enough to succeed in an environment for which their military training didn't necessarily prepare them for. It's like selecting a quarterback who can read the defense and then call audibles.

Blademaster · 11-20-2007, 00:35 AM

Why can't you have two types of armies? One in a conventional role and the other in a COIN role? That way you can call upon those two armies at any given time. I would make the regular Army a conventional type army and make the National Guard a COIN type army.

Stan187 · 11-20-2007, 05:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shek

Stan,

Remember, the officers under consideration for O-7 on this board grew up in the Army through battalion command before COIN even re-entered the vocabulary in 2004.

This shouldn't be seen as a COIN vs. high intensity decision, but rather a decision over who was mentally agile and adaptive enough to succeed in an environment for which their military training didn't necessarily prepare them for. It's like selecting a quarterback who can read the defense and then call audibles.

Sorry, that's not what I meant, though it came across that way because it is in this thread. I didn't mean in terms of promotion of these officers, I meant in general. What S-2 discussed raised separate questions from promotion.

Albany Rifles · 11-20-2007, 12:11 PM

Succesful combatant commanders, even in time of war, have traditionally (in recent decades, anyway) served on promotion boards for the US Army.

I don't see this as one side versus another. GEN Casey realizes that GEN Petraeus has both the conventional (check Rick Atkinson's "In The COmpany of Soldiers" a book on the 101 ABN DIV in OIF in 2003 whcih prominently figures Petraeus) and COIN expertise to evaluate the brigade commanders of the past several years.

I would like to know what the full composition of the board would is before I making any sweeping pronouncements vis-a-vis Hal McMasters' chances for promotion....but I do like Peter Mansoor's chances! (He would be a good choice, BTW). I loved his disertation.

http://warhistorian.org/wordpress/?p=670

S-2 · 11-20-2007, 14:27 PM

Buck,

I couldn't get the link opened!

Could ya check it?

Go Mountaineers

Albany Rifles · 11-20-2007, 14:34 PM

FOr some reason, it crapped out.

Keep trying. If I can get it to open I will post it here.

troung · 11-20-2007, 16:46 PM

Quote:

Why can't you have two types of armies? One in a conventional role and the other in a COIN role? That way you can call upon those two armies at any given time. I would make the regular Army a conventional type army and make the National Guard a COIN type army.

If one where to make two different armies, making the NG a conventional heavy army and the regular forces for overseas stability/king-maker work would make more sense. France uses the legion and their marines for external lighter work and the regular army (which during the Cold War was full of conscripts) for heavy operations. Its easier to move regular forces around to the shitholes of the world then reservists.

But making a distinction in the USA would cost A LOT and produce units that sit around and do nothing as one type of war is waged. Even then COIN operations say in Iraq require different composition of forces then say the Philippines.

Blademaster · 11-22-2007, 12:50 PM

US already has two types of armies, the US Army and the US Marines. It would serve US a lot better if the US Army takes the conventional role and leave the COIN to the Marines, leaving one MEU intact.

Stan187 · 11-23-2007, 04:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blademaster

US already has two types of armies, the US Army and the US Marines. It would serve US a lot better if the US Army takes the conventional role and leave the COIN to the Marines, leaving one MEU intact.

And who would do conventional amphibious operations?

Blademaster · 11-23-2007, 15:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Stan187

And who would do conventional amphibious operations?

The one MEU would be capable of conventional amphibious operations.

Adux · 11-23-2007, 15:54 PM

Indian Paramilitaries are said to be very effective in COIN operations, what is their US equivalent.

11-19-2007, 12:53 PM	#2 (permalink)
S-2 *Military Professional* Join Date: 09-11-06 Location: Portland, Oregon Posts: 2,105 Country:	Shek Reply I noted this when it hit a couple of weeks ago and somehow failed to comment. First thought, particularly given that this is a BG selection board, was that the refs have thrown a "make-up" flag to correct the penalty call on McMaster...and maybe I'm right. That would be the most narrow perspective of the implications behind Petraeus' recall for this task, however. It reaches further, by far. We could see, if we've over-estimated Petraeus' talents but not his influence, a battle between traditionalists and an emerging "COIN mafia"- a dissembling internecine light-heavy redux under slightly different terms and conditions, but with the same dibilitating bureaucratic in-fighting that's accompanied these type seismic shifts in the past. A visible manifestation of this was the heavy-light track at IOBC some years ago, as example. Hopefully, Petraeus' participation on this selection board goes far deeper than highlighting our pertinent but topical COIN emphasis- 1.) Acknowledging the need to sustain our conventional over-match capabilities AND be masters of unconventional warfare, we need general officers that are strategically attuned more than ever- with the requisite disparate command and educational experiences (both military and civilian post-graduate) coupled with demonstrated proficiencies in prioritized languages. Minimum. 2.) OIF has increasingly taken on the face of Petraeus. Probably no single officer in the U.S. Army has been so linked to this conflict. His involvement from division through MNFC-I command has been intimate. As such, I personally doubt that any officer knows as much about those men/women who are before the selection board. He knows of, or has worked with many (maybe most) at some point in his career-quite probably within the last four years. 3.) There is the benefit of a visible signal within D.A. of a ground-shift emphasis in the way we develop and select general officers by the appointment of Petraeus. Whether we are headed in the correct direction is undetermined. Without question, though, we aren't going to do business as before. Criterion will change. Change is good, in this case, even if misdirected. Wherever we're headed, the world is changing fast. So must our requirements for the selection of general officers coupled with new skill-sets for the rank. Clearly, this will be an interesting board. What follows, though, will be even more important. __________________ "This aggression will not stand, man!" Jeff Lebowski Last edited by S-2 : 11-19-2007 at 16:48 PM.

11-20-2007, 12:11 PM	#8 (permalink)
Albany Rifles *Defense Professional* *Military Professional* Join Date: 04-27-07 Location: Prince George, VA Posts: 1,013 Country:	Not surprising Succesful combatant commanders, even in time of war, have traditionally (in recent decades, anyway) served on promotion boards for the US Army. I don't see this as one side versus another. GEN Casey realizes that GEN Petraeus has both the conventional (check Rick Atkinson's "In The COmpany of Soldiers" a book on the 101 ABN DIV in OIF in 2003 whcih prominently figures Petraeus) and COIN expertise to evaluate the brigade commanders of the past several years. I would like to know what the full composition of the board would is before I making any sweeping pronouncements vis-a-vis Hal McMasters' chances for promotion....but I do like Peter Mansoor's chances! (He would be a good choice, BTW). I loved his disertation. http://warhistorian.org/wordpress/?p=670 __________________ "Always with the negative waves Moriarty, always with the negative waves." TSGT Oddball, Tank Commander

11-20-2007, 14:27 PM	#9 (permalink)
S-2 *Military Professional* Join Date: 09-11-06 Location: Portland, Oregon Posts: 2,105 Country:	A.R. Reply Buck, I couldn't get the link opened! Could ya check it? Go Mountaineers

11-20-2007, 14:34 PM	#10 (permalink)
Albany Rifles *Defense Professional* *Military Professional* Join Date: 04-27-07 Location: Prince George, VA Posts: 1,013 Country:	Deuce FOr some reason, it crapped out. Keep trying. If I can get it to open I will post it here.

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11-20-2007, 00:35 AM	#6 (permalink)
Blademaster Military Enthusiast *Senior Contributor* Join Date: 08-15-03 Posts: 3,045	Why can't you have two types of armies? One in a conventional role and the other in a COIN role? That way you can call upon those two armies at any given time. I would make the regular Army a conventional type army and make the National Guard a COIN type army.

11-22-2007, 12:50 PM	#12 (permalink)
Blademaster Military Enthusiast *Senior Contributor* Join Date: 08-15-03 Posts: 3,045	US already has two types of armies, the US Army and the US Marines. It would serve US a lot better if the US Army takes the conventional role and leave the COIN to the Marines, leaving one MEU intact.

11-23-2007, 15:54 PM	#15 (permalink)
Adux Banished Join Date: 07-29-05 Location: Cochin Posts: 2,931 Country:	Indian Paramilitaries are said to be very effective in COIN operations, what is their US equivalent.

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