I think that we need to take a step back here and answer the question asked and not answering what we wanted the question to be.

By far and large the military is meeting the challenges placed upon it. From force projection (ie deploying the surge to Afghanistan while simultaneously drawing down in Iraq) to power projection (anti piracy off of the horn of Africa to the support we are providing to South Korea). From kinetics (direct fire engagements supported by combined and joint fires) to non-kinetic contingencies (Haiti & Thailand) the military is doing what it is tasked and trained to do.

Where the "failures" are coming into play is in those points where a purely military response is not sufficient to the task at hand. The ackowledgment of need for whole of government approach is creating this issue. As the largest agency with the most fiscal flexibility and operational reach the military has been tasked with taking the lead. This means that the Generals that have been trained and selected based upon their military competencies (fight and win America's wars) are being graded on a skill set that they have not been required, or encouraged, to build (develop a nations economy, infrastructure, and political system). These failures have been focused on the 4 star level primarily as this is when the generals transition from "General" to "Viceroy".

This desire to create military "viceroys" is a natural outgrowth from the combatant command system. Instead of attempting to change the entire military to create up to a few 4 stars it might be better to instead change, and empower, the other elements of the USG. Specifically, instead of having a general as the head of a combatant command or COIN expedition place a civilian with the title commander. This would enforce unity of effort and unit of command. This civilian would have be trained, educated, and selected based upon his/her expertise in diplomacy, economics, etc and would have the ability to do what needs to be done. This could be an ambassador or a political appointee. The fact that GEN P is a statistical outlier does not mean that the rest of GEN officer corps is incompetent at their jobs. Only that he is competent in areas outside of his traditional role.

There is not so much a failure in our generals as much as it is a failure for our government to appoint the appropriate person with the appropriate skill set to accomplish the mission.

IRR, yours is one of the best discussions of this subject which I have read. And as far as the 'warrior ethos' goes it is not only anti-intellectual but counter-productive in producing an almost moronic reaction to stress and change.

To paraphrase Chales Moskos, the best recruiter is someone with a credible service experience that the recruit/applicant can relate to.

How do you begin effectively recruiting in a place like NYC when you barely have any officers from there and haven't really tried to recruit there since the 70's? This question only begins to illuminate the problem the Army faces. This issue cuts across all commissioning sources. In 2007 or 2008, only 5 NYC residents graduated from West Point. Five - from a city with a population greater than Virginia or Georgia. Could you imagine only 5 USMA grads a year from VA or GA? Of course not. When NYC is involved, no one even bothers to ask if this is unacceptable - let alone do actually do something about it.

The Army doesn't have the credible "sales force" to recruit the best. The USMC does and their OSO program is a model of how we need to be adjust our business practices. The Army needs to identify young officers who have the personality and background to recruit the best. The young CPT from Ft. Drum featured on the Front Page of the NY Times last Sunday - a Yale and OCS graduate - is the kind of person we need to be sending out to do this necessary work.

A compelling argument for the Army can be made to those with "options." I know of which I speak as I did this as an Army Medical Department Recruiter in NYC (who also dabbled in OCS awareness). It's not impossible. You need the right people. You would be amazed at the dialogue you can have when someone with a latent interest in service finds out that 1) they can relate to you; and 2) you have some knowledge of where they're coming from. Without these elements you only wind up with the "converted" (very small pool) or the "desperate."

I appreciate IRR's discussion of recruiting, and don't disagree with what he says. What he says, though, applies to people who won't be up for general's stars until about 2030 or 2035. In the meantime....

We have now a large number of Army and Marine officers with combat experience, surely the most relevant kind if we're looking for future generals who might help us win a war. So how does their experience weigh in the services' respective promotion systems? Ideally, captains and colonels who have excelled in the field would have a big edge with respect to future promotions for that reason. Do they at this time? Will they in the future?

Junior officers experiencing low level combat while trying to understand and implement a confusing COIN doctrine may end up with practical experience that is not very helpful in a different type of war scenario. We may end up with a corps of COIN officers who are at sea when it comes to conventional combined arms?

The biggest problem has little to do with recruiting, the recruiting is mostly political with "Goals" set by whoever is in charge at the moment-for instance, "Goals" for Officers are largely based on each service, usually they represent a goal similar to a targeted minority group or for females. The Navy for instance has a "goal" of 15% going up to 20% for females and even more so for Black due to the low proportion of Black Officers in the Navy vs their representation in the General Populace. So while recruiting is a problem due to what drives it (politics), I really do not think it matters as much as training and time in an area. I do not care who your recruit, you can train them to be at least a mediocre leader, it would be great if we only got studs but you can still get by with pack horses too if you train them right.

Training, outside of the USMC, it is a bit of joke and mostly based on the business model and while it produces great managers, it does not produce warfighters and very few leaders. The focus is on business type "Command Philosophy", "Command Mission", etc...all of which are rarely paid attention to, hardly ever taken seriously and really are just platitudes like "Be the best (Insert unit here) Operators in the world", a total joke but that is what the training produces once these guys reach 05. The SEAL Teams have even swallowed this Kool Aid, taken from the Army, with "The SEAL Creed" and other silliness that is mandatory and placed all over the commands.

The biggest problem after training and focus is the placement, each officer is in a position for a max of 24 months. 24 months is NOT enough time to know what you are doing and be good at it at the Batt., Regiment, etc...level and the 2 year punch becomes just that-a ticket punch. Assignments need to be longer and the combat arms need to be put ahead of the support units for promotions, not promotions within a service arm, ie; if only 5 06's are to be made per year the Combat Arms should get the priority. The whole personnel system is a joke and only produces people who will go to a spot, a program or a unit to "punch their ticket" not to lead and be a warfighter.

ERIC_STRATTONIII, I have no problem with your analysis. You certainly know the inside far better than me. I think what IRR and I were discussing was the larger picture of getting higher quality people to come into the armed services as officers. Seems to me that the services would want academically accomplished people of good character who otherwise would go into other demanding civilian careers. As IRR said that does not seem to be happening particularly for the Army. While serving my tour of duty on Wall Street I ran into numbers of talented young people who possessed brilliant minds and who excelled in college athletics at top tier schools, precisely the kind of person one would think the armed forces would desperately want.

Your point about the quality and intensity of training and serving sufficient time in one billet or another is very valid. I might mention and you know better than I that SEAL’s don’t train like the Army, from what I can tell from my venue they don’t do anything like the Army. They may have those silly ‘warrior’ creeds and other bullshit all over the place but they actually go out and bust their butts training. No Marine even goes through what they do particularly on their visits to Niland.

The point is that ALL groups, except the USMC, have adopted some of the less savory methods of training officers from the Big Navy and the Army, platitudes are all over the place now. As for the recruitment, it would be nice to get the best and the brightest but the best and brightest do not always make the best leaders either, there is not a really good method for recruiting someone who has the intangibles to be a good leader. There is however a good way to train and mentor someone to become a good leader, this is the where we are really lacking-short assignments, business models for training O's, etc..
Also, keep in mind, once your boy is out of the JO ranks, the stuff I am talking about will start to be more the norm for him, once he hits the senior O4 or junior 05 Ranks that is where these things will become the problem as far as training and assignment of our Officer Corps.

I guess to address about training like the Army, no, the NavSOF does CURRENTLY not train like the Army but once you have an Officer Corps that is removed from the Operational Level after 3-4 Operational Deployments and who work more and more with Army SOF groups and start to adopt some their ideas and habits for big picture stuff from the Army and/or Big Navy even, those things influence how they think training for NavSOF should go and what is important. Look to the dropping of 5 weeks off of BUD/S now in order to get more numbers of graduates for an example. You don't kill a frog by throwing him into a pot of boiling water, you put him in a pot of cool water and slowly heat it up till it is too late to hop out ;)

Paul,

You raise some great points. Recent college grads and law students/grads are but two audiences who are ready and willing to hear a compelling pitch for officership - if, and only if - it is conducted properly with the right pitch. "Cutting and pasting" the "Army Strong" ad campaign won't cut it with these folks.

Without exaggeration, the increased reliance on OCS as a source of officers and the economy, are providing the Army with a once-every-half-century chance to fundamentally shift who and how it recruits and selects its officers. Really, this is a golden moment and, thus, far, the Army has completely blown it. The USMC has not.

Law students/grads are certainly eligible to enlist for OCS. I've seen an uptick in attorneys at www.armyocs.com. Unless an individual is passionate about "law" (very few are), I almost always suggest they consider regular OCS and service as a basic branch officer: 1) the service commitment is a full year shorter than JAG, 2) the accessions bonuses are better; and 3) service as an officer in the Signal Corps, Corps of Engineers or Military Police (among others), provides one with tangible leadership experience and is a great platform to "recareer" after discharge.

You are correct, the Army is completely missing these recruiting sources and in the rare instances where it does engage them, it does so ineptly that it casts the service in a less-than-flattering light (e.g. SGTs with a HS Diploma/GED sent to recruit on selective campuses; or recruiters in rumpled field uniforms at events where everyone else is wearing a suit).

I cannot tell you how impressed I am with the increasing caliber of 20 and 30-somethings visiting ArmyOCS.com. Great degrees, impressive work experience, extensive foreign travel and language skills. These are precisely the people we need in our officer corps. Unfortunately, we're only getting through to the small fraction who are already "100% sold" on the idea or those who have great patience in navigating a truly dysfunctional officer recruiting system that often seems designed to discourage those with "options" from pursuing an Army commission.

Again, this is a once-every-fifty-years opportunity. I hope that the Army commits to catching this opportunity before it is too late. Army OCS "College option" is a fantastic deal - Great pay, great experience, a three year service commitment (training, a deployment, and a few months after return to the next phase in life, and the wonderful new GI Bill that can provide a top-notch graduate education for nothing or close to nothing (e.g. Dartmouth for free).

Again, sorry, but it is not recruiting that is the problem, it is training, mentoring and assignments.
I would look at my previous posts and our previous discussions on this topic, you can recruit from MIT, Harvard, etc...all day long it does not mean you will get good Officers, the Army trains managers, not leaders and not warfighters, the same can be said of all the services, with the USMC being the possible exception. How then does the Marine Corps continue to produce good leaders compared to the Army and in my opinion the Navy? It comes down to training and mission focus. The USMC is still hampered by our personnel system and could be improved upon but they do a good job of making leaders, not just managers, which is what the rest of the services seem to do.

Eric,

I think you are fundamentally misstating what I am trying to say.

My point is simple: The military's decision (except the USMC) to essentially write off vast swaths of the country as a source of future leaders is problematic and will make a bad situation worse. I'm not just talking about "MIT" or "Harvard", I'm talking about CUNY, SUNY and Central Connecticut as well. These resource allocation decisions have screwed everyone - first generation Americans at state colleges and the prep school set alike.

The interesting thing is that you readily concede the USMC has it the most "right" as far as leader development goes. Is it any coincidence that the USMC employs an officer outreach/recruiting strategy almost identical to the one I advocate? I'm not trying to say I have all the answers, but there would seem to be some merit in the Army aligning its leader recruitment efforts to those areas where other government agencies, the private sector and even the USMC have had demonstrated success in recruiting solid leader talent.

Look at the campuses Army ROTC chooses to focus on. Who actively goes to Valley Forge Military College or the New Mexico Military Institute (2 year military junior colleges) to recruit future strategic leaders? Think about that one.

The point about "MIT" and "Harvard" was the I really do not think recruiting matters as much as training. The reason the USMC does such a good job is due to their focus on combat and combat leadership, all the other services focus on management and look to a business model, very different approaches to the problem vs the USMC.
While throwing the net a bit further is not a bad idea and I agree, the Northeast especially is lacking for good programs (again, we have talked about this before), in the end, recruitment is really only a tiny part of the battle. Their is no barometer to tell you who will be the best combat leader, often those things that make a good combat leader are intangible or learned over time and matter not as much about your background, education, socio-economic status, etc...they matter more about how you were trained and mentored.
If you truly want to train the Officer Corps of tomorrow, revamp the personnel system, the branch system in the Army (All should be trained as infantry first like the Marines) and most importantly-focus leadership training on leadership and not management. Base the training on the Military Culture, not the Business culture. A CEO loses money, a CO loses lives.

1. Attributing flaws in general officers to failures in recruiting is a copout, as though the intervening two decades of experience, training, and grooming - how the recruit was raised - are less than primary determinants. Silly.

2. ICAF is one of the 5 senior service colleges.

3. Concur your basic commend commending jointness etc. SSC is where those bound for flag rank best (and perhaps first) come into close contact with the people and topics they will need to engage if moved up.

4. Cold War days were not glory so much as hard, grinding work. The neat thing about winning a war: you don't have to 'return.' How're those Iraq and Afghanistan things working out?

Really?
While I agree with your points about training being more important than recruitment and think recruiting has little to do with anything but numbers, acting like you "Fought" in a war is a bit much. The Cold War was just that-Cold, hardly a shot fired. Also, Vietnam and Korea were hardly stunning examples of either your Cold War era leadership or your Draft Military that you seem to think would do a much better job. Also, I would not say we are all done with Russia quite yet.

Irrelevant...we can sum up all your posts with "The Army lost, get rid of the all volunteer force"
What you miss in your analysis is that to offset the political aspects of having an all volunteer force, the U.S. Military can not sustain itself without the Reserve or National Guard. This was a system put in place by leaders such as coin Powell. A large part of the sustainment structure, as well as combat units reside in the Reserve and Guard respectivly.
The decision to leave either Vietnam, Iraq, or Afghnistan is a political decision, not really influenced by wheather it is an AVF or a draft military. You make the campaign promise to leave, that is what you do.
The "experience" you have is in a draft military, and in the Navy, hence your propensity to say that what you did and experinced is what would work.

You implied you "fought" and those of who came up in those days were involved too, so stop the grasp at glory, the might cut it "Proceedings" but not in real life. (Yes, I have read some of your articles)
Also, speaking of history you never offer anything constructive or point on how a miracle save for all of us the draft Military would somehow be? Why? Just because it would force Americans to somehow rebel and get us out of OEF and OIF? That seems to be your reasoning and not a good one I might add. As for any other benefit, there is none really, with the exception of the possible re-connect of the Civilian-Military Culture. As to the Army being jacked up and you singing the praises of the Navy a lot, go look at your history again Ducky, that is what it is-History. The Navy is just as bad at the top for leadership, I will even give you the benefit of the doubt and say back in your day it may have been a lot more professional and well lead-it is a total joke now, not a combat leader in the fleet have I met. The CNO is scary PC, really they are all Pols with Uniforms and who are trained on the business model, not trained for combat. They have VBSS teams (Go look it up Ducky ;) ) go on board without rounds in the chamber, most of the crew are hardly cross trained in other ratings, Damage Control is not a priority for all members, it has become a specialty, and Sailors initial training is horrible compared to how it was just 15 years ago. Heck, even the Navy complains about it! The Navy Times even wrote articles last year covering that topic and how ill prepared the kids were when they go to the fleet after boot and A school. So while the Army has a lot of problems, the Navy is just as bad and is mostly run by guys who are good Politicians that happen to be in a uniform. Outside of NSW and a few Expeditionary Commands there are no combat leaders in the Navy.
Sorry Ducky, I am not sure exactly how the Navy was in your day but the Navy of today is a PC joke lead by guys whose leadership is based on the business model and career enhancements.

The Navy still gets a highly educated recruit for the most part, far more so than the WWII era recruits and you are also being selective-WWI, Korea, Vietnam, heck, even the Civil War were full of conscripts, how did some of the leadership work out then? Mass assaults in WWI and the Civil War, on line fighting with the introduction or repeating rifles, the mini ball, etc...it all goes back to how are leaders who make the choices on how the troops are trained and prepared are they themselves trained and prepared. The Draft Military did well in WWII dues to one thing-focus on combat leadership, ie; get the war won, now we focus on "Don't rock the boat" and "Keep the people in office happy and you will retire a 4 star".
Training is and always will be the key, recruiting is a tiny part of the problem as I have stated several times in previous posts. Train, Mentor and reward good leaders. The USMC is also an AVF branch and manage to maintain training standards, esprit de corps and have, IMHO, the best officer corps by far. So, tell me, would a draft somehow changes the training and leadership of the Navy, AF or Army? I think not and this whole hope that a draft military would save the day seems a bit much to me. I have said again and again the only benefits that a draft military would have-
a possible reconnect between the civilian culture and military culture (something I am not sure I want) and there would be a more broad distribution of the burden, both the rich and the poor would be forced to join that way, now the burden is carried by the working and middle class. The poor not being able to pass the ASVAB and/or not having a HS Degree and the rich not thinking they should serve. I actually do not think that would spread the burden out though, I pointed prior to the examples of Bush and Gore both skipping out on duty due to connections. I just think the draft is something you use in a real emergency-WWI, WWII, The Civil War, etc....

Gore did a shorter tour and was not in a combat unit, nice try, do some research
The poor are not doing as well on the ASVAB due to OUR poor education system, go look it up Ducky, that is why the burden is falling on the working and middle class. The socio-economic groups at the lower end of the spectrum suffer from poor schools and hence often do not get a HS degree and/or pass the ASVAB. I wish I was making that up, you have a problem with that? Take it up with the NEA and AFT, don't use "arrogant bullshit" to cover up your ignorance.
We should be in OEF Ducky and the fact that you do not even do basic research shows how out of touch you truly are on many military matters, heck, you still thought military areas were all company towns with everyone living on base, that the NEX/AEX etc...were subsidised, etc...etc...etc....I also recall you saying that we should not question our orders and we even had an argument about why you should behind closed doors. Really, you never cease to re-enforce my opinions about 0's. So, tell me, why should we not be in OEF? And your Draft Military, the one that was involved in Vietnam from 59'-75', how did they do again?
Ducky, the last line about the "superiority", it is different culture (Military) than the one it supports (Civilian), necessary to be so, where did I say it was superior? Again, I recall you saying we should reflect our society in past posts, culturally. That does not jive with a good working military. It also kind of contradicts some of your posts in the past about just doing what your told by the civilian leadership and not questioning it, so should we question openly, I mean that is what civilian society would do and you want us to be a reflection of that correct? Or, should we just shut up and do what we are told Ducky?
Ducky, you often post ignorant, uninformed comments and what you base them on I have no idea. How the heck "Proceedings" lets you write for them amazes me due to the out of touch some of the comments you post are, it does in fact prove that our officer corps is lacking in ground truth in a lot of areas. I see it all the time, people to far removed from the fight really have no idea what is going on in their own AOs.

The last post was hardly a froth and you alway say that a draft military is superior to a AVF, you have talked of their past performance in posts, even posts on how they did in combat vs "our" performance in OEF and OIF, so please, spare me the back pedal. Lets not kid ourselves, I remember most of your posts, hard to forget ;)
As for reform with the nation it serves, reform what? How? What are your goals and how do you really think a draft would help? It certainly is not going to help at the leadership spots, which is what this topic is on. Good leaders? Well, that comes down to training, mentoring and time in (wisdom), so- what are the benefits vs the cost?

I've said the AVF is failing in its missions in its two wars: with this much blood and treasure invested, we should not be so totally baffled by small bands of irregulars. We are losing our ass. The draft would have kept our focus on the first one and allowed us to cap victory. It would have kept us from ever getting into the second one in Iraq.

As to fixing My Favorite Army, that gives me about as much trouble as responding to nitwits. But I'd start with a fundamental, reform-oriented review of every aspect of the Army and go from there.

AF? I'd absorb it into the Army - no longer can justify 'combat operations in the air' when there ain't none and the mission has evolved into space/cyber in one direction and pure ground-war support in the other. We do have need for coninuted space/cyber functions; maybe a new branch of service to serve these new warfare areas.

USMC: zero change; they know who their customer is and they pay their way.

Navy: break the backs of the three dominant warfare communities and get the officer corps back to being blue-suiters with primary loyalty to the nation and the Navy, not the particular warfare specialty they serve in.

Finally, I don't like mercenaries, be they contractors in the war zone or AVF professionals. We need a cadre on which to fall in on for big conflicts and to serve as a ready-response force and military presence at all times. But a standing army living apart from society and claiming special privelege and position? Nope. Not in my country.

RD,
When your done with those changes, you can fly away on your majic unicorn. Hopefully the monsters won't catch you on your way out.
As for the rest of us, we will look for intelligent, informative posts that are relevant to the threads.

RD, your wish that somehow we would re-connect with society via a draft is a nice one it is just that, a wish.
While I agree with your AF Comment, no need for them to be a different branch and if the Army would train all of it's people as Infantry first it would give us a better pool with one more branch who had basic skills to pull from. I disagree with just about all else you say-
The Army has a problem at the leadership level, same as does the Navy and AF, the simply have a poor model for leadership at the 06 and above, it starts at the 05 level. It is also has a problem with how it trains it's people and billets them-2 years is not enough time to know and do your job or make changes in unit as an OIC or CO. The lack of training in the non-infantry arms is dismal, it needs to be re-vamped.
The Navy, same problems, they are loyal to their rank and careers, then the warfare pin and at the top they have the same problems in leadership as does the Army. The Navy itself has poorly trained sailor compared to just a decade ago.
Lastly, RD, you seem to think we live apart and claim some sort of superior position, what exactly are you talking about? I think you are far to removed to comment like that, your past posts on military bases being 'Company Towns" or housing, etc...is a bit typical of your post without the knowledge base to back it up. Even in your past career field I recall you saying that the Sub Capt's were just fine in what they did and not risk adverse at all, again, out of touch since I have seen it myself when working with them over and over again with the rare exception and usually that is only due to a direct order from someone above them. If you think that the military tends to view it's culture as being superior to the civilian culture it protects, I would agree with you but also that part of that culture is a strong belief that we protect and serve the US Constitution-Period, end of story and if you do not think that Military Members in your era held the same views I have a bridge in NY to sell you.
JPWREL,
RD is a bit removed from the reality of what is going on today, it is evident in a lot of his posts and while I am always thankful for someone who has served he is hardly a weeping willow who calls people names (Note that the AVF are mercs in his view) and makes comments that a retired man should be able to take if he is going to give. I also would not call the Sub force elite anymore, they are better fed than the rest of the fleet and in that way, yes they are elite but outside of that, not so much anymore. The Navy RD grew up in is all but gone-traditions, standards, combat focus, etc...gone. Many of his fond memories of Company Towns, Subsidized NEX and Housing, Free Medical and Dental, all gone....
So, while I respect RD for serving and putting his money where his mouth is, most of his views are outdated and uninformed and calling the AVF mercs? Well, that is just typical of him and speaking of superior position, I think it is Ducky who seems to have that idea that he is somehow owed some special respect for his views due to having served for so long and I suspect because he got published a couple of times. He is owed a thanks and respect for that time in service but not his views if they are that far off and as often is the case, terribly uninformed.