Let's Have Flexible Armed Forces -- A Commentary

ABO ASSESSMENT - U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Raymond Ramos conducts a project assessment in the city of Abo Alhafat, Iraq, Jan 21, 2009. Ramos is assigned to Company B, 445th Civil Affairs Battalion. U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Rasheen A. Douglas

From The Wall Street Journal:

Don't assume the next war will look like the last one.

During the 1990s, the U.S. defense debate was dominated by those who argued that advances in technology, particularly information technology, had revolutionized military affairs and changed the nature of warfare. Under former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, this view -- now called transformation -- came to characterize U.S. military planning. Based on the example of the 1991 Gulf War, advocates of transformation argued that our technological edge would allow American forces to identify and destroy targets remotely, defeating an adversary at low cost in casualties.

Though the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have largely discredited staunch transformation advocates, a heated debate still rages about the shape of the future U.S. military. One side, the "Long War" school, argues that Iraq and Afghanistan are characteristic of the protracted and ambiguous wars America will fight in the future. Accordingly, they say, the military should be developing a force designed to fight the Long War on terrorism, primarily by preparing for "small wars" and insurgencies.

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WNU Editor: Both Weathawk and Prairie Pundit comment on the above commentary.