European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - April 28, 1985, Darmstadt, Hesse                                How Well has the military Learned the lessons of Vietnam by Charles Mohr new York times the armed services of the United states were among the casualties of the Viet Nam but Many of the wounds have healed re leaving a military body in some ways healthier than there is a tendency for some civilians to believe that the armed forces Learned Little from and forgot most of that thesis does not Bear scrutiny As the 10th anniversary of the fall of South april some soldiers think the lessons of the War in Southeast Asia could have been studied More systematically and embedded in current military doctrine More but change growing out of the War has not been neg i Vietnam was a trauma for the armed forces just As it was for the political Community and the Bruce Palmer a retired army recently wrote that it was the first Clear failure in our Histo for the military the scars were not Only although the army arrived in Vietnam in 1965 and the stress and frustration of a Peculiar conflict wore Down that admirable mechanism and produced a degradation in capability and Elan that lasted until Well after the troops had left Southeast but in Many measures of capability the services Are clearly better today than in and some problems not fully solved seem relatively close to on the other it is not Clear that the military is Able or willing to apply some of the wars a Ledger of the wars legacy shows Many positive including the following the loss of Indochina did not cripple the United states As some had Palmer has said that in the course of the War the 7th army in Europe became Little More than a training and replacement depot for the 7th army has been restored to an effective fighting and Many senior officers have written that the United states is much More Able to meet commitments abroad than it was during the the air whose Aerial combat ratios were three enemy planes shot Down to one lost in world War ii and 10tol in was shocked by a Mere 2 to1 ratio in against poorly trained North vietnamese Mig concluding that its own train ing had been the air Force has instituted one of the most realistic combat training programs in military against a soviet air Force that does Little realistic it might prove a similar emphasis on realistic training is found in other in the Vietnam Era the Whiz kid civilian systems analysts in Robert Mcnamara Pentagon viewed As Mere platitudes of Little value the principles of War formulated by the prussian army officer Carl von Clausewitz arid other theoreticians of War of the in recent there has been a burst of philosophical revivalism in which uniformed officers have returned to a study of such partly As a result of officers conscious of their role As military advisers to civilian authority have tried to reemphasize the unbreakable link Between politics and War expounded by Clausewitz and to redefine the conditions in which the United states should commit itself to greatly their message is never again not without Achieva and vital objectives not without Broad Public but what is still unclear is whether officers will insist on being heard or will in a crisis relapse into what they Call the unfortunate can do syndrome of although improvements in military technology were under Way in Vietnam and fertilized they have become increasingly technology creates its own problems but has been the main contrib Utor to a leap Forward in few people outside the and not All those in seem to realize How deadly future conventional combat is Likely to be and what that portends for National Security if it becomes understood that the United states May be Able to fight outnumbered and not All of the legacy or lessons can be and some parts of the Ledger Are not As there has been at least some Effort to use ideas that were never really employed in an example can be found in special when the army special forces were trained in unconventional warfare and the first is usually behind helices operations meant to support the main Effort and disrupt the main perhaps by creating insurgencies of ones the second is countering hostile most often by and even leading indigenous As was done with the montagnard Hill tribes of the Green berets in Vietnam made no secret of their disappointment that they were forced to spend most of their efforts on counterinsurgency rather than unconventional for Trail watching in North Vietnam was almost All done by ethnic cambodian or Nung it was civilian officials in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations who became enraptured with counterinsurgency and heavily invested military resources in but the military was not Harry Summers who is on the staff of the army War College and is the author of the Muchard mired critique of the War on is a major Force behind today military calling counterinsurgency an example of the tyranny of sum mers Twenty years later it is hard to envision the Force with which the concept of counterinsurgency struck the to him the counterinsurgency fad demonstrated a open Muddy Rice Jungle thick Fields of elephant grass terrain often As perilous As the a file photo 1965 a file photo 0966 wounded medic right continued to Aid fatal inability to recognize the True nature of the he argues that Vietnam was no longer a pure insurgency or guerrilla War after regular North vietnamese army units infiltrated the South in a judgment with which few soldiers or civilians with Vietnam War experience would he argues that this failure to recognize the wars nature was the main reason it was lost because it bled resources from the conventional Arena and contributed to a poverty of strategic thought on How to isolate the South Vietnam Battlefield from infiltration by regular North vietnamese the last few years have seen a revival of interest in special but coloured by the Viet Nam a new special operations come was recently created to coordinate special forces and army the emphasis now is increasingly on unconventional Al though the actual performance of Small commando that preceded the main body in the 1983 invasion of Grenada did not impress All military the capability has come into being and can presumably be some thinkers have persuasively argued that while a better strategy to Block North vietnamese infiltration was badly a More deft use of counterinsurgency concepts was also like believed that the main american task was to develop a Strong South but that the goal was not in the end the War was lost when 17 North vietnamese divisions overran the South in 51 poor strategic and flawed planning by the South vietnamese contributed to their say most military students of the counterinsurgency itself retains importance because guerrilla War remains a feature of world Wallace a former commander of the Southern come in Central repeatedly stressed the political of the conflict in Al Joseph a former senior adviser in that placed Strong emphasis on avoiding past mis takes such As the body count syndrome of or efforts to defeat guerrillas by pure army to bile training teams apply a Good Deal of Vietnam experience in training forces in several nations confronted with any assessment of How Well the armed services May have Learned the lessons of Vietnam requires consideration of what the principal lessons one major Issue is the question of How Power can be effectively applied in the late 20th there is no serious debate that Vietnam was a limited in recent years a number of mostly civilians and Many of them political have professed to see this As the source of arguing that timid civilian authorities handcuffed the military and refused to permit the application of sufficient some go so far As to argue that without such restraint the War could have been won in a week or even a this View does not seem to be widespread among professional As one officer most wars in history have been among the few exceptions Are world War ii and the punic in which Rome ultimately destroyed killed most of its and even scattered Salt in the furrows of farm in his Book the 25year Palmer seems to suggest that there is nothing hopeless in limited per and that such conflicts Are Likely to remain More plausible than total but such military intellectuals think it is important to understand what limited actually meant in the Viet Nam in practical there has to be some limit on manpower and although Many offi cers have strongly disagreed then and now with the limits set by president Johnson and his what really distinguishes limited War is that the National objective of the War is Many thoughtful professional soldiers see no fatal flaw in in the korean War is now seen As a consid Erable though not a classical what is say and former army chief of staff Fred who was the third and last Vietnam is that the limited objective be that it be Broad enough to achieve vital above that the even though be sufficient to reach the that May seem so simple to be trite measured against the yardstick of Vietnam it appears much More Wallace who was commandant of the Marine corps for much of the believed that Suc Cess might require a million men in the the administration tried to set an upper limit of later modestly expanded to Many senior officers at the time believed that constraints on the total Force were leading to but William the Viet Nam commander for much of the wrote in his Book a Soldier reports i suffered my problems in Vietnam because i believed that Success eventually would be ours despite that they were not to As Napoleon put instruments of my army the can do syndrome was an unpalatable act of discipline for some but a personal Choice for the United states has had persistent problems about How the military establishment should be led and Organ Vietnam threw these questions into Sharp focus but did not clearly resolve uniformed and civilian military analysts often draw the distinction Between blacksmiths and by which they mean the difference Between military bureaucrats who procure weapons and fighters capable of wielding both Are but a healthy balance has to be Summers describes the problem As knowing the differ ence Between preparation for War and the conduct of War there is widespread concern that and after Vietnam the bureaucrats of preparation have been dominant and sometimes stifle the Art of James former undersecretary of the has said that Pentagon analysts tend to develop an instinct for the capillaries rather than for the James a retired Soldier who was noted for his Gruff aggressiveness in has said any Damn fool can write a its the execution of it that gets you All screwed to some veterans of Hollingsworth remark could serve As a capsule history of the Many Good ideas were conceived and adopted As policy in the Vietnam but carrying then out successfully was often not Clausewitz wrote More than 150 years ago that in War everything looks but that Only those who have seen combat can understand How difficult the simplest task becomes in the friction of the use of Complex and inflexible plans in quest of vague goals Only exacerbates the some modern soldiers have used a less elegant for keep it Palmer wrote that the joint chiefs of staff and the Vietnam not Only failed to resist civilian interference in detailed military planning failed to develop a coherent strategy that would have offered a reasonable Chance of to execute any simple or the armed forces must have and innovative leaders and must let them exercise William commander the Marine corps Force that is earmarked for possible use in Southwest said recently that in the mechanized desert warfare foreseen there the emphasis would be on Mission structured there is similar emphasis in other this in theory at that battalion commanders will be Given considerable latitude in achieving their As signed although this grows in part out of present military it is also an outgrowth of in the Vietnam command helicopters packed with radio gear permitted brigade and division commanders to Circle a Battlefield and to usurp the role of company and battalion commanders by issuing detailed tactical orders from on Many officers now see this As a such interference May not be but it is Likely to be limited anyway because of hostile Airpower and antiaircraft rockets in the most Likely future Early in the War it was not uncommon to see Fiel Grade majors and with two stars on their combat infantryman one of Mel then a lieutenant colonel in the 101st airborne remarked that this meant a perfect attendance winning badge and stars for combat in world War and where Garten lost both his the american armed in entered Viet Nam with More combat experience than any Force in the world and with a High percentage of very experienced unit commanders and noncommissioned that percentage is probably lower but Vietnam produced a new cadre of leaders experienced in a great Many of today Fiel Grade officers led Small com Bat units and practically All general officers saw such experience is most military men there was not much to criticize in Small unit tactics in forces won almost All of their Battles failure grew out of what Palmer Calls a fatally flawed strategy and the failure to create in South Vietnam a durable military some military innovation emerged from the War and has tended to strengthen today Mili tary the helicopter As a tool for moving troops and the armed helicopter for versatile and close support from the air Are the soviet and other a have also used the helicopter in these new the m16 Rifle caused problems in Vietnam because of avoidable mistakes in the selection of Gunpowder and in a modification of the guns but those mistakes have been and Etnyre Calls the m16 the Best Rifle we have Ever military communications have been significantly improved since the there Are other issues raised by Vietnam that Are peripheral to some people and of great importance to one is the question of How reporters should be permitted to cover a future although Many senior retired and agree that the press did not reveal operational secrets in some believe that television coverage of the War greatly contributed to a loss of Public support by graphically depicting the but Summers cites Clausewitz observation it would be futile even wrong to try to shut ones eyes to what War really is from sheer distress at its to at least some military thinkers it would be More useful to involve the Public emotionally in War the government tried hard to avoid this in Vietnam than to try to suppress Public knowledge of the horrors of As some have the United states seemed a pitiful giant during there has been a Strong recovery since the War in a military its military can be committed in a future even if More Cau Tion is with a Good degree of Confidence in the Likely Summers quotes a remark by Clausewitz that May have relevance on the 10th anniversary of the fall of Vietnam in War the result is never merely a transitory for which a remedy May be found in 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