Regarding the discussions of institutional learning…

What was of key importance in [the process of bringing German reserve units up to the standards of the regular army] was that the German army in its ‘lessons learned analysis’ did not use its studies to support existing doctrine. Rather it used its after-action reports to improve doctrine and military standards throughout the army.

The critical element in the German evaluation process was the system of after-action reports. Nearly all military organizations use similar systems, but German reporting methods were unique because they worked. Unlike many armies where the reporting system is disorted by what commanders wish to hear, the German system was both highly critical and honest within tactical and operational spheres. The higher the headquarters, the more demanding and dissatisfied were commanders with operational performances… This willingness to criticize itself was to be a major factor in the German army’s high level of competence throughout the Second World War.

Williamson Murray. The Change in the European Balance of Power, 1938-1939: The Path to Ruin. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1984, 338-9.

Haven’t had time to pull together a proper post in response to Adam’s prompt, so here are some slightly expanded thoughts.

While discussing Secretary Gate’s attempts to get more NATO troops for OEF, Adam writes the following:

…as Andrew Bacevich notes in today’s Los Angeles Times, NATO itself is structurally unsuited to this kind of war. Many European nations lack the military reserve, equipment, and public will to commit to expeditionary guerrilla warfare. And for good reason, as NATO’s original role was to deter Soviet aggression and build a common European defense architecture. Trying to force it into the role of Eurasian counterinsurgent is wrong-headed.

We need to distinguish between two related issues: (1) European anti-guerilla capabilities and (2) NATO anti-guerilla capabilities.

NATO’s anti-guerilla capabilities (or lack thereof) is dependent upon the underlying military capabilities of its members. In a perfect world, perhaps NATO could have been a forcing function to get European nations to develop COIN capabilities.

This gets us into an interesting question of institutions - to what extent is NATO a vehicle for American influence (setting the rules of the game)?

Then again, perhaps all of this is a symptom of NATO free-riding on American military power and not confronting the operational environment it needs to face. European states occupy the same geostrategic environment as the US. If the US is guilty of having bought one military and operated another during the 1990s, then what judgement can we render on Europe?

Or, is this representative of a different grand strategic response by Europe to the threat of unstable and ungoverned regions in a networked world? Perhaps European states adapted their military capabilities to less activist and intervention-based foreign policies.

Ultimately, though, we will need new international institutions for the 21st Century (just as we need new bureaucratic arrangements domestically). These could happen incrementally (as in Barnett’s vision of building the Core’s “Functioning Executive” on the foundation of the G-20) or more abruptly (though creating a new organization out of whole cloth would require some compelling, commonly recognized crisis that required the organization).

A beautiful tour of the 21st Century street as platform. While not revelatory for technically inclined readers, it is an excellent synthesis. (H/T Gibson)