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Doug MacGregor sent an e-mail to his contacts, pointing out this commentary of his in the Washington Times.
My reply was this:
Dear Doug MacGregor,the campaign actually lasted six weeks, not three weeks.The British Expeditionary forces in France were not optimised for colonial warfare at all - they were an almost fully motorised, modern force for conventional warfare. Their only role in a possible trench war would have been rapid reserves, breakthrough and tactical/operational exploitation of breakthrough.The British lack of modern army equipment after the campaign was a consequence of the campaign's losses, not a consequence of poor procurement. Your article might mislead in this regard."Otherwise, the generals' current obsession with counterinsurgency will leave the American armed forces as unprepared for a real war in 10 years as the British and French forces were for their confrontation with Germany in 1940."I generally agree, although I prefer to draw parallels to the time of Boer Wars to 1914. That seems to fit better in my opinion because I doubt that any nation has got the right doctrine for modern conventional land war. The political conditions (lack of respect for war due to no great war in decades) seem to resemble 1913 more than 1938 as well.Best regards,Sven Ortmann
I do generally support such there'll be a conventional war in the future, and we are ill-prepared warnings. I'm not sure that WW2 is a good example, and in any case examples should be accurate, not misleading.
The problem in 1940 wasn't that the Western powers had prepared for colonial wars; they had prepared for a war with front lines and with mobile phases being rather the exception than the norm. That was not the kind of campaign that was forced on them - and there were other shortcomings. A focus on colonial war is a rather rare accusation in regard to this historical campaign, though.
Sven Ortmann
edit: alternative link; the CDI website has the full article as well.
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