Why They Are Laughed At.

Soros-funded Quincy Institute for allegedly Responsible Statecraft continues to exhibit a complete lack of self-awareness and sheer illiteracy in military affairs. Hey, I get it that Colonel Macgregor had some conversation with some Russian "general" who told him about 40+ million losses of USSR in WW II, but here is another guy who has no clue but warns about not using "bad history". This is the type of people who run America and America's dazzling failure as serious continental power. 

Bad history makes for bad policy on Ukraine. The West needs better historical analogies for understanding Russia’s war and how to counter it.

And the moment the author makes this statement he does, guess what? Exactly, spews propaganda BS about Great Patriotic War. 

Soviet Marshal Zhukov absorbed 860,000 casualties to the Germans’ 200,000 at the Battle of Kursk in World War II. He also lost 1,500 tanks to the Germans’ 500, yet Kursk is remembered as a great triumph that crushed Hitler’s final hopes of victory. Can one imagine Germany celebrating its superior casualty ratio while being defeated by Stalin’s hordes? However shocking this tactic may be, it is a resource that Moscow has and Kyiv does not. Consider the battle for Bakhmut and the daily bulletins trumpeting Ukraine’s success in killing thousands of Russians, right up to the moment that Bakhmut fell to Wagner Group mercenaries — weirdly reminiscent of the Pentagon’s body-count bulletins in the Vietnam war. 

The historic "knowledge" of this former Pentagon "analyst" with the background in humanities ("politics" no less) evidently dictates him to avoid any serious WW II documents, because if he followed best Russian military historians, such as Krivosheev, a real general incidentally,  he would have known that TOTAL casualties for Kursk Strategic Defensive Operation (July 5-23, 1943) amounted to 177,847 with KIAs and MIAs count being: 70, 330. After that, Strategic Offensive Operation Kutuzov started (July 23-August 18, 1943), with TOTAL casualties resulting in 429,890, with KIAs and MIAs count being: 112, 529. So, in all, from July 5 to August 18 1943, Red Army sustained 177,847 + 429,890 = 607,737 casualties, with total of KIAs and MIAs equaling 70,330 + 112, 529= 182,859. Where the number of 860,000 came from only this guy knows, but I have a clue. 

But then again, US perception of war, especially of WW II was shaped by Wehrmacht which, in the end, had its ass handed to it by the Red Army. Obviously, most of Anglo-American historiography on Wehrmacht cannot be taken seriously, precisely because of known manipulation with data with a strong bias toward German figures. But even if to accept that Wehrmacht lost 203,000 at Kursk. One still has to consider the fact that West needs not "better historical analogies" but basic education in military history with serious revision of sources, it also needs serious military science education and good schooling in strategy. I omit here operational art because NATO needs to start from the clean slate. If you want to learn something, you better learn it from the best, NATO learned from losers who confabulated the whole history in order to save their wounded pride and war crimes. That is why they are in shock and awe at Pentagon. As is the author--Robert English. And don't tell me that I didn't warn--I did, last 9 years I did non-stop.

How To Put It More Politely?

Teach the real war in the US, not this Hollywood BS. And I mean not just USMA at West Point which is not a real military academy anymore but an indoctrination institution with mostly made-up military "history" and zero academics. 

Ukraine will struggle to make good on its promise to drive Russian forces out of its former territory, US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley stated on Friday. While civilian officials in Washington insist that Kiev must keep fighting, Milley has repeatedly questioned the chances of success. “President Biden, President Zelensky, and most of the leaders of Europe have said this war is likely to end in a negotiation,” Milley said during a meeting of the US-led Defense Contact Group at Ramstein Air Base in Germany. “From a military standpoint, this is a very, very difficult fight,” he added.

Are there any real military historians in the USMA or the US Army War College left? I doubt it, when one's military "science" is built around Hollywood that is what you get. Considering the level of the US public school graduates, USMA is basically a vocational school now, as long as it meets its quota on "diversity". Now, imagine some "graduates" from the US "strategic studies" experts. Idiocracy is upon us. 

A Note-Worthy Admission.

An interesting piece on the US Navy's approach to education of personnel.  

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — The U.S. Navy is overhauling its approach to education because the nation no longer has a massive economic and technological edge over potential adversaries, according to a strategy it is releasing Monday. The Education for Seapower Strategy 2020, provided to The Associated Press ahead of its release, is the first unified, comprehensive education strategy for the Navy and Marine Corps, said John Kroger, who is implementing the strategy as the Navy's first chief learning officer.

I didn't see this document yet but the news is interesting and very symptomatic. As Kroeger comments on this approach he arrives to some notable conclusions, such as this:

“In a world where potential adversaries are peers economically and technologically, how do you win?" Kroger said in an interview. "We think we can out-fight potential opponents because we can out-think them. In order to do that, we must have, by far, the best military education program in the world."

But here is the catch, of which I write non-stop. Armed Forces in developed nations start from the student desk at the public schools--it is there where foundation for future personnel, be that lower rank or future officers is laid. But here one has to point out, again, that the key for the modern warfare, STEM that is, is non-existent in the American public schools as a well defined and rigorous physics-mathematics programs. To no service does this requirement applies more than to naval service, which operates the most complex technology there is embodied in modern state-of-the-art ships, submarines, their weapon systems and sensor suites. Running naval ship, as well as pretty much any modern military (air force, ground troops etc.) unit or formation requires more than just rigorous STEM training, which goes without saying, but a symbiosis of STEM and of military science (degrees not awarded in the United States) covering issues of not only operational art, strategy and history but, overall, military and general culture. As Kroger continues:

When the United States entered World War II, nearly all its admirals were Naval War College graduates. Now, less than a quarter of them are because the Navy hasn't stressed education as much, Kroger said.

Ah, that's warmer. In other words, it is more complex than just some, however brilliantly written, and implemented, manual but a requirement of having well-educated thinkers who lead modern militaries. Damn, I just betrayed foundations of military education and pedagogy as formulated in the Soviet Naval Academies in 1970-1980s, LOL. I am not kidding. But I can totally see where the US Navy is coming from, especially once one sees the world filled with peers. Anyhow, it is a note-worthy development as well as a admission--lacking the "edge".