The way these differences played out is fascinating to behold. The US was much more inclined to see each individual soldier as a cog in a much bigger machine that could be replaced easily if need be. The US military on the other hand, heavily influenced by Taylorism and business-think, was much more enamored with management theory and top down micromanagement, which said that superior officers should be the ones making the decisions and subordinates should follow their orders to a "t." The Wehrmacht, according to van Creveld, valued the mind, body, and spirit of its soldiers in a way that the US military did not. High ranking officers were encouraged to allow subordinates to use their best judgment to carry out orders the way they saw fit. The Germans took great pains to cultivate a sense of independence within its command structure. Here, the question is "Fighting Power." What made the German Wehrmacht such a formidable fighting force? Van Creveld tries to parse some of the intangibles and comes up with fascinating differences between the Wehrmacht and US military in World War II.Įven though the US military organization was in many ways inspired by and modeled on the German Army, it is fascinating to see how business and capitalism influenced differences between these two fighting forces in World War II. This book makes a nice companion piece with James Gibson's The Perfect War: Technowar in Vietnam.
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