(Kevin Brooks) wrote:

:Fred J. McCall wrote in message . ..
: (Kevin Brooks) wrote:
:
: :Fred J. McCall wrote in message . ..
: : (Kevin Brooks) wrote:
: :
: : :That would appear to be a restatement of an old maxim. True enough
: : :that troops the world over do grumble; my mistake for using the word
: : :"unique", as opposed to maybe "typical of". ISTR it was one of your
: : fficers who was somewhat amazed that US troops tended to have to be
: : :told the "why" of their orders, as opposed to the quaint "yes, sir,
: : :three bags full, sir" type of response to which he was accustomed...
: :
: : US troops are trained to expect and get explanations of what they're
: : doing and why. It's the only way they can intelligently fulfill their
: : orders and know when initiative in the field is and is not
: : appropriate.
: :
: :"Are trained"? No, Fred,
:
: "Are trained". Yes, Brooks,
:
uh. Context is really beyond you, isn't it Fred?

I don't know. Is context Fred?

Duh, Cognition is really beyond you, isn't it, Kevin?

[Note comma above, which changes meaning from the phrase "isn't it
Kevin".]

: :this tendancy was established long before the
: :more recent concentration on "auftragstactik" (or however the hell it
: :is spelled in the original German). Comments on this date back to at
: :least the First World War, and it was more a result of the US practice
: f depending upon citizen soldiers, along with the rather independent
: :streak to be found in Americans who deplored the idea of being placed
: :below anyone on a social, or for that matter military, ladder. ISTR
: :reading that it is a trait shared with Aussie troops who frequently
: :displayed it to their British superiors.
:
: Well, things have changed here in the last century (and not
: necessarily always for the better). A lot of effort has been spent
: teaching people NOT to think over the last half-century or so, more's
: the pity....
:
:Finished your sermon yet? Now what does the manner in which we train
:troops today have to do with a discussion of a historical factor like
:the fact that US troops have demonstrated a tendency to want to know
:the "why" (and not for the reasons that they do today)?

Feel free to turn the question around and ask it the other way, too.
What does the fact that US troops have demonstrated a tendency in the
past have to do with how they are trained today?

--
"Some people get lost in thought because it's such unfamiliar
territory."
--G. Behn