Gen. Mark A. Milley, the new Army chief of staff, used the pulpit as keynote speaker before an audience at the Association of the U.S. Army annual convention in Washington, D.C., to counter several conventional notions about warfare that he believes are overly simplistic or just plain wrong:
- Future wars likely would not be as short as some expect, and there is no such thing as “a minor dustup.”
- Technology alone cannot win a war. “After the shock and awe comes the march and fight,” Milley said.
- Special operations missions alone cannot win a war either. Spec Ops troops are necessary, Milley said, but their successes more often than not result in tactical gains rather than strategic ones.
- Armies cannot easily be regenerated. Milley cautioned budget cutters that haphazard approaches are not easily undone. Platoon sergeants and battalion commanders, for instance take at least a decade and upwards to 17 years to train.
