Rating: 
Summary: Essential reading for Military Thought
Review: A very intriguing and thought provoking book. It should be required reading for anyone interested in Military Affairs. This is precisely the type of thinking that we need at this time. We are on the verge of a great revolution in military affairs and we need some new thinking to go along with all our new technology. Douglas MacGregor is the type of leader this country needs. He should be the type of person who makes Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, but his career will probably suffer because of this book.
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Summary: Building the U.S. Army combined-arms Phalanx since WWII
Review: Col MacGregor was first seen as the S-3 along with (both were then Majors) LTC H.R. McMaster fighting the Battle of 73 Easting described in Tom Clancy's Armored Cav. After battling the Iraqis, both of these brilliant tacticians went to work to better America's Army taking their experiences of combining arms in the Cav to heart. LTC McMaster focused in his book on the geo/domestic politics that led our nation into war in Vietnam and Col MacGregor looks into U.S. Army force structure/design. MacGregor begins by showing that in WWII, the U.S. Army created Regimental Combat Teams combining-arms to defeat the German mechanized armies long before the marines (who never had to fight a mechanized 1st world enemy in WWII or ever for that matter) created their smaller battalion-sized imitation brand. MacGregor shows that the Regiment/Brigade size is just the right size to combine arms (armor, infantry, artillery, engineers, aviation) as the Division is larger and harder to fight as an entity. My only regret is that he then proposes we get "break" the Divisional phalanxes to create Brigade Combat Teams where young one-star generals can command units fully equipped for modern warfare at all times and not assembled ad hoc. This is not necessary since you can create BCTs within existing Divisions, maintaining the honor/fighting traditions/identity of these legendary formations. The idea that by making the Army smaller we will be rewarded by the same amount of money that was for the larger force then being transferred to new equipment---is doubtful with America's anti-military spending mindset. Less is rewarded with less. These two assumptions have black-listed this otherwise fine book---just read the book and keep in mind that what he proposes can be done with existing Divisions and all will be well. 30 BCTs are better than 26. Col MacGregor then shows how we can mix/match what the U.S. Army already has to achieve some amazing capabilities---to show us the need he writes a Clancy-esque scenario in the Middle east to illustrate why reorganization is needed. His Airborne/Air Assault force structures create possibilities of Air-Mech 3-D maneuvers that could unhinge enemies by dislocation and support 2-D heavy force combinations by positional advantage. His recomendations throughout the book to move to an Army that is able to strategically deploy and be dominant in maneuver using digital means and PGMs is the proper combination of America's military power that stands in stark contrast to those that just want to posture from the sea/air or even space and never take control of the ground. He states: "precision strike is a capability not a stragey", and he is (pardon the pun) on target! Its almost prophetic that he stated that we must be able to deploy before a foe attacks his neighbor---just two years later we had the Serbs brutalize Kosovo and America could not rapidly deploy combined-arms units in relevant Brigade sizes by AIR as fast as we needed to. His book is full of brilliant observations of things from the obsolescence of surface amphibious ships to the need to have forces that rapidly deploy by AIR and not take 6 months to go by ship in an age of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD). Read with a highlight pen and be ready to make marginal notes to yourself! MacGregor is a hero. He needs to be honored with the highest peacetime honor the Army can bestow for moral courage and given any choice of assignment. As the years go by and his ideas are adopted we should never forget many of them began with this fine book, written by a fine scholar, warrior and human being. Airborne, Sir!
Rating:
Summary: Visionary
Review: Colonel MacGregor's thoughts on transforming the military and making it better organized to respond to future threats (many of these "future threats" are upon us today) are outstanding. We need the agility and force tailoring that Colonel MacGregor proposes - sooner rather than later. An excellent read for anyone who takes the profession of arms seriously.
Rating: 
Summary: A new Mold, an Old Mold
Review: Future historians of American military doctrine may well identify this book as the fulcrum point of American military thought and force structure at the turn of the 21st Century. This is not a collection of war stories or a diatribe against what is wrong with the "system" today. This book looks at the future, and offers a plan. It is easy to be a naysayer, but Colonel MacGregor, to his great credit, did not take the easy way. Readers should be warned that there is some effort required to read and digest this important work. I would guess that the price would come first. However, if the value of a book is measured by the time required to read and understand it, then I would suggest that this is well worth the price. In a very few pages, MacGregor advocates a total redesign of American land-based forces. His vision is an Army without divisions, one with tailored "groups" such as an air assault group and a heavy combat group. These "groups" consist of several (5-7) battalions of the required type, and could deploy more rapidly than current U.S. divisions. MacGregor's vision of the future suggests as many as 18 of these groups, mostly based inside the United States. Based primarily upon this he has been labeled as a "Regimentalist," a term that he explicitly denies as applicable to his ideas. (Note: For those unfamiliar with the U.S. Army, there is a long raging debate regarding force structure. A U.S. "Regiment"would be 2-3 battalions, akin to the "traditional" American regimental structure. Not to be confused with the current British system and nomenclature. In opposition are those that favor the current U.S. Division/Brigade structure. Careers have been lost in the course of this fight.) Beyond the redesign of the force, MacGregor does what nobody else has seriously attempted since the 1980s. He takes on the training structures and doctrine of the Army. Specifically, he addresses that most sacred of cows -- synchronization. In practice, the contemporary U.S. Army still treats warfare as an activity that can be carefully scripted. Because of the concerns with synchronization in operational and logistical planning, not enough attention is devoted in training to the missed or seized opportunities for battlefield success which may result from subordinate initiative and new fighting techniques and tactics. MacGregor takes this issue on. One should also remember that this book appeared before the current draft of FM 100-5 (the U.S. Army base doctrine, now called FM 3). It now forms a portion of the discourse upon the concepts embodied in the new doctrine. This is a well written book that those interested in the topic will need to use and consult as they consider the uncertain future. It gives insight like few other books do on the current trends of theory and military force structure as they appear in the United States. If there are any shortcomings at all, I would say that it comes in the area of information and its applications in the future. In this area, MacGregor is both a little too positive and vague about how anything beyond tactical communications affects U.S. forces. He uses a hypothetical scenario to describe how a conflict might unfold once the Army adopts his force structure. Although he mentions CNN early in his scenario, that is the last significant point at which he notes the interaction and role of non-military communications/information upon the military. For a scenario involving western military forces this is inexcusable. Admittedly, this is a book about the U.S. Army and landpower, and so perhaps information is a little beyond the scope. But given the quality of treatment for the other topics he addressed, I personally would have liked to see more on this subject from him. In Macgregor's book, satellites are never shot down, CNN doesn't show up on the battlefield, the BBC doesn't broadcast from your assembly area.
Rating:
Summary: A new Mold, an Old Mold
Review: Future historians of American military doctrine may well identify this book as the fulcrum point of American military thought and force structure at the turn of the 21st Century. This is not a collection of war stories or a diatribe against what is wrong with the "system" today. This book looks at the future, and offers a plan. It is easy to be a naysayer, but Colonel MacGregor, to his great credit, did not take the easy way. Readers should be warned that there is some effort required to read and digest this important work. I would guess that the price would come first. However, if the value of a book is measured by the time required to read and understand it, then I would suggest that this is well worth the price. In a very few pages, MacGregor advocates a total redesign of American land-based forces. His vision is an Army without divisions, one with tailored "groups" such as an air assault group and a heavy combat group. These "groups" consist of several (5-7) battalions of the required type, and could deploy more rapidly than current U.S. divisions. MacGregor's vision of the future suggests as many as 18 of these groups, mostly based inside the United States. Based primarily upon this he has been labeled as a "Regimentalist," a term that he explicitly denies as applicable to his ideas. (Note: For those unfamiliar with the U.S. Army, there is a long raging debate regarding force structure. A U.S. "Regiment"would be 2-3 battalions, akin to the "traditional" American regimental structure. Not to be confused with the current British system and nomenclature. In opposition are those that favor the current U.S. Division/Brigade structure. Careers have been lost in the course of this fight.) Beyond the redesign of the force, MacGregor does what nobody else has seriously attempted since the 1980s. He takes on the training structures and doctrine of the Army. Specifically, he addresses that most sacred of cows -- synchronization. In practice, the contemporary U.S. Army still treats warfare as an activity that can be carefully scripted. Because of the concerns with synchronization in operational and logistical planning, not enough attention is devoted in training to the missed or seized opportunities for battlefield success which may result from subordinate initiative and new fighting techniques and tactics. MacGregor takes this issue on. One should also remember that this book appeared before the current draft of FM 100-5 (the U.S. Army base doctrine, now called FM 3). It now forms a portion of the discourse upon the concepts embodied in the new doctrine. This is a well written book that those interested in the topic will need to use and consult as they consider the uncertain future. It gives insight like few other books do on the current trends of theory and military force structure as they appear in the United States. If there are any shortcomings at all, I would say that it comes in the area of information and its applications in the future. In this area, MacGregor is both a little too positive and vague about how anything beyond tactical communications affects U.S. forces. He uses a hypothetical scenario to describe how a conflict might unfold once the Army adopts his force structure. Although he mentions CNN early in his scenario, that is the last significant point at which he notes the interaction and role of non-military communications/information upon the military. For a scenario involving western military forces this is inexcusable. Admittedly, this is a book about the U.S. Army and landpower, and so perhaps information is a little beyond the scope. But given the quality of treatment for the other topics he addressed, I personally would have liked to see more on this subject from him. In Macgregor's book, satellites are never shot down, CNN doesn't show up on the battlefield, the BBC doesn't broadcast from your assembly area.
Rating:
Summary: Thoughts have stood test of time
Review: Interesting to note that COL MacGregor's book has been retrieved from the basement of the Pentagon and is being reread in light of our recent operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. It took a lot of courage to write this book since thinking outside the box is talked about, but acting outside the box is rarely done in the Army. In Iraq we still wanted to employ WWII force structures on the modern battlefield. However, we've also learned (maybe) that the much celebrated deep attack by Army Aviation was a failure.
Rating:
Summary: Thoughts have stood test of time
Review: Interesting to note that COL MacGregor's book has been retrieved from the basement of the Pentagon and is being reread in light of our recent operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. It took a lot of courage to write this book since thinking outside the box is talked about, but acting outside the box is rarely done in the Army. In Iraq we still wanted to employ WWII force structures on the modern battlefield. However, we've also learned (maybe) that the much celebrated deep attack by Army Aviation was a failure.
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Summary: Techno-toys are great, but only if you get there
Review: MacGregor makes several important points about how we COULD improve our Army. Many ideas are even being adopted (the new "medium brigades" and the LAVs)...but what the military as a whole needs to do is stop pretending that we are gearing up for a showdown with a big 1st world enemy in Europe. What happened to "full spectrum dominance?"
Rating:
Summary: Deep thought for the wealthy end of the spectrum
Review: This an excellent book and the author should be applauded for applying some long overdue deep thought (especially at the time of writing) to practical problems 1st world armies face in the coming decades - with shrinking budgets, less manpower and greater technology driven specialisation. The first two-thirds of the book are extremely relevant to people involved in the military across the world, however, in the last chapters the book narrows its focus to a discussion of uniquely American problems and current defence politics - which is to be expected given the nationality of the author. All in all a very intelligent and practical look at the future - well worth the asking price.
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Summary: Army rewards MacGregor with dead-end assignment
Review: This book received a lot of attention in the Army when it was published, and for good reason; it attacked the Army's organization that had existed since the second world war. Interestingly, the Army's new chief of staff, General Eric Shinseki, has begun changing the Army in ways first outlined in this book over two years ago. Among the changes: the adoption of more rapidly-deployable forces, "medium weight" forces, Light Armored Vehicles, such as those used by the USMC, and a squadron/battalion sized reconaissance element for greater intelligence. The Army has also modified the Officer Personal Management System, a move MacGregor advocated. Sadly, MacGregor himself is a full-bird colonel right now assigned to the National Defense University. Essentially, Macgragor has been put out to academic pasture. He will not get to command a brigade, and consequently will probably not be promoted again.
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