I heard the assertion today from a well-connected friend in the business that
The [US] Army is mindlessly headed in the QDR [Quadrennial Defense Review] toward a force structure that's mostly light infantry, and it will come to regret this at some point in the medium-future.
I would like to ask, once and for all, that everyone please stop using the term light infantry. Call them infantry, riflemen, regiments of foot—whatever. Just stop using that adjective light. Infantry might be light if they’re walking about on foot, but once they saddle up in armored vehicles, there’s nothing light about them. If they’re flying to their objectives by helicopter, they’re own gear might be light enough to carry, but the logistics footprint of their accompanying aviation isn’t light either. Still, troops of the 101st Airmobile Division aren’t light if they’re riding in MRAPs—at that point, whether they like it on not, they’re effectively panzergrenadiere. And as the campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan have demonstrated, infantry are going to ride under armor when that’s appropriate regardless of their shoulder patches or cap badges.
This is more than a matter of nomenclature—it’s a fundamental issue of force structure, generation, and employment. A modern infantry unit, trained for action across the spectrum of warfare, is a very flexible instrument. Send it out on foot, and it can chase Taliban up-and-down the slopes of the Hindu Kush. Mounted in armored vehicles, it’s relatively protected from interdiction on the way to its stepping-off point, and can subsequently exploit gaps in enemy defenses by motor march. With enough antitank weapons and on-call firepower, it can defeat even the most heavily armored forces opposing it.
Questions about that narrative can be referred to Stephen Biddle’s excellent Military Power: Explaining Victory and Defeat in Modern Battle (Princeton University Press, 2004). Biddle’s case studies and statistical tests argue convincingly that factors like training and combined arms doctrine are far better predictors of success in conventional land battles than the weight of armor, the volume and precision of firepower, or the latency of technology. These are important factors, but only inasmuch as they enable well-handled forces to more severely punish the incompetence of their opponents.
As Biddle observes, the Marine expeditionary force that frontally assaulted Iraqi lines in Kuwait in 1991 achieved its breakthrough in roughly the same amount of time, and at roughly the same casualty rate, as the much heavier and more recently equipped Army corps moving through the desert to its left. Following this argument, what US land forces need is not more or newer armor or artillery: these they have in more than sufficient quantities. With tens of thousands of armored personnel carriers on hand, there’s no concern that anyone is going to walk when he should ride. Asking Oshkosh to build another 5,244 troop carriers by next March isn’t lightening the infantry, either. So, we can all probably take a deep breath now.
Rather, if anything is important, the Army should be very careful not skimp on training, maintenance, and doctrinal development, regardless of budget problems. And frankly, the QDR may very well recommend a US Army that’s structured more like the US Marine Corps: largely composed of infantry that can walk, ride, or fly as the mission requires, and with enough tanks, artillery, and attack aviation that it can add armor and firepower as conditions permit. Are there growth areas, then, for companies with interests in land warfare? Absolutely. Even if more and newer tanks aren’t the answer, land forces will continue to consider continued healthy spending on C4ISR systems, but particularly on those that actually help them make better decisions in combat. That was the one part of the Once-and-Future Combat System program that survived the recent termination relatively intact, and that’s like a pattern that will hold for some time.
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