It is time to drag out the old historical concepts and put them into a contemporary framework in a readable fashion. History is unbeatable in teaching lessons. The U.S. Army needs to understand the struggle the Prussian/German Army went through to introduce this superior command culture to avoid the old mistakes and repeat the successes. Only then is there a chance in the future that once American officers will face the enemy not with a superior budget, gadgets, fire power, or electronics but with a superior mind and command culture. The language of mission command is like the command culture itself: brief, uncompromising, focused, and ruthless.
A Crisis in Command and the Roots of the Problem
The U.S. Army currently tries to introduce the German command philosophy of Auftragstaktik — Mission Command — but still fails to understand the essentials of that system. One of them is empowered subordinates whose opinion is valued and who do not have to fear repercussions if they voice criticism against their superiors. The Prussian/German army struggled for 30 years with the introduction of this superior command philosophy and the U.S. Army seems to be determined to make every single mistake the Prussian army made and add some of their own.