The Death of the Armor Corps
The Death of the Armor Corps
by Colonel Gian P. Gentile
Download the full article: The Death of the Armor Corps
The Armor Corps in the American Army is gone, it is no more.
The Army has become decidedly infantry centric. This wouldn’t be so bad if it was a fighting kind of infantry centered army. But instead it is an infantry centric Army grounded in the principles of population centric counterinsurgency and Rupert Smith’s view of war in the future as “wars amongst the people.”
To be sure the American Army will be told to do lots of things from winning hearts and minds in the Hindu Kush, to passing out humanitarian relief in the troubled spots around the world, to nation building in Iraq. But first and foremost it must be an Army grounded in combined arms competencies. This must come first, and not second or third after fuzzy concepts as “whole of government approach” and building emotional relationships with local populations. The latter may of course be important, depending on the mission, but those kinds of competencies must be premised on combined arms and not the other way around.
Download the full article: The Death of the Armor Corps
The author is a serving Army Colonel. The views in this article are his own and not those of the Department of Defense.
