@Alexis #72; No particular disagreements
especially as pertains to the need for multiple capabilities.

However, as I read history, the guerilla-oriented force has an easier time adapting to conventional warfare needs than the conventional force has in meeting unconventional needs. So if I can’t have a perfectly balanced force, I think the tilt should be towards the irregular.

Likewise, it seems to me that the lean force has a relatively easy time adding muscle (Pershing in WWI). The over-equipped force finds it next to impossible to shed the useless (Westmoreland in VN.)

Finally, I’ve no complaints about Rumsfields’
“light footprint”. Very seldom that mass trumps economy of force. What I think would have been disastrous was General Shineskis’ call for 300,000 to 400,000 men in Iraq. Pre-Petraeus and his adaptations, that would just have given terrorists a “target-rich environment” and made a big enough mess to render victory impossible.