Mission Command books: They provide a wealth of information, providing the Who, What, Why and How To? But do not replace that final, difficult step!

This is an ongoing series in support of Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth as he reforms U.S. DoD.

Fortunately, there exists a vast array of literature, including books and articles, that thoroughly examine Mission Command (Auftragstaktik), encompassing theoretical foundations, historical case studies (both successful and unsuccessful), implementation strategies, and personnel development methodologies. Notable historians who have made significant contributions to this field include Dr. Bruce Gudmundsson, Dr. Martin Samuels, Dr. Eitan Shamir, Mr. William S. Lind, and Dr. Jorg Muth, in addition to my own published works. While these texts provide comprehensive, well-documented insights into Mission Command, the most substantial and challenging obstacle, particularly within the U.S. military and non-governmental organizations, lies in effective implementation. The following texts can facilitate the development of a strategic plan, subsequent to a thorough examination of the principles and misconceptions surrounding Mission Command. Please note that this list is not exhaustive, and I apologize for any notable omissions.

1. William S. Lind:

   1. Maneuver Warfare Handbook (WESTVIEW SPECIAL STUDIES IN MILITARY AFFAIRS) 1st Edition: '“Maneuver warfare, often controversial and requiring operational and tactical innovation, poses perhaps the most important doctrinal questions currently facing the conventional military forces of the U.S. Its purpose is to defeat the enemy by disrupting the opponent's ability to react, rather than by physical destruction of forces. This book develops and explains the theory of maneuver warfare and offers specific tactical, operational, and organizational recommendations for improving ground combat forces. The authors translate concepts?too often vaguely stated by manuever warfare advocates?into concrete doctrine. Although the book uses the Marine Corps as a model, the concepts, tactics, and doctrine discussed apply to any ground combat force.”

   2. The New Maneuver Warfare Handbook (Special Tactics Institute): “Since the original maneuver warfare handbook was published in 1985, understanding of maneuver warfare has broadened and deepened. Here, the author of the original book, William S. Lind, shares that new knowledge with readers. The New Maneuver Warfare Handbook offers novel insights in military theory while remaining focused on the people who do the fighting, Marines and soldiers from Battalion level on down through staff NCOs and NCOs. It includes updates of Marine Colonel Mike Wiley’s examples which illustrate the application of critical maneuver warfare concepts. It goes beyond the original book in discussing how to train for maneuver warfare. In short, the New Maneuver Warfare Handbook augments the original book rather than replacing it, in ways useful to commanders at every tactical level. Like the earlier book, it is destined to become a classic in its field.”

   3. Reforging Excalibur: Creating a Sustainable and Relevant Defense for 21st-Century America: “Reforging Excalibur is an exciting and unique proposal for restructuring America’s armed forces in order to better prepare us for Fourth-Generation warfare. After a withering critique of the bloat and waste of the Department of Defense and Pentagon’s “business as usual” attitude towards military spending, the authors disclose why this approach is unsustainable in terms of budget and combat readiness. In short, while our military is prepared to fight wars with other state militaries, it is woefully unprepared — psychologically and structurally — to succeed in Fourth-Generation warfare.

      The authors address social experiments and challenges hoisted upon military servicemen that wind up confusing and emasculating them as effective warriors: the deleterious effects of women and gay men in units, insufficient command time for commanding officers, et al. These issues have been discussed behind closed doors among combat veterans for years, although they are never openly addressed by general officers before Congress. This book aims to change that conversation.

      Ultimately, the vision that Lind and Ewald share is one of a military scaled down to precision, while the National Guard takes on a new and bold outsized role in protecting the United States.”

2. Jorg Muth:

   1. Command Culture: Officer Education in the U.S. Army and the German Armed Forces, 1901-1940, and the Consequences for World War II: In Command Culture, Jörg Muth examines the different paths the United States Army and the German Armed Forces traveled to select, educate, and promote their officers in the crucial time before World War II. Muth demonstrates that the military education system in Germany represented an organized effort where each school and examination provided the stepping stone for the next. But in the United States, there existed no communication about teaching contents or didactical matters among the various schools and academies, and they existed in a self chosen insular environment. American officers who finally made their way through an erratic selection process and past West Point to the important Command and General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, found themselves usually deeply disappointed, because they were faced again with a rather below average faculty who forced them after every exercise to accept the approved “school solution.”

      
      Command Culture explores the paradox that in Germany officers came from a closed authoritarian society but received an extremely open minded military education, whereas their counterparts in the United States came from one of the most democratic societies but received an outdated military education that harnessed their minds and limited their initiative. On the other hand, German officer candidates learned that in war everything is possible and a war of extermination acceptable. For American officers, raised in a democracy, certain boundaries could never be crossed.

      
      This work for the first time clearly explains the lack of audacity of many high ranking American officers during World War II, as well as the reason why so many German officers became perpetrators or accomplices of war crimes and atrocities or remained bystanders without speaking up. Those American officers who became outstanding leaders in World War II did so not so much because of their military education, but despite it.William S. Lind:

3. Eitan Shamir:

   1. Transforming Command: The Pursuit of Mission Command in the U.S., British, and Israeli Armies: '“On today's complex, fragmented, fast-moving battlefield, where combatants adapt constantly to exploit one-another's weaknesses, there is a demonstrable requirement for military commanders to devolve a high level of autonomy of decision-making and action to leaders on the ground. An effective model for doing this has existed for some time in the form of mission command and has been utilized by the U.S., Israeli, and British Armies—but with mixed success. This book examines in depth the experiences of the armed forces of each of these countries in implementing mission command, and reveals the key factors that have determined the success or failure of the implementation—factors such as the Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA), the spread of low-intensity conflicts and operations other than war, and differences in how military cultures interpret, articulate, and exercise the command function. It has significant implications for both the development of military doctrine and the training and education of tomorrow's military leaders.”

4. Martin Samuels:

   1. Piercing the Fog of War: The Theory and Practice of Command in the British and German Armies, 1918-1940: “Since the late 1970s, anglophone and German military literature has been fascinated by the Wehrmacht‘s command system, especially the practice of Auftragstaktik. There have been many descriptions of the doctrine, and examinations of its historical origins, as well as unflattering comparisons with the approaches of the British and American armies prior to their adoption of Mission Command in the late 1980s. Almost none of these, however, have sought to understand the different approaches to command in the context of a fundamental characteristic of warfare – friction. This would be like trying to understand flight, without any reference to aerodynamics. Inherently flawed, yet this is the norm in the military literature. This book seeks to address that gap.
      
      First, the nature of friction, and the potential command responses to it, are considered. This allows the development of a typology of eight command approaches, each approach then being tested to identify its relative effectiveness and requirements for success. Second, the British and German armies’ doctrines of command during the period are examined, in order to reveal similarities and differences in relation to their perspective on the nature of warfare and the most appropriate responses. The experience of Erwin Rommel, both as a young subaltern fighting the Italians in 1917, and then as a newly-appointed divisional commander against the French in 1940, is used to test the expression of the German doctrine in practice. Third, the interaction of these different command doctrines is explored in case studies of two key armoured battles, Amiens in August 1918 and Arras in May 1940, allowing the strengths and weaknesses of each to be highlighted and the typology to be tested. The result is intended to offer a new and deeper understanding of both the nature of command as a response to friction, and the factors that need to be in place in order to allow a given command approach to achieve success.
      
      The book therefore in two ways represents a sequel to my earlier work, Command or Control? Command, Training and Tactics in the British and German Armies, 1888-1918 (London: Cass, 1995), in that it both takes the conceptual model of command developed there to a deeper level, and also takes the story from the climax of 1918 up to the end of the first phase of the Second World War.”

   2. Command or Control? 1st Edition: “This is a comparative study of the fighting systems of the British and German armies in The Great War. Taking issue with revisionist historians, Samuels argues that German success in battle can be explained by their superior tactical philosophy. The book provides a fascinating insight into the development of infantry tactics at a seminal point in the history of warfare.”

5. Donald Vandergriff:

   1. Adopting Mission Command: Developing Leaders for a Superior Command Culture (Association of the United States Army): “In September 2010, James G. Pierce, a retired U.S. Army colonel with the Strategic Studies Institute at the U.S. Army War College in Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania, published a study on Army organizational culture. Pierce postulated that the ability of a professional organization to develop future leaders in a manner that perpetuates readiness to cope with future environmental and internal uncertainty depends on organizational culture. He found that today's U.S. Army leadership may be inadequately prepared to lead the profession toward future success. The need to prepare for future success dovetails with the use of the concepts of mission command. This book offers up a set of recommendations, based on those mission command concepts, for adopting a superior command culture through education and training. Donald E. Vandergriff believes by implementing these recommendations across the Army, that other necessary and long-awaited reforms will take place.”

   2. Mission Command: The Who, What, Where, When and Why An Anthology: In the chaos and uncertainty of modern war, our troops must be empowered to make decisions, take the initiative, and lead boldly. This is Mission Command: a command culture, leadership style, and operating concept that has been embraced by armed forces the world over. While the U.S. Military and many of our allies have formally adopted Mission Command, much work remains to truly understand and implement this style of leadership. In this anthology, 12 authors from 3 nations (United States, United Kingdom, and Norway) offer diverse perspectives on the topic of Mission Command as it relates to their service in the military, law enforcement, government, and private sector. Real-world examples supported by in-depth research provide the who, what, when, where, and why of Mission Command, identifying opportunities to improve how we lead our teams. Topics and authors include: - Unit Cohesion (Joe Labarbera) -Mission Command at Sea (Tommy Krabberød) -The Historical Evolution of Mission Command (Donald Vandergriff) - Improving Army Doctrine (Regina Parker) - Military Campaign Analysis (Gerry Long) - Organizational Culture (Thomas Rebuck) -Mission Command in Garrison (Darrell Fawley) - Training and Leadership for Mission Command (Chad Foster) -Mission Command and Complex Operations (Grant Martin) -Fitness and Mission Command (Daniel Markert & Scott Sonnon) -Civil Policing and Mission Command (Fred Leland) ...and more!

   3. Mission Command II: The Who, What, Where, When and Why: An Anthology: In this second volume of the Mission Command Anthology, a team of new and returning authors offers diverse perspectives on the concept of Mission Command. Drawing from their first-hand experience as leaders as well as rigorous scholarship, they provide insight as relevant to the future of national defense as it is to how the reader will lead his or her own team.

6. Dr. Bruce Gudmundsson:

   1. Stormtroop Tactics: Innovation in the German Army, 1914-1918: “The radical transformation in German Infantry tactics that took place during World War I, this book presents the first detailed account of the evolution of stormtroop tactics available in English. It covers areas previously left unexplored: the German Infantry's tactical heritage, the squad's evolution as a tactical unit, the use of new weapons for close combat, the role of the elite assault units in the development of new tactics, and detailed descriptions of offensive battles that provided the inspiration and testing ground for this new way of fighting. Both a historical investigation and a standard of excellence in infantry tactics, Stormtroop Tactics is required reading for professional military officers and historians as well as enthusiasts.
      
      Contrary to previous studies, Stormtroop Tactics proposes that the German Infantry adaption to modern warfare was not a straightforward process resulting from the top down intervention of reformers but instead a bottom up phenomenon. It was an accumulation of improvisations and ways of dealing with pressing situations that were later sewn together to form what we now call Blitzkrieg. Focusing on action at the company, platoon, and squad level, Stormtroop Tactics provides a detailed description of the evolution of German defensive tactics during World War I―tactics that were the direct forbears of those used in World War II.”

   2. On Infantry (The Military Profession Series) 2nd Edition: “Another volume in Praeger's The Military Profession series, this revised edition of the 1984 Praeger classic tells the story of infantry in the 20th century and its impact on the major conflicts of our time. Its purpose is to provide the reader--whether infantryman or not--with hitherto unavailable insights on the role that infantry plays in the larger battle and how that has helped shape the world that we live in today. Unique aspects of the book include the treatment of technical issues in non-technical language, the extensive use of German and French sources generally unavailable to the English-speaking reader, and the shattering of some long-cherished myths. Combat motivation and combat refusal, the role played by small units (such as the squad and fire team), the role of infantry in the Blitzkrieg, and many other issues often papered over in the literature of infantry are discussed and analyzed in detail in this revised edition.”