Chiefs of Staff: The Principal Officers Behind History's Great Commanders

• Author: Fred L. Borch III
• Pages: 08

CHIEFS OF STAFF: THE PRINCIPAL OFFICERS BEHIND HISTORY'S GREAT COMMANDERS1

REVIEWED BY FRED L. BORCH III2

Military libraries are filled with books about commanders- understandably so, given the importance of command in military operations.3 But, while Judge Advocates have served as commanders in both war and peace,4 Army lawyers spend most of their military careers as staff officers advising commanders and their staffs. It follows that Judge Advocates should look for ways to enhance their abilities as staff officers―and reading this new, unique, and groundbreaking study of chiefs of staff in modern history is a great start.

The theme of Chiefs of Staff: The Principal Officers Behind History's Great Commanders is that while the commander is critical to victory in war, that commander cannot succeed without a chief of staff- the "key staff officer responsible for translating the ideas of the commander into practical plans for soldiers to execute on the battlefield."5 The chief of staff must not only understand the commander's intent, but also translate that intent into clear and succinct guidance for subordinate staff principals. Additionally, the chief of staff must manage and run the staff, and coordinate with subordinate, higher, and lateral commanders. This takes not only intelligence and knowledge, but tact and diplomatic skill as well. Finally, the chief of staff must have the ability to envisage new (and perhaps unexpected) ways for the staff to enhance mission success. The ultimate message of Chiefs of Staff is that commanders get the credit for great victories and are blamed for battlefield disasters. Their chiefs of staff, however, are overlooked, if not forgotten. Yet the importance of the chief of staff in military operations makes it imperative to study them.

What makes a chief of staff successful? Chiefs of Staff answers this question by examining more than twenty operational-level chiefs of staff from the Napoleonic Wars through World War I (Volume I) and World War II through Vietnam (Volume II). More than twenty distinguished military historians, including David T. Zabecki, who served both as an author and editor, provide biographical sketches of more than thirty German, British, French, Soviet, and U.S. officers who served as chiefs of staff over a nearly 200 year period.6

Each profile begins with a chronology of the subject's military career, followed by an eight to twenty page discussion of the chief of staff's relationship with his commander and his strengths and weaknesses as an organizer and manager. Each sketch naturally

concentrates on a particular warfighting event that highlights the chief of staff's contribution to the commander's success-or failure-on the battlefield.

Zabecki, who penned two of the profiles contained in these volumes, is well-qualified to write about military history generally and chiefs of staff in particular. He served as an infantry rifleman in Vietnam and, after earning a commission, commanded at the company, battalion, brigade, and division level.7 Before he retired as an Army major general, Zabecki had served as the senior U.S. Army commander south of the Alps and had been the chief of staff at the 7th Army Command in Heidelberg, Germany.8 He also is a professionally trained historian, with a Ph.D. in military history.9

Chiefs of Staff begins with a quick historical examination of the evolution of the staff at the operational level of warfare.10 Although King Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden was the first to develop a regimental staff in the early 1600s, most military historians view the era of the French Revolution and Napoleon as triggering the need for a warfighting-level staff. The emergence of large national armies in the early 1800s meant a commander could no longer control his troops directly. The mass warfare carried out by corps-sized organizations in an even larger army also required detailed planning to move and supply thousands and thousands of troops, and the commander simply did not have the time to do this complex and time-consuming staff work.11

While Napoleon's Grand Army-more than 500,000 men by 1812- had an improvised staff of officers doing administrative work and war planning, and a chief of staff who acted as a "facilitator" and coordinator, it was the Prussians who first developed the framework for the modern general staff.12 Operations and training, logistics and movements, intelligence, and ammunition resupply were the chief business of the staff, although administrative, personnel, legal, and medical also were part of the Prussian warfighting staff structure.13

Chiefs of Staff explores the German contribution to the development of the General Staff, and explains why German battlefield success in the Austro-Prussian War (1866) and Franco-Prussian War (1870) convinced early twentieth century military observers from the United States to Japan that the German staff structure was the model to emulate.14

Perhaps more important than staff structure, however, was the German development of tactical doctrine or Auftragstaktik, which not only guided subordinate commanders in executing military operations, but guided warfighting staffs in their work. Zabecki's profile of German General Friedrich-Wilhelm von Mellenthin (who served as a chief of...