I’ve managed to avoid the news and reading about war for most of the last week. Thanks go to Peter Carey, Garrison Keillor and Julian Evans. Back to the fray today, with a question that came up in class last term, and draws the attention of Michael Evans today: why are there so many senior officers in the British armed forces? Evans notes that:
Although the size of the trained Army has shrunk to about 100,000 soldiers, there are now 255 members with the rank of brigadier or above — or one for every 400 service personnel. [...] There are now 65 generals in the Army, with 43 major-generals, 17 lieutenant-generals and five four-star generals. In addition there are 190 brigadiers, a one-star rank; 20 more than in 1997.
I can think of some reasons for over-officering, such as the historical need to dramatically expand the army at short notice, or the staffing of coalitions. But frankly, not much occurs that would explain the current phenomenon, except inertia and the tendency of unchecked bureaucracies to spawn senior and functionally unnecessary posts. The services themselves are responsible, of course, but I wonder about the role of politicians in this. Without sustained interest in strategic affairs, who will grasp the nettle of stripping out all those unnecessary posts and formations, particularly at a time when the public stock of the army is high, while that of politicians is less so?
The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have been wars of small formations, requiring officers of brigadier and below. Granted, not all wars will look like this, and we may in time need to field divisions once again. But does an army that cannot at present deploy and sustain anything above a couple of brigades really need 190 brigadiers, or 43 major generals? It seems likely that the civilian component of the MoD will be slimmed down dramatically in the years ahead. It might be politically more challenging to force significant restructuring on the uniformed services, but I suspect nonetheless that it will happen.
By contrast, I see that the IDF, with some 170,000 active service personnel, is still commanded by a Lt General, with the three constituent services each led by a two star officer. Is there a reason we can’t do likewise?
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It doesn’t explain the sheer number but surely the UK has far more need for senior officers than Israel:
-To work in other organisations, i.e. NATO, ISAF, EU Army, with the Americans, Brunei etc.
-To provide the necessary staff for global operations and outreach.
I note a recent David Axe article about how RN officers are the glue holding together the Somali Piracy force. Might this be the same case for the Army in organisations like NATO?
Guy – I think those are both plausible reasons. But then the IDF needs sufficient senior officers to scale up dramatically in times of national emergency, has a longer ongoing occupation to contend with than our Afghan deployment, and must balance the need for high intensity warfighting capabilities with its low-intensity counter-guerrilla role.
There is another possibility that I missed – status: the need for rank to confer standing with other nations’ armed forces. That’s a role related to, but broader than participation in coalitions and alliances. Again, however, our stock of senior officers seems more than ample for that purpose.
Why compare an apple and a cucumber? The organizations and missions are completely different. Have you compared the UK rank numbers to the French, who have similar organizations and missions? Or compared it proportionally to the US?
Have you examined the career paths, promotion points, and officer management of the IDF and MOD to see if there are similarities or if, again, they are completely different?
I frankly expect something a little more substantive and analytical here, not cheap shots.
libertariansoldier,
this is a blogsite, not a journal article. its legitimate to raise issues and ask questions, without always being exhaustive.
Of course even in Israel, there are those who think they too have too many generals–at least involved in politics:
Maybe there are just too many generals in Israeli politics
Ya’alon’s misstep
Here’s a prediction: When Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu travels to London and Berlin next week, Vice-Premier Moshe Ya’alon won’t be standing in for him as acting premier. That’s because Ya’alon has gone off the reservation.
As guest of honor earlier this week at a meeting of the Jewish Leadership Movement, a stridently right-wing Likud caucus led by Moshe Feiglin, Ya’alon said the wrong things, in the wrong way, in the wrong place.
In arguing that Jews have a right to live anywhere in Judea and Samaria, Ya’alon was articulating a fairly conventional Israeli position. Yet this government, in pursuing an accommodation with the Palestinian Arabs, has agreed that Israel will not exercise Jewish rights everywhere between the River Jordan and the Mediterranean.
In arguing that even unauthorized outposts “are completely legal,” Ya’alon was staking out a position at odds with his own government.
The tone of what Ya’alon said was also off-putting. This newspaper has been critical of Peace Now for its wholesale marginalization of the entire settlement enterprise. We’ve criticized the organization too for taking money from foreign powers and foundations intent on swaying Israeli public opinion and government policies. Yet we have never questioned the motives of grassroots Israelis who earnestly identify with Peace Now. And we think Ya’alon’s intolerant characterization of the organization as an elitist “virus” further demeans the level of political discourse in this country.
Ya’alon’s venue was also peculiar. Netanyahu opposes any role for Feiglin within the party. The premier’s ongoing campaign to block Feiglin, who nowadays plays by the rules of the political game, from lawfully dissenting within the Likud strikes us as wrongheaded. But in aligning himself so publicly with Netanyahu’s nemesis, Ya’alon has demonstrated a remarkable lack of loyalty to the man who so recently ushered him into politics.
THE YA’ALON affair exposes yet again why the Israeli political system is dysfunctional. There is something awfully wrong when a number two feels no compunction about turning against his chief after only five months in office.
The controversy also reminds us that generals tend to find the give-and-take of politics exasperating. Politics is the art of the possible; it demands compromise and endless bargaining over who gets what, when and how. The military, in contrast, is a hierarchical organization. Generals give orders; subordinates obey.
Just as Ya’alon is proving a divisive force in the Likud – irritated, perhaps, that he has to compete with others in influencing the premier – Shaul Mofaz is champing at the bit as Tzipi Livni’s number two in Kadima. Ehud Barak, meanwhile, has practically eviscerated the Labor Party to maintain his grip on power.
Ya’alon presents himself as a man above the fray who speaks truth to power. His supporters believe that Ariel Sharon did not extend the then chief of staff’s term by the customary year because Ya’alon opposed the Gaza disengagement. Opinions differ on whether this was really so.
In any event, Ya’alon could learn something from his cabinet colleague Bennie Begin about honorable behavior at the apex of government.
THE PRIME Minister’s Office announced that “Minister Ya’alon’s statements are unacceptable to the prime minister, both in substance and in style, and do not represent the government’s position.”
Speaking at Bar-Ilan University in June, the premier outlined the peace policies of this government. He noted that “in the heart of our Jewish homeland [there] now lives a large population of Palestinians. We do not want to rule over them. We do not want to run their lives.” He offered to negotiate the creation of a demilitarized state for the Palestinians, insisting that they recognize Israel as a Jewish state and renounce the “right of return” to Israel proper for refugees and their descendants. A pullback to the 1949 Armistice Lines is out of the question.
Ya’alon heard that speech – some reports suggested he participated in drafting it – and the next day told Army Radio that he could live with a Palestinian state under the conditions defined by Netanyahu.
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Shabbat shalom
http://elliotjager.com/2009/08/maybe-there-are-just-too-many-generals.html
Patrick Porter,
Thank you for the clarification, sir, on the fact that this is a blogsite.
You are certainly correct in stating that you can compare an apple and an orange on a blogsite and ignore the differences.
Hi Libertarian. I’d say we currently have different missions from both the French and the Israeli armed forces, though both alliance membership and an expeditionary bent are common features with the French.
But even so, there’s similarity with the IDF: not least in the desire to retain the capacity for high-intensity conflict alongside ongoing low-intensity wars. I think, however, that the ethos and history of these militaries might be more significant than current operations in explaining the over-officering of the British army.
Kenneth Payne,
I agree with every point you make in your comment, except the last. That is, there is nothing in your initial writing that actually demonstrates “over-officering”, or more accurately, I imagine, “over senior officering”, which was my point. I think to make that judgement would require at least looking at where they are distributed, what they do, why there are the numbers that currently exist, and what the alternatives would be. I personally have no idea whether the UK Army senior officer corps is in fact, too big, too small, or just right. And my comment was meant to show that there was nothing in the report that advanced my knowledge.
Now, here at NTM-A, on the other hand, I can assure you it is incredibly over-senior-officered. It seems I cannot turn around without bumping into a GO/FO. A three star, two two stars, and almost a dozen one stars to run an organization considerably smaller than Ft. Benning. But it seems that the need for representation means everybody gets there piece of the senior officer pie. And since the UK works in many such international headquarters, perhaps this is a contributing factor to the demand–as both you and Guy posited above.
regards.