Modern warfare and the Long Tail

Uninspected is the long tail of necessary training for the general troops. See "Pentagon's New Map" for a partial description of how this is viewed as going. Looks like they require a Long Tail of specialists, who can move quickly into an area, supported by local government coalistions rather than our own logistics. The key impact force would be directly supported, but only for the time they were factually needed. Means smaller forces, uniquely positioned in key airports and aggressively defended.

The Long Tail:

"Long Tail counter-insurgency
John Robb applies the theory to the US military operations in the Middle East, and (in the earlier post linked from this post) to the insurgents themselves: ' The complexity of the threat posed by open source warfare in Iraq has accelerated the US military's use of outsourcing. Traditionally, the long tail has been used to describe the number of support personnel (the tail) required to support combat troops (the tooth). Tooth-to-tail ratios have grown over the years as the complexity and resource intensity of modern combat has increased. In essence, modern warfare requires a loooong tail of support troops. The US military's tooth-to-tail ratio is approximately 1 to 10 (or more).'"