|
Author
|
Topic: Regarding S.L.A Marshall
|
I.M.A
Member
|
posted 08-20-2007 01:42 AM
  
Hello
I realize that this topic has a tenuous connection at best with the late Col. Dupuy's theories but I didn't know where else to post it.
I think the furor caused by S.L.A Marshall's "Men Under Fire" is nothing new and the controversy regarding Marshall's findings continues unabated, but I wonder what forum members think of Roger Spiller's analysis of his findings? Some current historians imply that the work of "pro-German" authors like Dupuy, Hastings, and Weigley was influenced by the above mentioned book. Dr.Spiller, as a friend of mine put it, did a "hatchet job" on Marshall's book. Here is a sample:
http://warchronicle.com/us/combat_historians_wwii/marshallfire.htm
Basically Spiller is implying that Marshall just made the whole thing up, his interviews et al! I would really appreciate any input on the topic from fellow forum members.
IP: Logged |
Niklas Zetterling
Senior Member
|
posted 08-20-2007 02:40 AM
I have no knowledge that may shed light on the alleged forgery of data, but I don't believe that Marshall's work has had any significant impact on the issue of relative combat performance. After all, Marshall only investigated one army, thus his data is hard to use for a comparative analysis, unless similar data is obtained for the German army.
The bulk of evidence suggesting high German combat efficiency does not originate from SLA Marshall.
IP: Logged |
Niklas Zetterling
Senior Member
|
posted 08-20-2007 03:00 AM
I might add that an Israeli army psychologist who made similiar studies of Israeli soldiers in battle found that rate of fires were much higher. However, he added that firing seemed to be a way of relieving the stresses of battle, causing soldiers often to fire without having identified any meaningful target.
I suspect that Marshall's "rates of fire" are very problematic to interpret, because they are likely to vary a lot depending on the combat situation. They can possibly be used to say something about combat performance, but there are numerous reservations, which motivates close scrutiny of the basic data.
In effect, it is not self-evident that a high rate of fire (in the sense used by Marshall) is better than a lower.
IP: Logged |
Michate
Member
|
posted 08-21-2007 03:41 AM
Actually German combat reports (or those reports by general staff officers sent out to visit the Eastern front on their impressions there) are full of statements that many infantry men, especially newly arrived recruits, (including new NCOs), often did not participate in the fighting, so the fighting was done almost exclusively by heavy weapons and those experienced men that had long enough surivived. It is of course difficult to generalise this, but the problem was clearly recognised.
The German official history (DRZW, Vols. 5.1 and 5.2) provide some occasional quotes from these reports.
IP: Logged |
Michate
Member
|
posted 08-21-2007 03:46 AM
BTW, Greg Michno, who is an expert on the US - Red Indian wars of the 1860-1890 period provided some interesting remarks in one of his articles or books ("Lakota Noon") about combat psychology of the US cavalry men to explain their poor performance in the battle of the Little Bighorn River.
IP: Logged |
Michate
Member
|
posted 08-21-2007 03:53 AM
Third remark, Hew Strachan also wrote an interesting article on combat psychology/motivation in the two world wars and its relation to primary groups (the Shils Janowitz motive), institutional pressure (the Bartov motive) and third, combat training and drill (his own motive).
The article is published in a German book "Erster Weltkrieg - Zweiter Weltkrieg - Ein Vergleich", an interesting collection of scholar articles tyring to work out a common perspective of the two world wars.
IP: Logged |
LWD
Senior Member
|
posted 08-21-2007 08:20 AM
My impression is that Marshall saw a problem and wanted to fix it. The purpose of the book was not to write a defintive acount it was to motivate people to fix the problem. In makeing his case as strong as possible Marshall didn't seam to worry overly much about contrary data.
IP: Logged |
I.M.A
Member
|
posted 08-27-2007 08:18 AM
Niklas Zetterling said:
"The bulk of evidence suggesting high German combat efficiency did not originate from SLA Marshall"
I couldn't agree more. Which is why it has always been puzzling to me why revisionist historians that tend to doubt German combat efficiency always set up SLA Marshall as a straw-man for their arguments.LWD said:
"In making his case as strong as possible Marshall did not seem to worry overly much about contrary data"
Evidently not. But I think the problem people like Spiller have is that Marshall seems to have actually fabricated the data to make his case, which is actually a far more serious accusation than presenting contrary data. Also, anyone familiar with the controversy would also find a spate of ad hominem attacks on Marshall himself. It's sad that an old soldier and eminent military historian is not around anymore to defend himself.
IP: Logged |
Chris Lawrence
Moderator
|
posted 01-31-2008 11:16 AM
quote:
Originally posted by I.M.A:
Basically Spiller is implying that Marshall just made the whole thing up, his interviews et al! I would really appreciate any input on the topic from fellow forum members.
Years ago I meet several times with Harold Leinbaugh (Men of Company K) to discuss this issue. Leinbaugh, a former FBI agent and WWII vet was pretty instrumental in raising the specific issue of how Marshall came up with the 15-25% only firing their guns. I believe the subject has been discussed in considerable depth elsewhere. Off the top of my head, it is my understanding that Marshall did such a formal survey (who fired the guns in the last battle) in the Pacific theater and got that result. His methodology was to basically sit down with a group of soldiers after the battle and interview them. There is no evidence that he did any formal surveys in the European Theater, although he may well have done some informal surveys. Probably what was done was to take the results he found in the Pacific and as a result of informal surveys and conversations, decide to extend it to the European theater. It is certainly sloppy methodology and somewhat deceptive in the way he described it in his book. Not the first author/analyst to take a point in time and extend it to cover far more than that. Anyhow, SLA Marshall has little to do with Trevor's work (although he knew him). On the other hand, if you want an independent confirmation of Trevor's work on combat effectiveness, take a look at the Briefing I gave at ISMOR on Measuring Combat Effectiveness. It is on this site and the data used is presented in the briefing. I believe Niklas Zetterling has also done some independent analysis of the same issues.
IP: Logged |
I.M.A
Member
|
posted 02-01-2008 11:39 PM
"Anyhow, SLA Marshall has little to do with Trevor's work (although he knew him)"
Agreed. As I stated earlier, it looks like Marshall's theories are being set up as a straw-man for criticizing Col.Dupuy's ideas. I will check out your article.
IP: Logged |
Chris Lawrence
Moderator
|
posted 03-24-2008 01:54 PM
You may also want to take a look at David Rowland, The Stress of Battle: Qunatifying Human Performance in Combat.He looks at the issue of combat degredation, among other things.
IP: Logged |
The Dupuy Institute Forum
UBBFriend: Email This Page to Someone! 
