Sublime

In a presentation I heard General McChrystal give at the New York Times New Work Summit in the summer of 2016, he said, “I tell people, ‘Don’t follow my orders. Follow the orders I would have given you if I were there and knew what you know.’”

President Truman and the European heads of government believed that only Eisenhower, the supreme commander in World War II, had sufficient credibility to bring those forces into being—and at the same time to be taken seriously by the Soviets.

for a team’s new operational needs from others is likely to be the individual who

Kiras, James D. Special Operations and Strategy: From World War II to the War on Terrorism. London: Routledge, 2006.

To oversee the development of the US Army’s first commando unit, Marshall reluctantly assigned Colonel Lucian K. Truscott, Jr., a gravel-voiced, goggle-eyed, rock-jawed horse soldier from Texas who offset his saturnine appearance by routinely wearing the high-leather boots of the cavalry, a polished helmet, a striking red jacket, and a yellow scarf

Smuts,

Charles Briscoe and his coauthors (Briscoe 2003) produced an early, official account of U.S. Army Special Operations Forces in Afghanistan: Weapon of Choice.

Yet when it comes to the great captains of irregular warfare, the same can hardly be said. While there are many accounts of daring commando raids, and more thoughtful works that explore the complex relationships between elite military advisors and friendly indigenous fighters, there is precious little study of the principles that might be distilled