William DuPuy

A general in the United States Army, William E. Dupuy (1919-) was known as a combat commander, staff officer, but as a military thinker and one of the spiritual fathers of the "revolutionary in military affairs". Perhaps his most influential assignment, however, was the four-star assignment to the new U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC) in 1973.He was at the heart of the restructuring of the U.S. Army after the Vietnam War disrupted its tradition, discipline, and ability.

He entered the Army as a second lieutenant from the Reserve Officers Training Corps in 1941, landed in the Battle of Normandy, and, by the end of the Second World War, was a 25-year-old [battalion]] commander.

During the Korean War, he served as a battalion and regimental commander during the Cold War. While a battalion commander, he served under Hamilton H. Howze, whose tactical combat pulled together, in an American context, things he had seen as effectively used by Second World War German troops. He particularly appreciated their sense for the use of terrain, and their use of responsive direct fire rather than waiting for air and artillery support.

His responsibilities grew during the Vietnam War, where he first served as operations officer for the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam]. During that time, he decided that as long as the enemy could fight from the sanctuaries of Cambodia, Laos, and North Vietnam, it was impossible to bring adequate destruction on the enemy, and the model was inherently flawed.

In the Vietnam experience, he became concerned that the extreme U.S. firepower superiority had formed bad habits. The man who had studied terrain use by the Germans, and the overwatch methods of Gen. Howze, concludded that a genertion ofelicopter-borne commanders lost their respect for the ability of terrain to hamper the mobility of units on the ground. They became so dependent on air and indiret fire that they ignored basic infantry defense. "None of those," DePuy said in 1974 when referring to Vietnamese-style U.S. defensive positions, "would survive for two seconds on the modern battlefield."

Subsequently, he commanded the 1st Infantry Division in Vietnam. Returning to Washington, he became the Service as the Special Assistant for Counterinsurgency and Special Activities (to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and as assistant vice chief of staff of the Army in Washington, D.C. In the latter position, he headed the interim Continental Army Command (CONARC), which was responsible for both doctrine and preparation. The mobilization mission went to the new Forces Command, and he went to TRADOC.

Pre-TRADOC, the Army had general principles, but no formal doctrine: the statement of "how we fight" above the tactical level. Developed under Dupuy was the first version, published in 1976, of Field Manual 100-5, Operations, which established Army doctrine for operational art. The first edition featured a Cold War model called "Active Defense", but the tradition of doctrinal thinking emerged. It introduced the AirLand Battle doctrine but did not tightly integrate it with other doctrine. Nevertheless, FM100-5 was the first of a series, under various names and numbers, of Army "capstone" documents. Joint U.S. doctrine arguably involved from that Army development, along with the more informal "maneuvrist" thinking from COL John Boyd of the Air Force and GEN Alfred M. Gray, Jr. of the Marines.

He was forceful and highly energetic, but not especially charismatic, with a focus on the mission: We are not in this business to be good guys. . . . Nice, warm human relationships are satisfying and fun, but they are not the purpose of an Army. Establishing the most marvelous, warm, sympathetic and informed relationships is unimportant, except in the context of making the team work better.