> On Wed, 10 Dec 2003, Dwayne Monroe wrote:
>
> > This story raises an interesting question: can anyone recall a similar
> > sort of counsultative relationship between the US military establishment
> > and that of another country?
>
> Sure. We took instruction from the British and the French in Vietnam
> because they'd recently had experience in guerrilla warfare and we hadn't.
>
> Michael
Col. David Hackworth - Led With Courage And The Force Of His Own Intelligence
By Loren Fleckenstein
David Hackworth became America's most decorated living soldier by searching out victory when all five senses signaled defeat.
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One key to his battlefield success was a readiness to learn from anyone.
In the early part of the Vietnam War, for example, Hackworth paid close attention to allied Australian soldiers. They were experts in jungle fighting.
Without authorization, he invited crack Aussies to fight along with his Army units.
Friends believe Hackworth, a native of Santa Monica, Calif., came by that kind of independent thinking as a youth.
''David was an orphan at a young age. He joined the Army at 15. I think growing up with that background, he naturally became a scrappy, combative, competitive kind of guy,'' said retired Lt. Gen. Henry Emerson.
''I think he's always been a creative, open-minded guy, willing to know the past but conceptualize new thoughts. Hackworth was one of seven or eight people at the battalion level to grasp the nature of the enemy'' in Vietnam, Emerson said.
Headquarters didn't see the value of Hackworth's liaison with the Australians. ''When Gen. (William) Westmoreland heard about it, he freaked,'' Hackworth said of the head of U.S. forces in Vietnam. ''He said, 'We can't be learning from those guys.' ''
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http://www.hackworth.com/ibdart.html