Senior Leadership - The Crucial Element of Combat Power: A Leadership Analysis of Selected World War II Commanders, European Theater, 1944-45.

摘要

This study is an historical analysis of the demonstrated leadership attributes of three World War II commanders in the European Theater, 1944-45: General William H. Simpson, Ninth Army Commander; Major General Troy H. Middleton, VIII Corps Commander; and Major General John S. Wood, 4th Armored Division Commander. Each officer's performance is examined in detail based on available historical records and by focusing on the four components of senior leadership identified in Field Manual 22-999, Senior-Level Leadership. These four facets are personal leadership, technical competence, organizational leadership and management. Among the many conclusions which could be drawn from this investigation are: personal leadership was instrumental in each commander's success, although all used diverse styles; all three exhibited an appropriate level of technical competence, regardless of how this expertise was obtained; each used different, but successful, approaches to organizational leadership; and their effective management techniques consistently stressed mission-type orders, regular visits to forward units and well-defined goals. The study concludes that the conceptual framework used is appropriate for systematic investigations of senior leadership and organizational behavior and is useful to the historian as a means of examining and describing the battlefield performance of other historical figures. (author)