One of the highlights of COIN camp yesterday for me was finally meeting SWJ’s Dave Dillegge in the flesh while we both ran to get a cup of coffee. I think it’s fair to say that neither of us looks like the other thought we would look. But he reminded me of something really quite remarkable: Brig. Gen. H.R. McMaster sent Dave and his partner-in-COIN, Robert Haddick, the latest draft of the Army’s Capstone Concept, a document that shapes the service’s efforts at training and preparing for future conflict while incorporating the lessons of today’s. (Or, from the introduction, "how to think about future conflict within an uncertain and complex environment.") McMaster wants the commenters at SWJ to critique it and offer some additional ideas.

To call that a laurel — and a show of respect — for the SWJ community is a significant understatement. I struggle to think of a parallel for the political blogosphere, but imagine if the Democratic National Committee emailed the Great Orange Satan and said, "Here’s a draft our 2012 platform. What do you think misses the mark; and what aren’t we thinking about sufficiently?" Dave and Robert should be very proud of what they’ve assembled in such a short period of time, and at the risk of feeding accusations of source-greasing, this is a very cool thing for McMaster to do. 

Greg Grant has such a great post on the differences between McMaster’s draft of the updated Capstone Concept and the 2005 version that anything I write would be redundant.