John's third suggestion was about the training and training of military logistics personnel. Whether it is to build a transparent system www.biquge.info of army assets or improve the supply model of troops, it is inseparable from a professional logistics team.

No matter how powerful John is, it is impossible for him to change the entire army logistics system by himself, not to mention that he is just a two-knife on paper, and he is not as good as Martin in terms of actual operation.

In his proposal, in addition to proposing to build an education system for logistics personnel, set up a special training class for logistics officers, strengthen the daily training of the troops' logistics support system, and hold regular assessments and exercises in logistics subjects, John also specifically proposed the introduction of a number of professional personnel from the country's well-known business schools.

That's right, not from the disciplines of mathematics, statistics, accounting, etc., which seem to be closely related to logistics, but from seemingly unrelated business schools. John argues that warfare in the industrial age has lost its mystery and chivalry, and has become more and more dependent on the economic power of nations, so that many "commercial methods" are also applicable to warfare.

In his view, the country in the industrial age is like a big ant nest, and every citizen is a small ant in it. Once the nation is at war, each individual is assigned a different task around the ultimate goal of victory. A country's war strength is the combined force formed by the coordination and cooperation of all these individual forces.

At this time, how to make the most effective coordination is very important. It is necessary for someone to classify the tens of thousands of social responsibilities one by one, and properly arrange the personnel, money, and materials to carry out various tasks, so as to ensure the maximum utilization of national resources. And that's exactly what business school professors and students do best.

John was able to think of this because he was completely inspired by McNamara. Historically, McNamara and his Harvard Business School classmates, known to later generations as the "Blue Bloods," joined the Army Air Corps' Bureau of Statistics Control under Colonel Thornton.

There, McNamara successfully used his incredible numerical flair to find the most efficient way to execute the Army Air Corps' work plan. General LeMay once recalled that McNamara simply put his college homework on the battlefield and increased the flight capability of his B-29 bomber by 30 percent. By analyzing pilot and aircraft data, McNamara rearranged the pilots' attendance schedules, which made the air force much more efficient than the one arranged by Li May's staff.

John believes that the most important thing the U.S. Army's logistics system needs now is a group of management talents like McNamara who are proficient in data analysis and advocate efficiency. Even if the professors and students of those business schools are not as "demonic" as McNamara, they can have such astonishing discoveries as "10,022 aircraft, plus 120765 air force personnel, can do the work that 44 ships and 3,200 sailors are currently doing". But at least it can make the formulation of the army's logistics plan more accurate and reasonable.

In the history of World War II, the U.S. military was so conservative in its logistical plans that it was simply breathtaking to those of the other belligerent countries. It can really be said that he has a lot of money, and he doesn't take money properly. In almost every battle, the logistics department is eager to consider the difficulty of supplying materials to the front line many times more serious.

Looking back, it is a little ridiculous to look back at the plans made by the logistics department of the US military at that time. For example, they would assume that the state of the French roads means that the average daily distance traveled by a car is only 160 kilometers, and that the maximum distance from the railway line to the troops is 75 kilometers. And the reality is that at least two or three times farther away is no problem.

For example, they are always accustomed to arranging their supply plans according to the maximum material consumption of 650 tons per day (in fact, it generally does not exceed 400 tons) per division. Therefore, after preparing 227 quartermaster car companies for 22 American divisions in France, they also insisted that they still need to have 100 more car companies to meet the material supply needs of Operation Cobra.

In fact, even if the daily material consumption of each division is really as much as 650 tons, 227 munitions car companies are more than enough. This is because there is also a ready-made railway system available, and it is not only the car company of the quartermaster department that has trucks.

At that time, each American division had its own strong automobile capacity, and they were able to tow a large part of their supplies back from the rear supply zone hundreds of miles away. And the logistics department never considered these trucks when calculating capacity.

Fortunately, Patton and Hodges did not listen to them and boldly began to advance into the interior of France, clearing the Germans west of the Seine in only 23 days. It was 11 days ahead of the original plan, which the logistics department thought could not be realized.

John vaguely remembers that the logistics commander in history who insisted that Operation Cobra could not be completed was Crawford, who was then the chief of the supply department of the Allied High Command. I didn't expect this logistical expert to make such a low-level mistake.

However, Crawford himself cannot be blamed entirely for this, he was still directing the deployment of supplies in Britain at that time, and how did he know the actual situation in France on this side of the Channel. This also proves the necessity of John's request to bring in talent from the business school.

If there are a group of professional management personnel in the logistics system who have modern management knowledge, believe in numbers and facts, worship efficiency and control, and take the pursuit of maximizing efficiency as their lifelong goal in the future, this kind of unbelievable mistake will naturally not occur again.

As for McNamara himself, John was reluctant to let him join the army. The work of FedEx's Systems Analysis Office is still waiting for him to preside.

Anyway, this kid is really good enough, and he traveled abroad and swam to the battlefield. This summer, McNamara, a graduate of Harvard Business School, traveled to Europe with a group of classmates. They are said to have scraped together $20 each to buy a second-hand Ford station wagon and board a ship from Boston to Italy.

After that, they spent more than three months visiting 10 countries, including Italy, Switzerland, Austria, France, Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and Germany.

When they had finished enjoying the idyllic scenery in a rural town in southern Germany and were ready to set off for England as planned, they realized that the world outside had changed. War broke out, and Britain and Germany were already at war. Although not a single shot has been fired between the two sides, the passenger ship they had booked has been suspended, and the ticket has become waste paper.

Because there were too many expatriates who were eager to evacuate, they wandered around Germany for half a month and could not find a way back to the United States. If John hadn't remembered him in time and asked Lieutenant Commander Victor, who was a naval attache at the Berlin embassy, to help them, McNamara would probably have been trapped in Europe as he was in history, and ended up spending all his money and had to return to the United States by cleaning the deck and peeling potatoes on a merchant ship.

Counting the days, this kid should be almost in the United States. Maybe you can ask if there are any suitable candidates among his classmates.