Freedom Line Blog

When General Stanley McChrystal, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan, saw this slide in a PowerPoint presentation he said, “When we understand that slide, we’ll have won the war.”  No wonder this is called “the long war”!

Though this is an extreme version of the business school mentality infecting military strategy, some members of the top brass are banning PowerPoint.

‘It’s dangerous because it can create the illusion of understanding and the illusion of control,’ he told the New York Times. ‘Some problems in the world are not bullet-izable.’

There is growing concern about the insiduous spread of PowerPoint which has come to dominate the lives of many junior officers.

Dubbed the PowerPoint Rangers, they spend hours slaving away on slides to illustrate every Afghan scenario.

Lieutenant Sam Nuxoll, a platoon leader posted in Iraq, told military website Company Command how he spent most of his time making PowerPoint presentations.

‘I have to make a storyboard complete with digital pictures, diagrams and text summaries on just about anything that happens,’ he added.

‘Conduct a key leader engagement? Make a storyboard. Award a microgrant? Make a storyboard.’

Good grief.

H/T: Daily Mail