In 9 pages this paper examines the RA and other specialized units of the military in a consideration of how important infantry maintenance skills are and also assesses whether or not they are as important in contemporary combat as is high tech weaponry. Two sources are cited in the bibliography.
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on basic infantry skills, but it would also be equally fair to assert that specialisation is more important than broad-based training. For example, one could argue that specialisation is not
in itself possible unless there is a solid foundation of knowledge on which to build: in this instance, it could be argued that the effective use of field artillery cannot
be achieved unless those concerned are already practised in basic field skills as well as those specifically related to the use of artillery.
Separating specialised skills from more general ones is, on the whole, counter-productive, in that it implies that one
can gloss over the basics in order to concentrate on particular aspects of military technique, and this is not usually a successful mode of operation. It has always been accepted
that there will be various technical or logistical skills which should be developed for use in particular operations, and that the individuals who demonstrate a particular propensity for such skills
will be of less use if these capacities are not fully developed. In World War II, for example, the long-term planning which underpinned the Normandy landings relied on the cooperation
of various different military sections as well as on the infantry skills of the troops who gathered information for analysis: there would have been little point in sending those whose
speciality was geophysical analysis out on the reconnaissance missions which actually amassed data for such analysis.
In a more modern context, however, one could assert that despite the fact that warfare is now frequently conducted with long-range weapons