I know I have linked to articles about this incident before, readers, but this piece seemed to have some insights worth further consideration. So I have linked it here today for your edification and cogitation. Enjoy!
LGOPs and the Power of Collective Intent
Published Nov 12, 2022
Little Groups of Paratroopers (LGOPs)
One of the first things a Paratrooper learns upon arriving at Fort Benning for Airborne school is the Rule of LGOPs, which goes something like this:
“After the demise of the best Airborne plan, a most terrifying effect occurs on the battlefield. This effect is known as the rule of LGOPs. This is, in its purest form, small groups of pissed-off 19-year-old American Paratroopers. They are well-trained, armed to the teeth, and lack serious adult supervision. They collectively remember the Commander’s intent as “March to the sound of the guns and destroy anyone who is not dressed like you…” Happily, they go about the day’s work.”
In July 1943, the first night mass parachute jump was conducted in Operation Husky, the invasion of Sicily. Then Colonel James M. Gavin led the 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment, with the 3rd Battalion, 504th attached. Winds increased to 35 to 45 miles per hour just before the jump, but it was too late to cancel. They were already in the air approaching their drop zones. Planes were blown wildly off course and some gliders crashed. Less than half of the paratroopers reached their rally points. This is when, naturally, LGOPs occurred. The troops knew not only their unit mission, but also the overall mission. When a small group of paratroopers got together, they went into action. They cut every telephone line they found, they conducted ambushes and raids, and they accomplished every objective, and the best part is, these LGOPs were comprised of troops that had just met one another, right there on the DZ.
A Song of Joy by Caroline Furlong 
American service members seem to be unique in this regard. I don’t know if the doctrine of commander’s intent was taught before the D-Day paratroop fiasco turned success, or not, but I understand that incident is an essential part of a serviceman’s training.
Soldiers of many countries run by dictatorships and with cultures with a rigid class structure tend to react one of two ways in the absence of direct orders, sit on their heinies or begin raping and pillaging. British troops, on the other hand, have always demonstrated outstanding bravery and devotion to duty, but that sometimes means they will follow the most absurd of orders–see the charge of the Light Brigade.
American troops have likewise shown amazing, even suicidal, bravery as in the torpedo squadrons at Midway and the destroyers that took on an entire Japanese fleet at Leyte Gulf. In both those cases their actions led to ultimate victory though not in any way the troops involved could possibly have imagined. The downside to such enterprising initiative and big picture thinking is the occasional fragging incident when some CO demonstrates dangerous incompetence.
Non-Americans rarely understand America. That now includes even most of those in DC I’m afraid. When you become an American citizen, you don’t pledge allegiance to a king, a fatherland, or a “sacred soil”. You promise to protect and defend–a document–the Constitution. Do that sincerely, and for most Americans you’re in. You’re one of us whether you celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, Cinco de Mayo, or the Dragon Boat Festival. Leftists from Woodrow Wilson forward hate and despise that document because it constrains their ability to act “for the best interests of the people”. To me, that is the definition of treason.
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