News stories have indicated that the post 2012 brigades will again have three maneuver battalions instead of two (Stryker unit being an exception having retained three battalions).

 

If this is the case, the cuts will be in non infantry or armor battalions?

Historically, when a nation's military has demonstrated tactical effectiveness there are efforts made in other countries to leverage what they've perceived as valuable, even incorporating features of those successful foreign armies' style of dress.

 

Note the prevalence of the absolutely idiotic French kepi on both sides in the War to Enforce the Morrill Tariff (1861-1865) owing to the performance of the Second Empire's forces in the 1859 campaigns against Austria in northern Italy (Montebello, Magenta, Solferino).  After the Prussians whacked the French so decisively in 1870, plenty of armies were including a modified Pickelhaube of some kind in dress uniforms.

 

Are there any modern - particularly "Western" style - foreign militaries considering adaptations of their force structures and tactical doctrines to emulate the perceived U.S. successes on the battlefield since this whole GWoT business got started a dozen years ago?

We can save 70 to 80% of personnel costs for every billet moved from Active to a Reserve Component.  Currently no combat arms in the Army Reserve, but that doesn't have to stay that way.

It takes MONTHS to prepare an RC unit, combat, for overseas deployment and combat, currently running at 90-180 days, IIRC.  38 training days/year does NOT allow for the development of or sustainment of required combat skills.

 

Tzahal manages it, to the extent they do, by using their reservists much more than the US.  By "using" I mean requiring training, and hence disruption of life and economy.

 

The RC's are great for sustainment of mission, but they cannot be used to project power tomorrow, which AC units can.

 

Note the prevalence of the absolutely idiotic French kepi on both sides in the War to Enforce the Morrill Tariff (1861-1865) owing to the performance of the Second Empire's forces in the 1859 campaigns against Austria in northern Italy (Montebello, Magenta, Solferino).  After the Prussians whacked the French so decisively in 1870, plenty of armies were including a modified Pickelhaube of some kind in dress uniforms.

 

Are there any modern - particularly "Western" style - foreign militaries considering adaptations of their force structures and tactical doctrines to emulate the perceived U.S. successes on the battlefield since this whole GWoT business got started a dozen years ago?

"The Australian Military has the surname patch on the left hand side and the matching service patch on the right. I think you will find many other militaries that have adopted this practice too."

 

 Beyond the superficialities of military costume (bear in mind that among both the Northern Aggressors and the valiant defenders of the Constitution on the southern side in Lincoln's War to Destroy the Union there were volunteer regiments and battalions dressed as Zouaves in emulation of the units which had fought so valiantly for Napoleon III) there are organizational, tactical, and operational characteristics of foreign militaries which have been perceived to be worth emulating, and which had "set the style" in terms of training, equipment, and fighting doctrine.

 

Those are the characteristics of the U.S. Army discussed in the article above, and about which I'm wondering.  

 

Following our entirely unconstitutional and therefore criminally unlawful war against the Tikriti Mafia in Iraq, years of blood, time, and treasure were invested in building a new Iraqi army, and much of that effort was spent in close damn-near-KATUSA-style integration of Iraqi and U.S. troops in combat operations, down to the squad level. 

 

The Iraqi soldiery perceived the superior effectiveness of their American co-belligerents and began so effectively to demonstrate the tactical style of the U.S. troops that our commissioned and non-commissioned officers often reported that in firefights they had trouble distinguishing their attached Iraqi personnel from their American grunts, so well-integrated had the Iraqi soldiers become in terms of movement, situational awareness, and fire discipline.

 

In other "Western" militaries - notably the South Korean, Japanese, and the various Southeast Asian polities, none of which had to rebuild their armed forces from scratch, the way that the Iraqi government has had to do - emulation of the American war-waging model would seem to be both practicable and extremely advantageous on higher scales.

 

My interest is whether the more knowledgeable readers in this forum have noticed any such trend.