This is coolbert: After the disastrous end to the Vietnam War, with the U.S. side losing, the U.S. military, and particularly the Army, decided to do a self-evaluation to see what had gone wrong and what could be done to correct the situation.

Several conclusions were immediately reached. One was the U.S. Army, with the end of the draft and conscription, would not be able to field in the future, the massive numbers of troops they had as say during WW1 and WW2. Attrition warfare against potential adversaries would not be possible. Possible future foes such as the old Soviet Union, Red China, North Korea, or countries in the Middle East such as Iraq would always be able to field armies that in manpower would always be more numerous [sometimes much more so] than the forces the U.S. could put into the field. And these potential adversaries would be equipped with gear not a whole lot qualitatively worse off than the equipment used by U.S. soldiers. Secondly, the U.S. Army would not have the luxury to mobilize the entire society and retool industrial production to meet wartime demands. The Army would have to fight on very quick notice with what it had. And NOT ONLY FIGHT, BUT WIN the conflict, and do it in very short time. The consequences of losing another war would not be just a bump in the road as Vietnam was, the consequences would be a sink hole with the disabled car you are driving falling in!! These realizations led the U.S. Army to drastically rethink it's concepts and it's entire outlook from the mid-seventies onward.

coolbert.