In a military staff decision (Entscheid), a commander issues short orders to ~100 people with no discussion, and subordinate commanders just answer "Understood!". Why is independent judgement deliberately removed at the point of execution?

Question

Accepted Answer

Because once the decision is made and orders issued, unity of action and speed matter more than further debate — the critical thinking lives in forming the decision, not in re-litigating it down the chain.
The scene: the commander lays out his mission, the sub-tasks he has identified, and how he intends to solve it; he states his intent in short sentences and assigns tasks. No discussion follows — these are orders. Subordinate commanders reply "Verstanden!" (Understood!), take the order dossier, and go to command their own units in turn. The soldiers finally deployed are expected to follow orders strictly — if necessary at the risk of their lives.
The reasoning:

A large force can only act coherently if the order propagates without each level renegotiating it. Debate at every node would fragment the operation.
The hard critical thinking happens upstream, in the staff work that produces the decision (der Entscheid) — weighing the mission, the sub-tasks and the options.
"Understood!" is an acknowledgement of receipt and comprehension, not assent to a debate — the time for input was during planning, not at the order.

So independent judgement isn't valued less in the military — it's concentrated at the planning stage and in the proper channels, and intentionally suppressed at the execution stage where it would only cause chaos.
Tip: This mirrors the surgical and resuscitation cases exactly: think hard before, execute decisively during, review after. The crisis domains differ in subject but share this three-phase split of when thinking is welcome.