OK, how could the US Army, or predecessor colonial militia forces, have established their own standing Indian Scouts-style force before the OTL practice of forming the scouts from friendly tribes (Pawnee, Crow, black Seminole, friendly Apache & Navaho, etc) for the wars on the Great Plains from 1866 (see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_scouts) ? I mean, the colonial militias, British authorities on the frontier, & the antebellum US Army from 1st English settlement had established alliances with local tribes to fight hostile Indians & the French in such contexts as the Mohegans, Niantics & Praying Indians in Metacom's War, the Yamasee, Catawba, Yuchi, Apalachee, Cusabo, Wateree, Sugaree, Waxhaw, Congraree, Pee Dee, Cape Fear, Cheraw, Saxapahaw, Cherokee in the Tuscarora War, the Cherokee, upper Creek & Catawba in the Yamasee Wars, the Iroquois, Catawba, Stockbridge Indians among others in the French & Indian Wars, the Stockbridge Indians, Oneida, Tuscarora, Mashpee, Penobscot & Passamoquody in the ARW, friendly Cherokee & Creeks alongside Andrew Jackson in the War of 1812- but WI the institutionalisation of Indian scouts had become more established at some point before 1866 ?