Small Wars Journal

Colloquium 2015: Majors Offer Thoughts on Army Operating Concept

Thu, 04/02/2015 - 10:31am

Colloquium 2015: Majors Offer Thoughts on Army Operating Concept by David Vergun, US Army

FORT LEAVENWORTH, Kan. (March 31, 2015) -- The Army Operating Concept, or AOC, assumes a relatively small all-volunteer force will be up to the task of facing a large, well-equipped foe, Maj. Thomas Root said.

That assumption might be wrong, he said, pointing to a relatively small Army that had to be rapidly expanded after 9/11.

Root was speaking to 83 other majors as well as Gen. David C. Perkins, commander of U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command, also known as TRADOC, and other senior leaders at Colloquium 2015 here, March 30.

Colloquium provided a forum for majors to offer their candid views and opinions, even if those thoughts went against current Army thinking and doctrine.

Root continued his dissection of the AOC.

The AOC implies being outnumbered, but winning in a complex world, he said, with most of the emphasis being on shaping the environment and preventing conflict from ever taking place.

That strategy focuses on special operations forces and regionally aligned forces working with partner nations to train and build relationships, Root said. Policy makers and academia have bolstered the argument that conflicts can either be avoided or the enemy can be defeated with a small force allied with a broad coalition. This may not pan out.

So far, full-blown war has not happened, for example, with Russia employing a level of force below a threshold of what it would take to invoke a NATO Article 5 response, he said, meaning all-out war.

Can the Army continue to call their bluff with a force that is downsizing and engaged in prevent, shape strategies, he asked.

The drawdown of forces and the fiscally-constrained environment is the new norm, Root continued. "What we've experienced in the last decade or so in reality was a very fiscally generous environment."

The Army has to change its cultural mindset and learn to operate with fewer Soldiers and less money and still work to succeed, but be more realistic about what it's capable of doing, he said.

Perkins said he appreciated Root's perspective of the AOC and it made for a good discussion. He added that he should perhaps have provided more clarity of what the AOC is intending to convey.

The AOC says that even with a full-scale operation, there would be elements of a hybrid threat. Therefore, the AOC provides a more detailed and comprehensive approach moving forward. "We think continuities of the nature of warfare would apply to wars on every scale," Perkins said.

Lt. Gen. Bob Brown, commander of the Combined Arms Center, said when the AOC was published, he thought it made a pretty bold statement. "We've never before said we could win without fighting."

The AOC does not take anything away from maneuver warfare. It simply adds the prevent-shape pieces to afford a wider range of options.

Maj. Rustin Necessary then picked up, discussing implementation of the AOC.

He focused on assigning the right Soldiers to the right missions at the right time.

Human resources needs to track who has been to which region and figure out what skills each Soldier has, be it operating in a joint, interagency, intergovernmental or multinational environment, he said.

Perkins asked that in a regionally-aligned force-context, should the Army repeatedly send Soldiers to specific regions to "leverage continuity" or send them to places they have never been so they can better understand the different environments?

Necessary said the decision should be mission-dependent. In a low-threat environment, the payoff would be to rotate different people in and out, but in a high-threat region, it would be wise to assign people experienced with that region to leverage personal contacts and operating wisdom.

Perkins said he found the conversation interesting and thought-provoking and said the Army has been grappling with these types of questions.

Every year, the Army is obliged to report its readiness to Congress, Perkins said. The question then becomes readiness for what: a mission that is anticipated near-term in a specific area of the world or an unknown future threat that isn't yet out there?

The Army's answer in the AOC and the combat training center, or CTC, rotations is to train for all possible scenarios. Perkins noted that the original design of the CTCs was to "conduct leader development in unit sets."

Suppose you are a company commander slated for a Royal Air Force mission in Africa, Perkins said. You go to a CTC to learn how to drill wells and do other humanitarian work. Then, years later, you become a battalion commander in a maneuver outfit and something unpredictable happens, but all you know is how to drill wells.

That is why the AOC and the CTCs are focused on the full range of military operations, Perkins said. The Army can't afford the luxury of training specialists who only know how to drill wells or only know synchronized fire and maneuver.

ABOUT COLLOQUIUM

Colloquium is similar to the recently-held chief of staff of the Army's captains Solarium, in that seven topics of high importance to the Army were discussed including talent management, diversity, education, training and mission command.

Colloquium was conducted by the Center for Army Leadership on behalf of the Combined Arms Center. It was the first-ever colloquium for majors. All 84 majors were students enrolled in the Command and General Staff College or the School of Advanced Military Studies.

(Editor's note: This is the first in a series of articles on Colloquium 2015.)

Comments

"Win,"

"In a complex world" and (preferably)

"Win without fighting."

Herein, what does "winning" actually mean?

From a political/strategic perspective, winning might be defined as transforming outlying states -- and their societies -- more along modern western political, economic and social lines.

The "complex" dimension here might be seen through the lens of:

a. Certain large states and societies -- with access to conventional, etc., weaponry -- being more so, or less so, opposed, AT THIS TIME, to such a transition. Likewise,

b. Certain smaller entities also -- with less access to such weaponry (but possibly more support from/connection with the population) -- also, AT THIS TIME, being more so, or less so, opposed to such radical state and societal transformations as we require.

(Thus, tons of complexity -- re: our political objective -- described in my "a" and "b" above.)

This brings us to the "win without fighting" part and logic.

Given that one's political objective is to transform outlying states and societies -- both big and small, weak and powerful, etc., etc., etc. -- more along modern western political, economic and social lines,

Then one comes to understands that this, indeed, may -- in many instances -- be accomplished "without fighting," if one can get one's act together.

How?

For example:

a. By winning over a long standing, respected and capable governor/government to our way of thinking and, through this such governor/government, making the necessary changes.

Or, should a long-standing, respected and/or capable government not be available (or simply not wish to cooperative), then

b. By winning over the population generally to our way of thinking and, via this population, (1) removing the uncooperative/incapable governor/government and (2) installing a new governor/government in its place; one that will do our -- and the population's -- "transformational" bidding.

Thus, to understand -- via our political objective -- all of the above, to wit:

a. "Winning,"

b. "Winning in a complex world" and

c. "Winning without fighting."

gkleponis

Tue, 04/07/2015 - 3:21am

Interesting article. The issue is that like the last 10 plus years, the more junior officers with experience have ideas have a symposium and some 2 or 3 star sits in on it and nods his head and says "interesting" and nothing changes. Two observations: 1) What we do NOT need is more rapid rotations through high conflict zones. This is a proven recipe for mediocrity as both the last conflicts have demonstrated. 2) Aligning the right soldiers for the right missions is critical. Perhaps giving the right training might be a start. Our mixed success with having combat arms train police is a good example. Militarizing everything is also not a good idea. Afghanistan is an economic basket case because we failed to build an economic infrastructure. Instead we built white elephants like schools and hospitals and police and army barracks without the economic means to sustain them. I recently visited such places where the pipes are leaking, windows are broken, ceiling tiles are falling in and the local govt. has no money to fix them. I digress. I think the point is that the Army under the current construct should NOT be the lead in the interagency, multi-national peacebuilding process. Current organizational set up does not reward officers for these skills therefore it's a pick up game and amateur hour each and every time.