Joint Operational Concepts for Transformation and NCO

1
Joint Operational Concepts for Transformation and
NCO

• Dr. Richard Kugler
• Director, Transformation Short Course
• Distinguished Research Professor, NDU-CTNSP
• March 22, 2006
• Marshall Hall 155A

2
Operational Concepts

• Operational concepts are ideas or principles of
  how military forces operate in peace, crisis, and
  war
• Help provide guidance on how transformation is
  pursed, how future forces are built, and how wars
  are fought

3
Operational Concepts Today

• The operational concepts that guide
  transformation and U.S. military forces today are
  significantly different from those of the Cold
  War
• Bigger emphasis on expeditionary warfare, joint
  force operations, NCO, and effects-based
  operations
• Much greater reliance on information, shared
  awareness, precise targeting, high lethality, and
  rapid maneuver all of which help substitute for
  traditional mass and attrition

4
Operational Concepts for the Cold War

• Land Warfare positional, continental warfare in
  Central Europe
• Linear defense of inter-German border with 11
  corps
• Reliance upon firepower and attrition, not
  maneuver
• Slow deployment from CONUS
• Air Warfare emphasis on winning Air Battle
  marginal impact on land battle
• Air Forces locked avionics, sensors, and
  munitions to influence land battle
• Naval Warfare emphasis on controlling seas and
  defeating naval adversaries
• Joint Warfare? Mostly service components fought
  separately, not jointly

5
Transition of the 1990s Desert Storm and
Kosovo War

• Desert Storm (1991) introduced expeditionary
  warfare in Persian Gulf
• Fast deployment and offensive counterattacks
• Coordinated multi-component campaign
• Sequential attack air-bombardment followed by
  ground attack
• Initial use of modern communications, sensors,
  smart munitions, laser targeting

6
Transition of the 1990s Desert Storm and
Kosovo War

• Kosovo War (1999) employed air bombardment to
  coerce Serbs into leaving Kosovo
• U.S. air forces flew 70 or more of the sorties
• Expanded use of communications, sensors, and
  smart munitions

7
New Operational Concepts from Joint Vision
2010/2020

• Joint Expeditionary Warfare for Full-Spectrum
  Dominance
• Expeditionary war is a temporary journey to a
  distant place for specific purposes
• Subordinate war-fighting concepts
• Advanced C4ISR
• Dominant maneuver
• Precision engagement
• Full-dimensional protection
• Service-endorsed concepts
• Network-centric warfare (NCW USN)
• Rapid decisive operations (RDD USA)
• Effects-based operations (EBO USAF)

8
Growing Impact of Joint Operations on US
Principles for Land Warfare

• Cold War 80 of firepower for land warfare come
  from USA and USMC only 20 from USAF and USN
• Current Era 60 comes from USA and USMC 40
  from USAF and USN
• Bottom Line New era permits joint operations
  because major air and naval threats are lacking
• New era also mandates joint operations because
  ground forces can win only if air and naval
  forces help them
• Joint operations enable all components and make
  them synergistic

9
War on Terrorism Afghanistan and Iraq

• Operation Enduring Freedom defeats Taliban and
  al Qaeda through new forms of warfare
• SOF, GPS target designators, standoff strikes by
  fighters and bombers, Northern Alliance ground
  troops
• Operation Anaconda (2002) exposes strains in
  joint force operations

10
War on Terrorism Afghanistan and Iraq

• Operation Iraqi Freedom introduces new era of
  joint offensive warfare
• Speedy deployment of relatively small, dispersed,
  parallel ground force (5 divisions)
• Simultaneous joint offensive quickly unravels and
  overpowers larger enemy force
• Major use of information networks, sensors, and
  smart munitions
• Quick, easy win in war-fighting phase followed by
  prolonged struggle in SR phase

11
Current Capstone Concepts for Joint Operations
JOpsC
Joint Operations Concept (JOC)
Joint Functional Concepts (JFC)
e.g. MCO, Stability Ops, Shaping Ops, Homeland
Security
e.g. battle-space awareness, NCO, force
application
Joint Integrating Concepts (JIC)
forcible entry, global strike, joint logistics,
joint urban operations
12
Key Features of Joint Operations

• Fundamental Actions
• Establish, expand, and secure reach
• Acquire, refine, and shape knowledge
• Identify, create, and exploit effects
• Supporting Action
• Act from multiple directions and domains
  concurrently
• Conduct integrated and interdependent actions
• Project and sustain force
• Act directly and decisively on target system
• Control tempo and transitions
• Manage perceptions and act discriminatingly
• Key Warfighting Goal
• Fracture enemys cohesion and decision-making in
  order to win attrition battle

13
Key Characteristics of Joint Forces

• Knowledge empowered
• Networked
• Interoperable
• Expeditionary
• Adaptable/Tailorable
• Enduring/Persistent
• Precise
• Fast
• Resilient
• Agile
• Lethal

QDR 2006 also emphasizes these characteristics
for wide spectrum of missions
14
Impact of Network-Centric Operations

• Networked combination of intelligence,
  operations, logistic support, and information
  grids greatly enhance shared battlespace
  awareness
• Among all command echelons and components
• Shared battlespace awareness produces better
  force employment decisions and strengthens all
  characteristics of joint force operations
• The result is better joint pursuit of
  effects-based operations

15
Lingering Issues

• Are new networks being developed, deployed, and
  employed at proper place?
• Is the U.S. military becoming so confident of
  airpower, overhead fires, and standoff fires,
  that it is unwisely diluting its ground forces
  and close-combat capabilities?
• Now that the U.S. military can win wars quickly,
  can it win the peace afterwards?
• MCO vs. SR Ops