|
The task seemed simple enough. The U.S. armed forces should use a technological edge to adapt forces to whatever type of fight came to pass. They were prodded by an impatient Secretary of Defense who saw information technology (IT) as the means to win conventional wars quickly with less force. But they also were instructed by Quadrennial Defense Review 2006 to prepare for combat operations against new, non-state, elusive foes, with a focus on multiple irregular, asymmetric operations. They also had to give equal weight to combat and sustainability operations.
Convinced they were uniquely empowered by IT, US armed forces discovered in Iraq in 2003 that their lean, mean, kinetic-based, net-centric combat force was ill-prepared for asymmetric, soft-war against insurgents and, most critically, least of all to play a leading role in stabilization and nation-building.
Led by the U.S. Army and Marines— the most immediately challenged by insurrections and irregular warfare —the US military establishment is again in a state of retransformation. However, their efforts are subject to conflicting guidance on how to balance the demands for hard and soft wars. Specifically, how should they respond to DOD Directive 3000.05 to “rebalance training and readiness focus between stability operations and conventional combat” and perform “all tasks necessary to establish and maintain order when civilians cannot do so.”
On the one hand, while admonishing senior officers to listen to their combat-wizened junior officers and enlisted soldiers, JCS Chairman Admiral Michael G. Mullen also cautioned them to “widen their view and remain ready for “who—and what—comes after.” At the same time, Defense Secretary Gates, concerned about “creeping militarization” in U.S. foreign policy, and convinced that insurgencies are the conflicts this nation is most likely to face in the future, and while acknowledging a need to maintain a strategic hedge against rising powers, speaks forcefully against “next-war-itis.”
Add to this cacophony of conflicting guidance a Congress that perceives short-comings in an interagency processes that obliges the defense department to assume missions that are not its core military responsibilities and ordering a “thorough review of the military services roles and missions.”
In a Newsweek article, Evan Thomas and John Barry assert this conflict in direction is creating a “generational divide in the military,” just when the shape, size and funding of America’s armed forces will be one of the most pressing issues facing the next president. The Economist calls it “splitting the army,” citing a contest between old bulls, stubbornly wedded to a force structure that twice defeated Saddam Hussein’s army, and the new generation of officers focused on winning hearts and minds.
Reflecting on a legacy of irregular conflicts dating at least from 1798 and considering US involvement in 320 “operations that cannot be characterized as conventional wars,” one asks why unconventional war skills were allowed to atrophy and if irregular wars are the immediate and dominant threat, how best to recover.
Maj. Gen. David Fastabend USA noted at a June 2008 Joint Warfighting 08 conference that “It doesn’t mean we have to choose between regular war and irregular war. It’s the combination that poses some serious challenges to the military.” (Signal Sept 2008)
On Point II: Transition To The New Campaign, published in June 2008 by the US Army Combined Arms Center, is the story of the U.S. Army in Operation Iraqi Freedom: May 2003-January 2005. It provides some surprisingly frank answers to what and why things went wrong and what corrective measures are necessary.
While admitting that “the American military establishment in general, and the US Army specifically, have a long, well-established, and multifaceted history of conducting missions that do not feature conventional combat…These conflicts, taken as a group, have dominated the Army’s historical record, even though they have not dominated its culture and training focus”.
The Army called these missions Military Operations Other Than War (MOOTW), but admits “they did not include counterinsurgency operations or major counterterrorism missions.” Consequently, those who authored doctrine did not heed Marine Corps Commandant General Charles C. Krulak who in 1997 wrote about the “three block war” and the “Strategic Corporal”, accurately anticipating the day when Army guidance to “find, fix, finish” would give way to “clear, hold, build”.
Nor did doctrine, training and exercises reflect the activities of Lt. Gen Paul K. Van Ripper USMC (Ret), who brought joint force exercise Millennium Challenge 2002 to a sudden halt when, as the Red force commander, he waged asymmetric war with motorcycle C2 and employed a fleet of small boats to sink sixteen of Blues fleet.
Military responses to the stability and support demands of MOOTWA in the Balkans, Haiti, Somalia, were episodic, dismissed as anomalies, and quickly forgotten. Any lessons-learned were passed down informally and anecdotally and “did not lead American Soldiers to internalize these types of operations as a core mission.”
On Point II, finds that “while Army doctrine in 2003 accepted stability and support operations and contained a formal approach to those operations…[but] doctrine has limited influence if it is not disseminated and practiced through the means of education and training.”
The consequences of doctrine dominated by “decades of conventional U.S. military practice” are further explained in joint Army Field Manual 3-24 and Marine Corps Publication 3-33.5. Written under the supervision of General David H. Petraeus USA and Lt. General James F. Amos USMC, the new counterinsurgency (COIN) field manual admits to doctrine that did not equip our forces with the knowledge or tools to cope with “time-honored insurgent tactics,” nor trained them for the key task of protecting the population, nor empowered them with “all of the political, diplomatic and linguistic skills needed to accomplish their mission.”
While a cultural clash between old bulls and new info-warriors may be impeding the transformation to a structure capable of both conventional and irregular war, it is not the only complicating and conflicting issue. The armed services are laboring to adjust to the demands of irregular warfare involving functions that are normally the responsibility of civilian agencies. On Point II reports that joint force planners were “reportedly assured that other elements of the U.S. Government would handle the larger issues involved in planning for an executing Phase IV [stability and support] operations.” Now the House Armed Services Committee wants to know if post-conflict reconstruction is a proper military core mission.
Here are some of the sharply differing views on military restructuring. They range from confidence in evolving organizational arrangements to the creation of multiple armies—one to fight conventional war, another for COIN operations, another for counterterrorism, and yet another to conduct humanitarian operations.
In the Winter 2007 issue of the U.S. Air Force Strategic Studies Quarterly, —an odd venue for discussion of ground warfare—Colin S. Gray avers that counterinsurgencies are winnable by regular armies. He notes that all wars contain both regular and irregular elements, but that “few armies excel at both regular and irregular warfare.” He cautions that “irregular warfare calls for cultural, political and military qualities that are not among the traditional strengths of Americans and warns against an overreaction “only to discover the COIN challenge was a distraction from more serious security international business.” Differing sharply with the Secretary of Defense Gates, professor Gray argues it would be a “political and strategic mistake to identify irregular warfare, COIN especially, as America’s dominant strategic future.”
Naval Postgraduate School professor John Arquilla agrees that the U.S. military “lost touch with its own colonial and revolutionary roots in irregular warfare,” but he believes that armies can wield both hard and soft power. Arquilla argues in his book Worst Enemy, that a dual capability does not require retraining the entire Army for unconventional warfare, nor forming two different types of forces, thereby creating a “bifurcated military” that is unable to prevail in either conventional or unconventional warfare. He contends the initial Afghanistan campaign should be seen as a “war to change all wars” and that the army of the future should be “the many and the small” rather than the “few and the large.” His view—Arquilla was one of the early advocates of netwar—on the role of IT faults the Army for trying to use it to sustain and revitalize its big units, when it should be combining IT with smart weapons to empower “small and nimble units.”
Retired Army officer and now journalist Ralph Peters also agrees with the wisdom of preparing for soft and hard wars, but in his book Wars of Blood and Faith, he credits the new Joint COIN manual as but a “useful first step.” He contends that “no two insurgencies are identical,” that not all insurgent goals are political and amenable to negotiation. Therefore, the “hearts and minds” model in Iraq and Afghanistan ought not be the prime guide for restructuring of the armed forces.
While acknowledging that “Environmental [human terrain] mastery helps us avoid making unnecessary enemies,” Peters believes that “no amount of cultural sensitivity will persuade fanatic believers to discard their religion.” He argues that the “techniques that work against opponents inspired by ideology fall woefully short when applied to enemies aflame with divine visions or the lust to avenge old or imagined wrongs done to their kind.”
JCS Chairman Mullen admonished newly graduated Army colonels to “heed the words of the younger generation.” An excellent place to begin is with the thoughts of Major Kenneth J. Burgess, USA, expressed in his Naval Postgraduate School thesis, Organizing for Irregular Warfare: Implications For The Brigade Combat Team.
After meticulously working through dozens of books, reports and studies on irregular war, Operation Iraqi Freedom veteran Burgess agrees the Army can be organized to deal with both types of war, but finds that most recommended changes result in a “radically-bifurcated force structure that would lessen the Army’s strategic flexibility and create unnecessary (and costly) force redundancy.” While some conventional units now have the potential to perform irregular operations, Burgess thinks the Army has made only incremental progress in preparing its General Purpose Forces as directed by joint U.S. Army and Marine Corps Irregular Warfare Joint Operating Concept, Version 1. “Today’s transformation is not wrong,” he argues, “it’s just not enough.”
Burgess challenges the Army claim that the Brigade Combat Team (BCT) modular construct is “more than adequate to address the demands of stability operations.” He finds it to be an incremental step resulting from a decade-long process to fix strategic mobility problems and institutionalize tactical successes from the 1991 Gulf War and these changes fall short of “transforming the Army for twenty-first century conflict.”
While admitting his recommendations draw heavily from Iraq and Afghanistan experience, he argues they are far more representative of future conflict than those that now are driving force structure design. Burgess asserts that current infantry brigade teams can be more autonomous, multifunctional “full-spectrum capable” units as described in FM 3.0, but that “not all units should, or can, be restructured to do all things equally well.” “Irregular warfare may be intellectually more difficult than traditional warfare,” he notes, “yet competent specialists are rarely dedicated beyond the brigade level to assist commanders with planning and conducting these operations.” He believes that “COIN requires a greater autonomy at squad, platoon and company levels.”
Finally, Burgess emphasizes a critical element brought out in On Point II : what matters most is not the number of troops, but what kind of troops and how they are trained and organized to contribute. What needs more attention, he finds, “are human-capital intensive investments in the current force structure.” His proposals include, structural changes that decentralize resources, flatten the command structure, and increase the capacity and integration of intelligence personnel, mobility assets, and population-focused capabilities (such as civil affairs, information operations specialists, military police, and civil engineers) at the battalion and company level.
What does irregular warfare require of human capital? Are there some things that a “can-do-army” can’t, or shouldn’t be asked to do? Can a soldier be also a guardian and nation-builder? Is it reasonable to ask a warfighter to function as a social worker, a civil engineer, a school teacher, a nurse, a boy scout?
Some fear it unrealistic to expect those trained in violence to retain the essential basic survival instincts while simultaneously functioning as civil policemen, agronomists and judges. For how long, asks former Army Ranger and now Senator Jack Reed (D-R.I.), can a field artilleryman maintain readiness after spending tours in Iraq driving trucks?
But more to the point, these new demands on human capital are not limited to the uniformed forces. Secretary Gates has expressed concern that “When it comes to America’s engagement with the rest of the world, it is important that the military is and is clearly seen to be in a supporting role to civilian agencies.” U. S. Joint Forces Commander General Lance L. Smith USAF recommends “bringing other elements of national power into the fight at the operational and strategic levels of war… by harnessing the diplomatic, informational, military and economic elements of national power into a common purpose.”
In his 2007 State of the Union address, President Bush asked the congress to expand the national security team by establishing a Civilian Reserve Corps that would function as a post-conflict reconstruction unit—a nation-building corps for stabilization and reconstruction. State and Defense Secretaries Rice and Gates agree that “The primary responsibility for post-conflict stabilization and reconstruction should not fall on our fighting men and women but to volunteer civilian experts” and they have joined efforts to increase 2009 funding for a Civilian Response Corps.
Senator John McCain offers yet another variation on that theme. He writes in the Nov-Dec 2007 issue of Foreign Affairs that “America needs not simply more soldiers but more soldiers with the skills necessary to help friendly governments and their security forces to resist common foes.” He proposes an Army Advisory Corps that could draw together specialists in unconventional warfare, civil affairs, and psychological warfare, covert-action operators, and experts in anthropology, advertising, and other relevant disciplines from inside and outside government to train and work together with the military in post-conflict reconstruction.
Echoing the need for a civilian counterpart to the military in his article “The Age of Nonpolarity” (Foreign Affairs May-June 2008), Richard N. Haass calls for establishing a civilian counterpart to the military reserves that would provide a pool of human talent to assist with basic nation-building tasks.”
Any of these proposals could profoundly change current military planning simply because they would substantially reduce demands on both the quantity and quality of military personnel. They also will have a profound impact on the design of IT and supporting networks.
In their groundbreaking 1998 Proceedings article, Arthur Cebrowski and John Gartska avowed that a networked force “should be able to triumph over any foe, regardless of mission, regardless of force size and composition, and geography.” Retired U.S. Army General Tommy Franks wrote in a 2004 memoir that the new technology promised “today’s commanders with the kind of Olympian perspective that Homer had given his gods.”
Networks and IT in Iraq did support the combat phase of what the Army calls “full spectrum warfare,” but not the demands of COIN. Networked IT may have given commanders a God’s eye view of their own troops, but as a RAND report warned in 2002, airborne observation by unmanned aerial vehicles and other electronic means was unlikely to consistently find an enemy hiding in hills, under rocks or in caves or in urban environments, or impersonating noncombatants. The COIN enemy hides in an electronic sanctuary.
On Point II and the new Army/Marine COIN manual do not directly explain the role of IT, but Noah Shachman does in “How Technology Almost Lost the War” (Wired December 2007). He concludes that while network-centricity promised to be the magic solution to wars of the future, “the future lost.” If insurgencies are the dominant future threat, then Shachman is correct when he concludes “[t]he failures of wired combat are forcing troops to improvise a new, socially networked kind of war.”
The goal of the Global Information Grid (GIG) is to “push information to the edges,” meaning downward and outward to the warfighter at the tactical level. This push-down and outward approach may be suitable for troops engaged in conventional war, but makes little sense in a COIN operation where actionable intelligence resides at the tactical level: it was collected by soldiers improvising all manner of undoctrinal means. On Point II proclaims this to be a major shift in practice if not policy: “Exactly the opposite of major combat operations in terms of producers and consumers of intelligence.”
Capt. J. Lee Johnson USN (Ret) gets the role of IT right (May 2008 Proceedings), writing “the benefits provided by technological developments depend on their use. The Army and Marines are striving to achieve full spectrum capability, but experience in Iraq suggests that no standard network architecture will adequately satisfy the uncomplimentary demands of conventional, COIN, counter-terrorism and stability operations.
Networking will be even further tested if, as many predict, US foreign policy shifts to humanitarian operations, with the military moving to a supporting role. The GIG might then become the latticework connecting a multi-agency national security team, with operators from the X, Y and millennial generations and a Web 2.0 view of sharing, collaboration and networking. (Signal March 2008 p. 39 and 96). Further, as noted by deputy JFCOM commander Lt. Gen. John Wood USA, at the Joint Warfighting 08 conference, “Today’s young warfighters are forcing solutions from the bottom to the top”.
The U.S. military has proven that given time, adequate resources, and a predictable and explicit foreign policy, it can adapt to unanticipated demands. But, it not obvious that the Iraq/Afghanistan experience should drive the vector, velocity and end-state of changes that will take at least a decade to unfold. Richard N. Haass hopes that political decisions will be made mindful that “the U.S. military will take a generation to recover from Iraq…and the United States lacks sufficient military assets to continue doing what it is doing in Iraq, much less assume new burdens of any scale elsewhere.”
“We need a new national security act,” says Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Joseph Biden (D-DE). He wants one that “equips the U.S. with diplomatic and civil administration capacity that can move into irregular conflicts as rapidly as can the military”.
Before the legislative gears start to grind, the next administration must define its foreign policy objectives and craft a national security structure that tasks all the elements of national power, matching means to end. Only then can it tell the military what kind of wars it expects them to fight, identifies the opponents, defines the objectives, and then gives them time to raise, equip and train the necessary forces. If this proves too difficult, then former Defense Secretary Rumsfeld will not be the last to lament going to war with the “army you have rather than the one you need.”
Col. Alan D. Campen, USAF (Ret) is a contributing editor to Signal Magazine and the contributing editor to four books on information warfare and cyberwar.
(An abridged version of this essay appears in the October 2008 issue of Signal Magazine)
|
