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You will be called upon in many ways in this new era to keep the peace, to relieve suffering, to help teach officers from new democracies in the ways of a democratic army, and still . . . to win our wars
President Bill Clinton
West Point, 29 May 1993
a. We live in a dynamic world, an era of contradictory trends shaped by two great forces, one strategic, the other technical--the advent of the Information Age. The scale and pace of recent change have made traditional means of defining future military operations inadequate. Change will continue, requiring our Army to recognize it as the only real constant.
b. In the absence of a relatively fixed, strategic environment, we are faced with a far more complex world that defies authoritative forecasts of the future. Nevertheless, various schools of thought predict what the twenty-first century will look like. One is a vision of the future devoid of major war--a century of peace. This school argues that due to an expanded number of democratic states, shared understanding--through advances in information technology, and global economic interdependence, we are entering a new era where war is no longer deemed a productive means of pursuing strategic objectives. Even if history proves this prediction correct, it will also show that the transition from the world's bloodiest century to one of relative peace was not smooth.
c. Even though in the mid-1990s no credible near-term threat to the U.S. exists, the nation's vital security interests may not go unchallenged during this period of great strategic reordering. As a result, early twenty-first century U.S. armed forces--active, reserve component and civilian--will remain fully engaged throughout the world, meeting the nation's security needs and helping shape the future strategic environment.
d. The types of crises and conflicts we have experienced since the end of the Cold War will likely continue Into the early decades of the twenty-first century. During this period, the United States Army, along with other services, civil agencies and nations, will be called upon to defend and promote national and collective security interests throughout the world, often on short notice and often in combinations of nations and armed forces not previously experienced.
a. United States interests will remain worldwide and will cover many dimensions of the strategic security environment. National Security Strategy (NSS) and National Military Strategy (NMS) are complementary and are founded on universal strategic pillars shared by most democratic countries. These pillars will continue to shape American foreign policy.
(1) As the basis for National Security Policy, the NSS will continue to integrate the elements of national power as they apply to the various regions of the world. It envisions strategic actions for supporting democratic growth, human rights, independent judiciary, economic cooperation and available markets and unrestricted trade. It outlines the defensive needs of friends and allies, the forming of alliances or coalitions, the need to eclipse or limit potential sources of conflict and the deterrence or defeat of regional aggression.
(2) The NMS Integrates the military element of national power, in conjunction with the other elements, to achieve national security objectives and remain the basis for future DOD programs. It envisions the integration of strategic deterrence and defense, the forward presence of U.S. forces, the force projection of U.S. forces and the reconstitution of forces as necessary. It outlines the strategic principles necessary to ensure the readiness of U.S. forces to accomplish a wide range of missions under a variety of situations. This strategy requires reserve forces more ready, more capable, more modernized, more integrated and more available than ever before.
(3) Under these strategies, the U.S. military may have to conduct operations unilaterally to protect specific national interests. More likely, the nation will find itself leading allies in pursuit of collective interests. The unique capabilities and leadership of America's armed forces will be applied in different forms throughout the world to promote peace with freedom. As it has in the past, the Army is prepared to lead the way to achieve future national security and military objectives.
b. Doctrine is the engine that drives change within our Army. That is so because doctrine embodies our ideas, and ideas drive change. Sir Basil Liddell Hart's dictum--that the real challenge is not to put a new idea into the military mind but to put the old one out--clearly applies. 1
(1) Doctrine does not predict the future but sets in motion that which will produce conditions for success. Doctrine Integrates principles and fundamentals and describes how to meet operational challenges. Therefore, one of the most critical challenges confronting today's Army is continuing development of relevant doctrine.
(2) Strategy and doctrine are interrelated. Military doctrine must be capable of executing the strategy of its time. Thus, for our Army's needs, doctrine in the present and predicted strategic environments will be much less prescriptive and much less given to precise, scientific analysis than military doctrine of the Cold War.
(3) There can be no single, prescribed, authoritative Army doctrine for this strategic period. Hence, in 1993 our Army adopted a doctrine of full-dimensional operations, stressing principles to be learned and understood, then relying on the art of battle command to apply those principles in scenarios as they occur--be they war or OOTW. This doctrine is a profound shift from the relatively deterministic and very appropriate scientific approach of the Cold War, with its focus on Central Europe, echelonment and presentation rates and precise-force-ratio analysis. This pamphlet continues that shift, emphasizing a concept built on principles that must be translated to action in specific scenarios that cannot now be predicted with enough certainty to warrant a return to prescriptive doctrine.
1 Thoughts on War, 1944.
(a) America's Army will be structured to keep pace with the evolutions of its strategies and doctrine. While doing so, the Army must be fully prepared for situations of war, conflict and peace. Major regional contingencies would normally occur in War or during major conflicts, while minor contingencies would occur during peacetime or minor-conflict situations. Regardless, the great majority of these operations center upon the control of people and territory. Thus, the Army is the most prepared service to deal with the variety of situations that can occur in a world of emerging regional powers.
(b) Strategic interests have increased the number and expanded the range of OOTW that the armed forces will be required to perform. At times, OOTW may exhibit charactistics of conflict and involve violent combat. When conducting such operations, the Army may find Itself engaged against forces, including nonnation state armies operating outside Western convention. To deal successfully with such forces, the Army must expand its understanding of conflict beyond current Western paradigms.
Figure 1-2. Operating Environments and Missions of U.S. Forces
c. In addition to strategic and doctrinal challenges, significant technological challenges are associated with entry into the Information Age. Many of these can be overcome through effective use of the inherent technical strengths of other services (for example, Navy and Air Force satellite technology could greatly benefit land operations).
d. We must also recognize that success on past battlefields has resulted not so much from technological advances but from innovative ways of considering and combining available and sometimes new technologies as they apply to warfighting. A number of these technologies dealt with the communication of information. For example, the telegraph led to distributed operational maneuver in the latter part of the nineteenth century. The telephone redefined the fire support paradigm, resulting in the greatly expanded role of artillery in World War I. Finally, the radio led to the coordinated airground, mobile, armored combat operations of World War II. Clearly, the potential military impact of emerging information technology is so great that it requires address.
e. Information technology is expected to make a thousandfold advance over the next 20 years. In fact, the pace of development is so great that it renders our current materiel management and acquisition system inadequate. Developments in information technology will revolutionize--and indeed have begun to revolutionize--how nations, organizations and people interact. The rapid diffusion of information, enabled by these technological advances, challenges the relevance of traditional organizational and management principles. The military implications of new organizational sciences that examine internetted, nonhierarchical versus hierarchical management models are yet to be fully understood. Clearly, Information Age technology, and the management ideas it fosters, will greatly influence military operations in two areas--one evolutionary, the other revolutionary; one we understand, one with which we are just beginning to experiment. Together, they represent two phenomena at work in winning what has been described as the information war--a war that has been fought by commanders throughout history.
(1) First, future information technology will greatly increase the volume, accuracy and speed of battlefield information available to commanders. Such technology will allow organizations to operate at levels most adversaries cannot match, while simultaneously protecting that capability.
(2) Second, future technology will require the Army to reassess time-honored means of battle command--to recognize that in the future, military operations will involve the coexistence of both hierarchical and intenetted, nonhierarchical processes. Order will be less physically imposed than knowledge-imposed. Combinations of centralized and decentralized means will result in military units being able to decide and act at a tempo enemies simply cannot equal.
In summary, the Army will have to make wise use of all of its resources to meet the challenges of the future. It must recognize where bold change is necessary and where little or no change is needed. Meeting these challenges will take a long-term, sustained commitment to excellence--to develop leaders, soldiers, equipment and organizations capable of performing the diverse missions of the future.
a. The Army must continue to leverage the capabilities and potential of the reserve components in both combat roles and logistics roles. Their expertise, especially in civilian-related skills, such as combat service support and civil affairs, allows the active component force structure the flexibility to focus more on warfighting skills. The Army in the early twenty-first century will not be able to move, supply, nor sustain itself to meet the requirements of the National Military Strategy without the reserve components. For these reasons, the RC must be integrated fully into all facets of our efforts in areas such as doctrine, training and equipment as we prepare for the future.
b. Above all, meeting these demands will require the Army to take a long view toward the future without losing its focus on today's strategic security needs. While recognizing that the historically solidified bedrock of Army doctrine will not change greatly, the Army must ensure that the underlying concepts of operations captured in current doctrine continue to evolve. Many principles will remain, yet methods must adapt and change. Thus, at the same time, the Army must examine alternatives and explore new ideas that will ensure quick decisive results in War and success in OOTW--at the least cost in lives and national treasure.
c. The Army will lead through change. Today's operations are shaping those of tomorrow. Patterns in the conduct of future operations are sufficiently clear to set in motion changes in land warfare doctrine--as we did in the June 1993 FM 100-5. This concept projects that momentum into the future. We know enough to act now.
