Read on Twitter
I've decided I need to get smart on "multi-domain operations" and plunge deep into TRADOC publications. Maybe I should live tweet the adventure.
I'm not sure I can get past Milley's letter in the forward. https://www.tradoc.army.mil/portals/14/documents/mdo/tp525-3-1_30nov2018.pdf
Did Homelander write this?
More seriously, there's this assertion: "Simultaneously, emerging technologies like artificial intelligence, hypersonics, machine learning, nanotechnology, and robotics are driving a fundamental change in the character of war. " Are they really?
Then the next sentence backtracks: "the impacts have
the potential to revolutionize battlefields..." Oh, so it's only a possible thing.
the potential to revolutionize battlefields..." Oh, so it's only a possible thing.
"The military problem we face is defeating multiple layers of stand-off in all domains in order to maintain the
coherence of our operations." Because up until now we've been winning all our wars.
coherence of our operations." Because up until now we've been winning all our wars.
"Therefore, the American way of war must evolve and adapt. The U.S. Army in Multi-Domain
Operations, 2028 is the first step in our doctrinal evolution." I find this odd. If this is true, what was AirLand Battle all about? What's really so different? I guess I'll find out.
Operations, 2028 is the first step in our doctrinal evolution." I find this odd. If this is true, what was AirLand Battle all about? What's really so different? I guess I'll find out.
Here's this statement. Not sure how that's an army mission. And I love the bit "achieve strategic objectives (win)".
It's winning AND forcing "a return to competition on favorable terms."
p. v just doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
All of p. v is a "logic map."
Skipping to the main sections. I'm hoping that the distilled stuff I'm choking on in the intro, preface, etc. will go down more smoothly in the portions where the author(s) took the time to explain things.
I should be numbering these. I think we're at 13. Ok, so here's what I'm seeing so far....
14. I see an attempt to come up with some grand doctrine (I balk at "strategy) that responds to a number of major challenges. But I also see a confusion of these challenges, which seem to bleed together, which makes for muddled solutions to them. What are they?
15. First, anti-access/area denial (A2AD). Sometimes the text talks as if that's all this is about. Which really is a tactical or at most operational problem encountered when dealing with Russia or China or anyone with significant air or anti-ship defenses.
16. The text sometimes suggests that's it: that's THE problem the US military faces. I'd suggest that's A problem the US military faces, in some scenario, not THE problem, and I'm not sure it's necessarily something the Army can fix.
17. Then this TRADOC pub talks about "information warfare," adversaries' ability to keep warfare below the threshold of actual war, and blurring of lines between war and peace. That's a totally different set of problems from A2D2. What does the Army do about that?
18. I have a really bad feeling the answer will be SOF.
19. AND, the doc says, the Army now has to contend with the "domains" of cyber and space.
20. AND the challenges of urban warfare.
21. p. 6 "we're going to assume China and Russia are the same."
22. Here's a bit I totally agree with, but will this document treat appropriately the fact that it represents a problem radically different in nature from A2AD?
23. It's also maddening in that this is NOTHING new. I mean, it's Lenin, right? Or Beaufre's discussion of "total strategy" and the "salami maneuver," which Beaufre used to describe Hitler's moves against Cz and the Rhineland. https://warontherocks.com/2020/10/grand-strategy-is-total-french-gen-andre-beaufre-on-war-in-the-nuclear-age/
24. The basic idea is that if Clausewitz said war was a continuation of politics, it also sort of follows that war--or really just violence--was a political tool like any other, one that should be subordinate to overall political strategies and not the first tool to reach for.
25. Please, TRADOC, tell me this isn't some new development.
26. My apologies, but the frequent use of the words "domination" and "dominate" make me think of Foucault.
27. Here's the key passage, I think, which tries to put the above together, i.e. the challenges of A2AD, plus political warfare, plus, tech, I guess. Need to chew over this.
28. This all boils down to: China and Russia have a strategy that involves challenging us political and militarily. That I can understand.
29. It remains to be seen what TRADOC says the Army should do about these things. Like the political thing. And please don't tell me the answer is SOF. Please.
30. I'm back. Still fighting through. https://www.tradoc.army.mil/Portals/14/Documents/MDO/TP525-3-1_30Nov2018.pdf
31. So, I've decided that TRADOC's identifying several distinct challenges but seems intent on conflating them. And then we find hot messes like this:
32. One thing I find weird about this is the insistence on imposing a linear, geographic dimension to this spectrum. That possibly enables the authors to link stuff like political, non-violent warfare (I WILL NOT USE THE TERMS KINETIC AND NON-KINETIC) to A2D2.
33. One of French General Guy Hubin's better ideas is his insistence on the non-linearity of conflict, which is also consistent with the whole Beaufrian (is that a word?) concept of the external maneuver, which I'm sure the Soviets/Russians would have agreed with.
34. Aside: Michael, why don't you like "kinetic" and "non-kinetic?" Answer: Go read Arendt on Nazi Sprachregeln.
35. I can't even:
36. This bit's interesting, for it forces the concept of Russian political and below-threshold activities to be essentially a military problem, which is convenient because the Army's got military solutions. I good example of ppl with a hammer looking for a nail.
37. I'm sure Russian SOF do unconventional warfare, but surely they're only one part of the Russian government that does what I think TRADOC's talking about, no? Is there a will to define this as a SOF activity?
38. I don't get this idea of "escalation advantage," p. 11. "The ability to employ all elements in a coordinated manner provides Russia with an escalation advantage, in which any friendly reaction risks a more powerful response." Isn't that ALWAYS true?
39. Or is the idea to so cow Russia that they're too afraid to react? That's crazy, unless we're talking about nuclear thresholds.
40. This is true(p. 11). BUT NOT NEW. Hence Berlin, Hungary, 1956, Cz in 1968, etc. Sure wish I had read this before I wrote about Beaufre.
41. I also wonder if it's a mistake to see the use of violence as an escalation rather than simply an option. It's not necessarily a step up but another thing one does. This matters: a step up also implies that militaries now take charge.
42. Ok, so this makes sense.
43. But let's translate it into Beaufre, so it might be more coherent: A2AD is a problem precisely because it limits one's liberty of action when one wishes to respond militarily to the adversary's fait accompli military action.
44. I'm mixing historical metaphors here, bet let's imagine Hitler wants to seize the Sudentland. France would like to have the option to respond militarily, but it can't because it's afraid of Germany's A2AD capabilities.
45. So in a way Germany's constrained France's liberty of action, which is how one wins. This is a valid argument for TRADOC to make, though by using the pseudo-historical analogy I wish to point out that fundamentally the problem is not new, just the A2AD part.
46. Beaufre wrote about how even with nukes, one has to be able to respond to limited military actions on the part of one's adversary by means of having the adequate conventional forces--ideally expeditionary and FAST--to do so with the same speed as the adversary's.
47. TRADOC is trying to say more or less the same thing.
48. Is this true? "Russian long- and mid-range fires systems are its operational center of gravity in armed conflict. These systems create stand-off that enables a successful fait accompli attack." p. 13.
49. What is the "return to competition?"
50. TRADOC keeps wanting to subordinate all the political/info warfare stuff to military activities. I think it needs to be the other way around. I think that's how Lenin saw it. That's how Russians see it. That's how Beaufre saw it. Etc. But if it's the other way around...
51....then the military takes the passenger seat. Or one could say that it's riding shotgun.
52. This makes more sense now. The Army wants to restore its liberty of action notwithstanding A2AD such that it can respond military to a fait accompli operation and, thereby, bolster America's conventional deterrence.
53. I'm on board with that except to the extent that TRADOC seems to conflate political/information warfare with responding in kind to a fait accompli attack. The latter clearly would be an Army mission. The former not so much. Others would be better suited.
54. Again this insistence on locating everything linearly. There's a front and a rear. Feels very 1916.
55. I think this is the weakest part of the document. I'd back away from wanting the Army to conduct MDO. I'd want the USG to conduct MDO, with each service branch and gov agency playing specific roles therein.
56. The doc itself suggests the Army's focus should be on countering fait accompli missions, which is what Beaufre wrote in 1962. And I bet others said the same thing in the 1920s-50s. The task described above feels more like a Air Force/Space mission, frankly.
57. Here's the part where TRADOC starts making wild claims (p. 17). I have more confidence in the eight-fold path and the four noble truths.
58. But you know what? The prescriptions that follow aren't crazy, they just fall short of "solving" all the challenges of MDO. Mainly, they help address the need to be able to respond quickly to a fait accompli attack, through forward positioning and expeditionary capabilites.
59. And, they want to ramp up the combined and jointness of everything by giving lower echelons more access to cross-domain effects. That's not the same thing as the fait accompli problem.
60. It is simply a desire to make better use of combined and joint resources. We're getting really close to Hubin's call to kill the homothetic army. What's that? Stay tuned :)
61. Here's the bit where TRADOC's calling for empowering lower echelons, though it doesn't say how low, to have greater authority to call upon combined and joint assets that normally it would not have access to, plus this all has to happen fast. C2 has to be flexible and adroit.
62. This, too. Basically, lower echelon commanders need both access to multi-domain capabilities and a lot of it organic. The idea being that these fighting units can do their thing faster and more deftly.
63. I'm going to ignore the "maximize human potential" part (pp. 19-20). That reads like a call to put soldiers on methamphetamemes cloaked in talk of high-tech. Worked for the Wehrmacht :)
64. Ouch, this sentence: "The Joint Force currently converges capabilities through episodic synchronization of domain-federated solutions."
65. This is interesting. Compares with the French idea of subsidiarity and their application of Auftragstaktik. Hubin also signals the importance of this on the modern battlefield. Similar to this, though I think Hubin deals with it more cogently.
66. Interesting that TRADOC is thinking Armies/Corps/Divisions/Brigades and nothing smaller. And places huge workload on brigades. Just FYI French push things lower; Hubin says companies are the thing, which means they can't be MDO but must have access to others.
67. This part makes a lot of sense and tracks with lots of other things written on the subject: C2 has to be flexible. Hierarchies supple.
68. What follows is a lengthy discussion of all the things the Army's going to do. Some makes a lot of sense, namely with regard to ensuring liberty of action notwithstanding A2AD and ideally degrading it. Others make less sense, such suggesting the Army's going to take on the...
69. ...political and information warfare piece to counter-adversary info and political ops. Maybe Army peeps will do some of that, but only some.
70. Ensure interoperability with allies. Yes. I try to use that to pitch my work on foreign militaries, but it doesn't get me far. It's as if people don't really mean it. Or maybe interoperability means the burden's on allies to learn to do things our way.
