U.S. Army River Crossing Doctrine and AirLand Battle Future: Applicable or Anachronistic?

Abstract

This monograph examines whether current U.S. Army river crossing doctrine is adequate to meet the unique challenges of tomorrow's battlefield. Under the Air-Land Battle Future Concept (ALB-F) the future battle-field is expected to be highly dispersed and nonlinear; an environment in which survivability is largely a function of agility and mobility. The rapid tempo of ground force dispersion and concentration will present unique challenges to heavy forces conducting river crossing operations. This paper concludes that current river crossing doctrine has evolved into a more force, vice terrain oriented doctrine, as was previously the case. Therefore, it is in step with emerging trends of future warfare. Finally, there appears to be a need to seriously evaluate force structure requirements to support river crossings on the ALB-F battlefield.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Nov 27, 1990
Accession Number
ADA233627

Entities

People

  • Gordon M. Wells

Organizations

  • United States Army Command and General Staff College

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Autonomy
  • C4I
  • Energy and Power Technologies
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Bridges
  • Combat Forces
  • Command And Control
  • Control Systems
  • Fire And Forget Weapons
  • Force Structure
  • Lessons Learned
  • Military History
  • New York
  • Operations Security
  • River Crossings
  • Second World War
  • Task Forces
  • United States
  • Unmanned Aerial Vehicles
  • Warfare

Readers

  • Maritime Combat Support and Expeditionary Logistics.
  • Military History / Militaries and War Studies
  • Military Science