Preparing Military Forces for Integrated Operations in the Face of Uncertainty
Abstract
This issue paper offers a way to think about two related issues that bear on current and future U.S. military effectiveness: (1) How to assemble forces to meet operational needs in a security environment rife with uncertainty, and (2) How to transform forces to exploit technology and meet long-term needs. It is now widely agreed that both assembling and transforming forces in the new security era must be driven by the demands of joint operations. American military successes in Afghanistan and Iraq have proven this to all but die-hard skeptics. Yet, there has been only modest progress in building both a firm conceptual basis and a genuine consensus about how to enhance and make the most of operational jointness. Organizational change is essential to exploiting new technology, especially information technology, but change has been cautious and marginal in the U.S. military establishment. The ideas in this paper are meant to prompt a more open debate about how best to prepare forces for whatever military contingencies the nation may call on them to face, now and in the future. A premise of the paper, encouraged by recent combat experience, is that joint operations integrated by common information networks are key to enabling the United States to overcome a wide and fluid assortment of threats and meet its global security needs. This paper suggests that new security conditions, new technology, and new concepts of operation require more-innovative concepts of organization.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 01, 2003
- Accession Number
- ADA433538
Entities
People
- David C. Gompert
Organizations
- RAND Corporation