Trust: The Key to the Success of Mission Command in the Joint Force

Abstract

As the United States military continues to encounter more asymmetric and hybrid security threats, it has moved to the decentralized command philosophy of Auftragstaktik, or mission command. In moving to mission command, we must acknowledge that trust is one of the most important component of a decentralized command philosophy. Adding to this challenge is an increasingly joint force, often assembled without the ability to build trust. To successfully enable this command philosophy, the U.S. military has to find a method outside of time intensive interaction to build that trust. This study looks particularly at the Germans model of employing Auftragstaktik and gaining trust through rigorous education and the decentralization of many personnel systems. It identifies current U.S. systems that betray trust and identifies possible solutions to an internalized understanding and practice of mission command.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
May 18, 2015
Accession Number
ADA621061

Entities

People

  • Lawrence Rubal

Organizations

  • Naval War College

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • C4I
  • Human Systems
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Army Personnel
  • Department Of Defense
  • Doctrine
  • Education
  • Human Behavior
  • Instructors
  • Military Education
  • Military Operations
  • Military Organizations
  • New York
  • Professional Development
  • Schools
  • Students
  • Training
  • United States
  • War Colleges
  • Warfare

Readers

  • Joint Military Operations and Doctrine.
  • Systems Analysis and Design
  • Team-Based Human-Centered Cognitive Task Decision Making and Information Performance.