what are the 7 warfighting functionswhat are the 7 warfighting functions

This next comment sums it up; Unless, of course, you mean to present an ahistorical role for SOF in future conflicts such as the lead in the military. These advocates recommended the adoption of critical realism, multi-paradigmatic frames and the like. To many, Operational Design has come to represent what is fundamentally wrong with recent U.S. Army concepts. And yet, since the Political Science world has shifted towards Rational Choice Theory- we too have tried to stay edgy and cool, and likewise we have come up with all kinds of elegant models and metaphors to try to make life seem simple to us- turning abstractions into concrete concepts and teaching everyone the language of those abstractions through doctrine- which helps in communication, but does little for us in terms of critically knowing ourselves. This likewise helping to explain, for example, why artestry, innovation, etc. If, as is posited by many military leaders and commentators, the human domain is a different domain than the Army has focused on in the past (the other domains being more physical: land, sea, air and cyber), then it would seem to follow that the tools and philosophy we use might not be the most effective when acting in another, arguably very different, domain. On a personal note, I remember when I was in Iraq in 2003, 2004/05, all the internet cafes on the FOBs that allowed our troops lots of free time when they were back inside the wire to communicate with family, friends etc. The joint functions, then, were never intended to be another level of organiza-tion. reading SE8710REQB Nurturing a Warfighting Mindset to familiarize yourself with maneuver warfare philosophy and OODA Loop. "This was true for the SF of the 60/70s---the ability to "understand the mission, understand your enemy and understand yourself" before one is dropped in with no support from the outside world.. Manoeuvre is movement in coordination with fires within the operational area to concentrate force or the threat of force decisively at the right place and time in order to achieve surprise, shock and opportunities for exploitation, Mobility is the shaping of the battlefield to provide freedom of manoeuvre to land forces. For the human domain, art is the key. One note on the mission scenario your notional SOF team receives.it is not so much a mission as a policy statement. Cortez went to the city and took Montezuma hostage, taking advantage of the fact that Aztecs thought that the Spaniards were descendants of their god, Quetzalcoatl, and had come to fulfill a prophecy. Strictly Necessary Cookies - Always Active. Regardless of the constructs philosophical issues, why are Special Operations Forces (SOF) pushing for a new Army warfighting function and why is the Army supporting SOF in doing so? I also agree with your thoughts on how we misunderstand our enemy. What the population of a nearby town thinks about the battle, however, and, more importantly, what they will do that could affect ones objectives, fall more into the social realm. 21 What is the most important warfighting function? Win friends and influence people? It is essential to retaining and exploiting the initiative. The mission became one of democratization. In addition, they are more likely to remain fixated on the hyper-tactical level of operations. Though weathered or overgrown, the relics stand as permanent markers of the ingenuity and art of the pre-Columbian civilizations. This example was taken straight out of the website "borderland beat" which treats totally the Mexican and Central American transnational Criminal Organizations (TCOs)--AND if you think beheadings were a thing of AQI in Iraq---one will see the actual bodies in the web site and if one thought Hezbollah had a corner on social activities in Lebanon think twice when one looks at Mexico---if one thinks that the TCOs do not tangate the US check recent reports out of Tulsa OK. [xxi] I would assume Jean Baudrillard, from his Simulacra and Simulation (1981), would have a field day with how we have conducted Afghanistan. Virtually everyone knows what our end-game objective is. Agree with you that a deeper problem (THE problem?) Protection efforts must consider and account for threats and hazards in all directions, at all times, and in all environments. The seven warfighting functions are command and control, fires, force protection, information, intelligence, logistics, and maneuver. Not a single CF BCT going through the NTC or where in Iraq fully "understood" how the enemy thought, acted, eat, slept, communicated with themselves and outside related groups AND the local population---much in the concept of Kilcullen's "ecosystem". A particular IED group had been literally giving us fits meaning statistically seen a gun truck would be hit once in every three trips out the wire---this particular group had gotten extremely good with RC IEDs. ", Sparapet---more concerning the so called notional scenario--. It prioritizes education and training over platforms and technology as well as persistent engagement over drone strikes, direct action raids, and Hollywood movies. We dont take a lot of guys to do that and its pretty cost-effective." Many times good intentions morph into concepts that are meant to communicate vision, but instead drive questionable acquisition and funding strategies. The purpose of the Sustainment WFF is to maintain the forces freedom of action. I also don't see how managing humans, be you occupying them or sharing some skills, is a uniquely UW/SW activity. Thus, "knowing one's enemy" seems to be taking a back seat to building partner trust and building partner capacity during this new period of peace. Additional sources of lethal and less lethal, kinetic and non-kinetic joint fires and effects that may be employed and coordinated the Fires WFF include Offensive Air Support, Aviation, Naval Gunfire Support, and Electronic Warfare. A warfighting function (WFF) is a group of tasks and systems united by a common purpose that commanders use to accomplish missions and training objectives. Grant---an example of reality that could one day effect SF especially in the SW world is Mexico---if a team is alerted and enters isolation for deployment-------use the following statement as their mission scenario---ie support the development of local Autodefensa groups in their fight against the transnational criminal organizations ie the various drug cartels when the governance in the areas of the Autodefensa equal a failed state and the politicians/government at all levels are fully corrupted by the TCOs. Table. As Grant opened up the question of SW/UW vs the Special Action side and would suggest that Mexico become the training scenario for SW/UW. Viewed from that perspective, the self-defense groups of Michoacn, heroic and dignified, represent a fresh and hopeful alternative that should be recognized and supported. We select, train, and equip our forces specially- and we can see the difference at our lowest levels: the team level, but then we plan, promote, organize, and educate them at higher levels largely in the same manner as the conventional forces do. Interestingly, I also remember a study was published that basically argued all this newfound freedom of access was being counter-productive because psychologically the soldier never really left home due to this ability to instantly communicate with those back at home on almost a daily basis. Plus, there has been less friendly fire incidents. [xxix] This has resulted in the doctrine seeming to contradict itself. It accomplishes this by engaging with non-military elements, conducting support and development activities to and with them, and coordinating actions between them and the force. It accomplishes this through the collective and coordinated use of kinetic and non-kinetic joint fires and effects in support of a manoeuvre plan, employing these means to delay, disrupt, or destroy enemy forces (adapted from RNZA Duties in Action). or so it seems. Our technical surveillance enables smart weapons which largely depend on digitized enabled surveillance. WHAT it takes is as you correctly note a national strategy and a SOCOM that fully understands UW/SW and SF teams that can practice. At some Where is that quote from? Were learning what their culture is so next time we come back in, they understand who we are, and we understand who they are. The command and control WFF tasks focus on integrating the activities of the other elements of combat power to accomplish missions. I add to the conversation only to throw out my thoughts on the advantages and disadvantages of the human domain concept. [xxxix] Some will argue vehemently that SOF values education, but in my experience the resources spent on education are a far cry from what is spent on equipping. Thru the same lens they would have recognized what events indicate discipline and control and what events reflect anxiety, panic, fear and hysteria. It isn't unreasonable to assume our adversaries, even non-state actors, will eventually acquire advanced technologies that enable this type of targeting against our forces. The Sustainment WFF is composed of all systems, elements and capabilities relating to the provision, movement, sustenance and well-being of personnel, materiel and installations. The movement and maneuver warfighting function is the related tasks and systems that move forces to achieve a position of advantage in relation to the enemy. They will have used their collective MIEs to survive assault from all of the above weapon system and platforms - by units as small as 4 man SF teams, as rapid as Air Mobile and as overwhelming as a mechanized Infantry Brigade. The distinction you explicitly make seems to detract from your deeper point. How does the textbook's discussion of Anglo-American settlers in the Ohio Valley support or challenge each of the historians' arguments regarding British policy? Warfighting functions and the dependability of knowledge. This positivist[xviii] philosophy would be bad if we simply believed it consciously. This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. The CIMIC aspect of the WFF is a command led function in order to ensure coordination with the mission objectives, and that the military efforts of the force are coordinated as part of the comprehensive approach. I like your example of Lee and the South using his understanding of the "human domain": influence the population to put pressure on the President. The first being the political aspect of military operations and the second being tied to the firstthat democracy is a bottoms up political ideologywhere political power is rested with the people. Your email address will not be published. In typical UW fashion he pulls his entire team together and they go over in detail all the circuits and devices---found nothing and went out to attempt it again. where there is no, as yet, defined and identifiable enemy. and are likewise both required to understand it. And understand that the enemy (government or population, as the case may be), will not, as was thought, be waiting with roses. As all actions (words and deeds) undertaken by the force contribute to the coherent narrative, the IA WFF is used to coordinate the actions of the force to ensure a consistent message is portrayed. would be safe from effective enemy fire 24/7, versus the random attacks with dumb weapons that are normally way off the mark. Since the purpose of military action is to affect the behavior of human groups in the operational environment toward a defined objective, the Army must improve the doctrinal representation of the operational environment and account for the socio-economic, cognitive, and physical aspects of human activity. Thus they are able to remain mission-focused and results-oriented. If SW was as important, the amount and quality of education that soldiers get who are involved in SW would be similar in per capita spending as those in SS get for their specialized training and equipping. NATURE OF PLANNING o Planning as Command and Control o The Functions of Planning and Plans o Uncertainty and Time: Planning for an Unknowable Future IMO the failure to understand the simple basics of the fighting culture or fighting motive-sets of our opponents undermines every aspect of our effort in Afghanistan. Upon promulgation of Marine Corps Doctrinal Publication 1-0 with Change 2, this modified description is approved for inclusion in the next edition of reference (i). The problem is that we are attempting to put tacit knowledge- that which is hard or impossible to explain- into the same form (doctrine) as explicit knowledge- that which can be categorized, detailed, and made into a list. In other words, it's special tactics in a very conventional, multi-party, though not industrial scale, war. [v] White, Curtis, The Middle Mind: Why Americans Dont Think For Themselves, HarperOne, 2004, 7. QUOTE: They do not need to go to small town America to watch us they have us in their country to watch. Maya descendants still inhabit the Yucatan, but the technology, religion, and practices of the ancient civilization must now be slowly exhumed and catalogued by archaeologists-a difficult task considering the Maya had no central ruling capital. "A warfighting function is a group of tasks and systems united by a common purpose that commanders use to accomplish missions and training objectives" (Department of the Army, 2019a, p. 5-2).. When someone asked him a difficult question, Walt _____ because he did not know the answer. In the old days of SF UW when the mission was given to us during isolation the first thing a team did was to kick back and go into what one would call the "what if" mode---regardless of how crazy some of the comments or ideas where we went completely through until that was nothing left that could have surprised us ---then the true conversations started and all ideas reviewed and tossed until we were comfortable with the remaining one or two. b. peterborough vs cardiff forebet; blake school uniforms; bacterial speck vs bacterial spot During that time the Beards would have recognized the way the conflict ecosystem changes when a man stepped on a mine, an IED flipped a vehicle and a helicopter was shot down. We have to take a look at the paradox of the human domain before we can offer a way out of this conceptual mess weve made for ourselves. Participatory Observation is the (social anthropological) way, not governance, development, and security, and critical realism is the philosophy, not technical rationality and relying on operational methodologies.". Knowing one's enemy in and out is a cornerstone of guerrilla warfare or as the Iranians call it microwarfare. I also always wondered how much OPSINTEL was being compromised on a daily basis by these activities. If not, if we believe that in the human domain (as well as the levels beyond tactical in all domains) things are highly dependent upon context, fraught with tacit knowledge, and fall more into the art side than the science side,[xxiv] then the preferred philosophy should be the critical realist philosophy. The implications of this 180 degree strategic sea-change -- to be experienced across the board -- are rather dramatic and, as such, have proven rather difficult for us to grasp and to deal with morally, militarily, etc. In a broader Operational sense our inability to align Tactical success with Strategic success might stem from the possibility we are mistaking UW for Revolution, Resistance or Secession. "Understanding" and "seeing" that particular world is what we have not done well as a Force. The Son Tay raid never occurs, nor does the one on bin Laden because there is no rapid way to get there and away. I did not want to recall how many negative comments were made by countless officers about how stupid the insurgents were when in fact they are still in the fight and we are long gone from Iraq. [xiii] Freeburg, Sydney, J., After 10 Years Of Abject Failure, Army, SOCOM, Marine Leaders Focus On Strategic Landpower, Breakingdefense.com, 10 AUG 2013. This website uses cookies to improve your experience. It means preserving the force which includes personnel and physical assets of the United States as well as the host nation and any military or civilian allies. Mr. White might be horrified to see his term associated with the military, as he is decidedly anti-militarism. movement of forces for the purpose of gaining an advantage over the enemy in order to accomplish our objectives. The more conservative/anti-western reform folks -- who represent and defend the non-western way of life and way of governance of a state and society -- these folks are likely to be your natural enemies. The fires warfighting function is the related tasks and systems that provide collective and coordinated use of Army indirect fires, AMD, and joint fires through the targeting process. By this I don't mean training in TTPs or organizational and topical minutia. Technical rationality (TR) is closely linked to positivist philosophy and is the antithesis of critical realism: TR assumes the social world can be treated the same as the physical world in terms of philosophical approaches and using the scientific method can gain knowledge about it that can be exploited in action in the future. Sustainment. Effective maneuver requires close coordination with fires. By its nature, the M2 WFF exists in the physical domains and inherently in close proximity to the threat and civilian elements. To boot, recent history seems to have muddied the waters on the subject. Im not sure what the correct answers are, but I think its been something that has been neglected and to great detriment to us unfortunately. But- point taken- and agree. [xl] Although I think it is terrible to see war in terms of three levels: tactical, operational, and strategic, I use these terms for communication purposes. I think as well that the difference between the 60s and now is the length of rotations---we had a year to gain experience---AND the replacement process was individual replacements not team replacements--this allowed a sizeable amount of institutional knowledge to remain inside the team all the time---now whole teams come and go thus the institutional knowledge disappears if not passed on extremely well during RIP/TOA. Trusting a subordinate to plan and execute a mission objective enhances efficiency and places the U.S. at an advantage against its near-peer rivals. Coordination activities involving the civilian community may be considered within the CIMIC aspect of the IA WFF, but general engagement or engagement with the community to exert influence would more properly be considered an IA WFF aspect. If our young leaders of today had, as we may have had in our day, a good idea of what our national objective was, then might they be able to innovate, do mission command, and perform better? The insurgent does not have to observe small America in order to understand our fielded units as we tended to in Iraq and AFG export our life styles into the enemies own territory making it easy for them to "know" and "understand" us. "I did not want to recall how many negative comments were made by countless officers about how stupid the insurgents were when in fact they are still in the fight and we are long gone from Iraq.". Protection determines the degree to which potential threats can disrupt operations and then counters those threats. Direct fire is inherent in maneuver, as is close combat. Grant---I have been following your writings for a long number of years---this one is complex and has about three or four major points depending on interpretation---will respond but need to mull over a response as the points are both intriguing and very valid. SF majors would offer SOF much more and gain greater experience if their main job was as a Theater Special Operations Command (TSOC) planner in my opinion, or perhaps a more broadening experience like working in an embassy or at the State Department. After doing some research online, here is the best definition I could find. The difficulty now in returning to UW or what you call SW is that there is a distinct lack of SF training personnel deeply grounded experience wise in UW---so much of what is being transferred is just from the recent wars. Grant-----maybe Ben Z might agree with the following ---I would venture that currently in the Force the use of MDMP in it's standard form does in fact kill critical thinking as one simply goes through the rote of doing the steps not the thinking behind the why one is doing each of the steps. Thank you for the listing and your comments. The second is related to the first. They are a tactical tool that often makes us feel good in achieving temporary gains or waiving the flag. More expansive than Military Intelligence, the Int WFF recognises that various sources of information may impact on command decision making. Gentlemen: Have we not gotten off track somewhat? It is what makes bringing a cookie-cutter approach to COIN and UW to be such a terrible idea, and yet our bureaucracy forces us into these approaches at the operational and higher levels. The self, the psyche, must be involved somewhere. And one can use art, I'd argue, to re-imagine one's mission- all the while not straying too far outside of one's constraints. Command & Control 2. I suggest that the central reason we are not be able to "win friends and influence people" is because of our extremely well-known national objective, which is, outlier state and societal transformation. What do you think about the Army Warfighting Functions? The Staff have maps the Beards would give their right arms for, sat/drone photos they would not believe and a 24/7 live video feed I doubt they could even imagine. I must add that many would say that Special Operations is a separate Army Warfighting Function. "A warfighting function is a group of tasks and systems united by a common purpose that commanders use to accomplish missions and training objectives. Its language is one of math and formulaic metaphor,[xvii] its logic is the scientific method, and its philosophy is of the Enlightenment Period. What Is a Mass Grave? The first is the more political aspects of military operations. What is then the difference in the use of human terrain teams say from the term human domain recently used by the ACoS? [x] U.S. Army, TRADOC Pamphlet 525-3-0, The U.S. Army Capstone Concept, 19 DEC 2012, 15-16. Our culture, however (largely influenced by the same hierarchy the early advocates found fault with), refused to entertain the notion that a technically rational approach is the wrong one for complexity. Build and field indigenous forces which can be used to: 1. So what essentially we have done is gone from: a. machines to improve warfighting capability across the spectrum of military operations. A warfighting function is a group of tasks and systems (people, organizations, information, and processes) united by a common purpose that commanders use to accomplish missions and training objectives. Again a team meeting and he asks them if they had see or heard anything about the addition to the trucks---the youngest who was computer smart went then to the local internet shop that had tea and spent all day surfing. I suppose we are saying the same thing, all of us, but talking past one another at times. LTC Grant M. Martin is a Special Forces officer in the U.S. Army. Those always struck me as SF-light. The exercise of authority and direction by a properly designated commander over assigned and attached forces in the accomplishment of the mission. (Thus as one might, in my day, have been required to explain one's ideas and proposals within the context of containing communism, likewise today might one benefit from explaining one's concepts and proposals within the context of promoting the Western way of life and governance?). The force learns them, regurgitates them, has faith in them, and many defend them without question. Preferably we should take our cues from critical realism and multi-paradigmatic framing and reject the notion that the social realm should be approached using mainly the scientific method and linear logical tools and processes. Interestingly, this makes me wonder how we could have missed such an important aspect of the human domain and the military operations we undertook as a nation. Reading your comments combined with RantCorp and Carl I believe in many ways you all are saying the same thing but maybe at a different level. Right now it has yet to be named, although some of the early candidates have included Influence, Engagement, and Shape. They could learn nothing at all about what the people in a platoon outpost are likely to do by looking at small town America. It does this through the three sub-functions of movement, manoeuvre and mobility. To add to those types of missions I would include any military operation in which either the objectives are very unclear and abstract or the operation is structured in such a way as to have a high likelihood of being unbounded in scope and time. [xxix] Then-Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC) Commanding General, General Martin E. Dempsey, according to one anonymous School of Advanced Military Studies (SAMS) instructor, told the SAMS authors of the draft design publication that it was too long, had too many big words, and didnt have any of our current doctrinal concepts like Center of Gravity in it. Whether this is true or not, shortly thereafter Dr. Jack Kem wrote a short design booklet (Design: Tools of the Trade) that linked design to doctrine and as soon as LTG William B. Caldwell IV left Fort Leavenworth for Afghanistan and took Dr. Kem with him, the original draft authors quickly published The Art of Design, Student Text 2.0, which attempted to undo the changes that TRADOC reportedly had ordered. We saw in the last days the killing of a really major Hezbollah Commander by an AQ affiliate who is rumored to be supported by the Saudi's. "YOU (meaning the US military and agencies with which it works) are a part of the human domain and you cannot divorce yourselves from any of it. I have even gone so far as to suggest that in knowing oneself (specifically one's political objective) one can: b. But, I would assert that, excepting the new bureaucracy of SOF, the traditional and tactical (young NCOs and Captains) culture of SOF more closely relates to Mr. Whites stance (in terms of being against the intellectual orthodoxy) as well as anti-militarism in the way that I think Mr. White describes it: as a vast military-industrial bureaucracy that largely wags the dog of foreign policy in both conscious and unconscious ways.