This is anathema to what is needed for building an SW force able to operate within the human domain, but alas we are beholden to a requirements process that is set up to facilitate the bureaucracy. Maya civilization, often considered to be the most exalted and mysterious of the three, inhabited the Yucatan Peninsula of Eastern Mexico as long ago as 2,6002,6002,600 B.C. The difference is that equipment is easy to count, education is not. I dont ever remember reading anything where General Lee thought he could defeat and outright destroy the Army of the Potomac so his chosen course of action was one based on influencing the power base, the northern citizenry correct? I would hazard a guess that in a zone 50 km west of the Durrand Line there is not a single BCT HQ, FOB or COP that has not been under a guerrilla Mark One Eyeball (M1E) for less than 30 years. 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. 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. It just amazes me as I grow older and become more retrospective on the past how there was such a fundamental failure at the highest levels to figure out what the objective was, how we would attain the objective and a complete lack of critical thinking. The seven warfighting functions are command and control, fires, force protection, information, intelligence, logistics, and maneuver. But rather the wholistic meaning that an educated person has studied the full range of human knowledge and has (formally or informally) developed the ability to be informed by that knowledge as they apply it in their endeavors, be they economic or professional. The human domain implies the social realm: a dominion of non-visible abstractions that, although mostly falling outside of the scientific are nonetheless real, if real means to have an effect on others. Russia and Ukraine battle daily in the sky. In terms of our personnel system, at the tactical level we make up for the lack of flexibility by being able to rely on young, uninstitutionalized NCOs and officers who, because of the way they are normally deployed, we fortunately find it very difficult to micromanage. For the human domain, art is the key. [xxvi] The tactical level (young NCOs and officers) seems in my experience to have largely remained mission-focused and results oriented. To this was added a few things arguably unique to SOF campaign planning as well as a very explicit link to the Army Special Operations (ARSOF) 2022 vision. We have, possibly like the rest of America, become specialists capable of great micro efforts, but terrible at macro vision. Sustainment. that are part and parcel to these such state and societal breakdown and rebuilding initiatives? [viii] My pick would be The Sublime, but, since that might not have enough of a military sound to it, would offer social action instead in order to emphasize the social aspect as well as the requirement for action. Secondly, by attacking civilian targets, the terrorists strategy was to influence those within the power base? prior to embarking upon major military operations. 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. What is the Movement and Maneuver warfighting function? We must continue to plan, synchronize, and deliver sustainment warfighting function capabilities. What we in the military seem to forget is that the enemy always has a voice and especially in Iraq where the education levels are high they were a quick adapting organism whose ecosystem was built on the Darwinian principle of survival which has always been the top rule for a guerrilla force. Doing the SF legacy mission with none of the high selectivity. [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. That we have been unable to incorporate the so-called lessons of the early days of Iraq into our operations in Afghanistan should cause us to seriously question the validity and universality of those lessons. This is most likely well and good when SOF is engaged in doing the so-called surgical strike missions of which our nation (and our government to a large extent- to include USSOCOM) is enamored with as of late. Or to use the language of the military, your own assumptions. To successfully incorporate informa - tion as a warfighting function, Marine leaders on all levels need to better un-derstand the information domain or how information flows in a metaphysi - cal realm. Merton described many of the problems that are endemic to bureaucracies: "trained incapacity" resulting from "overconformity", defending of ones own entrenched interests rather than acting to benefit the organization, resisting change to established routines, emphasizing formality and process over relationships, and trained to ignore context and circumstance. 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. But, if that statement mirrors the missions SOF receives, then there needs to be a deeper and more meaningful meaning-of-life-come-to-Jesus type conversation that needs to be had in Tampa about what UW/SW is as a tool and how policy shapes its implementation. Decisions need to be made and executed quickly. In this book Dr. Paparone explains how the military thinks institutionally and links it to the technically rational mindset. Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. He was around twenty, Latino and born and bred in the Bronx. Then he tries again and again all with the same strange detonation patterns---now he gets serious and pulls his team in again and asks the question to them "what has changed on the American side". One cannot believe how many times I have heard the comment "we cannot template the insurgency"---my argument even to today was "yes we could as they were hiding nothing from us"---the CF just did not want to admit that the insurgency was a living, thinking, adapting group of people who were giving us a solid run for our money----or is anyone wanting and or willing to state we "won" the IED fight in Iraq and or AFG----Gen. P nor Nagel has ever mentioned anything on this front. For the most part we have tactical-level teams who can do this now. It is unlikely they have ever viewed the target with their M1Es and probably never will. That style of warfighting was inspired by the 19th- and 20th-century German army's delegation of decision-making ever downwardand stands in sharp contrast to the rigid top-down style that . That we attempt to measure things is but one example of a greater issue: most, if not all, of our constructs remain uncritically accepted on faith by the vast majority of our force. Terrorists were the first to recognize this change. 19 What are the 7 Army warfighting functions? And no one sees the need for UW as the core ability of SF? Trusting and empowering subordinates to act, within the commanders intent, is a force multiplier. Thus, the tone is one of preparations and preemption -- not participation in ongoing battles and conflicts. peterborough vs cardiff forebet; blake school uniforms; bacterial speck vs bacterial spot Also let me suggest that our enemies may have a better understanding of our political objective -- and, thus, the war that we and they are embarked upon -- than do many of our leaders and soldiers. Without that systemic logic- the system was doomed to strategic failure. This, so as to be able to determine whether any of the ideas/options offered actually (a) address and meet our needs and, if so, (b) whether any one such idea or option might do this better than another. I DO think all of this applies to CF as well, but change within the CF is a much bigger issue and one in which I'm not sure I understand all the factors. So as we go into a country in Africa or in the Middle East or the Pacific region, were learning about them. We are convinced we can measure everything we do, to the extent that we talk about things like measures of effectiveness and measures of performance as if effectiveness is something one can always measure (the problem of sufficient causation and original causes). Any Medical Service Corps (MSC) officer worth his or her salt can quickly recite the 10 medical functions: medical mission command, medical treatment, hospitalization, medical evacuation, dental. WFF are the physical means that tactical commanders use to execute operations and accomplish missions assigned by a superior commander. Entire tribes vanished as smallpox, scarlet fever, and influenza decimated the native population of the Americas. Regardless, they are a formulaic-like approach linked linearly to the Armys concept of how it intends to fight and/or influence and win the nations wars or keep wars from happening. In some areas of Afghanistan it made perfect sense, but in other areas it did not. This will ensure freedom of action, extend operational reach, and prolong endurance in support of . Youve got to start it early, and thats one of the things Special Operations forces do very well build a small footprint. It could be extremely beneficial if we allowed our people to openly look for information that our enemies are posting openly, yet we need to restrict or control exactly how and what our own people are posting when they are in theater. The warfighting functions are the physical means that tactical commanders use to execute operations and accomplish missions assigned by superior tactical- and operational-level commanders. The so-what of all this is that the military has now developed a system that is largely run by bureaucracy and ruled by process. Its antithesis is post-positivism, or, as many prefer to call it- especially within the military- critical realism. Everything evolved in and out of UW---I am surprised that the current SF senior leaders do not jump immediately back to UW/SW as it is and always has been the core historical success of SF. Flip it over and consider how much time ALQ/Taliban spend studying small town USA in an effort to understand how to best engage the US Army and USMC? Like Bill M stated if the enemy acquired ATGMs, beam riding weapons and secure Comms we would be looking a much more lethal conflict ecosystem - to put it mildly. I have read and heard many who claim that the Army Warfighting Functions just create more red-tape and are not needed. To illustrate how the MIE multiplier might augment the guerrillas effectiveness lets take a senior Haqqani Network (HN) commander who has designs on attacking a position in or near Khost, Paktia AF. 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. Democracy is a bottom-up political ideology. The conduct of Example---for all our efforts in understanding the Iraq security forces and in training the same forces why are they then failing against a resurging ISIL and JRTN? Preferably we would rigorously experiment with different constructs and approaches as our norm. The Pushtoon Secessionists fighting the Pak Army across the border in Pakistan are a good fit but a similar approach to Counter UW is IMO a dead loss at best and dangerously ruinous at worst. Wanat troops depending only on ground sensors and deprived of overhead surveillance the final night get slaughtered on OP Topside. The distinction you explicitly make seems to detract from your deeper point. Doctrine applied to the physical domains- made up of explicit knowledge- makes sense in some areas. [xxiii] UW is defined by US SOF as support to resistance (insurgent) forces to overthrow or disrupt a government or governing entity. The . How to Protect Mass Graves? Its certainly a sticky issue and Im not sure what the right mix of security and positive public affairs efforts are. 5. In the natural world, this underlying mechanism refers to the natural laws that have visible effects -- for example, gravity or aging. -- as produced by the enemy -- seems to be a step ahead of our own? In my opinion the human domain is nothing more than observations on human nature and has always been a part of military thinking. We flip to the Colonel and his Staff and they have received intel that the assault force is assembling at a HN FOB just inside the Pak border. A war to resist westernization and to preserve or reinstate their more traditional/preferred way of life and way of governance.). This forces SOFs into such missions as Village Stability Operations which, in effect, are designed to help separate a population from its present or traditional way of life and way of governance and to attach the population to a way of life and way of governance which is more in line with our way of thinking, our way of life and our way of governance. In this manner, it is believed, we can continue to work to "transform" others, even in these times of austerity and achieve "staying power" through the training up and use of surrogates. I know this may sound conspiratorial- but it is largely emergent and unconscious- so it isn't insidious in a malicious way (no intent). This largely unconscious effect is to be expected: any large organization experiences it quite naturally. It was the application of human nature to a military situation. [xxvii] What should concern the American people and those within SOF, however, is how much capability we have lost to act within complex environments (i.e., the human domain) as Special Operations becomes more and more consumed by the exact same bureaucratic pressures that the conventional forces have long suffered from. [xv] COL John Boyd famously said (and I paraphrase): The military has a strategy. Just using the comment below sets the stage for a massive exercise in critical thinking and team discussions that do not fit the standard Powerpoint MDMP presentation. Below is a reading passage followed by several multiple-choice question. HERE is the issue that was recently discussed with a Robert Bunker over on the SWJ El Centro site. Like the Aztecs, the Inca practiced human sacrifice and lacked a written language; however, the Inca made up for language shortcomings with advanced architecture and a complex government. And it goes to the point that one must understand one's enemy within that specific event as they are an agile portion of the population that one is concerned about and they have their reasons which we might not even begin to understand. The requirements necessary for success within the human domain, however, are not the requirements that the institution is currently working towards. 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. Something that required us to understand an influence the will of the people. I was sitting in the 2 shop writing a report one day when we took mortar fire into the FOB---everyone ran to the bunkers and I continued to type. When someone asked him a difficult question, Walt _____ because he did not know the answer. Grant---I think part of the current issue inside SF is a distinct lack of UW experience passed on from the 60/70s to the Groups having to just survive in order to rebuild. At the operational level we are sorely handicapped. The Problem: Assuming a Technically Rational Approach within the Human Domain. Knowing one's enemy in and out is a cornerstone of guerrilla warfare or as the Iranians call it microwarfare. These two occurrences arguably have brought Special Operations to a level similar to the rest of DoD wherein the most important priority among the hierarchy is the growth of the bureaucracy. 3 The nature of war does not change, even though the Marine Corps added an additional warfighting function to our lexicon. 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. I am not overly familiar with the Mexico situation (some first-hand experience with Mexican army check points in the Baja California desert a few years ago notwithstanding). The human domain, a conceptualization of the influence that populations have on military operations, is one way of viewing reality. Understanding human domain means understanding the environment one operates in has been a true fact since the beginning of warfare not just since Iraq and AFG. Why Protect Mass Graves? If our adversaries had that capability our TTPs in Afghanistan would have to rapidly and drastically change. A. This Warfighting Function is the process of deploying troops to operational areas as well as maneuvering troops, equipment and arms to gain advantage over the enemy. There was just recently heavy fighting reported initially between the Civilian Defense elements in another area with the local TCO and then the military stepped into between to defend the civilians and it really got into heavy fighting. The Inca Empire shared a fate similar to that of the Aztec, but at the hands of a conquistador more sinister than Cortez. He relies on it very heavily when shaping his tactical and operational planning process. Indeed, in any stability op or war scenario beyond covert support/sabotage of an indigenous government it is the CF that will lead the main effort and take the majority of the blame for screwing it up (rightfully so). 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. b. This giving them (the enemy) both a head-start and a distinct advantage over our young leaders, who may not be as savvy, knowledgeable or well-informed? This process is ongoing and commanders use tasks in: to obtain this intelligence. Thus they are able to remain mission-focused and results-oriented. Again, the enemy, per se, seems to be missing. .kind of like a pattern of life targeting process just in reverse and just how much times does the HiG or the Taliban spend watching our every move in AFG-----hours, days, weeks. Conversations Ive had with many others about the human domain tend to revolve around two very confounding comments: 1) that the Air Force and Navy rarely- if ever- have anything to do with humans, and, 2) that when referring to ourselves we should use the term human dimension. That any organization attempting to be more nuanced and savvy in its approach and be more population-centric would refer to the human domain as other humans and our own selves as a dimension can only point to us being a slave to our own confusing doctrinal system (I submit when we attempt to indoctrinate abstraction (tacit subjects), we quickly run into these intellectual train wrecks). (See below). [xxxiv] White, Curtis, 7. I believe the system works but I would like to hear your opinion. I think your comment actually reinforces RantCorp's point. "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. That the autodefensas exist and have the capacity to organize armed resistance to TCO's does not mean that they should be helped (timely
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